ABSTRACT
The opinions and beliefs of crowds may be divided into two very distinct classes. On the one hand people have great permanent beliefs, which endure for several centuries, and on which an entire civilisation may rest. Such, for instance, in the past were feudalism, Christianity, and Protestantism; and such, in own time, are the nationalist principle and contemporary democratic and social ideas. The Egyptian civilisation, the European civilisation of the Middle Ages, the Mussulman civilisation of the Arabs are all the outcome of a small number of religious beliefs which have left their mark on the least important elements of these civilisations and allow of their immediate recognition. In the absence of the philosophic test it might be supposed that crowds change their political or religious beliefs frequently and at will. The opinion of crowds tends, then, more and more to become the supreme guiding principle in politics.
