"First,
because the price mankind must pay to achieve Communism by Bolshevik methods is too terrible;
and secondly
because, even after paying the price, I do not believe the result would be what the Bolsheviks profess to desire."
"The larger events in the political life of the world are determined by
the interaction of material conditions and human passions"
human passions ??
"We may begin with desires for the necessaries of life: food, drink,
sex, and (in cold climates) clothing and housing. When these are
threatened, there is no limit to the activity and violence that men
will display"
"Planted upon these primitive desires are a number of secondary
desires."
" Love of property, of which the fundamental political
importance is obvious, may be derived historically and psychologically
from the hoarding instinct.
Love of the good opinion of others (which we may call vanity) is a desire which man shares with many animals; it is perhaps derivable from courtship, but has great survival value,among gregarious animals, in regard to others besides possible mates.
Rivalry and love of power
perhaps developments of jealousy; they are akin, but not identical.
These four passions--
acquisitiveness,
vanity,
rivalry,
love of power
after the basic instincts,
these four are the prime movers of almost all that happens in politics.
Their operation is intensified and regularized by herd instinct.
But herd instinct, by its very nature,cannot be a prime mover,
it merely causes the herd to act in unison, without determining
what the united action is to be.
Among men, as among other gregarious animals,
the united action,
in any given circumstances, is determined
by the common passions of the herd,
and
by imitation of leaders.
The art of politics consists in causing the latter to prevail over the former."
"
