The Undiscovered Self

"All mass movements, as one might expect, slip with the greatest ease down an inclined plane made up of large numbers.  Where the many are, there is security; what the many believe must of course be true; what the  many want must be worth striving for, and necessary, and therefore good.  In the clamour of the many resides the power to snatch wish-fulfillments by force; sweetest of all, however, is that gentle and painless slipping back into the kingdom of childhood, into the paradise of parental care, into happy-go-luckiness and irresponsibility.  All the thinking and looking after are done from the top; to all questions there is an answer, and for all needs the necessary provision is made.  The infantile dream-state of the mass man is so unrealistic that he never things to ask who is paying for this paradise.  The balancing of accounts is left to a higher political or social authority, which welcomes the task, for its power is thereby increased; and the more power it has, the weaker and more helpless the individual becomes".