monetary power. The more industrial and pecuniary functions are confided to the State or city, the more rapidly will this result he brought about. The place to watch to see whether the result will be arrested or not is in the mores. Do the people show strong political sense? Do they show real insight into their own institutions and the spirit of the same, so that they cannot be deceived by political fallacies? Do they resist the allurements of glory and cling to the genuine forces which make for national health and strength? Are they cynical about political corruption, or honestly outraged by it? Is their world-philosophy ignoble? Do they resist a steal because it is a steal or because they are not in it? Are they captivated by appeals to national vanity or do they turn aside from such appeals with contempt? These are the questions which decide the trend of institutions and the destiny of states, and the answer to them must be sought in the mores.
Parties formed on interests invent dogmas which will serve as major premises for the especial inferences which will suit their purpose. These are the "great principles" of history which are always preached as eternal and immutable. John of Salisbury, the friend of Thomas à Becket, taking part in the quarrel of the prelate with the king, which really was a quarrel of the Roman law concept of the State with the Church, developed, in his Polycraticus, notions of the sovereignty of the people and of republican self-government. Guelphs argued the sovereignty of the people to get the alliance of the middle class against the emperor, in Italy; while Ghibellines used the same argument to get the alliance of the middle class against the popes, in Germany.[1] St. Augustine thought
- ↑ Bezold. F. von: Die Lehre von der Volkssouveränität während des Mittel-Alters, in Sybel's Zeitschrift, XXXVI, 313.
