It is tempting to linger over such a delectable morsel as this, for even if it is only the absurd and irresponsible output of one poor, foolish man, it does express more or less what industrial civilization holds to be true, though few would avow their faith so whole-heartedly.  The statement was made as propaganda, and propaganda is merely advertising in its most insidious and dangerous form.  The thing revealed its possibilities during the war, but the black discredit that was then very justly attached to it could not prevail against its manifest potency, and it is now universally used after the most comprehensive and frequently unscrupulous fashion, with results that can only be perilous in the extreme.  The type and calibre of mind that has now been released from long bondage, and by weight of numbers is now fast taking over the direction of affairs, is curiously subservient to the written word, and lacking a true sense of comparative values, without effective leadership either secular or religious, is easily swayed by every wind of doctrine.  The forces of evil that are ever in conflict with the forces of right are notoriously ingenious in making the worse appear the better cause, and with every desire for illumination and for following the right way, the multitude, whether educated or illiterate, fall into the falsehoods of others’ imaginings.  Money, efficiency, an acquired knowledge of mob psychology, the printing press and the mail service acting in alliance, and directed by fanatical or cynical energy, form a force of enormous potency that is now being used effectively throughout society.  It is irresponsible, anonymous and pervasive.  Through its operation the last barriers are broken down between the leadership of character and the leadership of craft, while all formal distinctions between the valuable and the valueless are swept away.

I have spoken at some length of this particular element in the present condition of things, because in both its aspects, as the support of our present industrial and economic system and as the efficient moulder of a fluid and unstable public opinion, it is perhaps the strongest and most subtle force of which we must take account.

With a system so prevalent as imperial industry, so knit up with every phase of life and thought, and so determining a factor in all our concepts, united as it is with two such invincible allies as advertising and propaganda, it is inconceivable that it should be overthrown by any human force from without.  Holding it to be essentially wrong, it seems to me providential that it is already showing signs of falling by its own weight.  Production of commodities has far exceeded production of the means of payment, and society is now running on promises to pay, on paper obligations, on anticipations of future production and sale, on credit, in a word.  The war has enormously magnified this condition until an enforced liquidation would mean bankruptcy for all the nations of the earth,