-June 3, 1905, Daily News
Quotes by and posts relating to one of the most influential authors of the 20th century, G.K. Chesterton
Wednesday, January 13, 2016
Now, of course, it is very easy to say that all this is only the ignorance of the people which we have to enlighten. It is quite easy and quite reasonable, but also quite oligarchical. A democrat is bound to feel that the mass of a community is almost certain to hold some kind of secret of sanity. He is bound to feel that whether or no the voice of the people is the voice of God, at least it is the voice of Man. And we shall be ignoring this democratic drift in things quite as much if we become mere common sociologists as if we became mere common kings. The aristocracy which holds itself strong enough to raise the people is quite as aristocratic as the aristocracy that holds itself strong enough to crush the people. A free man ought neither to raise the people nor crush the people; he ought to be the people. And we ought not to be always asking ourselves, as we are in this educational controversy, 'What laws shall we make for the people?' We ought sometimes to ask 'What laws will the people make for us?' In the same way, the middle-class educationalist ought not to be always saying, 'In what subjects shall I educated the poor?' Sometimes in still spells of night under the stars the middle-class educationalist should ask the awful question, 'In what subjects can the poor educate me?'
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