Mein Kampf
crowd’s favor for his plans? Is he to buy it? Or, in view of the stupidity of his fellow-citizens, is he to abandon the tasks which he knows are vital, and retire; or is he to stay nevertheless?
In a case like this, does not a real character fall into hopeless conflict between insight and honor (or rather honorable intentions)? Where is the dividing line between duty to the community and duty to one’s personal honor?
Must not every true leader decline to be thus degraded into a political juggler?
And conversely must not every juggler feel called on to go into politics, since the ultimate responsibility falls not on him, but on some intangible mob?
Must not our parliamentary majority principle lead to the total destruction of the leader idea? And can anyone believe that the progress of this world comes from the brain of majorities, and not from the heads of individuals? Or does anyone suppose that in future we can do without this essential of human civilization? Does it not, on the contrary, seem more necessary today than ever?
By denying personal authority and substituting the number of the crowd in question, the parliamentary principle of majority rule sins against the basic aristocratic idea of Nature; though we must admit that Nature’s idea of nobility is by no means necessarily personified in the present decadence of our upper ten thousand.
Unless he has learned to think and examine independently, the reader of Jewish newspapers can scarcely imagine the havoc wrought by the institution of modern democratic parliamentary rule. This rule is the chief reason why our whole political life is so incredibly overrun with the inferior figures of the present day. A true leader is bound to withdraw from a political activity which must consist largely not of creative work and achievement, but of trading and haggling for the favor of a majority, while such activity is sure to suit and to attract small minds.
The more dwarfish the mind and powers of this sort of petty tradesman, and the more clearly he recognizes the wretchedness
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