XV.
ONE would have thought that through the diffusion of education, improved means of transit and increased communication between the men of different nations, through the diffusion of the Press, and above all through the complete removal of danger from other nations, the deception of patriotism ought to become more and more difficult and in the end impossible to keep up.
But the fact is that those very means of general superficial education, increased facilities for transit and communication, and above all of the Press, captured-and more and more so as time goes on—by the Governments, give them now such opportunity for exciting in the nations hostile feelings towards one another, that while the uselessness of patriotism becomes more obvious and its power for evil becomes greater, the influence of Governments and ruling classes in exciting patriotism becomes stronger.
The difference between the past and the present is only that, as now a far larger number of people participate in the advantages which patriotism secures to the upper classes, a far
