after a more or less prolonged struggle yields its place to a new idea which was till then an ideal, but which thus becomes a present idea.
But it does occur that an antiquated idea, already replaced in people's consciousness by a higher one, is of such a kind that its maintenance is profitable to certain people who have the greatest influence in their society. And then it happens that this antiquated idea, though it is in sharp contradiction to the whole surrounding form of life which has been altering in other respects, continues to influence people and to sway their actions. Such retention of antiquated ideas always occurred and still occurs in the region of religion. The cause is that the priests, whose profitable positions are bound up with the antiquated religious idea, using their power, purposely hold people to the antiquated idea.
The same thing occurs, and for similar reasons, in the political sphere, with reference to the patriotic idea, on which every dominion is based. People to whom it is profitable to do so, maintain that idea by artificial means, though it now lacks both sense and utility. And as these people possess the most powerful means of influencing others, they are able to achieve their object.
In this, it seems to me, lies the explanation of the strange contrast between the antiquated patriotic idea, and the whole drift of ideas making in a contrary direction
