Hedendaags fetisjisme

impossible to study the natures and actions of governing agencies.’

‘So this power-worship idealizes the State, as embodied either in a despot or in king, lords, and commons or in a rc-publican assembly, and continually hopes in spite of continual disappointments.’

‘Just as, in societies made restive by despotism, the propo-sed remedy for the evils and dangers brought about is always more despotism; just as, along vvith the fading power of a dc-caying Papacy, there goes, as the onlv fit cure, a reassertion of Papal infallibility, so, to set right the misdoings of State-agency, the proposal is always more State-agency.’

‘In the very aspect of a lawdeed, written in an archaic hand on dingy parchment there is something which raises a conccption of validity not raised by ordinary writing on paper. Around a governments stamp there is a certain glamour which makes us feel as though the piece of paper hearing it, was more than a mere mass of dry pulp with some in-tended marks. Any legal form of words excites a sense of security greater than that which would be feit were the lan-guage free frome legal involutions and legal technicalities. And so is it with all the symbols of authority, frorn royal pageants downwards. That the judges’ wig gives to his dcci-sions a weight and sacredness they would not have were he bare headed, is a fact familiar to every one. And when we descent to the lowest agents of the executivc organizations, we find the same thing. A man in a blue coat and whitemetal buttons, which carry with them the thought of State-warrant, is habitually regarded by citizens as having a trust-worthiness beyond that of a man who wears no such uniform, and this confidence survives all disproofs. Obviouslv, then, if men’s judgments are thus ridiculously, swayed, notwithstanding bet-tcr knowlcdgc, by the mere symbols of State-power, still more must thev be so swayed by State-power itself, as cxercised in ways that leave greater scope for the imagination.’

Dit zijn enkele grepen — wellicht niet eens de meest sprekende — uit een bladzijdenlang betoog hetwelk hierop neerkomt dat eerbied voor het Gezag (‘loyalty’) alleen mogelijk

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