No one of the many causes or appearances of the sentiment adequately defines it. Those who fix upon some one impulse, habit, or reason, and try to fit all the facts of patriotism into that, oversimplify the situation. They leave out essential features. This would hold true of J. M. Robertson,[137] who makes patriotism to consist of the impulses of fear and hatred. There are important kinds of patriotism, directed toward the internal improvement of the country for instance, which cannot be so classified. If one followed the clue of Trotter,[138] he would explain the phenomenon as the result of the herd instinct. But patriotism is not purely instinctive. Veblen[139] would lead one to make the economic motive and the impulse of rivalry or emulation prominent. But patriotism is something more than a contest and a contest, too, which is mainly for material goods. Loisy[140] would make patriotism a worthy religion, and recommend it as such. But the love of country does not always attain the dignity that it has in Loisy. Powers[141] makes men’s interest in their civilization the root of their patriotism. But he opens his book with the recognition that men do fight over material things. None of these accounts can be used as an adequate basis from which to define and present the central concept of patriotism. Yet patriotism is one. There is a common center about which all the impulses, habits, and beliefs of the sentiment cluster. There is a concept “patriotism.” It is that concept, though perhaps inarticulate, which guides even in the gathering of material for its own definition. It will be enlarged after the preliminary examination, but it is present from the beginning. The clue that one really has in hand when he sets out to study patriotism is the popular definition that it is “the love of country.”[142] And it is a hopeful clue from which to start. It does lead one to the material that he seeks. Moreover, it shows what patriotism has meant in racial wisdom, the wisdom of the plain people who have long and intimately been associated with and been most moved by the sentiment.