the ordinary man, as opposed to him, need not be stupid • 252 He is merely the man whose talents do not increase the efficiency of other men • 252 Poets, in this technical sense, are ordinary men • 252 So are the most skilful manual workers, • 253 for very great manual skill does not promote progress or influence others, • 254 unless it can be metamorphosed into the shape of orders given to others • 256 Again, brilliance or charm in private life does not promote progress • 256 Therefore ordinary men, who do not promote progress, are not asserted to be lacking in high qualities • 257 Indeed, what is really interesting in human nature is the typical part of it, not the exceptional, • 258 as we may see by referring to art and poetry • 258 Average opinion also on social matters is for each class the wise opinion; • 259 and the average faculties shared by all are in one sense the test of truth • 259 Therefore in denying to the average man the powers that promote progress • 260 we are not degrading the average man. We are merely asserting that these powers form but a small part of life • 260 Socialists can object to this conclusion only because it establishes the claim of exceptional men to exceptional wealth • 262 They cannot have any theoretical objections to it, for they are beginning to recognise the importance of the exceptional man themselves, • 263 and only obscure the fact for purposes of popular agitation • 264 So far, however, as the reasoning of this book has gone already, no claim has been made for the great man to which socialists need object; • 264 for we have assumed that he keeps none of the exceptional wealth he makes, for himself, • 265 but that he works exactly on the terms the socialists would dictate to him • 266 It now remains to consider whether he would really do so • 266 BOOK IV CHAPTER I THE DEPENDENCE OF EXCEPTIONAL ACTION ON THE ATTAINABILITY OF EXCEPTIONAL REWARD, OR THE NECESSARY CORRESPONDENCE BETWEEN THE MOTIVES TO ACTION AND ITS RESULTS. Great men differ from ordinary men in degree only, not in kind, • 271 and the use of exceptional powers is conditioned like the use of ordinary powers • 272 Now let us take the most universal powers possessed by man, viz. those used in acquiring the simplest food • 272 Man’s powers in agriculture would be latent unless man wanted food and the earth’s surface were cultivable • 272 Thus the exercise of the simplest faculties depends on the want of some certain object, and the possibility of attaining it • 273 If this is true of the commonest faculties which aim at supplying necessaries, much more is it true of rare faculties which aim at producing superfluities • 273 Society, then, if great men are to work in it, must be so constituted as to make the reward they desire possible • 274 In so doing society makes a contract with its great men; • 274 and this is a contract which is being constantly revised • 275