So much, then, for two of the most shallow sophisms that ever imposed themselves on presumably serious reasoners. We will now turn to {71} those two other arguments in which the case against the great man finds its main support, and which, however misleading they may be, must be examined at greater length. In both of these the distinctly exceptional character of the great man is assumed, or at all events is not denied, but it is represented as being, if it exists, not properly the great man’s own. The first argument refers it to aggregates of external conditions—the knowledge accumulated for the great man’s use, the character of his fellow-citizens, who are ready to carry out his orders, and generally to what Mr. Bellamy calls his “_social inheritance and environment_.” The second argument refers it to the great man’s line of ancestors, insisting that he inherits from them his own exceptional capacities, which capacities his ancestors acquired by being members of society, and of which it is accordingly contended that society is ultimately the source. Now on both these arguments, before we consider them in detail, there is one broad criticism to be made, which applies to both equally. There is a certain sense—a remote and speculative sense—in which they are both of them quite true, and indeed are almost truisms; but for practical purposes they are either not true at all, or if true, are altogether irrelevant; and it is necessary to show the reader, by a few simple examples, that in the doctrine that statements can be at once true and not true there is no philosophical hair-splitting, and no Hegelian paradox, but merely the assertion of a {72} fact which, when once attention has been called to it, common sense will perceive to be as obvious as it is important. It was just now observed that the same thing can be great and not great, according to the things with which we compare it. In the same way the same statement may be true or not true, according to the nature of the discussion on which it is brought to bear. Let us take as an example those familiar statements of fact which are given in terms of averages. If the vast majority of any given population vary in height between the limits of five feet six and six feet, the statement that a man’s average height is from five feet seven to five feet eight would be a truth most important to the producers of ready-made overcoats. But if half the population were two feet high, and half rather more than nine feet, to give the average stature as something like five feet seven would be for the coatmakers the most absurd misstatement imaginable, and would lead them to make, if they acted on it, garments that would fit nobody.