“I cannot see that the getting of food, or whatever else the economic activities may be defined to be, is any more the logical basis of existence than the ideal activities. It is true that there could be no ideas and institutions without a food supply; but no more could we get food if we did not have ideas and institutions. All work together, and each of the principal functions is essential to every other.” “History is not like a tangled skein which you may straighten out by getting hold of the right end and following it with sufficient persistence. It has no straightness, no merely lineal continuity, in its nature. It is a living thing, to be known by sharing its life, very much as you know a person. In the organic world—that is to say in real life—each function is a centre from which causes radiate and to which they converge; all is alike cause and effect; there is no logical primacy, no independent variable, no place where the thread begins. As in the fable of the belly and the members, each is dependent upon all the others. You must see the whole or you do not truly see anything.” (Publications of the American Economic Association, Third Series, vol. v, 426 _ff._) CHAPTER XXIII ON THE ASCENDENCY OF A CAPITALIST CLASS THE CAPITALIST CLASS—ITS LACK OF CASTE SENTIMENT—IN WHAT SENSE “THE FITTEST”—MORAL TRAITS—HOW FAR BASED ON SERVICE—AUTOCRATIC AND DEMOCRATIC PRINCIPLES IN THE CONTROL OF INDUSTRY—REASONS FOR EXPECTING AN INCREASE OF THE DEMOCRATIC PRINCIPLE—SOCIAL POWER IN GENERAL—ORGANIZING CAPACITY—NATURE AND SOURCES OF CAPITALIST POWER—POWER OVER THE PRESS AND OVER PUBLIC SENTIMENT—UPPER-CLASS ATMOSPHERE. Since in our age commerce and industry absorb most of the practical energy of the people, the men that are foremost in these activities have a certain ascendency, similar to that of warriors in a military age. Although this sort of men is not sharply marked off, it is well enough indicated by the term capitalist or capitalist-manager class; the large owner of capital being usually more or less of a manager also, while the large salaries and other gains of successful managers soon make them capitalists. It is not quite accurate to speak of the group in question as the rich, because, at a given time, a large part of its most vigorous membership is as yet without wealth—though in a way to get it—and, on the other hand, many of the actual possessors of wealth are personally idle or ineffective. The essential thing is a social tendency or system of ideas generated in the accumulation of wealth and having for its nucleus the more active and successful leaders of commerce and industry.