A certain fatalism seems to have overtaken the people of Europe, a mood under the dominion of which they are prepared to regard even their own vagaries and whimsicalities as heretofore most men have regarded the weather, that is, as something inevitable and fore-ordained which nothing can modify, resist or avert. If a particular group manifest a disposition for war, then it is war to which they resign themselves; if it is female suffrage, then lo! Votes for Women come upon them with the certainty of the monsoon or the mistral. Nobody moves, nobody holds up a hand to ward off the approaching scourge, because everybody is either too indolent to make an effort, or too thoroughly persuaded beforehand that nothing can avail, to attempt to interfere with what he calls “the natural course of events.” The scrub on a wind-swept moor offers more resistance to the elements than does modern man to his fellows’ restless tinkering at the social structure; and as for the gentle fine rain which, falling athwart the fiercest blast, ultimately constrains it to abate its fury, and to die down, modern man has no knowledge of such tactics, and even [p96] if he had a knowledge of them he would not put it into practice. Despite the enormous amount of apparent hostility aroused by the immense progress that Socialism and Communism have made since the war, it must not be supposed that with regard to them modern men are feeling any more actively indignant than they have felt towards any other impending change. The hostility, as we have pointed out, is only apparent. For, in their heart of hearts the men of the present day are just as much prepared to resign themselves to Socialism as to civil war, class war, or any other kind of social upheaval. The factor in the threatening reform which makes certain sections of the public stand as if they really meant to offer resistance, is unfortunately not their intellectual conviction that Socialism or Communism is so palpably wrong that it must be resisted at all costs; but rather the negative quality of inertia, which in this case assumes the appearance of positive resistance because, as it happens, Socialism and Communism propose to oust from positions of ease a great number of people who have not only grown accustomed to ease, but to whom life without ease presents few if any attractions. Otherwise, Socialism, Communism, Bolshevism, Nihilism--who cares? They appear right because so many millions seem to believe in them. Any “ism” seems to be right to modern man, provided a sufficient number of people raise their hands in favour of it. In this sense, be he a Tory, a Conservative, or a Monarchist, modern man is essentially democratic in spirit. [p97]