Some day perhaps a competent student may give us a work upon the psychology of the rebel. That there is something typical about the mentality of the great rebels may be gathered even from a cursory reading of a few obvious biographies. There is usually an abnormal mental sensitiveness combined with great physical restlessness, a keen craving for comradeship, combined with fondness for solitude and lonely meditation, a vivid perception of present evils together with a passion for a future which should restore some ancient simplicity, a tendency—once the first step in revolt has been taken,—to broaden the rebellious front to include other issues, a frequent admixture of integrity of character with a certain irregularity of conduct. Yet this is only the psychological basis; and the real _differentia_ of the true rebel lies in the character of the occasion which crystallises his mental make-up into a definite course of action. Disraeli used to speak of the “two nations” which inhabited England. These were the privileged people and the disinherited. But that is a phenomenon peculiar neither to England nor to the modern world. It is the great permanent line which divides the human race from top to bottom into two classes. We belong either to the exploiting race or the exploited, are either top dogs or under-dogs. The Greek cities with all their emphasis upon freedom yet thought of it as the prerogative of the few. “There were vague beginnings of a new ideal in Athens, but even in Athens personal liberty such as is now connected with the word ‘democracy’ was confined to a very small percentage of the population.”[22] The remainder were women and slaves upon whose subordination the entire social order rested. The line of division has not always been political or economic. In our own time the acute sense of disinheritance has been the main-spring of the feminist movement. In religion especially the cleavage has been conspicuous. The Reformation controversy about the layman’s rights to receive the chalice in the Sacrament was at bottom a repudiation of the tradition of a privileged caste; and every considerable reformation of religion has involved a challenge to priestcraft on the part of a disinherited laity. Footnote 22: G. D. Burns, _Greek Ideals_, p. 76.