But what causes me to believe this is a matter of everyday experience. Men create their idols out of nothing, and by means of their imagination fashion their fellow-men, both living and dead, into something quite different to what they really are. These creations naturally partake of their own substance and are after their own likeness. Sometimes they create something really great, sometimes a monster, a demigod, or a devil. We often see that hatred against one person is, so to speak, polarised and converted into love towards his antagonist. A great unpopularity is, in the person of another, changed into a great popularity. The reward which should have been given to the worthiest is given to the unworthy, in order to crush the deserving. At the award of a famous prize one who was uninitiated lately asked: "Why did not X get the prize?" "Because Y was to have it," was the answer. Fifteen years ago a very remarkable book of 650 pages was published. It obtained no notice in the press. But at the same time a wretched pamphlet received all the praise which the large book ought to have had. When I read the reviews of the paltry pamphlet I thought I was reading those of the book, for the subject-matter was the same. Recently an important post was filled up, connected, let us say, with road-making and hydraulic structures. The person who received it was a very remarkable man. Public opinion (though not private) regarded him as the most deserving and suitable candidate. He passed for a distinguished engineer, thoroughly up in his profession, was said to be well off, an able organiser, diligent and considerate towards his subordinates. Now it is to be remarked that the man was nothing of all that; he had never made roads or constructed hydraulic works, but left that to his skilful assistants; he did not know his profession; he neglected what he had in hand; he was not to be found in his office, for he played cards and spent the nights in carousing. He was hard towards his employees, managed so badly that he never knew the state of his affairs, and was careless in money matters. How then had he come to be elected? Some said he had been chosen in order to punish and humble the conceited engineers who had become unpopular. Others thought that the intention was that he should come to grief and be ruined because he was feared and hated. However that may be, he was a materialised apparition created by the hate, envy, and malignity of the crowd; he had become an idea, a lucky rascal, a ruthless man whose elevation was necessary in order to still the tumult. He was like a crude mass of ore which stood for four hundred years in the market-place and was supposed to represent Justice, but was really the counterfeit presentment of a thievish alderman foisted in by the burgomaster.