s has become the
common possession of all the world. But though a belief, when it
prevails, may at last be adopted by the whole of a generation, it rarely
happens that a widespread conviction has grown up spontaneously among
the multitude. "The initiation," it has been said, "of all wise or noble
things comes, and must come, from individuals; generally at first from
some one individual," to which it ought surely to be added that the
origination of a new folly or of a new form of baseness comes, and must
in general come, at first from individuals or from some one individual.
The peculiarity of individuals, as contrasted with the crowd, lies
neither in virtue nor in wickedness but in originality. It is idle to
credit minorities with all the good without ascribing to them
most, at least, of the evils due to that rarest of all human
qualities--inventiveness.

The course of events in England may often, at least, be thus described:
A new and, let us assume, a true idea presents itself to some one man of
originality or genius; the discoverer of the new conception, or some
follower who has embraced it with enthusiasm, preaches it to his friends
or disciples, they in their turn become impressed with its importance
and its truth, and gradually a whole school accepts the new creed. These
apostles of a new faith are either persons endowed with special ability
or, what is quite as likely, they are persons who, owing to their
peculiar position, are freed from a bias, whether moral or intellectual,
in favor of prevalent errors. At last the preachers of truth make an
impression, either directly upon the general public or upon some person
of eminence, say a leading statesman, who stands in a position to
impress ordinary people and thus to win the support of the nation.
Success, however, in converting mankind to a new faith, whether
religious or economical or political, depends but slightly on the
strength of the reasoning by which the faith can be defended, or even
on the enthusiasm of its adherents. A change of belief arises, in the
main, from the occurrence of circumstances which incline the majority of
the world to hear with favor theories which, at one time, men of common
sense derided as absurdities or distrusted as paradoxes. The doctrine of
free trade, for instance, has in England for about half a century held
the field as an unassailable dogma of economic policy, but a historian
would stand convicted of ignorance or folly who sh