egoistic motives in the
patriotism of the aristocrat and the militarist, but still we see no
place in the world for the man without a country. It is not yet the
workmen of the cities, who say that all men are brothers, who can lead
us to a better social order. Patriotism must be educated, modernized,
made more productive, but certainly its work is not yet done. It
cannot be cast aside as something archaic and only a part of the
ornamental and useless encumbrances of life. _It is not by weakening
loyalty to country, but by strengthening it, that internationalism
will be made secure._ If patriotism fits into modern life like sand in
the machinery, as Veblen says, we must see how patriotism may be made
to do better service.

Some views about patriotism which thus disparage it seem to be based
upon a biological conception of it. Not a few writers apparently think
of patriotism as a fixed trait of the human organism, even as a kind
of mendelian character unrelated to other social qualities. This trait
antagonizes social progress, but it is preserved because of secondary
values which it represents, such as moral or aesthetic values.
According to these views patriotism may be complex, but it acts like a
unitary character. It is subject, theoretically, to selection, but as
a matter of fact it remains a strong factor in the temperament of
nearly all races.

But in our view patriotism is something less precise than all this
would imply. It is a form in which the most fundamental and general of
desires are expressed, in becoming fixated upon their most natural and
necessary objects. It is an aspect of the whole process of development
of the affective life. Leaving out patriotism (if such a thing were
possible) would mean a break in the continuity of the social life. It
would leave one group of functions without their natural support in
desire. Economists sometimes seem to leave out of account the profound
emotional forces and the irresistible tendencies which make social
groups. They want organizations without the moods and impulses by
which alone social bodies are formed or sustained; and they expect to
see organization broken up or interest in it lost while all the
conditions that keep alive the passion for it are intact. Patriotism
and the existence of nations seem, however, to be the opposite sides
of the same fact. And we may assume that so long as nations exist, at
any rate, patriotism will exist, and one of the most neces