eseen. But if socialism really
has entered the realm of practical possibilities, it becomes the duty
of everybody to study the new demands from his own standpoint. The
nation must see the facts from many angles before it can decide on
this tremendous issue. Any one-sidedness, whether in favour of or
against the new programme, must be dangerous. In such a situation even
the psychologist may be excused for feeling tempted to contribute his
little share to the discussion.

The central problem of the psychologist would evidently lie in the
question whether the socialistic reformer calculates with right ideas
about the human mind. There might, to be sure, be a little
psychological side-show not without a peculiar interest at the
entrance gate of socialism. We might turn the question, what is the
psychology of the socialist, so as to mean, not with what psychology
does the socialist operate, but what goes on in the socialist's mind.
No doubt the motives have gone through deep changes even in the mind
of the cultured leaders. When Karl Marx laid the foundations of
socialism, he was moved solely by the desire to recognize a necessary
development. It was the interest of the theorist. He showed that the
things which the socialist depicted simply had to come. He did not ask
whether they are good or bad. They were for him ultimately natural
events which were to be forestalled. The leaders to-day see it all in
a new light. The socialistic state is to them a goal to the attainment
of which all energies ought to be bent. Not their theoretical
knowledge, but their practical conscience, leads them to their
enthusiasm for a time without capitalism. In the minds of the masses,
however, who vote for the socialist here or abroad, the glory of moral
righteousness is somewhat clouded by motives less inspiring in
quality. The animosity against the men of wealth rushes into the
mental foreground, and if it is claimed that the puritans disliked the
bear baiting not because it gave pain to the bears, but because it
gave pleasure to the onlookers, it sometimes seems as if the
socialists, too, desire the change, not in order that the poor gain
more comfort, but in order that the rich be punished. And many cleaner
motives have mixed in, which resulted from the general change of
conditions. The labourer lives to-day in a cultural atmosphere which
was unknown to his grandfathers. He reads the same newspaper as his
employers, he thinks in the same cat