but a limitation, a limitation forever. We need
a new beginning, a new impetus, -- perhaps a
new delusion?

See, too, how the thought of our five teachers
lies concentrated and connected in this new
approach: what have we done but renew con-
cretely the Socratic plea for intelligence, the Pla-
tonic hope for philosopher-kings, Bacon's dream
of knowledge organized and ruling the world,
Spinoza's gentle insistence on democracy as the
avenue of development, and Nietzsche's passion-
ate defence of aristocracy and power? There
was something in us that thrilled at Plato's con-
ception of a philosophy that could guide as well
as dissect our social life; but there was another
something in us that hesitated before his plan of
slavery as the basis of it all. We felt that we
would rather be free and miserable than bound
and filled. Why should a man feed himself if his
feet are chained, and he must never move? And
we were inspired, too, by the demand that the
best should rule, that they should have power
fitted to their worth; we should be glad to find
some way whereby the best could have power,
could rule, and yet with the consent of all, -- we
wanted an aristocracy sanctioned by democracy,
a social order standing on the broad base of free
citizenship and wide coöperation. Socrates shows
us how to use Bacon to reconcile Plato and
Nietzsche with Spinoza: intelligence will organ-
ize intelligence so that superior worth may have

-269-