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 SOCIAL CONTROL. IX.

PERSONALITY. I.

THE natural inequality of men, which explains so much to the sociologist, is nowhere more strikingly manifested than in the ascendency which certain persons are able to gain over their fellows without reliance on the ordinary means of procuring obedience. The assumption that everybody acts egotistically until some form of control is exercised is undermined, not only by the existence of spontaneous sympathy, but also by the fact of voluntary subordination. Sympathy with fellows and defer- ence to the born leader are the two primitive social facts which precede and antedate all the species of control I have been describing.

That at the appearance of certain exceptional men the impulse to obey is as natural and overpowering as that of the spaniel to nose the heels of a master, can be established by numerous citations.

Garibaldi "inspired among men of the most various tempera- ments love that nothing could shake, and devotion that fell little short of idolatry." " He enjoyed the worship and cast the spell of a legendary hero."

Cortez had "wonderful power over the discordant masses gathered under his banner."

Of Sam Houston it is said : " If he had been bound naked upon the back of a wild horse, like Mazeppa, the first tribe he came to would have chosen him prince."

Mirabeau "carries all before him;" has "a terrible gift of familiarity," "turns people round his thumb," "is possessed of a secret charm that .... opens him the hearts of almost all people."

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