Page:Propaganda by Edward Bernays.pdf/18

 CHAPTER

the days when kings were kings, Louis XIV made his modest remark, "L'Etat c'est moi." He was nearly right.

But times have changed. The steam engine, the multiple press, and the public school, that trio of the industrial revolution, have taken the power away from kings and given it to the people. The people actually gained power which the king lost. For economic power tends to draw after it political power; and the history of the industrial revolution shows how that power passed from the king and the aristocracy to the bourgeoisie. Universal suffrage and universal schooling reënforced this tendency, and at last even the bourgeoisie stood in fear of the common people. For the masses promised to become king.

, however, a reaction has set in. The minority has discovered a powerful help in influencing majorities. It has been found possible so to mold the mind of the masses that they will throw their newly gained strength in the desired direction. In the present structure of society, this practice is inevitable. Whatever of social importance is done