Page:The Hero in History.djvu/17

Rh possible until they are realized, and for this competent leadership is required. As promises, they can be betrayed or broken, depending upon who makes them and who carries them out.

Despite their theoretical pronouncements, according to which every individual, no matter what his status, is a chip on a historical wave, social determinists of all hues cannot write history without recognizing that at least some individuals, at some critical moments, play a decisive role in redirecting the historical wave. Engels speaks of Marx, Trotsky of Lenin, Russian officialdom of Stalin in a manner completely at variance with their professed ideology. Even theological determinists like the Popes, who believe we can trace the finger of God in all historical events, speak of Western culture since the Reformation as if it had been created by Luther and Calvin behind God’s back. The twists and turns by which these contradictions are extenuated we shall examine later. The fact remains that, for all their talk of the inevitable, the determinists never resign themselves to the inevitable when it is not to their liking. Their words, however, confuse their actions both to themselves and to others. In the end we understand them truly by watching their hands, not their lips.

Crises in human affairs differ in magnitude and intensity. But, judging by the history of peoples of whom we have more than fragmentary records, there has never been a period which has not been regarded by some of its contemporaries as critical. History itself may not inappropriately be described as one crisis after another. Whatever the social forces and conditions at work, and they always are at work—in so far as alternatives of action are open, or even conceived to be open—a need will be felt for a hero to initiate, organize, and lead. The need is more often felt than clearly articulated, and more often articulated than gratified. Indeed, the more frequent the cries, and the higher their pitch mounts for an historical saviour or for intelligent leadership, the more prima facie evidence accumulates that the candidates for this exalted office are unsatisfactory.

A democratic society has its “heroes” and “great men,” too. It is no more exempt from sharp political crisis than other societies, and rarely lacks candidates for the heroic role. It selects them, however, on the basis of its own criteria. Where a democracy is wise, it will wholeheartedly co-operate with its leaders and at the same time be suspicious of the powers delegated to them—a difficult task but one which must be solved