Post on 21-Jan-2023
SUMMARY OF THE BOOK THE REVOLT OF THE MASSES BY JOSE ORTEGA Y GASSET
CHAPTER 1THE COMING OF THE MASSES
In this chapter, Jose Ortega y Gasset tries to tell us that his
use of the word “masses” is not to be viewed from the angle of politics
whereby the word masses connotes “rebellion,” “masses,” and “social
power” but that public life is equally and even primarily,
intellectual, moral, economic, religious and that it also comprises of
all our habits, including our fashions both of dress and amusement.
He further makes it known that from our everyday experience we
realize that there seems to be a multitude or “plenitude” of persons
and that even the world war did not reduce the number of people in the
world and now it looks to those living that there are more persons than
there ever was. For him, the multitude has become visible and no longer
to be passed unnoticed.
Society that has always been divided along the lines/factors of
minorities and masses is no longer the case. The minorities were
considered as individuals or group of individuals who are specially
qualified while the mass was an assemblage of persons not specially
qualified and they were understood to be “the working masses.” This in
turn became a standard for classifying peoples.
The idea of minority was also viewed as group of persons with
special interest as against that of others. The multitude of persons
that was seen as of no consequence or importance now has a place in the
scheme of things. The only class that could be said not to have changed
or affected is the classification of persons into “upper” and “lower”
classes for it is on this class that society is based.
In the area of democracy and governance that has always been
dominated by a select few has finally been taken over by the masses
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than ever before. Here he tried to show that the multitude now have a
say than before, not in the sense that they are in power but that they
now have a greater participation in the way and manner in which they
are to be governed.
For him now, the masses have gotten to the level that they are
not be viewed as that which is not to be reckoned with but that they
now have within the power to crush or to make.
CHAPTER 2THE RISE OF THE HISTORIC LEVEL
This chapter tries to trace the history of the rise of the masses
which for him is to be found in the history of the Roman Empire. The
rise was as a result of the depopulation of the country side (that is
the urban rural migration that took place at the time). He does not
deny the fact that societies were and have been aristocratic in nature
which for would forever be the case for if it fails then, the society
ceases to exist.
The rise of the masses and the overthrow of the aristocracy shows
that those who were considered as the “happy few” or even events that
were restricted to them alone has now become an event for all. He
places the triumph of the masses under two main headings for
examination. The first, the masses exercising of their functions in the
social life today which coincide with those which hitherto seemed
reserved to minorities; and secondly, the masses are no longer indocile
to the minorities but have pushed them aside and supplanted them.
His analysis of the first heading was to show us that that which
was said to be enjoyed by the selected few has now become that which
even the common person now enjoys. He says that the appetite that the
few had is the same as that which the multitude and the refine which
the few sought after, the multitude also felt the same craving for. He2 | P a g e
gives a series of example, first, the case of the baths that existed
only in the homes of the noble but has now become a thing to be shared
by all. The quest for rights, privilege and equality before the law has
become a common to all also.
Expounding further on the notion of right, Gasset reveals that
there was a shift from just aspirations and ideals into appetites and
unconscious assumptions which in the end implanted itself in the mind
of the ordinary man and was brought to fruition through history.
The idea that Europe was Americanized was rejected by Gasset. For
him, there was a simultaneous rise in both area but the changes were
not noticed in the initial stage not until it was late. He argues that
there was an internal change that was taking place through Europe as
the increase in economic, intellectual and social status of the people
grew; there was also a re-orientation that was taking place.
He says that the reason why some think that Europe was
Americanized was because the general life expectancy in America was
greater than that of Europe and that if care was not taken and if that
notion was not challenged, then, the future lies with America. It’s
quite an irony that this is actually the case as all nations in the
world look to America.
He also believes that we are in a period wherein there is a
leveling of fortunes, of culture among the various social classes, of
the sexes as well as in the same way, there is also a leveling of
continents in which Europe has now gained from. Consequently from this
standpoint, the masses have also had a fabulous increase of vital
possibilities as against the decadence of Europe that was making the
rounds.
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THE HEIGHT OF THE TIMESGasset reflects on the height in which the masses have attained.
He believes that life can have different altitudes that could and can
be attained as found in the old sayings when people speak of “the
height of our time.”
The height of time here refers not to abstract notion of time but
to the comparisons that exist between and within generations. For
example, an individual measures his/her present with the past and makes
allusion to “our time” or “their time.” Gasset believes that this
happens because there is this idea of falling contained in the word
decadence which has its origin in intuition and when an individual
thinks he/she has risen or fallen and or even leveled with the
situation that persist therein. For Gasset, not every age has felt
itself inferior to any past age, nor have all believed themselves
superior to every preceding age as every historical period displays a
different feeling in respect of this strange phenomenon of the vital
altitude.
Majority of the periods and epochs tend to look at the past and
dream dreams of a fuller existence. The decline in population and
strength of the people only shows the decline in vitality and every
epoch seems have this period while there are also epochs that have
actually attained great, full and definitive heights. There are also
epochs who believe that they have not only attained the height they
have deemed for themselves but they also die because they are self
satisfied and lack the courage to renew their energy and desires. Hence
the fact that these epochs have always felt in the depth of their
consciousness a special form of sadness.
The use of the term “modern” has somewhat affected the
orientation of the people in the sense that whatever is not considered
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as modern has actually fallen into the past thereby imprinting into
consciousness of the people a form of new and superior life as against
the old one. The idea of the “modern culture” he (Gasset) feels only
narrows and shut out our field of vision because the height we seem to
have attained cannot be compared to that of the past and using the
ruins in and structures in the old Roman Empire as a reference point
that the view it command only brings about a feeling of melancholy in
our time. He also feels that we are acting like little noisy children
just let loose from school.
Politics or cultural aspect of history are more considered than
the biological aspect of history and he believes that the latter
actually holds more ground for it is in it that the cosmic world
flourishes. Speaking on decadence, he views it as a comparative concept
because decline can be viewed from a higher state to a lower state but
in this regard, the comparison can be viewed from most varied points
imaginable. But the most justifiable and natural view-point is when
takes up a position in life itself, to look at it from inside, and to
see if it feels itself decadent (diminished, weakened, insipid). Though
major challenge here is to ascertain whether life feels itself on the
decline or not. Gasset suggests the following symptom: a life which
does not give preference to any other life, of any previous period,
which therefore prefers its own existence, cannot in any serious sense
be called decadent.
Making allusions to the poets in the last century who were asked
by the ladies in the drawing room what period of life would they love
to have lived in? But the answer was that they would have preferred the
age of Pericles the renaissance during which the value that holds today
were prepared. The same question when asked of any person today, the
honest answer no doubt would be that; anytime in the past, without5 | P a g e
exception, would give him the feeling of a restricted space in which he
could not breathe because our present life feels itself as ampler than
all previous lives.
Gasset sums up this chapter by saying that “our grave
dissociation of past and present is the generic fact of our time and
the cause of the suspicion, more or less vague, which gives rise to the
confusion characteristic of our present-day existence. We feel that we
actual men have suddenly been left alone on earth; that the dead did
not die in appearance only but effectively; that they can no longer
help us. Any remains of the traditional spirit have evaporated. Models,
norms, standard are no use to us. We have to solve our problems without
any active collaboration of the past, in full actuality, be they
problems of art, science, or politics. The European stands alone,
without any living ghosts by his side; like Peter Schlehmil he has lost
his shadow. This is what always happens when midday comes.”
The “height of our time” then is not the fullness of time, and
yet it feels itself superior to all times past, and beyond all known
fullness. It is not easy to formulate the impression that our epoch has
of itself; it believes itself more than all the rest, and the same time
feels that it is a beginning. Hence in a few words; our time is
superior to other times, inferior to itself. Strong, indeed, and at the
same time uncertain of its destiny; proud of its strength and at the
same time fearing it.
CHAPTER 4THE INCREASE OF LIFE
The existence of the human person is no longer restricted to only
his immediate environment but that now life has become world-wide in
the sense that what happens in a place is no longer restricted to that
place alone and can be known throughout the world. Films and6 | P a g e
illustrated papers have brought the far-off potion of the universe
before the immediate vision of the crowd.
Physical space and time he considers as the absolute stupid
aspect of the universe and the worship of speed is also no less stupid
but serves to nullify physical space and time. For it is through speed
that we kill space and strangle time. Our acknowledgment of them serve
vital purposes as we could be in more places than we could before and
enjoy more coming and goings and in essence do more things within
cosmic time.
Life can be compared to “purchasing” in the sense that existence
is primarily about the consciousness of what is possible to us for if
we had more than one possibility, it would be meaningless and become
more of a necessity. To say that we live is the same as saying that we
find ourselves in an atmosphere of definite possibilities which we call
“circumstance.” The “world” means the sum total of our vital
possibilities. It is not something apart from and foreign to our
existence, it is its actual periphery. Hence it is that the world is
seems to us something enormous, and ourselves a tiny object within it.
The world or our possible existence is always greater than our destiny
or actual existence.
In the case of science, there has also been an increase in
opportunities as things that have been hitherto considered as a utopia
are now available. The potentiality of the human person is said to have
increased today than in the past. This does not go to say that the
quality of life today is better than in the past but that there is an
increase in the quantitative advancement of existence. That is, there
is a greater potentiality than ever before and in all previous time
seeming dwarfed by contrast.
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Returning to his argument about decadence, Gasset explains that
there is only one decadence and it consist of it lowering of vitality,
and that it only exists when it is felt as such. The idea that an epoch
is superior to all past time is actually the problem because based on
presumption, an epoch believes it is superior and does not want to be
seen as inferior to past times. Despite the advancement that is at the
disposal of the human person today, the world is still goes in the same
way as the worst worlds have been; it simply drifts.
By the very fact that everything seems possible to us, we have a
feeling that the worst is still possible: retrogression, barbarism
decadence. We have also arrived at that point when we feel insecure
(which is essential to all forms of life) and are not sure what is
going to happen and this urges us to be ever on the alert. Our
presumptions about the future has lulled us to cast away the rudder of
history and we have ceased to keep watch, have lost our agility and
efficiency believing that the holds in store no more surprises nor
secrets, nothing essentially new and assured that the world would
proceed on a straight course thereby putting away the anxiety about the
future and taking a stand in the definite present.. Can we then be
surprised that the world today seems empty of purposes, anticipation,
ideals? Nobody has concerned himself with supplying them. Such has been
the desertion of the directing minorities, which is always found on the
reverse side of the rebellion of the masses.
CHAPTER 5A SATISTICAL FACT
Life, which means primarily what is possible for us to be, is
likewise, and for that very reason, a choice, from among these
possibilities, of what we actually are going to be. Life does not
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choose its own World; it finds itself, to start with, in a world
determined and unchangeable: the world of the present. Our world is
that potion of destiny which goes up to make our life. But this vital
destiny is not a kind of mechanism.
We are not launched into existence like a shot from a gun, with
its trajectory absolutely predetermined. Instead of imposing on us one
trajectory, it imposes several, and consequently forces us to choose.
Surprising condition, this, of our existence! To live is to feel
ourselves fatally obliged to exercise our liberty, to decide what we
are going to be in this world. Not for a single moment is our activity
of decision allowed to rest. Even when in desperation we abandon
ourselves to whatever may happen, we have decided not to decide.
For him then, it is false to say that in life “circumstances
decide.” On the contrary, circumstances are the dilemma, constantly
renewed, in presence of which we have to make our decision; what
actually decides is our character. All this is equally valid for
collective life.
In our time it is the mass-man who dominates, it is he who
decides. The mass-man is he whose life lacks any purpose, and simply
goes drifting along. Consequently, though his possibilities and his
powers be enormous, he constructs nothing. And it is this type of man
who decides in our time. It will be well, then, that we analyse his
character.
We ask ourselves: “Whence have come all these multitudes which
nowadays fill to overflowing the stage of history?” Werner Sombart, an
economist has laid stress on this very simple fact: from the time
European history begins in the 6th Century up to the year 1800- that
is, through the course of twelve centuries- Europe does not succeed in
reaching a total population greater than 180 million inhabitants. Now,9 | P a g e
from 1800 to 1914- little more than a century- the population of Europe
mounts from 180 to 460 millions! That is in three generations, Europe
had produced a gigantic humanity that has made it possible for the
masses to triumph but this fact also proves how unfounded the
admiration the stress laid on the increase of new countries like the
United States of America when the really astonishing fact is the
teeming fertility of Europe. Europe has increased in the last century
much more than America. America has been formed from the overflow of
Europe.
The whole of history stands out as a gigantic laboratory in which
all possible experiments have been made to obtain a formula of public
life most favourable to the plant “man.” And beyond all possible
explaining away, we find ourselves face to face with the fact that, by
submitting the seed of humanity to the treatment of two principles,
liberal democracy and technical knowledge, in a single century the
species in Europe has been triplicated.
Such an overwhelming fact forces Gasset to draw the following
conclusions: first, that liberal democracy based on technical knowledge
is the highest type of public life hitherto known; secondly, that that
type may not be the best imaginable, but the one we imagine as superior
to it must preserve the essence of those two principles; and thirdly,
that to return to any forms of existence inferior to that of the 19th
Century is suicidal.
CHAPTER 6THE DISSECTION OF THE MASS-MAN BEGINS
Gasset starts this chapter by asking who the mass-man who today
dominates public life, political and non-political, and why is he like
it? He answers by saying that; the man who today is attempting to take
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the lead in European existence is very different from the man who
directed the 19th Century, but he was produced and prepared by the 19th
Century. He believes that any keen mind would have foreseen this
situation just as Hegel had said “The masses are advancing” and Comte
pronounced “Without some new spiritual influence, our age, which is a
revolutionary age, will produce a catastrophe,” while Nietzsche
shrieked from a crag of the Engadine “I see the flood-tide of nihilism
rising.”
It is true that it is only possible to anticipate the general
structure of the future, but that is all that we in truth understand of
the past or of the present. Accordingly, if you want a good view of
your own age, look at it from far off.
He asks again what appearance did life present to that
multitudinous man who in ever increasing abundance of the 19th century
kept producing? He answers; never had the average man been able to
solve his economic problem with greater facility. Whilst there was a
proportionate decrease of great fortunes and life became harder for the
individual worker, the middle classes found their economic horizon
widened every day. Every day added a new luxury to their standard of
life. Every day their position was more secure and more independent of
another’s will. What before would have been considered one of fortune’s
gifts, inspiring humble gratitude towards destiny, was converted into a
right, not to be grateful for, but to be insisted on.
The realisation of this fact and of its importance becomes
immediate when we remember that such a freedom of existence was
entirely lacking to the common men of the past. On the contrary, for
them life was a burdensome destiny, economically and physically. From
birth, existence meant to them an accumulation of impediments which
they were obliged to suffer, without possible solution other than to11 | P a g e
adapt themselves to them, to settle down in the narrow space they left
available.
But still more evident is the contrast of situations, if we pass
from the material to the civil and moral. The average man, from the
second half of the 19th Century on, finds no social barriers raised
against him. That is to say, that as regards the forms of public life
he no longer finds himself from birth confronted with obstacles and
limitations. There is nothing to force him to limit his existence. Here
again, “Wide is Castile.” There are no “estates” or “castes.” There are
no civil privileges. The ordinary man learns that all men are equal
before the law. Three principles have made possible this new world:
liberal democracy, scientific experiment, and industrialism. The two
latter (scientific experiment and industrialism) was not invented by
the 19th century but proceeded from the two previous centuries but
their implementation was the glory of the 19th century.
The 19th Century was of its essence revolutionary. Revolution is
not the uprising against preexisting order, but the setting up of a new
order contradictory to the traditional one. Hence there is no
exaggeration in saying that the man who is the product of the 19th
Century is, for the effects of public life, a man apart from all other
men. For the “common” man of all periods “life” had principally meant
limitation, obligation, and dependence; in a word, pressure, but also
in the cosmic.
The world which surrounds the new man from his birth does not
compel him to limit himself in any fashion, it sets up no veto in
opposition to him; on the contrary, it incites his appetite, which in
principle can increase indefinitely. It also turns out that that this
world of the 19th century and early 20th century not only has the
perfections and the completeness which it actually possesses, but12 | P a g e
furthermore suggests to those who dwell in it the radical assurance
that tomorrow it will be still richer, ampler, more perfect, as if it
enjoyed a spontaneous, inexhaustible power of increase.
Gasset ends this chapter with a thesis: the very perfection with
which the 19th Century gave an organisation to certain orders of
existence has caused the masses benefited thereby to consider it, not
as an organised, but as a natural system. Thus is explained and defined
the absurd state of mind revealed by these masses; they are only
concerned with their own well-being, and at the same time they remain
alien to the cause of that well-being. As they do not see, behind the
benefits of civilisation, marvels of invention and construction which
can only be maintained by great effort and foresight, they imagine that
their role is limited to demanding these benefits peremptorily, as if
they were natural rights. In the disturbances caused by scarcity of
food, the mob goes in search of bread, and the means it employs is
generally to wreck the bakeries. This may serve as a symbol of the
attitude adopted, on a greater and more complicated scale, by the
masses of to-day towards the civilisation by which they are supported.
CHAPTER 7NOBLE LIFE AND COMMON LIFE, OR EFFORT AND INERTIA
We are what our world invites us to be, and the basic features of
our soul are impressed upon it by the form of its surroundings as in a
mould. Naturally for our life is no other than our relations with the
world around. The general aspect which it presents to us will form the
general aspect of our own life. But the modern man finds complete
freedom as its natural, established condition, without any special
cause for it. He is satisfied with himself exactly as he is.
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Gasset makes a distinction between the mass-man and the select
man or man of intellectuality. The former would never would never have
accepted an external authority had not the society made it so, while
the latter does not see serving as an oppression. The noble life then
is lived as a discipline while nobility is based on obligation it
demands of us and not by rights.
Nobility is viewed from the perspective of having done great and
having to be rewarded for doing something worth commending and even
though nobility seems to be passed from one generation to the next
which is not supposed to be so, Gasset believes that the one to be
called noble is actually the one who continually makes effort and not
one who has added nothing only to inherit it based on the effort of
another.
CHAPTER 8THE MASSES INTERVENE IN EVERYTHING, AND WHY THEIR INTERVENTION IS SOLEY
BY VIOLENCEThe soul of an average man is shut up within him and it is in
this obliteration that the rebellion of the masses consists, and in its
turn lays the gigantic problem set before humanity today. The mass-man
regards himself as perfect while the select man needs others in order
to regard himself which arises from his vain and problematic character.
The mass-man is no fool for he is cleverer today and has the
capacity of understanding reality than his fellow of any period but the
problem is that this capacity is shut up inside him and the vague
feeling of reality keeps him from using it. That is why he never
questions what goes on around him because it never occurred to him to
challenge the “idea” of others from its own. But on the other hand, the
average man has “ideas.”
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An idea is a putting truth in checkmate and whoever wishes to
have ideas must first prepare himself to desire truth and to accept the
rule of the game imposed by it. An acceptance of a higher authority to
regulate truth is also important as it is on it these that the
principle of culture rest, as there is no culture where there are no
standards to which one can have a recourse, legal appeal and final
intellectual position to which a dispute may be referred. When all this
and many more are lacking, there is no culture.
The average man finds himself with “ideas” in his head but he
lacks the faculty of ideation but wishes to have opinions but is
unwilling to accept the conditions and presuppositions that underlie
all opinion. Hence his ideas are nothing more than appetites in words.
The inability to discuss and conform to opposing ideas has led to
break in communication in Europe and is leading to a form of barbarism
through a process called “direct action.” This was actually formed in
the 1900 by a group of French syndicalists and realist wherein violence
was used when all other forms of defense of the right of justice has
failed.
Civilisation which is before all, the will to live in common and
place others into account is being taken over by barbarism wherein
groups separate and are hostile to one another. The politics of liberal
democracy carries to the extreme the determination for one’s neighbor
and its prototype is “indirect action.” It announces the determination
to share existence with the enemy who is weak which is too difficult a
discipline and complex to take root on earth.
CHAPTER 9THE PRIMITIVE AND THE TECHNICAL
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The rebellion of the masses may, in fact, be the transition to
some new, unexampled organisation of humanity, but it may also be a
catastrophe of human destiny. There is no reason to deny the reality of
progress, but there is to correct the notion that believes this
progress secure.
It is evident that every old civilisation drags with it in its
advance worn-out tissues and no small load of callous matter, which
form an obstacle to life, mere toxic dregs. There are dead
institutions, valuations and estimates which still survive, though now
meaningless, unnecessarily complicated solutions, standards whose lack
of substance has been proved.
The fact that mass-man still carries in him some sense of
primitiveness, since without being preached to, the average man does
not feel spontaneously, any ardent enthusiasm for sciences and related
ones like biology, though he leaves in a technical and civilized world.
The average man is interested in aesthetics, motor-cars, and a few
other things, but not the technology itself. What this means is that
the type of man dominant in to-day is a primitive one living in a
civilized world. The world is a civilized one its inhabitant is not: he
does not see the civilization around him, but he uses it as if it were
a natural force. And according to Gasset as he quoted Rathenau, we are
witnessing the “vertical invasion of the barbarians”. But the
experimental science needs the cooperation of the mass-man.
CHAPTER 10PRIMITIVISM AND HISTORY
Nature is always with us but that which is not always the case is
civilization in the sense it comes and goes, built upon and sometimes
destroyed. The problem Gasset finds with the world of today is that it
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is failing not because it lacks principles which were the demise of
other eras but that man has refused or rather unable to keep up with
the pace of progress of his own civilization.
History he considers to be a very vital tool and technique in the
maintenance of civilization not because it gives solution to every
problem but it helps us to avoid the mistakes of the past. And the
problem of Europe then is based on the fact that they are ignorant
about history. The lack of a historic conscience is that which Gasset
believes is affecting the politics of Europe.
The attitude of “anti-anything” is one which has affected us
because it is seen as a reaction against a present existence and sees
itself as previous and the innovation which the anti represents fades
away into an empty negative attitude, leaving as its only positive
content an “antique.” So the only way to accept the past is not to put
it out but to accept its existence, and so behave in regard to it as to
dodge it, to avoid it. In a word, to live “at the height of our time,”
with an exaggerated consciousness of the historical circumstances.
CHAPTER 11THE SELF-SATISFIED AGE
The new mass man is said to of the following characteristics;
born with the impression that life is plentiful without any grave
limitations, he see himself/herself as morally and intellectually
complete and shuts out the opinions of others and refuse to submit to
them and lastly, will impose his/her own view without respect or regard
for others in accordance with a system of “direct action.” In allusion
to the spoiled child of human history, Gasset says is the heir of
civilization who finding himself/herself amongst plenty has been unable
to make good use of it that has been deceived into believing there is
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no need for struggle as he can neither represent himself or its
ancestors. So the “self-satisfied man” is one who enters upon life
doing “what he jolly well likes.” But one thing is quite true and
certain and it is that the destiny of all would naturally come to be no
matter how hard we try to deny it.
CHAPTER 12THE BARBARISM OF “SPECIALISATION”
The 19th century is summed up as liberal democracy and technicism
and modern technicism springs from the union between capitalism and
experimental science this does not imply that previous periods lacked
techinicism because not all technicism is science. Gasset asks who
wills the social power today and impose his/her mind on the period? The
answer he gives is that it is the man of science because he has become
the prototype of the mass man which has in turn turned him into a
primitive and modern barbarian.
The fact of specialization in the sciences has gradually brought
to an end the need for unification of the sciences as each scientist
has been restricted and confined to a narrower field of mental
occupation and this started in the 19th century when science was
removed from culture and European civilization. Specialization has only
left scientist with having to know just a tiny part of the universe and
to remain ignorant of others thereby making him/her a learned
ignoramus.
CHAPTER 13THE GREATEST DANGER, THE STATE
The mass is actually a part of the society as it does not act of
itself but is expected to be represented, influenced, directed,
organized as such is its mission and for the mass to claim the right to
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act of itself is then a rebellion against its own destiny. The State
is seen as the replica of science in the sense that the fertility of
principles brings about fabulous progress, but this inevitably imposes
specialization, and specialization threaten to strangle science which
is also happening with the State.
The State was built in the Middle-Ages by a class of men very
different from the bourgeois- the nobles, a class admirable for their
courage, their gift of leadership, their sense of responsibility.
Without them the nations of Europe would not now be in existence but in
all this they were in a word “irrational.” The State was not as
powerful as it looked as it depended upon the bourgeois to finance its
affairs which made it weak in a sense. It was not until the revolution
of the middle class in 1884 that the State became powerful as they
applied their undeniable qualities to its running which brought an end
to revolutions and ever since, there has been no genuine revolutions in
Europe. The only things now possible were coup d’état which in the
following years tried to look like a revolution but was still a coup
d’état in disguise.
In our day, the State has become a formidable machine which only
with the touch of a button its enormous levers start working and
exercise their overwhelming power on any portion whatever of the social
framework. The State is a product of human invention which was invented
by certain men yesterday and may vanish into thin air tomorrow.
Society, that it may live better, creates the State as an instrument.
The State gets the upper hand and society has to begin to live for the
State thereby becoming a machine that is fueled by the people.
CHAPTER 14WHO RULES THE WORLD?
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The following could be said to be the reverse side of European
civilization; the displacement of power which brings with it the
displacement of spirit. Gasset’s conception of “rule” is not one based
primarily on the exercise of material power or physical coercion as it
is naturally understood which inadvertently leads to “force” but on the
exercise of authority that is based on public opinion. When public
opinion is nonexistent, brute force takes over which in turn gives rise
to relative chaos, barbarism and a deficit public opinion.
The inabilities of having directly complete knowledge of reality
and the arbitrariness of constructing a reality of things happening in
a certain fashion that is, the formulation of concepts to capture
reality. The not so certain Europe’s ability to continue ruling has
also given rise to rebellion in the sense that smaller nations now
accuse her of decadence and the irony is that they themselves cannot
control and order their lives without Europe.
The rumored deceit that the Europe’s force is no longer to be
reckoned with which has given rise to an unexpected holiday and a
general wastage under the guise of freedom. The lack of creativity
where in the ability to command and rule is lost and control is
renegaded to someone else. The decline in economics capabilities;
leading to depression and pessimism in both political and intellectual
clime of Europe.
The building and formation of City-States which was an innovation
of human beings brought together people from different climes and
region to live together but a lack of imagination to continue in this
light brought about an end to any further development. Only the
determination to construct a great nation from the group of peoples of
the Continent would give new life to the pulses of Europe. She would
start to believe in herself again, and automatically to make demands20 | P a g e
on, to discipline, herself. But the situation is much more difficult
than is generally realized. The years are passing and there is the risk
that the European will grow accustomed to the lower tone of the
existence he is at present living, will get used neither to rule others
nor to rule himself. In such a case, all his virtues and higher
capacities would vanish into air.
The coming together of a people to form a nation is based on the
fact of their having a common future. Despite this, the fact is that a
nation is never formed as it is either in the making or the unmaking.
The homogeneity that now pervades Europe whereby religion, science,
law, arts, social and sentimental values are being shared alike has
brought about a sort of unification as against individuality but there
still exist the idea of the old “nation” as based on the past.
CHAPTER 15WE ARRIVE AT THE REAL QUESTION
In this last and final chapter Gasset leads us to believe that
the whole problem of Europe is one based on morality. The fact that no
one is willing to submit to the other and wants to do as he/she deems
fit is the bane of Europe. The desire also in wanting to remain “young”
because it means that an individual considered thus is free of
obligations and endowed with rights. To say that morality can be
eliminated is nothing but immorality as do this would mean the
submission to nolens volens which for him is a negative morality. The
problem of Europe therefore is her blind adoption of a culture which is
magnificent but has no roots.
A REVIEW AND CRITIQUE OF THE WORK
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The book “The Revolt of the Masses” was written by Jose Ortega Y Gasset
and published in the year 1930 and its aim was to highlight the subtle
changes that were beginning to happen unnoticed by some in Europe and
to compare them to happenings in the not too distant past. Gasset’s
writing is a bit difficult to place as it cannot be constricted to any
genre in philosophy but possess a deep affiliation to history and
existentialism as he tends to talk about the history of Europe in a
sense and the nature of human existential at that time.
One of the striking points about Gasset’s work is that even
though it was written eighty-three years ago, the work is still
relevant in this contemporary time because it’s like he writing and
commenting about issues and situations of our time.
The title of the book “the revolt of the masses” is somewhat
misleading in the sense that it could appeal to Marxist or would be
Marxist but upon reading the book one would not help but notice that
his use of the word ‘revolt’ and ‘masses’ is not used in the manner that
we are naturally accustomed to. The word revolt for him does not stand
for violence in the actual sense of the word but rather the sudden
change and awareness of the people not of their right per se but of
their inclination and actions to do that which was actually reserved
for a selected few in the society. The word masses also do not refer to
the hoi polloi but to every individual and soul that exist as a person.
The work run through 138 pages and is divided into fifteen
chapters and it is in this that he brings to light a new understanding
of what the masses and the society is all about. The book starts by
discussing The Coming of the Masses that is, the sudden awareness of people
who were hitherto not known and then moves on to The Rise of the Historic Level
which aimed at tracing the rise of the people/masses from the history
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of the Roman Empire. The Height of the Times reflects upon the different
altitude that the people have attained.
The Increase of Life tells us that the human person can no longer be
restricted only to his immediate environment but that life has become
world-wide which happens to be A Statistical Fact in the sense that life does
not choose its own world but finds it-self in a world determined and
unchangeable. It should be noted that though life appears determined,
there is still room for freedom and choice. The Dissection of the Mass-Man
Begins brings to mind the awareness of a new different kind of man who
was produced and prepared by the 19th century and now dominates the
public sphere.
Noble Life and Common Life, or Effort and Inertia calls to mind that nobility
as we now have it which is based on the good deeds of a parent and
passed on to their children should not be the case but that rather each
person should strive for nobility on his/her own merit. The Masses
Intervene in everything, and why their Intervention is Solely by Violence this happens to be
one if not the only part that violence was actually referred to in the
whole work but it says here is that every person has an idea but if
that idea is not submitted to an authority who would help mediate them,
it could lead to chaos.
The Primitive and Technical shows us that man still carries within him
some sense of primitiveness based on the fact that he tends to believe
to be progressing and secure because of civilization. Primitivism and
History tells us that civilization is built and that it comes and goes
or betters still built upon unlike nature which is permanent. The Self-
Satisfied Age is the case of the human who finds himself/herself amongst
plenty and is unable to make good use of it. The Barbarism of “Specialization”
simply informs us that we tend to know a lot about a little thereby
making us an educated illiterate. Many refused to agree with Gasset on23 | P a g e
the point but the fact remains that even though there is the tendency
for tis in the human person, it is not the case for all persons.
The Greatest Danger of the State, we should not that the state is always
a product of like minds or better still human invention and it may
vanish into thin air tomorrow. Who Rules the World? Is a question that
Gasset asks but answer that Europe still is a force to be reckoned with
even though her decadence has brought about other States but these
cannot do with Europe.
We arrive at the Real Question which happens to be the concluding chapter
of the work; Gasset believes that the problem of Europe is adoption of
a culture which is magnificent but has no root.
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