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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