All systems of government are ultimately supported upon three bases: the value of property, the value of life and the value of emotion. Oligarchy rests most strongly upon the first, democracy upon the second and dictatorship on the third. The ideal, of course, is an equal distribution of weight: as should theoretically obtain in England, where the Lords stand for land and money, the Commons for the average man, and the King for the old and moving tradition of a living country. But oligarchy is passing: democracy drags out a mechanized existence: young, ardent and austere minds turn to follow with a dedicated loyalty the leadership of a minority or of a man, the proletariat, the dictator, the monarch. Russia is ruled by the tiny Communist party, Italy by Mussolini, Germany by Hitler; Austria and Hungary meditate the restoration of the Hapsburgs.

The desire for political leadership springs from one of two causes. The first is the possession of a life so busy and emotionally so satisfying as to leave neither time nor energy for political activities: this is usually to be perceived among peasants and housewives, and is the foundation of monarchy. In the King the peasant secs the living embodiment of the loved land: in the Royal Family the woman finds the prototype of her own. The drama of marriage, child-bearing, and death, celebrated in magnificence for them, is charged with meaning for her: their life is symbolic and universal.