"...Ferdinand de Lesseps has known the intoxication of triumph and the bitterness of disappointment--Suez and Panama.At this point the heart revolts at the morality of success.When de Lesseps had succeeded in joining two seas princes and nations rendered him their homage; to-day, when he meets with failure among the rocks of the Cordilleras, he is nothing but a vulgar rogue....In this result we see a war between the classes of society, the discontent of bureaucrats and employes, who take their revenge with the aid of the criminal code on those who would raise themselves above their fellows....Modern legislators are filled with embarrassment when confronted by the lofty ideas due to human genius; the public comprehends such ideas still less, and it is easy for an advocate-general to prove that Stanley is a murderer and de Lesseps a deceiver."Still, the various examples that have just been cited represent extreme cases.To fix in detail the psychology of prestige, it would be necessary to place them at the extremity of a series, which would range from the founders of religions and empires to the private individual who endeavours to dazzle his neighbours by a new coat or a decoration.
Between the extreme limits of this series would find a place all the forms of prestige resulting from the different elements composing a civilisation--sciences, arts, literature, &c.--and it would be seen that prestige constitutes the fundamental element of persuasion.Consciously or not, the being, the idea, or the thing possessing prestige is immediately imitated in consequence of contagion, and forces an entire generation to adopt certain modes of feeling and of giving expression to its thought.This imitation, moreover, is, as a rule, unconscious, which accounts for the fact that it is perfect.The modern painters who copy the pale colouring and the stiff attitudes of some of the Primitives are scarcely alive to the source of their inspiration.
They believe in their own sincerity, whereas, if an eminent master had not revived this form of art, people would have continued blind to all but its naive and inferior sides.Those artists who, after the manner of another illustrious master, inundate their canvasses with violet shades do not see in nature more violet than was detected there fifty years ago; but they are influenced, "suggestioned," by the personal and special impressions of a painter who, in spite of this eccentricity, was successful in acquiring great prestige.Similar examples might be brought forward in connection with all the elements of civilisation.
It is seen from what precedes that a number of factors may be concerned in the genesis of prestige; among them success was always one of the most important.Every successful man, every idea that forces itself into recognition, ceases, ipso facto, to be called in question.The proof that success is one of the principal stepping-stones to prestige is that the disappearance of the one is almost always followed by the disappearance of the other.The hero whom the crowd acclaimed yesterday is insulted to-day should he have been overtaken by failure.The reaction, indeed, will be the stronger in proportion as the prestige has been great.The crowd in this case considers the fallen hero as an equal, and takes its revenge for having bowed to a superiority whose existence it no longer admits.While Robespierre was causing the execution of his colleagues and of a great number of his contemporaries, he possessed an immense prestige.When the transposition of a few votes deprived him of power, he immediately lost his prestige, and the crowd followed him to the guillotine with the self-same imprecations with which shortly before it had pursued his victims.Believers always break the statues of their former gods with every symptom of fury.
Prestige lost by want of success disappears in a brief space of time.It can also be worn away, but more slowly by being subjected to discussion.This latter power, however, is exceedingly sure.From the moment prestige is called in question it ceases to be prestige.The gods and men who have kept their prestige for long have never tolerated discussion.For the crowd to admire, it must be kept at a distance.
