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nydus/Instincts of the Herd in Peace and WarPublic
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SPECULATIONS UPON THE HUMAN MIND IN 1915

of the people thereon, cannot fail to have reached the conclusion that here is exposed in a crucial experiment a people which is either totally in­com­pre­hen­sible, or is responding to the calls of herd instinct by a series of reactions almost {184} totally different from those we regard as normal. When the biological key to the situation is discovered the series of events otherwise bizarre to the pitch of incredibility becomes not only intelligible and consistent, but also inevitable.

The differences in instinctive social type between Germany and England are betrayed in many minor peculiarities of behaviour that cannot be examined or even enumerated here. Some of them are of little importance in themselves, though all of them are significant when the whole bulk of evidence to which they contribute a share is considered. Indeed, some of the less obviously important char­ac­ter­is­tics, by the very nicety with which they fulfil the conditions demanded by the biological necessities of the case, have a very special value as evidence in favour of the gen­er­al­i­za­tions which I have suggested. I permit

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