It reveals
what the highest spirits deemed the highest, and what was said lay so
close to the heart of the race that it is still remembered and read.
That literature discloses the character of the national being, still to
be manifested in a civilization, and it must flame out before the tale
which began among the gods is closed. Whatever brings this communal
character into our social order, and at the same time desires the
independent aristocratic intellect, is in accord with the national
tradition. The co-operative movement is the modern expression of that
mood. It is already making a conquest of the Irish mind, and in its
application to life predisposing our people to respect for the man of
special attainments, independent character, and intellect. A social
order which has made its economics democratic in character needs such
men above all things. It needs aristocratic thinkers to save the social
order from stagnation, the disease which eats into all harmonious life.
We shall succeed or fail in Ireland as we succeed or fail to make
democracy prevail in our economic life, and aristocratic ideals to
prevail in our political and intellectual life.
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