Patriotism is a complex sentiment. It grows out of a great variety of roots and reasons, and finds expression in many forms. In the preceding parts of this treatise these foundations and expressions of patriotism have been dealt with. They throw light upon the questions of why patriotism is and why it is what it is. It remains for patriotism to be defined.

No one of the many causes or appearances of the sentiment adequately defines it. Those who fix upon some one impulse, habit, or reason, and try to fit all the facts of patriotism into that, oversimplify the situation. They leave out essential features. This would hold true of J. M. Robertson,[137] who makes patriotism to consist of the impulses of fear and hatred. There are important kinds of patriotism, directed toward the internal improvement of the country for instance, which cannot be so classified. If one followed the clue of Trotter,[138] he would explain the phenomenon as the result of the herd instinct. But patriotism is not purely instinctive. Veblen[139] would lead one to make the economic motive and the impulse of rivalry or emulation prominent. But patriotism is something more than a contest and a contest, too, which is mainly for material goods. Loisy[140] would make patriotism a worthy religion, and recommend it as such. But the love of country does not always attain the dignity that it has in Loisy. Powers[141] makes men’s interest in their civilization the root of their patriotism. But he opens his book with the recognition that men do fight over material things. None of these accounts can be used as an adequate basis from which to define and present the central concept of patriotism.

Yet patriotism is one. There is a common center about which all the impulses, habits, and beliefs of the sentiment cluster. There is a concept “patriotism.” It is that concept, though perhaps inarticulate, which guides even in the gathering of material for its own definition. It will be enlarged after the preliminary examination, but it is present from the beginning.

The clue that one really has in hand when he sets out to study patriotism is the popular definition that it is “the love of country.”[142] And it is a hopeful clue from which to start. It does lead one to the material that he seeks. Moreover, it shows what patriotism has meant in racial wisdom, the wisdom of the plain people who have long and intimately been associated with and been most moved by the sentiment.

It must be said that in one way the result of an examination of this popular definition is negative. The preliminary study made in this dissertation shows that. Patriotism is hardly to be defined simply as the love of country. Devotion to one’s native land is in one phase an exalted and intelligent loyalty to country as an ideal, but it may show another character. Its nature has instinctive roots. It may be no more than a habit. Even the reasoned support of country is not exclusively what may be described as love; at any rate, it not uncommonly appears as a quite self-interested affection. The conduct of patriots has often been such as to cause wonder if the emotion consuming them were really pure, unmixed love. It has frequently seemed that there was mixed in a full portion of hate. The phrase, “the love of country,” covers a multitude of sins. Patriotism is a pure white light, but seems to be one in the sense that it can be broken up and any color desired extracted from it. Love of country, in view of such facts as these, frequently gets to look like something not quite the same as the exalted sentiment of school textbooks and Fourth-of-July oratory.

And yet there must have been some considerations that led to the definition of patriotism as the love of country. Out of what facts did the definition grow? In the light of all the instincts, habits, and reasons of patriotism, what does it seem that the phrase “the love of country” covers?

It seems obvious, for one thing, that patriotism is an attitude toward country. It is easily seen that “country” is a constant in the phenomena of patriotism. The country is the object of the patriot’s emotions. Patriotism, in other words, has to do with “mother country” or “fatherland.” And that is to say that patriotism is a feeling of nationality. “Patriotism is the sentiment in which consciousness of nationality normally expresses itself.”[143] One would not know where to look for patriotism at all if to begin with he did not know in a general way that it was this nationalistic sentiment. Generically, patriotism is like family pride, civic pride, team spirit, university spirit, and the like; specifically, it is nationalistic spirit. It might be necessary that this be said only for the sake of completeness were there not a confusion of language on the subject. It is, strictly speaking, a strange and metaphorical use of words to talk about “patriots of the world.” Such a combination of words may serve a useful purpose of propagandism in furthering a desirable spirit of internationalism or cosmopolitanism, and it may in time take on the further connotation, but it is not historically accurate. Patriotism in its meaning as a word and as a matter of fact has to do with a country, and it will serve to keep thinking clear if we hold the term to its historical meaning. Patriotism is the sentiment of attachment to one’s national group.

The quality of the sentiment impresses one. Patriotism is not merely consciousness of nationality. It is more active and explosive than that. It is not even such an emotion as that of thankfulness for the country. Thankfulness or joy, is the feeling of returning soldiers as they land back upon American shores. Is that feeling of satisfaction with the homeland at getting back, patriotism? A kind of love of country it may be said to be. But ask the man in the street if it is patriotism, and he will hesitate. He will, however, be quite sure that it is not anything like as patriotic as the acts of the same soldiers in going across to Europe, or in breaking up socialistic parades after they get back. The mere joy at being once more in the bosom of one’s country doesn’t seem to be patriotism par excellence. There appears to be a great difference between liking one’s country and loving it. The immigrant may like his new home, like it better than any other, and still not be patriotic. What is it that must be added to turn the liking of country into patriotism? Patriots demand homage to the country. Faith must be shown by works. Patriotism is a passion inspiring active allegiance. It is devotion that means service, if necessary “the service.” The patriot is solicitous for his native land. He not only pronounces his country good; he also wants some good for it. He is, moreover, determined upon that good. That it be secured and maintained is part of his ruling purpose. In sum, his will is set upon it. Patriotism has it as an essential characteristic that it includes a will towards one’s country.

What is it that the patriot wills? Briefly, he is vitally interested in the selfhood of his country. The thought of self as to the country is always present. Patriotism is the will that the country do some such thing as be, remain, express, or develop itself. The thorough-going patriot in so far as he is such, is interested in the country, the whole country, and nothing but the country.[144] It becomes the this of his consciousness and affection. He has just one object in the focus of his interests, and that object is this country. The patriot says, “This,—this is my own, my native land.” Patriotism shows an intense singleness of affection. The country for the patriot is the one.

And now, the fact that patriotism is a will toward the country as it is in and for itself may be expressed in another way by saying that the patriot has a will toward the country as an individual, and his will as to its selfhood is a will toward its individuality. A self is an individual considered as an identity. The country has an individual place in the patriot’s heart; and he desires a singleness of the country corresponding to his singleness of affection. Love of country has done what all love does; it has individualized its object. It makes its object the one, the individual, of its devotion. It is with country as with woman. A man can love but one.[144] It is the one to him. And he wants it to be the one among all others. What it means to him he wants it to be objectively.

And so patriotism may be described as the will to national individuality. It is individualism expressed upon the national plane. One can see what it is when he observes the reaction of patriots to any suggestion touching the identity of their country. Opposition to the proposal for a league of nations is patriotism. It is narrow, perhaps, but nevertheless patriotism it is. Those who oppose the idea are actuated by the fear that loyalty to the league will develop at the expense of loyalty to the nation. The patriot feels for his country, puts himself in its place, and cannot bear to see its selfhood or individuality impaired.

It should be noted that the will to individuality may exist in strong measure when the external basis for it seems to be weak, and vice versa. Switzerland has an active patriotism with a heterogeneous people, while Sweden has a weaker patriotism with a homogeneous people. However, this merely amounts to saying that patriotism is sometimes weak and sometimes strong. The nature of patriotism remains the same. There is simply a stronger set of stimuli urging it to express itself in the one case than in the other. And the fact of individuality is not exclusively the stimulus to the will to it. There might be a will to an individuality which as yet existed only in ideal, and there can be a real individuality which leads only to a very weak fervor for itself. In the case of Switzerland and Sweden, the explanation is that the Swiss have had to fight for their identity much more than the Swedish. There must, however, be an actual individuality at least possible in order to justify the will. What we are at present concerned with is the description of patriotism as a sentiment. Where there is patriotism it is such as described, whatever the stimuli may be. National individuality is what the Swiss aim at. The next chapter will take up the question of whether or not patriotism finds a real individuality to rest itself upon. An integrating spectroscope is a spectroscope the slit of which is illuminated by light from every part of the source under examination; this concept of the will to national individuality is the integrating spectroscope of the data of patriotism.

But the term individuality is an elastic one. It is necessary that it should be so. It has to be able to cover a great deal as a concept defining patriotism, for the manifestations of patriotism are various. Patriotism is so manifold that the limits of the definition cannot be drawn too closely. Individuality is a comprehensive term. It is, however, comprehensible. What does it mean? What are the main forms that the will to national individuality takes? And are the main forms of patriotism discovered in the answer to that question? Does a knowledge of the characteristics of an individual furnish the material for the understanding of the tendencies of patriotism?

The first characteristic of an individual is that it is unique. This proposition is agreed upon by practically all philosophers whatever may be the school of metaphysics to which they belong. All would agree with Royce, for instance, in saying that, “An individual is unique. There is no other of its individual kind. If Socrates is an individual, then there is only one Socrates in the universe. If you are an individual, then in reality there is no other precisely capable of taking your place. If God is an individual, then, as ethical monotheism began by saying, There is no Other.”[145] “Taken individually” means taken separately. Individuality means, in some sense, separateness. An individual case is a distinct or isolated case. When, therefore, one demands that he be allowed to be an individual, he means that he demands the right to be and remain himself.

And just this is a fundamental demand in patriotism. It is of no use to tell a country, even though it seems to others an insignificant one, that it will be better off in another country; that its citizens could enjoy to a greater extent the physical satisfactions of life; and that they will be able to share in a greater kultur. They will not listen. They do not wish to live more comfortably as animals; they do not wish to live under the ægis of some one else’s greatness, no matter how great that may be. An individual will hardly consent to unself himself. The citizens of any country wish to be themselves, and retain their own national individuality. Veblen[146] suggests that so far as creature comforts are concerned, we might all be fairly well off if we voluntarily surrendered to Germany. Art might also be furthered. And in view of the high cost of resistance, so Veblen says, it might be well to accept the German imperial rule. But Veblen also knows that no nation will listen to his proposal. And why? It is simply because we do not live primarily for creature comforts, or that a classical science and philosophy should be developed. Self-preservation is the first law of nature. We want to exist, and exist as separate and unique. We want to be ourselves, and have an individuality that has a continuous history of its own. At its lowest terms, the will to individuality is a will to live. France will not listen to a counsel to negate that will; neither will Belgium; neither will Britain; neither will America; and neither will Germany. Patriotism seeks to make the country unique; that very will itself becomes a factor making for the uniqueness of the country. The country is what the patriot wills; it is his; he cherishes it; and in its place he will accept no other. The will to uniqueness, which is a form of the will to individuality, does in fact turn out to be one of the important forms of patriotism.

In the second place, an individual is a unitary being. It is one whole, an individuum. In comparison with others, it is separate; in its own inner constitution, it is a unity. It is one in both its external and internal relations. Unity is of two grades, simple and complex. The simple unity means solidarity and that in the last analysis the individual cannot be further subdivided. An atom would be an individual of this kind. But in our actual experience we do not meet with such individuals. What we ordinarily mean by an individual is not that which is such by virtue of its indivisibility. Taken just as a physical fact, it is divisible. It is when we take it as a fact of meaning that we see what we ordinarily have in mind as an individual. An individual is such because nothing can be subtracted from it without destroying its distinctive character. It is a unity not because of physical indivisibility, not because it is a simple unit, but because, even in complexity, it has in it a principle of unity. The richness of variety in it only contributes to the richness of its individuality. Bosanquet has made the distinction between the two kinds of individuals. “Individuality, it has been said, has prima facie two extremes. An ‘atom’ may claim it, on the ground that it is less than can be divided; a world may claim it, on the ground that its positive nature is ruined if anything is added or taken away.”[147] In another place he says that an individuality is “a world self-complete.”[148] The principle that individuality means unity and the distinction between the two kinds of unity are well summed up in the following quotation: “That individuality always involves some sort of unity will hardly be denied. That which is in no sense one is in no sense an individual; and the more truly a thing can be called one, the more truly can it be called an individual. We must distinguish, however, between two aspects of unity,—the quantitative aspect or numerical unity, and the qualitative aspect or inner coherence.”[149] The atom was an example of numerical individuality; the qualitative individual would be exemplified in the life of a man. A human being can of course be rent limb from limb, but so far as bodily life is concerned he ceases then to be a man; his identity as a human individual has been destroyed.

Now a country is an individual by virtue of being a qualitative unity. It is a unity in difference. Aristotle says: “A state is not made up only of so many men, but of different kinds of men; for similars do not constitute a state.”[150] The unity of a country is not a simple but a complex unity. It is often quite rudimentary, but its essentials are there, if there is any country at all. And those essentials may be developed. They at least exist as the material for an ideal unity. National individuality, to be sure, is often an ideal rather than a present fact. But the patriot holds just this unity of his country in ideal, and strives towards it. His is a will to national unity, national individuality. There were in the revolutionary period two movements developing side by side,—the movements towards independence and unity. Washington was a patriot not only because he sought for separation from England, but because he consistently counselled unity as among the colonies. Lincoln was a patriot not in the sense that he stood for the separation of his country from other countries (there was no call for that), but in that he stood for the preservation of the unity of the United States. He preserved the Union. The nationalistic movements of the nineteenth century in Europe were directed in large part towards unity. The Germans and Italians strove to the end that all their people might be united. Those movements were struggles for national unity, and hence struggles for national individuality.

The stimulus of war brings out in supreme degree the demand of the patriot for national unity. The present war has compelled unity within each individual nation to an unparalleled extent. The whole population in each country has had to be organized for the war. The civil and military populations are not now as distinct as they once were. “The war is waged not only by the soldier but by the baker, the manufacturer, the engineer, the farmer, the small investor, the women. Unless, therefore, the emotions of the entire country can be keyed up to volunteer pitch and maintained at the point of fighting efficiency, the war machine loses momentum.”[151] The patriot sees the necessities of the times, and insists upon absolute unity. It is the form that his will to national individuality then takes.

The patriot ought, however, to remember that unity does not mean solidarity, and that a true individual is not one which has to be maintained by the suppression of all differences. The patriot insists so strongly upon unity, no doubt, because he believes that to act as one is the only way in which the national individuality can be preserved. But he should remember, as some one has remarked, that “a solid front does not necessitate a solid head.” The unity of patriotism is one of will, and moreover is one of good will. There cannot be national unity on any basis that ignores that fact. The honest pacifist should be treated accordingly. On the other hand, there is no reason why the pacifist should be made the recipient of peculiar honors or the object of special solicitude. He has thrown his opinion into the arena of human affairs, and will have to take his chances. And he in his turn should remember that the patriot is fighting for priceless possessions, more valuable than any material possessions, his own individuality and the individuality of his country. If the pacifist has a right to insist upon his opinion, he must accord the patriot the same right to insist upon his. What will take place if the patriot happens to have a large majority, and deems it most fair to enact a selective draft law? The pacifist can do no other than insist upon his inmost convictions. But neither can the patriot. There is inevitably a clash, and the problem is to be solved not only as a question of right, but also of expediency. It may easily be most expedient, it usually is so, for the patriot to grant easy terms to the pacifist. And the latter’s right to free speech and agitation, as long as he does not actually break or incite to the breaking of a law, is really indisputable. But the danger to national individuality may be great. It is conceivable that an aggressive enemy may be at the very doors. In that case, the nonconformist will have to become in some sense a martyr. If his country needs him, he ought either to serve or pay the penalty. He might have to suffer imprisonment. Or he might find it wisest and most effective to martyr his convictions to the extent of performing some patriotic service, even to bearing arms. The fact that the majority differs from him might well be an indication that he is wrong, and that he should revise his opinions or at least not insist upon them too strongly; and moreover, if one martyrs his convictions to the extent of helping win the war, he may expect then to get a more ready hearing for his opinions. One is always listened to more respectfully when he has identified himself with the group than when he has cut himself off from it. Conformity for the present might prove the best method of making his ideals effective in the long run. It is often easier to work from the inside than from the outside. The chick within the shell is in the very best position in the world for breaking through it.

But the essential point is that patriotism insists on unity within the nation. There is no nation engaged in the war which is not insisting upon the utmost unity of action and even of thought. And this rests back upon the unity that had already really been developed. If each country had not developed and marshaled its resources to such an extent in peace time, they could not be so mobilized in war time, and indeed there would be no need for it; the enemy would not be bringing such resources to bear. It is just the very complexity and unity in complexity in modern nations that makes war so drastic, and makes it so necessary that neither side should neglect the bringing of any of its resources to bear upon the waging of the war. The will to unity, a form of the will to individuality, is quite characteristic of patriotism.

A characteristic of individuality in human beings and their institutions is that an individual is self-directing; its destiny is worked out from within. The following quotation sums up what is meant: “We pass on to the third factor in individuality. We have spoken of it as completeness or self-sufficiency; but in its higher degrees it may also be called self-direction. That some measure of independence is essential to our notion of individuality will hardly be questioned.”[152] The phrase “have some individuality” means, in part at least, that one make his actions the expression of his own true self. It means to think and act for oneself. If one does not do that, we say that he is not a real individual. If one is not self-directing, and is subject to the will of another, his individuality is, in so far, taken from him, and he becomes a part of the individuality of that other. If he is integrated in the other’s will, he really in a true sense ceases to be even unique. Fite says: “As a spiritual individual I am found in every action that expresses my meaning, whether it be that of my hand, my typewriter, my servant, or my political party; and any object that refuses to express my meaning, though it be a member of my own body, is so far not truly myself.”[153] It follows that one has to be free and independent to be an individual. And this is the reason that freedom is so precious; not because the free man will live in better material circumstances, but because he wants to be an individual. He wants to be himself, and have his chance of working out his life in his own way.

And patriotism involves just this demand for liberty. The patriot wants his country to be free. It must, to satisfy him, be not only a recognizable separate unit as among the peoples of the world, but must run its own affairs. He wants it to be self-directing and autonomous. He cannot bear to have his country used as a thing, or a mere piece of mechanism at the mercy of another’s will. Any one who is patriotic in China will not be satisfied with a situation where any foreign power has concessions over parts of his country’s soil. Weak governments frequently find it necessary to guard their neutrality, and they do it jealously because the patriotic spirit will not permit them to allow others to put them in subjection as a means to the furtherance of alien designs. Belgium is an instance. Belgium does not want to be a roadway or the battlefield of Europe. She does not want to be a pawn in a game. She wants her territory to be the expression of her own free life. To stand for her neutrality is to stand for her sovereignty, and to assert herself. Belgium might utterly perish, but in doing so, she would have asserted herself, and she would rather die in that magnificent self-assertion than to be the tool of another. It is not often that a supposedly sovereign power will, like Luxemburg, allow its neutrality to be disregarded without a struggle. President Wilson understood the sensitiveness of patriots when he insisted that no foreign troops should be landed in Russia without her consent. Patriotism is often thought of altogether as the fight for freedom. The patriot insists upon the freedom, the autonomy, the sovereignty of his country; the will to self-direction is one of the moving forces of patriotism.

To be a true individual is to have some significance of one’s own. Individuality comes to mean marked individuality. It stands for the opposite of the quality of being common. The phrase “have some individuality” often means to have something for which one stands, and something that is really significant in the world. It means that one’s activities should be the expression of a life plan which is his, and which has real value. This characteristic takes a step beyond those of mere separateness and independence. When we say of one that he has no individuality, we do not mean that he is not numerically separate from other men, but, in part at least, that he has no life plan which is specially his own. He has no significance. The man who is an individual is one who has a specific character. And if he prides himself upon being an individual he wants to “be somebody.” He has “self-respect.” He regards himself as significant. He wants not only to count as one; he wants to count.

And, again, this is a characteristic of patriotism. Patriotism is a will to be nationally significant. It is national pride. It is national ambition, a will to self-respect and the respect of others, a will to national standing, greatness, distinction, importance, power. The existence of this will to be significant is why nations are so sensitive on points of honor and prestige. Their national significance is lowered if they allow, let us say, a public insult to go unavenged. It is a reason why nations cannot back down in a war when it once gets started, and why they can all be for peace after the war, but not while it is being waged. National significance, as national significance now goes, will not permit them to do other than win the war. This is why states like to regard themselves as “powers,” for it is as a “power” that a nation finds itself significant in world politics. It is why countries fight for their “civilization.” The predominance of their civilization means the fulfillment of their desire for national significance. It is why the knowledge of the history and literature of one’s country is likely to produce patriotism; such knowledge creates both a conviction of the country’s significance and the desire to realize it further.

The grounds upon which a country asserts its significance is an important matter. As long as military prowess and possession of much territory are esteemed to be things of great importance, the nations will strive to be significant by being distinguished for those things. If the ideals of mankind can be more largely turned to constructive activities, the nations will strive to be significant along those lines. There are patriots whose ideals are of the latter type. They seek the internal development of their country as a means of making it more worth while and hence more significant. The significance that they seek is not merely that which glories in the admiration and perhaps envy of the world; it is not a significance adjudged by a jury of mankind, but one that they themselves find in making their country approximate an ideal. Patriotism is the will to be nationally significant; another main characteristic of the will to individuality is what is working in important manifestations of patriotism.

An individual, at least a finite individual, is one of a community. And its individuality, therefore, rests upon a “broad basis of likeness.”[154] The conscious individual, for instance, does not strive to make his individuality consist in absolute difference. He wants to be different only within certain limits. He does not want to be “outlandish.” He wants in certain broad ways to be like his fellows. He would, if it were called to his attention, agree that his individuality rested in great measure upon membership in his community.

It is impossible for one to avoid seeing the fact that he is one in a world with others. The human individual is a social animal.[155] And this fact is formulative of his very individuality. Fite says, “Not only does ... intercourse with others broaden the range of your self-consciousness; it also furnishes the basis of contrast through which you become aware of yourself, and define yourself, and are enabled to assert yourself as a distinct and unique individual.”[156] Two points are involved in what Fite says. First, we become self-conscious in contrast with others; we know ourselves in that way. Second, our own individuality becomes richer because others exist. What they have become broadens one’s own vision of the range of human possibilities by so much the more; and that broader vision enriches and enlarges one’s own life. One will, then, find his life expanded by the multiplication of his social relations. “If our argument has shown anything, it has shown that through the extension of his social relations, the individual becomes, not less, but more of an individual, and acquires a greater individual freedom.”[157] The high integration of society is not necessarily inimical to the development of the individual. The fact is that as society has been builded into larger wholes, the individual has also become more and more significant. Royce says, “... our time shows us that individualism and collectivism are tendencies, each of which, as our social order grows, intensifies the other.”[158] And Royce draws this conclusion: “No individual human self can be saved except through the ceasing to be a mere individual.”[159]

The existence of others has important consequences for one’s practical attitude toward life. When one becomes aware of such existence he can no longer act as if it were not. “When I have perceived even a chair standing in my way I can no longer proceed as if it were not there.”[160] And one’s conduct will usually be more radically changed when it is human individuals that are in the way. The same knowledge which shows one himself shows him also other human beings who are just as real and important as himself, and upon the basis of that knowledge he can logically and ethically find no good reason for treating them merely as means for the furtherance of his own interests. He cannot simply walk over them as if they were not there. But if one is even wise, he will adopt no such ruthless plan of life. He will realize that consideration for others is best for himself. He will not only have less trouble, but he will also find his individuality enriched by his intercourse with other free beings who have their own meaning. One cannot be a positive reality unless his neighbors are also. And if these things are true, it means that the interests of the individuals of a community may be harmonized. When each one understands his own true nature, he at the same time realizes that his own good is best found in harmony with the others of his community. Individualism, rightly interpreted, attains the results desired by those who place the emphasis upon collectivism. Howison says: “The very quality of personality is, that a person is a being who recognizes others as having a reality as unquestionable as his own, and who thus sees himself as a member of a moral republic, standing to other persons in an immutable relationship of reciprocal duties and rights, himself endowed with dignity, and acknowledging the dignity of all the rest.”[161] This is an ideal of individuality as it appears in persons. The enlightened individual is really concerned about finding his proper place in his world.

Does patriotism recognize that individuality involves membership in a community? Does the patriot actually wish to realize the individuality of his country in that way? The answer is that he often does. There are patriots who have their hearts in the desire that their country be a good neighbor. This desire is, of course, not always present in the patriotic state of mind. But neither are the other characteristics of individuality always invariably present. Some of them are always present, and together they make up the will to individuality which is the essence of patriotism. It must be admitted that only too often does the patriot think of the individuality of his country as realized apart from or at the expense of others. The more generous notion of patriotism is still as much a problem as a fact. And yet, in times of peace at least, the patriot sees the good of countries other than his own. It is a defensible proposition that even the common man is capable of and actually does possess such vision. Certainly there are examples of illustrious patriots in whom it is found. The following has been penned concerning Professor Royce: “... his ethical idealism is best understood as an interpretation of the spirit of modern civilization as it had found expression in his native land. Not that there was anything of the Chauvinist in Royce. If there were aught of value in our social and political ideals it was due to the fact that they rested on principles that cross the boundaries between nations, and might equally serve as the basis of that community of nations to which he hopefully looked forward.”[162] But one can also place in evidence the very words of one of the greatest patriots of all time, Joseph Mazzini. Mazzini was devoted to the ideal of serving humanity. He wrote to the laboring people of his country: “Your first duties—first as regards importance—are, as I have already told you, towards Humanity. You are men before you are either citizens or fathers.”[163] But he was also an ardent patriot. He was devoted to Italy, to her freedom, unity, and significance. And he thought that Italians, like all other men, could serve humanity effectively only by being in association. “This means [of effective association],” he says, “was provided for you by God when he gave you a country; when, as a wise overseer of labor distributes the various branches of employment according to the different capacities of the workman, he divided Humanity into distinct groups or nuclei upon the face of the earth, thus creating the germ of Nationalities.”[164] The duty of a nation was to be the servant of humanity, but that was also its glory and its right to be. Patriotism and internationalism were complementary. “In labouring for our own country on the right principle, we labour for Humanity. Our country is the fulcrum of the lever we have to wield for the common good. If we abandon that fulcrum, we run the risk of rendering ourselves useless not only to humanity, but to our country itself. Before men can associate with the nations of which humanity is composed, they must have a National existence. There is no true association except among equals. It is only through our country that we can have a recognized collective existence.”[165] This, then, patriotism quite often actually is. And once more, in its positive recognition of the country as truly one of a community, patriotism turns out to be the working of the will to national individuality. This last phase is an altruistic form of the will.

The concept of the will to national individuality, derived from the popular definition of patriotism as the love of country and wrought out in the light of the data which clusters about that popular idea, proves to be a seminal principle. If one follows out the various forms of the will, he comes to the main forms of patriotism. He could, by a knowledge of the characteristics of the will to individuality, foretell in general what the manifestations of patriotism would be found to be.