296 | MP conclusion

to shake off their oppressors once and for all. The
'rational' party members can then, after the conquest of
power, educate the rest of the population. Since, in their
kindness, they will 'disoppress' (liberate) the masses,
these will gradually lose the irrational ideas which they
owed to oppression, and all will be well. This attractive
scheme does not explain what makes the party members so
exceptionally rational that they will disoppress the masses.

On the other hand, if we believe that a rational saciety
cannot be achieved before the majority of people have become
rational, mass propaganda is not likely to bring us nearer
our goal. It has, as we showed, to further irrational
emotions, and one expects it to throw a veil of lies over
events, and to enable its addicts to vegetate in the
twilight of self-deception.

In all these questions we have not yet found a standard
which allows us to decide where the truth really lies. On
one point, however, agreement is, I think, possible already
now.

It would be a great relief for all of us if the scope of
our social instincts could be increased. All that isolates
damns. All that associates, saves. These words sum up
the gist of what psychologists know about mental hygiene.
Mental disorders can be cured only by satisfactory social
relations. "Fellowship is heaven, and the lack of fellowship
is hell: fellowship is heaven, and the lack of fellowship
is death", as William Morris put it. The fact that the
present social and economic system undermines the feeling of