The Crowd

In this fascinating book, Gustave Le Bon examines the psychology of crowds. He posits that crowds have personalities, just like individuals, and that individuals change when part of a crowd. "The most careful observations seem to prove that an individual immersed for some length of time in a crowd in action soon finds himself-either in consequence of the magnetic influence given out by the crowd, or from some other cause of which we are ignorant-in a special state, which much resembles the state of fascination in which the hypnotized individual finds himself in the hands of the hypnotizer. The activity of the brain being paralysed in the case of the hypnotized subject, the latter becomes the slave of all the unconscious activities of his spinal cord, which the hypnotizer directs at will. The conscious personality has entirely vanished; will and discernment are lost. All feelings and thoughts are bent in the direction determined by the hypnotizer." This edition has been completely reset in fresh type.