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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from The Crowd by Gustave le Bon: intelligence that shapes the destiny of the world, but very
indirectly. The philosophers who evolve ideas have long since
returned to dust, when, as the result of the process I have just
described, the fruit of their reflection ends by triumphing.
3. PRESTIGE
Great power is given to ideas propagated by affirmation,
repetition, and contagion by the circumstance that they acquire
in time that mysterious force known as prestige.
Whatever has been a ruling power in the world, whether it be
ideas or men, has in the main enforced its authority by means of
that irresistible force expressed by the word "prestige." The
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