I refered to Kierkegaard's book "The Crowd is Untruth" in my previous entry. Here I will quote a paragraph as an indication of what he says for those who may be interested.
"A crowd - not this or that, one now living or long dead, a crowd of the lowly or of nobles, of rich or poor, etc., but in its very concept - is untruth, since a crowd either renders the single individual wholly unrepentant and irresponsible, or weakens his responsibility by making it a fraction of his decision. Observe, there was not a single soldier who dared lay hands on Caius Marius; this was the truth. But given three or four women with the consciousness or idea of being a crowd, with a certain hope in the possibility that no-one could definitely say who it was started it, then they had the courage for it, what untruth! The untruth is first that it is "the crowd" which does what only the single individual in the crowd does. For a crowd is an abstraction which does not have hands; each single individual, on the other hand, normally has two hands, and when he, as a single individual, lays his two hands on Caius Marius, then it is the two hands of this single individual, not after all his neighbour's, even less the crowd's, which has no hands. In the next place, the untruth is that the crowd had "the courage" for it, for never at any time was even the most cowardly of all single individuals so cowardly as the crowd always is. For every single individual who escapes into the crowd, and thus flees ......contributes his share of cowardice to "the cowardice" which is the crowd.
The crowd is untruth. There is therefore no-one who has more contempt for what it is to be a human being than those who make it their profession to lead the crowd."
Copenhagen Spring 1847
I have quoted here from the kindle edition and do not have the page number, but this passage is near the beginning. I have omitted a few lines where the dots are to cut down the length. There is much more on this subject. In notes at the end of the book he clarifies,
"I have never denied, that is in relation to all temporal, earthly, worldly ends the crowd can have validity, even its validity as a decisive court of last resort. But I am not speaking of such things. Seen ethico-religiously the crowd is untruth when it is taken as a valid court of last resort for what "the truth" is. "The crowd" here is understood as a purely formal conceptual definition, not what one otherwise understands by "the crowd". "The crowd" is the number. As soon as the numeral is at work, the "crowd" is "the crowd"."
"A crowd - not this or that, one now living or long dead, a crowd of the lowly or of nobles, of rich or poor, etc., but in its very concept - is untruth, since a crowd either renders the single individual wholly unrepentant and irresponsible, or weakens his responsibility by making it a fraction of his decision. Observe, there was not a single soldier who dared lay hands on Caius Marius; this was the truth. But given three or four women with the consciousness or idea of being a crowd, with a certain hope in the possibility that no-one could definitely say who it was started it, then they had the courage for it, what untruth! The untruth is first that it is "the crowd" which does what only the single individual in the crowd does. For a crowd is an abstraction which does not have hands; each single individual, on the other hand, normally has two hands, and when he, as a single individual, lays his two hands on Caius Marius, then it is the two hands of this single individual, not after all his neighbour's, even less the crowd's, which has no hands. In the next place, the untruth is that the crowd had "the courage" for it, for never at any time was even the most cowardly of all single individuals so cowardly as the crowd always is. For every single individual who escapes into the crowd, and thus flees ......contributes his share of cowardice to "the cowardice" which is the crowd.
The crowd is untruth. There is therefore no-one who has more contempt for what it is to be a human being than those who make it their profession to lead the crowd."
Copenhagen Spring 1847
I have quoted here from the kindle edition and do not have the page number, but this passage is near the beginning. I have omitted a few lines where the dots are to cut down the length. There is much more on this subject. In notes at the end of the book he clarifies,
"I have never denied, that is in relation to all temporal, earthly, worldly ends the crowd can have validity, even its validity as a decisive court of last resort. But I am not speaking of such things. Seen ethico-religiously the crowd is untruth when it is taken as a valid court of last resort for what "the truth" is. "The crowd" here is understood as a purely formal conceptual definition, not what one otherwise understands by "the crowd". "The crowd" is the number. As soon as the numeral is at work, the "crowd" is "the crowd"."
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