A Religious Shape
Le Bon lists a number of the characteristics of crowds that he has discussed thus far, and recognizes that their convictions have the following qualities:
- They accept or reject ideas as a whole
- They polarize to the extremes
- They are motivated primarily by primitive emotions (hatred and fear)
- They have an extremely limited capacity for reasoning
- They do not tolerate dissent or discussion
- They are quick to take action, even to their own detriment
- They blindly follow their chosen leaders
- They are prone to violent outbursts
- They are drawn to established ideas and resist new ones
The convictions of crowds assume those characteristics of blind submission, fierce intolerance, and the need of violent propaganda that are inherent in religious sentiment, and it is for this reason that Le Bon asserts that the beliefs of crowds have "a religious form."
Religion represents a core of unquestioned and unquestionable beliefs, and is accompanied by intolerance and fanaticism. Those two qualities can be seen, albeit less frequently, in non-religions matters: any philosophy that is based on a dogma and demands compliance without question is a form of religion, even if it has no supernatural component. The Jacobins during the Reign of Terror were essentially as religious as the Catholics during the Inquisition.
The similarity between religion and crowd psychology is not accidental: a religious creed is successful precisely because it is successful in inspiring crowds of people and instilling in them fanatical sentiments.
Consider the example of the Roman Empire: it was not maintained by force, as it never had more than thirty legions, which were wholly insufficient to maintain direct control over a hundred million subjects. Instead, Rome maintained loyalty and fanaticism by means of the religious admiration it inspired. At a time when all of Europe was populated by barbarians living in squalor, the city of Rome was an otherworldly place that inspired awe. Its representatives and leaders were likened to priests or messiahs for the ideals they represented.
People, as a rule, are superstitious - and while one religion sometimes replaces another, the concept of religion remains even when society has become secular. The faith placed in the Roman republic and the French republic was religious in nature: the belief in abstract ideals that could have a transformative effect on adherents, maintained in spite of the fact that those ideals were never realized.
Certain historical events cannot be explained except by the religious convictions of crowds, as there are many instances in which events were predicated on irrational ideals. The inquisition, the reformation, and the reign of terror all had in common the religious sentiments - a fear that united people, and a hatred that caused them to set upon their perceived enemies with ferocity.