Nor how trust gradually spreads through a
newspaper or an acquaintance who is interested in public affairs to
public personages. The literature of psychoanalysis is rich in
suggestive hypothesis.
At any rate we do find ourselves trusting certain people, who
constitute our means of junction with pretty nearly the whole realm of
unknown things. Strangely enough, this fact is sometimes regarded as
inherently undignified, as evidence of our sheep-like, ape-like
nature. But complete independence in the universe is simply
unthinkable. If we could not take practically everything for granted,
we should spend our lives in utter triviality. The nearest thing to a
wholly independent adult is a hermit, and the range of a hermit's
action is very short. Acting entirely for himself, he can act only
within a tiny radius and for simple ends. If he has time to think
great thoughts we can be certain that he has accepted without
question, before he went in for being a hermit, a whole repertory of
painfully acquired information about how to keep warm and how to keep
from being hungry, and also about what the great questions are.
On all but a very few matters for short stretches in our lives, the
utmost independence that we can exercise is to multiply the
authorities to whom we give a friendly hearing. As congenital amateurs
our quest for truth consists in stirring up the experts, and forcing
them to answer any heresy that has the accent of conviction.
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