Dear, very dear, to himself, he [the plebeian] would be hard put to say anything about this self which would explain why he, or anyone, should hold i… - R. W. K. Paterson

The direction in which to look for the patrician is always upwards. This is because his nature is to aspire, to rise always higher—not necessarily to rise above others but to rise above where he himself has been and above things as he finds them.

It is rare to find the ideal of the patrician standing alone, not joining hands, albeit unavoidably and sometimes most reluctantly, with the ideals of very different human types. Even Plato’s Guardians, who have had the vision of The Good, are presented first of all as ideals rulers of earthly men, although Plato will soon openly declare that the commonwealth of which they are master is ‘set up in the heavens for one who desires to see it, to found one in himself, and whether it exists or ever will exist is no matter, for this is the only commonwealth in who politics he can ever take part’.

The plebeian … absorbs himself in tasks, whether pleasant or tedious, and in the procedures, complicated or simple, needed to carry out these tasks, and he thinks of himself as busy, as usefully occupied. He tries not to think about the end purposes of his activities, where they are supposed to be ultimately leading him to, for he dimly surmises that they are leading him nowhere.