“Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, and one by one.”

—  Charles Mackay, book Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds

Source: Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds (1841)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their se…" by Charles Mackay?
Charles Mackay photo
Charles Mackay22
British writer 1814–1889

Related quotes

Bertrand Russell photo

“It is normal to hate what we fear, and it happens frequently, though not always, that we fear what we hate. I think it may be taken as the rule among primitive men, that they both fear and hate whatever is unfamiliar. They have their own herd, originally a very small one. And within one herd, all are friends, unless there is some special ground of enmity. Other herds are potential or actual enemies; a single member of one of them who strays by accident will be killed. An alien herd as a whole will be avoided or fought according to circumstances. It is this primitive mechanism which still controls our instinctive reaction to foreign nations. The completely untravelled person will view all foreigners as the savage regards a member of another herd. But the man who has travelled, or who has studied international politics, will have discovered that, if his herd is to prosper, it must, to some degree, become amalgamated with other herds.”

Bertrand Russell (1872–1970) logician, one of the first analytic philosophers and political activist

1950s, What Desires Are Politically Important? (1950)

Richard Dawkins photo

“Indeed, organizing atheists has been compared to herding cats, because they tend to think independently and will not conform to authority.”

Richard Dawkins book The God Delusion

Source: The God Delusion

Al-Tabari photo

“We have been dealt a situation from which there is no escape. You have seen what Muhammad has done. Arabs have submitted to him and we do not have the strength to fight. You know that no herd is safe from him. And no one even dares go outside for fear of being terrorized.”

Al-Tabari (839–923) influential Persian scholar, historian and exegete of the Qur'an

Source: Al-Tabari, Vol. 9, p. 42

John Steinbeck photo

“Free men cannot start a war, but once it is started, they can fight on in defeat. Herd men, followers of a leader, cannot do that, and so it is always the herd men who win battles and the free men who win wars.”

John Steinbeck book The Moon Is Down

Source: The Moon Is Down

Bertrand Russell photo

“The world at present is obsessed by the conflict of rival ideologies, and one of the apparent causes of conflict is the desire for the victory of our own ideology and the defeat of the other. I do not think that the fundamental motive here has much to do with ideologies. I think the ideologies are merely a way of grouping people, and that the passions involved are merely those which always arise between rival groups. Ideologies, in fact, are one of the methods by which herds are created, and the psychology is much the same however the herd may have been generated.”

Bertrand Russell (1872–1970) logician, one of the first analytic philosophers and political activist

1950s, What Desires Are Politically Important? (1950)

Everett Dean Martin photo

“One of the serious results of propaganda is that it has caused the public to think that education and propaganda are the same thing, and thus to make an ignorant multitude believe it is being educated when it is only being manipulated. Education aims at independence of judgement. Propaganda offers ready-made opinions for the unthinking herd.”

Everett Dean Martin (1880–1941)

Source: Are We Victims of Propaganda, Our Invisible Masters: A Debate with Edward Bernays (1929), p. 145

D.H. Lawrence photo

“And dimly she realized one of the great laws of the human soul: that when the emotional soul receives a wounding shock, which does not kill the body, the soul seems to recover as the body recovers. But this is only appearance. It is really only the mechanism of the reassumed habit. Slowly, slowly the wound to the soul begins to make itself felt, like a bruise, which only slowly deepens its terrible ache, till it fills all the psyche. And when we think we have recovered and forgotten, it is then that the terrible after-effects have to be encountered at their worst.”

D.H. Lawrence book Lady Chatterley's Lover

Lady Chatterley's Lover (1928)

Joshua Jackson photo

“Right now there are a lot of young actors out there. And in the next couple of years, there's inevitably going to be a thinning of the herd. I think if I improve as I go, I'll survive the slaughter.”

Joshua Jackson (1978) Canadian actor

As quoted in the article 'Joshua Makes a Splash" in TV Guide magazine (April 15th, 2000)

John Dryden photo

“But far more numerous was the herd of such,
Who think too little, and who talk too much.”

John Dryden Absalom and Achitophel

Pt. I, lines 532–533. Compare Matthew Prior, Upon a Passage in the Scaligerana, "They always talk who never think".
Source: Absalom and Achitophel (1681)

Related topics