《乌合之众·第一编·群体的心理·群体的情感与道德》第15节
Unfortunately, legends--even although they have been definitely put on record by books--have in themselves no stability. The imagination of the crowd continually transforms them as the result of the lapse of time and especially in consequence of racial causes. There is a great gulf fixed between the sanguinary Jehovah of the Old Testament and the God of Love of Sainte Therese, and the Buddha worshipped in China has no traits in common with that venerated in India. It is not even necessary that heroes should be separated from us by centuries for their legend to be transformed by the imagination of the crowd. The transformation occasionally takes place within a few years. In our own day we have seen the legend of one of the greatest heroes of history modified several times in less than fifty years. Under the Bourbons Napoleon became a sort of idyllic and liberal philanthropist, a friend of the humble who, according to the poets, was destined to be long remembered in the cottage. Thirty years afterwards this easy-going hero had become a sanguinary despot, who, after having usurped power and destroyed liberty, caused the slaughter of three million men solely to satisfy his ambition. At present we are witnessing a fresh transformation of the legend. When it has undergone the influence of some dozens of centuries the learned men of the future, face to face with these contradictory accounts, will perhaps doubt the very existence of the hero, as some of them now doubt that of Buddha, and will see in him nothing more than a solar myth or a development of the legend of Hercules. They will doubtless console themselves easily for this uncertainty, for, better initiated than we are to-day in the characteristics and psychology of crowds, they will know that history is scarcely capable of preserving the memory of anything except myths.
注释摘要
勒庞在这段里继续推进他对群体观察能力的批判，从目击证词的不可靠，转向一个更宏大的结论：连被文字固定在书中的历史记忆，都不可能摆脱群体想象的持续改造。他先是用宗教形象的变化作铺垫：旧约里血腥的耶和华，和圣德肋撒所爱的上帝之间隔着一道深渊，中国的佛陀和印度的佛陀也几乎没有共同之处。这一组比较意在说明，哪怕最初有经典文本撑着，信仰的集体想象一旦在不同时代、不同土…