Gustave Le Bon on the transformation of men by crowds

By the mere fact that he forms part of an organised crowd, a man descends several rungs in the ladder of civilisation.  Isolated, he may be a cultivated individual; in a crowd, he is a barbarian — that is, a creature acting by instinct.

~ Gustave Le Bon

Gustave Le Bon on crowds and civilization

The ascendancy of crowds indicates the death throes of a civilisation.  The upward climb to civilisation is an intellectual process driven by individuals; the descent is a herd in stampede.  Crowds are only useful for destruction.

~ Gustave Le Bon

Gustave Le Bon on crowd behavior and images

A crowd thinks in images, and the image itself calls up a series of other images, having no logical connection with the first...  A crowd scarcely distinguishes between the subjective and the objective.  It accepts as real the images invoked in its mind, though they most often have only a very distant relation with the observed facts...  Crowds being only capable of thinking in images are only to be impressed by images. 

~ Gustave Le Bon

Gustave Le Bon on how the crowd clamors for illusions

The masses have never thirsted after truth.  Whoever can supply them with illusions is easily their master; whoever attempts to destroy their illusions is always their victim.

~ Gustave Le Bon, The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind, p. 137