John Dewey: “Popular government has at least created public spirit even if its success in informing that spirit has not been great.”

But the wingèd words of conversation in immediate intercourse have a vital import lacking in the fixed and frozen words of written speech.

Publication is partial and the public which results is partially informed and formed until the meanings it purveys pass from mouth to mouth.

That and that only gives reality to public opinion.

The problem of securing diffused and seminal intelligence can be solved only in the degree in which local communal life becomes a reality.