Schoeck_2010_EnvyATheoryOfSocialBehaviour.pdf

340 THE EMINENT IN THE SOCIETY OF EQUALS
of power at the disposal of the individual, one consequence was greater
immunity from the threat of the evil eye exerted by the less gifted and the
less successful.
The virtue and value of modesty in a society may be indispensable;
yet it would be a highly questionable procedure if those seeking power
should intensify, by propaganda or rhetoric, the modesty of the individual
citizen, which derives from the vague fear of being envied, until it
becomes an attitude of neurotic envy-avoidance, thus making possible
the enactment of levelling measures which, among other things, facilitate
the control of the society by those in authority.