By ARTHUR F. THORN.

Author of “Richard Jefferies and Civilizations,” “Social Satires,” etc.

THE ILLUSTRATED LONDON NEWS, November 2, 1918.

THE truth that civilization has been strained almost to breaking point by the war will not be denied by those who are able to recall the cataclysmic events of the past four and a-half years.

Nothing less than a revolution has taken place in society, but its progress has been too gradual for immediate realization; the spectacular horrors of modern warfare have largely distracted the public consciousness from the social changes which have come about as a result of world conflict, but when peace comes these things will need to be appreciated in their true perspectives.

The future will consist mainly of social problems that will demand the concentrated mental effort of every individual brain

Vital national issues directly affecting the lives of the people will demand serious consideration and successful treatment, not only by a few men of genius, but by the people themselves.

There will be a vacuum in the social atmosphere that will draw all mentalities into its vortex, and if those mentalities are insufficiently equipped for the strain which will be put upon them, then the wisest plans of the minority will prove ineffectual.

How few are able to grasp mentally the significance of the present moment, or to visualize the intensely dramatic possibilities of the near future?

How few are able to perceive that the war has, in the sense of destruction, set civilization back a century, and that it will be absolutely necessary to repair the wreckage as soon as possible after peace is desired?

The emotional reaction of joy will that will inevitably succeed the birth of peace will, for a time, subordinate every other public emotion.

One can quite clearly visualize a condition of happy chaos that will laugh in the face of serious thought and be quite unable to appreciate the fact that grave danger still threatens civilizations—that nothing short of collective intelligence and collective thinking will assure a safe future for democracy.

The future needs thought as the human body needs food,

• it needs dynamic ideas and ideals,
• it needs effectively applied mental science, and
• it needs human understanding.

The failure of the past to secure for the people a general high standard of living and social security which might leave man free to become aware of his higher mental self: this failure has been due to the absence of collective thought—the failure, in fact, of the average undeveloped mind.

Let us examine this question closely.

Great ideals and schemes for the betterment of mankind have been conceived and expressed by thinkers whose sole motive was the uplifting of their fellow man. They had no axe to grind—men like Ruskin, William Morris, Tolstoy, Emerson, and many others, whose life work was directed towards the elevation of mankind.

These great men were not in themselves failures; they expressed their ideas very clearly; it is humanity that has failed, not the men of genius who have pointed a way to emancipation.

Why have these mental pioneers been unable to produce a full and satisfactory result?

Why has humanity failed to utilize the ideals of its great teachers?

There is no excuse for humanity:

• humanity has consistently refused to think,
• it has neglected its mind,
• failed to realize the importance of ideas, and, in doing so
• has allowed the paralyzing forces of ignorance to overwhelm it.

False dignity cannot point a flaw in this argument; it is as clear as the sun in mid-heaven.

Thought, rightly directed and intelligently applied to the complex problems of human life, can alone lift the race beyond the devastating effects of mental apathy and intellectual inertia.

We have neglected our brains; we have failed to apprehend the infinite power of mind; and we suffer in consequence. Then, it will at once be said, education is also a failure.

What has education been doing all these years?

What is wrong with our educational system that the average person is not, in the highest sense of the word, educated?

The answer is, that educationists have been much too anxious to provide a utilitarian education; an education purposely designed to fit in with conventional ideas of life, and with things as they are.

Educationists have not properly appreciated the fact of individual psychology.

Conventional education may impart much valuable technical knowledge, and, at the same time, fail to draw out those vital qualities of personal initiative and individual thought which are alone able to develop the pupil’s highest potentialities.

The result of such education is not a mind alive to the color and joyous possibilities of life, but a mind encumbered with a certain mechanical arrangement of facts that are, within limits, quite useful, but which are also narrowly restricted, and do not, as a rule, enable the individual to become intimate with the possibilities of his or her own unique personality.