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(Philosophy ...)

[tape interruption]

(Philosophy 10, March 17th, 1954.)

I'd better go home right away. I mean, after class.

In these four cycles, gentlemen, these four stages -- these -- in these three cycles -- theology, of the universities, scholasticism; academic knowledge, the natural sciences, in the academic cycle; and the social sciences, at this moment in a turmoil of preparation, semi-natural sciences and semi-social, as they are -- all are represented in their various phases by great men. They all co-exist. At every one moment, we have today too still theology and natural science. But you will agree that even the physicists are at this moment yearning for some social wisdom, so that the atomic bomb doesn't have to be thrown and that their secrecy can be lifted, under which they suffer, which is a purely social arrangement, their scientific research. And you know how these physicists labor at this moment under this se- -- secrecy. They aren't accustomed to that. All science was, for the last 800 years, open. The Americans have introduced this new-fangled idea that it has to be secret. The Americans have introduced this. And that's -- { } -- has been { } in this country, because what we -- when we tried the -- began the atomic research, you know on what it was based? On German publications of the year of the Lord 1938. German science was still, even under Hitler, freer than American science is at this moment.

You never think up to four here, in this country. You think this is -- you can always talk about liberty and democracy and lose it in the same time -- at the same time. Something terrible has happened here. Science has been deprived of its cyclical value, that it must go from idea to commonplace. Now, if this is true, gentlemen, then physics has to conquer the man on the street. Then the boy who listens to stratospheric radio talks is right. And Mr. -- what was the man named, Mr. Groves? -- was this the general? -- what was the general's name, you see? -- was wrong.

So we are in a very serious predicament, gentlemen. The progress of science is at this moment in great danger of being abandoned. Totally abandoned, because you cannot have scientific progress in part. You cannot say, "Certain things cannot be mentioned, and others can." That's -- you cannot divide knowledge. Truth is one. You cannot say, "This chapter is closed, and all the others are open."

Because the next thing is: they will clamp down on me and say I cannot criticize this arrangement here in class, you see. So then you have already abolished the second part of science, you see, that it can be talked over in an educational institution freely.

The danger is terrific, and is -- at this moment I foresee very dark ages for the next 30 years. We'll have great difficulties. And I don't know if this country will overcome it, because in the -- you see, now to characterize it once more -- when you come to the commonplace state -- stage, as you see it now at this moment with natural science in this country, everybody can buy a book on mathematics which is called Mathematics for the Millions, you see, and which contains onemillionth of mathematics. Then the only movement, only spiritual movement is sensation from day to day, because the man in the street no longer looks up to the Reverend So-and-So, as his teacher; and the teacher doesn't look up to the Reverend So-and-So, his research scholar -- his sci- -- authority; and the authority doesn't go down on his knees and praise God for genius. And if you don't have this relation of gratitude, gentlemen, of mankind's layers of -- for each other, you cannot {penetrate}.

A German university is as dead as a dodo at this moment, because it doesn't believe that Nietzsche or Goethe were people on whom their own life depends, you see? They don't believe that the genius is outside the organized science.

The French -- well, I won't go into this, because they are, as you know, the most asocial people. They just -- everybody to himself. They don't believe that the -- that the man who has the idea must be carried on the shoulders, so to speak, by the organized group of good brothers, you see. There is no frater- -- no fraternity in France. There everybody stabs everybody in the back.

And in England, as you know, people are snobs. And people who are snobs think that to be -- to pose as educated is everything. Where it comes from, you see, and where it goes to, is the -- is not the Englishman's concern.

And in America, as I said, we live here by the sensation. If you -- these pictures of the perversion of these four nations is -- is very useful, I think, in order to tell you that as educated people, you must overcome the gross caricature of your own nationality, and its mental behavior. It is not enough for you to say, "Well, I'm an American, therefore I must." Or "I'm an Englishman," or "I'm a German," you see. This no longer, after this catastrophe of the Western world, suffices. You are not allowed to say, "I do as the Romans do," because you then will just go insane. And sometimes you have the impression that the Western world overwhelmingly is mentally unproductive and insane. This is my impression, very likely.

And it is the same in all the countries, because they lean back and say -- you talk to a Frenchman and he says, "Well, I can't help. I'm French." You go along to a German, and he says, "Can't help. I'm German." And on it goes. Well, if this is the last line of -- you see, of retreat, of course you can no longer argue with these people. They made a vice into the basis of their justification. And that's going on in this country, too, of course -- {exactly} the same time -- the same thing.

And so let us look at the perversion. The perversion is very simple, that the connection is given up with the other cataracts, the other terraces of the spiritual waters that have to run down this way. And this is really true. They come from the mountain peak, and that is the hero of the story. And they go down to sea level, where all know it. That was Mr. {Penzel}, as you'll remember, our scandal {on} -- our scandal, that you said "everyone." And I meant sea level, where you don't say, "every drop of water," but you have some expression for the "all," because every one -- single man disappears, you see. He is no longer responsible for the truth. The man in the street is the man you say -- who says, "Everybody else knows it, therefore I have to -- not to pay any -- make any sacrifice for knowing it." It's too cheap, you see. No effort.

And we said -- you'll remember we said the whole man is singled out. Jesus is singled out at Christmas to be the victim of the human race. He's the hero of Christianity. That is, a man who is -- or take a man in the secular field like Goethe -- born a speaker and becoming the greatest natural scientist, and the greatest research man, poet, speaker and social orga- -- I mean, sage of society that mankind has had, so far, as the grot- -- great prophet of the new cycle of the social sciences.

You get this man's, we said -- whole life, from birth to death is included. He serves it. He's born to do it. We said the scientist does it as a life vo- -- life's -- his life's vocation. That is, he does it not for his whole life. At one time, he decides, "I'll do this." So he is not molded by the gods. He is not molded by fate and destiny, but by his own decision. You see, it's a great difference, whether you have to be something, because there's -- everything, you see, is making you into something, or you decide one day it's a good idea to become a doctor, you see, a professional. You see, there's a great difference in this. Will cannot do everything that -- that genius can.

I had a long discussion yesterday at lunch with Mr. Sidney Hook on this topic. Who listened to him? He's a man absolutely of consciousness and will. And he only accepted the second stage of life as possible. He could not admit that people were called, and that they had to avoid willing, and to be too conscious of -- because they are driven to these things like poet- -- the artist, you see, or the prophet, or the seer. That is, they had to do things. They were led to things to do,

but it wasn't their -- of their free choosing. Just as little as -- as Jesus took a pleasure to go Gethsemane.

(Isn't Stage 1, of the {peak}, the strongest will, though?)

No, "Thy will be done," not mine, Sir. Now, you can trans- -- pervert this into your own will, but I think you do a wrong to the prayer.

You can do everything by logic, you see, but some experience will show you that this is not true, that it is really against your will that you are overcome by necessity. Any man who had to defend a fortification against an enemy will pray, "I don't will -- die -- want to die here, really not, but thy will be done," Sir. And if you ever had to defend a weak point in the -- in the line of your army, my dear man, you would not suggest that it is always your own will. That's the strongest will. Of course, you can say the man, you see, the hero overcomes his first will, then wills. But he doesn't do it because it isn't his will, you see, but because it is in the cards, because somebody has to do it, you understand?

So it is a wiping-out on -- of one's own will which is the important insight you must gain. I grant you that we call such a brave man who is willing to be killed at the weakest point, you see, we -- we say he is brave, but that doesn't mean that he wills it. You understand?

(I see.)

You cannot -- you cannot introduce this. This is a kind of juggling of sophistry, which is very widely spread in this country, where you believe everything is will. This was the argument yesterday with Mr. Hook. Was quite interesting, you see. I spoke of these greater powers of authority, of leadership, of inspiration, which suddenly make the people listen to a man and go after, you see, with him wherever he leads. And he said, "Well, that's just will and consciousness."

And I said, "Pardon me. It is that this man does not will, and that he does not base it on his consciousness that gives him the faith of the millions."

Well, there's a -- there's a vacuum. He's a humanist, you see, and an enlight- -- man of the Enlightenment. He doesn't believe that this sphere exists, you see. It just doesn't exist. You can't prove it very hard to a man who -- if a man is colorblind, he's color-blind.

Well, most people are color-blind today to one of these four stages, gentlemen. A Frenchman, when you say to him, "Well, an invention -- or property must become common-sensed -- common to all," we are all in this sense much more

Communist. And the French say, "No, I like my private property, and I love it all the more the less other people have something." And that's what a Frenchman feels. He is not glad that other people have something, too. But he is glad because he has something other people have not. This is a man who is absolutely and totally blind to the existence of the sea -- of the ocean of mankind, you see, which at this moment I want to build up in you as -- as -- as being very respectable, very real. The common man has a right to all these great things genius discovers, you see. That's why the nations have to be christened. It isn't enough that Christ came into the world of some interesting saints. All can participate in this jubilation of -- that we are all free, and all equal.

But you understand -- we'll see this, from the point of view of the -- of the creator of these values, you can also find a snob, a -- man who says, "I'm delighted that not everybody knows what I know." A perfectly possible attitude, you see. "It pleases me more that I know something, because I am one of the happy few."

And that's very much -- very -- I'm afraid to say, I don't wish to do an injustice here to a whole nation, but I do know this from my own prof- -- experience that envy in France and this lack of frater- -- fraternity is a terrible disease, that the -- the rich people in France, as you know, do not care what is next door. They just -- perfectly indifferent. It's as bad as on Park Avenue. And there is some rejoicing that the other fellow doesn't have something which I have.

So there is no continuation of this {hope}. The mountain peak, so to speak, doesn't want his source to become a brook. Now we go to Germany and there you will find that the brook doesn't want to become a river. That is, that the people in science are very willing to recognize each other. And you see this -- why is Germany the most titled country, where everybody is Geheimrat, and -- and -- and Rat and -- and -- the titles are on end, you see. It's a very clumsy country to live in, because you have to give even the wife and -- sometimes even the daughter the full title.

There was a -- still the story of a little university town in Germany where the -- a young lady didn't get a husband. And she had been the daughter of a professor. And so in order to comfort her, the people began to call her "Miss Professor," just to recognize the title of the father, you see, in her social position. You can hardly see the joke, because here might be -- in America you have Miss Professors. Professor Adamson, for example. But this girl could hardly cook, and she was called "Miss Professor" by hered- -- by heredity, so to speak, you see, in order to prove that she belonged to the chosen few, to this class which -- which preserved science, and scholarship and, you see, and professionalism.

We had a -- of course full professors, and associate professors, and assistant professors in -- in Germany. And so the lady who was the wife of an associate professor would always call my wife with the full title, "Mrs. Professor," to mark out that she was conscious that my professor title was better than her professor's title -- husband's title of professor, you see. I had the full {spirit of worth}, you see, and he had only half of it.

Well, here you get then not the envy of the -- of the French. You don't get this -- this callousness to the poor. But in Germany, you get the mutual recognition and the encumberment of title. Everybody is -- is addressed with full title. Hardly do you say -- call the president "President." You say, "Eisenhower," you see. But in Germany, you call everybody with more than his title, so to speak. You -- you enhance his specialty, his competency in a scientific group, because science, gentlemen, needs to be competent in a -- { } a field. This is the authority, you see, on worms, and that is the authority on lions.

So we have here a great vice. This is the national vice -- titularism, you may call it. How do you say -- title? Hard to form a verb of abuse of title. One -- how would you call it? Ceremony -- standing on ceremony, you could call it. But it isn't quite that, you see. It's -- the nearest we have in our language, "to stand on ceremony."

The -- the English, as I said, every scholar there runs around with an attach‚ case, and when you ask what is in it, he says, "Oh, I'm just going off hunting for the weekend." And when you open this -- the attach‚ case in his absence, they are books. He's just as hard a worker as a German, but the German will boast with his -- with his studies. And the English will conceal them. You mustn't show that you work, because you want to be a gentlemen. So the whole life in England is based on the assumption that everybody is well-to-do. And everybody is a gentlemen. And they don't respect intelligence, you know. The more stupid, the more advanced you are. Look at Mr. Baldwin, Mr. Chamberlain, and Mr. Atlee. That's a collection of idiots.

And Mr. Churchill -- they always said he couldn't become prime minister, because he was too brilliant. Now, have you ever heard such a thing? You see, he was too brilliant. In Germany, and in France, that would be a recommendation, you see. In -- in England, they kept him out of government because he was too brilliant. And if you are stupid, you -- you're -- you're sa- -- you -- you see, you belong to the group, to the educated group, and no -- you don't -- you don't have any personal ambition, as the French; and you have no pride in your specialty, in your professionalism, that you know how to be a diplomat. No. Everybody in England, you see, who belongs to the educated group is good for {every day}.

If you read the history of English politics, of the last 300 years, the most amazing thing is, you see, that anyone who belongs to this group can do anything. Mr. Atlee can become prime minister; Mr. Bevins -- can be minister of foreign affairs. People do not know anything of anything. Well it's -- well, of course, you aren't sur- -- not surprised. It happens in this country, too.

The condition however in England was a certain degree of not common sense, at all, but education or eccentricity in education. These lords and these gentlemen, they had to have manners. So you may say that the English have mannerisms. It's the only country where manners matter. In Germany, ceremonies matter. And in -- in -- in -- in -- in France, originality matters. Now, in this country, as you know, it matters to begin with a joke, and to be very humble and say first that -- you are the great expert on the field, you say, "I -- of course, I know nothing, dear people, and you know -- understand that you know just as much as I," and then they all believe him. Why they should listen to him, nobody knows, because it's a contradiction in terms. But you -- this is a humility which is demanded here from a public speaker, that he must assure his audience that he is still more stupid than they. And then he says, "You are, of course, intelligent. You will be able to criticize what I'm going to say very easily. I'm sure I make many mistakes." And then, you see, the ceremonies of this country are all observed.

The ceremonies, then are that the low-brows are in the chair, you see, and the high-brows are accused. That is the common-sense situation. Give me the ideas of others -- here, one of you wrote a paper -- he is not here, so I can speak freely -- in the other course. It begins: "In general, I'm in agreement with your approach to life."

Now, I daresay, if he hadn't written this sentence, he would -- he would impress me a little more. It's a stupid sentence. He's my student. I give him -- have a course with him. I do not care whether he agrees with my approach to life in the least, gentlemen. I want to find out if he knows something, and if he understands something. Since he cannot -- why -- is it catering, or is it judgment? It's -- it's certainly impertinent. He has no idea of my approach to life. I haven't hit him, yet. I haven't raped his daugh- -- his sister. I haven't done anything to him -- with him. He's seen me in class. What does he know of my approach to life?

But he thinks it is very important that I'm collecting votes. Gentlemen, I'm not going to give you a quiz: how do you approve of my approach to life? I've never seen such a silly sentence, with which he begins this { }. But he thinks he's very smart, or doesn't know, because here is the -- common sense sitting in judgment over the whole history of mankind, and all the ideas, and all the sciences, and all the educations that have gone before, of which I have tried to

be -- the careful and -- and solid faucet to communicate all this to him. He mistakes all this as a private enterprise of mine, you see, of which he is just as much competent judge as I am myself. Now, I have never said that I'm the competent judge of this whole stream of life. I'm carrying it on to you, gentlemen. I'm not inventing these things. It's not my property. They must be said, so that life exists.

So the whole sentence is typical of the American approach. "I am in general in agreement," you see, "with your approach of life." This you can only have if you break society into an ocean of water drops in which everybody opens his mouth and says, "I agree" or "I disagree." That's not how the ocean is formed, gentlemen. When everybody buys a telephone or a television set, he just buys a television set, whether he -- says "I agree with the television set," the -- he re- -- gets the thing ready-made. The drop in the water of the ocean, gentlemen, reaches -- it -- is reached by the truth in its finished form. And he no longer can alter it. His agreement or disagreement doesn't count at all. You can't buy -- build the cars yourself. You accept them, the products of this society.

Gentlemen, I'm all for common sense and common agreement, but for the modesty that Mis- -- this gentleman who wrote to me, "I in general agree," is no "I" that can agree. He is one of the boys. He said, "We agree." If he had written that, I would have been impressed that he at least would have known the situation in which he finds himself: that he is not able to form any personal judgment, unless he lifts himself up to quite another phase. Now, if he was -- act as an -- educated man, or as a -- scientist, he would never write, "I'm in general disagreement," but he would -- in Germany he would have begun, "I totally disagree," you see, because that's the -- the -- the mark of a specialist, that he disagrees with his colleagues. And secondly, he would have immediately launched on a specific thing, not "approach to life." But he would have said, "What do you think of suicide?" "What do you think of Cea- -- Julius Caesar?" "What do you think of Mr. McCarthy?"

On the higher levels of life, gentlemen, one doesn't talk such stuff as "I in general agree with the approach of life." "General" is too much. "Agree" is too much. "I" is too much. "Approach" is too much. "Life" is too much. You see, that's all only talk. It's worthless. It's nice. { } it's just like saying, "How do you do?" Well, that's fine. That's by and large on the same level. Everybody speaks to everybody. You're absolutely non-committal.

Now, this whole process in England, as I said, is -- is ruined by mannerism. And well -- here it is ruined in -- this country by brazenness, the brazenness of everybody -- saying he has an opinion on this matter, when it isn't a matter of opinion. To accept the automobile, you see, it's not interested. You know what happened in this country when -- when Margaret Fuller said, "I accept the uni-

verse." She said she was good enough to accept the universe. So Emerson said, "She had better."

That's your attitude. The brazenness with which the obedience, which is demanded on the 4th stage is -- is turned -- or the acceptance, or the sympathy, or the plebiscite -- is turned into a choose-and-pickiness, as though we depend on this good "I," individual's, you see, special permit to exist.

It's very hard for you to see this. But when we come to another country, I think you will be grateful to have understood why people must differ, why it is a great blessing that there are Englishmen, Frenchmen, Germans, and America, why it would be terrible to -- even to think of one world-state, because you would then have no havens, no ports for these various terraces to show to each other their relative value. You have one single system; you have tyranny. And since all these things are not known in the common-sense philosophy of -- in this country, you see, everybody in this country thinks all the people who don't want a world-state are wicked.

It isn't true, you see. Reasonable people must say it is better to go to war, gentlemen, than to have the one humanity which would cease to be a humanity totally, which would be stagnating, and dead, and have no life whatsoever. It's a very serious question. You can only begin to understand this if you do not write, "I agree with your approach of life," but if you say, "I wonder. I'm astounded to see things I haven't seen before." This is what this man alone could have said. But you -- by learning, you wake up to certain things your common sense just doesn't know. Isn't that true? You have never thought of this, that the nations are not separated by climate, and by speech. But they are separated by representing different phases of human movement of the spirit through the world.

So impertinence is the mental habit of this country which is preached. And that is based on the denial of anything except self-consciousness and will. Now, you will see that, obviously on the highest level, it is inspiration. And the second, it is hard work, service. On the third, it is formation. And here it is penetration, or communication.

Well, inspiration, gentlemen, service, formation, and penetration -- they are not anything of my or your will. That you have gone to a public school in this country, that's not a question of your will. It's a question of your formation, is it not? That you are living, under -- after Abraham Lincoln, that gives you some inspirations. You have to thank God for this man. He is a forebear of yours, if you are good enough to accept him, you say. You cannot say "good enough to accept him." You are privileged to have him as your forebear. Isn't that true? You cannot say on the Level of 4, "I agree with Lincoln's approach to life in general."

Do you see how funny that is?

He is molding you. I could still -- said -- instead of "formation," "mold," to make it quite clear what the British school system does. It molds people, you see. But there is -- or fortunately, of course, in this country an element of the spirit in our word "statesman." They have inspired people. Not the great -- the great research men.

I got a letter yesterday -- a strange letter, where a man talked of Helmholtz. Helmholtz is the greatest research man in the 19th century in physiology, optics, and all these things. And as you know, Mr. Edison applied all these findings of the 19th century in Germany, and made a lot of money. And so he's very much beloved in this country as a great man. So this man, Helmholtz, was invited in 1893 to Chicago. And in a party, another man -- other German was approached, and said, "Who it -- devil -- for devil's sake is this man? Helmholtz. What's this -- what has he done?"

So he gave him some data. And so the American said, "Ah, I see. An Edison in a small way."

Now all the ideas of Mr. Edison came from Mr. Helmholtz, you see. But since Mr. Helmholtz was not a practical inventor for the electric bulb, so he was Edison in a small way. In this strange way do we pervert reality, every one nation, and omit the merits. Now this country should be proud, gentlemen, of everybody receiving what one invents. It is a great thing that in this country everybody can drive a car, and that you have nothing of the like in Russia, or in England, or in France. This we must boast of, because we have made good on Level 4. We have been serious, that what one man knows, everybody at the end should have, you see. That's a great thing. I think the democratic contribution of America has been mass production, and has been the open door, the open road, the openness that everybody could receive what one man had.

And we -- you should think this through. It puts a tremendous honor -- mark of honor on this country. It's the first country in the world where the idea has been really penetrated -- penetrated, you see, in the literal sense. The idea has penetrated. In -- a country like France, the upper 10 don't care. In America, we don't care for the upper 400. That's the -- {our} difference, you see. Let them all go drunk or what-not and exchange their wives. Who cares? The common man in this country survives even Barbara Hutton.

But you see, you have to know that not everything can be generated in this form, that we depend on each other, that unless the -- Stage 4, which produces many cars -- millions of cars -- allows a country in which people do not think of

immediate usefulness, but of the law of physics, there will be no cars to be driven, finally, because it is a long process before Mr. Ford is able to build cars. It took 300 years of physics, none of which has been lived in this country. All these poor idiots in Europe, who didn't get one cent out of their invention and discoveries, had to live for 300 years and study in their brown studies, before Mr. Ford could reap the harvest and make the money. But you are told that nothing that not immediately pays is worth doing. That's where you go wrong. In the -- within the American orbit, you are right. But only as long as the -- all the discoverers come from abroad, obviously. All the first theoreticians. All the great mathematicians. Has this atom bomb been -- {be} produced by one American? Not at all. The one American, Oppenheimer, who participated at { }, they studied at G”ttingen, and they studied at Oxford. That is, they got their inspiration abroad.

Now today, thanks to the late beginning of America in the Second World War, all the -- Europe is destroyed, wouldn't have been necessary. Now how do we produce these -- these -- these terraces, 1, 2, 3, after they no longer function in these three other countries, you see? We -- you can't rely on this today. You must never forget that the atomic energy thing was -- is a stunt that was pulled off by Europeans who in the last minute came to this country. A Dane, an Italian, a German. They are the main people.

This is such a delicate system. It's as delicate as a watch, or a barometer, or a thermostat. The connection of the four countries has produced what you call "Western civilization." And that's the deepest reason why at this moment they are -- forced to form NATO. Gentlemen, this is only -- you -- do you know what the deepest reason is? The deepest reason is that any one of these nations, if it had to live alone, would go nuts. Leave the Americans, without Mr. Atlee, or Mr. -- Mr. {Pl‚verne}, or Mr. Adenauer sometimes speaking to them, to their own devices, they go absolutely nuts in world politics. And the same is true, of course, of the French, the Germans, and the English perhaps even more so. I don't think that they are any better. But they {have} to speak to each other before anything makes sense, before anything is seen in the true proportions, you see, of 1, a bright idea, you see; 2, thinking it through with all the knowledge that { }; thirdly, responsible people undertake to devote their life to it; and 4, everybody must reap the benefit of it.

Now gentlemen, this is so foreign to you, only because you think that every important problem is solved within 24 hours. Mr. Edgar Hoover, as you know, went to Japan on April 1st, Fools' Day, and said he wanted to reform the Japanese police, and he'll return May 30th. No -- on April 30th, pardon me. He was here on May Day again. And in 30 days, he had reformed the Japanese police, you see. And we pay for this -- we, the taxpayer -- for this nonsense.

You cannot reform the Japanese police in 30 days. You understand that? It's nonsense. But anything common-sense, of course, you can do in 30 days. But this isn't -- you have to implant respect and respe- -- for an authority for a man who knows it's a very slow process before you have the four leading {captains} of your -- of your police force so instilled with the spirit of the leader, you see, that they then will contrive to put it over in their various districts, you see. And finally the public of New York will put away with the garbage. But that's an education which no city government in Am- -- in New York has ever been allowed to be put through, because every two years, you have a new mayor, and a new { }.

Because you think, on the common-sense place, gentlemen -- and now we come to the important thing why I bring this all out: common sense has never time, because the knowledge, the understanding which you can acquire on the level of the mass is in five minutes. I said to you, when we have common-sense knowledge, the element of time is negligible. I can buy this book, Mathematics for the Millions, in five minutes -- on the street, scan it through in five minutes, throw it away, you see. Just one of these 25-cents books, you see, and I know this one-millionth of mathematics.

Therefore, gentlemen, anything that is common-sense, will always be rushed, unless it has this respect for coming from deeper sources, from higher levels. And this is, in this country, as you know, the curse, that the important matters -- for example, reforms of colleges are -- every day we have a new plan. Does anybody ever give time to educate a whole generation of teachers? How can you reform any college in America, if you don't give 30 years to have different kind of teachers? You can't reform the world with the same man. Perhaps it shouldn't be reformed. I { }. But the whole discussion in this country about all the blessings of humanity which can be fought out {under} -- over Dartmouth students, or college graduates, you see, is all nonsense to me, because certainly you cannot change anything unless you build up a whole new generation of teachers. Now that takes 30 years. Now who is willing to plant anything in this country in the field of spiritual life for 30 years? So you have no spiritual life. But you have Flower Week, Mother Week, Father Week, Sharing Week, Peace Week, you see -- and everything is done on the next Sunday, because nothing is done.

Now, as I said, in France, they have the opposite vice. It's a vice, too, to do nothing. You have all the slums. We have a different slum every two years. They have always the same slum.

So we must help each other, gentlemen. My appeal to you is not to laugh over these things, in their perversions, but to complain our fate that people are too vain -- every one of these groups is so -- is so blinded by vanity that they will not

admit that they function very well within a very wonderful arrangement. Can you see this? This is the whole problem, that they are interacting, every one of his own level. Once you get into -- this must make you feel respect for the wonderful and miraculous organization of the human race. It has taken thousands of years to get that far. And at this moment, it is wantonly destroyed. { }. Because of pride, vanity, and nationalism. Because every one of these nations says, "I'm the best in the world."

{Well --.} (Sir, wouldn't the world state be an ideal situation in that you could bring all these four elements together, to work {together} willingly, instead of having them -- being forced to work together without being willing to? Do you understand my question?)

Not quite, no.

(Don't you think that the world state would be an ideal situation, recognizing these four stages, represented by these four different nations, in that it would bring all four nations together in a brief picture, without there being any friction between them?)

Well, do you believe that a world state would have any interest in these {distinctions}? Wouldn't it wipe out all this? Wouldn't it, by necessity? You see, all the laws of France, all the laws of England, all our Constitution in America reflect this difference. Now you get a world state. They hold, as you -- if I read these themes, they are just terrifying. They say everybody has a vote, you see -- the 18-year-old, perhaps the 9-year-old next time, you see. That's all demagoguery. It's just perversion of everything, you see. You should all rise in arms against the vote at 18, because it -- best means to make stupidity win. And the demagogue. It's an op- -- insult to your college education, gentlemen, that you should get the vote before you go to college.

But this is how -- you see the -- if you get -- the larger the unit you have to create, you see, the more abstract must you treat humanity. They're all just people with legs, and arms, and a stomach, in the end. All these distinctions of their {service} will be overruled, I'm afraid. This is my greatest fear, you see, that they -- the ruler of the whole will have no -- how could I believe for one minute that Mr. Dwyer, ambassador in Mexico City, would even listen to me if I began to talk to him about it? I mean this type of person, after all, rules the world.

(I would feel that they would become complacent under one single, general state.)

No effort made anyone -- { }, you see. Tyranny on the top. A secret police, and everybody else, if he says something different, shut out -- as a -- Brave New World, put in a strait-jacket. Now they wouldn't -- they wouldn't kill him, probably. They would just say he's insane; you see, that's much milder.

Now, to fill this with -- with names will be the content of the second half of the meeting. Let's have five minutes off.

[end of tape]