Sibylla : $b or, The revival of prophecy — John Shaqi
Sibylla : $b or, The revival of prophecyMace, C. A. (Cecil Alec)
Philosophy
Sibylla : $b or, The revival of prophecy
Mace, C. A. (Cecil Alec)
Civilization; Progress
All this is coming about no longer by mere chance or blind experiment,
but by the operation of a principle which I take as a foundation
stone for prophecy. Man has slowly and painfully acquired facility in
adopting the scientific attitude of mind. Gradually he has been able to
achieve this point of view in relation to the material universe. But
he finds a peculiar difficulty in being scientific in the face of the
animate; and the difficulty would appear to be almost insuperable in
the face of mind. It is because we are living at a time when the feat
is being accomplished that I feel impelled to prophesy an important
revolution, a revolution beside which the Bolshevic incident, for
instance, is dwarfed to almost comical insignificance.
The revolutionists are level-headed but far-seeing men of business,
acting in alliance with the scientists. Here is their programme as
voiced by Professor Catell in 1903.
“It is our business to make both a science and an art of human nature.
As in the physical world we select first the material suited to our
purpose, and turn the iron into steel, and temper the steel for a
knife, so in the world of human action we must learn to select the
right man, to educate him and fit him for his exact task. This indeed
we try to do in all our institutions, religions, commerce, system
of education, and government. But we work by rule of thumb――blind,
deaf, and wasteful. The nineteenth century witnessed an extraordinary
increase in our knowledge of the material world, and in our power to
make it subservient to our ends; the twentieth century will probably
witness a corresponding increase in our knowledge of human nature and
in our power to use it for our welfare.”[4]
[4] Homo Scientificus Americanus: _Science_, April 10, 1903.
Let us note the implications of this programme. At present we have made
but a few experiments and a few discoveries in industrial psychology.
The future, however, is to see the principle applied to education,
criminology, government, war, perhaps religion and the intimate
personal life of man.
Can we foresee the consequences? To some extent, I think, we can. As Dr
Fournier d’Albe puts it in the first of his prophetic volumes,[5] we
have but to extrapolate the curves of present developments into the
future. We must, however, also take into account so far as possible
some of the other factors at work. The general course of evolution
is in outline known to be one of differentiation, specialization,
integration, growing consciousness of ends, and substitution of
systematic experiment in place of blind trial and error. We shall
find other clues which, carefully studied, enable us to speak
about the future with at least as much assurance as biologists and
anthropologists enjoy in speaking about the remoter past. We shall,
moreover, have the added benefit of finding confirmation in the years
to come.
[5] _Quo Vadimus._
III
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