The question of markets was more difficult. It was clear that, through
machinery, the exploitation of labour, and the manipulations of finance,
the product would be enormously greater than the local or national
demand. Until they themselves developed their own industrial system, the
other nations of Europe were available, but as this process proceeded
other markets had to be found; the result was achieved through
advertising, i.e., the stimulating in the minds of the general public of
a covetousness for something they had not known of and did not need, and
the exploiting of barbarous or undeveloped races in Asia, Africa,
Oceanica. This last task was easily achieved through "peaceful
penetration" and the preëmpting of "spheres of influence." In the end
(i.e., A.D. 1914), the whole world had so been divided, the stimulated
markets showed signs of repletion, and since exaggerated profits meant
increasing capital demanding investment, and the improvement in
"labour-saving" devices continued unchecked, the contest for others'
markets became acute, and world-politic was concentrated on the vital
problem of markets, lines of communication, and tariffs.
As for the finding or development of competent organizers and directors,
the history of the world since the end of medievalism had curiously
provided for this after a fashion that seemed almost miraculous. The
type required was different from anything that had been developed
before. Whenever the qualitative standard had been operative, it was
necessary that the leaders in any form of creative action should be men
of highly developed intellect, fine sensibility, wide and penetrating
vision, nobility of instinct, passion for righteousness, and a
consciousness of the eternal force of charity, honour, and service.
During the imperial or decadent stages, courage, dynamic force, the
passion for adventure, unscrupulousness in the matter of method, took
the place of the qualities that marked the earlier periods. In the first
instance the result was the great law-givers, philosophers, prophets,
religious leaders, and artists of every sort; in the second, the great
conquerors. Something quite different was now demanded--men who
possessed some of the qualities needed for the development of
imperialism, but who were unhampered by the restrictive influences of
those who had sought perfection. To organize and administer the new
industrial-financial-commercial régime, the leaders must be shrewd,
ingenious, quick-witted, thick-skinned, unscrupulous, hard-headed, and
avaricious; yet daring, dominating, and gifted with keen prevision and
vivid imagination. These qualities had not been bred under any of the
Mediterranean civilizations, or that of Central Europe in the Middle
Ages, which had inherited so much therefrom. The pursuit of perfection
always implies a definite aristocracy, which is as much a goal of effort
as a noble philosophy, an august civil polity or a great art. This
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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