Why Men Fight: A method of abolishing the international duelRussell, Bertrand
Philosophy
Why Men Fight: A method of abolishing the international duel
Russell, Bertrand
Liberty; Property; Social problems; State, The; War
It is a good religion, and its work of destruction must be
completed. But it is not all that man has need of. New growth must come
after the destruction, and new growth can come only through the spirit.
Both patriotism and the love of man and woman, when they are merely
instinctive, have the same defects: their exclusions, their enclosing
walls, their indifference or hostility to the outside world. It is
through this that thought is led to satire, that comedy has infected
what men used to consider their holiest feelings. The satire and the
comedy are justified, but not the death of instinct which they may
produce if they remain in supreme command. They are justified, not as
the last word of wisdom but as the gateway of pain through which men
pass to a new life, where instinct is purified and yet nourished by the
deeper desires and insight of spirit.
The man who has the life of the spirit within him views the love of man
and woman, both in himself and in others, quite differently from the
man who is exclusively dominated by mind. He sees, in his moments of
insight, that in all human beings there is something deserving of love,
something mysterious, something appealing, a cry out of the night, a
groping journey, and a possible victory. When his instinct loves, he
welcomes its help in seeing and feeling the value of the human being
whom he loves. Instinct becomes a reinforcement to spiritual insight.
What instinct tells him spiritual insight confirms, however much the
mind may be aware of littlenesses, limitations, and enclosing walls
that prevent the spirit from shining forth. His spirit divines in all
men what his instinct shows him in the object of his love.
The love of parents for children has need of the same transformation.
The purely instinctive love, unchecked by thought, uninformed by
spirit, is exclusive, ruthless, and unjust. No benefit to others is
felt, by the purely instinctive parent, to be worth an injury to one’s
own children. Honor and conventional morality place certain important
practical limitations on the vicarious selfishness of parents, since
a civilized community exacts a certain minimum before it will give
respect. But within the limits allowed by public opinion, parental
affection, when it is merely instinctive, will seek the advantage
of children without regard to others. Mind can weaken the impulse to
injustice, and diminish the force of instinctive love, but it cannot
keep the whole force of instinctive love and turn it to more universal
ends. Spirit can do this. It can leave the instinctive love of children
undimmed, and extend the poignant devotion of a parent, in imagination,
to the whole world. And parental love itself will prompt the parent
who has the life of the spirit to give to his children the sense of
justice, the readiness for service, the reverence, the will that
controls self-seeking, which he feels to be a greater good than any
personal success.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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