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The
Will Durant On-Line Editorial From John Little
WE WILL REMAKE
The terrorist attacks of
September 11, 2001; unprovoked, unexpected and
unprecedented, have left vast numbers of humanity
from all over the world in varying states of shock,
anger, fear and confusion. As one who has studied the
ideas and philosophy of Will Durant, I have been
asked many times of late, "What do you think
Will Durant would think of what happened?" And
"What would he say was the cause of all
this?" These are very difficult questions to
answer conclusively. However, I believe there exists
ample materials from Dr. Durant to at least fashion a
reasonable presentation of what his perspective might
have been on this matter.
I should
preface these quotations and opinions by stating that
they have been selected by me, and, therefore must be
viewed as having come through the filter of another
man’s judgment. And as such, you have a right to
know what stake if any I might have in all of this so
that you can better weigh what I am about to present.
If one still measures a man by the invisible line
that is supposed to separate one block of humanity
from the next, then I would be considered a
"Canadian;" I was born in Toronto, attended
schools in the province of Ontario but I received my
education in the United States, and my mentors have
been, for the most part, Americans.
Having lived in the
United States for the past nine years and having two
"American" children, our family was upset
by the attack on the very hearth and home of our
friends and family. As a representative of sorts for
Will Durant, I had a business meeting to attend on
October 2nd
in Manhattan with the publishers at Simon and
Schuster, who had been Durant’s publishers
throughout his lengthy career. There was, admittedly,
an impulse – a strong impulse – to postpone
it; not for fear of additional terrorist attack, but
the fear of actually beholding in person the awful
aftermath of what the terrorists did to New York,
that magnificent city and towering symbol of American
"can-doism." This impulse gave way as soon
as I thought of what New York meant – rather
than being afraid or worried by what I might see, I
found myself drawing strength from knowing what I
would see – brave men and women, a will-to-power
or, at least, to a will-to-persevere and to rebuild.
This is power. This is fuel. This is America. It has
been said that nobody ever had a rainbow until they
had the rain; well, it rained hard in New York and
the rainbow is in full bloom.
I took the
Staten Island Ferry and looked at the skyline that
used to showcase the World Trade Center and saw the
cranes at work removing debris that made for unholy
tombs and shattered families. I thought of the
courage of the firefighters that gave their lives
helping others; of the stories of heroism by
passengers and crew within hijacked airplanes; of the
heroes who went back into the World Trade Center
towers to help those who could not help themselves.
And the images – my God, the images! – the
most powerful being that of a lone fireman carrying
the limp body of a fellow New Yorker – a New
Yorker who was only one-and-a-half years old –
and weeping as he did so. I remembered a passage that
Will Durant had written in praise of the human spirit
that could well serve as the rallying cry for those
cities and families that were hit so hard on that
black day of September 11, 2001:
The blood
of martyrs is the seed of saints. We speak and
pass but effort is not lost. Not to have tried is
the only failure, the only misery; all effort is
success….We will remake. We will wonder and
desire and dream and plan and try. We are such
beings as dream and plan and try; and the glory
of our defeats dims the splendor of the
sun….We will remake.
And what of New York? I have
heard some say that we should not have such high
towers; that they are merely inviting targets to the
soulless warriors who find it easier to kill for a
cause than to live for it. To give in to such
trepidation would be a mistake; the terrorists tried
to kill a symbol, the fearful among us would have us
finish the job and kill a soul. New York’s
buildings are not mere office spaces and decadence;
they are her very essence; her symbol of life; of
industry, of growth, of hope. Upon my return home, I
found a passage in among Durant’s writings of
the beauty and significance of New York, her skyline
and her buildings. I must share it with you if only
to point out that these magnificent symbols of
prosperity, happiness, and man’s ability to
aspire – and achieve successfully – his
dreams are not "targets" they are
America’s very alma mater, her "nourishing
mother," in a very literal sense:
…there
are signs of good hope even here. The Woolworth
Building was a splendid imitation; let others, if
they can, look down upon it as a bargain counter
of Gothic lace; for my part I cannot stand before
that lofty spire of latticed stone without
feeling a thrill at its audacious height, and the
courage of its makers. And when I cross Brooklyn
Bridge on winter evenings, and look back at the
peaks of granite piled as if by giants upon
Manhattan’s Atlas head, and see the windows
lit with a million lights as though the mountain
were studded with precious stones, I know that it
is one of the sights and wonders of the modern
world, and that nothing in Europe or Asia or
Africa -- no, not even the bleak and artless
Pyramids -- can rival it.
And then,
if only to recover Whitman’s thrills, the
ferry across the Hudson -- the eager walk to the
fore deck of the boat, the spray of the busy
river, the feeling again of home-coming, the
abandonment of judgment and fault-finding, the
surrender to New York.
Yes,
without doubt, this skyline, this granite graph
of human will, is one of the seven wonders,
perhaps the greatest of the man-made wonders, of
the modern world. What courage and imagination to
build this iron landscape, this mountain range of
architecture upon this eighteen dollars’
worth of soil! God knows there is much nonsense
here to a designer’s eye, a hash of foreign
styles hastily adapted to the needs of
businessmen: Doric columns and Gothic gargoyles,
Babylonian ziggurats and Venetian Campaniles,
Roman Pantheons and Moorish domes, Irish
cathedrals and English homes. What could be
expected of a people so alien and varied in
origin but that it would bring with it all these
motifs to pour into the crucible of our chaotic
life?
Therefore
I marvel all the more at these airy audacities;
at the Telephone Building, Number One Fifth
Avenue, the Woolworth and Metropolitan Towers,
the Graybar Building with its jeweled head, the
Sherry-Netherland Hotel, the Hudson River Bridge;
I beg leave to admire these achievements with all
the simplicity of an unsophisticate. It is clear
that the energy and will of New York are not in
its politics, not even in its industry, but in
its building, its passion for power and mass, its
mad push into the skies. After all, a state is
only a group of politicians clinging to office,
an organization of tax-gatherers collecting
taxes; we must expect to have such things as long
as we are such men.
This is
New York. I see the brokers, salesmen and clerks
ebbing and flowing in Wall Street at noon;
billionaires working sedulously eight hours a
day; lawyers wondering whether to be honest or
rich, whether to pore over precedents or to join
the Organization; businessmen amassing fortunes,
and then wishing they had an education; dreamers
practicing futuristic art and love in Greenwich
Village shoppes and tearooms; patrician plumbers
denouncing Russia; unplaced communists
excommunicating heretics, and preparing to burn
socialists at the stake; churches symbolically
closed for repairs; the Church of the Ascension
dark, respectable and dead since it lost its
soul; St. Patrick’s always crowded; Tammany
always victorious; Crime Club books on the
newsstands, murder movies at the theatres, murder
sketches on the radio; the ambitious young
immigrant studying eagerly in the crowded
Library; the country elder wondering which night
club will show him the most women for the least
money. I see the filth of lower Manhattan, the
dilapidation of Coney Island, the garbage
mountains of Queens, the beauty of Riverside
Drive, the panorama of Fifth Avenue’s gaudy
stores, the restless lakes and bridges, lanes and
fields of Central Park, the sparkling giants of
the financial district seen from Brooklyn Bridge
on a winter evening, the aristocratic facades of
Fifty-seventh Street, the new skyline around
Central Park. Behind the great monuments of
architecture I see thousands of dingy brick
stores, garages, apartment-houses, the offices of
half the business in America gathered here on a
little island, ten thousand shouting signs,
vulgar and exhilarating; elevated structures
obstructing traffic and obscuring the avenue; a
million automobiles marvelous and mad, hunting
like rats for a hole in which to hide. Five
million people rushing through the streets,
stumbling over torn-up pavements, running into
one another, stamping down stairs into catacombs,
fighting and scratching to get into cattle-pens.
How this noise and chaos cry out for a dictator,
some Napoleon to outlaw them with an imperious
word -- not waiting to count the insensitive
noses that will re-elect knavery and
incompetence, or throw it out to replace it with
incompetence and knavery! And over it all, the
unworried stars, careless of the destiny of these
millions of souls.
What a
medley of good and evil, of nonsense and majesty!
London is better governed, but who can stand its
weather, or its accent? Paris has history,
manners, perfect opera, and the Louvre; but who
can stand its hotel-keepers? Vienna is beautiful
but dead, Venice is lovely but dead, Rome has
grandeur and holiness, Munich is quiet and
quaint, Moscow has profound bassos and
shirt-sleeve Napoleons. But this disorderly Isle
of Towers now equals any of them; nowhere on
earth has man in our day built for himself a more
impressive monument. I would not live in it, for
it leaves me in no mood for work; but I would not
have it too far away to let me look at it now and
then, to feel its will to power, to catch the
electricity of its feverish life.
But what of
the "causes?" I hear repeatedly that these
terrorists might have had reason to hate the United
States. Can this be a serious proposition? One
individual intoned that it "was American
materialism" that so infuriated the terrorists
that they felt they had to strike out at us. Not only
is this a grotesque position to assume, but history
has revealed that "American Materialism" is
shared by the world far more readily than
"American Generosity." As Durant pointed
out over 70 years ago:
Once more
it is a romantic delusion that vilifies the
actual and idealizes the distant; no man who has
traveled can subscribe to the notion that the
American is more greedy for gold than the average
European or Asian. It is inevitable that where
there has been, until recently, no appreciable
percentage of inherited wealth, every man, being
forced to carve his own path, would be "on
the make." A new continent must, for the
rapid development of its resources, select,
stimulate and reward the earthly type of man --
the man who is willing to take great risks, and
explore novel possibilities, if he is permitted
to hope for great gains. This has resulted in the
dominance of the acquisitive type among us, and a
disposition to think night and day of the
financial aspects of life. But at the same time
it has transformed with incredible quickness a
vast wilderness into the most prosperous region
on earth, and has given to the common man
luxuries, facilities and opportunities once
dreamed of by reformers and reserved for
aristocrats and kings. We need not be so
conscience-stricken about comforts; we may be
sure that no one denounces them except for the
thrill of moral superiority. Money is an evil
only when it is in another man’s pocket.
The
traveler is driven to the conclusion, however
awed and courteous he may set out to be, that the
foreign criticism of America is largely envy. For
he observes everywhere in other nations an
eagerness for money which seems to him quite as
keen as the American’s, and he comes away
with the impression that there is a little more
glue on foreign fingers. Let any tourist recall
his experiences with the hotels in Bermuda, or
Paris, or Geneva; let him observe the haste of
Europe and Asia to imitate the industrial methods
(except the policy of high wages) of the
Americans whose greed and materialism they
denounce; let him recall the protest of European
employers against Henry Ford’s proposal to
pay his workmen in Europe as handsomely as his
workmen in Detroit. Let him also recall the
exploitation of workingmen by Europeans and
Japanese in Manchester, Birmingham, Cape Town,
Bombay, Calcutta, Shanghai and Osaka. Let him
reexamine the specious arguments by which we were
urged to cancel completely (after having reduced
them more than half) debts deliberately incurred
by European governments to prosecute, or to
recover from, a war in which their real aims,
dishonestly concealed from our own government,
were not justice but territory, not honor but
iron and coal, markets and power, oil wells and
trade routes, and other "spiritual"
objectives; and let him remember that Europe,
which so disdains material pursuits, took at
Versailles hundreds of thousands of square miles
of land, and gave to these United States, so
quick to respond to idealistic catchwords, only a
Covenant whose central article invited America to
guarantee forever, with all her arms and blood,
the territorial acquisitions of her allies in
Europe, in Africa and in Asia. No one would have
suspected, from these suave and altruistic
suggestions for cancellation, that if Europe did
not meet these obligations America would have to
take from its own harassed people, in increased
taxation, the funds to meet the principal and
interest on the bonds held by those who provided,
often out of modest savings, the substance of
these loans. The general feeling in European
foreign offices is that Americans are gullible
enough to believe anything if it is told them
with an Oxford accent.
It is poor
taste for Americans to say these things. It is
not poor taste for foreigners to say the
opposite, after accepting lavishly of our
hospitality and our homage.
If
"American materialism" is not the cause,
could it be that we have done something to rouse the
ire of the Judaeo-Christian God, who orchestrated
such a catastrophe in order to make us a more
"God-fearing" nation? This is the opinion
advanced by "Moral Majority" leader, Jerry
Falwell, a mere two days after the attacks in the
October 25th
edition of Rolling Stone
magazine, who announced:
…the
abortionists have got to bear some burden for
this because God will not be mocked. And when we
destroy 40 million little innocent babies, we
make God mad. I really believe that the pagans,
the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays
and the lesbians who are actively trying to make
that an alternative lifestyle, the ACLU, People
for the American Way, all of them who have tried
to secularize America, I point the finger in
their face and say, "You helped this
happen."
The crime is not that a man
might be allowed to voice such opinions – but
that he should have followers that listen to them.
This is not morality but theology and bad theology at
that. These are not words of comfort – which is
the solace of a religious faith – but an
opportunistic sales pitch, akin to the
"ambulance chasing" attorney who knows that
out of tragedy arises opportunity. Such intolerance
by a "spiritual leader" is sufficient to
cause many to reconsider Santayana’s phrase
that, "Faith in intellect is the only faith yet
sanctioned by its fruit." I wonder if Mr.
Falwell can divine whether or not the body of that
poor lifeless child the fireman was carrying was gay
or lesbian? Please do not look to Jerry Falwell for
the Christian position on this matter, for he shows
an appalling lack of empathy for the ethics of
Christ. As Durant pointed out in 1943:
What is
the most important sentence in the Bible?
"Thou shalt love thy neighbor as
thyself." This alone lifts the Bible above
every other scripture or writing, even above all
the literature of the Greeks. It appears several
times in the two Testaments; first in Leviticus;
xix, 18. The word neighbor may there have a
racial limitation; but in verse 54 we read:
The
stranger [i.e., foreigner] that dwelleth with
you shall be unto you as one born among you,
and thou shalt love him as thyself.
In Exodus;
xxiii., 4., the idea of good will is extended
even to one’s enemies:
If
thou meet thine enemy’s ox or his ass
going astray, thou shalt surely bring it back
to him again. If thou see the ass of him that
hateth thee lying under his burden [i.e.,
fallen] thou shalt surely help with him.
It was
natural for the Jews to think of men as brothers,
since they were the first people to think of God
as one. "Ye are the children of the Lord
your God," says Jehovah in Deuteronomy xiv,
1. The brotherhood of man is an inevitable
conclusion from the fatherhood of God. "The
Greeks," said Renan, "conceived the
idea of natural law, science and philosophy; but
the Jews conceived the greater idea of social
justice and the brotherhood of man." In this
sense Isiah is greater than Aristotle.
In
Confucius we find not only a statement of the
Golden Rule, but the simple proposition:
Within
the four seas all men are brothers.
In Jesus
the idea reaches its fullest development and
widest application, and becomes the center and
summit of his moral code. Over and over again he
repeats: "Thou shalt love thy neighbor as
thyself." (Luke x, 27); he wisely described
this as a summary of the Old Testament by saying,
"This is the Law [i.e., the Pentateuch] and
the Prophets [Matthew vii, 12);" this phrase
was always used by the Jews to mean their entire
sacred scriptures. When "a certain
lawyer" asked him, "Who is my
neighbor?" he took the opportunity to extend
the term to one’s worst enemies, by telling
the story of the Good Samaritan, For the
Samaritans were the bitterest enemies that the
Jews had in all the ancient world. They, too,
were neighbors, and had to be loved as
"one’s self." (Luke x, 50).
From that
time to this the idea of the "brotherhood of
man" has been the most powerful inspiration
to the betterment of human character and society.
It has entered into a thousand reforms, into the
cleansing of prisons, the charity of the
fortunate to the unfortunate, the emancipation of
slaves – individually and en masse –
the care of the sick, the building of hospitals,
the suppression of infanticide, and of
gladiatorial games, the exaltation of womanhood,
the improvement in the conditions of labor, and
the whole movement of social reform. Let not
cynics tell us that the idea is impractical; it
has already accomplished great things, and will
accomplish more.
No, if we are
looking for causes, we need not look at religion, but
at human ignorance and intolerance. President Bush is
right in not condemning Islam for these attacks
– but rather ignorant and intolerant human
beings, who are not worthy of their country or their
faith. Let us reconsider the words of Durant’s
famous "Declaration of
Interdependence":
- That
differences of race, color, and creed are
natural, and that diverse groups,
institutions, and ideas are stimulating
factors in the development of man;
- That to
promote harmony in diversity is a responsible
task of religion and statesmanship;
- That
since no individual can express the whole
truth, it is essential to treat with
understanding and good will those whose views
differ from our own;
- That by
the testimony of history intolerance is the
door to Violence, brutality and dictatorship;
and
- That the
realization of human interdependence and
solidarity is the best guard of civilization.
- Therefore,
we solemnly resolve, and invite everyone to
join in united action.
- To uphold
and promote human fellowship through mutual
consideration and respect;
- To
champion human dignity and decency, and to
safeguard these without distinction of race,
or color, or creed;
- To strive
in concert with others to discourage all
animosities arising from these differences,
and to unite all groups in the fair play of
civilized life.
ROOTED
in freedom, bonded in the fellowship of danger,
sharing everywhere a common human blood, we declare
again that all men are brothers, and that mutual
tolerance is the price of liberty.
Let us
consecrate this moment to burning these words into
our souls.
If ignorance
and intolerance are the causes, what shall be our
response? While no civilized country wishes war, no
civilized country can endure when its foundation has
been attacked; when the very root that allows for
freedom and civilization to grow has been threatened
by the ax wielded by such terrorist groups. Durant, a
man who loved peace and abhorred war, once said:
…variety
and freedom are worth the price we pay for them,
even the price of war.
Will there be
a war? It would appear a certainty, even though it is
equally certain that many more innocent men, women
and children will lose their lives. As a parent this
troubles me. But upon reflection it does not trouble
me as much as having my children live in a world in
which the office building in which they work can be
turned into a steel and concrete hell, or the planes
in which they must fly to experience and learn and
understand foreign cultures can be commandeered at
knife point. I think of the fear that those
passengers must have experienced when they knew they
were not getting out of that plane alive. For my
children – and yours – to be the inheritors
of civilization, there must first be a civilization
that can be inherited. And in a world run by
terrorists, civilization will be the first casualty.
And so we return to New York. I
believe that Will Durant would applaud the
President’s decision to offer financial aid to
New York City. For reasons already indicated, this is
a symbol that needs to be repositioned on the
American landscape so that all the world can see its
representation of liberty and human possibility. As
New York goes, the politicians tell us, so goes the
American economy. This is probably true, but,
perhaps, more importantly, as New York goes, so goes
the soul of America. Let it shine. There will be
great struggles ahead, admittedly, but also great
achievement, advancement, understanding and –
Jerry Falwell and his God willing – harmony of
all peoples, of all creeds, persuasions, colors and
beliefs. Do not let the prospect of the struggle dim
the vision of such a future, because it is within our
grasp – if we but make the effort required to
reach it. For, as Durant once said:
Perhaps we
mistake our personal fatigue for the exhaustion
of life. A few of us are tired of struggling, and
we conclude that our race or our civilization is
finished. Our children, who are not tired, do not
understand our apathy; they astonish us by
insisting on believing, hoping and planning
again. Do we wish to recover our sense of life
and meaning? Let us put aside our fatigue, and
while profiting by our experience, take our stand
with our children, and lose ourselves in their
dream.
We will
remake.
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