THE ANCIENT TEMPER
What now about that “modern temper,” which seeks to do away with the
romantic ideal of a world well lost for love and with the classic
ideal of austere dignity? We have followed it through many channels of
expression, and have discovered that it was well described. Of either
dignity or love it has not a shred.
But we have discovered another thing. It is not being driven from the
old ideals by science. Or rather there are two sciences, one modern,
scientific and inspiring. The other not quite so modern in anything but
the names which it applies to itself, not quite so scientific--indeed,
no longer scientific at all.
Its chariot comes thundering down Main street, and all are bidden to
throw themselves before it and let its wheels pass over them. One would
think it was the car of Juggernaut. But its license, when we come to
look it up, proves to have been taken out by Propaganda.
Sometimes these propagandists descend and try to persuade us with
pleasant words. More often they prefer to threaten. Those who stand
upright before them or try to block their passage are termed morons,
or ignoramuses. To be snubbed by this new snobbery is almost like not
being in society. Yet after all, a university professor is sometimes
only a school-teacher, and not necessarily a good one. The letters
PH.D. after a man’s name do not turn him necessarily either into a
scientist or a Venerable Don Bosco. Beyond question, some of our
Misbehaviorists would have constructed better theories had they come
more in contact with other than diseased or adolescent minds.
But why the propaganda? Why this endeavor to make man out a machine or
worse? The ancient hypothesis was that such teachings emanated from
the devil. To discuss that ancient hypothesis would take us beyond the
limits of the present volume, but it cannot be denied that it seems
rather to fit the case. Certainly the temper of these gentleman is no
newer than is the temperament of Lucifer. Among the many things which
distinguish man from the animals is this strange perversity, this
ability to sink beneath himself.
The “modern temper” then is but the ancient temper, and like the
ancient it is of two sorts. This division also is old--as old as the
distinction between good and evil.
Fundamentally, man never changes. I do not mean the individual man. He
may change immensely, and from having chosen to turn to the left may
turn and choose the right. But this choice has always been open before
him.
Not even our fashions, our methods, our ways of doing things are quite
as novel as we sometimes like to think. Albertus Magnus, though he
died in 1280, laid down the principles of our cherished “experimental
method,”--and they were already old. Says Fenelon, “If an enlightened
man were to gather from the books of St. Augustine the sublime
truths which this great man has scattered at random therein, such a
composition ... would be far superior to Descartes’ ‘Meditations.’”
That takes us back to before the year 430--and wisdom then was far from
being a child. There is going on about us all the while a systematic
falsification of history so that the present may seem to stand upon an
isolated pedestal, or rest like a tumbleweed upon a heap of sand, or
like a thistledown to float seemingly upon nothing. Probably this sort
of thing, too, is coeval with the dawn of human life.
Pyrrho, the Greek philosopher, who attained fame from having made the
remark that “nothing is more one thing than it is another,”--in other
words that black is no blacker than is white nor white whiter than
black--Pyrrho died 270 years before Christ. He voiced the “modern
temper” of his day as Watson and Freud voice it in ours. For we have
seen that Psycho-Analysis and Behaviorism spring from the same root. It
makes little difference to what we are slaves, whether to reflexes or
passions. If there be but one stuff, it is the same stuff whether we
call it spirit or matter. No man ever yet succeeded in thinking of an
abstract triangle, let alone an impersonal God.
So, of old time as today, reason was Psyche’s good servant but a sorry
master. Then, as now, reason died with the fool who said in his heart,
“There is no God.” Then as now Wisdom cried, not in the class-room but
in the streets, and had its being in that Love--“_che muove il sole e
l’altre stelle_”--which moves the sun in heaven and all the stars.
Transcriber’s Notes
- Italics represented by _underscores_.
- Small caps converted to ALL CAPS.
- Footnotes renumbered consecutively and relocated to the end of each
chapter.
- Obvious typographic and grammatical errors silently corrected.
- Variations in hyphenation and spelling kept as in the original.