ONLY ONE VOICE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 210, 6 September 1938, Page 6

ONLY ONE VOICE.

THE SINGLE DOCTRINE.

To learn something 8 from Benjamin Franklin, something from Abraham Lincoln, something from Edison and Charles W. Eliot and Louis Pasteur and W. E. Gladstone and Karl Marx and Goethe and Beethoven and Joan of Arc and Thomas Aquinas and Confucius—such advice nsed to be a commonplace., But" it has faded out from large areas of the world in this new totalitarian e^e. It is a totalitarian age in which the master of the State takes charge of the whole man, body and soul. It is a ".monolithic" age in which a nation of subjugated men is tied down to the single doctrine, the single faith. In one part of the world Hitler is the only guide and saviour. In another part of the world the whole meaning and conduct of life rests with Joseph Stalin. To-day in Soviet Russia people will tell you that Stalin is not only the greatest of all political leaders, but he is also the greatest educator, the greatest writer, the greatest historian, and, very likely, the greatest zoologist and miniature painter if his interests should turn that way. Rigid doctrines -enforced by iron-handed men have taken possession of a large part of mankind and are contending for mastery over the rest. Hitler's doctrines, Stalin's socalled Leninist doctrines, must be accepted as the answer to everything. That is why it is good to be reminded how really complex is the structure of human history. We live in an age which compels us t<> think much more tenderly of the' old-style welkin-ringing orator in politics and the prosy after-dinner and cornerstone orator in general affairs. We aTe in the mood to-day to recognise that whatever the sincerity and technique of the table-thumper he does speak up for freedom and free men. To-day masses of men are being educated tp the idea that it is beautiful to be slaves, in an economically determined world or a Hitler-determined world. We live in an age when it sounds much less humdrum than formerly to be reminded that we have much to 'learn from George Washington and Joan of Arc and Aquinas and Socrates. Once upon a time the world took these things for granted, and to be reminded of them "was an impertinence or a bore. But to-day these names from all ages and all climes have a fresh and cheering sound, for we live in a world which is being taught or forced to jdeny the brotherhood of man. —N.T.