AGE OF MUDDLE

Evening Star, Issue 23352, 23 August 1939, Page 5

AGE OF MUDDLE

DOUBTERS AND DITHERERS Why have tc developed the habit of doubting, dithering, and being sceptical about everything? comments an. English journal. It puts us at a great disadvantage. Doubters and ditherers are an easy prey for unscrupulous folk. Unless we hold on for a reasonable time to an opinion, an ideal, a theory, or an idea, we have nothing to guide us, no anchor, and we are not giving time a chance to work out any solution. It is all very well to say “ times are bad,” but who makes,them bad? Time can no more get into a muddle by itself than a ball of wool can, but so great is the power of human beings that time can be thrown out of gear by them as easily as a ball of wool can be tangled by a kitten. The housewife without system, the office without method, the child without discipline, the girl without an aim, the man without fair play, all are helping to create the prevailing state of dither, and unless some sort of stand is made it is impossible for the times to improve. We are in a house-that-Jack-built muddle because we depend upon each other for stability. If only we had confidence in the people who are striving to stand firm, we should at least arrive at something definite which we could judge calmly as it took shape. Like Alice in Wonderland, we must begin at the beginning and go on. The beginning is ourselves, whoever we may be. We must be firm, make a plan, form an opinion, carry out the first and stick to the second until it proves to bo

entirely wrong. We must not allow thoughts to be confused by scandal, any more than we allow a caller to induce us to put salt and pepper in the jam tart we may he making for dinner. We must even err on the side of generosity rather than on the side of justice. Even if we make a mistake, it is better than making nothing at all, for a mistake teaches us something, while dithering only takes from us the little learning we may have acquired. Most of the ditherers of history have come to a bad end, no matter how successful they may have been before the doubting malady set in. The story of the great Athenian general Nicias is an excellent warning. He had been successful and he was honoured, hut when something unforeseen occurred he dithered. After he had decided to attack the Syracusans on a certain day there was an eclipse of the moon, which terrified him, and, instead of carrying out his plans, he doubted the advisability of defending himself while the moon was unfavourable and dithered hopelessly as to what he should do. Hearing of his hesitation, the Syracusans attacked violently, destroyed his entire army, and killed him.