The Hawera Star. MONDAY, APRIL 11, 1927. THE DANGERS OF GENERALISATION.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVI, 11 April 1927, Page 4

The Hawera Star.

MONDAY, APRIL 11, 1927. THE DANGERS OF GENERALISATION.

Delivered every evening by 5 o'olook in Hawera, Manaia, Normanby, Okaiawa. Kltbarn, Mangatoki, Kaponga, Alton Harley ville, Patea, Waverley, Jlokoia, Whakamara, Ohangai. Meremere. Frasei Road and Ararata

Tlu; Deputy Official Assignee of Auckland recently saw fit to publish a statement to the- effect that lie had had plenty of eases before him to show that business morality was at a low ebb. This statement lias been telegraphed throughout New Zealand, and doubtless wo will soon be treated to the spectacle of business men meeting in solemn conclave and passing resolutions on the subject. It is not strange that a public official, whose daily work brings him into close contact with much of the worst in the business life of the community, should take a pessimistic and narrow view, but it is less comprehensible that so much weight should be given to his statement of his views by the public. Scarcely a day passes without some such solemn pronouncement being made by an individual, or by a group of individuals, if not In this country, then in some other part of the world. Sometimes the pessimism with which a public man is accredited is repudiated, sometime* the speaker qualifies his remarks, but very often those who make such pronouncements are confident that, the little evil cross-sec-tion of life which has come under their notice is life itself, and they are therefore confirmed in their belief that oil life is bad. Quite recently newspapers readers were regaled with an account of a speech alleged to have been made by a clergyman to the effect that. we were raising a. nation of liars in our schools. This was the kind of sweeping stricture which no fair-minded community could allow to pass uncontradicted, and it was as the result of a Hawera criticism of the remarks that the misstatement was brought under the notice of the speaker who was said to have made it, with the result, happily in this instance, that it was found that such a statement had never been made. But these pessimistic misstatements cannot always be traced to faulty reporting, and the fact still remains that daily we see in print the forebodings of persons who believe that their experiences make them competent to utter swooping condemnations of the community at large, with the result that we are constantly being told that dancing is a curse, business morality a thing of the past, that the prevailing fashions have changed human nature for the worse, and that generally the world is sliding speedily on tho downward path. It is to be feared that the average man, who at present treats such forebodings very lightly, would be prone to fall into similar error if he lived in an atmosphere of crime, divorce, or poverty, but we expect those who occupy positions of responsibility In be above ,such common weaknesses in (lie exercise of judgment. To generalise is human, but a duty devolves upon those whose calling places them in tho position of leaders of pubile thought to retain their perspective aul resist the temptation to believe that dishonesty prevails in the business world in the same proportion as it does in the eases which come under the notice of tho official whoso business it is to look into the affairs of bankrupts. If those whoso habit it is solemnly to warn the world that it is sinking into decadence would remember that an overwhelming proportion of their fel-low-men are too busy earning an honest living, and spending their leisure in healthful recreation, to have time to interest. themselves in the minority and their ways of doing business and of amusing themselves, we would be less frequently annoyed by the tiresome exhortations of the pessimists who would, if they had their way, turn the world into a reformatory on wholesale lines.