EUCLID AND LIFE

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XXIII, Issue 7, 19 December 1932, Page 11

EUCLID AND LIFE

SOME AXIOMS QUESTIONED. THE MAN AND THE TEAM. An 'unusual form of attack was adopted by Mr. J. S. Barton, S.M., in an address to the parents and scholars who assembled for the breaking-up ceremony of the Hutt High School. Mr. Barton began by saying that he had considerable difficulty in finding his subject. He had set out to speak on a statement which would be absolutely true viewed from every angle and in all the relations ■of life. The subject that 2 and 2 equals 4 has been suggested as a statement absolutely true. But was it? What did two pie melons added to two jew'a harps make?

What did two whiskies added to two shallow-pated young men make? Certainly not a plus quantity. Euclid had twelve axioms which were called self-evident truths, but were they? . . ‘ ‘.Things that were equal to the same thing were equal to one another.” That was not true; except from one particular angle they were not equal. A number of bricks might look the same but tests would prove differences of texture and capability of taking strain. That particular axiom was one of the dangers of democracy. One voter was not always equal to another, and it was not right that 50 must always outweight 49. John Morley had said that twelve men in armour were worth more than one man in his shirt.

But that was not always true. It would not bo true in the case of assisting a drowning man, nor would it evln be true in the sense in which it Wils used if the battlefield was on mwjjshy ground. There was, however, an axiom ot Euclid which was always true used in all the relations of life, and that was that the whole must be greater than the part, and he hoped they would take that as his message to them. It was true in sport, the team was mote than the player at football, and the side more than the man in cricket.

They must take this thought into their school life and plaj for the class and the school.

They must apply it to the family. The family was more than the individual, and nothing must ever be done that would let the family down. What a great thing it would be if this axiom were brought into politics. If to-day all legislators would forget eyery division of the past, and realise that the whole was greater than a part thereof. English history in the future would give honour to the men who in the recent crisis had learnt the axiom.

They must remember too that life was greater than a part, and not risk for the sake of a few years of inglorious ease or unworthy indulgence the record of an honourable life.