The Wanganui Chronicle SATURDAY, APRIL 23, 1949 ENQUIRING MINDS

Wanganui Chronicle, 23 April 1949, Page 4

The Wanganui Chronicle SATURDAY, APRIL 23, 1949 ENQUIRING MINDS

need today to have citizens with enquiring minds who do not accept everything that is told them without examination,” declared Mr. Clement Attlee, Britain's Labour Prime Minister to the National Union of Teachers’ Conference at Margate.

“Tile last thing we want in the building up of society is the drilling of people to accept without criticism an aulhoritatarian, uni form view.”

The averment strikes at the toot of human progress. Unless there arc free minds that arc not only free but also active, then human, social and spiritual stagnation must be the inevitable result.

It must be emphasised, however, that notwithstanding its apparent individualistic character, thought is a social function. When Colonel Younghusband led fne British expedition to Lhassa he witnessed a, strange sight an ascetic occupying a grave in which he was fed once daily and the'stone covering returned to the mouth of the grave afterwards. It would be difficult to perceive what purpose was served by such conduct but it can be believed that the living occupant of that grave would not emerge from it a wiser man than he was when he went into it. Communication is essential for human t'nought. Thought is like the building of an arch, one man places a stone on Hie right side, another places one on the left, and this goes on until some fortunate individual is enabled to place the keystone in position, completing the structure. Thought, too, may be said to be the result of fruitful seed falling upon fertile ground. None can say where that fruitful ground is or is likely to be found. The dairy maids of England learned before authoritative medicine that cowpocks avoided the contraction of smallpox; the fisherfolk learned long before fine doetoi's that codliver oil remedied the sun deficiency disease of rickets. St. Paul set out on his missionary effort of introducing into Europe new ideas on religion more by the backing of the church at Antioch than by that of Jerusalem, while Francis Bacon, with the Bennaisance in full burgeoning before his eyes could proclaim that ‘‘Truth is the daughter of Time-, not of Authority.” To limit the means of communication between men in any age or community is to limit their thought processes. A free mind ami an aulhoritatarian setup cannot go together, for Authority means the domination of the thought of another. But it is precisely from the free minds of the world that progress is engenered. Pasteur refused to accept the doctrines of his day concerning infection, lie worked on his own line and endured the opposition experienced by all pioneers in the realm of thought. But because he could communicate his ideas and demonstrate them by experiment, be established a new' era in health of mankind.

It is significant of almost all authoritatarian regimes that they engage in the burning of the books. It is by books that men are made. In China the cry goes up “a dearth of books and men.” for every invader seems to be intent upon destroying the records of men’s thought. If Mr. Attlee desires to ensure that his country will have those “enquiring minds who do not accept everything that is told to them” so that human progress shall continue then he must see to it that the printed word is made available to all men. It is not given to the average man to engage in exploring a complicated set of facts ami the net has to be spread wide in order to arrest sufficient minds to permit of the thinking of the world being carried on. These mental toilers must communicate with each other and this implies free facilities to read. Reading, like thought, is a social habit. It is not possible to confine reading to a narrow range. The reading habit like any other, either waxes or wanes. Here is New Zealand, where the Government is decrying the doctrine of Communism, that deadening of the soul of man : that same Government is paving Ihe way for this miasma of the mind by restricting books entering the country. Sir Percy Unwin, the famous English publisher, when he wrote “The Truth About Publishing’’ some thirty years ago found it possible to praise New Zealand as a country which bought good books in plenty. The name of New Zealand stood high in the estimating of the work! when books were freely obtained because of the mental quality of the men produced in these isolated islands. These references to New Zealand have had to be eliminated from the latest edition of this book because they are no longer true. What a judgment on this Dominion! Today the complaint is that men of above average ability go abroad and stay there and the reason for this is the mental atmosphere of other countries is richer than that of New Zealand. Export sales of books from the United Kingdom, according to Sir Stanley Unwin, have increased from £3,500,000 in 1938, to £9,000,000 in 1949, yet in New Zealand the policy is to restrict the import of books to the 1938 level. Notwithstanding Ihe population being double that of South Africa's Lhiglish-s'peaking population, imports ini o'New Zealand of English books do mil equal those imported into South Africa. Comment on that fact is not needed. But the position is worse than at first appears. It is the better books that tend to be shut out in a country imposing such a restriction upon thought and expression. Technical books which cannot be expected to be purchased byTetailers and in other countries are imported by the publishers’ agents, are restricted in New Zealand because publishers’ agents cannot secure licences to import these technical works. Small wonder that, like China, there is a dearth of books and men and indifference prevails so widely. It should be remembered that every great movement in the minds of men has been associated with a book. The Bible, the Book of Common Prayer. Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress. The Koran. The Vedas, The Analects of Confucius, Savonarola’s Triumph o the Cross. The Encyclopaedists who paved the way for the New Era of freedom in Erance, Darwin's “Origin of the Species.” which gave direction to thoughts on Evolution. Hobbes Leviathan, and Rousseau’s Social Contract, Marx’s Das Kapital are all books associated with great human movements and without which books such movements would not have taken the form that they did. The Burning of the Books may easily be dispensed with if the prohibition of the books entering an isolated country such as New Zealand can be sufficiently established. Such prohibition need not be complete by any means to impair human thought and progress. The number of men to shape the future will be conditioned always by the number of books that are available to them. Let New Zealand beware lest their liberties, like those of Rome, be lost amidst an abundance of circuses and games and a lack ol: enlightment ol men’s minds. If it be true that the licensing of the importation of books is to be done away with then the handicaps on knowledge that now' oppress the people and rob them of future leaders will have disappeared. If the impediments on importing technical and better class literature remain then, in due time, and that at no distant date, the pathetic, cry of China will be heard in the land:

“A dearth of books ami men. ’ and the men ol: enquiring minds desired by Mr. Attlee will not be available to rescue the country from darkness and bring it once more into the light.