THE SENSE OF VALUES.

Waikato Times, Volume 104, Issue 17502, 8 September 1928, Page 13 (Supplement)

THE SENSE OF VALUES.

POLITICIANS AND THEIR WORK. ■ (Ry “-Cephas.”) “Mr Bell has a theme of absorbing interest in ‘Civilisation: An Essay,’ on which he has been meditating, with radical changes of judgment, for something like twenty years; and he has things to say of . penetrating vitality and vigour.” 'This is proved by what he has to say in bis chapter, "The Sense of Values.” In his argument Mr Clive Beil says:— From a sense of values -comes that desire for, and belief in, liberal education which no civilised age has been without. The richest and fullest life obtainable, a life which contains the maximum of vivid and exquisite experiences, is the end of every civilised man’s desire. Because he desires it he alms at complete self-development and complete self-expression; and these are to be achieved only by those wh-o have learnt to think and feel and discriminate, to let the intellect play freely round every subject, and the emotion respond appropriately to all stimuli. Knowledge Neoessary. Knowledge in addition is needed; for without knowledge the -intellect remains the slave of prejudice . and superstition, while the emotions sicken on a monotonous and cannibalistic diet. The civilised man desires an education which shall be as direct a means as possible to what alone is good as an end. He cultivates his powers of thinking and feeling, pursues truth, and acquires knowledge, not for any practical value that these may possess, but for themselves, or—that I may distinguish him sharpLy from the date-collector and competition-win-ner—for their power of revealing the rich and complex possibilities of life The Philistine, wanting the sense of values, expects education to show him the way to wealth and power, things which are valuable only in so far as they are more or less remote means to their ultimate go-od, whither liberal education leads direct. Liberal education teaches us to enjoy life; practical education to acquire things that may enable us or someone else to enjoy it.

Politicians Under Fire. Mr Clive Bell, too, is not -inclined to over-estimate the services of politicians and looks upon them as instiuments rather than creators. He writes. “Politicians, for their hour, loom as large as actors and jockeys, and then, like them, fade from the public mind, and arc known to curious erudition only. * Alive ridiculous, and dead forgot"’ It the last part of the quotation be true, so must be the first; for what could bo more ridiculous tlia.ii one doomed to speedy oblivion, giving himself the airs Cabinet minis lei s aio apt to assume? “And, tell me, how many of your friends -could tell you who was Prime Minister of England at the tme of Waterloo, .who was at the War Office, and who was Firsh Lord of the Admiralty. Of how many politicians alive and active in tlic year 1815 are the names familiar to the reading public? Of Canning, perhaps, and Castlereagh (chiefly because lie was the object of Byron’s satire and bhelley’s), and possibly of Urey. Does anyone but an avowed student of military history know the names of more than two of AN cilinglon s fc>enerals? And who was in command of Hie British Fleet when Napoleon came on board Hie Beilerophon? “But if well-educated English men and women do not know the name of the Prime Minister who presumably ‘won’ the the Napoleonic War, no? the names of his Cabinet colleagues, no. of more than two of his soldiers, nor of a single one of his admirals, every second-class undergraduate can tell you that Shelley, Byron, Reals, Wordsworth, Coleridge, Southey, Lamb. Hazlitt, Scott, Aioore, Rogers, and Jane Austen were writing at that time. Do Not Make the Tune. “And the explanation is simple: these are remembered because they they have had, and have still, a real ■and direct effect c.n Hie minds of men; because they are still creating, still stimulating new thoughts and feelings, still suggesting new points of view or changing old ones; because they are even adding now to the world’s store of good. “Politicians, at best, do but manipulate and distribute the good things others have produced; never do they create. When they are rememnered it is chiefly for Hie great and dramatic events with which their names are associated, but of which they are not the cause; and, as wc have seen, great events will not save them always. They belong, as a rule, to that Ihrd or fourth order which, though it. may play a -conspicuous, can never play a leading, part in Hie history of the race. Politicians leave scars and scratches on Hie disk, but they do not make the tune; they neither originate nor conclude nor greatly modify those more conscious impulses of the human mind which give shape to human history. It is a mistake, therefore, to expect them to be of those who create civilisations, though often they will be found significant manifestations of the civilisations of which they arc parts.” Mr CUvc Bell has his views on the future of civilisation and the place of reason as the ultimate arbiter of life. He may not convince all his readers, but he will make them think. Patriotism, religion, riches, social well-being, all come under review in Mr Clive Bell’s exhaustive survey;