Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

be a most uninteresting place to live in; most people would be bored to tears and probably die from sheer ennui. It is the present-day struggle for existence and perfection which continues to drive men onwards and upwards and keeps life interesting. But take away the incentive created by competition, whereby one man strives to excel another, and all human progress would cease. We have experience of this fact in the present war. Nowhere does the glamour of a name count for so little as on the field of battle. The men desire to be led by leaders who have demonstrated their capacity to lead, irrespective of their station in civil life. Genius, character and will power is what they seek, desire and are anxious to follow. Genius is held " uppermost and nearest the sun,' and if this be a guiding principle in the Art of War, it should be so no less in the Arts of Peace and National Government.

[ocr errors]

"For opinions are a matter of will; they are always, or ought to be always, travelling tickets implying a certain definite aim and destination, and the opinions we hold concerning Life must point to a certain object we see in Life; hence there is just as great a market for opinions, and just as great a demand for fixed values to-day as there ever was, and the jealous love with which men will quote well-established views, or begin to believe when they hear that a view is well

M

established-a fact which is at the root of all the fruits of modern popularity-shows what a need and what a craving there is for authority, for authoritative information, and for unimpeachable coiners of opinion."

What Democracy really means when it discusses equality is that all men shall have equal opportunities, to which no man can have any possible objection; but to attempt to make all men equal is to run contrary to the laws of Nature. In the world as we find it strong men, like strong nations, will always make, or secure advantages, which the weaker men cannot. In the race of life the men of talent, skill, energy and genius, soon get far in advance of the rest.

But they are the artists who give shape and form to our economic life; who help the weak in their struggle for existence; who impress their character upon the national will. A striking example of what men can do in this respect is afforded in the person of Mr. Woodrow Wilson, President of the United States of America, a noble type of manhood. His whole character and policy have been impressed upon the people of the United States; but the great strength of his position is mainly due to the concern he exercises in only using his fine position and authority to advance the welfare of the people from whom he derives his power, nationally and internation

ally. He is the apex of the United States Pyramid.

"He is the great legislator who discovered what sacrifices his people can afford to make, what things they will be able for ever to discard in order to reap the advantages of a certain mode of life. His teaching must include restraint. It is the renunciation of some things and the careful cultivation of others that builds up a a noble type.

"It cannot be said too often, therefore, that the Egyptians were a happy and contented people, and this they were because there was some power abroad in their world, and because he who wielded that power could make them believe that the human race was as high as a pyramid, although but one man perhaps could ever represent the apex.1

"Upwards life striveth to build itself with columns and stairs; into remote distances it longeth to gaze and outwards after blissful beauties therefore it needeth height!

"And because it needeth height, it needeth stairs and contradiction between stairs, and those who can climb! to rise striveth life, and in rising to surpass itself!

[ocr errors]

Verily, he who here towered aloft his thought in stone knew as well as the wisest ones about the secret of life!

1 Nietzsche and Art (Ludovici).

"That there is struggle and inequality even in beauty and war for power and supremacy: that doth he here teach us in the plainest parable.

"Thus spake Zarathustra.”1 1 Z., II. xxix.

CHAPTER VI

ART, ECONOMICS AND WORLD POLITICS

CREATIVE genius is considered by certain people to be incapable of definition, as they believe it to be something that is elusive and not positive. Now if we start from the belief that conception and truth are synonymous, we can only come to the conclusion that genius is positive and not elusive. For to be a genius in the intellectual sphere, a man must be able to give effect to some ideal which is out of the ordinary. He must be capable of intelligently anticipating events in accordance with some predetermined idea; as in the realm of pure art he must be able to impart to a canvas, or a cast, a conception that is distinctive with the impress of his personality.

Creative genius conceives a state of things far above anything which exists; but to be rational it should conform itself to a system with a direction, a goal and a purpose. A creative genius, therefore, is nothing more or less than a super-artist, a rational optimist-one who desires to give effect to some ideal which may improve the lot of man

165

« AnteriorContinuar »