" It is indeed what we are fighting for--peace. But
we believe today, more strongly than ever before, as democracy advances,
as peoples tend to gain more and more control over their governments,
that even this may not be an unrealizable ideal. Democracies, intent on
self-realization and self-development, do not desire war.
The problem of social science, then, appears to be to organize human
society on the principles and ideals of Christianity. But in view of the
fact that the trend of evolution is towards the elimination of commercial
competition, the question which must seriously concern us today is--What
in the future shall be the spur of individual initiative? Orthodoxy and
even democratic practice have hitherto taken it for granted--in spite of
the examples of highly socialized men, benefactors of society--that
the average citizen will bestir himself only for material gain. And it
must be admitted that competition of some sort is necessary for
self-realization, that human nature demands a prize. There can be no
self-sacrifice without a corresponding self-satisfaction. The answer
is that in the theory of democracy, as well as in that of Christianity,
individualism and co-operation are paradoxically blended. For
competition, Christianity substitutes emulation. And with democracy,
it declares that mankind itself can gradually be rained towards the level
of the choice individual who does not labour for gain, but in behalf of
society.
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