ce, embraced poverty, lived simply and austerely. Religious
asceticism is no novelty. But the wholesale rejection of acquisition and
accumulation as a way of life certainly marks a turning point in the
popular attitude toward the utilitarian axiom that human happiness is
directly proportioned to the quantity and variety of material
possessions.

Civilization presupposes getting, keeping and exercising power over
nature, society and man. Each civilization has added to man's
utilization of nature. This has been a notorious aspect of western
civilization since the inauguration of the scientific-technological
revolution. After a century of intensified exploitation of the natural
environment, entire communities are reacting with dismay and disgust
against the resulting pollution of air, water and land, the wanton waste
of soil fertility, forests and minerals, and extermination of various
forms of "wilderness." Freedom to exploit nature's storehouse has not
brought happiness. On the contrary, it threatens the existence of other
life forms and even the continuance of human life on the planet.

Private enterprise and other forms of permissiveness have led to
practices that circumscribe and hamper life. Their declared objective is
the liberation and enlargement of human life and well being. Where they
have been tested out they have proved themselves to be obstructive and
destructive rather than creative and constructive.

Notable advances in science and technology have greatly increased the
human capacity to transform nature and remake society. Designed and
executed as a means of enhancing the general welfare, science and
technology might have promoted human well-being. But employed as a means
of exploiting nature and society for the benefit of a favored few,
science and technology, whether directed by European and American
promoters of the African slave trade, Spanish conquerors in Latin
America, by Belgians in the African Congo, by European whites in their
dealings with the North American Indians, by the Nazis in Europe, or by
Americans in South East Asia, have involved merciless exploitation
accompanied by revolting atrocities.

Never in recorded history was the capacity of man to modify nature and
exploit society more publicly tested out than in the atom bombing of
Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the purposeful devastation of jungle life and
village life in large parts of Vietnam and Cambodia. Reported in the
public press and