era, society is always in a state of unstable
equilibrium, tending either toward better or worse. It may indeed be of
the very essence of human life, but it is a plant of tender growth and
needs delicate nurture and jealous care; a small thing may work it
irreparable injury. It may reach very great heights of perfection and
spread over a continent, as during the European Middle Ages; it may sink
to low depths with an equal dominion, as in the second dark ages of the
nineteenth century. Sometimes little enclaves of high value hide
themselves in the midst of degradation, as Venice and Ireland in the
Dark Ages. Always, by the grace of God, the primary social unit, the
family may, and frequently does, achieve and maintain both purity and
beauty when the world without riots in ruin and profligacy.

I have taken the problem of the organization of society as the first to
be considered, for it is fundamental. If society is of the wrong shape
it does not matter in the least how intelligent and admirable may be the
devices we construct for the operation of government or industry or
education; they may be masterly products of human intelligence but they
will not work, whereas on the other hand a sane, wholesome and decent
society can so interpret and administer clumsy and defective instruments
that they will function to admiration. A perfect society would need no
such engines at all, but a perfect society implies perfect individuals,
and I think we are now persuaded that a society of this nature is a
purely academic proposition both now and in the calculable future. What
we have to do is to take mankind as it is; made up of infinitely varied
personalities ranging from the idiot to the "super-man"; cruel and
compassionate, covetous and self-sacrificing, silly and erudite, cynical
and emotional, vulgar and cultured, brutal and fastidious, shameful in
their degradation and splendid in their honour and chivalry, and by the
franchise of liberty and the binding of law, facilitate in every way the
process whereby they themselves work out their own salvation. You cannot
impose morality by statute or guarantee either character or intelligence
by the perfection of the machine. Every institution, good or bad, is the
result of growth from many human impulses, not the creation of
autocratic fiat. But growth may be impeded, hastened, or suspended, and
the most that can be done is to offer incentives to action, remove the
obstacles to development