All known societies take special care to insure that each succeeding generation is made acquainted with their culture and history, suitably processed for easy assimilation. That processing is a mark of civilization. Soka Gakkai has a distinguished record not only in fostering the diffusion of knowledge, but also in helping to create it through its support of research and the arts. Just as education serves values beyond supplying knowledge, so knowledge itself comes through other means than formal education. That is, I think, what Daisaku Ikeda meant in his address on Peace and Society when he quoted President Toda's statement that confusing knowledge with wisdom is the principal error in the thinking of modern man.
Mankind can pursue and cherish enlightenment from infancy to old age.
Enlightenment enriches all eight of the values that define human aspirations. Policy scientists list it along with other values like Power, Wealth, Well-being or health, Skill, Affection or loyalty, Respect, and Rectitude, all of which are base values toward which individuals and institutions can aspire. Enlightenment is not only an end in itself, but it also serves these other seven values, for purposes that are both good and evil. Knowledge permits people to gain Power through its capacity to influence or enrich the lives of other people, but it also contributes to such practical technologies as making war and enforcing peace. It enhances the Well-Being of individuals and whole populations by contributing to medical sciences and the maintenance of good health, but it can be degraded to serve those guilty of vivisection and torture.