The Wilmington morning star., 1947-04-23
Germany AS
A Warning

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collapse of Western civilization-an eventual
ity the possibility Of which is claiming in
creasingly general interest. Specifically, it is
10 forecast and a warning Of what would hap.
pen on a far broader stage following another
general war, which it is supposed would top
pie Western civilization.
The physical aspect Of Germany-its ruins,
its disease, its filth, its stencils a perfect
setting for this preview Of a civilization-in
collapse. The sight of its people-Beriiners
especially, the inhabitants OF what was once
the third largest city in the world and al
most an epitome Of Western civilization
Itrudging along the streets with backs bent
low under heavy burdens or grubbing in gar
bage cans or, in the appropriate season,
searching the cutters for acorns with which
to make some wierd sort Of ersatz flour or,
mindless Of traffic, rushing out into the
street to pick UP tiny piece OF coal dropped
from a passing truck; all this is uncozafort-
ably suggestive Of the kind OF throwback to
primitive animal existence which could quite
conceivably happen throughout the Western
world generally.
Fitting into the picture, OF course, is the re-
version 10 economic primitivism-the doni-
nance Of barter and the virtual meaningless
ness Of money. And with ii, too, goes the
moral anarchy-the individual collapse which
makes the soul as corruptlble as malnutri-
ton and disease the body: the willingness to
trade integrity for a material boon, however
trivial.
One may observe all this with dispassionate
leyes, and yet 1t is difficult not to think, with
the ghost Of Hamlet's father: What a falling
off was th~ere!'-but meaning not the Ger
mans but Western man in general. Or per-
haps: ''There, but for the grac eof being an
American. 60 l."
The question is really how much longer
haps: There, but for the grace Of being an
helps going TO stave off the doom. For the
= f. - G.s~s~- 10000
lence, even among Americans, who so far
are the least affected, that something is pro-
foundly wrong with the world in which they
find themselves, and that 1t is something
which can by no means conveniently be
blamed on the supposed mistakes Of persons
in high places or even on those Of a whole
administration
For one thing, the post : war world-in
which most Americans more or less believed
OF bigger and better refrigerators, automo-
biles and bathroons-has not only failed to
materialize but shows in fact decreasing evi.
| dence of coming into being in the lifetime Of
those now living. And instead Of peace, vic
tory has brought almost unbearable interna-
ional tensions and. the undeniable threat
sooner or later, Of war. The atomic bomb
has opened up awesoIne horizons not calcu-
lated TO enhance the prospects Of peace.
. But it is in their individual lives also that
people are beginning to have misgivings; it
is difficult to convince themselves that they
are getting any happier. The goals OF the good
life-inner peace, goodwill toward men and a
certain measure Of material and emotional
security - seem farther off than ever, and
most people find themselves caught up in a
lhighly-tensed, personally competitive race in
which being polite de, bootlicking) is more
important than being competent, in which
count more than integrity or abil-
ity.
Those who think about such matters have
been aware of these symptoms for a very
long time and have advanced, certain theories
in explanation. Perhaps the most popular
now, or at last the most generally accepted,
is what may be called the cyclical interpre-
tation OF civilizations. This Interpretation,
however, variously it may be advanced, sug-
gests simply that civilizations develop toward
a high point and then decline, and that what
we loosely term Western civilization is now
in its period of decline-is, in fact, in a very
advanced stage Of disintegration.
Most Illuminating in this connection are the
parallelisms drawn between our society and
that ct Rome shortly before its fall. The
parallelisms are almost inexhaustible and
mostly applicable: the tremendous growth OF
bureaucracy, the per capita increase Of in
sanity. suicide and alcoholism, the prevalence
OF divorce with its implication OF the break
down Of the family as a social institution, ex-
~cessive legalism which progresses farther and
farther away from the human factor, the stul-
LITIGATION Of the arts REALISTICALLY, we have de-
Iveloped criticism to an exact science, but WI
have created little) the performance Of war
and cruelty, and above all the general EN-.
Ipaasis on material things in opposition to if
not actually excluding spiritual, moral or phil
osophlca. considerations.
II this Interpretation possesses any validity
and it is certainly difficult to dismiss or re-
flute the preponderant weight Of the parable
lisms-it alters, among other things, the ma
ture OF the threat OF another war. The genesis
Of such a war would be discoverable, that is,
not so much in conflicting ideologies ('Can
two diametrically-opposed p~olitico- philosophi-
cal systems exist side by side in the same
1world?") but rather as an inevitable CONGO
infant of the working out of the disintegration
Of Western civilization (of which disintegra-
ton, incidentally, the slave systems Of Fas-
cism and Communism are viewed as symp-
toms).
Surely it is so basic as to sound almost
inane that, if human beings really pos
sessed the reasonableness of which they once
boosted, there would be no problem of war
and the two opposed ideologies could certainly
exist side by side. Granting, as a kind Of
|epitaph on the detunct theory of progress,
that human beings are far from possessing
reasonaoleness as a dominant characteristic,
it Is certainly logical to expect in a disinte-
grating civilization, in which individual hui
man beings are in themselves torn by strifes
and conflicts and desires incapable of satia-
ton, more and vaster wars - war being the
most disintegrative of all forces. Which is
another way Of saying that the world is a
macrocosm of the Individual human being.
Those who would avoid war, therefore,
might be better advised, as the late Irving
Babbit long ago advised, to look into their
own lives and the society they form than to
trust in diplomatic councils. Unfortunately,
SO far has the disintegrative process appar.
emily gone, there seems little in our world
which could any more give to human beings
the prerequisites to inner peace of content
mentor a c~oncomitant. of the disintegration