Functional socialism

100 FUNCTIONAL SOCIALISM

scarcity a scare of the past, with our economy and our culture built on a new vision of life, ambition will not itself be purified and all missions confined to the spiritual activities. If a man wants a thing greatly, there need then be no reason why we should not help him. For instead of climbing on our backs to our loss, the man’s new achievements, new discoveries, new adventures must all redound to our gain. This is as true in the functional sphere as in the cultural.

From the functional point of view, with things as they are, it is not the ambitious man who is to be feared, but rather the complacent, contented man. The problem is how to stir him into consciousness of life’s realities, into some understanding of how near we are to the abyss. It is this quiet man, with a small bank balance, who grows a small family, in a small house, and potatoes and cabbages in a small garden, who is the object of admiration and flattery from the present possessing and ruling classes. And, equally, the quiet man without a bank balance or a house and garden, who feels and does not think his way through life. These are the outer defences of the existing order. To-day, the only ambition worth pursuit is to carry the fiery cross through both suburbia and slumland.

There is another type which must not be overlooked. There are ambitions or desires honourable in themselves which urge on men and women irrespective of their industrial or financial position. But because they have these ambitions, they keep an exceedingly shrewd eye upon their economic interests.