Principles of western civilisation

CHAPTER Ix

THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE GREAT ANTINOMY IN WESTERN HISTORY: SECOND STAGE

In the study of the many-sided movement which, dating from the Renaissance in Europe, and which, taking its course through the religious and political upheaval known in history as the Reformation, carries us rapidly forward into the midst of the principles governing the development of the modern world, it is of the first importance that the attention of the observer should continue to be concentrated on the character of the central problem with which we have been concerned from the beginning. That problem in its briefest terms involves, as we saw, the realisation in Western history of conditions in which the principle of Projected Efficiency is to become more effectively operative than has ever been possible in the world before.

Standing at this point for a moment and looking back over the history of the progress which the race has made, it may be recalled that the conditions under which development has been possible in the social process have had one characteristic feature. While progress has been identified from the beginning with competition, the inherent tendency of all competition, in the era of the ascendency

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