It is not so certain as is often alleged that modern factory work, in its actual detail, is and must remain mere drudgery. In general, it is good management to give a man the most intelligent work he is fit for, and, in general, this kind of work will evoke most interest and self-expression. Much of what appears to be drudgery to an onlooker is not really so—there is commonly more room for skill and individuality in manual work than is apparent from the outside—and what is really so should tend to be eliminated by better training and placing, more considerate management, a better spirit of co-operation, and other probable improvements.
No doubt the free play of individuality, for most of us, must be sought outside of working-hours, but there should be something of self-expression and the spirit of art in all work.
Perhaps the greatest weakness of our idealism is that it does not imagine living social wholes. So strong is the individualist tradition in America and England that we hardly permit ourselves to aspire toward an ideal society directly, but think that we must approach it by some distributive formula, like “the greatest good of the greatest number.” Such formulas are unsatisfying to human nature, however justly they may give one aspect of the truth. The ideal society must be an organic whole, capable of being conceived directly, and requiring to be so conceived if it is to lay hold upon our imaginations. Do we not all feel the dispersive, numerical, uninspiring character of “the greatest good of the greatest number” as a call to faith and action? It is like covering a canvas with ten thousand human figures an inch high and crying: “Behold the ideal man!” No number, however vast, and no aggregation of merely individual good can satisfy the need of the imagination for a unitary conception. It is well to dwell at times on personal opportunity, comfort, self-expression, and the like, but at other times, and especially times of spiritual exaltation, we must have the vision of a larger good.
And our conception of life as a race in which every one must have a fair start, is useful but inadequate. It overstresses competition and fails to set before us worthy objects of endeavor. We need a conception more affirmative and inspiring, which shall above all give us something worth while to live for, something that appeals to imagination, hope, and love.
I think those nations were not wholly wrong who, rejecting the extreme doctrines of utilitarian individualism, have maintained the idea and feeling of a transcendent collective reality. Hegel’s view that “the state is the march of God in the world” appears mystical to us, but is in reality no more so than our exaltation of the individual. It is true that in Germany the dominant classes seized upon this doctrine of an ideal whole and made it an instrument for exploiting the masses of the people. But we constantly see that great truths are used for selfish ends, and we have a close parallel in the exploitation of the idea of individual freedom by English and American commercialism to maintain its own ascendancy.
The idealization of the state, the impressing of a unitary life upon the hearts of the people by tradition, poetry, music, architecture, national celebrations and memorials, and by a religion and philosophy teaching the individual that he is a member of a glorious whole to which he owes devotion, is in line with the needs of human nature, however it may be degraded in use by reactionary aims. Our country is backward, inferior to countries far less fortunate, in the richness, beauty, and moral authority of its public life. Our freedom is too commonly cold, harsh, and spiritually poor, and hence not really free. Let us hope that no theories may deter us from building up a national ideal of which love, beauty, and religion can be a part. We need a collective life which, without repressing individuality, personal or local, shall afford central emblems that all may look up to and a discipline in which all may share.
A deeper community spirit is needed throughout our society. Our towns, cities, and country neighborhoods should have more unity, individuality, and pride, with the local traditions, art, fellowship, and public institutions that express these. We want popular choruses, pageants, social centres, local arts and crafts, an indigenous painting, architecture, and sculpture, a vivid communal life leading up from the neighborhood to the nation.[[84]]
Our idea of our country has plenty of vigor but lacks definite forms into which to flow. It does not sufficiently connect with real life, and, in ordinary times, is too commonly ineffective in raising us out of selfishness and confusion. Our picture of the republic is mostly a child’s sketch, without beauty of form or depth and harmony of color.
The direct and moving vision of the nation is sometimes to be had in our literature, though by no means in such various and familiar forms as we need. You will find it, for example, in Lowell’s ode, read in 1865 to commemorate Harvard students lost in the Civil War. I will not quote from it at length because its spirit is too impassioned to be congruous here, but read the ode as a whole, or the last two strophes, or even the concluding lines, beginning—
“O Beautiful! my Country! ours once more!