There are three courses we might take in the Put-Through Clan in dealing with our town. (1) We can stand for disciplining capital and labor into shape by passing laws and heaping up penalties. (2) We can let them see how much better they can make things by sicking them on to each other and having them discipline each other. (3) We can make fun of both of them until they make fun of themselves and each class begins disciplining itself. Then general self-discipline will set in. We propose to indulge—each group of us in the Put-Through Clan—the labor group in the town, the employer group and the public group, in self-disciplining ourselves, until the thing is made catching out of sheer shame and decency in others.
§ 3. Psycho-Analysis.
The scientific basis for psycho-analysis for a town, or for a labor union, or for a Republican or Democratic Party, is found in the facts that have been stated by Mathias Alexander in his book and demonstrated by his work.
Professor John Dewey in his introduction to Mr. Alexander's book speaks of what Mr. Alexander stands for, as Completed Psycho-analysis.
As Alexander's technique for pulling one particular man, soul and body, together, is precisely the technique I have in mind for pulling a nation together, I want to dwell on it a moment longer before applying it to the Put-Through Clan.
The first thing a man is always fooled about is his own body and in everything else he is fooled about, he just branches out from that.
The Put-Through Clan proceeds upon the idea that this is as true of his political or social or industrial body to which he belongs as it is of his first one.
Reform must be self-reform first.