It does not by any means follow that every new idea is a good one, that every proposed change would be an improvement. But as progress is the law of the universe, it rests with the old order to show why it should be continued. Wisdom, therefore, urges us to give careful consideration to new ideas, however contrary they may be to prevalent opinions, bearing in mind the frequent lesson of history that “the stone which the builders rejected, the same is become the head of the corner,” and approaching all questions in the spirit of St. Paul's injunction: “Prove all things; hold fast that which is good.” For all political and social problems, which are the burning questions of to-day, there is, it seems to me, a simple test in Herbert Spencer's “first principle”: “Every man may claim the fullest liberty to exercise his faculties compatible with the possession of like liberty by every other man.” Legislation that does not square with the self-evident truth and justice of this dictum is bad legislation, and must prove maleficent to the nation, state, or city that enacts it. I need not offer any modern instances.
Reasoning in reverse order, i.e., from effect to cause, we may be sure that when we see in a country abounding in natural resources, as ours is, inhabited by the most intelligent, energetic, and resourceful people the world has ever seen—when we see in such a country millions of willing workers in enforced idleness; when, to account for the idleness and its attendant want and destitution, we are offered the absurdity of “over-production” of the very things for which millions are suffering; when we see men and women who toil not revelling in luxury, while others who labor sixteen hours a day are barely able to keep body and soul together, we may know absolutely, without further investigation, that there is something fundamentally wrong in our social organization.
This is not the time or place to point out these wrongs specifically, or to advance, even in the most general terms, what, after much thought, I believe to be the remedies. I merely urge the thoughtful study of social problems without bias or prejudice. This state of openmindedness is not easy to achieve. We think that we think our own thoughts; but as Tarde, the French psychologist, says: “What the individual hypnotizer is to his sleeping and abnormally plastic subject, such, almost precisely, is society to the waking and normally plastic man.”[7]
On the solution of social problems, Ibsen says: “There is only one thing that avails—to revolutionize people's minds.” This was a difficult task about so plain a matter as the Copernican system, which was opposed by the combined learning and piety of Europe. How much more difficult must it be when the change affects the every-day life of every individual? As Nitti says: “Had the propositions of Euclid affected economic interests they would still appear doubtful hypotheses of arduous solution.”
[7] “As, then, in philosophy the first step is to begin by doubting everything, so, in social philosophy, the first step is to throw aside all supposed absolute rights.”—Jevons.
The public library is destined to play an important part, to exercise an incalculable influence in the solution of the social problems of to-day, and through this on the future of the nation and the race. The wisdom needed for this task is not to be obtained from schools or colleges, but from the higher education of mature minds—the masses of the people—which the public library alone can give. The preparation for this higher education of the masses devolves on the schools and colleges. Their curricula should be so arranged as to arouse “historic consciousness” in the youngest child, to awaken social consciousness, and to provide for its continuous development by starting every boy and girl on a career of self-culture—by matriculating every child in the People's University, the Public Library. In affairs that concern society as a whole, it is better to trust the well-informed common-sense of the people than the learning of the schoolmen.
It is not knowledge of mathematics or physics, or Greek and Latin, or modern languages; it is not the study—academic study—of history, or philosophy, or even political economy, that will solve the great social problems that now confront us. These will help in various degrees, directly or indirectly, some more, some less, some, perhaps, not at all. A knowledge of the general course of history is essential; some acquaintance with philosophy is useful; dogmatic theology serves only to confuse, but the true religion that lies in a vital acceptance of Christ's two commandments as a summary of the law and the prophets—that is the greatest aid of all. Such, however, is the influence of established order on men's minds that no investigation will avail without a determination to take nothing for granted, to re-examine what have been considered basic principles, to accept no postulates that do not square with reason and justice. This cannot be done by confining our reading to the accepted standards of a generation or a century ago. We must keep abreast of the thought of the time; we must keep our eyes and ears, and still more our minds, open; we must scorn no aids to enlightenment; but we must do our own thinking; we must consider the idea, not the source from which it came, remembering that good may come out of Nazareth; we must live up to the motto; “Truth for authority, not authority for truth,” and we must “lend a hand.”
My faith in the efficacy of the education offered by the public library is not without foundation. In more than one case I have seen a course of lectures or the reading of a single book lead to a course of reading in economics and sociology, which has entirely changed points of view. New ideals, higher standards, have made new men with higher lines of action. Their natures have not been changed, but their visions have been clarified.