The Uncommon Common Man

New Zealand Listener, Volume 15, Issue 389, 6 December 1946, Page 5

The Uncommon Common Man

to-day why we don’t give more attention to uncommon men. Common men, he argues, take their opinions from uncommon men, and instead of thinking so much of them we should, he suggests, think of those with whom everything that most people say and do begins. It is a good point up to a point, but no further. The uncommon man can, and does, look after himself if he really is uncommon. He is the man Dr. Johnson had in the back of his mind when he said that a man who is fool enough to need advice will be too foolish to take it. Giving advice is of course not our job; but if it were, the last man we should venture to advise would be | \ CORRESPONDENT asks us

the man of original and independent powers of thought. Our correspondent’s real complaint, we imagine, is that we are not sufficiently high-brow. Well brows are difficult to measure. We know that our correspondent is not thinking of academic attainments or of any of the conventional indications of. culture. By uncommon men he means intelligent men whether the schools know them or don’t; but even from that angle appearances can be deceptive. Some of the most penetrating minds are conventional three times in four, It may be constitutional, but shocks await those who take liberties with them. But the real point is that the teacher, preacher, or journalist who ‘asks himself who is worthy of his attention and who is not is already unworthy himself. Consciously or unconsciously he is wallowing in smugness, or soon will be. We prefer the company and the discipline of ordinary mortals,