CIVILISATION ON TRIAL
Sir,-Your book reviewer M.H.H. is surprised that Professor Arnold J. Toynbee "should be anxious to prove that our present culture in the west has better chances of survival than its predecessors." M.H.H. prefers "to adopt the ‘tragic’ view of human destiny, which gives hope only to the climbing spirit." He jumbles together as "great religious leaders — Confucius and Lao-Tse, the Buddha, the prophets of Israel and Judah, Zoroaster, Jesus, Muhammed and Socrates." Surely this reveals a tragic lack of differentiation, of perceptivity of the fruits of Christian civilsation, Should not the "logical" approach be a determination to do everything possible to foster and spread the Christian ethic and practice rather than to insist upon "the tragic view of human destiny?" This groping towards the notion of some diluted, nebulous, spineless "climbing spirit" will enable little headway to be made against the materialism of the world to-day.
J.
T.
(Remuera),
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New Zealand Listener, Volume 21, Issue 520, 10 June 1949, Page 5
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152CIVILISATION ON TRIAL New Zealand Listener, Volume 21, Issue 520, 10 June 1949, Page 5
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