Spencer Heath Archive

Item 2849

Thermofax of article by Dan Whiteside from The Personology Journal for September, 1963, pp. 11-13, reflecting Heath’s philosophy. A penned note by F.A. (“Baldy”) Harper that Robert Whiteside, Dan’s father and founder of personology, “is on our Council of Advisors of the Institute for Humane Studies.”

September 1963

 

 

 

REFLECTIONS OF SPENCER HEATH

 

EDITOR’S NOTE

Spencer Heath, one of the most stimulating minds of our time, is becoming known as a leading American philosopher. A noted industrialist, inventor and lecturer, Mr. Heath — who is an octogenarian — was in San Francisco some time ago, and Dan Whiteside was privileged to spend an afternoon in discussion with him. This great man’s main concern is to uncover the knowledge that will permit each individual — and his society — the greatest possible unfoldment. During the discussion, Mr. Heath touched on the following points, among others.

WHAT SHOULD A MAN DO WHEN HE IS FACED WITH A NEGATIVE CONFLICT?

A man must know enough to turn away. But when he can’t dismiss a rightful conflict, he must know enough to go no more where the negative forces may harm or limit him.

 He must conceive what it is he really wants and fight for that — to WIN. Yes, when he is pressed, he must fight with two hands. Many of our current moralists fail here, for while urging a “finer morality,” they advise you not to fight the “Indians on the warpath” until you, personally, are attacked, and what is worse, they advise you not to prepare or arm yourself for the inevitable.

 There is no situation in which a man can’t choose the positive way — that is, the constructive, the creative way. A man jostles you in the street, for instance, or someone threatens your country with war. You can choose to resent it, complain about it, or fight back. The option is always there for you to exercise.

 The point is, however, that the energy you spend in combating evil is no better spent than in the service of evil.

 We must be FOR something. It doesn’t matter what we are against. If you overcome evil (the negative) just for the sake of overcoming it, where will you be? What will you have gained? You’ll still be in the same world, and you will still be faced with the same challenge, which is to build in a better way. For example, what good does it do to fight communism, when you should be using your energies to build freedom? You must be BUILDING — so work for the good. Combat without goals of progress is futile. Hold force in abeyance with one hand while you build a better house with the other. Build your edifice of freedom so strongly it can never be pulled down.

MAN AND CIRCUMSTANCE

Man is the only animal who can be inspired. And when he is inspired, he transcends himself — that is, he transcends his animal nature.

 We have two choices:

1. We can go back towards our limited, animal natures, back to our physical life, remembering that animals move only towards extinction and death by the very nature of their composition, or
2. we can go towards our human — spiritual — nature. After all, this is the only nature which endures within us.

 Among animals, only man has the seeds of immortality within him. These are in his imagination, not in his body. Imagination is his power. The human will can accomplish nothing ever except by first wishing for it. And the image of what he wants, of course, must precede his wish for the fulfillment of that image.

 The very power we have to WISH for a thing means we have CONCEIVED it. If it were not to be in our future, it would not have been perceptible to us in our past. The physical in our body is of the world — of our physical environment. It is the same stuff as the world. But our mental — our spiritual —  element, where did this come from?

 The power of idealizing, the power of our awakened imagination, is IN us. So it must have been in the block from which we are hewn. And the natural assumption, then, is that all of nature that is PHYSICAL nature — is also hewn from the rock of infinite imagination and is creative and capable of change and perfection.

 And so the SPIRIT in us is working to EMBODY the creative potential of ALL our past. In terms of personology, this means, the spirit of the individual is working to fulfill itself, to ______ itself, through the creative potential of its traits.

 The idealized wish is just one step from fulfillment. And that one step is the IMAGE-ING — and the power to REALIZE that image (the power which brings it into reality) is the power of the human will.

 And to be truly creative, to be truly free, men must practice towards each other a “golden rule” relationship, which is an

at-one-ment of minds with no one mind dominating another — each loving, each serving, the other. When the time comes that man can do this, man will no longer need to “die.” Man can live as long as he can image his continued progress through his human nature, as long as he maintains “dominion over his traits.” So long as he can do this, man will be free to fulfill himself. Just as the animal form which must die is not the total man — just so the personology traits of an individual man are not his final limitation. He can choose to be more than his animal nature suggests; he can choose to go beyond the natural limitations of his structure — and his power to IMAGE gives him unlimited freedom to create. His structure is but the base upon which he builds his life; his life need be no less than his image of himself.

 He who gives up to his animal self; he who lives only on his instincts and instinctive expressions will remain untouched by his real potentialities.

 Circumstance _________ as it is and created as it is by the hand of man, is nothing more than the IMAGE of the best and most capable of men, or the reflection of the worst and most irresponsible of men. Circumstance never determines anything. It simply gives us opportunity to choose. Our choice is far more often the result of our own inward, innate feeling than it is the result of circumstance per se. Only in rare extremes, such as in a completely totalitarian state, does circumstance really dictate the actions of a man. And even then it never leads him. It only pushes him. For example, it is not the carrot that leads the donkey; it is the hunger inside that pushes him toward the carrot.

 When circumstance does prescribe all behavior, then all freedom for the individual is lost. In the same sense, a person who comes to believe that circumstance prescribes his behavior also has lost his awareness of his own freedom. This is the real problem of our current “thinking.” Since the emphasis is placed on circumstance, freedom — real freedom for individual unfoldment — is in real danger of being overlooked, destroyed or lost. It is our obligation to maintain our own sense of our unfoldment or we will surrender to circumstance the control for our lives.

 Some dominate others with force and guile. In practice, force and guile are interchangeable. The weak resort to force, to guile and to indirection. The lie is the weapon of the weak. Flight is, also. The horrific picture of environmentalism and all such thinking is of the animal transcendent over man. Persons who hold such views of man are prehensile — they have a prehensile philosophy. Let those of us who believe in the infinite possibilities of the human ever focus on building our images of his unfoldment, and bend our every effort towards the freedom of each individual mind and body and spirit.