Spencer Heath Archive

Item 707

Taping by Spencer MacCallum during conversation with Heath.

August 4, 1956

Original is in item 706

     One’s mind need not wander in confusion when it observes the growth or functioning of an organization. There is always a norm to be distinguished. This norm is realized only in such growth or structure as contributes to the function either of the particular organ or of the organism as a whole. So the first thing to seek is the function. Only with reference to this can the worth of any structure be appraised — in a society as in any other organism or organization. The first hypothesis must be the function or functions that it is observed, in some degree at least, to perform. Without such basis, all examination of the structure is misleading and vain, seed-bed for false and injurious generalizations.

     In all the living world below man, growth into a predetermined form or pattern — a system of order, unique as against the less intricate order of its environment — is the highest goal, with failure always as its end. It cannot hold out indefinitely against the surrounding relative disorder; disintegration soon or late overtakes it. This is true also of man in his primitive and unregenerate state. But the regenerate, a truly social-ized man, exhibits a higher function. He has power to build order not only in himself but in the world which he has power to command. He can extend his biologic entelechy increasingly into his surroundings. He thus takes command over external nature and builds for himself a world in which he can increasingly grow and increasingly maintain himself by his dominance of, in place of succumbing to, the relative disorder. He achieves a function no other form of life achieves. Every other living thing deteriorates its environment for its own species or kind, thus seals its own doom. But man, the creative, the spiritual being, enhances his own self-environment. Functioning more freely, he better lives, and through better living, longer lives. Indefinitely enduring life, immortality, becomes the goal towards which he ever moves and increasingly attains.

     The key to this unique attainment of man is a spiritual key. The adoption of a spiritual relationship between man and man, a relationship in which both are elevated because each acts towards the other as he would have the other act towards him. Thus, and thus only, both rise. It is the central theme of Christian ethics (I hate the word), however incompletely understood. In their conscious prac­tice, it has been personalized to that behavior that springs from conscious feeling and benevolent intent. This is personal and limited, not impersonal and therefore universal and divine. On the impersonal side, Christian nations above all others practice the reciprocal relation with but little if any consciousness that it is creative and thereby spiritual and divine. They do not realize that the objective side of love is not limited by narrow, personal sentiments or aims. Yet they enjoy the gifts of the spirit, the fruits of creative relationships far more than all the other peoples of the world. For those who practice this impersonal Christian ethic are the only populations that have abundant food and that thereby enjoy abundant life, in comparative freedom and increasing length of days.