Part II. On the Possible Bases of a Universal Human Creed
Chapter 7: A Great Event
1. An Irresistible Physical Process: The Collectivization of Mankind
We might suppose, if we set out to examine the state of things on the morrow of the most fearful convulsion that has ever shaken the living stratum of the Earth, that we should find the soil mined and fissured to its depths. So great a shock must surely have exposed all the points of weakness, unloosed all the forces of dispersal and divergence and left Mankind shattered within itself. This is what we might expect to find.
But instead of this state of universal ruin, and if we disregard the
psychological haze of fatigue and resentment which, as I shall show, is only a passing phase, what do we actually see?
Geographically, since 1939 a vast expanse of the earth, the region of the Pacific, hitherto on the fringe of civilization, has for practical purposes entered irrevocably into the orbit of industrialized nations. Mechanized masses of men have invaded the southern seas, and up-to-date airfields have been permanently installed on what were until yesterday the poetically lost islands of Polynesia.
Ethnically, during the same period, there has been a vast and pitiless confusion of peoples, whole armies being removed from one
hemisphere to the other, and tens of thousands of refugees being
scattered across the world like seed borne on the wind. Brutal and harsh though the circumstances have been, who can fail to perceive the
inevitable consequences of this new stirring of the human dough?
And economically and psychically the entire mass of Mankind, under the inexorable pressure of events and owing to the prodigious growth and speeding up of the means of communication, has found itself seized in the mould of a communal existence -- large sections tightly encased in countless international organizations, the most ambitious the world has ever known; and the whole anxiously involved in the same
passionate upheavals, the same problems, the same daily news. . . . Can anyone seriously suppose that we shall be able to rid ourselves of habits such as these?
No; during these six years, despite the unleashing of so much hatred, the human block has not disintegrated. On the contrary, in its most rigid organic depths it has further increased its vice-like grip upon us all. First 1914-1918, then 1939-1945 -- two successive turns of the screw. Every new war, embarked upon by the nations for the purpose of detaching themselves from one another, merely results in their being bound and mingled together in a more inextricable knot. The more we seek to
thrust each other away, the more do we interpenetrate.
Indeed, how could it be otherwise?
Confined within the geometrically restricted surface of the globe, which is steadily reduced as their own radius of activity increases, the human particles do not merely multiply in numbers at an increasing rate, but through contact with one another automatically develop around
themselves an ever denser tangle of economic and social relationships.
Moreover, being each exposed at the core of their being to the countless spiritual influences emanating from the thought, the will and the
passions of all their fellow-creatures they find themselves constantly subjected in spirit to an enforced rule of resonance. It must surely be clear that, under the pressure of these relentless factors -- relentless because they are a part of the deepest and most generalized conditions of the planetary structure -- there is only one way in which the tide can flow: the way of ever-increasing unification. In speculating on the earthly destiny of Man we are accustomed to say that in the ultimate future nothing is certain, except that a day must come when our planet will be uninhabitable. But for those who are not afraid to look ahead, another thing awaits us that is no less certain. As the Earth grows older, so does its living skin contract, and even more rapidly. The last day of Man will coincide for Mankind with the maximum of its tightening and in-folding upon itself.
I know that to see determinisms everywhere in history may be to over- simplify and is certainly dangerous. Every so often authoritative voices are raised protesting that there is no fateful significance in the rise of the masses, or the leveling of classes or the growth of democracy. Where details and modalities are concerned, these defenders of individual liberty are often right. But they go astray, or will do so, if in their proper spirit of opposition to everything that is passive and blind in the world they seek to close their eyes, and ours, to the over-riding super-
determinism which irresistibly impels Mankind to converge upon itself.
Whether we like it or not, from the beginning of our history and through all the interconnected forces of Matter and Spirit, the process of our collectivization has ceaselessly continued, slowly or in jerks, gaining ground each day. That is the fact of the matter. It is as impossible for Mankind not to unite upon itself as it is for the human intelligence not to go on indefinitely deepening its thought! . . . Instead of seeking, against all the evidence, to deny or disparage the reality of this grand
phenomenon, we do better to accept it frankly. Let us look it in the face and see whether, using it as an unassailable foundation, we cannot erect upon it a hopeful edifice of joy and liberation.
2. The One Possible Interpretation: A Super-organization of the