Our Homage to the Past

contribution, it would be impossible for us to attain our objectives, no matter in what field. In many cases, we might not even understand what our objectives ought to be. All our journeys have to commence from the point at which we stand, and we must go through all the intermediary stages before reaching our ultimate destination. We cannot just make one gigantic leap into the future, ignoring everything which ought to take place between the beginning and the end of our journey. But before we can even begin, we have to receive that essential, initial impetus from the past, just as we cannot build the upper storey of a house until the lower walls have been completed. The people who are most likely to lose sight of these basic truths are those whose minds have been so clouded by romantic poetry and so overheated by provocative oratory that they have lost all sense of reality. Their thinking is made irrational by giving way to excessively emotional outbursts and their energies are simultaneously so drained by this that they fail to see that there could be anything wrong with the ‘protest and demand’ approach to life. They tend to rush into politics without first having acquired a sound education, or at least the valuable experience to be gained from a solid commitment to commerce or industry. They are people who are barely aware of their backwardness and who, in consequence, do little or nothing to improve upon their own conditions of living. They are quick to make claims upon society without giving a thought to the contribution which they themselves ought to be making. It is lamentable to think how probable it is that such people will spawn a whole generation which is even more inward looking and in no way self-sustaining. If so many of the present generation are swept off their feet by mere demagogy, what hope will there be for succeeding generations