THE WISDOM OF LIFE

It is good to be an idealist, but it has to be conceded that the attainment of the ideal in social life is seldom within the realms of the possible. This principle of nature, in brief, favours healthy competition. The American leaders granted freedom to their citizens and opened up opportunities to achieve the desired success by proving their capability in a highly competitive field. These leaders limited the Government’s sphere to law and order, thus granting its citizens full freedom of action in other fields. As a result everyone found unhampered opportunities for the optimal development of personal potential. The American leaders did not attempt to pour society into the mould of a fabricated ideology as the basis for national progress. Instead they looked only at what was naturally sustainable and adopted it. On the contrary, in the Soviet Union certain theorists clinging to a contrived ideology, attempted to re-structure the whole of society accordingly. When society refused to accept this, the rebels were killed in millions, as if they had no more significance than insects. This scheme of things was against nature and that is why, after a tumultuous struggle spanning over 75 years, it has met with total failure. The same was the case with a few other countries. Their leaders devised certain ideologies of their own and wished to recast their entire countries in this mould. The attempt to implement this system by force was a total failure. And precious time was wasted callously. These leaders should have adopted the same principle as nature adopts with regard to water. When water flows from a mountain peak, it is left free to cascade down the hillsides, meander across the plains, spread out into lakes—in short, follow its own natural course until it reaches the sea. Having properly understood actual conditions and circumstances, they should have left society to proceed unhindered on the thoroughfare of nature. In this way an atmosphere of healthy competition would have been produced, and the capabilities of all their citizens would have played their role in the process of progress and development. But this was not to be. Ideological fanaticism produced the logic of coercion, which vitiated everything that came within its orbit. The right way to proceed in this world is to allow things to take their natural course without placing any obstacles in their path. If any wielder of power conceives of a plan which in his view is superior (whatever its