💾 Archived View for gemini.spam.works › mirrors › textfiles › occult › URANTIA › p081.txt captured on 2022-07-17 at 10:03:41.
⬅️ Previous capture (2022-06-12)
-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Urantia Book Paper 81 Development Of Modern Civilization
SPIRITWEB ORG, PROMOTING SPIRITUAL CONSCIOUSNESS ON THE INTERNET.
Subjects Archive The Urantia Book Urantia Book PART III: The History of Urantia
: The Origin Of Urantia Life Establishment On Urantia The Marine-life Era On
Urantia Urantia During The Early Land-life Era The Mammalian Era On Urantia The
Dawn Races Of Early Man The First Human Family The Evolutionary Races Of Color
The Overcontrol Of Evolution The Planetary Prince Of Urantia The Planetary
Rebellion The Dawn Of Civilization Primitive Human Institutions The Evolution
Of Human Government Development Of The State Government On A Neighboring Planet
The Garden Of Eden Adam And Eve The Default Of Adam And Eve The Second Garden
The Midway Creatures The Violet Race After The Days Of Adam Andite Expansion In
The Orient Andite Expansion In The Occident Development Of Modern Civilization
The Evolution Of Marriage The Marriage Institution Marriage And Family Life The
Origins Of Worship Early Evolution Of Religion The Ghost Cults Fetishes,
Charms, And Magic Sin, Sacrifice, And Atonement Shamanism--medicine Men And
Priests The Evolution Of Prayer The Later Evolution Of Religion Machiventa
Melchizedek The Melchizedek Teachings In The Orient The Melchizedek Teachings
In The Levant Yahweh--god Of The Hebrews Evolution Of The God Concept Among The
Hebrews The Melchizedek Teachings In The Occident The Social Problems Of
Religion Religion In Human Experience The Real Nature Of Religion The
Foundations Of Religious Faith The Reality Of Religious Experience Growth Of
The Trinity Concept Deity And Reality Universe Levels Of Reality Origin And
Nature Of Thought Adjusters Mission And Ministry Of Thought Adjusters Relation
Of Adjusters To Universe Creatures Relation Of Adjusters To Individual Mortals
...
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Paper 81 Development Of Modern Civilization
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Introduction
REGARDLESS of the ups and downs of the miscarriage of the plans for world
betterment projected in the missions of Caligastia and Adam, the basic organic
evolution of the human species continued to carry the races forward in the
scale of human progress and racial development. Evolution can be delayed but it
cannot be stopped.
The influence of the violet race, though in numbers smaller than had been
planned, produced an advance in civilization which, since the days of Adam, has
far exceeded the progress of mankind throughout its entire previous existence
of almost a million years.
1. THE CRADLE OF CIVILIZATION
For about thirty-five thousand years after the days of Adam, the cradle of
civilization was in southwestern Asia, extending from the Nile valley eastward
and slightly to the north across northern Arabia, through Mesopotamia, and on
into Turkestan. And climate was the decisive factor in the establishment of
civilization in that area.
It was the great climatic and geologic changes in northern Africa and western
Asia that terminated the early migrations of the Adamites, barring them from
Europe by the expanded Mediterranean and diverting the stream of migration
north and east into Turkestan. By the time of the completion of these land
elevations and associated climatic changes, about 15,000 B.C., civilization had
settled down to a world-wide stalemate except for the cultural ferments and
biologic reserves of the Andites still confined by mountains to the east in
Asia and by the expanding forests in Europe to the west.
Climatic evolution is now about to accomplish what all other efforts had failed
to do, that is, to compel Eurasian man to abandon hunting for the more advanced
callings of herding and farming. Evolution may be slow, but it is terribly
effective.
Since slaves were so generally employed by the earlier agriculturists, the
farmer was formerly looked down on by both the hunter and the herder. For ages
it was considered menial to till the soil; wherefore the idea that soil toil is
a curse, whereas it is the greatest of all blessings. Even in the days of Cain
and Abel the sacrifices of the pastoral life were held in greater esteem than
the offerings of agriculture.
Man ordinarily evolved into a farmer from a hunter by transition through the
era of the herder, and this was also true among the Andites, but more often the
evolutionary coercion of climatic necessity would cause whole tribes to pass
top of page - 901
directly from hunters to successful farmers. But this phenomenon of passing
immediately from hunting to agriculture only occurred in those regions where
there was a high degree of race mixture with the violet stock.
The evolutionary peoples (notably the Chinese) early learned to plant seeds and
to cultivate crops through observation of the sprouting of seeds accidentally
moistened or which had been put in graves as food for the departed. But
throughout southwest Asia, along the fertile river bottoms and adjacent plains,
the Andites were carrying out the improved agricultural techniques inherited
from their ancestors, who had made farming and gardening the chief pursuits
within the boundaries of the second garden.
For thousands of years the descendants of Adam had grown wheat and barley, as
improved in the Garden, throughout the highlands of the upper border of
Mesopotamia. The descendants of Adam and Adamson here met, traded, and socially
mingled.
It was these enforced changes in living conditions which caused such a large
proportion of the human race to become omnivorous in dietetic practice. And the
combination of the wheat, rice, and vegetable diet with the flesh of the herds
marked a great forward step in the health and vigor of these ancient peoples.
2. THE TOOLS OF CIVILIZATION
The growth of culture is predicated upon the development of the tools of
civilization. And the tools which man utilized in his ascent from savagery were
effective just to the extent that they released man power for the
accomplishment of higher tasks.
You who now live amid latter-day scenes of budding culture and beginning
progress in social affairs, who actually have some little spare time in which
to think about society and civilization, must not overlook the fact that your
early ancestors had little or no leisure which could be devoted to thoughtful
reflection and social thinking.
The first four great advances in human civilization were:
1. The taming of fire.
2. The domestication of animals.
3. The enslavement of captives.
4. Private property.
While fire, the first great discovery, eventually unlocked the doors of the
scientific world, it was of little value in this regard to primitive man. He
refused to recognize natural causes as explanations for commonplace phenomena.
When asked where fire came from, the simple story of Andon and the flint was
soon replaced by the legend of how some Prometheus stole it from heaven. The
ancients sought a supernatural explanation for all natural phenomena not within
the range of their personal comprehension; and many moderns continue to do
this. The depersonalization of so-called natural phenomena has required ages,
and it is not yet completed. But the frank, honest, and fearless search for
true causes gave birth to modern science: It turned astrology into astronomy,
alchemy into chemistry, and magic into medicine.
In the premachine age the only way in which man could accomplish work without
doing it himself was to use an animal. Domestication of animals placed
top of page - 902
in his hands living tools, the intelligent use of which prepared the way for
both agriculture and transportation. And without these animals man could not
have risen from his primitive estate to the levels of subsequent civilization.
Most of the animals best suited to domestication were found in Asia, especially
in the central to southwest regions. This was one reason why civilization
progressed faster in that locality than in other parts of the world. Many of
these animals had been twice before domesticated, and in the Andite age they
were retamed once again. But the dog had remained with the hunters ever since
being adopted by the blue man long, long before.
The Andites of Turkestan were the first peoples to extensively domesticate the
horse, and this is another reason why their culture was for so long
predominant. By 5000 B.C. the Mesopotamian, Turkestan, and Chinese farmers had
begun the raising of sheep, goats, cows, camels, horses, fowls, and elephants.
They employed as beasts of burden the ox, camel, horse, and yak. Man was
himself at one time the beast of burden. One ruler of the blue race once had
one hundred thousand men in his colony of burden bearers.
The institutions of slavery and private ownership of land came with
agriculture. Slavery raised the master's standard of living and provided more
leisure for social culture.
The savage is a slave to nature, but scientific civilization is slowly
conferring increasing liberty on mankind. Through animals, fire, wind, water,
electricity, and other undiscovered sources of energy, man has liberated, and
will continue to liberate, himself from the necessity for unremitting toil.
Regardless of the transient trouble produced by the prolific invention of
machinery, the ultimate benefits to be derived from such mechanical inventions
are inestimable. Civilization can never flourish, much less be established,
until man has leisure to think, to plan, to imagine new and better ways of
doing things.
Man first simply appropriated his shelter, lived under ledges or dwelt in
caves. Next he adapted such natural materials as wood and stone to the creation
of family huts. Lastly he entered the creative stage of home building, learned
to manufacture brick and other building materials.
The peoples of the Turkestan highlands were the first of the more modern races
to build their homes of wood, houses not at all unlike the early log cabins of
the American pioneer settlers. Throughout the plains human dwellings were made
of brick; later on, of burned bricks.
The older river races made their huts by setting tall poles in the ground in a
circle; the tops were then brought together, making the skeleton frame for the
hut, which was interlaced with transverse reeds, the whole creation resembling
a huge inverted basket. This structure could then be daubed over with clay and,
after drying in the sun, would make a very serviceable weatherproof habitation.
It was from these early huts that the subsequent idea of all sorts of basket
weaving independently originated. Among one group the idea of making pottery
arose from observing the effects of smearing these pole frameworks with moist
clay. The practice of hardening pottery by baking was discovered when one of
these clay-covered primitive huts accidentally burned. The arts of olden days
were many times derived from the accidental occurrences attendant upon the
daily life of early peoples. At least, this was almost wholly true of the
evolutionary progress of mankind up to the coming of Adam.
top of page - 903
While pottery had been first introduced by the staff of the Prince about
one-half million years ago, the making of clay vessels had practically ceased
for over one hundred and fifty thousand years. Only the gulf coast pre-Sumerian
Nodites continued to make clay vessels. The art of pottery making was revived
during Adam's time. The dissemination of this art was simultaneous with the
extension of the desert areas of Africa, Arabia, and central Asia, and it
spread in successive waves of improving technique from Mesopotamia out over the
Eastern Hemisphere.
These civilizations of the Andite age cannot always be traced by the stages of
their pottery or other arts. The smooth course of human evolution was
tremendously complicated by the regimes of both Dalamatia and Eden. It often
occurs that the later vases and implements are inferior to the earlier products
of the purer Andite peoples.
3. CITIES, MANUFACTURE, AND COMMERCE
The climatic destruction of the rich, open grassland hunting and grazing
grounds of Turkestan, beginning about 12,000 B.C., compelled the men of those
regions to resort to new forms of industry and crude manufacturing. Some turned
to the cultivation of domesticated flocks, others became agriculturists or
collectors of water-borne food, but the higher type of Andite intellects chose
to engage in trade and manufacture. It even became the custom for entire tribes
to dedicate themselves to the development of a single industry. From the valley
of the Nile to the Hindu Kush and from the Ganges to the Yellow River, the
chief business of the superior tribes became the cultivation of the soil, with
commerce as a side line.
The increase in trade and in the manufacture of raw materials into various
articles of commerce was directly instrumental in producing those early and
semipeaceful communities which were so influential in spreading the culture and
the arts of civilization. Before the era of extensive world trade, social
communities were tribal--expanded family groups. Trade brought into fellowship
different sorts of human beings, thus contributing to a more speedy
cross-fertilization of culture.
About twelve thousand years ago the era of the independent cities was dawning.
And these primitive trading and manufacturing cities were always surrounded by
zones of agriculture and cattle raising. While it is true that industry was
promoted by the elevation of the standards of living, you should have no
misconception regarding the refinements of early urban life. The early races
were not overly neat and clean, and the average primitive community rose from
one to two feet every twenty-five years as the result of the mere accumulation
of dirt and trash. Certain of these olden cities also rose above the
surrounding ground very quickly because their unbaked mud huts were
short-lived, and it was the custom to build new dwellings directly on top of
the ruins of the old.
The widespread use of metals was a feature of this era of the early industrial
and trading cities. You have already found a bronze culture in Turkestan dating
before 9000 B.C., and the Andites early learned to work in iron, gold, and
copper, as well. But conditions were very different away from the more advanced
centers of civilization. There were no distinct periods, such as the Stone,
Bronze, and Iron Ages; all three existed at the same time in different
localities.
top of page - 904
Gold was the first metal to be sought by man; it was easy to work and, at
first, was used only as an ornament. Copper was next employed but not
extensively until it was admixed with tin to make the harder bronze. The
discovery of mixing copper and tin to make bronze was made by one of the
Adamsonites of Turkestan whose highland copper mine happened to be located
alongside a tin deposit.
With the appearance of crude manufacture and beginning industry, commerce
quickly became the most potent influence in the spread of cultural
civilization. The opening up of the trade channels by land and by sea greatly
facilitated travel and the mixing of cultures as well as the blending of
civilizations. By 5000 B.C. the horse was in general use throughout civilized
and semicivilized lands. These later races not only had the domesticated horse
but also various sorts of wagons and chariots. Ages before, the wheel had been
used, but now vehicles so equipped became universally employed both in commerce
and war.
The traveling trader and the roving explorer did more to advance historic
civilization than all other influences combined. Military conquests,
colonization, and missionary enterprises fostered by the later religions were
also factors in the spread of culture; but these were all secondary to the
trading relations, which were ever accelerated by the rapidly developing arts
and sciences of industry.
Infusion of the Adamic stock into the human races not only quickened the pace
of civilization, but it also greatly stimulated their proclivities toward
adventure and exploration to the end that most of Eurasia and northern Africa
was presently occupied by the rapidly multiplying mixed descendants of the
Andites.
4. THE MIXED RACES
As contact is made with the dawn of historic times, all of Eurasia, northern
Africa, and the Pacific Islands is overspread with the composite races of
mankind. And these races of today have resulted from a blending and reblending
of the five basic human stocks of Urantia.
Each of the Urantia races was identified by certain distinguishing physical
characteristics. The Adamites and Nodites were long-headed; the Andonites were
broad-headed. The Sangik races were medium-headed, with the yellow and blue men
tending to broad-headedness. The blue races, when mixed with the Andonite
stock, were decidedly broad-headed. The secondary Sangiks were medium- to
long-headed.
Although these skull dimensions are serviceable in deciphering racial origins,
the skeleton as a whole is far more dependable. In the early development of the
Urantia races there were originally five distinct types of skeletal structure:
1. Andonic, Urantia aborigines.
2. Primary Sangik, red, yellow, and blue.
3. Secondary Sangik, orange, green, and indigo.
4. Nodites, descendants of the Dalamatians.
5. Adamites, the violet race.
As these five great racial groups extensively intermingled, continual mixture
tended to obscure the Andonite type by Sangik hereditary dominance. The
top of page - 905
Lapps and the Eskimos are blends of Andonite and Sangik-blue races. Their
skeletal structures come the nearest to preserving the aboriginal Andonic type.
But the Adamites and the Nodites have become so admixed with the other races
that they can be detected only as a generalized Caucasoid order.
In general, therefore, as the human remains of the last twenty thousand years
are unearthed, it will be impossible clearly to distinguish the five original
types. Study of such skeletal structures will disclose that mankind is now
divided into approximately three classes:
1. The Caucasoid--the Andite blend of the Nodite and Adamic stocks, further
modified by primary and (some) secondary Sangik admixture and by considerable
Andonic crossing. The Occidental white races, together with some Indian and
Turanian peoples, are included in this group. The unifying factor in this
division is the greater or lesser proportion of Andite inheritance.
2. The Mongoloid--the primary Sangik type, including the original red, yellow,
and blue races. The Chinese and Amerinds belong to this group. In Europe the
Mongoloid type has been modified by secondary Sangik and Andonic mixture; still
more by Andite infusion. The Malayan and other Indonesian peoples are included
in this classification, though they contain a high percentage of secondary
Sangik blood.
3. The Negroid--the secondary Sangik type, which originally included the
orange, green, and indigo races. This is the type best illustrated by the
Negro, and it will be found through Africa, India, and Indonesia wherever the
secondary Sangik races located.
In North China there is a certain blending of Caucasoid and Mongoloid types; in
the Levant the Caucasoid and Negroid have intermingled; in India, as in South
America, all three types are represented. And the skeletal characteristics of
the three surviving types still persist and help to identify the later ancestry
of present-day human races.
5. CULTURAL SOCIETY
Biologic evolution and cultural civilization are not necessarily correlated;
organic evolution in any age may proceed unhindered in the very midst of
cultural decadence. But when lengthy periods of human history are surveyed, it
will be observed that eventually evolution and culture become related as cause
and effect. Evolution may advance in the absence of culture, but cultural
civilization does not flourish without an adequate background of antecedent
racial progression. Adam and Eve introduced no art of civilization foreign to
the progress of human society, but the Adamic blood did augment the inherent
ability of the races and did accelerate the pace of economic development and
industrial progression. Adam's bestowal improved the brain power of the races,
thereby greatly hastening the processes of natural evolution.
Through agriculture, animal domestication, and improved architecture, mankind
gradually escaped the worst of the incessant struggle to live and began to cast
about to find wherewith to sweeten the process of living; and this was the
beginning of the striving for higher and ever higher standards of material
comfort. Through manufacture and industry man is gradually augmenting the
pleasure content of mortal life.
top of page - 906
But cultural society is no great and beneficent club of inherited privilege
into which all men are born with free membership and entire equality. Rather is
it an exalted and ever-advancing guild of earth workers, admitting to its ranks
only the nobility of those toilers who strive to make the world a better place
in which their children and their children's children may live and advance in
subsequent ages. And this guild of civilization exacts costly admission fees,
imposes strict and rigorous disciplines, visits heavy penalties on all
dissenters and nonconformists, while it confers few personal licenses or
privileges except those of enhanced security against common dangers and racial
perils.
Social association is a form of survival insurance which human beings have
learned is profitable; therefore are most individuals willing to pay those
premiums of self-sacrifice and personal-liberty curtailment which society
exacts from its members in return for this enhanced group protection. In short,
the present-day social mechanism is a trial-and-error insurance plan designed
to afford some degree of assurance and protection against a return to the
terrible and antisocial conditions which characterized the early experiences of
the human race.
Society thus becomes a co-operative scheme for securing civil freedom through
institutions, economic freedom through capital and invention, social liberty
through culture, and freedom from violence through police regulation.
Might does not make right, but it does enforce the commonly recognized rights
of each succeeding generation. The prime mission of government is the
definition of the right, the just and fair regulation of class differences, and
the enforcement of equality of opportunity under the rules of law. Every human
right is associated with a social duty; group privilege is an insurance
mechanism which unfailingly demands the full payment of the exacting premiums
of group service. And group rights, as well as those of the individual, must be
protected, including the regulation of the sex propensity.
Liberty subject to group regulation is the legitimate goal of social evolution.
Liberty without restrictions is the vain and fanciful dream of unstable and
flighty human minds.
6. THE MAINTENANCE OF CIVILIZATION
While biologic evolution has proceeded ever upward, much of cultural evolution
went out from the Euphrates valley in waves, which successively weakened as
time passed until finally the whole of the pure-line Adamic posterity had gone
forth to enrich the civilizations of Asia and Europe. The races did not fully
blend, but their civilizations did to a considerable extent mix. Culture did
slowly spread throughout the world. And this civilization must be maintained
and fostered, for there exist today no new sources of culture, no Andites to
invigorate and stimulate the slow progress of the evolution of civilization.
The civilization which is now evolving on Urantia grew out of, and is
predicated on, the following factors:
1. Natural circumstances. The nature and extent of a material civilization is
in large measure determined by the natural resources available. Climate,
weather, and numerous physical conditions are factors in the evolution of
culture.
top of page - 907
At the opening of the Andite era there were only two extensive and fertile open
hunting areas in all the world. One was in North America and was overspread by
the Amerinds; the other was to the north of Turkestan and was partly occupied
by an Andonic-yellow race. The decisive factors in the evolution of a superior
culture in southwestern Asia were race and climate. The Andites were a great
people, but the crucial factor in determining the course of their civilization
was the increasing aridity of Iran, Turkestan, and Sinkiang, which forced them
to invent and adopt new and advanced methods of wresting a livelihood from
their decreasingly fertile lands.
The configuration of continents and other land-arrangement situations are very
influential in determining peace or war. Very few Urantians have ever had such
a favorable opportunity for continuous and unmolested development as has been
enjoyed by the peoples of North America--protected on practically all sides by
vast oceans.
2. Capital goods. Culture is never developed under conditions of poverty;
leisure is essential to the progress of civilization. Individual character of
moral and spiritual value may be acquired in the absence of material wealth,
but a cultural civilization is only derived from those conditions of material
prosperity which foster leisure combined with ambition.
During primitive times life on Urantia was a serious and sober business. And it
was to escape this incessant struggle and interminable toil that mankind
constantly tended to drift toward the salubrious climate of the tropics. While
these warmer zones of habitation afforded some remission from the intense
struggle for existence, the races and tribes who thus sought ease seldom
utilized their unearned leisure for the advancement of civilization. Social
progress has invariably come from the thoughts and plans of those races that
have, by their intelligent toil, learned how to wrest a living from the land
with lessened effort and shortened days of labor and thus have been able to
enjoy a well-earned and profitable margin of leisure.
3. Scientific knowledge. The material aspects of civilization must always await
the accumulation of scientific data. It was a long time after the discovery of
the bow and arrow and the utilization of animals for power purposes before man
learned how to harness wind and water, to be followed by the employment of
steam and electricity. But slowly the tools of civilization improved. Weaving,
pottery, the domestication of animals, and metalworking were followed by an age
of writing and printing.
Knowledge is power. Invention always precedes the acceleration of cultural
development on a world-wide scale. Science and invention benefited most of all
from the printing press, and the interaction of all these cultural and
inventive activities has enormously accelerated the rate of cultural
advancement.
Science teaches man to speak the new language of mathematics and trains his
thoughts along lines of exacting precision. And science also stabilizes
philosophy through the elimination of error, while it purifies religion by the
destruction of superstition.
4. Human resources. Man power is indispensable to the spread of civilization.
All things equal, a numerous people will dominate the civilization of a smaller
race. Hence failure to increase in numbers up to a certain point prevents the
full realization of national destiny, but there comes a point in popula-
top of page - 908
tion increase where further growth is suicidal. Multiplication of numbers
beyond the optimum of the normal man-land ratio means either a lowering of the
standards of living or an immediate expansion of territorial boundaries by
peaceful penetration or by military conquest, forcible occupation.
You are sometimes shocked at the ravages of war, but you should recognize the
necessity for producing large numbers of mortals so as to afford ample
opportunity for social and moral development; with such planetary fertility
there soon occurs the serious problem of overpopulation. Most of the inhabited
worlds are small. Urantia is average, perhaps a trifle undersized. The optimum
stabilization of national population enhances culture and prevents war. And it
is a wise nation which knows when to cease growing.
But the continent richest in natural deposits and the most advanced mechanical
equipment will make little progress if the intelligence of its people is on the
decline. Knowledge can be had by education, but wisdom, which is indispensable
to true culture, can be secured only through experience and by men and women
who are innately intelligent. Such a people are able to learn from experience;
they may become truly wise.
5. Effectiveness of material resources. Much depends on the wisdom displayed in
the utilization of natural resources, scientific knowledge, capital goods, and
human potentials. The chief factor in early civilization was the force exerted
by wise social masters; primitive man had civilization literally thrust upon
him by his superior contemporaries. Well-organized and superior minorities have
largely ruled this world.
Might does not make right, but might does make what is and what has been in
history. Only recently has Urantia reached that point where society is willing
to debate the ethics of might and right.
6. Effectiveness of language. The spread of civilization must wait upon
language. Live and growing languages insure the expansion of civilized thinking
and planning. During the early ages important advances were made in language.
Today, there is great need for further linguistic development to facilitate the
expression of evolving thought.
Language evolved out of group associations, each local group developing its own
system of word exchange. Language grew up through gestures, signs, cries,
imitative sounds, intonation, and accent to the vocalization of subsequent
alphabets. Language is man's greatest and most serviceable thinking tool, but
it never flourished until social groups acquired some leisure. The tendency to
play with language develops new words--slang. If the majority adopt the slang,
then usage constitutes it language. The origin of dialects is illustrated by
the indulgence in "baby talk" in a family group.
Language differences have ever been the great barrier to the extension of
peace. The conquest of dialects must precede the spread of a culture throughout
a race, over a continent, or to a whole world. A universal language promotes
peace, insures culture, and augments happiness. Even when the tongues of a
world are reduced to a few, the mastery of these by the leading cultural
peoples mightily influences the achievement of world-wide peace and prosperity.
While very little progress has been made on Urantia toward developing an
international language, much has been accomplished by the establishment of
international commercial exchange. And all these international relations should
top of page - 909
be fostered, whether they involve language, trade, art, science, competitive
play, or religion.
7. Effectiveness of mechanical devices. The progress of civilization is
directly related to the development and possession of tools, machines, and
channels of distribution. Improved tools, ingenious and efficient machines,
determine the survival of contending groups in the arena of advancing
civilization.
In the early days the only energy applied to land cultivation was man power. It
was a long struggle to substitute oxen for men since this threw men out of
employment. Latterly, machines have begun to displace men, and every such
advance is directly contributory to the progress of society because it
liberates man power for the accomplishment of more valuable tasks.
Science, guided by wisdom, may become man's great social liberator. A
mechanical age can prove disastrous only to a nation whose intellectual level
is too low to discover those wise methods and sound techniques for successfully
adjusting to the transition difficulties arising from the sudden loss of
employment by large numbers consequent upon the too rapid invention of new
types of laborsaving machinery.
8. Character of torchbearers. Social inheritance enables man to stand on the
shoulders of all who have preceded him, and who have contributed aught to the
sum of culture and knowledge. In this work of passing on the cultural torch to
the next generation, the home will ever be the basic institution. The play and
social life comes next, with the school last but equally indispensable in a
complex and highly organized society.
Insects are born fully educated and equipped for life--indeed, a very narrow
and purely instinctive existence. The human baby is born without an education;
therefore man possesses the power, by controlling the educational training of
the younger generation, greatly to modify the evolutionary course of
civilization.
The greatest twentieth-century influences contributing to the furtherance of
civilization and the advancement of culture are the marked increase in world
travel and the unparalleled improvements in methods of communication. But the
improvement in education has not kept pace with the expanding social structure;
neither has the modern appreciation of ethics developed in correspondence with
growth along more purely intellectual and scientific lines. And modern
civilization is at a standstill in spiritual development and the safeguarding
of the home institution.
9. The racial ideals. The ideals of one generation carve out the channels of
destiny for immediate posterity. The quality of the social torchbearers will
determine whether civilization goes forward or backward. The homes, churches,
and schools of one generation predetermine the character trend of the
succeeding generation. The moral and spiritual momentum of a race or a nation
largely determines the cultural velocity of that civilization.
Ideals elevate the source of the social stream. And no stream will rise any
higher than its source no matter what technique of pressure or directional
control may be employed. The driving power of even the most material aspects of
a cultural civilization is resident in the least material of society's
achievements. Intelligence may control the mechanism of civilization, wisdom
may direct it,
top of page - 910
but spiritual idealism is the energy which really uplifts and advances human
culture from one level of attainment to another.
At first life was a struggle for existence; now, for a standard of living; next
it will be for quality of thinking, the coming earthly goal of human existence.
10. Co-ordination of specialists. Civilization has been enormously advanced by
the early division of labor and by its later corollary of specialization.
Civilization is now dependent on the effective co-ordination of specialists. As
society expands, some method of drawing together the various specialists must
be found.
Social, artistic, technical, and industrial specialists will continue to
multiply and increase in skill and dexterity. And this diversification of
ability and dissimilarity of employment will eventually weaken and disintegrate
human society if effective means of co-ordination and co-operation are not
developed. But the intelligence which is capable of such inventiveness and such
specialization should be wholly competent to devise adequate methods of control
and adjustment for all problems resulting from the rapid growth of invention
and the accelerated pace of cultural expansion.
11. Place-finding devices. The next age of social development will be embodied
in a better and more effective co-operation and co-ordination of
ever-increasing and expanding specialization. And as labor more and more
diversifies, some technique for directing individuals to suitable employment
must be devised. Machinery is not the only cause for unemployment among the
civilized peoples of Urantia. Economic complexity and the steady increase of
industrial and professional specialism add to the problems of labor placement.
It is not enough to train men for work; in a complex society there must also be
provided efficient methods of place finding. Before training citizens in the
highly specialized techniques of earning a living, they should be trained in
one or more methods of commonplace labor, trades or callings which could be
utilized when they were transiently unemployed in their specialized work. No
civilization can survive the long-time harboring of large classes of
unemployed. In time, even the best of citizens will become distorted and
demoralized by accepting support from the public treasury. Even private charity
becomes pernicious when long extended to able-bodied citizens.
Such a highly specialized society will not take kindly to the ancient communal
and feudal practices of olden peoples. True, many common services can be
acceptably and profitably socialized, but highly trained and ultraspecialized
human beings can best be managed by some technique of intelligent co-operation.
Modernized co-ordination and fraternal regulation will be productive of
longer-lived co-operation than will the older and more primitive methods of
communism or dictatorial regulative institutions based on force.
12. The willingness to co-operate. One of the great hindrances to the progress
of human society is the conflict between the interests and welfare of the
larger, more socialized human groups and of the smaller, contrary-minded
asocial associations of mankind, not to mention antisocially-minded single
individuals.
No national civilization long endures unless its educational methods and
religious ideals inspire a high type of intelligent patriotism and national
devo-
top of page - 911
tion. Without this sort of intelligent patriotism and cultural solidarity, all
nations tend to disintegrate as a result of provincial jealousies and local
self-interests.
The maintenance of world-wide civilization is dependent on human beings
learning how to live together in peace and fraternity. Without effective
co-ordination, industrial civilization is jeopardized by the dangers of
ultraspecialization: monotony, narrowness, and the tendency to breed distrust
and jealousy.
13. Effective and wise leadership. In civilization much, very much, depends on
an enthusiastic and effective load-pulling spirit. Ten men are of little more
value than one in lifting a great load unless they lift together--all at the
same moment. And such teamwork--social co-operation--is dependent on
leadership. The cultural civilizations of the past and the present have been
based upon the intelligent co-operation of the citizenry with wise and
progressive leaders; and until man evolves to higher levels, civilization will
continue to be dependent on wise and vigorous leadership.
High civilizations are born of the sagacious correlation of material wealth,
intellectual greatness, moral worth, social cleverness, and cosmic insight.
14. Social changes. Society is not a divine institution; it is a phenomenon of
progressive evolution; and advancing civilization is always delayed when its
leaders are slow in making those changes in the social organization which are
essential to keeping pace with the scientific developments of the age. For all
that, things must not be despised just because they are old, neither should an
idea be unconditionally embraced just because it is novel and new.
Man should be unafraid to experiment with the mechanisms of society. But always
should these adventures in cultural adjustment be controlled by those who are
fully conversant with the history of social evolution; and always should these
innovators be counseled by the wisdom of those who have had practical
experience in the domains of contemplated social or economic experiment. No
great social or economic change should be attempted suddenly. Time is essential
to all types of human adjustment--physical, social, or economic. Only moral and
spiritual adjustments can be made on the spur of the moment, and even these
require the passing of time for the full outworking of their material and
social repercussions. The ideals of the race are the chief support and
assurance during the critical times when civilization is in transit from one
level to another.
15. The prevention of transitional breakdown. Society is the offspring of age
upon age of trial and error; it is what survived the selective adjustments and
readjustments in the successive stages of mankind's agelong rise from animal to
human levels of planetary status. The great danger to any civilization--at any
one moment--is the threat of breakdown during the time of transition from the
established methods of the past to those new and better, but untried,
procedures of the future.
Leadership is vital to progress. Wisdom, insight, and foresight are
indispensable to the endurance of nations. Civilization is never really
jeopardized until able leadership begins to vanish. And the quantity of such
wise leadership has never exceeded one per cent of the population.
And it was by these rungs on the evolutionary ladder that civilization climbed
to that place where those mighty influences could be initiated which
top of page - 912
have culminated in the rapidly expanding culture of the twentieth century. And
only by adherence to these essentials can man hope to maintain his present-day
civilizations while providing for their continued development and certain
survival.
This is the gist of the long, long struggle of the peoples of earth to
establish civilization since the age of Adam. Present-day culture is the net
result of this strenuous evolution. Before the discovery of printing, progress
was relatively slow since one generation could not so rapidly benefit from the
achievements of its predecessors. But now human society is plunging forward
under the force of the accumulated momentum of all the ages through which
civilization has struggled.
[Sponsored by an Archangel of Nebadon.]
top of page - 913
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Subjects Archive The Urantia Book Urantia Book PART III: The History of Urantia
: The Origin Of Urantia Life Establishment On Urantia The Marine-life Era On
Urantia Urantia During The Early Land-life Era The Mammalian Era On Urantia The
Dawn Races Of Early Man The First Human Family The Evolutionary Races Of Color
The Overcontrol Of Evolution The Planetary Prince Of Urantia The Planetary
Rebellion The Dawn Of Civilization Primitive Human Institutions The Evolution
Of Human Government Development Of The State Government On A Neighboring Planet
The Garden Of Eden Adam And Eve The Default Of Adam And Eve The Second Garden
The Midway Creatures The Violet Race After The Days Of Adam Andite Expansion In
The Orient Andite Expansion In The Occident Development Of Modern Civilization
The Evolution Of Marriage The Marriage Institution Marriage And Family Life The
Origins Of Worship Early Evolution Of Religion The Ghost Cults Fetishes,
Charms, And Magic Sin, Sacrifice, And Atonement Shamanism--medicine Men And
Priests The Evolution Of Prayer The Later Evolution Of Religion Machiventa
Melchizedek The Melchizedek Teachings In The Orient The Melchizedek Teachings
In The Levant Yahweh--god Of The Hebrews Evolution Of The God Concept Among The
Hebrews The Melchizedek Teachings In The Occident The Social Problems Of
Religion Religion In Human Experience The Real Nature Of Religion The
Foundations Of Religious Faith The Reality Of Religious Experience Growth Of
The Trinity Concept Deity And Reality Universe Levels Of Reality Origin And
Nature Of Thought Adjusters Mission And Ministry Of Thought Adjusters Relation
Of Adjusters To Universe Creatures Relation Of Adjusters To Individual Mortals
The Adjuster And The Soul Personality Survival Seraphic Guardians Of Destiny
Seraphic Planetary Government The Supreme Being The Almighty Supreme God The
Supreme Supreme And Ultimate--time And Space The Bestowals Of Christ Michael
????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????
? // ? ? ? ? ?
? Andite ? The Evolution ? Urantia Book ? Search ? SiteMap! ?
? Expansio... ? O... ? PA... ? ? ?
????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????
//
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????
? ? ? ? ? ? ? SPIRITWEB ORG (info@spiritweb.org), ? ?
? ? ? ? ? ? ? http://www.spiritweb.org ? ?
? ? ? ? ? ? ? Webmaster <webmaster@spiritweb.org> ? ?
? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
? ? ? ? ? ? ? ONLINE SINCE 1993. MAINTAINED IN SWITZERLAND. ? ?
? ? ? ? ? ? ? DISTRIBUTED TO CALIFORNIA, SPAIN, ITALY, SOUTH AFRICA, ? ?
? ? ? ? ? ? ? AUSTRALIA ? ?
? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????