Predicament of Human Incompetence 15
spirit our difficulties would disappear. Of course if every-
one had the right spirit everything would be easier all
around, but until that happens what are we going to do?
Make more surveys, issue more encyclicals and pronounce-
ments ?
Here again we leave a moral vacuum into which rush
the clever men who are impatient with talk and promise to
get something done. Our ideal is so remote that we try to
cover up our hopelessness or take for granted that what is
hard to change now is about as good as anyone could ex-
pect. While in Rome we do as the Romans do. And simply
holding ideals makes us feel that we are somehow faithful
to them. Of course we are not perfect, but certainly we are
as decent as our class expects us to be. We may compro-
mise now and then, but, after all, we do nothing question-
able unless so many others are doing likewise that we are
not conspicuous. We exploit no one save in the ordinary
course of business under the law. We are glad to let others
have access to privileges provided ours are safe first. We
will play fair, provided it does not interfere with success
in areas where it is better to be crooked and clever than to
be good but dumb.
This kind of sentimental idealism has been the road along
which our disasters have come. The Archbishop of Canter-
bury has recently remarked that “this vast accumulation of
evil is due to the fact that millions of people are as good as
we are and no better.” Such results produce the cynic who
honestly sees that there is a worm in every apple. But, as
someone has said, we cannot live by the discovery of worms
alone.
★
Revolting against the perfectionist and the sentimentalist,
there appears among us the fanatic type. The Germans,
after the last war, were allowed to remain in desperation