168 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



being put forth to suppress by legislative means the traffic in liquor, the 

 per capita consumption of alcoholic drinks in the United States increases 

 from year to year. From a per capita consumption of four gallons in 

 1850, it has steadily risen to nearly 25 gallons in 1913. The increase in 

 the last two or three years has been less marked, owing no doubt to the 

 remarkable extension of "dry" territory, but this is offset by a great 

 increase in the use of narcotic drugs and of tobacco. 



Narcotic drugs, such as alcohol and tobacco, relieve in an artificial 

 way the tension upon the brain by slightly paralyzing temporarily the 

 higher and more recently developed brain centers. The increase in the 

 use of these drugs is therefore both an index of the tension of modern life 

 and at the same time a means of relieving it to some extent. Were the 

 use of these drugs suddenly checked, no student of psychology or of 

 history could doubt that there would be an immediate increase of social 

 irritability, tending to social instability and social upheavals. 



Psychology, therefore, forces upon us this conclusion. Neither war 

 nor alcohol can be banished from the world by summary means nor 

 direct suppressions. The mind of man must be made over. War is not 

 social insanity nor is it even social criminality. It is too normal to be 

 classed as either. But war is fast becoming irrational and a substitute 

 for it must be found. Social reconstruction hereafter will have to be 

 conceived on a different plan. It will have to be based on an intimate 

 knowledge of psychology, anthropology and history, rather than merely 

 upon sociology and economics. As the mind of man is constituted, he 

 will never be content to be a mere laborer, a producer and a consumer. 

 He loves adventure, self sacrifice, heroism, relaxation. 



These things must somehow be provided. And then there must be a 

 system of education of our young differing widely from our present 

 system. The new education will not look to efficiency merely and ever 

 more efficiency, but to the production of a harmonized and balanced 

 personality. We must cease our worship of American efficiency and 

 German Strebertlium and go back to Aristotle and his teaching of 

 " the mean." 



