SCIENCE AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 267 



The obvious fact, which most of us will admit, is that "all 

 exhortations to duty and morality, and to elevation and 

 expansion of mind, in the face of material and social condi- 

 tions adverse to the growth of these virtues, are a waste of 

 time and human energy; and are as absurd as to expect a 

 rich and vigorous fruitage from trees or plants in spite of 

 adverse conditions of soil. " 3 Unfavorable material and 

 social conditions are a check upon cultural progress and 

 hence upon the aspirations of men. Individual conscience 

 and perseverance are not a myth. But in a world where 

 things make so many of their relationships, that is, their 

 ethical values, through their influence upon the minds of 

 men, it is idle to suppose that high idealism will long flourish 

 in the face of a sordid environment. The talk about men 

 being men in spite of adverse social and material circum- 

 stances is well enough, but it is a terribly effective means for 

 the perpetuation of iniquitous conditions. If men's ideals 

 are not literally bred of their surroundings, it is true that 

 their ideals are thus conditioned. The material and social 

 environment, in other words the general cultural level, is a 

 limiting factor in the advance of society along the lines of the 

 elevation and expansion of the individual. 



Scientific knowledge of fact has importance in the above 

 connection, because through science alone can men control 

 their material and social surroundings. Invoking a super- 

 natural control of these surroundings may be still practiced, 

 in the case of little-understood phenomena like disease and 

 the weather. But confidence in the effectiveness of such 

 invocations is rapidly disappearing, because mankind is 

 learning that the new way and the sure way lies through the 



"Civilization and Progress," in which he strenuously opposes the doctrine that 

 civilization is to be forwarded, rather by exhortations to duty and morality, 

 than by the gradual amelioration of the material and social conditions 

 of mankind. Crozier is thus opposed to Carlyle, whose emphasis upon 

 spiritual values led him to pour contempt upon the whole of material 

 existence. 



3 Crozier, J. B., loc. cit., p. 383. 



