2 o THE PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS 



Sociologists refer to our ' cultural lags ' when some of the phases 

 of our social life change more quickly than others and thus get out of 

 gear and cause maladjustments. Not sufficient harm is done to 

 strike the imagination when the change is a slow one, and all the 

 contexts of law, ethics, economic relations and educational ideals 

 tend towards harmony and co-ordination. We can even tolerate by 

 our conventions, gaps between them when preachers and publicists 

 can derive certain amusement and profit from pointing out our 

 inconsistencies. But when things are moving very rapidly, these 

 lags become important ; the concepts of theology and ethics, the 

 tradition of the law, all tend to lag seriously behind changes brought 

 about through science, technical affairs and general economic life. 

 Some hold that part of our present derangement is due to the lack 

 of harmony between these different phases — the law and govern- 

 mental forms constitutionally clearly lag behind even economic 

 developments as impulsed by scientific discovery. An acute American 

 observer has said that ' the causes of the greatest economic evils of 

 to-day are to be found in the recent great multiplication of inter- 

 ferences by Government with the functioning of the markets, under 

 the influence of antiquated doctrines growing out of conditions of 

 far more primitive economic life.' It would be, perhaps, truer to 

 say that we are becoming ' stability conscious ' and setting greater 

 store, on humanitarian grounds, by the evil effects of instability. 



In the United States it would be difficult to find, except theoreti- 

 cally in the President, any actual person, or instrument in the 

 Constitution, having any responsibility for looking at the picture of 

 the country as a whole, and there is certainly none for making a co- 

 ordinated plan. Indeed, in democracy, it is difficult to conceive it, 

 because the man in public life is under continual pressure of particular 

 groups, and so long as he has his electoral position to consider, he 

 cannot put the general picture of progress in the forefront. White- 

 head declared that when an adequate routine, the aim of every social 

 system, is established, intelligence vanishes and the system is main- 

 tained by a co-ordination of conditioned reflexes. Specialised training 

 alone is necessary. No one, from President to miner, need under- 

 stand the system as a whole. 



The price of pace is peace. Man must move by stages in which he 

 enjoys for a space a settled idea, and thus there must always be 

 something which is rather delayed in its introduction, and the source 

 of sectional scientific scorn. If every day is ' moving ' day, man must 

 live in a constant muddle, and create that very fidget and unrest of 

 mind which is the negation of happiness. Always ' jam to-morrow ' 

 — the to-morrow that ' never comes.' If we must have quanta 01 

 stages, the question is their optimum length and character, not 

 merely the regulation of industry and innovation to their tempo, 



