Basic Human Standards

It had been 200 years since the birth of Philosopher-Poet Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. To the University of Chicago's Robert M. Hutchins, 1949 seemed like a perfect time for calling attention to a "consciousness of moral responsibilities, liberty, and the dignity of man."

Inspired by Goethe, whom Hutchins called "the world's last truly universal man," a committee of U.S. citizens (honorary chairman: Herbert Hoover) arranged to take over the mountain resort of Aspen, Colo, for a three-week bicentennial festival. They hired the Minneapolis Symphony to play, and assembled a distinguished roster of speakers, including Poet Stephen Spender, Novelist Ludwig Lewisohn, Playwright Thornton Wilder, Alsatian Philosopher-Missionary Albert Schweitzer, and Spain's Philosopher-Teacher-Statesman Jose Ortega y Gasset.

The festival, which came to an end this week, was a cultural rather than a popular or financial success. Hutchins had set the spiritual tone of the gathering: "The major concern of thoughtful citizens today is the lack of serious consideration for the application ... of the basic human standards best represented in the humanities--philosophy, religion, ethics--and the social sciences."

In the days that followed, the Hutchins challenge was boldly met by Speakers

Schweitzer and Ortega. Both were optimistic about the status of human standards in the world today; both stood in agreement that man is good, and that, through his own efforts coupled with divine aid, he could better himself and his lot. Ortega welcomed, as normal and healthy, the doubts that now & again besiege humanity. Schweitzer felt that mankind was able, in fact dutybound, to take on fuller responsibilities.

Solid Ground. "Man needs faith," said Ortega, "he needs belief as a soil and a solid ground where he may stretch his limibs and rest." Man is constantly getting lost, he conceded, but being lost is actually a "dramatic privilege" and not an evil. When lost, the man who has faith turns himself into an instrument of orientation "to guide him and to return him to himself ... If man had not been lost, countless times, on land and sea, the points of the compass would never have been developed.

"I do not recollect that any civilization ever perished from an attack of doubt," Ortega said. "I recollect that civilizations usually die through the ossification of their traditional faith, through an arteriosclerosis of their beliefs."

To newsmen he said: "I do not see the world as darkly as many. People should not believe the politicians. I am optimistic about the fate of Europe, and America can help to save what it is possible to preserve of European civilization, principally by spiritual aid."

Incalculable Forces. Dr. Schweitzer was equally confident about man's ability to weather his current storms. The great problem of modern times, he said, is "to safeguard the integrity of the individual within the modern state." The great modern conflict: "Personality versus collectivity . . . [They are] fighting everywhere. Collectivism in its various forms has deprived the individual of his individuality."

Referring specifically to man's moral equipment, Dr. Schweitzer suggested a course of action. He had "great confidence in the incalculable forces of the spirit. The future depends on it," and would be "improved ... if these spiritual forces are brought into play." Schweitzer scoffed at pat distinctions between materialism and spirituality. The U.S. was a perfect example of the worthlessness of such a distinction. "Behind materialism it is often possible to find great spiritual forces at work. And behind spirituality an element of materialism also exists.

"Man's supreme manifestation of the spirit," said Dr. Schweitzer, expounding an idea of Goethe's, "is kindness. The spirit does not let man simply assert and impose himself over other beings, but obliges him to have consideration for them. The spirit in this fashion brings order into the chaos of relations. The man who really finds himself cannot do otherwise than let himself be guided by love. This latter is the divine element in him ... If love is the very essence of spirit, God can only be conceived as the fullness of love . . ."

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