Hi all,
The second of my three favorite books from 2016.
Tim
Fallen Leaves: Last Words on Life, Love, War, and God by Will Durant (November 2016)
This short collection of essays represents Durant finally 'speaking his mind' on the issues, events, and forces he wrote about so impersonally over six highly-decorated decades as a philosopher and historian. This posthumously published collection sees Durant explore many of the big ideas that we ponder throughout our lifetimes. The end result was a book that drove home his idea about what a 'good life' meant to him and undoubtedly will help many readers better understand how they might achieve this ideal for themselves, their communities, and their countries.
Unlike Tiny Beautiful Things or my third and final 'book of 2016' (a novel), Fallen Leaves is the type of book I tend to often read. It presents the distilled wisdom of Durant's near-century of experience in a way that readers can take or leave as they see fit. The writing is calm and thoughtful throughout and, as a reader, I was comfortable in rolling with some of his outdated views in order to fully immerse in the depth of his remaining insights.
I wrote briefly in December about how much I liked his comment regarding the need for a society to plan for peace in the same way it plans for war. The need is greater, in fact, due to a society almost always facing stronger incentives to go to war over remaining at peace. This thoughtful criticism exemplifies much of what I liked about the work- it's focus on the big-picture, a willingness to cut off his own suggestions when he senses that the details are better left to the more qualified, an unshakable conviction that goodness will win out in the end.
There is insight into what Durant considers the natural threats to the stability of a healthy, productive, and peaceful society. He notes the inevitable natural forces that lead to wealth accumulation, acknowledges that the birth rate is always incentivized to outpace the death rate, and concedes that a capitalist state is defined by its struggle to define its relationship with welfare as burdensome or symbiotic. In each case, he describes the effects of various policy levers that a government might use to address these and delivers his prescriptions in a measured and sympathetic prose.
Durant accumulated his knowledge over a lifetime of dedicated study. His experience undoubtedly influences the underlying theme of these essays- that ongoing improvement of education is the one non-negotiable component in maintaining the progress of society. Durant values education above any other institution of civilization. He views the fully educated as those who can control, enjoy, and understand their own lives. A society full of these people is prepared to understand the patterns of sixty centuries of human history and take the preventative measures needed to avoid the pitfalls that doomed so many of our predecessors.
The most powerful idea here, though, in a way does conflict with his views on education. The young, writes Durant, should prioritize love over gold. Love is the eternal human product, one that radiates naturally from us at birth, but it is soon smothered under the never-ending absorption of all the unnatural skills one must learn to thrive- morality, civility, prohibitions, financial caution. To Durant, wisdom in youth is valuing love over gold, even if it comes in conflict with the goals of the educational process that he championed so consistently in his life and in his writing.
I recognize that, in a way, this book arrived at just about the perfect time. In November, it was clear that many would look back on 2016 as the year they were challenged to accept the faults and limitations of their neighbors. Some rose to the occasion and sought ways to relate across differences. Others chose to entrench in their positions and resorted to pettiness or finger-pointing.
In reading books like Fallen Leaves, I'm finding ways to handle society's setbacks a little better. The concepts found here show pathways to acceptance with the imperfections of our states. To expect society to improve faster than the people within it defines utopian thinking, Durant writes.
But such a concession does not mean passively accepting the lethargic pace of change and progress. Rather, it means each person taking initiative to find their own way of influencing others and accelerating progress. It means forcing society to match the pace of the people, not forcing people to slow their pace to society.
The big ideas that push law and policy forward are seductive. Outlaw the cages and the chickens roam free.
But it's the little stuff, day by day, that adds up. Educate eggs consumers and the letter of the cage law becomes irrelevant.
Such a view at the start of 2017 is empowering. It means that, no matter the realities of policy or leadership, society can still change as long as the people are finding ways to influence change. It means accelerating at the grassroots so that society is forced to catch up. That kind of thing doesn't happen if the effort comes once every four years. It has to come every day, in the way we interact with our neighbors or participate in our communities.
