Vera Stanley Alder Quotes

The Spiritual Cabinet would bring forward the ancient law of the cycle of seven, the seventh period being one of rest and change. The symbology of God’s rest upon the seventh day will be understood, and this rhythm should be applied to the laws of living... Especially should that one which stipulated that the ground must lie fallow every seventh year be revived. The Agricultural Council should organize stores of food for the seventh year, and the Industrial members should arrange for a complete change of occupation for every individual during every seventh year. Naturally, in both cases these periods would be staggered. Therefore in the life of every human being every seventh year would be one of rest and change. This means that a seventh part of the community would thus be occupied every year. Each person could look forward to his seventh, fourteenth, twenty-first year and so on, as welcome landmarks in his life, which nothing would be allowed to spoil. Such holiday years need not be useless from the community’s point of view, as the person could be sent abroad on a year’s tour or visit, for the purpose of cementing international friendships, studying world conditions, spreading new ideas, practicing languages, and enjoying the stimulating art of making new friends abroad.

We have said that all the community will perform their share in World Government and in the government of the country to which they belong. Any agricultural or industrial worker would have the opportunity to qualify for this. He should be enabled to work for the World Government secretariat even from the heart of his farm or factory. Television and wireless and a comprehensive air-mail service will enable him thus to serve almost as though he were within the Government walls.

Only when man begins to feel a personal obligation towards his host, the planet, and cultivates an honourable consideration in all his acts for^ the good of the earth as well as for his own benefit, will real harmony begin to exist between humanity and the elements, especially in respect of those subtle conditions which produce some of the diseases and epidemics which are continuing to baffle science.

When fine new laws are made, only half the battle is won. If people do not understand their value and feel no personal responsibility, they go against these laws with every subtle act and thought in their power, often producing new complications and conditions worse than those which it is being attempted to improve. Only when man begins to feel a personal obligation towards his host, the planet, and cultivates an honourable consideration in all his acts for^ the good of the earth as well as for his own benefit, will real harmony begin to exist between humanity and the elements, especially in respect of those subtle conditions which produce some of the diseases and epidemics which are continuing to baffle science.

They will realize the fact that planet and man can and should work hand in hand, so to speak, to their mutual benefit and understanding; and that the majority of cataclysms, earthquakes, droughts and floods are in actuality man-made. The past unfortunate period of ignorant self-interest resulting in private enterprise, which has among other disasters, exploited parts of the planet to the extent of flaying the surface of its layer of fertile earth which has taken aeons to build up, will be found to have given all of mankind a serious set-back. It will be necessary for the people fully to realize that this is so, and therefore to subscribe to a patient and lengthy process of renovation of the soil.

The Spiritual Cabinet will encourage the Research Panel to do much work on this subject, until finally they are able to prove the truth of many revolutionary ideas to the Agricultural Council and to mankind. The Earth, is indeed, a living entity in a certain sense of the word, a Being who pursues His course of evolution and achievement as courageously and as inevitably as do all other living creatures. They will prove also that man bears a very special, intimate and fundamental relationship to the life of the planet—that there is a close interdependance between the morals, motives and acts of mankind and the reactions in climatic terms, of the planet to themselves.

This work will also prove successful in the older deserts such as Sahara, on the Russian Steppes, and in other districts where the mud nuisance will be largely overcome, and in districts such as those in China where famines are induced by climatic conditions which will have been found to be alterable by man through intelligent afforestation and other measures. Only when such problems are treated through a worldwide planning scheme and from a highly scientific angle can it be hoped to produce radical changes in climate and in desert-making conditions, but eventually it can and will be done.

The first concern of the Agricultural Section would be the serious one of preventing soil erosion through large-scale cropping of the land and through the cutting down of trees. It may be that such world-wide ravages will be stopped only just in time. At the present date of writing (1900) the menace is grave indeed. It will readily be seen that the cure of this type of devastation and the rehabilitation of great tracts of land can only be achieved under the most rigid authority and over a long period. By the time of which we are speaking a good beginning will have been made. The newly formed deserts and dustbowls of America and Africa will have been gradually reduced in size by afforestation and by the introduction of water systems around their borders.

The question of labour being cheaper in one country than in another, and of different standards of living which puzzle economists so much to-day, need not exist at this future period.

[Business transactions] would be completed through television or visual wireless, each purchaser being able to see the proffered goods in their natural colors, as will then be possible. The Chinaman and the Englishman would see each other, discuss their goods, give new orders, and become as friendly as if no distance divided them.

The Council for Economics would have the work of planning the arrangements by means of which every child born into the world would be assured of the necessities of life and all the advantages of education.

The effort would be made to encourage to the full the especial qualities and genius of each nation or tribe, and to arrange that the fruits of its unique expression be offered to the world in exchange for such things as it needed from outside. Thus the cultivation of native arts and crafts would be revived. Ancient and mature cultures such as those of the Chinese would not be pushed aside or forgotten in the scramble to keep pace with modern conditions, as is the danger to-day.

The Council for Economics would be assisted by the Continental Council in mapping out a chart of the particular products which represented the especial gifts, capacities and qualities of any one nation. It would be recognized that each division of the community would have a contribution to make to the whole of which it alone would be capable, and that the individuality and life of a nation is an immortal quality engendered by the climatic conditions and subtle forces at work in its own land, and which the hand of man can never permanently deflect or destroy.

The terrible exploitation of native labor and destruction of native home life and the degenerating living conditions which have often been the result of private enterprise will no longer be possible.

The stipulation that a community must first be as self-supporting as possible in regard to food will do away with large scale cultivation of any one article, such as sugar, by a population who, living in a small area, must therefore depend upon obtaining much of their food from abroad.