The Jamestown colonists were driven by wild dreams and endless optimism to the New World, where they did little work, and thus had little food and shelter come winter, and most of them died. The Transcendentalists were driven by wild dreams and endless optimist to the frontier, where they did little work, and thus had little food come winter, and most left.
Bertrand Russel started a school where students were not required to follow rules. It's not hard to guess how that turned out. Society can certainly be improved, history has shown that those who propose to remake human nature are consistently disappointed.
Ah, were all these folks mystics of some sort? Does the pursuit of perfect freedom, rather than moral purity, always lead to starvation? Are these folks all like the grasshopper?
ReplyDeleteI think you will enjoy the piece by Lousia May Alcott!
LDL