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NO ESCAPING EVIL: To a certain extent every age turns a blind eye towards most of its chief evils. One of the main reasons for this is undoubtedly helplessness, but others also include indifference, laziness, societal hostility, class rivalry, moral hypocrisy, ignorance, lack of imagination, and - probably most common of all - the inborn inclination of a majority of people to take matters more or less for granted.

Knowing this to be the case, however, one should nonetheless endeavour to attribute a reasonable justification to this string of evils (whatever they happen to be and wherever they happen to flourish). For not only do they constitute a very common, perennial, and ineradicable element in the life of a nation at any given time but, more importantly, they also constitute a very worthwhile element in the protection of that nation's psychic equilibrium, since without its evil side it would have nothing good to boast of, and therefore be unable to exist. Paradoxical though it may seem, it is important to note that evils of one kind or another will always exist, no matter what the gonfalon, for the good of the people. The assertion, however, that they don't exist when it is patently obvious they do, is in itself a clear example of a particular kind of evil which is fairly constant among certain individuals and institutions in every age.

Granted, then, that an age may be justified in turning a 'blind eye' to most of its chief evils, in pretending them not to exist and quite often in not knowing of their existence, it nonetheless has to be said that under no circumstances would it be justified in categorically denying their existence, in asserting them to be a figment of the popular imagination, since such an absurd attitude would amount to a veritable refutation of all life. It would, in fact, amount to something gravely unjustifiable in a world where antitheses are ever the mean!

The fact, however, that society is relatively integrated in every age stands to reason. For no matter what the situation, no matter how bad things may appear, good and evil must always co-exist in various degrees and guises, according to whether a nation is at peace or at war, even if a number of the standards concerning the respective criteria of good and evil are constantly being changed or modified in order to meet the demands of the occasion. What man ought to know, and too often forgets (though this is probably just as well), is that nature is ultimately wiser than he, that he is the product of nature and consequently is guided and motivated by it in every age, irrespective of what the chief political, social, religious, moral, economic, agricultural, or industrial priorities may happen to be at any given time.

The endeavour to create a perfect human society is inevitably a gross self-deception. For man can never attain to a society where, presumably, everyone will be equal and all the assumed evil elements be eliminated, when the essential nature of existence demands our acceptance of and acquiescence in the continuous interplay of polar opposites: good and evil, rich and poor, truth and illusion, ruling and ruled, noble and plebeian, etc., under virtually every gonfalon throughout history. Were mankind ever destined to arrive at such a 'perfect society', it would undoubtedly constitute something distinctly imperfect, anomalous, and insufferable. In sum, one can only rob Peter to pay Paul.