In devoting time to spiritual reform, we go to the root of all other reforms. If men get rid of their spiritual ignorance it is inevitable that they will more quickly get rid of undesirable conditions in every other department of their life. Nowadays we must especially guard ourselves against the one-sided unbalanced doctrines, the selfish degrading ethos, and the false materialistic ideas which have so widely permeated the political, cultural, commercial, and religious terrain of our time. No Marxian magic and no financial wizardry can turn a planet peopled by men and women still dominated by hates, greeds, selfishnesses, and lusts into a physical utopia. Ultimately the experience of all history, both individual and national, teaches the lesson that physical well-being alone is not enough. It contributes towards the true happiness of man on earth but does not complete it. The welfare of the body is not an end in itself but only a means to a higher end. Hence philosophy, in its consideration of the methods to be used to achieve such an end, says that external re-arrangement of social forms will not of itself bring about fully satisfactory results. A re-arrangement from within is equally if not much more necessary.
-- Notebooks Category 11: The Negatives > Chapter 3 : Their Presence in The World > # 371
