Philosophy as a search for truth must and does look at life as a whole, must and does take all human activities into its perspective, instead of leaving them outside. It is only because the philosophic teacher's human limitations prevent him from dealing with all things and compel him to specialize in one thing that he economizes time and strength by serving humanity as a spiritual educator rather than as a politician. Both services are needed by humanity but one is infinitely more needed than the other. Save in the exceptional cases where he feels charged by fate and duty to render some public service in connection with them, he holds aloof from practical politics, theoretical economics, religious controversy, and social questions. He knows that the inner issue is really at stake behind all these others and this in turn depends on the metaphysical world-view. To formulate such a correct world-view and to guide men in the realization of their higher selves is then his chief and only task.
He reserves his best thought and energy for the fundamental task of, on the one hand, unveiling hidden laws of life and imparting a knowledge which improves mankind morally, mentally, and mystically and, on the other hand, to improving his own self so as to be better able to help change human character, reduce its selfishness, and dissipate its materialism. The social usefulness of teaching philosophy is ultimately on a deeper level than the social usefulness of stimulating worldly reform. For here man is dealing with causes, but there with effects. The philosophical mystic's work is limited in area to this single domain, but it is very much deeper and therefore very much more important just because of that limitation.
-- Notebooks Category 20: What Is Philosophy? > Chapter 4 : Its Realization Beyond Ecstasy > # 274
