These are some of the philosophical meditations and thoughts of my Grandfather, Albert Fitton, a shop steward from Heywood, Lancashire who passed in 1982. These notes were found in his house when it was being cleared and were almost lost forever. They were passed to me and I thought it would be fitting to record them here for posterity.

The Thoughts of “A”

1. Technology is not going to remove our deep seated need for order and harmony, or the belief that some part of us is immortal. These things found expression some 2,000 years ago, and even if they are lost for a time, we can renew them.
2. One may have to accept a change in values because of circumstances, but to tolerate ever declining standards as being inevitable is an admittance of failure.
3. Collective, cohesion and co-operation, coupled with simple logic is the recipe for success in any battle for survival, yet it often becomes ignored, or not recognised, even among the most intelligent of groups.
4. Principles are an expensive luxury that many poor people find too costly.
5. The world has ample resources for survival except for one; wisdom.
6. Daily it becomes more obvious that there is no animal on earth more stupid than man.

Further Thoughts of “A”

1. Loyalty is the creation of powerful wisdom, a rare possession indeed.
2. The ability to evaluate segregate and manipulate available resources is the key to progress.
3. The only people who never make mistakes are dead or mad, for to do nothing is often the biggest mistake of all.
4. Time is often the thief of endeavour.
5. The eroding of moral standards because of the pursuit of material wealth has brought down whole nations.
6. Wealth should be a servant not a master.
7. To those who are able, there is a duty to help those in need.
8. Poverty is the most formidable enemy to the achievement of peace.
9. People were meant to be different; in appearance, in thought, in actions. This will always be. The creation of law and order and the desire for peace can bring about the unification of contradictory ideals and make co-existence a reality.

The pitfalls of human nature

The pitfalls of human nature and survival are legion.
There seems to be an inherent weakness prevailing in the species that leans more towards what we know and accept as evil or wrong, than towards good or right.

Some people are able to overcome this with little effort; others achieve it but only with the exercise of great personal will-power. Like most efforts of this kind, the longer it is practised, the easier it becomes. It would appear that for the common good, all life should be regulated and subject to rules and rulers. Though this is not the perfect answer (for nothing is perfect), yet it is as near as the imperfect human race can get.

One of the many problems is the imperfection of the rulers: the inability to evaluate correctly, their lack of wisdom and recognition of others who possess it.

If power corrupts (as we are told it does) , then I think the fear of failure or even of error, is also as great, if not a greater influence to corruption.

Many men know where they want to go, what they want to achieve (if not how) and the inability of others to see it, understand it and co-operate in it, frustrates them, leads to deviousness and malpractice in a desperate attempt to finish at any price.

The recognition of these and many other failings are seen by the few who are naturally or inherently wise but the inability to influence the situation is often one of their shortcomings and so they remain passive.

Someday, perhaps, when the human race is on the brink of doom, we will see and recognise the need for wisdom, and all will be well again, or will it?

More thoughts of “A”

1. Sometimes things happen to people for which there is no earthly logical explanation. It would therefore seem logical to believe in the presence of a supreme being. Only when people cry out for the assistance and help of God, but do not receive it to their own satisfaction, do they deny His existence or proclaim disbelief.
2. It is an undeniable fact that if the code of ethics and morals laid down by any one of the major religions was strictly adhered to, the world would be a more stable and acceptable place. In the cycle of survival, death is the one positive contribution that all creatures must make. Each in its turn must give way to let others continue. If man ever learned to avoid his contribution, all would perish.
3. Weighing the need for more freedom, against the need for control, in a dangerous situation, remains one of the toughest tasks facing any political leader of today.
4. We are guilty of many errors and many faults, but our worst crime is abandoning the children; neglecting the fountain of life. Many of the things we need can wait. The child cannot. Right now is the time his bones are being formed, his blood is being made, and his senses are being developed. To him we cannot answer tomorrow. His name is today!
5. Tomorrow will surely arrive, whether you care or not. If you do not care you do not deserve to see it.
6. Never underestimate the potential of youth.
7. It is impossible to encompass the world with one culture. The only universal effort and belief should be the elimination of hunger.
8. Ideals are the essence of effort, but they alone do not butter the bread.
9. To know what is right and not to do it, is the worst cowardice.
10. If the members of a community are making fair and full contribution to that community, to replace their efforts with machinery and thus have them idle is not progress, unless the resulting wealth is distributed amongst them and surplus effort redirected.
11. If a man’s mind is dominated by the insecurity of his position, all decisions taken and all actions are motivated from self-interest.
12. Effort is its own reward. A greater desire to improve the position and to make the thing right, first time, with co-ordination and liaison between individual departments and supervisory staff, on a genuinely co-operative basis, is bound to have merit and must produce improvement in the efficiency and economic fields.
13. Many activities of top value cannot by their very nature be performed well. The problems associated with them are now untried and uncertain. Doing them means taking risks, which whether calculated or not, will sometimes bring an unsuccessful outcome.
14. Never carry yesterday on your back, or you’ll soon be bent double.
15. World problems and world poverty necessitate and bring an awareness of the interdependence of people everywhere. Failure to recognise this simple fact is the cause of most of the social, economic and political evils of this world.

And I look around

And I look around and I see life and what do I really see? I see people; the most precious commodity on this earth. The most diverse animal the world enfolds.
Their intelligence is such, that no problem of survival is beyond them, yet they cannot extend this natural asset sufficiently to fully manipulate the resources at their command.

I see them apparently incapable of appreciation of what it is all about. I see those who have and those who have not, and soon it will be plain that the survival of all will depend upon knowledge and wisdom, not upon possession of what are we term wealth.

God help us, all of us, to appreciate this simple fact before it is too late.

A.

One Solitary Life

Here is a young man who was born in an obscure village, the child of a peasant woman. He grew up in another village. He worked in a carpenters shop until he was 30 and then for three years he was an itinerant preacher. He never wrote a book. He never held office. He never owned a home. He never had a family. He never went to college. He never set foot in a big city. He never travelled 200 miles from where he was born. He never did any of the things usually associated with greatness. He had no credentials but himself.

While he was still a young man, the tide of public opinion turned against him. His friends ran away. He was turned over to his enemies. He went through the mockery of a trial. He was nailed to a cross between two thieves. While he was dying, his executioners gambled for his only piece of property, his coat. When he was dead, he was laid in a borrowed grave, through the pity of a friend.

Nearly 2,000 years have passed and he is still the central figure of the human race and leader the column of progress. I am far within the mark when I say that all the armies that ever marched, all the navies that where ever built, all the parliaments that ever sat, or all the kings that ever reigned, put together, have not affected man’s life on earth more than this ONE SOLITARY LIFE.

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