Civilization, like other aspects of human culture, is never static but always dynamic.  It changes constantly, waxing and waning.  It develops, expands and contracts.  It reaches out toward universality, then breaks down and dissolves into a welter of conflicting regional and local interest groups.  These changes are the outcome of hard-nosed experience.  They are related to alterations in ideas, outlooks and purposes.  They are often associated with technical discoveries and inventions.  They come and go in more or less clearly defined cycles.  They are influenced by deep running political, economic and social forces and trends.

Each civilization matures into forms and develops functions and institutions that tend to consolidate and crystallize in well defined social patterns and habit grooves in which two forces oppose each other:  one force is status—­preserving that which is; the other force is change—­that which tends to become or is becoming.

Status and change confront each other at all social levels.  During periods of rapid social change they take the center of the stage and dominate the drama.

The planet-wide revolution of 1750-1970 is an outstanding example of rapid change.  The current opposition of status and change has pushed other aspects of social life into second place and has made the social status of yesterday outmoded today and obsolete tomorrow.

The disintegration of western civilization (indicated by its 1910-1975 time of troubles) is having profound effects on western man.  The effects are physical, mental, energenic and moral for individuals.  Socially they find expression in vandalism, hooliganism, major crime, in the break-up of the family; in alienation, inertia, boredom; in laxity, indiscipline; loss of faith, weakness or absence of purpose.  Most serious of all, perhaps, western peoples are learning to ignore principle, live for the moment, satisfy their already sated appetites and pay little or no attention to the future.  These attitudes are widespread in the western world of the 1970’s, particularly among the young.  These effects, on the whole negative, are offset by a number of positive factors.  Human beings are curious and imaginative.  They are also ingenious, inventive and intuitive.  All of these attributes are assets when dealing with the future and the unknown.

In a previous generation, preceding the war of 1914-18, a very large part of the West was under the influence of the Christian church, which promised good things in the hereafter.  During the ensuing years of military conflict, planned destruction and wholesale murder, another considerable part of the West, both socialist and liberal, was promising security, comfort and convenience here and now.  The influence of the Christian church on life style, even among its own membership, has declined in the past half century.  Affluent monopoly capitalism, meanwhile, has provided the rich, the middle class and important numbers of