Ralph Barton Perry

Educator and author, RALPH BARTON PERRY taught philosophy at Harvard under Presidents Eliot, Lowell, and Conant. From 1940 to 1945 he was Chairman of American Defense-Harvard Group, and during that time he lived by the logic of war. Today, as Professor Emeritus, he is dedicated to the logic of peace. Before returing to the University of Glasgow, where he has been delivering the Gifford Lectures, he made these remarks of light and leading to American undergraduates at Bucknell University and Wilson College, and at the Atlantic’s urging he has expanded his views in this farseeing paper.

“Civilization is not saved by the mere purging of one’s heart, but by the work of one’s hands. The forces of destruction must be met, each according to its kind, by the forces of deliverance.”