Two Kinds of Influence; L.E. Read

The important question at issue is not: "Should we [397 ] have an interest in others?" Obviously we should. In stead, the vital question is: "In what way can we best aid the millions of others upon whom we are unquestionably dependent?" There are two ways, constantly in action. One com mends the influencing of others by force. The other com mends the influencing of other by attraction. Both are useful if understood and properly practiced. Aggression vs. Defense There isn't any doubt but that force is an effective method of influencing others. Force, however, is of two kinds. There is initiated or coercive force-aggression. It is inconceivable that this kind of force can have any moral justification among men under any circumstances. There is, though, another kind of force-defensive or repellent force. But even defensive force has only the capacity to destroy or restrain and, therefore, is the type of influence that should be limited to negating aggression or coercive force, regardless of source: all violence, all fraud, all misrepresentation, all predatory practices. To avoid the authoritarianism of each citizen being a com plete law unto himself-each person his own gun-toter we should, in good theory, delegate the defensive func tion to a formal, codified, societal-wide agency called government. (When delegating only defensive functions to government, we grant no collective rights that are not the prior rights of individuals; for the collective cannot logically or morally exercise rights which are not in[398 ] herent in the very persons who organize 'the collective.) Defensive force, to be used profitably, must be con fined to minimizing coercive or aggressive force-that is, to securing those rights to life and honestly acquired livelihood common to all men. Force cannot, by its na ture, otherwise serve us creatively. Yet, force of the coer cive brand is attempted currently as a means of influenc ing others in tens of thousands of instances. All socialistic acts by government are cases in point-public housing, for example. How? The force of government-not de fensive but coercive force-is employed to take the prop erty of some for the "benefit" of others. In what manner is this aggression? The use of one's livelihood in one's own way is forcibly denied by the aggressive taking of it -effective, indeed!

Force as a device for having others behave in ways seemingly advantageous to oneself is not intelligent at tention to self-interest-except when used to restrain them from coercive acts. To aggressively force others is to thwart others. Self-interest requires that all others be come more creative, not more thwarted. The question, then, to which self-interest demands an answer is: "How does one influence others to become more creative?" The Power of Attraction Attraction is the best answer to influencing others creatively. Daily experiences supply evidence to support this conclusion. If one would influence another to become [399 ] a better cook or golfer, he should increase his own pro ficiency at cooking or golfing. He should attain a perfec tion, a leadership, a head-of-the-class status that would attract others to draw on him. No person is influenced to greater creative activity on any subject by one who is inferior on that subject. Influence of one on another in upgrading-materialistically, intellectually, spiritually -is by attraction only.

One can do things to others destructively, but not creatively. Creatively, one must confine himseH to what he can do for others. One can do things for others ma terialistically by having money or tools to lend or give, or goods and services to exchange; intellectually by hav ing knowledge and understanding for those who are in search of knowledge and understanding; spiritually by possessing insights that can be imparted to those who \vant them. Self-interest can best be served by minding one's own business-that is, by the process of self-perfection. It isn't that this idea has been tried and found wanting; it is that it has been tried and too often found difficult, and thus rejected. Actually, coercive meddling in other people's affairs has its origin in the rejection of self-perfection. Many persons conclude that they can easily improve others in ways they refuse to attempt on themselves. This is an absurd conclusion. Thus it is that in our dealings with our fellow men, we so often try to coerce them into likenesses of our own little images instead of trying to make of ourselves images that are attractive and worth emulating.

[400] THE STATE t, :JreJeric Ba61ial (1801-1850) I WISH someone would offer a prize-not of a hundred francs but of a million, with crowns, medals, and ribbons -for a good, simple, intelligible definition of the term, The State. What an immense service such a definition would render to society! The State! What is it? Where is it? What does it do? What should it do? We only know that it is a mysterious being; and, it is certainly the most petitioned, the most harassed, the most bustling, the most advised, the most reproached, the most invoked, and the most challenged of any being in the world. I have not the honor of knowing my reader, but I would stake ten to one that sometime in the last six months you have designed utopias, and if so, that you are looking to The State for the realization of them. But alas! That poor unfortunate being, like Figaro, knows not which plea to hear nor where to tum. The hundred thousand mouths of the press and of the plat form cry out all at onceOrganize work and the workmen.