Example Is Better Than Precept

M |
ost writing is a private activity, but a public service. I may dash off a protest in the solitude of a random study, or compile a report on any recent happenings, or even scribble a few secret paragraphs in a jiffy regarding some whimsical topics. But in each case, my intention would be the same that eventually, my writing would become the reading matter of someone else, that my private words would ‘go public,’ the reason why choosing an appropriate topic for my article was a fit of a stuck – in – the – mud feeling! Faced with an intense or convulated writing task, I may often become very inward – looking, struggling to put my thoughts into some abrupt words, and get the words down on paper.
Hence, coming to the point, ARE WE HAPPIER THAN OUR FOREFATHERS? Yes, it is difficult to answer this question, because the meaning of the word ‘happiness’ differs from person to person, and from time to time, even to the same person.
No doubt we produce and consume those plenty of goods which our forefathers might not even have dreamt of! We’ve got speedier means of transport and communication, a wide variety of entertainment media, improved systems of public health and hygiene, better medical facilities, civic amenities, and greater social and political stability and security. Modern man enjoys all comforts, luxuries and pleasures, which even the kings and emperors of the past would have envied.
But, against all this, we have slums, pollution, organized crime, social and political conflicts. The number of people living in abject poverty under degrading living conditions is increasing in numbers.
City life today is full of noise and congestion, hustle and bustle, hurry and worry, stress and tension. There exists pleasure, but no contentment; progress, but no peace of mind. Man in the cities is totally divorced from nature. We are so much engrossed in dull and drab work, that we have no time to stand and stare at the natural beauty around us, and neither do we enjoy the...