mediocrity

149:4.3On this same oc­ca­sion the Mas­ter talked to the group about the de­sir­abil­ity of pos­sess­ing well-bal­anced char­ac­ters. He rec­og­nized that it was nec­es­sary for most men to de­vote them­selves to the mas­tery of some vo­ca­tion, but he de­plored all ten­dency to­ward over­spe­cial­iza­tion, to­ward be­com­ing nar­row-minded and cir­cum­scribed in life’s ac­tiv­i­ties. He called at­ten­tion to the fact that any virtue, if car­ried to ex­tremes, may be­come a vice. Je­sus al­ways preached tem­per­ance and taught con­sis­tency—pro­por­tion­ate ad­just­ment of life prob­lems. He pointed out that over­much sym­pa­thy and pity may de­gen­er­ate into se­ri­ous emo­tional in­sta­bil­ity; that en­thu­si­asm may drive on into fa­nati­cism. He dis­cussed one of their for­mer as­so­ciates whose imag­i­na­tion had led him off into vi­sion­ary and im­prac­ti­cal un­der­tak­ings. At the same time he warned them against the dan­gers of the dull­ness of over­con­ser­va­tive medi­ocrity.

72:9.8The schools of states­man­ship have power to start pro­ceed­ings in the state courts look­ing to­ward the dis­en­fran­chise­ment of any de­fec­tive, idle, in­dif­fer­ent, or crim­i­nal in­di­vid­ual. These peo­ple rec­og­nize that, when fifty per cent of a na­tion is in­fe­rior or de­fec­tive and pos­sesses the bal­lot, such a na­tion is doomed. They be­lieve the dom­i­nance of medi­ocrity spells the down­fall of any na­tion. Vot­ing is com­pul­sory, heavy fines be­ing as­sessed against all who fail to cast their bal­lots.

111:7.5“Much of my dif­fi­culty was due to the un­end­ing con­flict be­tween the two na­tures of my sub­ject: the urge of am­bi­tion op­posed by an­i­mal in­do­lence; the ide­als of a su­pe­rior peo­ple crossed by the in­stincts of an in­fe­rior race; the high pur­poses of a great mind an­tag­o­nized by the urge of a prim­i­tive in­her­i­tance; the long-dis­tance view of a far-see­ing Mon­i­tor coun­ter­acted by the near­sight­ed­ness of a crea­ture of time; the pro­gres­sive plans of an as­cend­ing be­ing mod­i­fied by the de­sires and long­ings of a ma­te­rial na­ture; the flashes of uni­verse in­tel­li­gence can­celled by the chem­i­cal-en­ergy man­dates of the evolv­ing race; the urge of an­gels op­posed by the emo­tions of an an­i­mal; the train­ing of an in­tel­lect an­nulled by the ten­den­cies of in­stinct; the ex­pe­ri­ence of the in­di­vid­ual op­posed by the ac­cu­mu­lated propen­si­ties of the race; the aims of the best over­shad­owed by the drift of the worst; the flight of ge­nius neu­tral­ized by the grav­ity of medi­ocrity; the prog­ress of the good re­tarded by the in­er­tia of the bad; the art of the beau­ti­ful be­smirched by the pres­ence of evil; the buoy­ancy of health neu­tral­ized by the de­bil­ity of dis­ease; the foun­tain of faith pol­luted by the poi­sons of fear; the spring of joy em­bit­tered by the wa­ters of sor­row; the glad­ness of an­tic­i­pa­tion dis­il­lu­sioned by the bit­ter­ness of re­al­iza­tion; the joys of liv­ing ever threat­ened by the sor­rows of death. Such a life on such a planet! And yet, be­cause of the ever-pres­ent help and urge of the Thought Ad­juster, this soul did achieve a fair de­gree of hap­pi­ness and suc­cess and has even now as­cended to the judg­ment halls of man­so­nia.”

71:2.21. Glo­ri­fi­ca­tion of medi­ocrity.

100:0.1The ex­pe­ri­ence of dy­namic re­li­gious liv­ing trans­forms the mediocre in­di­vid­ual into a per­son­al­ity of ide­al­is­tic power. Re­li­gion min­is­ters to the prog­ress of all through fos­ter­ing the prog­ress of each in­di­vid­ual, and the prog­ress of each is aug­mented through the achieve­ment of all.

48:7.2927. Prog­ress de­mands de­vel­op­ment of in­di­vid­u­al­ity; medi­ocrity seeks per­pet­u­a­tion in stan­dard­iza­tion.

70:12.104. Stale­mate of the dom­i­nance of medi­ocrity.