Culture and Anarchy

Answers

• Q31SACRED

  Can reliance on machinery become a form of idolatry?

  Yes. machinery is valued as if it were an end. Says 'faith in machinery' is England's besetting danger: freedom, coal, railroads, wealth and even religious organisations are treated as ends in themselves.

  Faith in machinery is, I said, our besetting danger; often in machinery most absurdly disproportioned to the end which this machinery, if it is to do any good at all, is to serve; but always in machinery, as if it had a value in and for itself. What is freedom but machinery? what is population but machinery? what is coal but machinery? what are railroads but machinery? what is wealth but machinery? what are religious organisations but machinery? Now almost every voice in England is accustomed to speak of these things as if they [17] were precious ends in themselves, and therefore had some of the characters of perfection indisputably joined to them.

  Chapter I · Gutenberg #4212; passage read in Chapter I.