Thus under a system of collective responsibility the
process of social improvement is absolutely identified with that of
individual improvement. The antithesis is not between nationalism and
individualism, but between an individualism which is indiscriminate, and
an individualism which is selective.
II
CONDITIONS OF INDIVIDUAL EMANCIPATION
It is, then, essential to recognize that the individual American will
never obtain a sufficiently complete chance of self-expression, until
the American nation has earnestly undertaken and measurably achieved the
realization of its collective purpose. As we shall see presently, the
cure for this individual sterility lies partly with the individual
himself or rather with the man who proposes to become an individual; and
under any plan of economic or social organization, the man who proposes
to become an individual is a condition of national as well as individual
improvement. It is none the less true that any success in the
achievement of the national purpose will contribute positively to the
liberation of the individual, both by diminishing his temptations,
improving his opportunities, and by enveloping him in an invigorating
rather than an enervating moral and intellectual atmosphere.
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