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Show 280, scientists understood only in very general terms. Men would need to preserve the vast unspoiled realm of Nature and study the laws exhibited there. "Wildness," Muir would conclude, was the "one great want, both of men and sheep." That meant that any "higher culture" should be concerned with the production of high quality men and animals. This was very close to the argument which Henry George presented in "Our Land and Land Policy." The influence of George on Muir has interested critics because John Swett, one of Muir's closest friends during this period, was also a close friend of George, and helped edit Progress and Poverty. George believed that men were "children of the soil," and he attempted to remind his fellow Californians that simple dominion, or ownership of the soil, did not constitute wealth. Out of this soil, George felt, "our greatest product is a crop of men." Muir agreed with George about the goals of agriculture, though he took a different view of the means to that end. They both doubted that a "gross national product" was a worthy goal for a culture. Men needed to grow from Nature, not aspire toward independence from it. They needed to recognize that quality, not quantity, was the hallmark of a fine culture. Muir was aware of the modern consciousness which said, "the world might not be made for men, but men can use it anyway." He would try to answer this godless argument, and meet the "resource conservation and development consciousness" on its own ground. He would write a kind of Socratic Dialogue |