Will Durant (1885-1981) author of critically acclaimed eleven–volume master piece The Story of Civilization and The Story of Philosophy wrote some independent inspiring articles which were published posthumously in a smart volume The Greatest Minds and Ideas of All Time in 2002. Following excerpts are from a classic article A Shameless Worship of Heroes:“Of the many ideals which in youth gave a meaning and radiance missing from the chilly perspective of middle age, one at least has remained with me as bright and satisfying as ever before-the shameless worship of heroes. I say shameless, for I know how unfashionable it is now to acknowledge in life or history any genius loftier than ourselves.
Why should we stand reverent before waterfalls and mountaintops, or summer moon on a quite sea, and not before the highest miracle of all: a man who is both great and good? So many of us are mere talents, clever children in the play of life, that when genius stands in our presence we can only bow down before it as an act of God, a continuance of creation. Such men are the very life-blood of history, to which politics and industry are but frames and bones.
No, the real history of man is not in prices and wages, nor in elections and battles, nor in the even tenor of common man; it is the lasting contributions made by geniuses to the sum of human civilization and culture. The history of France is not, if one may say it with all courtesy, the history of the French people; the history of those nameless men and women who tilled the soil, cobbled the shoes, cut the cloth, and peddled the goods(for these things has been done everywhere and always)- the history of France is the record of her exceptional men and women, her inventors, scientist, statesmen, poets, artists, musicians, philosophers, and saints, and of the additions which they made to the technology and wisdom, the artistry and decency, of their people and mankind. “
No, the real history of man is not in prices and wages, nor in elections and battles, nor in the even tenor of common man; it is the lasting contributions made by geniuses to the sum of human civilization and culture. The history of France is not, if one may say it with all courtesy, the history of the French people; the history of those nameless men and women who tilled the soil, cobbled the shoes, cut the cloth, and peddled the goods(for these things has been done everywhere and always)- the history of France is the record of her exceptional men and women, her inventors, scientist, statesmen, poets, artists, musicians, philosophers, and saints, and of the additions which they made to the technology and wisdom, the artistry and decency, of their people and mankind. “
For us Muhammad Ali Jinnah is one such hero.
