The power to become habituated to his surroundings is a marked characteristic of mankind. Very few of us realise with conviction the intensely unusual, unstable, complicated, unreliable, temporary nature of the economic organisation by which Western Europe has lived for the last half century. We assume some of the most peculiar and temporary of our late advantages as natural, permanent, and to be depended on, and we lay our plans accordingly. On this sandy and false foundation we scheme our social improvement and dress our political platforms, pursue our animosities and particular ambitions …

Having lost the comfort of our geographic boundaries, we must in effect rediscover what creates the bond between humans that constitute a community.