Toynbee urges again and again the cultural strategy of 
the imitation of the example of great men. This, of course, is to 
locate cultural safety in the power of the will , rather than in the 
power of adequate perception  of situations. Anybody could 
quip that this is the British trust in character as opposed to 
intellect. In view of the endless power of men to hypnotize 
themselves into unawareness in the presence of challenge, it 
may be argued that will-power is as useful as intelligence for 
survival. Today we need also the will to be exceedingly informed 
and aware.

     Arnold Toynbee gives an example of Renaissance 
technology being effectively encountered and creatively 
controlled when he shows how the revival of the decentralized 
medieval parliament saved English society from the monopoly 
of centralism that seized the continent. Lewis Mumford in The