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   There is a wide feeling of pessimism about halting pollution which is frequently accompanied by an individual sense of guilt; there have been too many shocks!

   It seemed simple enough to clean-up smog; it was only factory smoke and stuff! But it was a shock to learn that the worst air pollution was caused by the invisible gases from our own motor cars.

   Water pollution seemed just a matter of being careful with drinking water and treating all sewerage; but it was another shock to discover that after treatment, the effluents which look quite clear still pollute the rivers and the seas.

   It was a shock to learn that the milkman delivers the D.D.T. every morning and that it is in everything we eat.

   The disclosures about how the chemicals concentrate along the living food-chains was very interesting. The crunch came when we realised we were the final link and got the bigeest dose.

   D.D.T. in penguins in the Antarctica gave cause to wonder how much we eat in a meal of fish caught along our coastline. And in October, 1971 there was a locust plague and 20,000 square miles of our country was sprayed with tons of synthetic chemical poisons and not an alternative suggestion or a word of protest from anyone until it was too late--just a fatal acceptance of the inevitable? Hell! What a world and there is sure to be worse to come!

   Pollution in this country was not an inevitable part of progress or of over-crowded cities.

   Pollution is the result of the normal functioning over many decades of an inefficient, arrogant and impersonal establishment. The environment is polluted because it is made up of the chaotic landscapes of the establishment.

   WE NEED A HUMAN ENVIRONMENT REVOLUTION. Not until there is health and harmony in all our landscapes can there be humanity and common sense in the society of man. This book is concerned with correcting the two fundamental causes of our rapidly deteriorating environment.

   THE FIRST CAUSE IS THE COMPLETELY INEXPLICABLE FAILURE OF MANKIND TO DESIGN HIS LANDSCAPE--HIS TRUE LIVING PLACE.

   THE SECOND CAUSE IS THE BASTARDISATION OF AGRICULTURE. (see Chapter 14).

   Mankind ages ago used his skills to design a shelter from the rain where he could sleep safely at night, but he lived in the natural landscape. Eventually he designed a house, his castles and cathedrals, even a place for the repose of his corpse, but he did not design the landscape which he came to completely dominate. He became an architect but still he ignored the architecture of the natural landscapes. But if he had used his developing skills and had learned to understand the landscape design of Nature and also had come to terms with the soil which fed him, he could have avoided his crimes against Nature which have caused his problems of today.

   He could have designed a landscape that was; healthy, pleasant, efficient and clean by using his skills and arts as they developed and combining them harmoniously in his living environment. If he had, he could not have fallen prey to the utter foolishness of divorcing his advancing knowledge into separated compartments. The fragments of science, which are his principal downfall, would surely in such an environment, have been combined in wisdom and common sense. if he had remained at peace with Nature he may have been able to live more peacefully with his fellow man and have avoided his problems of pollution and of perpetual fear.

   The principal difficulty in eliminating pollution may be the mental attitudes of people. The older members of the population have been brainwashed and conditioned all their lives to believe in doctrines which in today's crowded world are false and anti-landscape. There has been no preparation in their education or in their lives for understanding the problems of today which have seemingly rushed at them so quickly! It is difficult to accept that modern science is often different from wisdom and that technology sometimes loses itself in its own clever creations. They do not fully understand why their own kids are so different from themselves as youths. They have not yet appreciated that the revolt of kids against the establishment. represents the dawning of sanity and common sense in a society otherwise hell-bent on its own destruction.

   Those who were born after the Second World War entered the new world of man's unlimited. power of annihilation. And during the years since then, the great nations have been equipping themselves for just that purpose. And if not the military, there is pollution--the second road to annihilation! Youth had no part in causing it, yet they are suffering the most from its health-destroying and life-shortening effects.

   Thanks to the attitudes of the establishment over the past few years, youth has been robbed of any reason to be proud of its country. But still the real hope lies today in the questioning disbelief of young people and in their contempt for authority, whether traditional, financial, scientific or government, which does not make sense. They know the things that are wrong; they are searching for truth and real freedom, and many are devoting themselves to changing society for the better. It is a healthy sign that the wisdom and intuition of these people in Australia is leading them north in the search for a new frontier of life style. In the more heavily populated and over emphasised south eastern corner of Australia, where we have copied the exploitation of the environment from other countries, the situation looks hopeless. But Northern Queensland appears to offer a chance to move in bold new directions and to influence future cultural, industrial and population advances in the quality of life. Countless others would like to follow them out of the environs of the big city and live in the country where they could grow their own food free from artificial fertilisers and poison sprays and collect their drinking water from the rainfall.

   BUT IT IS TOO LATE! The poison wave is too all pervading for them to find either health or life satisfaction in any form of isolation.

   The young people of today are the most important to world survival in all human history and their destiny offers them only two courses of purposeful action: Firstly, that they select and, by using their voting rights, take over a place and build an environment of humanity and healthy balance as a demonstration of living; secondly, that they start the Human Environment Revolution now wherever they are; get with it and stay with it, no matter what!

   They have the numbers and the strengths to do it. They have what no other age group ever possessed; a capacity to organise their thoughts and their actions to proceed almost spontaneously both as individuals and as a multitude. And they have a mutual integrity which is not a particular characteristic of the Establishment.

   In the past, the great revolutions came from empty bellies. The Human Environment Revolution is different. The dissatisfaction of youth and its demanding search for a better way of life is the power. Of course the Establishment is the enemy, where the stupid and the complacent within government, and the evils and the avarice of finance, science and big business, can never be reconciled in a common sense solution to the problems of the sick landscape or the inhumanity of society.

   The chemical sciences which have been debauched by business to make billions from polluting the Planet will continue to out-shout the healthy but financially crippled biological and social sciences. Business will fight strenuously and as ruthlessly as ever against changes which threaten their influence and their profits, while at the same time, they will advertise with the power of their money, that they will save the world.

   Youth has a task on its hands but they do not have to fight everyone. The strangers, the confused and the lost in this world are not the young people, but their parents. Youth should not dismiss them but should guide and teach their elders. Their most valuable ally may be the 'healthy' farmers and their wholesome food. It could well be that city kids and these 'rebel' farmers will create the human environment revolution.

   There was variety and durability in the natural landscapes, but mankind has merely imposed his smothering clutter on Nature's living environment. He failed to design the special purpose landscapes for himself. The older professions and each of the new professions which had to do with land use, merely added their random pieces. Even the English countryside has no logical basis of design. Its pleasing appearance today arose from an era of tree planting which engendered a consciousness of landscape, at the end of the seventeenth century and continued through the eighteenth century. There were fears that the nation was in danger of running short of hardwood for the fleet and for building purposes generally. Evelyn's book on forestry, "Silva", was published in 1678 and exerted a strong influence on the landed gentry.

   I saw these landscapes during the spring and summer of 1958 and visited some of the majestic homes, manors and castles. These buildings with their mature trees and artificial lakes seemed to lord it over the lush green fields with their copses, hedgerows, and planted forests. Even the fences and gateways possessed their measure of conceit. The near perfection of each individual factor had combined in a mild and gentle climate to create a mosaic scene of great beauty.

   The fragile nature of the landscape was apparent in the drought of 1959 when it reminded an Australian of his droughty homeland.

   This book shows that the harmony of pure design in the landscapes of Nature has always been overlooked. It offers a simple extension of Nature's way for the design of the environment of man.