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It is not true, as Aldous Huxley said, that for Western man waiting is tortur-only waiting without a goal in sight. "It is not that we are an impatient people but that we are a highly moralistic people," says Harvard Sociologist Seymour Lipset. "In a conflict we tend to feel strongly that there is a wrong and a right, and something must be done. Essentially, this is Protestant thinking." Adds Italian Author Luigi Barzini: "What makes an American different from most other people is the certainty that all problems in life, like those in a good math textbook, can be solved. Another is the certainty that each man is responsible for his own success. Both these beliefs are often sadly contradicted by reality. The American's reaction is to double his efforts-work longer hours, invest more money, put more men on the job, and try to make up for lost time. His impatience is the proof of his optimism."
Insofar as the pressures and problems of the world create technological challenges, there need be no concern about America's sticking it out. Nor is there any reason to think that Americans cannot face the psychological challenge of danger, disappointment and hostility. Says the State Department's Walt Rostow: "We can out-patience anybody if we want to." But in order to do so, the U.S. must see a goal to its patience, not simply a goal in a specific situation like Viet Nam but an overall purpose. In short, it will need answers not only to the pragmatic "how" questions, but to the philosophical "why" questions. These will demand the patience of Job. But Job's patience-boils and all-was not resignation but striving persistence. Despite his wife's admonition to "curse God, and die," despite the elaborate rationalizations of his philosopher friends, Job persisted, and persisted in demanding an answer from God himself-putting his suffering on the line for it. And he got the answer.