In the winter of 1961-1962, Daedalus, the journal of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, brought out an issue on youth (here to be referred to as the issue). It forms the basis for and provides the bulk of this book (here to be called the book). And although the privilege of writing the preface to the book has been given to me, it should be clear that the editor of Daedalus Professor Stephen Graubard and his co-workers planned and executed the issue in that special manner which has become a Daedalus tradition and works toward a high combination of scholarly endeavor and personal style. Having been selected at a preliminary conference the potential contributors to an issue of Daedalus are invited to foregather for a number of days in quiet surroundings in order to confront each other and their first drafts. The publications which emerge from such gathering of minds are modern symposia and should be read as symposia the strength and the limitations of which are integral to the composition of the group thus collaborating.