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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/3111.txt b/3111.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..1cf6c31 --- /dev/null +++ b/3111.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1004 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Certain Diversities of American Life +by Charles Dudley Warner + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Certain Diversities of American Life + +Author: Charles Dudley Warner + +Release Date: December 5, 2004 [EBook #3111] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CERTAIN DIVERSITIES OF *** + + + + +Produced by David Widger + + + + + +CERTAIN DIVERSITIES OF AMERICAN LIFE + +By Charles Dudley Warner + +This is a very interesting age. Within the memory of men not yet come to +middle life the time of the trotting horse has been reduced from two +minutes forty seconds to two minutes eight and a quarter seconds. During +the past fifteen years a universal and wholesome pastime of boys has been +developed into a great national industry, thoroughly organized and almost +altogether relegated to professional hands, no longer the exercise of the +million but a spectacle for the million, and a game which rivals the +Stock Exchange as a means of winning money on the difference of opinion +as to the skill of contending operators. + +The newspapers of the country--pretty accurate and sad indicators of the +popular taste--devote more daily columns in a week's time to chronicling +the news about base-ball than to any other topic that interests the +American mind, and the most skillful player, the pitcher, often college +bred, whose entire prowess is devoted to not doing what he seems to be +doing, and who has become the hero of the American girl as the Olympian +wrestler was of the Greek maiden and as the matador is of the Spanish +senorita, receives a larger salary for a few hours' exertion each week +than any college president is paid for a year's intellectual toil. Such +has been the progress in the interest in education during this period +that the larger bulk of the news, and that most looked for, printed about +the colleges and universities, is that relating to the training, the +prospects and achievements of the boat crews and the teams of base-ball +and foot-ball, and the victory of any crew or team is a better means of +attracting students to its college, a better advertisement, than success +in any scholastic contest. A few years ago a tournament was organized in +the North between several colleges for competition in oratory and +scholarship; it had a couple of contests and then died of inanition and +want of public interest. + +During the period I am speaking of there has been an enormous advance in +technical education, resulting in the establishment of splendid special +schools, essential to the development of our national resources; a growth +of the popular idea that education should be practical,--that is, such an +education as can be immediately applied to earning a living and acquiring +wealth speedily,--and an increasing extension of the elective system in +colleges,--based almost solely on the notion, having in view, of course, +the practical education, that the inclinations of a young man of eighteen +are a better guide as to what is best for his mental development and +equipment for life than all the experience of his predecessors. + +In this period, which you will note is more distinguished by the desire +for the accumulation of money than far the general production of wealth, +the standard of a fortune has shifted from a fair competence to that of +millions of money, so that he is no longer rich who has a hundred +thousand dollars, but he only who possesses property valued at many +millions, and the men most widely known the country through, most talked +about, whose doings and sayings are most chronicled in the journals, +whose example is most attractive and stimulating to the minds of youth, +are not the scholars, the scientists, the men of, letters, not even the +orators and statesmen, but those who, by any means, have amassed enormous +fortunes. We judge the future of a generation by its ideals. + +Regarding education from the point of view of its equipment of a man to +make money, and enjoy the luxury which money can command, it must be more +and more practical, that is, it must be adapted not even to the higher +aim of increasing the general wealth of the world, by increasing +production and diminishing waste both of labor and capital, but to the +lower aim of getting personal possession of it; so that a striking social +feature of the period is that one-half--that is hardly an overestimate +--one-half of the activity in America of which we speak with so much +enthusiasm, is not directed to the production of wealth, to increasing +its volume, but to getting the money of other people away from them. In +barbarous ages this object was accomplished by violence; it is now +attained by skill and adroitness. We still punish those who gain property +by violence; those who get it by smartness and cleverness, we try to +imitate, and sometimes we reward them with public office. + +It appears, therefore, that speed,-the ability to move rapidly from place +to place,--a disproportionate reward of physical over intellectual +science, an intense desire to be rich, which is strong enough to compel +even education to grind in the mill of the Philistines, and an inordinate +elevation in public consideration of rich men simply because they are +rich, are characteristics of this little point of time on which we stand. +They are not the only characteristics; in a reasonably optimistic view, +the age is distinguished for unexampled achievements, and for +opportunities for the well-being of humanity never before in all history +attainable. But these characteristics are so prominent as to beget the +fear that we are losing the sense of the relative value of things in this +life. + +Few persons come to middle life without some conception of these relative +values. It is in the heat and struggle that we fail to appreciate what in +the attainment will be most satisfactory to us. After it is over we are +apt to see that our possessions do not bring the happiness we expected; +or that we have neglected to cultivate the powers and tastes that can +make life enjoyable. We come to know, to use a truism, that a person's +highest satisfaction depends not upon his exterior acquisitions, but upon +what he himself is. There is no escape from this conclusion. The physical +satisfactions are limited and fallacious, the intellectual and moral +satisfactions are unlimited. In the last analysis, a man has to live with +himself, to be his own companion, and in the last resort the question is, +what can he get out of himself. In the end, his life is worth just what +he has become. And I need not say that the mistake commonly made is as to +relative values,--that the things of sense are as important as the things +of the mind. You make that mistake when you devote your best energies to +your possession of material substance, and neglect the enlargement, the +training, the enrichment of the mind. You make the same mistake in a less +degree, when you bend to the popular ignorance and conceit so far as to +direct your college education to sordid ends. The certain end of yielding +to this so-called practical spirit was expressed by a member of a +Northern State legislature who said, "We don't want colleges, we want +workshops." It was expressed in another way by a representative of the +lower house in Washington who said, "The average ignorance of the country +has a right to be represented here." It is not for me to say whether it +is represented there. Naturally, I say, we ought by the time of middle +life to come to a conception of what sort of things are of most value. By +analogy, in the continual growth of the Republic, we ought to have a +perception of what we have accomplished and acquired, and some clear view +of our tendencies. We take justifiable pride in the glittering figures of +our extension of territory, our numerical growth, in the increase of +wealth, and in our rise to the potential position of almost the first +nation in the world. A more pertinent inquiry is, what sort of people +have we become? What are we intellectually and morally? For after all the +man is the thing, the production of the right sort of men and women is +all that gives a nation value. When I read of the establishment of a +great industrial centre in which twenty thousand people are employed in +the increase of the amount of steel in the world, before I decide whether +it would be a good thing for the Republic to create another industrial +city of the same sort, I want to know what sort of people the twenty +thousand are, how they live, what their morals are, what intellectual +life they have, what their enjoyment of life is, what they talk about and +think about, and what chance they have of getting into any higher life. +It does not seem to me a sufficient gain in this situation that we are +immensely increasing the amount of steel in the world, or that twenty +more people are enabled on account of this to indulge in an unexampled, +unintellectual luxury. We want more steel, no doubt, but haven't we wit +enough to get that and at the same time to increase among the producers +of it the number of men and women whose horizons are extended, who are +companionable, intelligent beings, adding something to the intellectual +and moral force upon which the real progress of the Republic depends? + +There is no place where I would choose to speak more plainly of our +national situation today than in the South, and at the University of the +South; in the South, because it is more plainly in a transition state, +and at the University of the South, because it is here and in similar +institutions that the question of the higher or lower plane of life in +the South is to be determined. + +To a philosophical observer of the Republic, at the end of the hundred +years, I should say that the important facts are not its industrial +energy, its wealth, or its population, but the stability of the federal +power, and the integrity of the individual States. That is to say, that +stress and trial have welded us into an indestructible nation; and not of +less consequence is the fact that the life of the Union is in the life of +the States. The next most encouraging augury for a great future is the +marvelous diversity among the members of this republican body. If nothing +would be more speedily fatal to our plan of government than increasing +centralization, nothing would be more hopeless in our development than +increasing monotony, the certain end of which is mediocrity. + +Speaking as one whose highest pride it is to be a citizen of a great and +invincible Republic to those whose minds kindle with a like patriotism, I +can say that I am glad there are East and North and South, and West, +Middle, Northwest, and Southwest, with as many diversities of climate, +temperament, habits, idiosyncrasies, genius, as these names imply. Thank +Heaven we are not all alike; and so long as we have a common purpose in +the Union, and mutual toleration, respect, and sympathy, the greater will +be our achievement and the nobler our total development, if every section +is true to the evolution of its local traits. The superficial foreign +observer finds sameness in our different States, tiresome family likeness +in our cities, hideous monotony in our villages, and a certain common +atmosphere of life, which increasing facility of communication tends to +increase. This is a view from a railway train. But as soon as you observe +closely, you find in each city a peculiar physiognomy, and a peculiar +spirit remarkable considering the freedom of movement and intercourse, +and you find the organized action of each State sui generis to a degree +surprising considering the general similarity of our laws and +institutions. In each section differences of speech, of habits of +thought, of temperament prevail. Massachusetts is unlike Louisiana, +Florida unlike Tennessee, Georgia is unlike California, Pennsylvania is +unlike Minnesota, and so on, and the unlikeness is not alone or chiefly +in physical features. By the different style of living I can tell when I +cross the line between Connecticut and New York as certainly as when I +cross the line between Vermont and Canada. The Virginian expanded in +Kentucky is not the same man he was at home, and the New England Yankee +let loose in the West takes on proportions that would astonish his +grandfather. Everywhere there is a variety in local sentiment, action, +and development. Sit down in the seats of the State governments and study +the methods of treatment of essentially the common institutions of +government, of charity and discipline, and you will be impressed with the +variety of local spirit and performance in the Union. And this, diversity +is so important, this contribution of diverse elements is so necessary to +the complex strength and prosperity of the whole, that one must view with +alarm all federal interference and tendency to greater centralization. + +And not less to be dreaded than monotony from the governmental point of +view, is the obliteration of variety in social life and in literary +development. It is not enough for a nation to be great and strong, it +must be interesting, and interesting it cannot be without cultivation of +local variety. Better obtrusive peculiarities than universal sameness. It +is out of variety as well as complexity in American life, and not in +homogeneity and imitation, that we are to expect a civilization +noteworthy in the progress of the human race. + +Let us come a little closer to our subject in details. For a hundred +years the South was developed on its own lines, with astonishingly little +exterior bias. This comparative isolation was due partly to the +institution of slavery, partly to devotion to the production of two or +three great staples. While its commercial connection with the North was +intimate and vital, its literary relation with the North was slight. With +few exceptions Northern authors were not read in the South, and the +literary movement of its neighbors, such as it was, from 1820 to 1860, +scarcely affected it. With the exception of Louisiana, which was +absolutely ignorant of American literature and drew its inspiration and +assumed its critical point of view almost wholly from the French, the +South was English, but mainly English of the time of Walter Scott and +George the Third. While Scott was read at the North for his knowledge of +human nature, as he always will be read, the chivalric age which moves in +his pages was taken more seriously at the South, as if it were of +continuing importance in life. In any of its rich private libraries you +find yourself in the age of Pope and Dryden, and the classics were +pursued in the spirit of Oxford and Cambridge in the time of Johnson. It +was little disturbed by the intellectual and ethical agitation of modern +England or of modern New England. During this period, while the South +excelled in the production of statesmen, orators, trained politicians, +great judges, and brilliant lawyers, it produced almost no literature, +that is, no indigenous literature, except a few poems and--a few humorous +character-sketches; its general writing was ornately classic, and its +fiction romantic on the lines of the foreign romances. + +From this isolation one thing was developed, and another thing might in +due time be expected. The thing developed was a social life, in the +favored class, which has an almost unique charm, a power of being +agreeable, a sympathetic cordiality, an impulsive warmth, a frankness in +the expression of emotion, and that delightful quality of manner which +puts the world at ease and makes life pleasant. The Southerners are no +more sincere than the Northerners, but they have less reserve, and in the +social traits that charm all who come in contact with them, they have an +element of immense value in the variety of American life. + +The thing that might have been expected in due time, and when the call +came--and it is curious to note that the call and cause of any +renaissance are always from the outside--was a literary expression fresh +and indigenous. This expectation, in a brief period since the war, has +been realized by a remarkable performance and is now stimulated by a +remarkable promise. The acclaim with which the Southern literature has +been received is partly due to its novelty, the new life it exhibited, +but more to the recognition in it of a fresh flavor, a literary quality +distinctly original and of permanent importance. This production, the +first fruits of which are so engaging in quality, cannot grow and broaden +into a stable, varied literature without scholarship and hard work, and +without a sympathetic local audience. But the momentary concern is that +it should develop on its own lines and in its own spirit, and not under +the influence of London or Boston or New York. I do not mean by this that +it should continue to attract attention by peculiarities of dialect-which +is only an incidental, temporary phenomenon, that speedily becomes +wearisome, whether "cracker" or negro or Yankee--but by being true to the +essential spirit and temperament of Southern life. + +During this period there was at the North, and especially in the East, +great intellectual activity and agitation, and agitation ethical and +moral as well as intellectual. There was awakening, investigation, +questioning, doubt. There was a great deal of froth thrown to the +surface. In the free action of individual thought and expression grew +eccentricities of belief and of practice, and a crop of so-called "isms," +more or less temporary, unprofitable, and pernicious. Public opinion +attained an astonishing degree of freedom,--I never heard of any +community that was altogether free of its tyranny. At least extraordinary +latitude was permitted in the development of extreme ideas, new, +fantastic, radical, or conservative. For instance, slavery was attacked +and slavery was defended on the same platform, with almost equal freedom. +Indeed, for many years, if there was any exception to the general +toleration it was in the social ostracism of those who held and expressed +extreme opinions in regard to immediate emancipation, and were +stigmatized as abolitionists. There was a general ferment of new ideas, +not always fruitful in the direction taken, but hopeful in view of the +fact that growth and movement are better than stagnation and decay. You +can do something with a ship that has headway; it will drift upon the +rocks if it has not. With much foam and froth, sure to attend agitation, +there was immense vital energy, intense life. + +Out of this stir and agitation came the aggressive, conquering spirit +that carried civilization straight across the continent, that built up +cities and States, that developed wealth, and by invention, ingenuity, +and energy performed miracles in the way of the subjugation of nature and +the assimilation of societies. Out of this free agitation sprang a +literary product, great in quantity and to some degree distinguished in +quality, groups of historians, poets, novelists, essayists, biographers, +scientific writers. A conspicuous agency of the period was the lecture +platform, which did something in the spread and popularization of +information, but much more in the stimulation of independent thought and +the awakening of the mind to use its own powers. + +Along with this and out of this went on the movement of popular education +and of the high and specialized education. More remarkable than the +achievements of the common schools has been the development of the +colleges, both in the departments of the humanities and of science. If I +were writing of education generally, I might have something to say of the +measurable disappointment of the results of the common schools as at +present conducted, both as to the diffusion of information and as to the +discipline of the mind and the inculcation of ethical principles; which +simply means that they need improvement. But the higher education has +been transformed, and mainly by the application of scientific methods, +and of the philosophic spirit, to the study of history, economics, and +the classics. When we are called to defend the pursuit of metaphysics or +the study of the classics, either as indispensable to the discipline or +to the enlargement of the mind, we are not called on to defend the +methods of a generation ago. The study of Greek is no longer an exercise +in the study of linguistics or the inspection of specimens of an obsolete +literature, but the acquaintance with historic thought, habits, and +polity, with a portion of the continuous history of the human mind, which +has a vital relation to our own life. + +However much or little there may be of permanent value in the vast +production of northern literature, judged by continental or even English +standards, the time has came when American scholarship in science, in +language, in occidental or oriental letters, in philosophic and +historical methods, can court comparison with any other. In some branches +of research the peers of our scholars must be sought not in England but +in Germany. So that in one of the best fruits of a period of intellectual +agitation, scholarship, the restless movement has thoroughly vindicated +itself. + +I have called your attention to this movement in order to say that it was +neither accidental nor isolated. It was in the historic line, it was fed +and stimulated by all that had gone before, and by all contemporary +activity everywhere. New England, for instance, was alert and progressive +because it kept its doors and windows open. It was hospitable in its +intellectual freedom, both of trial and debate, to new ideas. It was in +touch with the universal movement of humanity and of human thought and +speculation. You lose some quiet by this attitude, some repose that is +pleasant and even desirable perhaps, you entertain many errors, you may +try many useless experiments, but you gain life and are in the way of +better things. New England, whatever else we may say about it, was in the +world. There was no stir of thought, of investigation, of research, of +the recasting of old ideas into new forms of life, in Germany, in France, +in Italy, in England, anywhere, that did not touch it and to which it did +not respond with the sympathy that common humanity has in the universal +progress. It kept this touch not only in the evolution and expression of +thought and emotion which we call literature (whether original or +imitative), but in the application of philosophic methods to education, +in the attempted regeneration of society and the amelioration of its +conditions by schemes of reform and discipline, relating to the +institutions of benevolence and to the control of the vicious and +criminal. With all these efforts go along always much false +sentimentality and pseudo-philanthropy, but little by little gain is made +that could not be made in a state of isolation and stagnation. + +In fact there is one historic stream of human thought, aspiration, and +progress; it is practically continuous, and with all its diversity of +local color and movement it is a unit. If you are in it, you move; if you +are out of it, you are in an eddy. The eddy may have a provincial +current, but it is not in the great stream, and when it has gone round +and round for a century, it is still an eddy, and will not carry you +anywhere in particular. The value of the modern method of teaching and +study is that it teaches the solidarity of human history, the continuance +of human thought, in literature, government, philosophy, the unity of the +divine purpose, and that nothing that has anywhere befallen the human +race is alien to us. + +I am not undervaluing the part, the important part, played by +conservatism, the conservatism that holds on to what has been gained if +it is good, that insists on discipline and heed to the plain teaching of +experience, that refuses to go into hysterics of enthusiasm over every +flighty suggestion, or to follow every leader simply because he proposes +something new and strange--I do not mean the conservatism that refuses to +try anything simply because it is new, and prefers to energetic life the +stagnation that inevitably leads to decay. Isolation from the great +historic stream of thought and agitation is stagnation. While this is +true, and always has been true in history, it is also true, in regard to +the beneficent diversity of American life, which is composed of so many +elements and forces, as I have often thought and said, that what has been +called the Southern conservatism in respect to beliefs and certain social +problems, may have a very important part to play in the development of +the life of the Republic. + +I shall not be misunderstood here, where the claims of the higher life +are insisted on and the necessity of pure, accurate scholarship is +recognized, in saying that this expectation in regard to the South +depends upon the cultivation and diffusion of the highest scholarship in +all its historic consciousness and critical precision. This sort of +scholarship, of widely apprehending intellectual activity, keeping step +with modern ideas so far as they are historically grounded, is of the +first importance. Everywhere indeed, in our industrial age,--in a society +inclined to materialism, scholarship, pure and simple scholarship for its +own sake, no less in Ohio than in Tennessee, is the thing to be insisted +on. If I may refer to an institution, which used to be midway between the +North and the South, and which I may speak of without suspicion of bias, +an institution where the studies of metaphysics, the philosophy of +history, the classics and pure science are as much insisted on as the +study of applied sciences, the College of New Jersey at Princeton, the +question in regard to a candidate for a professorship or instructorship, +is not whether he was born North or South, whether he served in one army +or another or in neither, whether he is a Democrat or a Republican or a +Mugwump, what religious denomination he belongs to, but is he a scholar +and has he a high character? There is no provincialism in scholarship. + +We are not now considering the matter of the agreeableness of one society +or another, whether life is on the whole pleasanter in certain conditions +at the North or at the South, whether there is not a charm sometimes in +isolation and even in provincialism. It is a fair question to ask, what +effect upon individual lives and character is produced by an industrial +and commercial spirit, and by one less restless and more domestic. But +the South is now face to face with certain problems which relate her, +inevitably, to the moving forces of the world. One of these is the +development of her natural resources and the change and diversity of her +industries. On the industrial side there is pressing need of institutions +of technology, of schools of applied science, for the diffusion of +technical information and skill in regard to mining and manufacturing, +and also to agriculture, so that worn-out lands may be reclaimed and good +lands be kept up to the highest point of production. Neither mines, +forests, quarries, water-ways, nor textile fabrics can be handled to best +advantage without scientific knowledge and skilled labor. The South is +everywhere demanding these aids to her industrial development. But just +in the proportion that she gets them, and because she has them, will be +the need of higher education. The only safety against the influence of a +rolling mill is a college, the only safety against the practical and +materializing tendency of an industrial school is the increased study of +whatever contributes to the higher and non-sordid life of the mind. The +South would make a poor exchange for her former condition in any amount +of industrial success without a corresponding development of the highest +intellectual life. + +But, besides the industrial problem, there is the race problem. It is the +most serious in the conditions under which it is presented that ever in +all history confronted a free people. Whichever way you regard it, it is +the nearest insoluble. Under the Constitution it is wisely left to the +action of the individual States. The heavy responsibility is with them. +In the nature of things it is a matter of the deepest concern to the +whole Republic, for the prosperity of every part is vital to the +prosperity of the whole. In working it out you are entitled, from the +outside, to the most impartial attempt to understand its real nature, to +the utmost patience with the facts of human nature, to the most profound +and most helpful sympathy. It is monstrous to me that the situation +should be made on either side a political occasion for private ambition +or for party ends. + +I would speak of this subject with the utmost frankness if I knew what to +say. It is not much of a confession to say that I do not. The more I +study it the less I know, and those among you who give it the most +anxious thought are the most perplexed, the subject has so many +conflicting aspects. In the first place there is the evolution of an +undeveloped race. Every race has a right to fair play in the world and to +make the most of its capacities, and to the help of the more favored in +the attempt. If the suggestion recently made of a wholesale migration to +Mexico were carried out, the South would be relieved in many ways, though +the labor problem would be a serious one for a long time, but the +"elevation" would be lost sight of or relegated to a foreign missionary +enterprise; and as for results to the colored people themselves, there is +the example of Hayti. If another suggestion, that of abandoning certain +States to this race, were carried out, there is the example of Hayti +again, and, besides, an anomaly introduced into the Republic foreign to +its traditions, spirit, aspirations, and process of assimilation, alien +to the entire historic movement of the Aryan races, and infinitely more +dangerous to the idea of the Republic than if solid Ireland were dumped +down in the Mississippi valley as an independent State. + +On the other hand, there rests upon you the responsibility of maintaining +a civilization--the civilization of America, not of Hayti or of Guatemala +which we have so hardly won. It is neither to be expected nor desired +that you should be ruled by an undeveloped race, ignorant of law, +letters, history, politics, political economy. There is no right anywhere +in numbers or unintelligence to rule intelligence. It is a travesty of +civilization. No Northern State that I know of would submit to be ruled +by an undeveloped race. And human nature is exactly in the South what it +is in the North. That is one impregnable fact, to be taken as the basis +of all our calculations; the whites of the South will not, cannot, be +dominated, as matters now stand, by the colored race. + +But, then, there is the suffrage, the universal, unqualified suffrage. +And here is the dilemma. Suffrage once given, cannot be suppressed or +denied, perverted by chicane or bribery without incalculable damage to +the whole political body. Irregular methods once indulged in for one +purpose, and towards one class, so sap the moral sense that they come to +be used for all purposes. The danger is ultimately as great to those who +suppress or pervert as it is to the suppressed and corrupted. It is the +demoralization of all sound political action and life. I know whereof I +speak. In the North, bribery in elections and intimidation are fatal to +public morality. The legislature elected by bribery is a bribable body. + +I believe that the fathers were right in making government depend upon +the consent of the governed. I believe there has been as yet discovered +no other basis of government so safe, so stable as popular suffrage, but +the fathers never contemplated a suffrage without intelligence. It is a +contradiction of terms. A proletariat without any political rights in a +republic is no more dangerous than an unintelligent mob which can be used +in elections by demagogues. Universal suffrage is not a universal +panacea; it may be the best device attainable, but it is certain of abuse +without safeguards. One of the absolutely necessary safeguards is an +educational qualification. No one ought anywhere to exercise it who +cannot read and write, and if I had my way, no one should cast a ballot +who had not a fair conception of the effect of it, shown by a higher test +of intelligence than the mere fact of ability to scrawl his name and to +spell out a line or two in the Constitution. This much the State for its +own protection is bound to require, for suffrage is an expediency, not a +right belonging to universal humanity regardless of intelligence or of +character. + +The charge is, with regard to this universal suffrage, that you take the +fruits of increased representation produced by it, and then deny it to a +portion of the voters whose action was expected to produce a different +political result. I cannot but regard it as a blunder in statesmanship to +give suffrage without an educational qualification, and to deem it +possible to put ignorance over intelligence. You are not, responsible for +the situation, but you are none the less in an illogical position before +the law. Now, would you not gain more in a rectification of your position +than you would lose in other ways, by making suffrage depend upon an +educational qualification? I do not mean gain party-wise, but in +political morals and general prosperity. Time would certainly be gained +by this, and it is possible in this shifting world, in the growth of +industries and the flow of populations, that before the question of +supremacy was again upon you, foreign and industrial immigration would +restore the race balance. + +We come now to education. The colored race being here, I assume that its +education, with the probabilities this involves of its elevation, is a +duty as well as a necessity. I speak both of the inherent justice there +is in giving every human being the chance of bettering his condition and +increasing his happiness that lies in education--unless our whole theory +of modern life is wrong--and also of the political and social danger +there is in a degraded class numerically strong. Granted integral +membership in a body politic, education is a necessity. I am aware of the +danger of half education, of that smattering of knowledge which only +breeds conceit, adroitness, and a consciousness of physical power, +without due responsibility and moral restraint. Education makes a race +more powerful both for evil and for good. I see the danger that many +apprehend. And the outlook, with any amount of education, would be +hopeless, not only as regards the negro and those in neighborhood +relations with him, if education should not bring with it thrift, sense +of responsibility as a citizen, and virtue. What the negro race under the +most favorable conditions is capable of remains to be shown; history does +not help us much to determine thus far. It has always been a long pull +for any race to rise out of primitive conditions; but I am sure for its +own sake, and for the sake of the republic where it dwells, every +thoughtful person must desire the most speedy intellectual and moral +development possible of the African race. And I mean as a race. + +Some distinguished English writers have suggested, with approval, that +the solution of the race problem in this country is fusion, and I have +even heard discouraged Southerners accept it as a possibility. The result +of their observation of the amalgamation of races and colors in Egypt, in +Syria, and Mexico, must be very different from mine. When races of +different color mingle there is almost invariably loss of physical +stamina, and the lower moral qualities of each are developed in the +combination. No race that regards its own future would desire it. The +absorption theory as applied to America is, it seems to me, chimerical. + +But to return to education. It should always be fitted to the stage of +development. It should always mean discipline, the training of the powers +and capacities. The early pioneers who planted civilization on the +Watauga, the Holston, the Kentucky, the Cumberland, had not much broad +learning--they would not have been worse if they had had more but they +had courage, they were trained in self-reliance, virile common sense, and +good judgment, they had inherited the instinct and capacity of +self-government, they were religious, with all their coarseness they had +the fundamental elements of nobility, the domestic virtues, and the +public spirit needed in the foundation of states. Their education in all +the manly arts and crafts of the backwoodsman fitted them very well for +the work they had to do. I should say that the education of the colored +race in America should be fundamental. I have not much confidence in an +ornamental top-dressing of philosophy, theology, and classic learning +upon the foundation of an unformed and unstable mental and moral +condition. Somehow, character must be built up, and character depends +upon industry, upon thrift, upon morals, upon correct ethical +perceptions. To have control of one's powers, to have skill in labor, so +that work in any occupation shall be intelligent, to have self-respect, +which commonly comes from trained capacity, to know how to live, to have +a clean, orderly house, to be grounded in honesty and the domestic +virtues,--these are the essentials of progress. I suppose that the +education to produce these must be an elemental and practical one, one +that fits for the duties of life and not for some imaginary sphere above +them. + +To put it in a word, and not denying that there must be schools for +teaching the teachers, with the understanding that the teachers should be +able to teach what the mass most needs to know--what the race needs for +its own good today, are industrial and manual training schools, with the +varied and practical discipline and arts of life which they impart. + +What then? What of the 'modus vivendi' of the two races occupying the +same soil? As I said before, I do not know. Providence works slowly. Time +and patience only solve such enigmas. The impossible is not expected of +man, only that he shall do today the duty nearest to him. It is easy, you +say, for an outsider to preach waiting, patience, forbearance, sympathy, +helpfulness. Well, these are the important lessons we get out of history. +We struggle, and fume, and fret, and accomplish little in our brief hour, +but somehow the world gets on. Fortunately for us, we cannot do today the +work of tomorrow. All the gospel in the world can be boiled down into a +single precept. Do right now. I have observed that the boy who starts in +the morning with a determination to behave himself till bedtime, usually +gets through the day without a thrashing. + +But of one thing I am sure. In the rush of industries, in the race +problem, it is more and more incumbent upon such institutions as the +University of the South to maintain the highest standard of pure +scholarship, to increase the number of men and women devoted to the +intellectual life. Long ago, in the middle of the seventeenth century, +John Ward of Stratford-on-Avon, clergyman and physician, wrote in his +diary: "The wealth of a nation depends upon its populousness, and its +populousness depends upon the liberty of conscience that is granted to +it, for this calls in strangers and promotes trading." Great is the +attraction of a benign climate and of a fruitful soil, but a greater +attraction is an intelligent people, that values the best things in life, +a society hospitable, companionable, instinct with intellectual life, +awake to the great ideas that make life interesting. + +As I travel through the South and become acquainted with its magnificent +resources and opportunities, and know better and love more the admirable +qualities of its people, I cannot but muse in a fond prophecy upon the +brilliant part it is to play in the diversified life and the great future +of the American Republic. But, North and South, we have a hard fight with +materializing tendencies. God bless the University of the South! + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Certain Diversities of American Life +by Charles Dudley Warner + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CERTAIN DIVERSITIES OF *** + +***** This file should be named 3111.txt or 3111.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/1/1/3111/ + +Produced by David Widger + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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Within the memory of men not yet come to +middle life the time of the trotting horse has been reduced from two +minutes forty seconds to two minutes eight and a quarter seconds. During +the past fifteen years a universal and wholesome pastime of boys has been +developed into a great national industry, thoroughly organized and almost +altogether relegated to professional hands, no longer the exercise of the +million but a spectacle for the million, and a game which rivals the +Stock Exchange as a means of winning money on the difference of opinion +as to the skill of contending operators. + +The newspapers of the country--pretty accurate and sad indicators of the +popular taste--devote more daily columns in a week's time to chronicling +the news about base-ball than to any other topic that interests the +American mind, and the most skillful player, the pitcher, often college +bred, whose entire prowess is devoted to not doing what he seems to be +doing, and who has become the hero of the American girl as the Olympian +wrestler was of the Greek maiden and as the matador is of the Spanish +senorita, receives a larger salary for a few hours' exertion each week +than any college president is paid for a year's intellectual toil. Such +has been the progress in the interest in education during this period +that the larger bulk of the news, and that most looked for, printed about +the colleges and universities, is that relating to the training, the +prospects and achievements of the boat crews and the teams of base-ball +and foot-ball, and the victory of any crew or team is a better means of +attracting students to its college, a better advertisement, than success +in any scholastic contest. A few years ago a tournament was organized in +the North between several colleges for competition in oratory and +scholarship; it had a couple of contests and then died of inanition and +want of public interest. + +During the period I am speaking of there has been an enormous advance in +technical education, resulting in the establishment of splendid special +schools, essential to the development of our national resources; a growth +of the popular idea that education should be practical,--that is, such an +education as can be immediately applied to earning a living and acquiring +wealth speedily,--and an increasing extension of the elective system in +colleges,--based almost solely on the notion, having in view, of course, +the practical education, that the inclinations of a young man of eighteen +are a better guide as to what is best for his mental development and +equipment for life than all the experience of his predecessors. + +In this period, which you will note is more distinguished by the desire +for the accumulation of money than far the general production of wealth, +the standard of a fortune has shifted from a fair competence to that of +millions of money, so that he is no longer rich who has a hundred +thousand dollars, but he only who possesses property valued at many +millions, and the men most widely known the country through, most talked +about, whose doings and sayings are most chronicled in the journals, +whose example is most attractive and stimulating to the minds of youth, +are not the scholars, the scientists, the men of, letters, not even the +orators and statesmen, but those who, by any means, have amassed enormous +fortunes. We judge the future of a generation by its ideals. + +Regarding education from the point of view of its equipment of a man to +make money, and enjoy the luxury which money can command, it must be more +and more practical, that is, it must be adapted not even to the higher +aim of increasing the general wealth of the world, by increasing +production and diminishing waste both of labor and capital, but to the +lower aim of getting personal possession of it; so that a striking social +feature of the period is that one-half--that is hardly an overestimate-- +one-half of the activity in America of which we speak with so much +enthusiasm, is not directed to the production of wealth, to increasing +its volume, but to getting the money of other people away from them. In +barbarous ages this object was accomplished by violence; it is now +attained by skill and adroitness. We still punish those who gain +property by violence; those who get it by smartness and cleverness, we +try to imitate, and sometimes we reward them with public office. + +It appears, therefore, that speed,-the ability to move rapidly from place +to place,--a disproportionate reward of physical over intellectual +science, an intense desire to be rich, which is strong enough to compel +even education to grind in the mill of the Philistines, and an inordinate +elevation in public consideration of rich men simply because they are +rich, are characteristics of this little point of time on which we stand. +They are not the only characteristics; in a reasonably optimistic view, +the age is distinguished for unexampled achievements, and for +opportunities for the well-being of humanity never before in all history +attainable. But these characteristics are so prominent as to beget the +fear that we are losing the sense of the relative value of things in this +life. + +Few persons come to middle life without some conception of these relative +values. It is in the heat and struggle that we fail to appreciate what +in the attainment will be most satisfactory to us. After it is over we +are apt to see that our possessions do not bring the happiness we +expected; or that we have neglected to cultivate the powers and tastes +that can make life enjoyable. We come to know, to use a truism, that a +person's highest satisfaction depends not upon his exterior acquisitions, +but upon what he himself is. There is no escape from this conclusion. +The physical satisfactions are limited and fallacious, the intellectual +and moral satisfactions are unlimited. In the last analysis, a man has +to live with himself, to be his own companion, and in the last resort the +question is, what can he get out of himself. In the end, his life is +worth just what he has become. And I need not say that the mistake +commonly made is as to relative values,--that the things of sense are as +important as the things of the mind. You make that mistake when you +devote your best energies to your possession of material substance, and +neglect the enlargement, the training, the enrichment of the mind. You +make the same mistake in a less degree, when you bend to the popular +ignorance and conceit so far as to direct your college education to +sordid ends. The certain end of yielding to this so-called practical +spirit was expressed by a member of a Northern State legislature who +said, "We don't want colleges, we want workshops." It was expressed in +another way by a representative of the lower house in Washington who +said, "The average ignorance of the country has a right to be represented +here." It is not for me to say whether it is represented there. +Naturally, I say, we ought by the time of middle life to come to a +conception of what sort of things are of most value. By analogy, in the +continual growth of the Republic, we ought to have a perception of what +we have accomplished and acquired, and some clear view of our tendencies. +We take justifiable pride in the glittering figures of our extension of +territory, our numerical growth, in the increase of wealth, and in our +rise to the potential position of almost the first nation in the world. +A more pertinent inquiry is, what sort of people have we become? What +are we intellectually and morally? For after all the man is the thing, +the production of the right sort of men and women is all that gives a +nation value. When I read of the establishment of a great industrial +centre in which twenty thousand people are employed in the increase of +the amount of steel in the world, before I decide whether it would be a +good thing for the Republic to create another industrial city of the same +sort, I want to know what sort of people the twenty thousand are, how +they live, what their morals are, what intellectual life they have, what +their enjoyment of life is, what they talk about and think about, and +what chance they have of getting into any higher life. It does not seem +to me a sufficient gain in this situation that we are immensely +increasing the amount of steel in the world, or that twenty more people +are enabled on account of this to indulge in an unexampled, +unintellectual luxury. We want more steel, no doubt, but haven't we wit +enough to get that and at the same time to increase among the producers +of it the number of men and women whose horizons are extended, who are +companionable, intelligent beings, adding something to the intellectual +and moral force upon which the real progress of the Republic depends? + +There is no place where I would choose to speak more plainly of our +national situation today than in the South, and at the University of the +South; in the South, because it is more plainly in a transition state, +and at the University of the South, because it is here and in similar +institutions that the question of the higher or lower plane of life in +the South is to be determined. + +To a philosophical observer of the Republic, at the end of the hundred +years, I should say that the important facts are not its industrial +energy, its wealth, or its population, but the stability of the federal +power, and the integrity of the individual States. That is to say, that +stress and trial have welded us into an indestructible nation; and not of +less consequence is the fact that the life of the Union is in the life of +the States. The next most encouraging augury for a great future is the +marvelous diversity among the members of this republican body. If +nothing would be more speedily fatal to our plan of government than +increasing centralization, nothing would be more hopeless in our +development than increasing monotony, the certain end of which is +mediocrity. + +Speaking as one whose highest pride it is to be a citizen of a great and +invincible Republic to those whose minds kindle with a like patriotism, I +can say that I am glad there are East and North and South, and West, +Middle, Northwest, and Southwest, with as many diversities of climate, +temperament, habits, idiosyncrasies, genius, as these names imply. Thank +Heaven we are not all alike; and so long as we have a common purpose in +the Union, and mutual toleration, respect, and sympathy, the greater will +be our achievement and the nobler our total development, if every section +is true to the evolution of its local traits. The superficial foreign +observer finds sameness in our different States, tiresome family likeness +in our cities, hideous monotony in our villages, and a certain common +atmosphere of life, which increasing facility of communication tends to +increase. This is a view from a railway train. But as soon as you +observe closely, you find in each city a peculiar physiognomy, and a +peculiar spirit remarkable considering the freedom of movement and +intercourse, and you find the organized action of each State sui generis +to a degree surprising considering the general similarity of our laws and +institutions. In each section differences of speech, of habits of +thought, of temperament prevail. Massachusetts is unlike Louisiana, +Florida unlike Tennessee, Georgia is unlike California, Pennsylvania is +unlike Minnesota, and so on, and the unlikeness is not alone or chiefly +in physical features. By the different style of living I can tell when I +cross the line between Connecticut and New York as certainly as when I +cross the line between Vermont and Canada. The Virginian expanded in +Kentucky is not the same man he was at home, and the New England Yankee +let loose in the West takes on proportions that would astonish his +grandfather. Everywhere there is a variety in local sentiment, action, +and development. Sit down in the seats of the State governments and +study the methods of treatment of essentially the common institutions of +government, of charity and discipline, and you will be impressed with the +variety of local spirit and performance in the Union. And this, +diversity is so important, this contribution of diverse elements is so +necessary to the complex strength and prosperity of the whole, that one +must view with alarm all federal interference and tendency to greater +centralization. + +And not less to be dreaded than monotony from the governmental point of +view, is the obliteration of variety in social life and in literary +development. It is not enough for a nation to be great and strong, it +must be interesting, and interesting it cannot be without cultivation of +local variety. Better obtrusive peculiarities than universal sameness. +It is out of variety as well as complexity in American life, and not in +homogeneity and imitation, that we are to expect a civilization +noteworthy in the progress of the human race. + +Let us come a little closer to our subject in details. For a hundred +years the South was developed on its own lines, with astonishingly little +exterior bias. This comparative isolation was due partly to the +institution of slavery, partly to devotion to the production of two or +three great staples. While its commercial connection with the North was +intimate and vital, its literary relation with the North was slight. +With few exceptions Northern authors were not read in the South, and the +literary movement of its neighbors, such as it was, from 1820 to 1860, +scarcely affected it. With the exception of Louisiana, which was +absolutely ignorant of American literature and drew its inspiration and +assumed its critical point of view almost wholly from the French, the +South was English, but mainly English of the time of Walter Scott and +George the Third. While Scott was read at the North for his knowledge of +human nature, as he always will be read, the chivalric age which moves in +his pages was taken more seriously at the South, as if it were of +continuing importance in life. In any of its rich private libraries you +find yourself in the age of Pope and Dryden, and the classics were +pursued in the spirit of Oxford and Cambridge in the time of Johnson. It +was little disturbed by the intellectual and ethical agitation of modern +England or of modern New England. During this period, while the South +excelled in the production of statesmen, orators, trained politicians, +great judges, and brilliant lawyers, it produced almost no literature, +that is, no indigenous literature, except a few poems and--a few humorous +character-sketches; its general writing was ornately classic, and its +fiction romantic on the lines of the foreign romances. + +From this isolation one thing was developed, and another thing might in +due time be expected. The thing developed was a social life, in the +favored class, which has an almost unique charm, a power of being +agreeable, a sympathetic cordiality, an impulsive warmth, a frankness in +the expression of emotion, and that delightful quality of manner which +puts the world at ease and makes life pleasant. The Southerners are no +more sincere than the Northerners, but they have less reserve, and in the +social traits that charm all who come in contact with them, they have an +element of immense value in the variety of American life. + +The thing that might have been expected in due time, and when the call +came--and it is curious to note that the call and cause of any +renaissance are always from the outside--was a literary expression fresh +and indigenous. This expectation, in a brief period since the war, has +been realized by a remarkable performance and is now stimulated by a +remarkable promise. The acclaim with which the Southern literature has +been received is partly due to its novelty, the new life it exhibited, +but more to the recognition in it of a fresh flavor, a literary quality +distinctly original and of permanent importance. This production, the +first fruits of which are so engaging in quality, cannot grow and broaden +into a stable, varied literature without scholarship and hard work, and +without a sympathetic local audience. But the momentary concern is that +it should develop on its own lines and in its own spirit, and not under +the influence of London or Boston or New York. I do not mean by this +that it should continue to attract attention by peculiarities of dialect- +which is only an incidental, temporary phenomenon, that speedily becomes +wearisome, whether "cracker" or negro or Yankee--but by being true to the +essential spirit and temperament of Southern life. + +During this period there was at the North, and especially in the East, +great intellectual activity and agitation, and agitation ethical and +moral as well as intellectual. There was awakening, investigation, +questioning, doubt. There was a great deal of froth thrown to the +surface. In the free action of individual thought and expression grew +eccentricities of belief and of practice, and a crop of so-called "isms," +more or less temporary, unprofitable, and pernicious. Public opinion +attained an astonishing degree of freedom,--I never heard of any +community that was altogether free of its tyranny. At least +extraordinary latitude was permitted in the development of extreme ideas, +new, fantastic, radical, or conservative. For instance, slavery was +attacked and slavery was defended on the same platform, with almost equal +freedom. Indeed, for many years, if there was any exception to the +general toleration it was in the social ostracism of those who held and +expressed extreme opinions in regard to immediate emancipation, and were +stigmatized as abolitionists. There was a general ferment of new ideas, +not always fruitful in the direction taken, but hopeful in view of the +fact that growth and movement are better than stagnation and decay. You +can do something with a ship that has headway; it will drift upon the +rocks if it has not. With much foam and froth, sure to attend agitation, +there was immense vital energy, intense life. + +Out of this stir and agitation came the aggressive, conquering spirit +that carried civilization straight across the continent, that built up +cities and States, that developed wealth, and by invention, ingenuity, +and energy performed miracles in the way of the subjugation of nature and +the assimilation of societies. Out of this free agitation sprang a +literary product, great in quantity and to some degree distinguished in +quality, groups of historians, poets, novelists, essayists, biographers, +scientific writers. A conspicuous agency of the period was the lecture +platform, which did something in the spread and popularization of +information, but much more in the stimulation of independent thought and +the awakening of the mind to use its own powers. + +Along with this and out of this went on the movement of popular education +and of the high and specialized education. More remarkable than the +achievements of the common schools has been the development of the +colleges, both in the departments of the humanities and of science. If I +were writing of education generally, I might have something to say of the +measurable disappointment of the results of the common schools as at +present conducted, both as to the diffusion of information and as to the +discipline of the mind and the inculcation of ethical principles; which +simply means that they need improvement. But the higher education has +been transformed, and mainly by the application of scientific methods, +and of the philosophic spirit, to the study of history, economics, and +the classics. When we are called to defend the pursuit of metaphysics or +the study of the classics, either as indispensable to the discipline or +to the enlargement of the mind, we are not called on to defend the +methods of a generation ago. The study of Greek is no longer an exercise +in the study of linguistics or the inspection of specimens of an obsolete +literature, but the acquaintance with historic thought, habits, and +polity, with a portion of the continuous history of the human mind, which +has a vital relation to our own life. + +However much or little there may be of permanent value in the vast +production of northern literature, judged by continental or even English +standards, the time has came when American scholarship in science, in +language, in occidental or oriental letters, in philosophic and +historical methods, can court comparison with any other. In some +branches of research the peers of our scholars must be sought not in +England but in Germany. So that in one of the best fruits of a period of +intellectual agitation, scholarship, the restless movement has thoroughly +vindicated itself. + +I have called your attention to this movement in order to say that it was +neither accidental nor isolated. It was in the historic line, it was fed +and stimulated by all that had gone before, and by all contemporary +activity everywhere. New England, for instance, was alert and +progressive because it kept its doors and windows open. It was +hospitable in its intellectual freedom, both of trial and debate, to new +ideas. It was in touch with the universal movement of humanity and of +human thought and speculation. You lose some quiet by this attitude, +some repose that is pleasant and even desirable perhaps, you entertain +many errors, you may try many useless experiments, but you gain life and +are in the way of better things. New England, whatever else we may say +about it, was in the world. There was no stir of thought, of +investigation, of research, of the recasting of old ideas into new forms +of life, in Germany, in France, in Italy, in England, anywhere, that did +not touch it and to which it did not respond with the sympathy that +common humanity has in the universal progress. It kept this touch not +only in the evolution and expression of thought and emotion which we call +literature (whether original or imitative), but in the application of +philosophic methods to education, in the attempted regeneration of +society and the amelioration of its conditions by schemes of reform and +discipline, relating to the institutions of benevolence and to the +control of the vicious and criminal. With all these efforts go along +always much false sentimentality and pseudo-philanthropy, but little by +little gain is made that could not be made in a state of isolation and +stagnation. + +In fact there is one historic stream of human thought, aspiration, and +progress; it is practically continuous, and with all its diversity of +local color and movement it is a unit. If you are in it, you move; if +you are out of it, you are in an eddy. The eddy may have a provincial +current, but it is not in the great stream, and when it has gone round +and round for a century, it is still an eddy, and will not carry you +anywhere in particular. The value of the modern method of teaching and +study is that it teaches the solidarity of human history, the continuance +of human thought, in literature, government, philosophy, the unity of the +divine purpose, and that nothing that has anywhere befallen the human +race is alien to us. + +I am not undervaluing the part, the important part, played by +conservatism, the conservatism that holds on to what has been gained if +it is good, that insists on discipline and heed to the plain teaching of +experience, that refuses to go into hysterics of enthusiasm over every +flighty suggestion, or to follow every leader simply because he proposes +something new and strange--I do not mean the conservatism that refuses to +try anything simply because it is new, and prefers to energetic life the +stagnation that inevitably leads to decay. Isolation from the great +historic stream of thought and agitation is stagnation. While this is +true, and always has been true in history, it is also true, in regard to +the beneficent diversity of American life, which is composed of so many +elements and forces, as I have often thought and said, that what has been +called the Southern conservatism in respect to beliefs and certain social +problems, may have a very important part to play in the development of +the life of the Republic. + +I shall not be misunderstood here, where the claims of the higher life +are insisted on and the necessity of pure, accurate scholarship is +recognized, in saying that this expectation in regard to the South +depends upon the cultivation and diffusion of the highest scholarship in +all its historic consciousness and critical precision. This sort of +scholarship, of widely apprehending intellectual activity, keeping step +with modern ideas so far as they are historically grounded, is of the +first importance. Everywhere indeed, in our industrial age,--in a +society inclined to materialism, scholarship, pure and simple scholarship +for its own sake, no less in Ohio than in Tennessee, is the thing to be +insisted on. If I may refer to an institution, which used to be midway +between the North and the South, and which I may speak of without +suspicion of bias, an institution where the studies of metaphysics, the +philosophy of history, the classics and pure science are as much insisted +on as the study of applied sciences, the College of New Jersey at +Princeton, the question in regard to a candidate for a professorship or +instructorship, is not whether he was born North or South, whether he +served in one army or another or in neither, whether he is a Democrat or +a Republican or a Mugwump, what religious denomination he belongs to, but +is he a scholar and has he a high character? There is no provincialism +in scholarship. + +We are not now considering the matter of the agreeableness of one society +or another, whether life is on the whole pleasanter in certain conditions +at the North or at the South, whether there is not a charm sometimes in +isolation and even in provincialism. It is a fair question to ask, what +effect upon individual lives and character is produced by an industrial +and commercial spirit, and by one less restless and more domestic. But +the South is now face to face with certain problems which relate her, +inevitably, to the moving forces of the world. One of these is the +development of her natural resources and the change and diversity of her +industries. On the industrial side there is pressing need of +institutions of technology, of schools of applied science, for the +diffusion of technical information and skill in regard to mining and +manufacturing, and also to agriculture, so that worn-out lands may be +reclaimed and good lands be kept up to the highest point of production. +Neither mines, forests, quarries, water-ways, nor textile fabrics can be +handled to best advantage without scientific knowledge and skilled labor. +The South is everywhere demanding these aids to her industrial +development. But just in the proportion that she gets them, and because +she has them, will be the need of higher education. The only safety +against the influence of a rolling mill is a college, the only safety +against the practical and materializing tendency of an industrial school +is the increased study of whatever contributes to the higher and non- +sordid life of the mind. The South would make a poor exchange for her +former condition in any amount of industrial success without a +corresponding development of the highest intellectual life. + +But, besides the industrial problem, there is the race problem. It is +the most serious in the conditions under which it is presented that ever +in all history confronted a free people. Whichever way you regard it, it +is the nearest insoluble. Under the Constitution it is wisely left to +the action of the individual States. The heavy responsibility is with +them. In the nature of things it is a matter of the deepest concern to +the whole Republic, for the prosperity of every part is vital to the +prosperity of the whole. In working it out you are entitled, from the +outside, to the most impartial attempt to understand its real nature, to +the utmost patience with the facts of human nature, to the most profound +and most helpful sympathy. It is monstrous to me that the situation +should be made on either side a political occasion for private ambition +or for party ends. + +I would speak of this subject with the utmost frankness if I knew what to +say. It is not much of a confession to say that I do not. The more I +study it the less I know, and those among you who give it the most +anxious thought are the most perplexed, the subject has so many +conflicting aspects. In the first place there is the evolution of an +undeveloped race. Every race has a right to fair play in the world and +to make the most of its capacities, and to the help of the more favored +in the attempt. If the suggestion recently made of a wholesale migration +to Mexico were carried out, the South would be relieved in many ways, +though the labor problem would be a serious one for a long time, but the +"elevation " would be lost sight of or relegated to a foreign missionary +enterprise; and as for results to the colored people themselves, there is +the example of Hayti. If another suggestion, that of abandoning certain +States to this race, were carried out, there is the example of Hayti +again, and, besides, an anomaly introduced into the Republic foreign to +its traditions, spirit, aspirations, and process of assimilation, alien +to the entire historic movement of the Aryan races, and infinitely more +dangerous to the idea of the Republic than if solid Ireland were dumped +down in the Mississippi valley as an independent State. + +On the other hand, there rests upon you the responsibility of maintaining +a civilization--the civilization of America, not of Hayti or of Guatemala +which we have so hardly won. It is neither to be expected nor desired +that you should be ruled by an undeveloped race, ignorant of law, +letters, history, politics, political economy. There is no right +anywhere in numbers or unintelligence to rule intelligence. It is a +travesty of civilization. No Northern State that I know of would submit +to be ruled by an undeveloped race. And human nature is exactly in the +South what it is in the North. That is one impregnable fact, to be taken +as the basis of all our calculations; the whites of the South will not, +cannot, be dominated, as matters now stand, by the colored race. + +But, then, there is the suffrage, the universal, unqualified suffrage. +And here is the dilemma. Suffrage once given, cannot be suppressed or +denied, perverted by chicane or bribery without incalculable damage to +the whole political body. Irregular methods once indulged in for one +purpose, and towards one class, so sap the moral sense that they come to +be used for all purposes. The danger is ultimately as great to those who +suppress or pervert as it is to the suppressed and corrupted. It is the +demoralization of all sound political action and life. I know whereof I +speak. In the North, bribery in elections and intimidation are fatal to +public morality. The legislature elected by bribery is a bribable body. + +I believe that the fathers were right in making government depend upon +the consent of the governed. I believe there has been as yet discovered +no other basis of government so safe, so stable as popular suffrage, but +the fathers never contemplated a suffrage without intelligence. It is a +contradiction of terms. A proletariat without any political rights in a +republic is no more dangerous than an unintelligent mob which can be used +in elections by demagogues. Universal suffrage is not a universal +panacea; it may be the best device attainable, but it is certain of abuse +without safeguards. One of the absolutely necessary safeguards is an +educational qualification. No one ought anywhere to exercise it who +cannot read and write, and if I had my way, no one should cast a ballot +who had not a fair conception of the effect of it, shown by a higher test +of intelligence than the mere fact of ability to scrawl his name and to +spell out a line or two in the Constitution. This much the State for its +own protection is bound to require, for suffrage is an expediency, not a +right belonging to universal humanity regardless of intelligence or of +character. + +The charge is, with regard to this universal suffrage, that you take the +fruits of increased representation produced by it, and then deny it to a +portion of the voters whose action was expected to produce a different +political result. I cannot but regard it as a blunder in statesmanship +to give suffrage without an educational qualification, and to deem it +possible to put ignorance over intelligence. You are not, responsible +for the situation, but you are none the less in an illogical position +before the law. Now, would you not gain more in a rectification of your +position than you would lose in other ways, by making suffrage depend +upon an educational qualification? I do not mean gain party-wise, but in +political morals and general prosperity. Time would certainly be gained +by this, and it is possible in this shifting world, in the growth of +industries and the flow of populations, that before the question of +supremacy was again upon you, foreign and industrial immigration would +restore the race balance. + +We come now to education. The colored race being here, I assume that its +education, with the probabilities this involves of its elevation, is a +duty as well as a necessity. I speak both of the inherent justice there +is in giving every human being the chance of bettering his condition and +increasing his happiness that lies in education--unless our whole theory +of modern life is wrong--and also of the political and social danger +there is in a degraded class numerically strong. Granted integral +membership in a body politic, education is a necessity. I am aware of +the danger of half education, of that smattering of knowledge which only +breeds conceit, adroitness, and a consciousness of physical power, +without due responsibility and moral restraint. Education makes a race +more powerful both for evil and for good. I see the danger that many +apprehend. And the outlook, with any amount of education, would be +hopeless, not only as regards the negro and those in neighborhood +relations with him, if education should not bring with it thrift, sense +of responsibility as a citizen, and virtue. What the negro race under +the most favorable conditions is capable of remains to be shown; history +does not help us much to determine thus far. It has always been a long +pull for any race to rise out of primitive conditions; but I am sure for +its own sake, and for the sake of the republic where it dwells, every +thoughtful person must desire the most speedy intellectual and moral +development possible of the African race. And I mean as a race. + +Some distinguished English writers have suggested, with approval, that +the solution of the race problem in this country is fusion, and I have +even heard discouraged Southerners accept it as a possibility. The +result of their observation of the amalgamation of races and colors in +Egypt, in Syria, and Mexico, must be very different from mine. When +races of different color mingle there is almost invariably loss of +physical stamina, and the lower moral qualities of each are developed in +the combination. No race that regards its own future would desire it. +The absorption theory as applied to America is, it seems to me, +chimerical. + +But to return to education. It should always be fitted to the stage of +development. It should always mean discipline, the training of the +powers and capacities. The early pioneers who planted civilization on +the Watauga, the Holston, the Kentucky, the Cumberland, had not much +broad learning--they would not have been worse if they had had more but +they had courage, they were trained in self-reliance, virile common +sense, and good judgment, they had inherited the instinct and capacity of +self-government, they were religious, with all their coarseness they had +the fundamental elements of nobility, the domestic virtues, and the +public spirit needed in the foundation of states. Their education in all +the manly arts and crafts of the backwoodsman fitted them very well for +the work they had to do. I should say that the education of the colored +race in America should be fundamental. I have not much confidence in an +ornamental top-dressing of philosophy, theology, and classic learning +upon the foundation of an unformed and unstable mental and moral +condition. Somehow, character must be built up, and character depends +upon industry, upon thrift, upon morals, upon correct ethical +perceptions. To have control of one's powers, to have skill in labor, so +that work in any occupation shall be intelligent, to have self-respect, +which commonly comes from trained capacity, to know how to live, to have +a clean, orderly house, to be grounded in honesty and the domestic +virtues,--these are the essentials of progress. I suppose that the +education to produce these must be an elemental and practical one, one +that fits for the duties of life and not for some imaginary sphere above +them. + +To put it in a word, and not denying that there must be schools for +teaching the teachers, with the understanding that the teachers should be +able to teach what the mass most needs to know--what the race needs for +its own good today, are industrial and manual training schools, with the +varied and practical discipline and arts of life which they impart. + +What then? What of the 'modus vivendi' of the two races occupying the +same soil? As I said before, I do not know. Providence works slowly. +Time and patience only solve such enigmas. The impossible is not +expected of man, only that he shall do today the duty nearest to him. +It is easy, you say, for an outsider to preach waiting, patience, +forbearance, sympathy, helpfulness. Well, these are the important +lessons we get out of history. We struggle, and fume, and fret, and +accomplish little in our brief hour, but somehow the world gets on. +Fortunately for us, we cannot do today the work of tomorrow. All the +gospel in the world can be boiled down into a single precept. Do right +now. I have observed that the boy who starts in the morning with a +determination to behave himself till bedtime, usually gets through the +day without a thrashing. + +But of one thing I am sure. In the rush of industries, in the race +problem, it is more and more incumbent upon such institutions as the +University of the South to maintain the highest standard of pure +scholarship, to increase the number of men and women devoted to the +intellectual life. Long ago, in the middle of the seventeenth century, +John Ward of Stratford-on-Avon, clergyman and physician, wrote in his +diary: "The wealth of a nation depends upon its populousness, and its +populousness depends upon the liberty of conscience that is granted to +it, for this calls in strangers and promotes trading." Great is the +attraction of a benign climate and of a fruitful soil, but a greater +attraction is an intelligent people, that values the best things in life, +a society hospitable, companionable, instinct with intellectual life, +awake to the great ideas that make life interesting. + +As I travel through the South and become acquainted with its magnificent +resources and opportunities, and know better and love more the admirable +qualities of its people, I cannot but muse in a fond prophecy upon the +brilliant part it is to play in the diversified life and the great future +of the American Republic. But, North and South, we have a hard fight +with materializing tendencies. God bless the University of the South! + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg Etext Diversities of American Life, by Warner + diff --git a/old/cwdal10.zip b/old/cwdal10.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..b310c6d --- /dev/null +++ b/old/cwdal10.zip diff --git a/old/cwdal11.txt b/old/cwdal11.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..79c4366 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/cwdal11.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1001 @@ +The Project Gutenberg Etext of Diversities of American Life, by Warner +#15 in our series by Charles Dudley Warner + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world, be sure to check +the laws for your country before redistributing these files!!!!! + +Please take a look at the important information in this header. +We encourage you to keep this file on your own disk, keeping an +electronic path open for the next readers. + +Please do not remove this. + +This should be the first thing seen when anyone opens the book. +Do not change or edit it without written permission. 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During +the past fifteen years a universal and wholesome pastime of boys has been +developed into a great national industry, thoroughly organized and almost +altogether relegated to professional hands, no longer the exercise of the +million but a spectacle for the million, and a game which rivals the +Stock Exchange as a means of winning money on the difference of opinion +as to the skill of contending operators. + +The newspapers of the country--pretty accurate and sad indicators of the +popular taste--devote more daily columns in a week's time to chronicling +the news about base-ball than to any other topic that interests the +American mind, and the most skillful player, the pitcher, often college +bred, whose entire prowess is devoted to not doing what he seems to be +doing, and who has become the hero of the American girl as the Olympian +wrestler was of the Greek maiden and as the matador is of the Spanish +senorita, receives a larger salary for a few hours' exertion each week +than any college president is paid for a year's intellectual toil. Such +has been the progress in the interest in education during this period +that the larger bulk of the news, and that most looked for, printed about +the colleges and universities, is that relating to the training, the +prospects and achievements of the boat crews and the teams of base-ball +and foot-ball, and the victory of any crew or team is a better means of +attracting students to its college, a better advertisement, than success +in any scholastic contest. A few years ago a tournament was organized in +the North between several colleges for competition in oratory and +scholarship; it had a couple of contests and then died of inanition and +want of public interest. + +During the period I am speaking of there has been an enormous advance in +technical education, resulting in the establishment of splendid special +schools, essential to the development of our national resources; a growth +of the popular idea that education should be practical,--that is, such an +education as can be immediately applied to earning a living and acquiring +wealth speedily,--and an increasing extension of the elective system in +colleges,--based almost solely on the notion, having in view, of course, +the practical education, that the inclinations of a young man of eighteen +are a better guide as to what is best for his mental development and +equipment for life than all the experience of his predecessors. + +In this period, which you will note is more distinguished by the desire +for the accumulation of money than far the general production of wealth, +the standard of a fortune has shifted from a fair competence to that of +millions of money, so that he is no longer rich who has a hundred +thousand dollars, but he only who possesses property valued at many +millions, and the men most widely known the country through, most talked +about, whose doings and sayings are most chronicled in the journals, +whose example is most attractive and stimulating to the minds of youth, +are not the scholars, the scientists, the men of, letters, not even the +orators and statesmen, but those who, by any means, have amassed enormous +fortunes. We judge the future of a generation by its ideals. + +Regarding education from the point of view of its equipment of a man to +make money, and enjoy the luxury which money can command, it must be more +and more practical, that is, it must be adapted not even to the higher +aim of increasing the general wealth of the world, by increasing +production and diminishing waste both of labor and capital, but to the +lower aim of getting personal possession of it; so that a striking social +feature of the period is that one-half--that is hardly an overestimate-- +one-half of the activity in America of which we speak with so much +enthusiasm, is not directed to the production of wealth, to increasing +its volume, but to getting the money of other people away from them. In +barbarous ages this object was accomplished by violence; it is now +attained by skill and adroitness. We still punish those who gain +property by violence; those who get it by smartness and cleverness, we +try to imitate, and sometimes we reward them with public office. + +It appears, therefore, that speed,-the ability to move rapidly from place +to place,--a disproportionate reward of physical over intellectual +science, an intense desire to be rich, which is strong enough to compel +even education to grind in the mill of the Philistines, and an inordinate +elevation in public consideration of rich men simply because they are +rich, are characteristics of this little point of time on which we stand. +They are not the only characteristics; in a reasonably optimistic view, +the age is distinguished for unexampled achievements, and for +opportunities for the well-being of humanity never before in all history +attainable. But these characteristics are so prominent as to beget the +fear that we are losing the sense of the relative value of things in this +life. + +Few persons come to middle life without some conception of these relative +values. It is in the heat and struggle that we fail to appreciate what +in the attainment will be most satisfactory to us. After it is over we +are apt to see that our possessions do not bring the happiness we +expected; or that we have neglected to cultivate the powers and tastes +that can make life enjoyable. We come to know, to use a truism, that a +person's highest satisfaction depends not upon his exterior acquisitions, +but upon what he himself is. There is no escape from this conclusion. +The physical satisfactions are limited and fallacious, the intellectual +and moral satisfactions are unlimited. In the last analysis, a man has +to live with himself, to be his own companion, and in the last resort the +question is, what can he get out of himself. In the end, his life is +worth just what he has become. And I need not say that the mistake +commonly made is as to relative values,--that the things of sense are as +important as the things of the mind. You make that mistake when you +devote your best energies to your possession of material substance, and +neglect the enlargement, the training, the enrichment of the mind. You +make the same mistake in a less degree, when you bend to the popular +ignorance and conceit so far as to direct your college education to +sordid ends. The certain end of yielding to this so-called practical +spirit was expressed by a member of a Northern State legislature who +said, "We don't want colleges, we want workshops." It was expressed in +another way by a representative of the lower house in Washington who +said, "The average ignorance of the country has a right to be represented +here." It is not for me to say whether it is represented there. +Naturally, I say, we ought by the time of middle life to come to a +conception of what sort of things are of most value. By analogy, in the +continual growth of the Republic, we ought to have a perception of what +we have accomplished and acquired, and some clear view of our tendencies. +We take justifiable pride in the glittering figures of our extension of +territory, our numerical growth, in the increase of wealth, and in our +rise to the potential position of almost the first nation in the world. +A more pertinent inquiry is, what sort of people have we become? What +are we intellectually and morally? For after all the man is the thing, +the production of the right sort of men and women is all that gives a +nation value. When I read of the establishment of a great industrial +centre in which twenty thousand people are employed in the increase of +the amount of steel in the world, before I decide whether it would be a +good thing for the Republic to create another industrial city of the same +sort, I want to know what sort of people the twenty thousand are, how +they live, what their morals are, what intellectual life they have, what +their enjoyment of life is, what they talk about and think about, and +what chance they have of getting into any higher life. It does not seem +to me a sufficient gain in this situation that we are immensely +increasing the amount of steel in the world, or that twenty more people +are enabled on account of this to indulge in an unexampled, +unintellectual luxury. We want more steel, no doubt, but haven't we wit +enough to get that and at the same time to increase among the producers +of it the number of men and women whose horizons are extended, who are +companionable, intelligent beings, adding something to the intellectual +and moral force upon which the real progress of the Republic depends? + +There is no place where I would choose to speak more plainly of our +national situation today than in the South, and at the University of the +South; in the South, because it is more plainly in a transition state, +and at the University of the South, because it is here and in similar +institutions that the question of the higher or lower plane of life in +the South is to be determined. + +To a philosophical observer of the Republic, at the end of the hundred +years, I should say that the important facts are not its industrial +energy, its wealth, or its population, but the stability of the federal +power, and the integrity of the individual States. That is to say, that +stress and trial have welded us into an indestructible nation; and not of +less consequence is the fact that the life of the Union is in the life of +the States. The next most encouraging augury for a great future is the +marvelous diversity among the members of this republican body. If +nothing would be more speedily fatal to our plan of government than +increasing centralization, nothing would be more hopeless in our +development than increasing monotony, the certain end of which is +mediocrity. + +Speaking as one whose highest pride it is to be a citizen of a great and +invincible Republic to those whose minds kindle with a like patriotism, I +can say that I am glad there are East and North and South, and West, +Middle, Northwest, and Southwest, with as many diversities of climate, +temperament, habits, idiosyncrasies, genius, as these names imply. Thank +Heaven we are not all alike; and so long as we have a common purpose in +the Union, and mutual toleration, respect, and sympathy, the greater will +be our achievement and the nobler our total development, if every section +is true to the evolution of its local traits. The superficial foreign +observer finds sameness in our different States, tiresome family likeness +in our cities, hideous monotony in our villages, and a certain common +atmosphere of life, which increasing facility of communication tends to +increase. This is a view from a railway train. But as soon as you +observe closely, you find in each city a peculiar physiognomy, and a +peculiar spirit remarkable considering the freedom of movement and +intercourse, and you find the organized action of each State sui generis +to a degree surprising considering the general similarity of our laws and +institutions. In each section differences of speech, of habits of +thought, of temperament prevail. Massachusetts is unlike Louisiana, +Florida unlike Tennessee, Georgia is unlike California, Pennsylvania is +unlike Minnesota, and so on, and the unlikeness is not alone or chiefly +in physical features. By the different style of living I can tell when I +cross the line between Connecticut and New York as certainly as when I +cross the line between Vermont and Canada. The Virginian expanded in +Kentucky is not the same man he was at home, and the New England Yankee +let loose in the West takes on proportions that would astonish his +grandfather. Everywhere there is a variety in local sentiment, action, +and development. Sit down in the seats of the State governments and +study the methods of treatment of essentially the common institutions of +government, of charity and discipline, and you will be impressed with the +variety of local spirit and performance in the Union. And this, +diversity is so important, this contribution of diverse elements is so +necessary to the complex strength and prosperity of the whole, that one +must view with alarm all federal interference and tendency to greater +centralization. + +And not less to be dreaded than monotony from the governmental point of +view, is the obliteration of variety in social life and in literary +development. It is not enough for a nation to be great and strong, it +must be interesting, and interesting it cannot be without cultivation of +local variety. Better obtrusive peculiarities than universal sameness. +It is out of variety as well as complexity in American life, and not in +homogeneity and imitation, that we are to expect a civilization +noteworthy in the progress of the human race. + +Let us come a little closer to our subject in details. For a hundred +years the South was developed on its own lines, with astonishingly little +exterior bias. This comparative isolation was due partly to the +institution of slavery, partly to devotion to the production of two or +three great staples. While its commercial connection with the North was +intimate and vital, its literary relation with the North was slight. +With few exceptions Northern authors were not read in the South, and the +literary movement of its neighbors, such as it was, from 1820 to 1860, +scarcely affected it. With the exception of Louisiana, which was +absolutely ignorant of American literature and drew its inspiration and +assumed its critical point of view almost wholly from the French, the +South was English, but mainly English of the time of Walter Scott and +George the Third. While Scott was read at the North for his knowledge of +human nature, as he always will be read, the chivalric age which moves in +his pages was taken more seriously at the South, as if it were of +continuing importance in life. In any of its rich private libraries you +find yourself in the age of Pope and Dryden, and the classics were +pursued in the spirit of Oxford and Cambridge in the time of Johnson. It +was little disturbed by the intellectual and ethical agitation of modern +England or of modern New England. During this period, while the South +excelled in the production of statesmen, orators, trained politicians, +great judges, and brilliant lawyers, it produced almost no literature, +that is, no indigenous literature, except a few poems and--a few humorous +character-sketches; its general writing was ornately classic, and its +fiction romantic on the lines of the foreign romances. + +From this isolation one thing was developed, and another thing might in +due time be expected. The thing developed was a social life, in the +favored class, which has an almost unique charm, a power of being +agreeable, a sympathetic cordiality, an impulsive warmth, a frankness in +the expression of emotion, and that delightful quality of manner which +puts the world at ease and makes life pleasant. The Southerners are no +more sincere than the Northerners, but they have less reserve, and in the +social traits that charm all who come in contact with them, they have an +element of immense value in the variety of American life. + +The thing that might have been expected in due time, and when the call +came--and it is curious to note that the call and cause of any +renaissance are always from the outside--was a literary expression fresh +and indigenous. This expectation, in a brief period since the war, has +been realized by a remarkable performance and is now stimulated by a +remarkable promise. The acclaim with which the Southern literature has +been received is partly due to its novelty, the new life it exhibited, +but more to the recognition in it of a fresh flavor, a literary quality +distinctly original and of permanent importance. This production, the +first fruits of which are so engaging in quality, cannot grow and broaden +into a stable, varied literature without scholarship and hard work, and +without a sympathetic local audience. But the momentary concern is that +it should develop on its own lines and in its own spirit, and not under +the influence of London or Boston or New York. I do not mean by this +that it should continue to attract attention by peculiarities of dialect- +which is only an incidental, temporary phenomenon, that speedily becomes +wearisome, whether "cracker" or negro or Yankee--but by being true to the +essential spirit and temperament of Southern life. + +During this period there was at the North, and especially in the East, +great intellectual activity and agitation, and agitation ethical and +moral as well as intellectual. There was awakening, investigation, +questioning, doubt. There was a great deal of froth thrown to the +surface. In the free action of individual thought and expression grew +eccentricities of belief and of practice, and a crop of so-called "isms," +more or less temporary, unprofitable, and pernicious. Public opinion +attained an astonishing degree of freedom,--I never heard of any +community that was altogether free of its tyranny. At least +extraordinary latitude was permitted in the development of extreme ideas, +new, fantastic, radical, or conservative. For instance, slavery was +attacked and slavery was defended on the same platform, with almost equal +freedom. Indeed, for many years, if there was any exception to the +general toleration it was in the social ostracism of those who held and +expressed extreme opinions in regard to immediate emancipation, and were +stigmatized as abolitionists. There was a general ferment of new ideas, +not always fruitful in the direction taken, but hopeful in view of the +fact that growth and movement are better than stagnation and decay. You +can do something with a ship that has headway; it will drift upon the +rocks if it has not. With much foam and froth, sure to attend agitation, +there was immense vital energy, intense life. + +Out of this stir and agitation came the aggressive, conquering spirit +that carried civilization straight across the continent, that built up +cities and States, that developed wealth, and by invention, ingenuity, +and energy performed miracles in the way of the subjugation of nature and +the assimilation of societies. Out of this free agitation sprang a +literary product, great in quantity and to some degree distinguished in +quality, groups of historians, poets, novelists, essayists, biographers, +scientific writers. A conspicuous agency of the period was the lecture +platform, which did something in the spread and popularization of +information, but much more in the stimulation of independent thought and +the awakening of the mind to use its own powers. + +Along with this and out of this went on the movement of popular education +and of the high and specialized education. More remarkable than the +achievements of the common schools has been the development of the +colleges, both in the departments of the humanities and of science. If I +were writing of education generally, I might have something to say of the +measurable disappointment of the results of the common schools as at +present conducted, both as to the diffusion of information and as to the +discipline of the mind and the inculcation of ethical principles; which +simply means that they need improvement. But the higher education has +been transformed, and mainly by the application of scientific methods, +and of the philosophic spirit, to the study of history, economics, and +the classics. When we are called to defend the pursuit of metaphysics or +the study of the classics, either as indispensable to the discipline or +to the enlargement of the mind, we are not called on to defend the +methods of a generation ago. The study of Greek is no longer an exercise +in the study of linguistics or the inspection of specimens of an obsolete +literature, but the acquaintance with historic thought, habits, and +polity, with a portion of the continuous history of the human mind, which +has a vital relation to our own life. + +However much or little there may be of permanent value in the vast +production of northern literature, judged by continental or even English +standards, the time has came when American scholarship in science, in +language, in occidental or oriental letters, in philosophic and +historical methods, can court comparison with any other. In some +branches of research the peers of our scholars must be sought not in +England but in Germany. So that in one of the best fruits of a period of +intellectual agitation, scholarship, the restless movement has thoroughly +vindicated itself. + +I have called your attention to this movement in order to say that it was +neither accidental nor isolated. It was in the historic line, it was fed +and stimulated by all that had gone before, and by all contemporary +activity everywhere. New England, for instance, was alert and +progressive because it kept its doors and windows open. It was +hospitable in its intellectual freedom, both of trial and debate, to new +ideas. It was in touch with the universal movement of humanity and of +human thought and speculation. You lose some quiet by this attitude, +some repose that is pleasant and even desirable perhaps, you entertain +many errors, you may try many useless experiments, but you gain life and +are in the way of better things. New England, whatever else we may say +about it, was in the world. There was no stir of thought, of +investigation, of research, of the recasting of old ideas into new forms +of life, in Germany, in France, in Italy, in England, anywhere, that did +not touch it and to which it did not respond with the sympathy that +common humanity has in the universal progress. It kept this touch not +only in the evolution and expression of thought and emotion which we call +literature (whether original or imitative), but in the application of +philosophic methods to education, in the attempted regeneration of +society and the amelioration of its conditions by schemes of reform and +discipline, relating to the institutions of benevolence and to the +control of the vicious and criminal. With all these efforts go along +always much false sentimentality and pseudo-philanthropy, but little by +little gain is made that could not be made in a state of isolation and +stagnation. + +In fact there is one historic stream of human thought, aspiration, and +progress; it is practically continuous, and with all its diversity of +local color and movement it is a unit. If you are in it, you move; if +you are out of it, you are in an eddy. The eddy may have a provincial +current, but it is not in the great stream, and when it has gone round +and round for a century, it is still an eddy, and will not carry you +anywhere in particular. The value of the modern method of teaching and +study is that it teaches the solidarity of human history, the continuance +of human thought, in literature, government, philosophy, the unity of the +divine purpose, and that nothing that has anywhere befallen the human +race is alien to us. + +I am not undervaluing the part, the important part, played by +conservatism, the conservatism that holds on to what has been gained if +it is good, that insists on discipline and heed to the plain teaching of +experience, that refuses to go into hysterics of enthusiasm over every +flighty suggestion, or to follow every leader simply because he proposes +something new and strange--I do not mean the conservatism that refuses to +try anything simply because it is new, and prefers to energetic life the +stagnation that inevitably leads to decay. Isolation from the great +historic stream of thought and agitation is stagnation. While this is +true, and always has been true in history, it is also true, in regard to +the beneficent diversity of American life, which is composed of so many +elements and forces, as I have often thought and said, that what has been +called the Southern conservatism in respect to beliefs and certain social +problems, may have a very important part to play in the development of +the life of the Republic. + +I shall not be misunderstood here, where the claims of the higher life +are insisted on and the necessity of pure, accurate scholarship is +recognized, in saying that this expectation in regard to the South +depends upon the cultivation and diffusion of the highest scholarship in +all its historic consciousness and critical precision. This sort of +scholarship, of widely apprehending intellectual activity, keeping step +with modern ideas so far as they are historically grounded, is of the +first importance. Everywhere indeed, in our industrial age,--in a +society inclined to materialism, scholarship, pure and simple scholarship +for its own sake, no less in Ohio than in Tennessee, is the thing to be +insisted on. If I may refer to an institution, which used to be midway +between the North and the South, and which I may speak of without +suspicion of bias, an institution where the studies of metaphysics, the +philosophy of history, the classics and pure science are as much insisted +on as the study of applied sciences, the College of New Jersey at +Princeton, the question in regard to a candidate for a professorship or +instructorship, is not whether he was born North or South, whether he +served in one army or another or in neither, whether he is a Democrat or +a Republican or a Mugwump, what religious denomination he belongs to, but +is he a scholar and has he a high character? There is no provincialism +in scholarship. + +We are not now considering the matter of the agreeableness of one society +or another, whether life is on the whole pleasanter in certain conditions +at the North or at the South, whether there is not a charm sometimes in +isolation and even in provincialism. It is a fair question to ask, what +effect upon individual lives and character is produced by an industrial +and commercial spirit, and by one less restless and more domestic. But +the South is now face to face with certain problems which relate her, +inevitably, to the moving forces of the world. One of these is the +development of her natural resources and the change and diversity of her +industries. On the industrial side there is pressing need of +institutions of technology, of schools of applied science, for the +diffusion of technical information and skill in regard to mining and +manufacturing, and also to agriculture, so that worn-out lands may be +reclaimed and good lands be kept up to the highest point of production. +Neither mines, forests, quarries, water-ways, nor textile fabrics can be +handled to best advantage without scientific knowledge and skilled labor. +The South is everywhere demanding these aids to her industrial +development. But just in the proportion that she gets them, and because +she has them, will be the need of higher education. The only safety +against the influence of a rolling mill is a college, the only safety +against the practical and materializing tendency of an industrial school +is the increased study of whatever contributes to the higher and non- +sordid life of the mind. The South would make a poor exchange for her +former condition in any amount of industrial success without a +corresponding development of the highest intellectual life. + +But, besides the industrial problem, there is the race problem. It is +the most serious in the conditions under which it is presented that ever +in all history confronted a free people. Whichever way you regard it, it +is the nearest insoluble. Under the Constitution it is wisely left to +the action of the individual States. The heavy responsibility is with +them. In the nature of things it is a matter of the deepest concern to +the whole Republic, for the prosperity of every part is vital to the +prosperity of the whole. In working it out you are entitled, from the +outside, to the most impartial attempt to understand its real nature, to +the utmost patience with the facts of human nature, to the most profound +and most helpful sympathy. It is monstrous to me that the situation +should be made on either side a political occasion for private ambition +or for party ends. + +I would speak of this subject with the utmost frankness if I knew what to +say. It is not much of a confession to say that I do not. The more I +study it the less I know, and those among you who give it the most +anxious thought are the most perplexed, the subject has so many +conflicting aspects. In the first place there is the evolution of an +undeveloped race. Every race has a right to fair play in the world and +to make the most of its capacities, and to the help of the more favored +in the attempt. If the suggestion recently made of a wholesale migration +to Mexico were carried out, the South would be relieved in many ways, +though the labor problem would be a serious one for a long time, but the +"elevation" would be lost sight of or relegated to a foreign missionary +enterprise; and as for results to the colored people themselves, there is +the example of Hayti. If another suggestion, that of abandoning certain +States to this race, were carried out, there is the example of Hayti +again, and, besides, an anomaly introduced into the Republic foreign to +its traditions, spirit, aspirations, and process of assimilation, alien +to the entire historic movement of the Aryan races, and infinitely more +dangerous to the idea of the Republic than if solid Ireland were dumped +down in the Mississippi valley as an independent State. + +On the other hand, there rests upon you the responsibility of maintaining +a civilization--the civilization of America, not of Hayti or of Guatemala +which we have so hardly won. It is neither to be expected nor desired +that you should be ruled by an undeveloped race, ignorant of law, +letters, history, politics, political economy. There is no right +anywhere in numbers or unintelligence to rule intelligence. It is a +travesty of civilization. No Northern State that I know of would submit +to be ruled by an undeveloped race. And human nature is exactly in the +South what it is in the North. That is one impregnable fact, to be taken +as the basis of all our calculations; the whites of the South will not, +cannot, be dominated, as matters now stand, by the colored race. + +But, then, there is the suffrage, the universal, unqualified suffrage. +And here is the dilemma. Suffrage once given, cannot be suppressed or +denied, perverted by chicane or bribery without incalculable damage to +the whole political body. Irregular methods once indulged in for one +purpose, and towards one class, so sap the moral sense that they come to +be used for all purposes. The danger is ultimately as great to those who +suppress or pervert as it is to the suppressed and corrupted. It is the +demoralization of all sound political action and life. I know whereof I +speak. In the North, bribery in elections and intimidation are fatal to +public morality. The legislature elected by bribery is a bribable body. + +I believe that the fathers were right in making government depend upon +the consent of the governed. I believe there has been as yet discovered +no other basis of government so safe, so stable as popular suffrage, but +the fathers never contemplated a suffrage without intelligence. It is a +contradiction of terms. A proletariat without any political rights in a +republic is no more dangerous than an unintelligent mob which can be used +in elections by demagogues. Universal suffrage is not a universal +panacea; it may be the best device attainable, but it is certain of abuse +without safeguards. One of the absolutely necessary safeguards is an +educational qualification. No one ought anywhere to exercise it who +cannot read and write, and if I had my way, no one should cast a ballot +who had not a fair conception of the effect of it, shown by a higher test +of intelligence than the mere fact of ability to scrawl his name and to +spell out a line or two in the Constitution. This much the State for its +own protection is bound to require, for suffrage is an expediency, not a +right belonging to universal humanity regardless of intelligence or of +character. + +The charge is, with regard to this universal suffrage, that you take the +fruits of increased representation produced by it, and then deny it to a +portion of the voters whose action was expected to produce a different +political result. I cannot but regard it as a blunder in statesmanship +to give suffrage without an educational qualification, and to deem it +possible to put ignorance over intelligence. You are not, responsible +for the situation, but you are none the less in an illogical position +before the law. Now, would you not gain more in a rectification of your +position than you would lose in other ways, by making suffrage depend +upon an educational qualification? I do not mean gain party-wise, but in +political morals and general prosperity. Time would certainly be gained +by this, and it is possible in this shifting world, in the growth of +industries and the flow of populations, that before the question of +supremacy was again upon you, foreign and industrial immigration would +restore the race balance. + +We come now to education. The colored race being here, I assume that its +education, with the probabilities this involves of its elevation, is a +duty as well as a necessity. I speak both of the inherent justice there +is in giving every human being the chance of bettering his condition and +increasing his happiness that lies in education--unless our whole theory +of modern life is wrong--and also of the political and social danger +there is in a degraded class numerically strong. Granted integral +membership in a body politic, education is a necessity. I am aware of +the danger of half education, of that smattering of knowledge which only +breeds conceit, adroitness, and a consciousness of physical power, +without due responsibility and moral restraint. Education makes a race +more powerful both for evil and for good. I see the danger that many +apprehend. And the outlook, with any amount of education, would be +hopeless, not only as regards the negro and those in neighborhood +relations with him, if education should not bring with it thrift, sense +of responsibility as a citizen, and virtue. What the negro race under +the most favorable conditions is capable of remains to be shown; history +does not help us much to determine thus far. It has always been a long +pull for any race to rise out of primitive conditions; but I am sure for +its own sake, and for the sake of the republic where it dwells, every +thoughtful person must desire the most speedy intellectual and moral +development possible of the African race. And I mean as a race. + +Some distinguished English writers have suggested, with approval, that +the solution of the race problem in this country is fusion, and I have +even heard discouraged Southerners accept it as a possibility. The +result of their observation of the amalgamation of races and colors in +Egypt, in Syria, and Mexico, must be very different from mine. When +races of different color mingle there is almost invariably loss of +physical stamina, and the lower moral qualities of each are developed in +the combination. No race that regards its own future would desire it. +The absorption theory as applied to America is, it seems to me, +chimerical. + +But to return to education. It should always be fitted to the stage of +development. It should always mean discipline, the training of the +powers and capacities. The early pioneers who planted civilization on +the Watauga, the Holston, the Kentucky, the Cumberland, had not much +broad learning--they would not have been worse if they had had more but +they had courage, they were trained in self-reliance, virile common +sense, and good judgment, they had inherited the instinct and capacity of +self-government, they were religious, with all their coarseness they had +the fundamental elements of nobility, the domestic virtues, and the +public spirit needed in the foundation of states. Their education in all +the manly arts and crafts of the backwoodsman fitted them very well for +the work they had to do. I should say that the education of the colored +race in America should be fundamental. I have not much confidence in an +ornamental top-dressing of philosophy, theology, and classic learning +upon the foundation of an unformed and unstable mental and moral +condition. Somehow, character must be built up, and character depends +upon industry, upon thrift, upon morals, upon correct ethical +perceptions. To have control of one's powers, to have skill in labor, so +that work in any occupation shall be intelligent, to have self-respect, +which commonly comes from trained capacity, to know how to live, to have +a clean, orderly house, to be grounded in honesty and the domestic +virtues,--these are the essentials of progress. I suppose that the +education to produce these must be an elemental and practical one, one +that fits for the duties of life and not for some imaginary sphere above +them. + +To put it in a word, and not denying that there must be schools for +teaching the teachers, with the understanding that the teachers should be +able to teach what the mass most needs to know--what the race needs for +its own good today, are industrial and manual training schools, with the +varied and practical discipline and arts of life which they impart. + +What then? What of the 'modus vivendi' of the two races occupying the +same soil? As I said before, I do not know. Providence works slowly. +Time and patience only solve such enigmas. The impossible is not +expected of man, only that he shall do today the duty nearest to him. +It is easy, you say, for an outsider to preach waiting, patience, +forbearance, sympathy, helpfulness. Well, these are the important +lessons we get out of history. We struggle, and fume, and fret, and +accomplish little in our brief hour, but somehow the world gets on. +Fortunately for us, we cannot do today the work of tomorrow. All the +gospel in the world can be boiled down into a single precept. Do right +now. I have observed that the boy who starts in the morning with a +determination to behave himself till bedtime, usually gets through the +day without a thrashing. + +But of one thing I am sure. In the rush of industries, in the race +problem, it is more and more incumbent upon such institutions as the +University of the South to maintain the highest standard of pure +scholarship, to increase the number of men and women devoted to the +intellectual life. Long ago, in the middle of the seventeenth century, +John Ward of Stratford-on-Avon, clergyman and physician, wrote in his +diary: "The wealth of a nation depends upon its populousness, and its +populousness depends upon the liberty of conscience that is granted to +it, for this calls in strangers and promotes trading." Great is the +attraction of a benign climate and of a fruitful soil, but a greater +attraction is an intelligent people, that values the best things in life, +a society hospitable, companionable, instinct with intellectual life, +awake to the great ideas that make life interesting. + +As I travel through the South and become acquainted with its magnificent +resources and opportunities, and know better and love more the admirable +qualities of its people, I cannot but muse in a fond prophecy upon the +brilliant part it is to play in the diversified life and the great future +of the American Republic. But, North and South, we have a hard fight +with materializing tendencies. God bless the University of the South! + + + + +End of this Project Gutenberg Etext of Diversities of American Life +by Charles Dudley Warner + diff --git a/old/cwdal11.zip b/old/cwdal11.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..e0c67ff --- /dev/null +++ b/old/cwdal11.zip |
