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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..678154e --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #55299 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/55299) diff --git a/old/55299-0.txt b/old/55299-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 52c4ed2..0000000 --- a/old/55299-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,6603 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Forum, by Various - -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/license - - -Title: The Forum - October 1914 - -Author: Various - -Release Date: August 8, 2017 [EBook #55299] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE FORUM *** - - - - -Produced by Carol Brown, and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - - - - - - - - - -THE FORUM - -FOR OCTOBER 1914 - - - - -THE WAR - -CHARLES VALE - - -In each of the nations now engaged in the European conflict, a large -number of people of all classes—the vast majority of people of all -classes—did not want war, and would have done all in their power to -avert it: for they knew, more or less completely, the price of war; -and they knew also, more or less completely, in spite of the -inadequacy of all the churches through all the centuries, that war -cannot possibly be reconciled with Christianity, with civilization, -with humanity, decency, and the most rudimentary common sense. But -when hostilities had actually been commenced, each of the nations was -practically a unit with regard to the prosecution of the war to its -final and terrible conclusion. With the exception of a few -professional agitators or eccentric fanatics, who have gleaned scant -sympathy for their antics, every citizen or subject of each country -has placed implicit faith in the justice of the nation’s cause and has -been prepared to give, ungrudgingly, the last full measure of -devotion. Canada, Australia, South Africa, India, and all the great -and small oversea commonwealths, colonies and dominions of Great -Britain have come forward in the time of stress to offer new strength -to the United Kingdom and new pledges of a United Empire. In the -Fatherland, every man and woman has accepted the issue as inevitable, -has held the cause of Kaiser and country as sacred and supreme, and -has shrunk from no sacrifice to ensure the fulfilment of the -long-cherished dream of victory, security and expansion. In France, -where the ghosts of the dead that von Moltke required have not yet -ceased to walk o’ nights, (they will have new companionship now), there -is no doubt in the mind of man, woman or child that _la Patrie_ is -waging a holy war for liberty and honor against the ruthless -aggression of an arrogant and pitiless foe. In Russia, Austria, -Servia, and whatever countries may have been dragged into the vortex -week by week, there is a similar spirit, a similar belief in the -justice of the national cause and the calculated injustice of the -enemy’s plans. And in Belgium, always the victim of her unneighborly -neighbors’ feuds, a people dedicated to peace has been flung into the -hell of butchery and flames. Verily, Macbeth hath murther’d sleep! - -In these United States, there has been little attempt to transcend -race-limitations, so far as concerns the aliens within our borders, -and those hyphenated-Americans who have rushed with virulence into a -wordy warfare, intent, not on establishing the truth, but on giving -publicity, _ad nauseam_, to their own special, and specially -obnoxious, prejudices. The American nation, and every individual in -it, has a clear right to hold and express a definite opinion: but it -must be an opinion formed in conformity with the American character -and the American freedom from entanglements of inherited and -unreasoned bias. No other opinion is worth, here and now, a moment’s -consideration; and no other opinion should dare to voice itself in -this country, which has ties with almost all the peoples of the -world—ties of blood and friendship, but not of bloodshed and -hysteria. - -America alone, of the great Powers of the world, is in a position to -exercise free and calm reflection and to form a free and just -judgment. The value of her decision has already been made manifest, -through the efforts of every country involved in the war to influence -American sentiment and gain American good will. A peculiar -responsibility therefore rests upon us to avoid the banalities of the -various special pleaders, and to form our judgment soberly and in good -faith, nothing extenuating, and setting down naught in malice. And one -of the first thoughts that should occur to us, one of the most -significant and pregnant thoughts, is that which I have expressed in -my first paragraph. Europe is a house divided against itself: but each -nation in Europe has proclaimed the sanctity of its cause; each nation -conceives that it has, or is entitled to have, the special protection -of Providence; each nation is sending its men to death and claiming -patient sacrifice from its women. - -What does this mean? Is there such little sense of logic in the world -that it is impossible to distinguish right from wrong, so that nation -may rise against nation, each convinced of its own probity, and each -unable to attribute anything but evil motives to its adversaries? Can -self-delusion be carried so far that black and white exchange values -according to the chances of birth and environment? Have Christianity -and civilization achieved this remarkable result, that the peoples of -the world are like quarrelsome children in a disorderly nursery? - -It is very clear that the world’s sense of logic must rank with the -world’s sense of humor, when presumably learned professors, unchecked -and unridiculed, take nationalism and egoism as the premises of their -argument and from them deduce, with great skill, obvious nonsense. The -lesson of incompetence and shallowness is driven home when baseless -rumors from one half of Europe are countered with fantastic inventions -fabricated by our alien patriots for the purpose of influencing public -opinion. It is the old appeal of ignorance and stupidity to ignorance -and stupidity, and the American public will not greatly appreciate the -poor compliment that has been paid to it. - -As an aid to impartiality and quiet thinking, let us first retrace the -immediate and superficial causes of the war. Austria, dismayed and -incensed by the murder of the heir to the throne at Serajevo on June -28, and considering the murder as the culmination of long-continued -Servian scheming and enmity, delivered to Servia an ultimatum so -framed that no nation, however small in territory or in courage, could -possibly have accepted it without reservations. The Servian reply went -to the extreme limits of concession, and an understanding should -easily have been reached on that basis. Austria, however, was -apparently resolved upon Servia’s abject submission, or upon war. She -refused to accept the reply as in any way satisfactory, and opened -hostilities. - -It is clear, then, that Austria was primarily responsible for the -actual commencement of the conflagration. Undoubtedly she had -provocation, of the kind that stirs tremendously the sentiment of the -nation involved, but is less easily understood in its full intensity -by those at a distance. But the point that should be particularly -noticed is that a country which was temporarily excited beyond all -self-control should have been able to take the initiative and plunge -Europe into war. And it should be remembered that Austria’s resentment -toward Servia was scarcely greater than the resentment of the Serbs -toward the nation that had violated the Treaty of Berlin and -permanently appropriated Bosnia-Herzegovina. Yet, in rebuttal, Austria -might well assert that she had a vested interest in the provinces to -which, in a score or so of years, she had given prosperity unsurpassed -in southeastern Europe, in place of the anarchy and ruin entailed by -four centuries of misrule, and civil and religious faction-conflicts. - -The first step taken, the next was assured. Austria knew perfectly -well that Russia, the protagonist in that drama of Pan-Slavism of -which several scenes have already been presented, would take immediate -steps in accordance with her rôle, and repeat her lines so sonorously -that they would echo throughout the continent. But the Dual Monarchy, -wounded and embittered, did not care: she could see before her, at the -worst, no harsher fate than she would have to face, without external -war, in a few years, or perhaps months. Only war, it seemed, could -save the dynasty from destruction and the aggregation of races from -dissolution. Relying upon the immediate help of Germany, and the -ultimate assistance of Italy (her traditional foe, but technical -ally), she refused to draw back or to temporise. - -In discussing the attitude of Germany, and the action of the Kaiser, -it is necessary to make full allowance for the strength and sincerity -of the German foreboding, for many a year, that the clash between Slav -and Teuton was bound to come sooner or later. The Russian forces were -being massed ostensibly to prevent Austria from coercing Servia. As -Austria had provoked the outbreak of hostilities, should she have been -left to take the consequences? Would Russia, after eliminating Franz -Josef’s heterogeneous empire, have resisted the temptation to claim -France’s help in the congenial task of humbling Germany? The situation -was not without its subtleties, after Austria had made the first -decisive move. But under what circumstances did Austria make that -move? Was she encouraged by the assurance of German coöperation? - -The point to be particularly noted is that Germany, as the ally of -Austria, was entitled to full warning of any step that would make war -inevitable. Did Austria give that warning? If not, why not? Is the -Kaiser a weakling, to be ordered hither and thither at the whim of -Franz Josef? The assumption will find few supporters. Yet it is quite -clear that the Kaiser either knew and approved of the substance and -purpose of Austria’s ultimatum, or—_mirabile dictu_—was willing to -forgive the incredible slight of being totally ignored, and commit his -country and his army to the support of an act of aggression with -regard to which he had not even been consulted. - -Carefully leaving the horns of this dilemma for the self-impalement of -any too-ardent enthusiast who may wish to run without reading, we pass -on to France, compelled, by the terms of her understanding with -Russia, to take her place in the firing line. Without entering into -the ultra-refinements of politics and discussing the question whether -France, or any other country, would have paid for present neutrality -and the violation of solemn engagements by subsequently being devoured -in detail, or reduced to vassalage, by a victory-swollen Germany, we -may point out that an alliance entered into primarily to safeguard the -peace of Europe and the balance of power has been the means of -dragging France into a war with which she had no direct concern. Such -is the irony of protective diplomacy! - -Great Britain has rested her case on the publication, without comment, -of the whole of the diplomatic exchanges that preceded her own -intervention after the violation of the neutrality of Belgium. Her -claim that she exerted her influence until the final moment in the -interests of peace is sustained beyond cavil: but the point to be -remembered particularly is whether a more decisive and uncompromising -attitude at an earlier stage would not have been preferable. Germany -would then have had no doubt as to Great Britain’s final alignment, -and with a kindly word from Italy that neutrality was the best that -could be expected from her, a reconsideration of the whole position -might have been forced before the final, fatal moments had passed, and -were irrevocable. - -It is unnecessary to prolong this cursory review of immediate causes -and conditions, nor does it greatly matter how the positions of the -different countries have been stated. The mood of a moment may add or -subtract a little coloring, without changing the fundamental facts. -But is it possible for any man, however impartial he may desire to be, -to state those facts now, accurately, clearly, and in such relation -and sequence that only one inevitable conclusion can be drawn? - -It may be possible, though it would be difficult: but it would not be -worth while. For the war has not been due to, and does not depend -upon, recent events; and however those events may be viewed or -summarized, the only fact of importance is the one already emphasized: -that every nation which has been drawn into the conflict counts its -cause just and its conscience clear. - -In the face of such unanimity of national feeling, it is absurd to -discuss superficial conditions only, or to assume that they are of any -real importance. For, apart from neutral America, and the few hundreds -of really educated and intelligent men and women in each country who -constitute the brains and conserve the manners of their nation, it is -impossible to find any just basis for criticism and judgment. The -average national is concerned with presenting an _ex parte_ statement -(in which, perhaps, he believes implicitly) rather than with -discovering the actual truth, whosoever may be vindicated or -discredited. The average national may therefore be disregarded, and -the supreme appeal be made, not to the common folly of the nations, -but to the common sense of those who have risen beyond national -limitations and national littlenesses. - -In the first place, that much-quoted and entirely despicable -confession of faith, “My country, right or wrong, first, last and all -the time,” may well be relegated,—first, last and for whatever time -may remain before a kindly Providence blots out this incredible little -world of seething passions and ceaseless pain and cruelty,—to the -limbo of antique curiosities. Nothing can be sillier, and more -contemptible, than such pseudo-patriotism, based on utter selfishness, -utter ignorance, and abysmal stupidity. The country which commits a -crime, or makes a grave mistake, is in the position of an individual -who commits a crime or makes a grave mistake; and no fanfare of -trumpets or hypnotism of marching automata, helmeted and plumed, -should confuse the issue and vitiate judgment. Mere nationalism, -unregulated by intelligence, is simply one of the most irritating and -blatant forms of egoism. Nationality itself depends upon so many -complex conditions that the ordinary semi-intelligent man can scarcely -unravel the niceties of history and discover to whom his heartfelt -allegiance is really due. He therefore accepts the untutored sentiment -of his immediate environment. He is essentially provincial, not -patriotic. Alsace and Lorraine, with their various vicissitudes, may -profitably be studied by the curious, in this connection. - -Until provincialism, of the type which has been so prominent in recent -controversies, can be eliminated or controlled, the settlement of the -more tragic issues of the time must be undertaken boldly by those who -have indubitably grown up, forsaking leading strings and the nursery, -the toys of childhood and the irresponsibility of childhood. All the -Governments of Europe, in which a few brilliant men are undoubtedly -enrolled, have failed now, as they have failed repeatedly before, to -perform their elementary duties and save their countries from the -horrors of unnecessary war. Generation after generation, the peoples -of Europe have been carefully led by their Governments into successive -orgies of slaughter, in which the allies of one campaign have been the -enemies of the next. The whole course of European history during the -last hundred years (we need not go further back: we are not -responsible for the dead centuries) has been indeed a subject for -Olympian laughter. What has been achieved by the unending succession -of wars, with all their attendant miseries and deadly consequences? -Merely the necessity for increased armaments, constant watchfulness, -perpetual strain—and more war. Could there be a clearer proof of the -futility of war? - -The Governments of Europe have failed because each, in greater or less -degree, has embodied the provincialism of its own section of the armed -and suspicious world. There have been a few notable exceptions to the -general rule of conventional mediocrity: but where have we found the -statesman who could break away altogether from the old stupid methods, -and by the sheer force of character and principle inaugurate a new era -of civilized diplomacy, as Bismarck inaugurated a new era of veneered -barbarism? In America, we are beginning to see the value and the -fruits of government based on fairness to all nations and justice to -all individuals: but neither here, nor in Europe, has the significance -of the new statesmanship yet been fully recognized. Europe, indeed, -still regards us with more than a little suspicion, contempt, and -imperfectly concealed condescension: it has heard and seen Roosevelt, -unfortunately, and the lingering impressions of crudity have not been -weakened. Will it listen to us now, and realize that the New World has -in verity something to offer to the Old in its time of special -tribulation? For Wilson, not Roosevelt, stands for the spirit of -America, the voice of America, and her chosen contribution to the -civilization of the Twentieth Century. - -It seems strange, perhaps, to talk of civilization in these dark days, -when primitive passions and primitive methods have flung an -ineradicable stain of blood across a whole continent. Yet only the -coward will bend to temporary defeat, or ridicule, or pessimism. It is -the task of the strong to turn disaster into triumph, and to frame a -new international polity built on sure foundations. The diplomacy -based on national antipathies must be made impossible by the new -understanding of the criminal folly of provincialism, the new -comprehension of nation by nation. For the true causes of the present -war cannot be discovered in mere incidents of July and August. They go -further back, and are rooted in ignorance, misconception, prejudice, -selfishness. - -I do not wish to accuse or exonerate any of the countries that have -turned Europe into a stage for the rehearsal of Christianity’s -masterpiece, the rollicking farce _Hell on Earth_. There have -been enough already to inflame racial resentments and flood the press -with taunts and recriminations. Ours is a bigger and worthier task: to -assuage, not to incense; to re-create order from chaos; to prepare the -way for peace, and for what must follow peace. - -Recrimination is so useless now. We have to face the future: we cannot -undo the past. We have learnt our lesson, surely, once for all: shall -the spectre of militarism again loom devilishly through such a -nightmare as Europe has endured for the last decade? Animosities and -jealousies may die out: France has forgotten Fashoda, England has -forgiven Russia for the blunder of the Dogger Bank. But the -expectation of war, the preparation for war, the whole habit and -incidence of militarism, must lead sooner or later to the clash. If -the guns were not ready, if the nations had to be drilled and armed -before they could be hurled at each others’ throats, there would be -time for reflection, for the subsidence of passions, for the revival -of dignity and decency. Militarism damns both the menacer and the -menaced. All the nations have suffered from that curse, Germany, -perhaps, the worst of all. The world has not yet forgotten Bismarck’s -gospel of blood and iron, so relentlessly preached and practised. The -inevitable results of the blood-and-iron doctrine, modernized as the -dogma of the “mailed fist,” can be seen to-day in the cataclysm that -has swept Europe. The pity of it, and the shame of it, that all the -skill of all the statesmen of the great Powers could produce no better -result than a continent divided into two armed camps, waiting for the -slaughter that was bound to come! - -As for Russia, and the assumed Slavonic menace, one must tread -somewhat diffidently where George Bernard Shaw has rushed in with -characteristic Shavian impetuosity. The world owes to Mr. Shaw the -discovery of a new nationality—himself; and it is impossible for any -citizen of the world to ignore the obligation. But even if Russia -achieves her never-forgotten dream of Constantinople and a purified -St. Sophia, Europe and civilization will not necessarily stand aghast, -trembling at each rumor of Cossack brutalities. Tennyson, who foresaw -the aërial navies “grappling in the central blue,” indeed proclaimed, -in one of the most execrable of his sonnets, that— - - “… The heart of Poland hath not ceased - To quiver, though her sacred blood doth drown - The fields, and out of every smouldering town - Cries to Thee, lest brute power be increased - Till that o’ergrown barbarian in the East - Transgress his ample bounds to some new crown: - Cries to Thee, ‘Lord, how long shall these things be, - How long this icy-hearted Muscovite - Oppress the region?’…” - -(I quote from memory, deprecating caustic correction). But, in spite -of anti-Semitic atrocities (are the hands of other nations so clean -now? They were foul once), and in spite of the blunders of a rigid -bureaucracy, the Russian nation is not necessarily a menace to -civilization: it has within it the elements of a wonderful idealism, -and whether autocracy may remain, or may not remain, as the outward -and visible form of government, the spirit of democracy is leavening -the people, and “Holy Russia” has in truth already been sanctified by -the blood of her innumerable martyrs—sometimes, perhaps, misguided -and mistaken; but offering to the world an example of idealism and -self-sacrifice that should surely dispel the nightmare of Russian -brutishness. - -I may record here, quite irrelevantly, my own fervent wish -(irrevocably established at the immature age of twelve years) that -Poland, with few of her limbs amputated, should be replaced upon the -map as an independent, and again powerful, nation. It was one of my -earliest dreams that I should be awakened at the dawn of a wintry day, -and urged by a delegation of Polish magnates to accept the one throne -of Europe that had been, and still should be, open to conspicuous (and -electoral) merit. That wish has not yet been gratified, and candor -compels me to attribute it to the delightful influence of the elder -Dumas, from whom I derived also my most enduring impressions of St. -Bartholomew, Catherine de Medici, Mazarin, Louis XIII, Richelieu, -Buckingham, Louis XIV, Louise de la Vallière, d’Artagnan, Athos, -Aramis, Porthos, and other immortals. India, I confess, held me -equally spellbound: for many months I hesitated between the succession -to Aurungzebe (why should I now spell the name differently?) and the -crown of Stanislaus. That hesitation has been fatal: I am still -throneless. - -Others may be throneless (the Mills of God grind steadily) before -final peace comes to the different warring nations. They have sowed in -their various ways, and will reap the ripened harvests. But how long -shall the childish quarrel of country with country be permitted and -encouraged by those who should have learnt a little wisdom, in this -twentieth century of perpetual miracles? Let us have done, once for -all, with petty jealousies and absurd misunderstandings. Let us blot -out, without regret and without the least compassion, the evil records -and results of insincerity and manufactured hatred. Let us extinguish, -finally and irresuscitably, those fires of malice and flagrant -nonsense that have been fed assiduously by the fools and knaves of the -world. - -Nowhere will you find a decent man, emancipated from the -leading-strings of prejudice and unafraid of the bludgeonings of -militarist authority, who does not condemn the present war, and all -wars, as useless, damnable, anachronistic and inexcusable. We have -learnt so much, in these later years; we have adventured in strange -ways, and silently borne strange reproaches. We have come very near to -God, and talked with Him by wireless, remedying the inconsistencies of -the prophets and filling in the gaps left blank by the poets. And -shall we still be bound by the gibes and gyves of the mediævalists? -The Middle Ages served their purpose: but why extend them to the -confusion of modern chronology? We have seen God, as no generation -before has seen Him. Let us then live, and not die, until the grave be -digged, and the night overshadow us at last. - - - - -SEEN THROUGH MOHAMMEDAN SPECTACLES - -ACHMED ABDULLAH - - -Although my father was a Muslim of the old Central-Asian school, a -Hegirist, of mixed Arab and Moghul blood, he had sent me to England -and the Continent for my school and university education. But boys are -much more broad-minded than grown-up men, and so my schoolmates and I -never worried about the fact that we had different customs, religion, -civilization, and atavistic tendencies. - -It was only after my return to the borderland of Afghanistan and -India, and after I had assumed once more native garb and speech, that -I began to feel myself an alien among those Europeans and -Anglo-Indians with whom I was brought into contact. - -For the first time in my life I felt the ghastly meaning of the words -“Racial Prejudice,” that cowardly, wretched caste-mark of the European -and the American the world over, that terrible blight which modern -Christianity has forced on the world. And it chilled me to the bone -and I wondered…. - -In Europe I had known many Asiatics who visited the universities -there. And we were the equals of the Europeans, the Christians, in -intellect and culture, and decidedly their superiors, being Muslim, in -cleanliness and courage. We were not only familiar with the European -classics which were the basis of their culture, but we were also -thoroughly versed in the literature and history of India and Central -Asia, things of which they knew less than an average Egyptian -donkey-boy. We were polyglots: we had mastered half a dozen European -languages, while even a smattering of Arabic or Turki or Chinese was a -rare exception amongst them. We all of us knew at least three Asian -languages to perfection. And finally we had a practical knowledge of -English, French and German political ideals and systems, while to them -the name of even such great Asian reformers as Asoka and Akbar and -Aurangzeb were absolutely unknown. - -In physical strength, virility, power of endurance and recuperation we -were immeasurably their superiors. And we were not picked men, but -plain, average Asian gentlemen. - -And yet, when I returned to my own land, there was that superior -smile, that nasty, patronizing attitude, that insufferable “Holier -than Thou” atmosphere about all of them whom I happened to meet. - -They made me feel that I was of the East and they of the West; and -they tried to make me feel—with no success—that they were the salt -of the earth, while the men of my faith and race were but the lowly -dung. - -Not even the bridge of personal friendship seemed able to span this -gulf, this abyss which I could feel more than I could define it; and -so I folded my tent and travelled; I studied India from South to -North, I visited Siberia, Egypt, Malta, Algeria, Turkey, Tunis, and -the Haussa country, wandering in all the lands where East and West rub -elbows, and I investigated calmly, I compared without too much bias. - -Finally I bent my steps Northward, to see with my own eyes and -according to the limits of my own understanding the working of -Christian civilization, and to study the dominant Western Faith in the -lands where it rules supreme. - -I was looking for a bridge with which to span the chasm, and I failed -miserably. Christian hypocrisy, Christian intolerance, savage -Christian ignorance frustrated me right and left. - -But I learned one thing, perhaps two. - -They spoke to me of Europe which they knew, and they spoke of India -which they did not know. They were what the world calls educated, -well-read people: and indeed they had read many books by eminent -Christian travellers, savants, and historians about the great -Peninsula. But the mirror of their souls reflected only distorted -pictures. They had no conception of the vastness of my land, they had -never heard of the great Asian conquerors and statesmen, they were -entirely ignorant of our wonderful literature. - -But still they spoke of India … fluently, patronizingly. - -They spoke of plague and cholera and famine and wretched sanitation -and cruelties unspeakable. But they did not understand me when I told -them that the teeming millions of Hindu peasantry somehow manage to -enjoy their careless lives to the full, and are really much more -satisfied than the European peasants or the small American farmers. - -I did not argue: I simply stated facts. But I discovered that it is a -titanic, heart-breaking task to prove the absurdity of anything which -the Christians have made up their minds to accept as true. I found -arrayed against me an iron phalanx of preconceived opinions and -misconstrued lessons of history. I began to understand that even -amongst educated people there can exist opinion without thought, and -that my two arch-foes were the Pharisee intolerance which is the -caste-mark and the blighting curse of the Christian the world over, -and the other Aryan vice: an unconscious generalization of those ideas -which have been adopted for the sake of convenience and self-flattery, -and in strict and delightfully naïve disregard of truth. The whole I -found to be spiced with religious hypocrisy; and is there a lower form -of hypocrisy than that which makes a man pretend for his own material -or spiritual purposes that a thing is good which in his inmost heart -he knows to be bad? The sincerity of such people is on a par with that -of him who, being debarred by a doctor from constant drinking, -proclaims that he is a reformed character and prates to his friends -about the delights of temperance. - -I learned that to fathom the murky depths of stupidity and intolerance -of the Christians of to-day, we should have a latter-day Moses -Maimonides amongst us, to write another _Moreh Nebukim_, another _Guide -for the Perplexed_. - -And then I made up my mind to attack that structure of ignorance and -misunderstanding, that jumble of generalization and hyperdeduction, -that idiotic racial self-confidence and national self-consciousness -which breeds Pharisee intolerance, which destroys individual inquiry -and unprejudiced opinion, and which sounds the death-knell of -procreativeness. - -The Hindu peasants say that it is a mistake to judge the quality of a -whole field of rice by testing one grain only. But the Europeans, the -Americans, who judge us have never even tested a solitary grain and -only know about its quality from hearsay. - -Not that they are afraid to voice what they miscall their opinions. -Only instead of having the courage of their own convictions, they have -the courage of somebody else’s convictions, not knowing that the most -obtuse ignorance is superior to dangerous, second-hand knowledge. - -They are eternally quoting the words of some writer whom they think -infallible. And there was chiefly one clever little jingle which was -on the lips of everybody with whom I tried to discuss the relations -between Orient and Occident. They used it as the final proof to settle -the argument and to preclude all further appeal to the tribunal of -common sense and common verity, and it ran as follows: - - “East is East, and West is West, - And never the twain shall meet.” - -I admire Kipling, chiefly because he is one of the few Europeans who -have studied the East with both intelligence and sympathy. From my -Oriental point of view I class his books with those of Max Müller, Sir -Alfred Lyall, Captain Sir Richard Burton, Pierre Loti, John Campbell -Oman, Victoria de Bunsen, Colonel Malleson, W. D. Whitney, William -Crooke, and two or three other Pandits. - -But I became sick to death of that smooth little jingle about the East -and the West. I found it everywhere, until it haunted me in my dreams. - -I would buy the gaudy Sunday edition of an American newspaper and I -would read the gruesome story of how a high-caste Mandchoo had beaten -and tortured his beautiful French wife … and, by the Prophet, the -picturesque account would wind up with an appeal to the intelligent -American reader not to wonder at the blue-beard Mandarin’s cruelty, -because the poet states that East is East and West is West. - -In the morning I would see in the _Petit Journal_ how the -unspeakable Turk had invaded a peaceful Armenian settlement, had shot -the males, outraged the females, and roasted the babes over an open -fire, and how I should also suppress my natural indignation at such -atrocities, because the East is naturally the East. - -And at night, before smoking the farewell cigarette of the dying day, -I would discover in _The Graphic_ harrowing accounts of -child-marriages in Hindustan, and would be instructed that the reason -for such a barbarous custom was contained in the poet’s statement that -“never the twain shall meet.” - -Do you wonder that every night, in my dreams, I strangled Mr. Kipling -slowly and deliciously with a thin silken cord? But of course you do -not wonder; for I am an Afghan … and … well … - - “East is East and West is West.” - - -II - -Assumed racial superiority is a foregone conclusion in the minds of -the so-called Aryans of Europe and of America. - -I was in Paris when the world rang with the war-glories of Nippon, and -afterwards, when for a while it seemed as if the bloodless Young Turk -revolution would meet with success. - -There we had at last two specific instances of Oriental nations -working out their own salvation against tremendous odds: Japan -threatened by the Russian Goliath, and Turkey a prey to the wrangling -and the selfish machinations of all Europe, of all lying Christendom. - -But the effect on the conceit of the Aryans was less than nothing. The -people of Europe and of America are blind to the Writing on the Wall. -They have sealed their ears against the murmuring voices of Awakening -Asia. - -Are they afraid to listen? - -Now and then, when not engaged in discussing the latest tango or -divorce case, they do read and talk about the awakening of China, the -commercial conquests and aggressive policy of Japan, and the -smouldering fires of United Islam, but without experiencing the least -abating influence on their artificially nurtured racial and religious -conceit. Peacefully and stupidly the Christians, the “white races,” -continue to misread the lessons of history and the signs of the times. - -They are afraid to see the brutal, naked truth. - -Once I watched an ostrich bury his head in the sand…. - -They have established the amusing dogma that the so-called White and -Christian countries are the superior countries, just because they are -White and Christian. - -I have established a slightly different dogma, and, being a charitable -and entirely guileless Oriental, I will make a present of it to my -Aryan friends: - -You Westerns feel so sure of your superiority over us Easterns that -you refuse even to attempt a fair or correct interpretation of past -and present historical events. You deliberately stuff the minds of -your growing generations with a series of ostensible events and -shallow generalities, because you wish to convince them for the rest -of their lives how immeasurably superior you are to us, how there -towers a range of differences between the two civilizations, how East -is only East, and the West such a glorious, wonderful, unique West. - -In _Tancred_, that brilliant Oriental, the Earl of Beaconsfield, in -devoting a few lines to a great Bishop of the Church of England, -really pictures the typical Christian such as he stinks in our -nostrils from Morocco to Kharbin. For the noble Jewish Peer -characterizes the Right Reverend Gentleman as a man who combined great -talents for action with very limited powers of thought, who was -bustling, energetic, versatile, gifted with an indomitable -perseverance and stimulated by an ambition that knew no repose, with a -capacity for mastering details and an inordinate passion for affairs, -who could permit nothing to be done without his interference, and who -consequently was perpetually involved in transactions which were -either failures or blunders. - -In material progress you have led the world for the last two or three -centuries. By the True Prophet … all of three hundred years! - -And like all parvenus, you are so astonished at your success, so -pleased with yourselves, that you imagine your present hegemony in the -race for material progress to be a guarantee for the future. But there -is not even the shadow of an excuse for such an assumption, unless it -be the fact that the Christian mind is diseased with racial and -religious megalomania. There is not a single historical parallel which -justifies your pleasant superstition that your present leadership, -which after all is of very recent birth, will show greater stability -than any of those many alien, ancient civilizations which long ago -came from the womb of eternity, to go back whence they sprang. - -Nations as well as men are judged by two factors: by their virtues, -and by their vices. - -As to virtues, what have you Christians done for the general uplift of -the world which could not be matched by a random look into the pages -of Oriental history? And as to vices, is there any degeneracy rampant -amongst us which is not equalled by the degeneracy of the Western -lands? - -History has an unpleasant knack of repeating itself; and the helot of -to-day has the disagreeable habit of being the master of to-morrow, -regardless of race and color and creed. I would like to return to -earth about three hundred years from to-day, just to observe how my -descendants, who will have intermarried with Chinese and Japanese, -will succeed in ruling their colonies in Europe and in America. And I -do hope that the Chinese blood of my descendants will not be too -preponderant: otherwise, taking a leaf out of European and American -colonization, and thus forcing their own food-laws on the subject -races, they might force their White and Christian subjects to eat -roast puppy-dog. - -Human nature is the same the world over, and there never was an -originally superior race or people. Some nations have founded powerful -civilizations which lasted for a shorter or a longer period, but it -was never the racial force which caused it, but rather the -irresistible swing of circumstances. - -It was Kismet. - - -III - -“But we are Aryans, don’t you understand?… Aryans, the salt of the -earth….” - -“Aryans” … I know the word, I find myself on familiar ground. - -My teachers at the universities of Oxford, Paris, and Berlin had -taught me that the Aryans were a Central-Asian race, a “white” race, -who conquered Europe and India, and who were of such superior -intellectual and physical fibre that they made themselves masters -wherever they went. And when I inquired about those Aryans who invaded -India, I was told that right there they showed their wonderful metal: -for brought face to face with teeming millions of dark aborigines, -they established a caste-system of which the higher strata represent -to this day the descendants of the white-skinned and therefore -high-minded invaders, while the sweeper, the menial, the village -laborer is the scion of the dark-skinned, conquered Dravidians. - -To an Oriental this is of course a ridiculous and lying assumption. -For even the purest of Aryan tribes in Hindustan, for instance the -Rajpoots, have intermarried extensively with at least two other races. -This superstition is not a new invention. It is as old as the -beginning of things, and that much-praised work, the Veda, is only a -chronicle of the ancient conceit of the Aryans, a conceit to which the -lying and barbarous intolerance of modern Christianity has given a -sharp and poisonous edge. - -Yet even the Veda speaks of intermarriages between the Aryans and the -original lords of the soil of India. - -The caste system was not a bright invention to put a lasting stamp of -inferiority on the conquered aborigines, but it is the outcome of a -slow evolutionary process, due to the machinations of Brahmin priests -who wished to preserve the profits arising from their sacerdotal -profession within a restricted circle of families. These Brahmins had -increased their ranks and influence by drawing recruits from the -devil-worshipping priests of the aboriginal jungle tribes. Thus, how -can there ever have been a question of preserving or establishing a -permanency of racial superiority through the medium of caste, since at -the very beginning of the system the race had lost its purity? - -No. Your wonderful Aryan kinsmen in India were absorbed by the -“inferior” races whom they conquered, just as the Normans were -absorbed by the Saxon Englishmen, the Alexandrian Greeks by the -Egyptians, the Mongols of the Golden Horde by the Chinese, just as the -strong always absorb the weak, and just as, a few hundred years hence, -we shall absorb you. - -To-day Christian England is ruling India, and the English Raj is just, -fair-minded, tolerant, and equitable. This is true, and it is also -true that the last Moghuls disgraced the throne of Delhi and shattered -Hindustan. But what can you prove by it? - -Others have ruled India successfully before Asia had ever heard of -England. - -Akbar, the Moghul Emperor, enforced tolerance and justice in those -barbaric days when the life of a Jew in Europe was at the kind mercy -of an ignorant and brutal Christian rabble. He, the Muslim, built and -endowed Hindu temples and charitable institutions while his European -contemporaries were periodically burning down the synagogues and were -trying to extend the sway of the gentle Christ with the effective help -of murder and torture. He, and before him his father’s successor on -the throne of Delhi, Shir Shah, the Afghan usurper, attempted to found -an Indian empire “broad-based upon the people’s will,” long before the -days of Voltaire, Robespierre, Rousseau, and Beaumarchais. He settled -land revenue on an equitable basis while the peasants of Europe were -groaning under the heavy and humiliating burden of serfdom. - -You say that his successors did not live up to the high standard -established by this greatest of Moghul princes? - -But we find fitting parallels in the history of Christian Europe. For -were not the successors of Theodosius as degenerate as those of Akbar? -Did not, in Macaulay’s words, the imbecility and disputes of -Charlemagne’s descendants bring contempt on themselves and destruction -to their subjects? - -Or take the civilization of ancient Rome. - -It was partially saved from ruin by the Asians, the Syro-Christians, -who brought the word of the great Jewish Rabbi across the Adriatic. -Judaism is an Oriental creed, and what is your famed European -Christianity if not “Judaism for the Masses”? - -The Asian genius of Christ and his Hebrew apostles saved the Aryan -genius from stagnation and stupidity, and brought the first faint -glimmer of light into the barbaric darkness of Northern Europe. - -The Asian Christians succeeded in Aryan Rome, and just as long as the -Asians ruled, the traditional cupidity and cruelty of Aryan Rome were -softened by the broadly tolerant humanity of Asia. But as soon as the -Syro-Christians were in the minority and the Christians of European -stock in the majority, persecution and intolerance commenced, and the -word of the great Oriental Prophet Jesus Christ was sadly mutilated -and misunderstood by that superior race, the “Whites.” - -But even then you could not rid yourselves of our subtle Asian -influence. I know your gifts of energy and your spirit of progress; -but we men of Asia have a power of resistance and a capacity for rapid -recuperation which you can never fathom. - -Could you break the spirit or the virility of the Jew? You have -tortured him, you have exiled him, and you have burnt him on the stake -for the greater glory of God … and he rules you to-day. - -Again, look at the history of your Europeanized Christian Church, and -observe what happened: - -The Asian spirit flourished again in Protestantism and the -Reformation. Many of your Protestant reformers were semi-Jewish, -semi-Oriental in spirit. Anti-Trinitarianism was preached in Siena, -and God ceased to be a mathematical problem. The Decalogue and the -Apocalypse were studied. Chairs of Hebrew philosophy and philology -were founded at French and German universities; and the Calvinists and -the Presbyterians were altogether of the old Testament, of Asia, in -spirit and sentiment. - -Your famous Reformation was only a return to the Ebionism of the Asian -Evangelists. One of the greatest events in your history, it was a most -complete and vindicating triumph for the spirit of that Asia which you -attempt to despise and patronize in your ignorance and intolerance. - -Must we sit at your feet? Shall the pupil teach the master? - -We taught you to read, to write, and to think. We gave you your -religion and your few ideals. We have done more for you than you can -ever do for us. We freed you from your ancient bondage of -superstitions and idolatry. We gave you the first sparks of science -and literature. We paved the way for your material progress. - -Without our help you would still be tattooed and inarticulate -barbarians. - -But you have been getting out of hand, and are sinking back into the -old slough of ignorance and crass intolerance. - -And so perhaps some day, after we Mohammedans have finished converting -Asia and Africa to the Faith of Islam (and we are doing steady work in -that direction), we may send another Tamerlane into Europe, reinforced -by an army of a few million Asians who laugh in the face of death, and -finish the job. - - -IV - -You speak of Oriental mystery, of Oriental romance. - -Are we Asians then like Molière’s bourgeois who spoke prose all his -life without knowing it? Is there really a veil of mystery about us? - -No, no. The Most High God did not take the trouble to create two -different types of human beings, one to work on the banks of the -Seine, and the other to sing His praises on the shore of the Ganges. -There is no veil, no mystery, no romance … except the veil of -Christian ignorance, the romance of Christian imagination, the mystery -of Christian want of desire to know. - -There is perhaps a latent search after knowledge and truth in your -hearts’ souls. But your inborn selfishness forces you to believe that -a healthy portion of ignorance is the best medicine against the -ravages of the dangerous malady which is called Tolerance. Just a -little effort would teach you that there is no mystery about us, no -abyss which separates you from us. But your ignorance is your bliss -and provides you with a sort of righteous bias. It also sheds a holy -and therefore eminently Christian halo around your attitude of -meddlesome interference in the affairs of Asia and North Africa. Of -course you only interfere because of your laudable intention to show -us the true path to civilization and salvation. And if accidentally -you increase your own power and wealth, if you impoverish the native -whom you attempt to “save,” if you incite strife where no strife -existed before you imported soldiers and bibles and missionaries and -whisky and some special brands of “white” diseases … well … Allah -is Great…. - -The mystery which is supposed to shroud the Orient is a lying -invention of Christendom destined to give a semblance of justice to -your selfish, harmful meddlings in the affairs, religions, politics -and customs of other countries. - -If you wish to conquer with the right of fire and the might of sword, -go ahead and do so, or at least say so. It would be a motive which we -Muslim, being warriors, could understand and appreciate. But do not -clothe your greed for riches and dominion in the hypocritical, nasal, -sing-song of a heaven-decreed Mission to enlighten the poor native, a -Pharisee call of duty to spread the word of your Saviour, your lying -intention to uplift the ignorant Pagan. - -Drop your mask of consummate beatitude in the contemplation of the -spiritual joys, the Christian and therefore very sanitary plumbing you -are endeavoring to confer upon us. Stop being liars and hypocrites: -and you will cease being what you are to-day: - -The most hated and the most despised men in the length and breadth of -Asia and North Africa. - -And I am not exaggerating. I am really putting it mildly so as not to -hurt your feelings. - -Let me point out just one instance: the Young Turk Revolution. - -You, the apostles of freedom and constitutional government and half a -dozen assorted fetishes, what was your attitude then? - -You allowed Austria, your trusted steward of other people’s property -since the Berlin Congress of Thieves, to steal this property, the -fertile provinces of Bosnia and Herzegovina. You looked on calmly -while the Bulgar mountebank annexed Turkish territory in time of -peace. You passed resolutions, full of blatant Christian hypocrisy and -Christian lies; but you never raised a finger in our behalf, in behalf -of that justice and humanity which you proudly claim as your -caste-right. The whole affair was a piece of brigandage, carried on -under the much-patched cloak of that whining cant which has made -modern Christianity an ugly by-word in Asia and North Africa. - -You united in your endeavors to establish an independent and -constitutionally governed Roumania, a free Servia, a modern Greece and -Bulgaria, and, more recently, an autonomous Macedonia, under the -pretext that Turkey, being controlled with an iron rod by a despotic -Sultan and an intolerably exalted Sheykh-ul-Islam, was not fit to -govern Christian races. - -But you obstruct Mohammedan Turkey’s efforts to introduce and enforce -the very principles of liberty and popular government which in former -years you had been advocating as a _sine qua non_ in the -administration of your precious Christian protégés. - -An ounce of baptismal water makes such a difference, does it not? - -I believe that I am the mouthpiece of a great majority of my -fellow-Muslim and my fellow-Asians when I state that the Jesuit policy -of Europe during the political travail of Young Turkey, when the -Osmanli attempted to crystallize his newly found liberty, will do more -to fan the red embers of fighting Pan-Islam into living, leaping -flames than any other political event since the Berlin treaty. - -We have suffered long enough a series of deliberate moral insults and -material injuries at the hands of selfish, canting, lying -Christianity, and we are still capable of tremendous energies when -Islam is in danger. - -And who can deny that Islam is in danger? - -Your attitude during the Balkan troubles proved to us that the liberty -which you deem necessary to the Christian Balkans is a negligible -quantity when applied to the followers of the Prophet Mohammed who -inhabit the same peninsula. - -And I could mention a dozen instances to prove that you yourselves are -forcing on the world the coming struggle between Asia, all Asia, -against Europe and America, against Christendom, in other words. - -You are heaping up material for a Jehad, a Pan-Islam, a Pan-Asia Holy -War, a gigantic Day of Reckoning, an invasion of a new Attila and -Tamerlane … who will use rifles and bullets, instead of lances and -spears. - -You are deaf to the voice of reason and fairness, and so you must be -taught with the whirling swish of the sword when it is red. - - -V - -You claim that altruism and the virtues are the monopoly of your creed -and your race. - -But in reality the teachings of Jesus are not a particle more apt to -lead his followers in the golden path than are the sayings of the Lord -Buddha, the laws of Moses, the wisdom of Confucius, or the words of -the Koran. True tolerance, true altruism teaches us that what is right -in Peking may be wrong on the shores of Lake Tchaad, and what is wrong -in a Damascus bazaar may be right at a Kansas ice-cream social. - -Such true tolerance is far broader than the limits of professing -Christianity, than the limits of any established, cut-and-dried creed. -It is as broad as the Seven Holy Rivers of Hindustan and as vast as -Time. The creed of mutual sympathy is a very old creed: even amongst -the troglodytes chosen spirits must have known it, the red-haired -barbarians of Gaul must have heard of it, and amongst the -lizard-eating Arabs of pre-Islamic days it must have found adherents. -It is a human truth, a human principle which is the common property of -mankind East and West; but Christian hegemony in worldly affairs has -killed it, has blighted it with the curse of the cross. - -Intrinsic unselfishness and abstract goodness is older than the -Gospel, the Koran, the Veda, or any other religious book. Being at the -very core of that civilization from which all changes spring, it is in -itself eternally unchangeable, be it clothed in the words of the -Sermon on the Mount, the Prophet Mohammed’s three great principles of -Compassion, Charity, and Resignation, or the famed edict of the -Emperor Asoka, who many centuries before the days of Jesus declared to -the world that “a man must not do reverence to his own sect by -disparaging that of another man.” - - - - - THE SHROUD - - EDNA ST. VINCENT MILLAY - - - Death, I say, my heart is bowed - Unto thine,—O mother! - This red gown will make a shroud - Good as any other! - - (I, that would not wait to wear - My own bridal things, - In a dress dark as my hair - Made my answerings. - - I, to-night, that till he came - Could not, could not wait, - In a gown as bright as flame - Held for them the gate.) - - Death, I say, my heart is bowed - Unto thine,—O mother! - This red gown will make a shroud - Good as any other! - - - - -NEW LOYALTIES FOR OLD CONSOLATIONS - -H. A. OVERSTREET - - -To most persons the conception of a godless world is the conception of -a world with the bottom dropped out. It is a world from which all the -high values, all the splendid consolations have disappeared. This is -true even for many who feel that they cannot, in reason, any longer -believe in a personal God. For all their honest disbelief, the world -has turned grey for them. It has lost its old wonder and joy. It has -become a dead world. - -It is interesting to ask ourselves whether all this need be true; -whether the high values and the finer consolations may not be just as -real when the belief in a personal God has vanished. With the -vanishing of that belief, of course, the whole attitude toward the -universe is altered. Hopes and comforts that were deeply and warmly of -the older order of beliefs have no place in the new order; while -loyalties and aspirations that were the breath of its life are become -meaningless and without force. But may not new loyalties and -aspirations, hopes and comforts find their place strongly and -inspiringly in the later order of belief? - -It will be interesting, as an answer to this question, to ask how -differently a society would behave all of whose members, disbelieving -utterly in the reality of a personal God, had no other thought of the -divine life than that it was their own larger and more ideal -existence. - -I remember at the time of the San Francisco earthquake passing one of -the cathedrals of the city and finding its broad stone steps, covering -a goodly portion of a city square, black with kneeling worshippers. -There could be no question of their reason for being there. They were -setting themselves right with their God, hoping that in the fervor of -their devotion he would have mercy upon them and save them from -destruction. So on shipboard in times of great danger one will find -the passengers gathered in the cabin praying to God for -deliverance,—always, to be sure, with the proviso, “Yet if it be thy -will that we perish, thy will be done!” - -These are dramatic but typical instances of what occurs constantly in -homes and churches where people pray to a personal deity. Could such -an attitude of prayer have any meaning for a man who disbelieved in a -personal deity? Obviously not. Would he cease to pray? It all depends -upon what one is to mean by prayer. - -Prayer of the kind indicated is an effort to secure assistance in -circumstances where the normal human means fail. Normally, for -example, if a man would have bread, he sets about to plant the proper -seed, or grind the flour, or mix the dough. He finds out, in short, -the laws that govern the production or manufacture of breadstuffs; and -he does not expect to secure his desired result until he has -accommodated himself in all the requisite ways to these laws and -conditions. If a man would save himself from a burning house, he looks -for a fire-escape, or a rope, or calls for a ladder; again -accommodating his action to the fundamental conditions of the -situation. But if the heavens are long without rain and the seed dry -up, or the fire burns away the means of escape, the man, at the end of -his human resources, calls to another power for help. - -Such a call for help is based upon two assumptions, which in some -respects scarcely support each other. They are the assumption, first, -that there is a power able to control to his beneficent purposes -forces that are humanly uncontrollable; but, second, that this power -will not act unless attracted by very special and fervent appeal. The -latter fact, that special appeal is needed, may be due to the God’s -impotence, his inability to be in all places at once: he does the best -he can, hurrying hither and thither from one distressing circumstance -to another. Or it may be due to his demand that his creatures shall -continually turn their minds to him, an attitude which he succeeds in -securing in them for the most part only when they are hard pressed -with danger. - -Stated thus baldly, it would be difficult even on the naïve planes of -religious thought to find persons who would acknowledge either that -their God was a jealous god, refusing help until all the requisite -ceremonies of abasement and supplication had been fulfilled, or that -he was a finite God, half distracted by the imploring voices calling -to him from all quarters of his universe. And yet, in prayer as it is -ordinarily practised, both of these views are more or less -unconsciously mingled. What prevents the emergence of their absurdity -into clear consciousness is the relatively healthy thought underlying -all prayer that if a man would secure something for himself he must -himself spend some effort in the process. _Ex nihilo nihil._ In -situations that pass beyond all his power of practical human control, -there is nothing for him to do but to give his mere effort of -adoration and hope. - -On the higher levels of religious experience, this semi-magical -conception of prayer grows increasingly in ill-repute. The thought is -more and more in evidence that if God wished to prevent certain -distresses, he would do so of his own beneficent accord. A request for -specific aid, in short, would insinuate in him, either a failure to -know in all circumstances what was best to be done, or an inability to -keep wholly abreast of the tasks which he ought to perform. To save -the majesty of God, prayer must become simply a turning of the mind to -him, not for specific help, but for that general uplift of spirit -which comes from the contemplation of his supreme perfection. - -Here obviously is the germ of a higher and radically different -conception of prayer. In the more naïve conception, help was to come -from the “power not ourselves”; in the maturer conception, help is to -come _through the stimulation in ourselves of our own highest -powers_—a stimulation effected by the turning of our minds and -spirits to the highest conceivable Reality. - -The efficacy of prayer, in short, in this conception of it, will lie -not in what it brings to us from without, but what it effects -within,—what powers, efforts, aspirations it develops in us. Let us -return to the kneeling worshippers. As they bowed their heads in -fervent supplication, other men and women were distributing bread and -clothing to destitute families, or were building shelters, or were -clearing the streets of débris, or were patrolling with gun on -shoulder against criminal disorder. Is it correct to say, as the older -religions have always said, that the latter were engaged wholly in -earthly affairs, while the former were entering the higher life of God -and the spirit? Or is it truer to hold that the digging away of débris -was a far more effective and powerful prayer to God than supplication -to him for help? - -The kneeling worshippers were indeed turning their minds to their -highest conceivable Reality. It was a Reality that they hoped would do -things for them. But the diggers of débris, or the distributers of -bread and clothing, were likewise, unconsciously no doubt, but in -actual effect, turning their minds to their highest Reality. Face to -face with the destruction of those things that give order and beauty -and power to life, they were thinking (in their unconscious selves) of -what a city for men and women and children _ought to be and could be_. -It ought not to be a tumbled mass of bricks and burning wood; it ought -not to be filled with starving people; it ought not to be given over -to looters and murderers; it ought to be a city clean, ordered, happy. -With their smoke-blinded eyes, they may not have seen far beyond the -immediate demands of their ideal; but ideal it nevertheless was to -which they lifted their souls in service. With all its vague -inadequacy, it was for them then and there their highest Reality, -their God—the ideal life in their members—to which they felt that -they must devote themselves with full power of brain and muscle. They -asked nothing of this their God; rather it was their God _that asked -everything of them_, that stimulated them to the full, devoted -summoning of all their essential powers. - -When a child lies sick unto death, what is the effective form of -prayer? If the divine life, as we have held, is our own ideal life, -prayer to such God is the tireless, unflinching effort to bring some -measure of that ideal life to realization. The death of a little child -of causes that might be controlled is hardly in keeping with the ideal -of life. Hence devotion to the ideal calls for every straining of -effort,—the loving care, the ceaseless watching, the sacrifice of -pleasure and comforts to purchase the best knowledge and skill to save -the little life. This is the essential prayer; not the bowing in -helpless misery and supplication before a God who needs to be called -from some far forgetfulness to his proper tasks. - -During recent winter storms, when New York was filled with hundreds of -thousands of unemployed, several hundred of these unfortunate men, as -reported by _The New York Times_, marched through the snow-filled -streets to one of the large evangelical churches where the weekly -prayer meeting was being held. As they filed in, consternation spread -among the worshippers. Their minister, however, stopped the oncoming -crowd and asked them what they wanted. “We want shelter for the night -in your church,” they said. The minister, looking at his cushioned -pews, replied that he could not permit it. “But cannot we sleep in the -basement?” they asked. No, the minister said, they could not, and he -advised them to leave the church quietly, at the same time whispering -to one of his congregation to call up the police. The police came in -due order and rough-handled the men; and the prayers to God were -resumed. Meanwhile, at another place in the city, a great body of men -and women were gathered, drawn together at the instance of the -American Association for Labor Legislation, to consider ways and means -for relieving the distressing conditions of unemployment. At the -latter meeting men spoke of municipal employment bureaus, of -scientific plans for unemployment insurance; they brought forth facts -and figures to prove the possibility of regulating business in such a -way as to prevent the alternation of slack and rush seasons. They did -not mention God. And yet one wonders whether their earnest and -forceful deliberations were not a far more fervent prayer to God, a -far more devoted yielding of themselves to the power of their ideal -selves than the windy prayer of that minister (or of his people) who -trusted his God so poorly that he called in the city’s police to help -Him out of an ugly scrape. - -Once the divine life is believed to be not a beneficent Person other -than ourselves to whom we may call for help, but the finer life that -lives potentially in ourselves, prayer ceases to be a semi-magic -formula applicable to an order of existence beyond our own. Prayer is -then nothing more or less than the turning of mind and spirit to the -service of the ideal that lives in us. And it is most effectually -realized not by departing from human activity, by yielding oneself to -a power not oneself; but rather by a vigorous turning to the problems -and difficulties of our life and enlisting every last shred of effort -to set them right. - -It follows then that there is prayer wherever there is service, -_service of any kind_ that makes for life-betterment. The chemist who -learns a new control has received an answer to his year-long prayer; -the physician who finds the saving serum has prayed long and fervently -and has been heard of his God. The business man who finds a way of -juster coöperation with his men need never have named the word God or -joined in holy adoration. But he has prayed—to his ideal of human -brotherhood; and has prayed so vigorously that his God has heard and -answered. - -But in each case the God that has heard and answered has been the -deeper possibilities of these men’s own life—their ideal life—which -they, by their loyal devotion, have wrought out of mere possibility -into some manner of actuality. - - -II - -This in part is what prayer must mean when the old devotion to the -personal God has vanished. The last shred of its supernatural, -semi-magical connotation will have disappeared. If things worth while -are to be done; if life values are to be accomplished and preserved, -it must be by a knowledge and control of the conditions of their -accomplishment. The devotion to the ideal in us presupposes therefore -the most strenuous and persistent effort to learn these modes of -control, to understand the deep and intricate ways of life, and to -bend every power—of mind and body, of science and art—to bring life -into harmony with their fundamental demands. - -The situation may be illustrated by the contrast between the older and -the newer ways of offering thanks to God for great benefits received. -In the older days a man would pray, “O God, if thou wilt save the life -of my child, there shall be so many candles burning before thine -altar”; or “There shall be a new chapel added to thy house of prayer.” -The burning candles and the new chapel may have served human -purposes,—certainly the candle-makers had their small benefit of it; -but the essential thought was not service to mankind, but tribute to -God. When, however, the personal God has vanished and there is no -divine life but our own deeper and more ideal existence, how shall a -man give thanks for deliverance? Any man who has helped wife and nurse -and doctors to fight with all the power that human knowledge and skill -can command for the life of his child, knows that out of the deep -thanksgiving of his heart the thing that he would most wish to do -thereafter would be to bend every effort to make such saving knowledge -and skill accessible to fathers and mothers of other children, or to -extend that knowledge and develop that skill to the saving of lives -from still deeper distresses. He will build a hospital or endow a -chair in medical research, or he will send his small contribution to -some agency that makes for the amelioration of life conditions. And he -will do this not as a tribute to a God who delights in adoration, but -in simple devotion to the ideal of a more adequate human life. - -Or, indeed, he _might_ found a church or endow a minister. For are we -to suppose that church and minister are to disappear when God the -Perfect Person no longer lives to hear the old supplications? But it -will be a very different church from the churches with which we are -familiar. The church of to-day still lingers in its animistic and -magical memories. The church services are supposed to have vital -efficacy for the saving of men’s souls, not simply in the ordinary way -of stimulating them by precept and example to better living, but by -performing for them and with them certain rites pleasing to God. There -is still in the minds of most churchmen something efficacious about -the very attendance upon divine worship. It is an act which God -enjoins and which he rewards when it is faithfully performed. It is -like the pagan custom of bringing gifts to the altar: the god demands -the gifts and rewards the bringer of gifts for his lowly obedience. It -is true that the more enlightened churches are rapidly outgrowing this -belief in the ceremonial efficacy of church service; but it would not -be difficult to show that it still persists in so great measure as -very definitely to color the word “religious” with the meaning “that -which pertains to divine ceremonial.” The sharp line of demarcation -between “religious” and “secular” is but the expression of this -animistic and supernatural survival in religion. - -But even churches that have largely outgrown belief in the saving -efficacy of supernatural ceremonial, who believe that attendance upon -church service is wholly for the sake of inspiration to better living, -seek to secure that inspiration by pointing the worshipper to the -perfect God, or to his beloved Son. One may doubtless get inspiration -from the tireless work of a Burbank, or a Curie, or a Florence -Nightingale. If the church, however, uses such sources of inspiration, -it is only by the way. Its fundamental source is the Perfect Person, -the Eternal God. The church has the special function of calling men -from their secular activities, of pointing upward to that great Guide -and Friend and Provider in whose name and through whose power they are -to live. - -The new type of church will indeed call men to the remembrance of the -divine life—it will point upward—but it will be their own divine -life to which it will call them. It will find their divine life in -their own ideals and in their loyal service of these ideals. Hence its -primary interest will be not in what some perfect God wants of men, -but what the God in themselves wants of them,—what types of things -they long for, what powers of mind and body they are willing to devote -to securing them. It will make far more difference to the new church -whether its communicant is fighting child labor with all his power of -mind and soul than whether he is a regular attendant upon weekly -prayers. Indeed, it will know no true and rounded prayer save actual -service. Hence its body of communicants will be first and foremost men -and women engaged in human service. The condition for admission to the -new church will be not a profession of faith but an exhibition of -deed. Does a man care enough for anything worth while to put strenuous -effort into its accomplishment; does he care for it not for his own -sake primarily but for the sake of enhancing the life of his fellows -and his world—it may be to discover a cancer cure, or to invent a -dishwasher, or to make a better school—such a man or woman is -welcomed into the new church. However circumscribed his ideal may be, -inasmuch as it is an ideal of service it is the divine in him that is -coming to life. He is already a worshipper. - -By this token, there will be no place in the new church for the man -who is anxious about his soul or who thinks much of what will happen -to him after death. He belongs properly in the congregation of -self-seekers; not in the church of the divine life. - -The new church, in short, will be primarily a clearing-house of -service, to which men will go not to save their souls but to save -their world. It will be a spiritual centre, so to speak, of all -service-activities; a place for comparing notes, for learning of each -other, for the heartening of one another in their worthful tasks. The -leader of such a church will be a man not only deeply interested in -and in touch with the agencies and activities of human betterment, but -versed likewise in the fundamental sciences that make for a finer -direction and control of life. His theology will be not an occult -research of supernatural relationships and powers, but physics and -chemistry, biology and sociology, ethics and philosophy—all the -fundamental approaches, in short, to the problem of human -self-realization. - - -III - -Yet splendid as such religious life may be conceded to be, it will -apparently lack one of the primary consolations of the older belief, -the assurance, namely, that the fundamental government of the world is -just and good. “God’s in his heaven; all’s right with the world.” If, -as we have been urging, God is not in his heaven, it may indeed, for -all we know to the contrary, be all wrong with the world. A few years -ago we were very much perturbed by certain conclusions reached by the -accredited masters of science. The universe was running down, they -said, and would end a lifeless, frozen mass. The thought of an -ever-living God was then a comfort against such ominous prophecy. If -God lives, it follows that all things of value will live, that the -world cannot go to ultimate ruin. - -That old prophecy, however, of a frozen and lifeless world no longer -has honor in our land. Recent discoveries of new types of energy, a -more penetrating analysis both of the mathematics and mechanics of the -situation, show the prophecy to have been made on wholly insufficient -and insecure grounds. The old dogmatic materialism has had to give way -to a critical and open-minded evolutionism which tends more and more -to regard the cosmic process as one of expanding power, in which the -values for which we deeply care—conscious life, purposive direction, -science, art, morality—appear to have a place of growing security and -effectiveness. And yet the evolutionism of the day, unlike the older -religious thought, finds no cosmic certainty upon which it may utterly -bank. The universe, with all the high values that have been achieved, -_may_ indeed go to ruin. There is no absolute guarantee for the -future. All that modern evolutionism can say to us is that looking -over such history of the world as is accessible, and analyzing the -processes there found, it seems highly probable that the line of the -future will be a line of advance, an advance from relative -disorganization to organization, from a large degree of mechanical -indifference to increasing organic solidarity and integration, from -antagonisms and conflicts to mutuality and coöperation. But it is only -probable. There is no God who holds the destiny in his hands and makes -it certain of accomplishment. - -In view of this uncertainty as to the world’s government and outcome, -it may be asked whether the new type of religion will not be weaker in -moral and spiritual vigor than the old. Do not vigor and initiative -spring from hope and sure confidence in the fundamental rightness of -the world? In answer to this one has but to ask the question: in what -type of situation does the human character grow strong and -heroic,—that in which there is no doubt of the happy outcome, in -which the individual plays his part, assured that nothing can happen -wrongly; or that in which the outcome is uncertain, in which the -individual realizes that he must fight his way, knowing not whether -victory or defeat will greet him, but assured only that whatever -happens, he must fight and fight to the end? Is it unfair to say that -the old religion with its confident, childlike resting on God (“He -loves the burthen”) developed a type of character that was not, in the -mass, conspicuously heroic? “God knows best”; “It will all come out -right”; “Thy will be done”—these are not expressions of fighting men; -they are expressions of men who resign themselves to the ruling of -powers greater than themselves. A civilization characterized by such -an attitude will not be one strenuously alive to eliminate the sorry -evils of life. But the men who believe that the issue of the universe -is in doubt, that there is no powerful God to lead the hosts to -victory, will, if they have the stuff of men in them, strike out their -manliest to help whatever good there is in the world to win its way -against the forces of evil. A civilization of such men will be a -tough-fibred civilization, strenuous to fight, grimly ready, like the -Old Guard, to die but never surrender. - -There is, in short, something subtly weakening about the optimism of -the traditional religions. Like the historic soothing syrup, with its -unadvertised opiate, it soothes the distress not by curing the disease -but by temporarily paralyzing the function. “To trust God nor be -afraid” means in most cases—not all—to settle back from a too -anxious concern about the evils of the world. “God will take care of -his own!” How different is this from the attitude: “The task is ours -and the whole world’s and we must see it through!” - - -IV - -But from another point of view there was an element of power in the -older religion which seems at first blush to be utterly lacking in the -type of new religion we are describing. A prominent world-evangelist -of the Young Men’s Christian Association was recently lecturing to the -college students of New York City on the ethical and religious life. -It was significant to note that most of his talk to students concerned -itself with temptations and that the invariable outcome of each talk -was that the one infallible means of meeting temptation was to realize -God’s presence in one’s life, to companion with God, to feel him near -and watchful, ever sympathetic, ever ready with divine help. Students -do indeed get power from that kind of belief. They feel themselves -before an all-seeing eye, a hand is on their shoulder, a voice is in -their ear; and when the difficult moment comes they are not alone. How -utterly uncompanioned, how lonely, on the other hand, must be the -student who knows no beneficent, all-seeing, and all-caring Father. -When his difficult moment comes he stands in desolate isolation. -Victory or defeat then must hang upon his own puny strength and -wavering determination. It is a favorite argument with Roman Catholics -that the belief in God is the one surest guard against the sexual -irregularity of young men. Remove God, the one strong bulwark, from -their lives, and the flood of their passions will sweep them to their -destruction. - -Such considerations as these must indeed give one pause; yet I feel -assured that they need not hold us long. How does a man get strength -for right living? He begins—in his childhood as in the childhood of -the race—by getting it through fear. The child is told, upon pain of -punishment, not to do certain things. There will come a time when it -will know why it ought not to do these things; but in its first months -and, in a degree, through its early years, it refrains from doing them -simply by reason of the pressure of the superior power of its parents. -Later it refrains through unconscious imitation and affection. It -lives in the light and love of its parents; and it consciously and -unconsciously shapes its life after the pattern of their lives. When -difficulties press, the child flees to the mother or the father for -comfort and advice. Those are delicious days, of warm trust and joy -and loving security. The child nestles up against the stronger power -of those it loves. But the child grows to manhood and womanhood. -Whence then does it get its strength for right living? The fear of the -infant days, the imitation and affection of childhood and youth are -now transformed into a new attitude,—an understanding of the reason -in the right and the unreason in the wrong. There are many factors and -influences that now take the place of parent power and affection: the -love and admiration of one’s group, the customs of one’s people, the -stimulus of great persons. But the essential power now is the power of -_insight_—of so understanding the forces and principles of life that -one’s whole self is surrendered in deep reverence and service to the -things that ought to be. Assuredly, no character is mature until it -has reached this last stage. There is indeed something beautiful about -the boy who in the midst of temptation goes to his father and talks it -all out with him; who clings to the father’s hand to lead him safely -through the dangerous ways. But the boy is only on the way to moral -and spiritual maturity; he is not yet morally and spiritually mature. - -The doctrine that the great evangelist and the evangelical churches in -general preach is a doctrine admirably adapted to a condition of moral -and spiritual immaturity; it is a doctrine, in short, for little boys -and girls; it is not a doctrine for morally and spiritually mature men -and women. I doubt even, in fact, whether it is a doctrine for college -youths and maidens; for I note in my own relations with college men -and women that there is among them the growing consciousness of right -for right’s sake, a growing cleanness and earnestness of life; and -this is so, I take it, not because they believe such conduct and -attitude to be commanded or because they are aware of a heavenly -Father who watches, but because their eyes have been opened to see the -truth and the truth has made them free. - -I believe that the problem of how to teach a young man to meet -temptation is a deeply serious problem. But I believe small good will -come of falling back upon the old easy expedient of half-frightening, -half-cajoling the young man into submission by reminding him of the -all-watching eye and the all-considering heart of the great Father. -That way is so easy that it is really unfair to the victims. It is -like hypnotizing a man into morality. The way of the new religion is -the harder but more lasting, more self-respecting way of developing -the whole moral self of the boy and the youth and the man,—beginning -far back in childhood and unremittingly, understandingly continuing -the training, until when the child becomes the youth and the youth the -man, righteousness is the firm, sweet habit of his life. We human -beings have an inveterate love of shirking our tasks. We neglect the -essential moral culture of the infant and the child; we let the -moments and the days slip by in the life of the youth without putting -any hard thought upon his training in self-control, in courage, in -moral insight; and then suddenly, when signs of danger begin to show -in the young man, we grow panic-stricken and implore him to call on -God to save him. The fact is that the task was ours and we shirked it. -Ours was the responsibility; and we had no right to put it off on a -miracle-working Deity. - -“When half-gods go,” says Emerson, “the gods arrive.” When once we give -up this easy way of moral and religious hypnosis; when once we believe -that God, the watchful policeman of the universe, no longer exists, we -shall solemnly and seriously take up the task we have so long cast -upon a deity’s shoulders—_our_ task of shaping and directing and -making strong the moral possibilities of the children we bring into -the world. From the old consolation, in short, of divine protection, -we shall awake to a new loyalty to our fundamental moral obligations. - -It is significant in this connection to note that the farther we go -back in the history of religion, the more the moral reference of -situations is secondary and the supernatural reference primary. The -ten commandments, for example, were first of all a divine behest, and -only secondarily a series of laws founded on the essential -requirements of human well-being. But as we come nearer to our own -day, the moral quality of situations tends more and more to usurp the -primacy of the old supernatural reference. The limit of such evolution -is the disappearance altogether of the supernatural, the evaluation, -ultimately, of all situations and activities in terms of their -inherent good or bad for the life of humanity and the world. - - * * * * * - -The old loyalty, in short, was the loyalty of loving children; the new -loyalty is the loyalty of strong-charactered men and women. Has the -time come for moral and spiritual maturity? To some of us there is no -longer an alternative. “When I was a child I spake as a child; I -understood as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish -things.” In the light of spiritual maturity, the god of magic, the god -of miraculous power, the god of loving protection, the god of -all-seeing care—the Parent God—must give way to the God that is the -very inner ideal life of ourselves, our own deep and abiding -possibilities of being; the God _in us_ that stimulates us to what is -highest in value and power. - - - - -THE PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE - -_August 18, 1914_ - - -MY FELLOW COUNTRYMEN: - -I suppose that every thoughtful man in America has asked himself -during the last troubled weeks what influence the European war may -exert upon the United States; and I take the liberty of addressing a -few words to you in order to point out that it is entirely within our -own choice what its effects upon us will be, and to urge very -earnestly upon you the sort of speech and conduct which will best -safeguard the nation against distress and disaster. - -The effect of the war upon the United States will depend upon what -American citizens say and do. Every man who really loves America will -act and speak in the true spirit of neutrality, which is the spirit of -impartiality and fairness and friendliness to all concerned. - -The spirit of the nation in this critical matter will be determined -largely by what individuals and society and those gathered in public -meetings do and say; upon what newspapers and magazines contain; upon -what our ministers utter in their pulpits, and men proclaim as their -opinions on the streets. - -The people of the United States are drawn from many nations and -chiefly from the nations now at war. It is natural and inevitable that -there should be the utmost variety of sympathy with regard to the -issues and circumstances of the conflict. Some will wish one nation, -others another, to succeed in the momentous struggle. - -It will be easy to excite passion and difficult to allay it. Those -responsible for exciting it will assume a heavy responsibility; -responsibility for no less a thing than that the people of the United -States, whose love of their country, and whose loyalty to its -government should unite them as Americans, all bound in honor and -affection to think first of her and her interests, may be divided into -camps of hostile opinions, hot against each other, involved in the war -itself in impulse and opinion, if not in action. - -Such diversions among us would be fatal to our peace of mind and might -seriously stand in the way of the proper performance of our duty as -the one great nation at peace, the one people holding itself ready to -play a part of impartial mediation and speak the counsels of peace and -accommodation, not as a partisan, but as a friend. - -I venture, therefore, my fellow countrymen, to speak a solemn word of -warning to you against that deepest, most subtle, most essential -breach of neutrality which may spring out of partisanship, out of -passionately taking sides. - -The United States must be neutral in fact as well as in name during -these days that are to try men’s souls. We must be impartial in -thought as well as in action, must put a curb upon our sentiments as -well as upon every transaction that might be construed as a preference -of one party to the struggle before another. My thought is of America. -I am speaking, I feel sure, the earnest wish and purpose of every -thoughtful American that this great country of ours, which is, of -course, the first in our thoughts and in our hearts, should show -herself in this time of peculiar trial a nation fit beyond others to -exhibit the fine poise of undisturbed judgment, the dignity of -self-control, the efficiency of dispassionate action; a nation that -neither sits in judgment upon others nor is disturbed in her own -counsels, and which keeps herself fit and free to do what is honest -and disinterested and truly serviceable for the peace of the world. - -Shall we not resolve to put upon ourselves the restraint which will -bring to our people the happiness and the great lasting influence for -peace we covet for them? - - WOODROW WILSON - - - - -ATAVISM - -KARL REMER - - -The city had withstood its besiegers for a long time. The guns on the -mountain had poured down shot, the guns on the north and on the south -had battered the old walls. The walls had crumbled and fallen. The -walls were old and they had been considered picturesque for so long -that it was as if they had forgotten the sturdy virtues of their -youth. - -Through the breaches came the soldiers. Tribesmen they seemed of the -old days of the Grand Khan. - -The soldiers were thinking. They were not accustomed to thought. Was -it true, ran their thoughts, that their leader had promised that there -would be no looting? He had promised, this they knew, that there would -be no looting after he entered the city. What was the meaning of that -“he”? Did it mean the army or did it mean the general? Did it mean the -soldiers? There was the rumor that the general could not leave his -present quarters for three days. Rain, or snow, or ice, or drought -prevented. What was the meaning of that? Did it mean three days of -fine, bloody looting? - -The soldiers entered the city. Like the tribesmen of the Grand Khan -they poured in. Through one gate, through two gates, through three -gates they came. It was a sullen business and silently did they press -forward. They had not made up their minds about those three days. They -were not sure about the general. Perhaps he was playing one of his -grim jokes. Was he, perhaps, already within the city? He had promised -before many that there would be no looting. The foreigner, the -Jesus-religion man in black clothes, had stood beside him. It was hard -to tell, where foreigners were concerned, how much to believe. -Foreigners were an unusual sort of people. Most of them did not look -dangerous, but any one of them might have power. It was one of the -inexplicable things about foreigners that one could never tell the -amount of power a foreigner had by the amount he used. To have power -and not use it, to have rice and not eat it—strange men these -foreigners. - -The soldiers poured into the city. Like the tribesmen of the Grand -Khan they came; but not like the tribesmen of the Grand Khan. The loot -and the fun were before them, yet they restrained themselves. - -The soldiers were yellow and clad in yellow, and they poured through -the gates as the yellow Yangtsze pours between its banks. Silver and -silks were before them, but the hand was withheld from the knife and a -sullen silence was around them. - -Some one began it. There came a curse and an answer, a taunt and a -gunshot. So it began. - -Here was a shop boarded, bolted, and locked. A crowd of soldiers -gathered before it. They demanded that the shop be opened. No reply -came from within. The demand was repeated and emphasized with a blow -of a rifle butt against the boards. Still there was no reply. More gun -butts fell upon the boards and they began to creak and snap. A scared -man within began to dicker for life, property, and family. He paid and -paid high—for nothing. The shop was broken open. Stripped and -wounded, the man was sent down the street. His goods became the -playthings of the soldiers. His wife lay above, outraged and stabbed. -His daughter was in the hands of other tormentors. At the command of -the soldiers, his son began carrying his father’s goods and piling -them as the soldiers directed. There was a look of death upon the -boy’s face; he was sick and weary. The soldiers demanded more silver. -The boy knew there was no more. He knew that his father had paid it -all to save the family. He was so sadly sure he would not look. The -soldiers cut him down and went their way. - -There was a ricksha coolie who had sunk frightened against a wall in a -side street. He had hidden his family, but he, himself, had come forth -from hiding in the hope of much work and large pay. With quaking knees -he had pulled loads of loot for the soldiers. At last the horror had -overcome him and here he cowered against a wall. He was called but he -could not move. He knew that he could not pass down the bloody streets -again. The call was repeated and still he did not move. They shot him -as he lay and took his ricksha from him. That street also, a little -street and a quiet one, had its spreading mark of red. - -A poor barber lay trembling upon his bamboo bed. He had no family and -few friends. Why had he not run away? He lay thinking and thinking but -he could think of no good reason. As he lay thus they came upon his -shop. Down came the boards. He paid them all his savings, a pitifully -small sum, and they demanded his wife and children. They killed him -because he had neither the one nor the other. “For,” said they, “no -honest man is without a family.” - -There was a girl of eighteen whom the soldiers seized. Guile or -temporary insanity prompted her to play her part as if with pleasure. -She smiled on them and shrugged her shoulders most coquettishly. She -bandied jokes with them and made advances. A petty officer accepted -her advances and, later, had her beaten to death. The soldiers -approved. “These people must be taught,” said they, “that modesty is a -woman’s duty.” - -For two days the riot continued. For two nights there was no sleep but -the sleep of death. The moans of the women, the groans of the men, -fire and fresh alarms made sleep a thing that seemed years away. The -city was red and the blood flowed. Loot and the lives of men, silver -and the bodies of women, these things did the victors take as is old -custom in China. Then came the third day and the general. - -The foreigner in black clothes, the man of the religion of Jesus, had -lived through these two days and two nights. “One can never tell,” -said the soldiers, “what power these foreigners have.” “That is the -foreigner’s house,” said the soldiers, “let it alone.” - -The foreigner had lived through the two days and the two nights, but -he had not slept. He had been thinking of the promise of the general. -“There will be no looting after I enter the city”—these were the -general’s words and the man who had spoken them had not yet entered. -As a joke the speech was not bad, but too much blood and no sleep -spoils the taste for jokes. - -The general entered with an important noise of trumpets. Where he rode -the looting stopped. He seemed weary, however, and did not ride far. -The smoke of the many fires may have hurt his eyes. The day may have -been too hot. In any case the general seemed discreetly weary and -discreetly blind. - -The man of the religion of Jesus came to the general. His words were -to the point. “Is this the way you keep promises?” he asked. - -The general did not like directness and he did not care to argue. -“There is no looting,” he said, and with a smile he pointed down the -street. - -“There is looting everywhere except before your eyes.” - -“There is none,” said the general. It was characteristic of him to -add, “What there is must be stopped.” - -“By whom?” asked the foreigner. - -“Take one hundred men,” said the general, “go up and down in the city. -If you see looting or outrage, cut off the guilty man’s head. As for -myself, I have seen none.” - -The foreigner hesitated, but thoughts came to him of the last two -days. If he did nothing, who would act? Opportunity seemed to him -duty. So in despair and rage he agreed and at the head of his hundred -he set out. - -They came suddenly to a corner where a soldier was searching a dead -man’s clothes. Here was guilt so plain no proof was needed. The man -was quickly sentenced and in another moment his head was off. -“Justice,” said the foreigner to himself, “must upon occasion be -swift.” - -They came upon a house where a widow and her young daughter lived. The -house was small and until now it had been overlooked. A noise of -scuffling caused the foreigner to look within. The younger woman lay -bruised and naked upon the floor, the mother was still struggling with -her assailant. Two heads fell and the foreigner smiled. “Payment,” -said he to himself, “is a thing dear to the Lord. Here two have paid.” - -The hundred and their leader came upon a half-crazed soldier who was -trying to run up a narrow street with two mattresses which he had -stolen. The mattresses brushed the sides of the buildings upon the -narrow street so that, as the man’s load struck gate or door-post upon -the one side or the other, the man reeled as a drunken man does. They -caught him and made him kneel upon those very mattresses. The hundred -went on and the man’s head was left resting softly upon the stolen -goods. The mattresses were becoming red. “The blood of justice is red -also,” said the foreigner. - -Thus did the man of the religion of Jesus and his hundred make -progress through this city of great suffering. - -They seized a soldier carrying a woman. She was groaning. He protested -that he was carrying her to shelter. The man had earrings and a chain -in his belt. The woman’s ears were bleeding. The good knife descended -and again punishment found guilt. - -They went on and as they went there came a great joy into the heart of -the foreigner. “These people,” said he to himself, “are children and -they need a lesson. By God’s help they shall have it. Many lessons are -hard but many must be learned.” - -They seized an old soldier who was picking up the trinkets that had -been dropped before a jewelry shop. He swore that he had robbed no -man, but the man in black decided against him and off came his head. - -As the hundred passed on they sent fear before them and left a trail -of red justice behind them. The joy burned brighter in the heart of -the man in black. “Have I not talked to these people of the justice of -God?” said he to himself. “Now they are seeing it. Now they will know -it to be swift and terrible. A knife with a keen blade, a judge with a -clean heart, these things this people needs.” - -They came upon two soldiers who were quarrelling over the division of -a sable coat. Each had an end and the altercation was proceeding over -the outstretched garment. They protested that they had bought the coat -not two hours before and that they had paid for it. One begged -piteously for his life, but the man in black shook his head. - -So the expedition of the hundred became a thing of blood and more -blood. The heart of the man of the religion of Jesus was filled with a -grim ecstasy. It seemed to dance within him. “Am I not,” he chanted to -himself, “a messenger of the Lord to a sinful people? With what -measure they have measured, have I measured unto them. As they have -pitied others, so have I pitied them. Blood must flow, for blood alone -can cleanse. Blood alone can cleanse.” - -A young soldier was caught as he climbed the stairs of a small house. -He was brought into the street and told to kneel. “I have heard of -your Jesus and his forgiveness,” he said; “now I know.” He knelt with -a sort of dignity, the dignity that death brings to the brave, and his -head fell. - -His words struck through the blood fever to the heart of the man in -black. For a second he closed his eyes and when he opened them again -he saw with his old clearness. He knew that blood is blood and shame -came over him. - -He sent back his hundred, saying: “Go. I have done wrong.” - -He came to his own house and to his own small room where a crucifix -hung above the bed. He knelt and remained for a long time with his -eyes fixed upon the figure. The words, “Father, forgive them,” came -from his lips as from the lips of a stranger. For two days and for two -nights he had not slept. He sank slowly to the floor and lay still -before the quiet figure on the cross. - - - - -THE CHANGING TEMPER AT HARVARD - -GILBERT V. SELDES - - -This article is not intended in any sense as a reply to the -_Confessions of a Harvard Man_ published several months ago in THE -FORUM by Mr. Harold E. Stearns. The importance of those articles, as -Mr. Stearns had reason to point out, lay not so much in what they told -about Harvard as in what they told about him. Precisely. Analyses of -the temper of Young America have their place. The temper of Harvard -itself, however, is something quite apart, and it is to that alone -that this article is devoted. The importance of it lies only in the -number of significant and true things it tells about Harvard. - -And that, perhaps, is importance enough. I say this in none of that -college spirit which makes a man believe that his college, because it -is his, is singled out for the peculiar attentions of the high gods -who brood over academic welfare. A change, such as I am describing, if -it took place at any other college, would be quite as important. The -fact is that it could have taken place nowhere else. - -Which brings us to the old Harvard and the popular misconceptions of -its character. It was supposed to create a type of man, effeminate, -detached, affecting superiority, incapable, and snobbish. Certainly -men of this order did graduate from Harvard, but the great truth is -that there was no Harvard type; there were always Harvard men, but -there was never a “Harvard man.” The importance of this distinction is -inestimable, because it points to the fundamental thing in the older -Harvard life: its insistence upon individuality. In that the old -Harvard struck deep through superficial things and came at once upon -the fundamental thing identical in democracy and in aristocracy. It -bestowed each man in accordance with his deserts and, following -Hamlet’s dictum, according to its own nobility; and gave him according -to his needs and according to his powers. Like every truly democratic -institution, Harvard was aristocratic; like every truly aristocratic -institution, Harvard was democratic. At the very moment when it was -supposed to be breeding aristocratic snobs, Harvard was fulfilling the -great mission of _democratic_ institutions in encouraging each man to -be himself as greatly and completely as he could. At the very moment -when it was supposed to exercise a mean and narrowing influence over -its students, it was fulfilling the great mission of _cultural_ -institutions in helping each man to a ripening of his powers, to -enlargement of his interests, and to widening of his sympathies. Its -effeminates went to war against dirt and danger and disease; its snobs -devoted themselves to the advancement of social justice; its detached -men became bankers and mill-owners and journalists; one of its -weaklings conquered the world. The great thing was that in all of them -the old impulse to a deep and full life remained; the tradition of -culture was beginning to prosper. So that Harvard could send out a -statesman who was interested in the Celtic revival, a littérateur with -a fondness for baseball, a financier who appreciated art and a -philosopher who appreciated life. At the same time it graduated -thousands of men who took with them into professional life and into -business life a feeling, perhaps only a memory, of the variety and -excellence of human achievement—men who without pride or shame, which -are equally snobbish, tried to substitute discipline and cultivation -for disorder and barbarity. It is no petty accomplishment. - -To achieve it Harvard had to stand with bitter determination against -the current sweeping toward the practical, the immediate, the -successful. At the same time it bought its cherished democracy of -thought at the price of social anarchy. The college as a body made -very little effort to protect or to comfort its individuals. It was -assumed that he who came could make his own way; if the way were hard, -so much the better! The triumph would be sweeter. The great -fraternities grew in strength, possibly because there was no -countervailing force issuing from the college itself. But there was -never a determined organized attempt to make the individual life of -the undergraduate happy or comfortable. In its place there was a huge, -inchoate, and tremendously successful attempt to make the intellectual -life of the individual interesting and productive. Each man found his -own; fought to win his place, struggled against loneliness and -despair, and emerged sturdier in spirit, younger and braver and -better. Some fell. They were the waste products of a civilization -which was harsh, selfish in its interests, generous in its -appreciations, a microcosm of life. A pity that some should have to -fall! But it would be a greater pity if for them the battle should -cease. Because the fighting was always fair. The strength which -developed in many a man in his efforts to make a paper, or a club, or -even in qualifying to join some little group of men, was often the -basis of a successful life. With it came an intensification of -personality; the absence of a set type made the suppression of the -individual at Harvard almost impossible. I am certain that no one with -a personality worth preserving ever lost it there. - -I wonder whether those who speak and write about democracy at our -colleges ever realize the importance of this intellectual freedom. Mr. -Owen Johnson is not unconscious of it, yet his whole attack upon the -colleges, practically unchallenged, was on account of their lack of -social democracy. It is considered a dreadful thing among us that rich -A should not want to talk to poor B; but it would never occur to us to -be shocked if they had nothing to say to each other except small talk -about baseball or shop talk about courses. And if the choice is -between social promiscuity and intellectual freedom, we must say, “Let -their ways be apart eternally, so long as they are free.” - -The terrible fact is that the undergraduate in his effort to attain -social unity has sacrificed the liberty of thought. It would be -indelicate for a Harvard man, however generous, to condemn other -colleges. Let Mr. Johnson speak for Yale: “It is ruled by the tyranny -of the average, the democracy of a bourgeois commonplaceness.” And an -undergraduate wrote in _The Yale Literary Magazine_ that “we are -accounted for as one conglomeration of body first, head next, and last -and least, soul. As one we go to chapel, as one our parental -authorities would like to see us pastured at Commons, and as one we -are educated.” For Princeton _The Nassau Lit_ writes this -significant editorial: “It is not long before the freshman learns that -a certain kind of thinking, too, is quite necessary here, and from -that time on, until graduation, the same strong influence is at work, -until the habit of _conforming_ has become a strongly ingrained second -nature…. Four years of this … results in a certain fixity of ideas…. -We are brought up under the sway of what seems to us a rather -bourgeois conventionality.” - -Apart from the fact that the term “bourgeois,” contradictory to the -aristo-democratic ideal in essence, occurs in two of these statements, -I do not think that they call for extended comment. These things, at -least, no man has been able to say of Harvard; even to this day there -remains a fierce, jealous, almost joyous tradition of intellectual -freedom—in spite of all! - -I say “in spite of all,” because I am now leaving the old Harvard and -am about to record the deep conversion of recent years which says a -prosperous and Philistine No to everything the old Harvard has said, -and which is surrendering its spirit to the very forces against which -the old Harvard made its arm strong and its heart of triple brass. I -do not mean that Harvard will cease to be great; I do mean that it may -cease to be Harvard. It is hard to deal with a phenomenon of this sort -solely by means of actualities. I am describing the disintegration of -a social background, the subsidence of one tone and the emergence, not -yet complete, of another. But, yielding to the present insistence upon -“facts,” I shall name a number of significant developments which -indicate the nature of what I have called the changing temper at -Harvard. - -They are of two orders, social and intellectual. In the first group we -have the senior and freshmen dormitories; a new insistence upon class -lines; a new emphasis upon college spirit and with it a disquieting -resurgence of that great abomination, “college life”; a change of -attitude toward our much maligned “Harvard indifference” and “Harvard -snobbery.” In the second class come the group system as opposed to the -free elective system, the failure of cultural activities, the contempt -for dilettantism, the emergence of the scholar. The last phenomenon is -mentioned out of no overbearing desire to be either thorough or fair; -it has a significance of its own. - -Superficially the most striking of these changes is the extraordinary -importance attached to class lines. It will be remembered that when -President Wilson tried to reform Princeton with the Oxford system as a -model, he was balked by precisely this feeling of class unity. At -Harvard the thing was not unknown; but it was not important. Princeton -men rejoice that their freshmen are compelled to wear caps, black -shirts and corduroy trousers for the first three months of the year, -so that no snobbery may develop! To the healthy Harvard man this seems -sheer insanity—democracy run to seed. Such solicitude for promiscuity -seems to intend a horrible mistrust of something, and certainly a -beautiful misapprehension of what democracy means. I am speaking not -from mere personal experience, but from that of generations of Harvard -men, when I say that it has been possible for a man to go through his -four years without knowing more than ten men in his own class -intimately, yet acquiring all that college could give by knowing the -finest spirits in a whole college cycle. The new order will change all -this. It will not forbid a man to seek his acquaintances outside his -class; but it will suggest and presently it may insist that his duty -to his class can only be fulfilled by cultivating the acquaintance of -all who entered college on the same day as he. We may live to see the -time when Harvard will emulate the Yale man’s boast that he knew all -his classmates (but one) by their first names! - -The outward forms of this change are the senior and freshmen -dormitories. The former resulted from the great schism of 1909 when -the Gold Coast was defeated in the vote for class officers by the -poorer men living in and about the Yard. It was considered intolerable -that a class should be so divided and a decided effort was made to get -the rich society men to live in the Yard, beside their poorer -fellow-students, during their senior year. This has been a great -success! A group of men, friends for three years, bound by steady -companionship and natural affinities, occupy one entry of Hollis. -Another group, equally bound by totally different sympathies and -activities, occupy another. They nod to each other as they come from -class. If a man in one group is taking the same course in Engineering -as a man in the other, they may discuss a problem or denounce a -“stiff” hour exam. in common. There their ways part. It seems -inconceivable that the heads of a great college should have been able -to believe that the mere accident of adjacent rooms could actually be -the basis, or even the beginnings, of a true democratic spirit of -fraternity. And—let me anticipate—_if the college had not -ignominiously failed in its effort to supply a true basis of -fraternity, it would not now be driven to a method so childish and so -artificial as that of class grouping_. - -But if the senior dormitories are merely silly, what can be said of -the plan to house all the freshmen together in a group of buildings -far removed from the centre of college activities? It is not here a -question of whether they “will work,” but of the spirit which prompted -their foundation. They will not be as bad as their opponents may -imagine, because nothing will break down the tradition of free -intercourse, and the man who writes or the man who jumps will -inevitably seek out his own. But it is certainly a weakening of -Harvard’s moral fibre that an effort should be made to “help along” -the freshmen, instead of compelling them to fight their own way. That -the change really drives into the spirit of Harvard can be judged by -these significant instances of the attitude taken toward the new -scheme by graduates, undergraduates, and by the college authorities. -First consider the testimony of an alumni organization secretary. In a -conversation he said, “We have found it the hardest thing in the world -to persuade graduates that Harvard needs freshmen dormitories. They -are perfectly willing to subscribe for dorms, but they balk at the -freshmen restriction.” Among the undergraduates there exists a -peculiar feeling of relief that they came to Harvard before the -buildings were up. Even those who defend them and say that they “will -be a good thing for the freshies,” do not regret that the “good thing” -was not for them. Articles have been written in undergraduate -publications defending them, but I do not know a single man in the -present (1914) senior class who passionately regrets that they were -not built four years ago. And finally from the college itself came -distinct and explicit denial that there is any intention of tucking -the freshmen into bed at nine o’clock each night. _Hein!_ - -And the result: a wonderful renaissance of the demand for “college -spirit.” College spirit is, of course, nothing in the world but -undergraduate jingoism. The desire to cheer his team is one which no -man can afford to miss, but it points to an undeniable falling off in -democracy when the “rah-rah” spirit can dominate a college and call -those who will not yield to it unfaithful and unworthy. Under that -tyranny Harvard is already beginning to suffer. Further, men are -beginning to be urged to do things not because they want to do them, -but for Harvard’s sake. They are urged to back their teams for the -sake of the college and its reputation. It will seem incredible, but -there actually appeared in the columns of an undergraduate publication -an ominous exhortation “not to be behind Yale” in showing our spirit. - -Disagreeable as these things are, they are inconsidered trifles beside -the change of attitude which has taken place in regard to the serious -work of the college. I cling, in spite of successive disillusions, to -the belief that _the function of the college is to create a tradition of -culture_: it is not to create gentlemen or scholars unless it can effect -the combination of both, and it is certainly not to prepare men for -success _in business_. Success in life is a different matter. College -should not spoil a man for life; it should enable him to appreciate -life, make him “able and active in distinguishing the great from the -petty.” That is what culture means; and that is precisely what Harvard -has decided not to do. Emphasis there has borrowed from emphasis -everywhere. The advantage of President Lowell’s system of course -grouping is that the undergraduate is no longer able to take 17 -uncorrelated courses and achieve a degree; he must know a good deal -about one thing at least. But aside from the obvious fact that a great -many freshmen are incapable of choosing their life work and choose -what is easiest for them, the group system has a terrible defect. It -has come about that men choose their group from worthy or unworthy -reasons and consider that they have acquired all the good of a college -career if they have done creditable work in that particular group. The -other courses are merely “fillers.” The majority of men are content to -concentrate, to narrow their interests, and the whole meaning of -college, which is to prepare the way for future enlargement of -sympathies, has been lost. Figures cannot be cited for or against this -assertion. But some tendencies now discernible at Harvard may be -illuminating. - -First, the scholar has emerged. He has become respectable; he has also -become a specialist, Economics, Government and the practical sciences -being the favored groups. Second, there has grown up a great and loud -contempt for the dilettante and æsthete. I hope these words will not -be misunderstood. The dilettante at Harvard is any man who writes, -thinks, talks well, is not particularly athletic and does not go to -the moving-picture shows which have become the chief attraction at the -Harvard Union. (This last, by the way, is not fantasy but fact; the -“movie” has proved the great agent for class solidarity at Harvard). -An æsthete at Harvard is one who has any diversity of interests and -activities. At Harvard it is almost a crime to be interested in art, -anarchism, literature, music, pageantry, dancing, acting; to write -poetry or fiction, to talk English, to read French (except de -Maupassant) for pleasure. Mr. Eric Dawson, whose article in _The Yale -Lit_ I have already quoted, advises the Yale man to keep it darkly -secret “if he cares for etchings, prefers Beethoven to Alexander’s -Ragtime Band, and Meredith to Meredith Nicholson.” It is a terrible -commentary on Harvard’s intellectual life that the words should be -applicable now. - -They are. Within the past three years the degeneration of every -cultural activity has been persistently rapid. _The Lampoon_ alone -resists, and it is marked by its satire on all the new movements. The -Socialist Club was founded in 1909. Its boast that it included the -active intelligence of the college was always a gross exaggeration, -but it was in itself active and intelligent. This year it is -practically dead; free, incisive thinking has gone out of fashion. The -Dramatic Club started at about the same time with high ideals and even -higher achievement. Its record for the past two years has been one of -protracted failure. (There is some excuse; other organizations have -taken some of its most talented actors.) The activity is too -“detached” for Harvard men of the brave new stripe. Even more -disastrous has been the career of _The Harvard Monthly_—_The Atlantic -Monthly_ of the colleges—which was founded about thirty years ago and -has had on its boards such men as George Santayana, Professor George -P. Baker, Robert Herrick, Norman Hapgood, and a host of other -distinguished men. It always lacked popular appeal, but there were -always enough men at Harvard to produce a superior magazine and almost -enough readers to make the production worth while. Within the last few -years it has been found almost impossible to keep the _Monthly_ going, -and its dissolution is imminent. It may combine with _The Advocate_, -another paper of other ideals, once graced with infinite wit, now -failing because that too is out of fashion. It is possible that these -activities may revive, that succeeding generations will take up the -slack. That is the work of individuals. The creation of a receptive -body is the work of the college, and that has been forgotten. - -And if you ask what the Harvard man is doing, what he is talking -about, while these activities are being ruined before his eyes, the -answer is not merely as Mr. Stearns gave it, that the Harvard man -talks smut. So do most other men. The terrible thing is that the -Harvard man talks very little else that is worth listening to. -Lectures, cuts, assignments, exams, and shows; baseball, daily news (a -mere “Did you see that?” conversation), steam engines; girls, parties, -class elections, piffling nonsense—that is the roster of the college -man. I am terribly conscious of the intolerable stupidity of -“intellectual” conversation; I do not wish that conversation at -college should consist of nothing but considerations of the Fourfold -Root. But it does seem rather unfortunate that the men who are, -theoretically, to be the leaders of the next generation, should never -talk or think about art, should have _no_ interest in ideas, should be -ignorant of philosophy and impatient of fine thinking, should use -their own tongue as a barbarous instrument, should be loud and vulgar -of speech, commonplace in manner, entirely lacking in distinction of -spirit and mind. - -The college has failed to make intelligent activity the basis of -democracy; there is no community of interest in things of the mind or -spirit and that is why artificial means, with the peril they bring to -the individual, are resorted to. How far President Lowell is -responsible for that which has happened in his administration is a -question I cannot answer. He has seen the signs of his time; he has -warned Harvard of the terrible danger which has come to it with the -decadence of individual study and independent reading. He is trying to -make intellectual activity the basis of Harvard’s democracy at the -very moment when he is the ablest of those who in reality help to -sustain all that I have here ventured to criticise. - -It has been in no reactionary spirit. I have not intended to say that -Harvard actually produces the type I have described. The truth is that -it does so little to refine what it gets. The care of the superior -individual, which always results in the greatest benefit to all, has -ceased to engross the college. The new order will not be of the same -heterogeneous excellence. That change all suffer, and all resent. -Granted that the new Harvard will be glorious and great, was there not -room, besides all the State colleges and the technical schools, for -its intransigeant detachment, its hopeless struggle for a “useless” -culture? It will be said that for such a training men should go to -smaller colleges, like Amherst, where they will receive the special -attention they may deserve. But I think of what William James said -once of Harvard, and I wonder what Harvard men, and what the country, -will do when they realize that it can never be said again: - -“The true Church was always the invisible Church. The true Harvard is -the invisible Harvard in the souls of her more truth-seeking and -independent and often very solitary sons…. As a nursery for -independent and lonely thinkers … Harvard still is in the van…. -Our undisciplinables are our proudest product!” - - - - -THE NEW STEERAGE - -FRANCIS BYRNE HACKETT - - -Eleven hundred of us, perhaps twelve hundred, were booked steerage -from Liverpool to New York. We had been brought to the dock at noon, -away from our friends, though we heard the vessel was not to leave -till five. On the other side of a stone pier rose the huge -_Lusitania_ with her four funnels. Everyone on our tender moved -expectantly forward. There was an official cry: “Britishers first!” -The chosen of the Lord! But the horde of ignorant foreigners came -surging ahead. Miscellaneously we crowded up the gangway. Another -gangway sloped for us on to the _Lusitania_. Several British policemen -and stewards faced us to keep us in line. At so many guardian angels -we began to feel depressed. - -Medical inspection. The instant we put foot on the deck of the -_Lusitania_, this was our first business. - -“Have your Inspection Tickets ready.” Before we could inquire what was -going to happen, it was happening. We were passed in a slow trickle -between two officials. “Take off your hat.” “Take off your glasses.” I -stood blinking while the doctor deftly plucked up my eyelids. He waved -me ahead, my ungranulated eyelids made harsh by the handling. Hundreds -were before us on the deck, and those from behind began to press on -our heels with the inevitable “myself first” impulse of human beings. -We were a medley of races, Swedes, Greek, English and Welsh, Irish, -Russian Jews, Poles, mute Lithuanian peasants, and men from a Northern -race who turned out to be Finns. It was almost as cosmopolitan as the -Third Avenue Elevated. We advanced with repeated hesitations and -conscious slowness. A woman turned white in the crush and had to be -helped to a seat near an open porthole. In front of me, a 12-year-old -boy, dead beat, leaned against his big brother—and under his arm, if -you please, wearily hugged a camp stool. “Why doesn’t he sit on the -stool?” The mother, a thin, strained, admirable creature, whose face -showed the fine wrinkles of a life too intent, allowed me to open the -stool for him. From his low seat he rewarded me more than once with a -look of confidence and smiling good-nature. They had travelled by rail -all night, the mother volunteered, from a town in Wales. They were on -their way at last to join the father in California. “I have two more -in California”—the mother pointed to her children, who cheerfully -smiled. - -Women and children. During that weary wait I observed them here and -there, standing submissively for three-quarters of an hour. At length, -after the long halt, the tension was relieved, and we moved again, -this time past another doctor. “Take off your hat.” The doctor had -apparently to inspect the unnaturalized polls on which that morning we -had paid a four dollar tax. He was a man of great perception, the -doctor, and the actual examination was an affair of split seconds. On -completing the circuit of the deck our yellow Inspection Tickets -(given to us at the office in the morning when we had paid our $37.50 -for the passage) received their first stamp. The Cunard Line accepted -us as healthy live stock. - -My Inspection Ticket said Room H 22, and a steward took me there. -There were seven other occupants. Most of them were taking their ease -in their berths and smoking. They were all English or American. I -responded to their cheery hello, but their carbonic gas was strong, -and the portholes proved to be immovable. I sat down on a lower berth, -bumped my head against the top one, and had hardly room for my knees -in the aisle. My carbonic gas did not improve the air. I felt -discouraged, and went out. Nearby I saw a most capacious 4-berth room, -and there was a vacancy in it. Henri Bergson says that “life proceeds -by insinuation.” I felt less gloomy. I found the bedroom steward and -asked him whether I could be changed. He was amicable but not quite -concrete, a bit of a Jesuit. About this time word flashed by that we -were back at the Landing Stage for the cabin passengers: deferring the -affairs of moment, I went on deck. - -We all pushed aft for a good view, only to find a rope stretched -across the deck, and a grim sailor guarding it. “That’s all the scope -you get.” We flattened back against one another. And they let down a -beautiful canopied gangway for the upper classes. - -Braided officers stood in a row to receive, on a nice clear deck. All -the stewards were lined up in fresh white coats. Against the sky line -we studied the new angles of hat plumes. On they stepped with leisured -gait, with an air of distinguished fatigue. “The daughters of Zion are -haughty and walk with stretched forth necks, walking and mincing as -they go.” Indifferently they handed their light burdens to the now -demure stewards. I looked around at my comrades back of the rope. A -child in arms next to me chortled as he bandaged his mother’s eyes. -She gently removed the bandage, only to be blinded again. Behind me, a -buxom Swede looked open-eyed at her feathered sisters abaft. -Everywhere the interest was intense and simple. I turned again to -envisage the daughters of Zion. As in another world they moved—a -world where policemen are unnecessary, where stewards are -spring-heeled, where officers stand in line, where eyelids are not -officially scrutinized nor polls inspected, where the gangway has a -canopy and weariness is consoled. I admired “the bravery of their -anklets, and the cauls and the crescents; the pendants, and the -bracelets and the mufflers.” Must it not be delightful, said I to -myself, to merit so much attention from everyone, and to be so -prettily arrayed? Must it not be pleasant to have eyelids so immune, -and to have a quite uninspected poll? - -The last piece of first-class baggage rolled aboard. Giant hawsers -strained, and were released. It was departure. From my coign at a deck -porthole the Landing Stage came into focus. I confess I exclaimed. As -far as the eye could reach, on the water and street levels, the glance -of thousands on thousands was rivetted on the vessel as she cautiously -edged away. It was a beautiful afternoon, the sky innocently blue. All -indifferent to us in the background stood the massive city of -Liverpool, concentrated on affairs, but no less indifferent to the -city itself ranged this childlike, almost awestruck, army of -curiosity, silently intent on us as we receded into the river. From -our porthole (I was joined by a Syrian) we could not help a glow of -pride. My companion was not able to vent his feelings in English, but -he was quite moved. His was an Indian-like head—high cheekbones, thin -lips, hard, beady eyes. He dwelt on the vast crowd, ejaculating -“ah-ye-ye-ye,” and clucking his tongue. I smiled at his solid wonderment. -Then he craned out of the porthole to view the water far, far below. I -followed suit. He pointed down, and gave a significant, cheerfully -reckless laugh. I laughed, too. We were in for it, and no mistake. - -The steamer’s first evening was spent, doing nothing, out in the -Mersey. The tide was in some way blameworthy. It seemed inefficient of -nature, but as we lay opposite Liverpool the night-lights came out, -definite and serene and friendly, and I took out my mental clutch. - -Time came for supper. I reserved for the morning the mysteries of the -cuisine. I had earlier gone below to the pantry, after some talk with -a humane steward, and to my surprise I had been allowed to help myself -to a cup of tea. - -The first evening was one of extraordinary activity. Still in their -best clothes, around our half of the entire deck poured streams and -streams of passengers. It was almost impossible to tread one’s way. -And in several places these streams turned themselves into dancing -whorls, where volunteers with a concertina had appeared. I happen to -like the concertina, and I enjoyed it during five entire days, though -not so much the concertina as the movement of life which it promoted. -There were never any deck sports, nor games, nor organized -distraction. But, except for one awful seasick period, there was -endless dancing and singing. On this first evening I stood in the -rings that framed the waltzers, and my blood raced with their -pleasure. The Swedes in particular took part much and well. They -occasionally ventured on those new forms, but only for dancing -reasons. When Swedes really want to hug each other, they do it openly -and for its own sake. - -To increase the friendliness of the evening, everyone was willing to -talk a little. I chatted with a Russian, a Greek, an Englishwoman and -an Englishman. He was a young and unhappy Englishman, and in disgust -at the ignorant foreigner. I later learned that he made up the -difference and was allowed to go second class. - -At 9 p.m., tired of repeated searches for my bedroom steward (he was -dishing out in the pantry most of the time), I went to the assistant -chief steward of the third class to see if I could be transferred to -the 4-berth room. He’d see, he said in a serious bass voice, he’d let -me know. At 9.30 p.m. he again told me he’d see. Whether he has yet -seen or not I have no means of discovering. At 10 p.m. I took the -berth, with the consent of the other men in the cabin. I gave my tip -to the bedroom steward, as I guessed he was the less Tammanyized. The -assistant chief steward was a strong character, free from numerical -superstition. He asked 13 cents for five penny stamps. - -In my room the bedding proved simple—a coarse white bag of straw for -mattress, and one dark blue horse blanket for clothing. A small pouch -of straw served as pillow. No linen, of course, and no frills of any -kind. There was an iron spring frame. I found it ascetic but clean. -The single blanket was not enough. I used my rug, and my fellow -passengers used overcoats and rugs, too. The mattresses, I was told, -serve just one trip. They are dumped overboard as soon as the steamer -is out to sea on the return voyage. In my bed I was the only living -creature present. - -Those who rose early had advantages. They had first use of the tin -basin in their own room, or of the bowls in the general washing room. -They had a bid for the solitary bath tub in male steerage. They were -up in time to be allowed to walk all the way aft, and look down the -wide lane of jade and white in the wake of the _Lusitania_. And they -were in time for the first sitting. - -Those who did not rise early had to listen to the tramplings that -began long before sunrise. Despite this, I got up late. Fifty of us -waited over half an hour outside an iron grill at the head of the -dining room stairs. The dining room is quite inadequate, so there had -to be four sittings—first come, first served. When we reached below -we took seats where we could. There was an understanding, however, by -which Britishers were grouped together. This was made effectual by -stewards who stood where the ways parted, and thrust Jews and Poles -and mid-Europeans to one side, and Britishers and Scandinavians to the -other. - -On the whole, the food during the trip was edible. I could not eat the -bacon or the beef. I did not try the eggs. The tea was vile and -usually not very hot. The coffee was vile. But the bread, served in -individual loaves, was most palatable. The Swedish bread was excellent. -The oatmeal was edible, even with the wretchedly thin condensed or -dried milk. We had herrings and at another time sausages, and both -were fair. The potatoes were always excellently boiled and good of -their kind, but the browned potatoes were invariably overcooked and -not fit to serve. The cold meats for supper could be eaten. The boiled -rice was insipid. The stewed prunes and stewed apricots were -palatable. I had very good baked beans and navy beans, good pea soup -and fair broth. I had no complaints to make of the food. I never -decided whether it was butter or margarine, but I ate it willingly. It -certainly had not that callously metallic taste that margarine used to -have. - -The service was on bold, wholesale lines. Twenty sat at each table, -and there were two equipments of bread and butter, sugar, salt, pepper -and vinegar. A disconsolate plant decorated each table. One steward -took charge of each ten people. I sat at a different table practically -every time, and most of my companions were delightfully obliging and -unaggressive. Only those who so wished had to stand up and harpoon -their bread roll. There were a few tiresome people who damned the food -and failed to pass the salt. The stewards were elusive, or rather that -one-tenth part of a steward who was your share. I regretted on one -occasion to discover egg shells in my dessert, and the next day I was -pained to find a knob of beef in my stewed apples. My sympathetic -steward remarked: “Puts you a bit off, don’t it?” It do. - -From about five in the morning till eleven at night these stewards are -working. Work is a good thing. It is strange that the stewards look -unhealthy and fatigued. It is due to the inherent inferiority of -stewards. - -Queenstown was the distraction for several hours on the first day out. -The Cunard and White Star Lines have just discerned that the harbor is -unsafe for big boats. At what point of profit, I wondered, would -Queenstown harbor suddenly and miraculously become safe again? - -As we left the coast of Ireland there came an unctuous swell upon the -sea. You would not think it could upset anyone, but when I ascended -after dinner I was horrified. Rows of passengers lay where they were -stricken, all too evidently ill, ghosts of their braver selves. The -stewards were in the dining room and could not come, and did not come, -for well over an hour. For well over an hour no effort at all was made -to clean the decks. I now understood this grave disadvantage of third -class, to which the company itself contributes. But there was much -kindness to the decimated, and much tolerance. Later I admired -immensely the work of the matrons. I seldom met three more splendid, -capable, sympathetic women. There were superior passengers who -despised the childishness with which simpler people gave in. I myself -laughed when I saw a girl lying with complete abandon plumb on top of -another girl. The grim sailor heard me and muttered: “Only an ignorant -person’d laugh at anyone was seasick.” - -During this distressing hour a Russian came flying to the master at -arms. “The doctor! the doctor!” “You can’t have the doctor,” said the -man in blue, not unkindly. “We can’t help seasickness. It’s got to be -expected.” “The doctor! Not seaseek! dead!” He made a ghastly face. -“Oh, all right,” said the master-at-arms, and we went straight below. - -Terrific pleading calls shook the cabin. “Sonya! Sonya!” The -master-at-arms walked right in, and emerged supporting a sack-like -girl, very white and inert. “You could cut the air with a knife,” -murmured the weary master-at-arms. He assisted her on deck, and she -was wooed to consciousness. - -At this time, on the enclosed deck, there was much commotion. A -striking red-haired Jewess, clad in green, had fainted and was put -sitting on a bench. A venerable Jew appealed to her excitedly while an -earnest young soul at the other side cried for water. It made me -furious to see the limp woman propped up, but they were evidently -playing according to the rules of a different league. The water at -last came and much to my surprise the earnest soul put it to her own -lips. But not to drink it. In her the Chinese laundryman had an -efficient rival. She was the most active geyser I ever saw. After a -time there was a feeble motion of protest, to the regret of the -delighted spectators. - -On the open deck during this weather the Jews monopolized one corner. -I counted thirty of them huddled inseparably together in their misery, -like snakes coiled in the cold. As they began to recover, a leg would -wiggle from under one blanket, and a head be thrust out from under -another. Later they sat up and drank their tea out of glasses, -nibbling the sugar. They soon littered the place with apple peels and -orange peels. After generations of inhibition they probably needed to -be told that they were permitted by a merciful dispensation to use the -sea as a waste basket. - -As the sea fell slumberously still, life recovered its audacity. Again -the decks became clamorous, multitudinous. People thronged the -promenade, or swarmed on the benches that do duty for deck chairs. -They began smoking everywhere again, and out came the stewards and the -Black Crowd to enjoy a sociable cigarette. There was little to do but -talk, until the dancing began. The grim sailor looked pityingly on -Babel, as he patrolled the Second Class partition. He was for smaller -ships. “On a smaller ship,” he deigned to remark, “you can come up and -throw your weight around.” - -Differences in manners obtruded. The third day out a youth emerged -whom I took to be a swineherd from the beech forests of Croatia. He -was not handsome. His fringe encroached upon his little eyes. His chin -was unformed. Up over his trousers, as if he had just waded through -the piggery, his socks were drawn. There he stood, plastic youth, a -hand in his pocket, pivotting a heel, surveying the world through his -own hirsute thatch. Suddenly, deliberately, he blew his nose -Adam-like. A Swedish woman next me turned livid. “De dirty pig.” I -felt myself the brother of a Swede. The Croatian saw us but beheld us -not. His mouth ajar, he ruminated afresh on the fleshpots of Croatia. -Raw material, simple even to the verge of our ancestral slime. I -prayed “God be with thee,” and looked elsewhere. - -That evening amid the throng which waited for admittance to the dining -room appeared a Greek. The glaring electric light concentrated on that -swart face, flung-out chest, and bared neck. He was incredibly -blasphemous and incredibly self-important. “Seventy-five dollars, see. -American money!” He showed his money to us, and gave a chuckle. His -lip curled. “They only Hunkies,” indicating his companions who -connected themselves with him by slavish eyes. “I in America before, -Christ, yes!” His eye roved boldly, and he showed his white teeth. -“I got more money still, you bet your life. When I get over I marry no -Hunkie. I marry Henglish girl. Yeh, Christ, you bet!” He antagonized -us, and yet we watched him eagerly. He lapped up our interest. -Overcome with the savor of attention, he incontinently spat. I drew -away. “It’s a’ right,” he said half-obsequiously, “I know what I do. I -no’ spit on American.” He felt too much kinship to spit on an -American. - -So things happen, but only in the steerage. At the door of the café -below, you will not find a Polish count informing the steward: “I -marry a Henglish girl. No penniless Hunkie for me.” Nor will the -first-class steward answer: “Who cares? Who’ll buy a beer?” - -In all these days, among all these peoples, there was no friction. -Some youths did start to make boisterous fun of two barefooted Italian -women, walking up and down in bright petticoat and kerchief. But the -Italians smiled and skipped back and sat down, and there was no more -“fun.” Between congruous people intercourse was easy and frank. The -fresh-hued Scandinavians were exceptionally lively. A little English -group revolved quietly together, with a private afternoon teapot for -central sun. Another little group, including two girls in service, a -cotton spinner and a grocery clerk, often sat in the prow and talked -amiably about anything from the food on board to their notion of a -God. They say that “sociability proceeds from weakness.” Steerage, at -any rate, is highly sociable. In some cases it was also frankly -amatory. The attractive girls, so soon well known, seemed to have no -fear of the predatory males. They took each other lightly. But at 9.30 -p.m., all the feminine kind, even the rebellious, had to leave their -conquests and go below. This rule was enforced to the letter. - -Two days before landing we had another medical experience. We learned -that American citizens in the third class were immune from smallpox -and need not be troubled on that score, but that aliens in the third -class must all be vaccinated. It was said there were ways of evading -this, but I found none. For several hours we were assembled while the -women filed in. After an hour in line, our turn came to enter the -surgery improvised in the companionway. On a table flamed a number of -small spirit lamps, over which the stewards sterilized the metal -scrapers. I bared my arm, as per orders from a pasty youth. The doctor -answered my queries by taking my arm, scraping it gently and applying -the lymph. “It is not our law,” he said politely. “Take this chap,” -motioned a bullet-headed assistant, and I was shoved to another group. -“Rub it off,” whispered a friendly scullion, but I let it stay, out of -curiosity. The new group crowded around another big table. An -additional hour’s standing brought up my turn to answer the clerk’s -questions. He recorded on the manifesto that I was destined for -Brooklyn and had friends. This was added to the facts I had provided -when I engaged passage. I was now catalogued for Ellis Island. - -The day before landing there was, I believe, another medical -inspection. We got in line for it, but the crowd simply disregarded -the stewards, and I never even saw the doctor. On that evening the -barriers were partly down, and the Goths and Huns invaded two decks. - -It was Friday morning before we came into the yellow waters of the -harbor, and passed under the cliffs of Manhattan. Already a fissure -had appeared in the steerage. On one side, separated from us more and -more, went the naturalized citizens, each armed with his papers. On -the other, we aliens congregated, to be shipped in due time to Ellis -Island. - -It was an inhuman morning, a morning of harrowing strain and -confusion. Though the inspection of baggage amounted to nothing in -itself, especially as there had been no preliminary declaration, there -was the uncertainty, and the three hours’ delay. Searching for -baggage, waiting for inspectors, hectored and shouted at, the poorer -immigrants reminded one of Laocoön. And then we had to wait for the -boat to Ellis Island, and we had to lug our hand baggage with us for -the hours that were to come. This fact alone made the day an ordeal -for all except the strongest, a brute ordeal to which wealthier folk -would not submit for two successive days. - -On the Ellis Island boat we were crammed like cattle. “Move up, I say, -move up. God! move UP, you damned kike!” So spoke our burly exemplar -of American citizenship. We “moved up” until the last square foot of -floor was shut off from sight by close-packed bodies. We coöperated -with the U. S. Government as well as we could to provide conditions -for another Slocum disaster. When such a disaster does occur on one of -these old boats, every editor in the country will demand with -magnificent emphasis: “Fix the responsibility!” Let us by all means -wait till the steed is stolen. - -Ellis Island basked in the sun. It was handsome and trim and restful, -after the swarming pier. We entered the fine examination building -single file, always lugging our suitcases and bundles and bags and -wraps and boxes and babies. - -Medical inspection, a real inspection this time. We passed through a -cleverly arranged aisle, and at each angle a new doctor in khaki -sought for blemishes. I finally impinged on a man who asked me if I -could see well without my glasses. I answered: “Not at all.” He leaned -over, and made two crosses in blue chalk on my raincoat. At the exit -from this trap an attendant wrote another little piece on my raincoat, -“Vis.,” short for vision. I was allowed to lay down my bags, and sit -and wait for half an hour. - -When the special examiners were ready, we were led up a corridor and -shown into a bright room. Around the walls were men and boys in all -stages of dress and undress, as at a bathing beach. - -“Ken you read English?” I said yes. “Read that over there.” A familiar -oculist test card hung on the wall. Being already so tired that I -would have welcomed deportation, I resentfully choked out: “B, T B R, -F E B D,” and so on. “All right, doc.,” said the attendant, and a -civil man at a high desk silently handed me an initialled slip. -Outside this was taken, and my dilapidated Inspection Ticket was -stamped “Specially Examined.” I had passed the test, and went back for -my baggage to the ante-room. A woman there, flushed and petulant, -commented on her being examined. The attendant turned away -contemptuously. “Aw, she’s ben hittin’ the pipe, or somethin’.” - -Up the steps into the great hall I proceeded. It resembled a big -waiting room, where to my delight benches ran the length of the room. -It was now nearly three, and I had neglected to eat anything all day. -In the particular bench decided by my Inspection Ticket, I -emphatically sat down. - -At the far end of these benches ran a long screen at right angles. In -that screen were a number of gates. Each gate was guarded by a seated -official with our manifestoes on the desk before him. Through those -gates we immigrants were being sieved into the United States. - -At last I was in the sieve. The guardian of the gate was kind of -voice. “You have a brother in Brooklyn, eh?” “How much money have you -got?” I was not asked to show it. “All right, pass on. No, there is -nothing further. You can go as far as you like now!” Two of us from -the _Lusitania_ whipped down the steps, bags and all, and delivered up -our Inspection Tickets at a last, final door. The sun shone outside. -The air was fresh. The light danced on the sea. There were no more -policemen, stewards, masters-at-arms, doctors, baggage examiners, -attendants, inspectors. I drew a deep breath, and tried to forget the -benefits of civilization. - -On the ferry to New York there mingled future Americans from the -Anchor Line and the Red Star Line, as well as from the Cunard. Already -I could find only a few of my former companions. Some had gone before. -Some were still on the Island. In the present crowd they were -absorbed, obliterated. The little world of the _Lusitania_ was already -annexed by America, as a little meteor is annexed by the burning star. -I regretted this absorption, this obliteration. For six days I had -belonged to them, and they had belonged to me. I thought of their -geniality, their simplicity, their naturalness, their long-suffering. -I was sorry to say good-bye. - - - - -THE C. T. U. - -GEORGE CRAM COOK - - -The battle began Monday morning when Assistant Professor Clark seated -himself facing the President in the President’s office. - -“I want permission,” said the lanky, trim-bearded young man, “for Vida -Martin, who is here raising money for the striking button-cutters of -Manistee, to speak in Assembly Hall.” - -The President’s grey eyes opened a little wider, then narrowed -shrewdly. He swung a little in his swivel chair, and pulled his -graceful iron-grey moustache. Then he said gently: “Would you regard -it as proper for the University to take sides to that extent in an -industrial dispute?” - -“We listened to Judge Graham’s Menace of Syndicalism.” - -“An address which was general. This is a specific conflict.” - -“Judge Graham talked about it.” - -“In illustration of his general point. Miss Martin, I understand, -talks of nothing else. She is an extreme radical—a professional -firebrand. I am surprised to find a man of your standing in sympathy -with her ideas.” - -“I’m not—altogether,” replied Clark. “That is scarcely a sufficient -reason for not listening to them. I want our students to hear her side -of the case—undistorted.” - -“We cannot lend unsound cases the weight of university authority,” -said the President. - -“Judge Graham’s case was thoroughly unsound,” said Clark. “Vida Martin -is, as you say, an extreme radical. But we have listened to an extreme -reactionary. If it is the policy of the University not to take sides, -it cannot invite him to speak and refuse to let her. Her subject, I -ought to say, is general—the Ideals of Syndicalism. As to her -soundness: she knows industrial unionism from the inside—her own -experience as organizer. She knows its leaders personally. All Judge -Graham knows is his own prejudice against labor and some newspaper -stories.” - -The President swung back to his desk and arranged some papers. - -Clark sat there looking irritatingly thorough. - -“What made you take the responsibility of discussing this with Vida -Martin?” the President demanded. - -“I met her on the train from Manistee last night. I used to know her -at Hull House. She spoke of the dismissal of Brooks and Gleason here -last year for insisting on their right to express their real ideas, -and made the sweeping claim that there is no free speech in any -American university. I said I’d disprove that by getting Assembly Hall -for her. If she can’t have it, it seems to bear out her charge against -us.” - -“Haven’t you yourself enjoyed freedom of speech here?” - -“Yes, I have. But frankly, I’m afraid I’ve never had anything to say -that was dangerous.” - -“Afraid! Your talk with Miss Martin seems to have had a singular -effect on your point of view.” - -“It has,” admitted Clark. “I never put such new life into the thinking -of any student as she put into mine last night. Six years ago in -Chicago she was not unlike me. If the labor movement makes her what -she is and the University makes me what I am—there’s something wrong -with the University. I think we should try to understand her.” - -“By all means—those of us who have not already done so.” - -Clark smiled. - -“Understanding her is one thing,” said the President, nettled, “and -giving her violent doctrines such sanction by the University as you -propose is quite another. You’ve been carried off your feet. When you -regain your balance you’ll thank me for not granting this wild request -of yours. Is there anything further you wish to say?” - -Clark rose to go. “Only that I regret this failure—of the -University.” - -“It’s not the University that’s in danger of failing, Mr. Clark,” said -the President significantly. - -Having sufficiently endangered his career to no purpose, Mr. Clark -strode out of the Liberal Arts’ Building, past the black bulletin -boards on which the announcement of Vida Martin’s lecture would not -appear. He marched down the old flagstone walk beneath the oaks and -budding maples and across to the hotel—a three-story brick building -painted slate-grey. - -There, with a local labor leader and the editor of a Bohemian paper -who were helping her organize her meeting for the following night, he -found Vida Martin, a trim, strong woman of thirty, not yet at the -height of her vivid powers. - -She handed Clark the first draft of a handbill. To his dismay it -announced as the place of her meeting—Assembly Hall. - -“That’s gone to the printers,” she said casually. - -“I—I’m sorry,” said Clark. “I have misled you. My confidence in the -University’s impartiality was misplaced. You must let me stand the -difference in your printing bill. You have been refused the use of -Assembly Hall.” - -Vida Martin smiled at him the smile of a wicked minx. “You didn’t -mislead me a bit, dear Kenton Clark,” she said. “I have already -engaged the Opera House for to-morrow night.” - -Dear Kenton Clark stared at the handbill. “Engaged the Opera House and -printed Assembly Hall on your dodgers!” - -She nodded. “My æsthetic sense,” she explained. “I thought how nice it -would look to have a cunning red line through ‘Assembly Hall’ and -‘Opera House’ stamped on in red with a rubber stamp. Don’t you love to -use a rubber stamp?” - -As the guile of the agitator dawned on him he started to disapprove. - -“It’s just a shame,” she said, catching his expression, “for me to -come contaminating the innocent professorial mind with the spectacle -of fighting tactics.” - -He laughed. “The professorial mind isn’t wholly infantile. The -University deserves what you’re going to give it. I shall announce -your meeting in my classes.” - -“Have you something else to do when you lose your job? Do you know -that one of your Regents, H. P. Denton, owes his appointment to Steve -Treadley of the Manistee Button Factory?” - -“Rather than be controlled by considerations like that I _will_ -lose my job!” Clark replied hotly. - -That was the mood in which he marched to his eleven o’clock lecture. - -After it, at noon, he came down the central walk amid the sweaters and -corduroys and fresh-filled pipes of the gossiping throng which carries -books in straps, books in green bags, and books in spilly armfuls. His -friend Guthrie of the English Department overtook him. - -“What’s this about Vida Martin?” Guthrie inquired. “They say you’re -lambasting the University because it won’t let her set up her soap-box -in Assembly Hall.” - -“Subtract the cheap fling and you have the idea,” Clark answered. - -Guthrie shook his fine, big head. “Well,” he reflected, “you’re -unmarried. But it isn’t a chip you have on your shoulder. It’s a log.” - -“John,” said Clark, “your education is hideously defective. You’ve got -to meet Vida Martin and learn what a soapbox is. Come to lunch with -her now.” - -Guthrie said he couldn’t because his wife was expecting him. - -“Telephone her and come,” insisted Clark. - -With an adventurous sense of breaking with routine and doing something -interestingly dangerous, Guthrie telephoned, and came. - -Five minutes after he met her he was quarrelling like an old friend -with Vida Martin—over Thompson and Geddes’ “rustic reinterpretation” -of evolution. Vida would none of it, holding that Nature’s creative -centres are now great cities—where evolution is kept entirely too -busy making a new kind of soul in women to bother with bugs and -things. - -Of the woman’s revolution Guthrie had a literary knowledge, but in his -cooped life Vida was the first who embodied it—the first who viewed -life with the unshockable tolerance of science, the first whose mental -background was wholly non-theological, the first even who was wholly -conscious of her economic independence and its implications. The new -ideas and feelings alive in her made him see the paleness of what he -had got from those plays, novels, and sociology books. The quiet -fearlessness with which she gave him and Kenton Clark to understand -that she had laid aside ready made morality, “the parasite code of -woman subordinate,” took his scholarly breath. She had replaced it, he -gathered, not with another code, but with a habit of discrimination -“confronting apparent good and evil with armed light—the Ithuriel -spear of woman free.” So unprofessorily the professor phrased it when -the thoughts she stirred in him began to sing. He was not aware of it, -but they sang the sooner because her heavy black hair had copper -glints in it and the joy of thinking made her eyes such wells of -light. - -“I’ve been thirteen years here in my treadmill,” he said to her as he -was leaving. “You, from your wonderful cities, make me realize that I -have taught all the life out of my old knowledge. I need new contacts -with the life of to-day. I must have more significant things to teach. -I want to see all I can of you while you’re here, and then—it would -help to keep in touch with you and your world through letters.” - -He started to ask her and Clark to dinner, but reflected that he must -first go home and lead up to that. - -“There’s a living soul,” said Kenton Clark when Guthrie had gone. - -“And with a flickering creativeness,” Vida added. “I wonder if -anything could gather the flickers into a flame?” - -“A passion for a woman,” Clark surmised. - -“Or a cause.” - -Afterwards they remembered her saying that, and looking back it seemed -a premonition. - - -II - -When he reached home that afternoon, Guthrie expended half an hour’s -skilled energy in overcoming Mrs. Guthrie’s instinctive objections to -the unusual, and the dinner invitation went over the telephone to -Clark and Vida Martin. - -Guthrie’s mind was full of glow and movement. His impulse was to draw -in from Vida Martin as with a deep inhalation all the modernity he had -missed—not merely her thoughts but her way of thinking, her inner -feeling and her technique of conveying it. Her manner he felt to be -not her own unaided invention but a social growth—a collaboration of -many men and women moving in the same direction. He felt a need of -moving with them. - -The most tangible thing for him was an accent of sincerity in Vida -which compelled her listener into an answering sincerity. He coveted -the secret of that social power—the power of being and doing that. It -rested down on a greater democracy than he had known—upon her sense -of oneness with others, her feeling of non-superiority, her -assumption: “You and I are fundamentally alike.” - -He wanted to be with her long enough to catch that feeling, to have -and to use it, giving it forth in turn to others. What a power to fill -his students with! The teacher in him craved that secret of living. He -wanted it to transmit; he wanted it as seed to sow in a more human -seminar than he had yet conducted. - -It meant scrutinizing, accepting and conveying the actual human truth -about one’s own feelings and motives—without thought of whether they -were or were not admirable. It meant the acceptance of one’s self as -the most authentic human document—a desire and firm resolution not to -embellish or in any way falsify that text in the mind of another. - -One couldn’t do that and continue to set one’s self up professor-like -as an example to youth. The power could be exerted only by taking -youth completely into his confidence. Only one’s real, uncensored -thoughts and impulses as they sprang out of one’s own nature had that -quality he sought. He felt that he needed the help of Vida, with her -long habit of truthful self-revelation, in learning to read that -intricate, much disregarded text—himself. - -In his new spirit he spoke to Mrs. Guthrie about the secret he wanted -to acquire from Vida Martin, hoping to rouse in Anna a desire to -acquire it for herself. - -But Anna Guthrie was not prepared to take John’s grouping of himself -and her as two human beings who had something to learn from a third. -She was hurt that her husband should find in another woman something -valuable which she herself lacked, and she thought him perfectly -brutal in the bald way he came out with it. Things like that which -would hurt people ought to be concealed. She herself concealed such -things. - -“Practising sincerity is like making a bargain,” Guthrie reflected. -“It takes two. Not everyone is ready for it.” - -To Vida arriving with Clark for dinner, Mrs. Guthrie was -conventionally gracious—a manner she put on as she took off the -all-over apron which protected her next to best dress in the hot -kitchen. The green young Bohemian girl there was chiefly useful to -Mrs. Guthrie as a topic of heartfelt conversation. - -Vida avoided it by starting some talk with Lucy and Harold, aged ten -and eight, who sat at a little table behind her. By the time she had -them laughing Mrs. Guthrie’s prejudice began to thaw. - -Their father noted their expressiveness with Vida. “They get it too,” -he reflected. “They’re more human than I’ve realized. Anna and I have -had too much the ideal of a child as a little obeying machine.” - -When Mrs. Guthrie heard that the evening paper had a story about -Vida’s exclusion from the University and Clark’s insubordination, she -was perturbed by the question: “What will the President’s wife say of -my having such a woman to dinner?” - -The discussion which gave that dinner its importance sprang from -Guthrie’s deploring, _à propos_ of the danger of Clark’s dismissal, -the fact that a professor could not act in accordance with his own -judgment in such a matter without endangering his position. He gave a -dozen instances of tyranny which seemed to have created in him only a -sort of reflected personal resentment against particular presidents -and regents. - -“Why do you scholars allow the power to remove you to be placed in the -hands of outsiders like the regents?” asked Vida, whose mind worked -promptly from individuals to the system they stood for. - -“Oh, that can’t be changed,” said Guthrie, off-hand. - -“Why not?” she challenged. - -“It’s as natural as sunrise,” he said. “We’re all controlled through -bread and butter channels.” - -“Other classes of workers are testing out ways of controlling their -own bread and butter. Bread and butter freedom is precisely what the -world now needs and seeks. Are university professors less capable of -thought than button-cutters?” - -“No,” said Clark. “But less capable of concerted action. We’re too -confoundedly jealous and individualistic to work together.” - -“How do you know that?” Vida demanded. “Have you ever tried it? With -things as they are you certainly can’t fulfil your social function. -You’ll either have to get together and secure your freedom or remain -in a position where you cannot really influence your students.” - -“But they do influence them!” protested Mrs. Guthrie. - -“About all the students look to us for,” said Clark, “is credits. A -credit costs on the average so much time and attention. A little more -and they resent your overcharge, a little less and they gloat because -they’ve been able to underpay.” - -“Imagine their having such an attitude toward a live man dealing with -live ideas!” exclaimed Vida. “Toward Bernard Shaw, for instance, -lecturing on the necessity of extending to unmarried women the right -to have children!” - -Mrs. Guthrie looked apprehensively at Lucy and then at the young -Bohemian girl who was bringing in the dessert. “Fortunately,” she -said, “our professors do not care to deal with things like that.” - -“No,” said Vida, “they prefer to let society continue unwarned its -present insane treatment of illegitimacy.” - -“There’s no question about our lack of freedom,” said Guthrie hastily, -“nor about our need of it. But what means do you suggest to us, Miss -Martin, for gaining it?” - -“Well,” said Vida, “here’s Kenton Clark, one of the best economists in -the country, in danger of being kicked out for recommending my -lecture. Brooks and Gleason went the same way last year. Who kicks you -out?” - -“The President,” said Guthrie. “He holds his authority, however, from -omnipotent Regents who can kick _him_ out—and frequently do.” -That idea seemed rather pleasant to Guthrie. He smiled at it. - -“Why don’t you elect your own Regents and your own President—as -Americans should?” asked Vida. “Why not insist that you shall be -removable only by vote of your own colleagues? It’s absurd that a body -of men as highly trained as a university faculty should not be -self-governing.” - -“Yes, yes,” said Guthrie, “it is absurd. But here’s the existing -system. What force is capable of transforming it?” - -“Organization,” said Vida, fresh from her button-cutters. “How many -college teachers are there?” - -“Twenty-eight thousand,” said Guthrie. “Five thousand of ‘em women.” - -“But not five thousand of ’em men,” said Kenton Clark with a malicious -chuckle. - -“They would be—with power,” said Vida. “I’d like to see it. The -scholar would become a real force. It would be good to see thinking -married again to doing, after the long divorce that has made them both -sterile.” - -“There’s plenty of powder lying loose in discontented faculties,” -Clark mused. “If only it could be rammed together and—touched with -flame.” - -“Be the flame!” cried Vida. “A movement nation-wide may sweep out from -John Guthrie and Kenton Clark.” - -Mrs. Guthrie pushed back her chair energetically, indicating that -dinner was over. “Shall we go to the parlor?” she said. The three were -so absorbed they did not hear. - -“Could we get a dozen men who’d hold together, Guthrie?” said Clark. - -“There are more than a dozen—twice that many—radicals in the -faculty,” said Guthrie. “Whether they’d hold together——” - -“The Regents would have to think a bit before they fired a dozen men,” -said Clark. - -He and Guthrie tried to see how to get the substance of the labor -union idea without taking the name or the form. Vida told them the -name was immaterial, the form essential. “You can’t get the strength -of organization without organizing,” she said. - -Their instinct was against applying the working-class method to their -profession. They raised the difficulty of equal pay for unequal work -and mulled around over it till Vida gave them up. “You’ve been too -carefully selected,” she said. “It’s temperamental. No real -revolutionist becomes a college professor.” - -That set Clark and Guthrie persuading her of the advantages of the -union—which college teachers certainly had the brains to perceive. - -“Yes,” said Vida, “but the will to achieve them, the spirit to fight -for them, the power to make sacrifices for them?” - -Mrs. Guthrie sprang up. The movement, which drew all eyes to her, -placed her unintentionally near Vida. “I don’t want Harold and Lucy -sacrificed!” she cried. - -Her primeval cry made Vida’s hand leap out and press hers for an -instant. Mrs. Guthrie wavered between hostility to Vida’s doctrines -and the attraction of that wave of sympathy which swept her like a -physical force. - -“The wives of the button-cutters are facing that to-night,” said Vida, -her voice deepening. “Don’t you see why, Mrs. Guthrie? Through the -present danger they seek the children’s greater safety.” - -“Sit down, Anna,” said Guthrie. “This talk is going to lead to -something.” - -“It shouldn’t!” exclaimed Mrs. Guthrie. “It must not!” She turned to -Vida. “The men who take the first steps—they will lose their -positions. My husband’s salary is all we have. For a father of a -family—it would be criminal. We can live very well as we are, John, -as we always have. The Regents have even appointed a committee to see -about raising salaries.” - -“Our despotism is benevolent,” said Clark, “—if we’re submissive -enough.” - -“Our positions are insecure _now_,” said Guthrie. “To hold them -some of us have to sacrifice the best that’s in us.” - -“If it’s that or the children——” said Mrs. Guthrie. - -“Don’t worry, Anna,” said Guthrie. “If we go into this it will be -because we see it will make us more secure, not less.” - -Mrs. Guthrie went to the children’s table, leaned over Lucy’s chair, -and drew the girl’s head against her breast. - -“What do you think, Lucy?” asked Vida. - -“Papa ought not to have to do his work wrong to get money for us to -live,” said Lucy. She rose and went to her father, who put his arm -around her and hugged her. - -Harold made a dive for the other arm. “I’ve got six dollars in my -bank, Papa,” he said. “I’ll get along without the Indian suit and only -buy the bow and arrow.” - - -III - -In one of his classes next day Professor Guthrie, _à propos_ of a -literary-historical question of intellectual freedom, talked of the -survival in American university government of the heretic-expelling -machinery of the theocratic seventeenth century college. He said no -professor who had a mind and spoke it was safe, and recommended the -lecture of the syndicalist leader Vida Martin that night as promising -to develop some new ideas on academic freedom. - -It had never occurred to the students, accepting things as they found -them, that it did not exist. - -Vida’s handbills appeared with the cunning red line through “Assembly -Hall.” Groups of students on the steps talked of the button-cutters’ -strike, of syndicalism, of Judge Graham and Vida Martin. There was hot -denunciation and defence of Professor Guthrie’s daring new ideas. He -had stated the argument in the preface of Shaw’s _Getting Married_. -The insulation between the university and the thought of the living -world was broken. - -A newspaper clipping about Vida Martin’s activity in university -circles reached Regent H. P. Denton of Manistee, who caught a train -from there that afternoon and called upon the President. - -Some of the professors in the Opera House that night were furious at -Vida Martin’s attack—the contrast she drew between striking -button-cutters and submissive professors—her characterization of them -as thinkers who dare not think. It seemed unjust to them because their -submissiveness was a life-long habit and unconscious. - -Some who realized this said it was stinging but salutary. - -Hostile or friendly they felt the speaker’s personal force—the -unfamiliar union in her mind of carefulness and fire. - -During the lecture one ambitious assistant professor left to inform -the President that he had been attacked in an alleged exposure of a -connection between factory owners of Manistee and the Board of -Regents. - -The student president of the Y. W. C. A. who had recently acquired a -taste for being shocked was disappointed because Vida advanced none of -the ideas she was supposed to entertain regarding free love. - -Mrs. Guthrie was in the dress circle with her husband and Clark. -Reporters were watching them as the probable centre of a new storm in -the faculty. - -When Vida came to that “militant union which can restore the scholar’s -dignity and through the fearlessness of freedom make the university -teacher a living force as in the days of Abelard,” she surprised Clark -and Guthrie by relating it closely to the syndicalist ideal. The -organized college teachers should ultimately form a section of that -part of the “one big union” which controlled education—a body of six -hundred thousand teachers. She looked ahead to a far, fine goal. -“Aside from its present, practical, fighting advantages,” she said, -“this organization is a necessity as germ of a social organ essential -to the future. It should be the crown of the crafts composing -industrial society, not aloof from the working-class in disdainful -superiority, but understanding its solidarity with all—free but -responsible, governed not from without as now by the economic control -of another class represented by Regents, but from within by the high -technical conscience of the guild.” There a bigger vision of it opened -to her unexpectedly. She spoke as awed by something mystic in her own -unforeseen words. “The Scholars’ Guild,” she repeated. “It might -become the central organ of the world’s new mind!” - -That closed her lecture religiously. While the bulk of the audience -was moving out—full of little explosions of argument—a number of -instructors and young professors gathered around the lecturer near the -stage door under the balcony. She found them surcharged with facts, -and feelings, about the way they were governed. - -When Mr. and Mrs. Guthrie reached the group, Sanders of the sociology -department was talking energetically about recent magazine criticism -of universities. “It’s unpenetrative,” he said. “They seem unable to -see anything but undemocratic student fraternities. They don’t get in -as far as the fundamental undemocracy of unelected governing -bodies—much less to the revolutionary idea of a craft organization of -teachers.” - -“The last is new,” said a statistics man. “The editor of -_Science_ has been hammering for years on election of president by -faculty.” - -“The University of Washington has a big committee working on -undemocratic government,” said Hastings the mathematician. - -“So’s Illinois,” said some one. - -“Cornell’s talking of letting full professors vote for a third of its -board of trustees,” said a professor of engineering. - -“Wouldn’t it be better,” said Vida, “if you put yourselves in a -position to compel such an elementary right as self-government, -instead of waiting to have a third of it bestowed—perhaps?” - -“Certainly,” said the engineer. “The right is only secure if based on -our own power to get and hold it.” - -“We ought to have got together last year when Brooks and Gleason were -fired,” said Hastings. - -“Better late than never,” muttered Sanders. “We might save the next -man.” - -“Yes,” said Searles of the French section, “but what some of us want -to know is why we have not heard of this militant union. It’s all -right in the right hands. But who’s responsible for the idea? When and -where did it start? Whom can one write to about it? Why isn’t it -represented in our own faculty?” - -Vida set her lips and looked at Clark and Guthrie. The iron was hot. - -Clark struck. “It started in this faculty last night,” he said. The -attention of the group, which included two newspaper men, centred upon -him. “I was one of those present.” - -There was a little thrill at the courage of his declaration. Vida -loved him for it. - -“I was another,” said Professor Guthrie. - -Mrs. Guthrie caught his arm. “John!” she exclaimed beseechingly. The -word filled the group with a sense of drama and danger. - -“As senior in that discussion,” said Guthrie, unshaken, “I regard it -as my duty now to invite others who feel possibilities in a movement -for freer government to meet and consider plans.” - -“When?” asked Searles promptly. - -“And where?” Two or three spoke at once. - -Mrs. Guthrie turned away despairingly and sank down in a theatre seat. -The thing was going. - -“I suggest my rooms now,” said Clark. - -“I will join you there as soon as I have taken Mrs. Guthrie home,” -said Guthrie. The footsteps of the pair echoed in the emptied -auditorium as they went out. - -The college teachers asked Vida Martin to give them the benefit of her -organizing experience, and nine of them went to Clark’s rooms. - -There two of them, one a specialist on the American revolution, -cautiously declined to commit themselves to any action at that time, -but the revolutionists increased their number from two to seven. - -They threshed their way through a lot of instinctive, irrational -objections to formal organization, and planned to dragnet the faculty -for members. In a few days, as things were going, they could make -their position impregnable. - -That the organization they sought was essentially a union of their -craft became so clear that a scorn of disguising names like league, -association, and federation prevailed even against the statistician’s -sarcastic suggestion that they dub themselves “Brain Workers, No. 1.” - -“Professors’ Union” was rejected, not on account of its openness to -ridicule, but because it did not include instructors and assistants. -In order not to exclude small institutions “college” prevailed over -“university.” - -When they went home that night, glowing with their new communal hope, -Guthrie was chairman and Clark secretary of the first local of the C. -T. U. - - -IV - -The brunt of battle fell next day on Guthrie. His eleven o’clock -lecture was interrupted by a messenger with a note asking him to call -at the President’s office at noon. - -When he faced the Ruler in his swivel chair, that representative of -things as they are was friendly of manner but meant business. - -“I want to talk to you about you and Clark,” he said. “I have asked -for Clark’s resignation, and I am extremely anxious not to have to ask -for yours.” - -“Clark dismissed!” exclaimed Guthrie. He realized that the President -was striking too quickly for them, and groped for defence. - -“I warn you fairly that the Regents are behind me,” said the -President. “You have your choice of severing with that preposterous -organization formed in Clark’s rooms last night or with the -University.” - -“You may not find it so simple a matter to dismiss teachers merely -because they choose to form an organization,” said Guthrie, -stiffening. “It is an open acknowledgment that freedom of action does -not exist. Moreover, it is not two men you dismiss, if any, but—a -considerable number.” - -“I have reason to think not,” replied the President. - -Guthrie was weakened by his lack of information, and by the fear that -his colleagues had gone to pieces. - -“Make no mistake,” said the President. “I am prepared to dismiss -_seven_—if necessary. There are other reasons for your own dismissal. -You supported Clark in his insubordination with regard to Vida -Martin.” - -“Since you did refuse to let her speak in the University what was -there wrong in saying so?” - -“Clark’s tone. And yesterday you came out astonishingly for -sex-radicalism. The student president of the Y. W. C. A. came to me -and protested, saying a professor in this institution had no right to -corrupt the youth of the State with any such doctrine as unmarried -motherhood.” - -“Because I presented Shaw’s argument!” exclaimed Guthrie indignantly. -“If you are going to adopt this girl’s point of view you will be -compelled to maintain the position that the ideas of the most -conspicuous living English writer shall not be mentioned to students -of English in this University!” - -“Well, Guthrie, you must know where the fathers and mothers of this -State would stand in a fight about that. You cannot expect the -University to rise higher than its source, and its source is the -community.” - -“The University has no reason for existence unless it rises higher -than the rest of the community,” said Guthrie. “It is nothing if it is -not able to lift itself out of the community’s inertia and maintain -itself against the community’s prejudice. If you had not condemned -without inquiry that organization formed last night, you might find -that it contains the possibility of raising the faculty into precisely -that commanding position.” - -“I know the purpose of your organization, Professor Guthrie. Its -success would mean the end of all directing authority. An executive -could not discipline men upon whose votes he was dependent for -continuance in his position.” - -“That is absurd,” said Guthrie scornfully. “An English premier, -dependent upon a parliamentary majority, possesses power enough to -govern the British Empire. He is not able to dismiss members of -Parliament. There’s no reason why the head of a university should have -any such power. There is altogether too much disciplining of teachers -for acting on their own honest convictions.” - -“I won’t argue that matter of opinion,” said the President. “The fact -is plain that you have placed yourself at the head of an organization -directed squarely against the legally constituted authority of this -University, and unless you drop it you go.” - -Guthrie sat silent, facing what he felt must be a vain sacrifice of -himself—and nothing gained for his cause. He heard the rushing click -of typewriters through the closed door of an adjoining office. Their -frequent tiny bells of warning gave him a sense of time moving too -fast, events crowding too close. - -The President rose and walked slowly up and down the room. “Can you -afford it, Guthrie?” he said kindly. “How about your life insurance? -Will it lapse if you stop payment? How about your house? Still paying -for it?” - -“You are remarkably well informed as to my private affairs,” said -Guthrie coldly. - -“You have given me reason to be. Your children are approaching their -most expensive years. How about their education? Do you want Harold -and Lucy Guthrie to sink back into the untrained, ignorant class?” - -“That’s the fiendish cruelty of this!” cried Guthrie. He saw the eager -face of Harold offering to sacrifice his little Indian suit. “That’s -where you’ve got me,” he said despondently. “No wonder one of the -Regents offered to double Clark’s salary if he would marry. There’s -something hellish in a system that makes a slave of a man through the -needs of his children!” - -“It is doubtful if any other university will want you when it becomes -known why you left here,” mused the President. “Don’t do it, Guthrie. -You’ve been a living influence with our students. Many an old grad. is -grateful to you for kindling in him here a life-long love of letters. -You ought to go on doing that for twenty years.” - -“It’s just because I do not want to stop being a living influence—— -A man must grow or ossify. Yesterday a new world of thought, a new -secret of living, a new sincerity, came to birth in my mind. You want -me to kill it. That is not being a living influence. That is spiritual -infanticide. It means my extinction as a free teacher. And deserting -that organization I helped to form last night—that means dishonor!” - -“No,” said the President emphatically. “You cannot be expected to -sacrifice your career and your family because you happened to be -carried away in a dramatic moment worked up by a professional -agitator. You’ll see that within a month. This means your salvation -from some wild ideas and wilder conduct.” - -With an air of relaxing from strain the President dropped back easily -in his chair. “That woman must be clever, Guthrie. Isn’t she?” - -“She’s more than clever,” said Guthrie. “She’s a brave and skilful -fighter for a great cause—a thing I cannot be. I cannot even face -what every married button-cutter faces when he goes on strike!” - -Partially realizing how low Guthrie was sinking in his own estimation, -the President was not the man to let sympathy keep him from gaining -his end. “Well, Guthrie,” he said, “I take it that chiefly on account -of your children I may count on your withdrawing from the College -Teachers’ Union.” He smiled. “I say nothing more about the -sex-radicalism, for I feel sure you will yourself see the need of -soft-pedalling that in the classroom and in public. I am heartily glad -you are still going to be with us.” - -Guthrie went out of the President’s office like a man who has been -drugged. With an instinct to hide from every eye, he sought the -noonday solitude of his seminar room, let the door lock behind him, -and at the head of the long green table sank into that chair they -called the chair of English. - -There, in the hour of his degradation, he felt prophetically the ennui -of the next twenty years—the dead thoughts he would there utter and -reiterate—the bored young faces—— - -What had become of the interestingness of ideas? Where was that -passion for the hard and glorious quest of the true truth within? Why -had he been so fiercely bent on shaping new channels for his energy? -He had no energy. His thwarted force flowed away from his will where -it meant health and conquest into a morbid intensity of emotion—the -road to melancholia. - -He stiffened up. There was one pain he must meet now. There was that -desire to hide to overcome—a self-revelation harder than any he had -ever thought to make. There was shame to endure. “I have to tell her,” -he said. - -He rose and left his solitude, went down the deserted central walk, -and over to the drab-colored hotel. He looked between the open double -doors into the dining room. There were a dozen people. At the table -by the window in the corner where he had sat with them two days before -were Kenton Clark and Vida. They beckoned eagerly to Guthrie. - -He found himself strangely unwilling to cross alone the moderately -large square room. Its floor of alternate light and dark wooden strips -seemed like a great open space in which something evil must happen. He -yielded to the irrational fear which impelled him to slip around close -to the wall. - -Without waiting for him to take off his overcoat or sit down, Clark -flashed news of his own dismissal—too much aglow with the war they -were going to wage to perceive anything wrong with Guthrie. - -“Searles wanted all six to resign!” said Clark in a low, eager voice. -“Corking spirit, but we decided not. Six is too few. With six more—! -If we’d only had a little more time! Never mind. The idea is sound. -We’ll put it through. We’re going to raise a fund. I’ll give my whole -time to it as organizer. Sit down, man, sit down!” - -Guthrie shook his head. - -Vida rose with sudden solicitude, came close and laid her hand on his -arm. “What has happened to you, Mr. Guthrie?” she asked, so low that -Clark barely heard. - -“You are happy people,” said Guthrie, for a moment permitting her -searching eyes to fathom his. “You will fight beautifully. I have -failed you. The children were too much for me. I have caved in. I keep -my job. I’m done for.” - -He turned away, unable to endure their eyes. “Good-bye,” he said, and -started back along the wall. - -Clark sprang up, napkin in hand, knocking a knife to the floor. “Oh, -here!” he protested. - -Vida, with compassionate eyes on the retreating figure of Guthrie, -stopped Clark with a gesture. - -“That’s final,” she said. “He’s crushed. There’s no use torturing him.” - - - - - THE CARDINAL’S GARDEN - - _Villa Albani_ - - WITTER BYNNER - - - Here in this place which I myself did plan, - With poplars, oaks and fountains,—and with sculpture, - The rounded body of the soul of beauty— - Here in this garden, by my own command - I sit alone under the freshening twilight. - Not to my eyes shall be made visible - Ever again morning or noon or twilight,— - Not to my eyes—which are my servants now - No longer, save as servants in the grave. - But to my forehead and my finger-tips - The days give touch of bud and opening - And of their bloom and of their hovering fall. - The morrow shall be born with sighs and rain, - But this is peace, this twilight, this is pause - Between the sunny and the rainy day, - Pause for the elements, and pause for me, - As though it were a silver brook that ran - Between a blinded day and blinded night,— - Between the dust of life and the dust of death. - Why shall I sit here? Why are colonnades - And paths and pagan statuaries more - Adroitly dear to my unseeing eyes - Than all the beaded letters of the Books - And colorings of all the bended Saints? - Because I hear the stealing feet of peace - Among these marbles more than anywhere, - Than in that cell itself where I have been - True Christian and exemplar of the Creed - To my own heart. There, not a Cardinal - In a red pageantry of holiness - Before all comers, but a penitent - In humble nakedness before my God, - I found the potency of Jesus Christ…. - And yet it is not there but here that I - Find peace. Sometimes I think that Hell hath set - An outer court for me within my garden, - That it may mock me better in its own! - But whether Hell or rank mortality, - This garden which I builded for my body - Is the one garden now wherein my soul - Finds comfort, benediction of the twilight. - There in my cell, drawn on the walls, arise - Old memories of craft and violence, - Of lust for carven images of beauty: - How in the night I sent my men to take - That obelisk which I had offered twice - Its value for and been refused,—to bring - That obelisk and set it in my garden. - The Prince of Palestrina never dared - (Such has my might been) to recover it! - Still I can see him gaping at the trick - And wishing he might strangle me, the trickster! - And though these eyes that cannot see would make - Me now no quick report if that same obelisk - Should be abstracted on a newer night, - Yet how these fingers and this heart would know! - Why shall my tears fall, as I sit among - My oaks and poplars, fountains and my sculptures, - Before my cypresses and Sabine hills? - Have I not seen them all a thousand times? - Are they not vanity? Would I behold - Them more? Life, to an aged Cardinal, - Blind and enfeebled, should but celebrate - The Sacrifice of Jesus Christ who died. - Time should grow short for prayer and preparation. - Why is it then that life has seemed to pace - More than enough its little path of vigil, - But not to know the endless path of beauty - Beyond the entrance and the mere beginning! - Pray for us sinners now and at the hour - Of death!… And, even while thou prayest, I, - Who should incessantly be praying also, - I who am Cardinal and might be Pope, - Sit with my blind eyes full of Pagan glory!— - Sappho, Apollo and Antinous, - And Orpheus parting from Eurydice! - First falls the breath before the drop of rain. - Before the rain shall follow, I have strength, - Praise God, still to support myself among - These marble temples, columns and museums, - These deities of beauty and of time. - Hail, Mary full of grace, the Lord is with Thee! - The obelisk is here. It has not been - Retaken. Pray for us now and at the hour - Of death! And I shall enter at my door - And seek the chimney-piece and stand before - My young Antinous from Tivoli, - With lotos in his hair and hands, who once - Belonged to Hadrian. And I shall touch - Again the garment of Eurydice,— - And wonder—when that final mortal touch - Summons Eurydice, summons my soul, - And when she turns and enters and is dark— - If Christ shall follow her and sing to her. - - - - -LADY ANOPHELES - -E. DOUGLAS HUME - - -I hold no brief for the mosquito. She has always treated me as a mere -restaurant, and I have provided her with so many meals that I feel all -obligations to be already on her side. Also, her extreme talkativeness -is almost as objectionable as her voracious appetite. Any one who has -been kept awake by her buzz-z-z, buzz-z-z, buzz-z-z, on a tropical -night must have come to the conclusion that “good will to all men” can -never be strained to include good will to all insects. Moreover, the -fact that the lady of the species alone feasts upon blood seems a -reflection on the female sex. Yet, so it is: her husband is a harmless -vegetarian. - -All the same, when a sense of justice is strong, one does resent the -misdemeanors of man being laid at the door of even the most -exasperating insect. Certainly the sturdiest viewpoint of disease is -to regard it as the outcome of inattention, personal or general, to -one or other of nature’s observances. Instead, nowadays, parasitic -organisms are blamed for most of the aches and pains of humanity, -while their distributors are searched for in the realm of insects and -animals. The mosquito has, perhaps, fallen a prey to her own weakness. -Had she talked less, it is possible that she might have evaded her -doubtful celebrity. As it is, she stands accused of being concerned -with a no less formidable array of maladies than elephantiasis, yellow -fever, dengue, and malaria. - -Let us here concern ourselves with the last-mentioned, and the hungry -suspect, whose name has been coupled with the disease, her Ladyship -Anopheles. - -She may at once be singled out from her fellows by her habit of -discreet silence and her odd proclivity for standing on her head when -resting and feeding. Other mosquitoes remain on all fours, or rather, -all sixes, when dining. This acrobatic insect is, as everyone knows, -accused of inoculating her human prey with a protozoon, or microscopic -animal organism, which in its turn is held responsible for the heats -and chills, the aches, the pains, the languor, all the miseries of -malaria. The idea is a simple one, requiring little intelligence to -be understood. Is it rude to ask, what wonder that it has become -popular? Less marvel, too, when one reflects that the theory is -safeguarded by dividing Anophelines into a variety of groups, and -claiming that the guilty must be the right sort, and yet further, the -right sort duly infected. - -Now, the means of infection must come about through the insect having -feasted on a malarial subject. That its subsequent bite might poison -the healthy sounds a contingent by no means unlikely. The drawback to -this probability is that the mosquito possesses the feminine -characteristic of fastidiousness. Malarial subjects are the very ones -avoided by her hungry Ladyship. Here I may interject that I am not -writing of insects under control. What a famished mosquito may or may -not eat during the course of an experiment, I am not concerned with. I -refer to mosquitoes in a natural state, and personal experience has -made me observe that the one benefit of malaria consists in the -freedom it confers from mosquito bites. Though these insects are in -the habit of treating me as a very Ritz or a Carlton among -restaurants, periods of malaria always freed me from their ravages. -They like their food to be of the best, and the blood freest from -fever is the provender for their delectation. During nineteen years of -tropical life, my mother never experienced a single attack of malaria; -yet she was always the chief _pièce de résistance_ for every mosquito -within her vicinity. It may be noticed that the individuals least -susceptible to malaria are those most feasted upon by mosquitoes, -including the suspects, though whether these be _Anopheles Umbrosus_, -_Anopheles Maculatus_, _Anopheles Christophersi_, _Anopheles -Albimanus_, _Anopheles Argyritarsis_, or any others of high-sounding -title, I should certainly not presume to discriminate. - -Why should this general evidence count for less than the few -experimental cases upon which the mosquito theory is built up? These -latter are mostly conspicuous by their weakness. Take, for example, -the mosquito-proof hut placed at Ostia, and inhabited for three months -by Dr. Sambon, Dr. Low, Mr. Terzi, and their servants. What analogy -does this well-ventilated erection, raised above the soil, bear to -many of the insanitary homesteads of the Campagna? What analogy is -there between its healthy inhabitants, further fortified by zest for a -theory in dire need of proof, and the permanent dwellers in those -unpropitious surroundings? If we admit strength in the case of the -infected mosquitoes sent to the London Tropical School, whose stings -are said to have produced attacks of fever in the late Dr. Thurburn -Manson and Mr. George Warren, we must also remember that Abele Sola in -the Santo Spirito Hospital in Rome, according to the account quoted by -Herms in his _Malaria: Cause and Control_, is claimed to have fallen a -victim to this disease from the bites of mosquitoes that had developed -from larvæ in his own room, and therefore could not be reckoned as -infected. Moreover, they numbered hardly any Anophelines, and of the -very few present, it was not known whether any stung the patient. Yet, -according to the modern theory, Anophelines alone could have been -responsible for the mischief. The proverbial grain of salt seems a -necessary condiment for the cases of experimenters. - -In the short space at our disposal, we are not concerning ourselves -with the micro-organism, first discovered in Algiers by Dr. Laveran, -and considered to be the parasite of malaria. Without in the least -committing oneself to a general belief in the germ-theory of disease, -there may, here and there, be maladies produced by parasites. Yet, -apparently, fever, bearing all the clinical symptoms of malaria, may -occur without the presence in the blood of such organisms, no matter -whether parasitic or inbred. On page 8 of the Medical Report of the -Federated Malay States’ Government reference is made to an unusual -swarm of sandflies, and the following commentary is given. “Whether -sandfly fever exists we are not prepared to say, but many cases -_with all the clinical symptoms_ were noted and _no malarial parasite -was detected_ on blood examination.” Hence the sandflies come under -suspicion! Might not another moral be drawn, and that is that fever -may be due to causes less crude than the inoculation of parasites by -objectionable insects? - -The conditions that produce mosquitoes seem to be the same as the -conditions that produce malaria, and, in any case, it is these that -must be attacked, no matter whether Lady Anopheles be proved innocent -or in any measure guilty. The mysteries that surround the subject, the -occasional outbursts of disease when areas have been drained, the -usual method of improvement, the occasional betterment of health when -the reverse process of flooding has taken place, may possibly be -explained by the law of subsoil water. Dr. Charles Creighton writes in -his _History of Epidemics in Britain_ (p. 278): “According to that -law, the dangerous products of fermentation arise from the soil when -the pores of the ground are either getting filled with water after -having been long filled with air, or are getting filled with air after -having been long filled with water. It is the range of the fluctuation -in the ground-water, either downwards or upwards, that determines the -risk to health.” - -However, far be it from me to descant upon the mysterious causes of -malaria. My object is only to try to prove the unwisdom of rivetting -attention upon the anopheline mosquito. Deductions as to her innocence -may be drawn from the accusations endeavoring to prove her guilty. We -are told how noticeable among troops the difference in fever rate has -been between those that slept on shore and those that remained on -board ship in malarious districts. But as the mosquito is free to come -aboard too, how does that statement tell against her? I remember a -host of such insect invaders on the _Sydney_, the French mail boat, -when anchored at feverish Saigon. We carried a shipload away with us, -and when out at sea they feasted on me to such an extent that I -arrived at Singapore looking as though stricken with a rash, but -otherwise none the worse for their greediness. - -Again I was scarred for a long period after the venomous attacks of -mosquitoes and sandflies combined at Kuala Klang, on the Malay coast, -in its old days of fever, before it started a new sanitary career -under the name of Port Swettenham. Yet these myriad bites produced -fever of no sort, although I was at that time pronounced a malarial -subject. I did not remain in Kuala Klang long enough to be affected by -its unhealthiness; but, had Lady Anopheles been justly blamed, the -terrible biting I underwent should have taken effect, irrespective of -my removal. On the contrary, my own experience of fever was connected -entirely with locality and never with mosquitoes. Intermittent fever, -the genuine article, with its burnings, its icings, its whole -programme of miseries, had me constantly in its grip during residence -at a particular house in Kuala Lumpur, the Capital of the Federated -Malay States. My one compensation was freedom from mosquito bites. -When I left that abode, fever left me, and soon after mosquitoes began -to feed on me again with infinite relish. What matter? It was a proof -of sound blood, freedom from that worse scourge, malaria! - -To turn from the personal to what is far more important, the general, -let us consider the Medical Reports from that haunt of malaria, the -Malay Peninsula. - -The year 1911 in the Federated Malay States held the unpleasant -distinction of being particularly malarious. The mosquito theorists -explained as cause a great influx of, often, unhealthy coolies from -India, and much clearing of land, which distributed the mosquitoes, -and drove them into the houses and among the inhabitants. But, if -mosquitoes be culpable, why should this same year have also been -particularly unhealthy in regard to most diseases, phthisis excepted? -Yet the Medical Report for 1912 shows that, concomitantly with a fall -in malaria, 1,010 fewer cases of dysentery were this year treated in -hospital. There were 77 notified cases of smallpox, as against 286 in -1911; 29 cases of cholera, as against 620; and 5,676 cases of -beri-beri, as against 6,402. The greater prevalence of disease in -general in 1911 surely shows that the causes for its specific forms -must be deeper seated than mere insect bites. Yet so dominating is the -fashion to rivet attention on such factors as these that fundamental -troubles, even when known, appear often to be unheeded. - -The F. M. S. Medical Report for 1912 provides a good instance, taken -from the portion dealing with the Institute for Medical Research, -Kuala Lumpur. - -On page 25 it states that the occurrence of several cases of bubonic -plague in and near Kuala Lumpur rendered it advisable to consider the -possibility of the disease appearing as an epidemic and measures to -avert such a calamity. A short paragraph refers to reported cases of -plague, and then follow nearly four pages devoted to rats. Toward the -bottom of the fourth page come the pregnant words: “Nearly 50 per -cent. of the plague-infected rats came from the small stretch of -Ampang Street, about 150 yards long.” The short description of this -small area surely reveals a source of danger. “At the back of most of -the houses there is a kitchen or bathing-place from which an open -brick drain, covered with planks, runs through the house to the front -of the shop and under the pavement of the five-foot way into one open -drain at the side of the street. The plank covering of the house-drain -is usually buried beneath sacks of grain or other heavy articles, so -that the drain is not often cleaned. The open cement street-drain -forms a convenient highway for rats, which can readily gain access to -the house by the unprotected house-drains leading into it. Some eighty -yards away the main drain empties into the Klang River, here a shallow -and muddy stream with irregular, foul banks covered with reeds, rank -grass and collections of garbage.” Now, who could expect rats to keep -well in the vicinity of such a drain “not often cleaned,” and such a -river, “shallow and muddy,” with “foul banks covered with collections -of garbage”? Surely gratitude is due to the rodents, who, being nearer -the level of the bad conditions, get ill first, and thus give human -beings a fair warning of the sickness likely also to be their due, -unless surroundings are made healthy for all animals, four-legged and -two-legged. Yet, actually the Report has not a commentary upon these -palpable ills, and, though it has by no means exhausted itself on the -subject of rats, proceeds to vary the topic with fleas, the -meteorological conditions that affect these high-jumpers, and the uses -of guinea-pigs as flea-traps. The results of searching questions to -medical men on the subject of flea bites are even given. “Of eighteen -who replied one stated that he had never been bitten by a flea in his -life” (p. 31). Most people must wish they were equally lucky. But not -a single mention again of the uncleaned drains and the river choked -with garbage during the course of pages all the more diverting because -intended so seriously. - -When such open evils can be so ignored, what wonder that the more -occult sources of malaria should not be arrived at? And when will they -be understood while accusations against particular insects require to -be held in reverence as dogmas? In the F. M. S. Report for 1911 Dr. -Sansom allows (p. 3) “there exists in the minds of a great many people -a doubt whether the mosquito carries malaria or any other disease”; -and proceeds to add “until this heresy has been corrected.” Heresy -indeed! Is not free thought the first fundamental of science? Having -thus labelled disbelief in his theory, Dr. Sansom in his next Report -for 1912 has to admit (p. 5), “I have visited many (rubber) estates -where anti-malarial work has not been completed _or even begun_, -so that infection remains as bad or nearly as bad as ever, yet, from -the time the laborers have been fed, down has come the death-rate.” If -food has so much to do with the trouble, why lay all the blame on Lady -Anopheles? - -And just as too little food helped to make the coolies ill, is it not -likely, if it be not rude to ask, that too much food was part cause -for the malaria that troubled the prosperous members of the community -of Kuala Lumpur, the Federal Capital, so long as a need of drainage -left much to be desired in their surroundings? Who acquainted with the -Far East does not recall the many courses of the Chinese cook, and the -constant refilling of the champagne glass at dinner parties? There -seems small wonder that the carnivorous feeder and spirituous drinker -from a chilly latitude should fall a victim in the East to malarial -and other fevers: and this without any assistance from Lady Anopheles -or her sister mosquitoes. To her a meed of praise would seem due, for -where the mosquito exists there is proof of a need of drainage, -clearance, and general sanitary attention. But man, who has stoned the -prophets throughout the ages, equally execrates the insects that come -as warnings. - -That non-proven is the verdict upon Lady Anopheles’ guilt seems well -shown by Dr. Fraser’s Report, incorporated with the general Medical -Report for the Federated Malay States for the year 1911. - -After rather shakily chanting the orthodox creed of the mosquito -theory, Dr. Fraser negatives faith by fact in the most heretical -manner. “It appears to have been assumed on inadequate grounds,” he -writes, “that a small number of malaria-carrying species in an area is -necessarily associated with a low incidence of the disease. Certain -observations made in the course of the present inquiry would appear to -controvert this view. On some estates where the maximum spleen and -parasite rates prevailed few anophelines of any sort were to be found, -while in other areas, where malaria-carrying anophelines were -numerous, these rates were low. Also it was noted that where different -classes of laborers were under identical conditions so far as the -mosquito factor is concerned, such as free and indentured laborers on -the same estate, the parasite rates varied widely in the two groups. -It is clear that factors affecting the general well-being of laborers, -such as the quality of the food supply, housing, etc., are by no means -negligible in the prevention of malaria, as they are equally not -negligible in the prevention of other diseases. To these factors -attention must be directed as well as to measures which aim at the -reduction of mosquitoes, if the disease is to be combated successfully -in the conditions which obtain in this country.” - -Precisely! We must attend to general sanitation and personal hygiene, -and then, having removed the beam from our own eye, we may be able to -see clearly to cast out the mote in the eye of the Lady Anopheles. - - - - -SUMMONS - -MARY LERNER - - -With the velvet springiness of turf under his feet, the sense of urge -and strain, as of something inexorably drawing him, relaxed at last; -the blind hurry slackened. Out of the whirl came quiet and ordered -perception, out of the breathless confusion, peace. And the years -which his journey seemed to have consumed ran together and were as a -single night. Between white cloud-fleets, the Irish sky began to show -blue as Mary’s cloak, and the soft May morning was sweet with dripping -green things,—thorn and gorse and heather. Christopher knew from the -well-remembered “feel” of the air that the west wind was due to resume -its hearty music. Almost out of sight above, a lark sang, and he could -see innumerable swallows diving and skimming. At once, the old rhyme -of _The Seven Sleepers_, forgotten these thirty years, rose to his -lips like a bubble to the surface of a stream;— - - “The corncrake and the watersnake, - The cuckoo and the swallow, - The bee, the bat, the butterfly—” - -All these tiny sleepers were awake to-day; himself awake, too, and -aware, with some super-awareness, of the last stages of his -oft-promised journey home, achieved at length after the long, -oppressive interval of weariness and restraint. This interval was fast -receding now, and he made no effort to recall it, for he was eager to -slough off all memory of that heavy weakness as well as all shackles -of solicitous and hampering devotion. He’d had his will at last, -however, though how he could not well imagine; and here he was, free -of them all,—comely, stylish wife; modern, masterful daughters. They -could spare themselves the pain of drawing long faces over him; he’d -no mind to give up with his visit home unpaid. - -A good, dutiful family, no doubt, God have them in his care; but this -was a time when a man must cut free of all bonds of maturer years and -turn to the land that gave him birth,—and to his mother, long -unvisited, but by no means forgotten. Many a money-order had crossed -the counter at the country post-office, and of late, many a cheque. -But the first years had been bitterly hard, and all the years -breathlessly busy. That land over-seas took you and drove you whether -or no; but its rewards were adequate. - -Foot-loose on the old sod now, no longer earthbound but light with a -marvellous buoyancy, the reek of peat in his nostrils, the corncrake’s -homely tune in his ears. His eyes strained forward for familiar -landmarks, carrying always before them the expectant image of a white -cot in a green hollow. Uplifted by an exhilaration that seemed -stranger to any possible fatigue, he pressed on again, this time with -a pleasant sense of anticipation in place of the former gnawing -avidity, keenly alive to the delights of this long-desired green -world, brilliant with sunshine yet fresh from frequent rains, and -rocked with the rising wind. - -At last the silver stretches of the Shannon appeared, and a certain -well-known white ribbon of road, winding among farms. As he went, the -trees began to take on the look of friendly faces;—tall beeches, -whispering limes, blackthorn bushes, white with blossom. A field of -gorse, ablaze with yellow spikes of bloom, sent out its heavy -bitter-sweet perfume. Grassy hills, lined with grey stone walls, -beckoned him, each with its happy memory.—The brook! where trout hung -under the bank and water-cress wove its green mazes. The sight of its -pebbly bed recalled the chilly prickle of gooseflesh on adventurous -legs. He leaned over the rude railing to watch its spring rush, giving -himself to its cool voice, its freshness on his face. He felt clean -now at last of the dusty breath of cities.—Here, too, were the elder -bushes, all abloom. To think of the “scouting guns” he’d hollowed out -of their pithy stalks, filling them with water by means of a -piston-like wadded stick to discharge on good-natured passersby! - -The happy sense of expectancy quickened. He topped a sudden rise, and -there, secure between two steep hillsides, drowsed the object of his -quest; a low, stone cot, whitewashed, with thatched roof and -overhanging eaves. What beds under that cosy roof!—of live-plucked -goose feathers (well he remembered grappling the kicking bird between -his knees!), mounted on heavily “platted” straw, and yielding such -sleep as no bed in the new world could afford. As he looked, the high -wind seemed suddenly stilled, and everything appeared to wait -breathlessly. From the chimney, a thread of smoke crept up, straight -as a string in the quiet air. - -Then, along the lane, he suddenly descried a group of children, whom -he knew at once for his youngest sister’s. Impatient of this reminder -of a new day and a new generation, he drew aside till they should have -passed, for he was passionately desirous that, for to-day at least, -everything should seem as it had been. The children charged past, -laughing and calling, fair heads and dark, apple cheeks and clear -eyes, as if there were no stranger within miles of them. And their -heedless youth and vivid life made him all at once an alien and unreal -creature. - -Thrusting aside this unwelcome impression, Christopher pressed on to -the house. A little old man with a black cutty between his lips was -taking the sun in the garden, his narrow shoulders humped under a -shiny coat. Christopher cast a careless glance at him; _his_ father, -though not tall, was a personable man, a man of thews and solidity. -This old one would be some charity guest of his mother’s.—“Ye’ll have -us eaten out of house and home with your beggars,” his father used to -protest. “Every tramp between here and Gingleticooch has you covered -with blessings. I wonder we don’t be rolling in gold, the good wishes -we do be enj’ying.” - -At the gate, Christopher caught the scent of wild hedge-roses, of -sweet-briar and hawthorn, spilling a fragrance as of honeysuckle. At -once the years rolled back, the old boyish yearnings kindled. His -mother!—her arms would be open to him still, despite all delays and -neglect. She was never the one to “fault” him, whatever the blame. As -he neared the low doorway, he glimpsed the blue ware on the dark oak -dresser, the black, shining kettle on the hob, the long table spread -with homespun white linen. On the trimly swept hearth, turf glowed, -and beside it, his mother sat in her high-backed chair, bending over -her heavy prayer-book. - -Through all the years he had thought of her as a tall woman still in -the prime of her days, though he knew well she was long past seventy, -and though she had reported herself in laborious letters as “growing -down like a cow’s tail.” All images of her had flaunted a blue and -yellow print, French calico, which had delighted his childhood; blue -as cornflowers and hung with golden chains. To her years he had -conceded grey hair, softly waving under a lacy cap above a face still -fresh and pink. - -She wore to-day no chain-decked gown of cornflower blue, no roses in -her withered cheeks. A cap, indeed, did crown her, coarse, but -lily-white, and it shook ceaselessly with the trembling of her head. -Yet, though her face was seamed beyond recognition and her full grey -eyes sunken under lids plucked into innumerable tiny wrinkles, he knew -at once that it was she; and the sight of her shrivelled body caused a -contraction to close about his own frame. Her hands, twisted, spidery, -and corded with blue veins, clutched at his heart. Where were the -strong, firm hands that had so often lifted and soothed him,—dragged -him home howling, too, and soundly smacked him?—He found himself -longing for that heavy hand on his shoulder as for the kiss of his -beloved. - -He crossed the flags and spoke her name, holding out eager arms. Just -then, the house-door blew back with a clap and she turned her head and -looked past him unseeingly, shivering a little as at the sharp -mountain wind. - -“She does not know me,” he thought, conscience-stricken. “My -fault!—how could she? I’ll not be alarming her with a stranger’s -face.” Then, as she dropped her dim eyes to her book again: “She -cannot see far. ’Tis old and weak her eyes are—she thinks it’s -himself. I’ll go see can I find and prepare him; ’twill be best for -him to break the news.” - -So great was the comfort the place bestowed, however, that he must -watch her a few minutes, drawing near behind her chair. The years fell -away and he felt as if he had recovered the very heart of his lost -youth. A little four-legged stool stood close beside her skirts, and -he longed to sit at her knee as he used, leaning his head against her -and staring into the dull glow of the peat. The old ballads she used -to sing to him there!—fresh conned from sheets bought at the fair and -set to tunes of her own adaptation; the stories of “the people” who -steal and change children; the saucer of cream you must set out All -Hallows’ Eve for the fairies; the long Christmas candle of welcome, -which burned before the open door against the coming of the Infant -Saviour. What prayers grew on that hearth-stone!—rosaries for May -nights, litanies. The rigors of fasting and abstinence he had known; -black fasts, too, cheerfully kept. There had been then no timorous -seeking of dispensation.—A question of health? Nonsense; a question -of backsliders and turncoats! Men lived not by bread alone in those -days, but by “the faith,” valiantly. - -Drawn to her irresistibly, he looked over her shoulder at the swaying -book, eager to mark her special May devotion to Our Lady.—Would she -be saying, “Hail, holy Queen, Mother of Grace,” or reiterating, -“Morning Star, Pray for us; Health of the Weak, Pray for us; Comforter -of the Afflicted——”? He bent his head to the black-marged page. She -was tracing with tremulous finger, “Prayers for the Dead.” - -A chill breath touched him and he drew back a little. For whom did her -old eyes read the prayer? Eager to share her mourning, he gently laid -hand on her bony shoulder, but she did not turn at his touch; only -bent her head the lower over her book and let a little rising murmur -escape her moving lips. - -At her failure to respond, he shuddered with a sudden uncanny sense of -remoteness. Then a terrible desolation seized him. “She’s not herself -any more, that’s it; childish, and they never told me. I’m too late, -then. She’ll never see me more. And I meant to come, always; God -knows, I meant to come.” - -Fearing to alarm the quiet figure with an outburst of the grief that -choked him, he slipped out and sought the old bench under the hedge. -Here the tranquillity of the little farm laid a soothing hand on -him,—the sight of the speckledy hens pecking in the long grass; the -white goats tethered at a safe distance from sheltered heaps of -potatoes; a red cow, deep in the lush grass of the meadow, who swung -her head threateningly at a decrepit setter that limped across her -path. For a moment, looking at the old dog, he thought: “That’ll be -Sojer; he’ll know me.” But at once, with newly swelling heart, he -realized that many springs had drifted the white blossom of the thorn -across old Sojer’s grave. A friendly yearning made him rise and seek -this other dog, so like the companion of barefoot jaunts; a descendant -of the old fellow’s, no doubt,—a bond across the hostile years. - -At the touch of his hand, the setter cowered away, shivering in every -limb, his dark soft eyes full of anguished terror. When Christopher -tried to speak reassuringly, the dog set up a sobbing whine, and, -struggling to uncertain feet, hobbled for the house with his -red-feathered tail between his legs. - -On Christopher, as he stood there in the sunny morning, a chill dark -descended, and he felt isolated beyond the farthest star. Foreboding -shuddered through him, but he cried obstinately, “No, I’ll not accept -it! It can’t have come to me yet.” But, in spite of his gallant -refusal, he turned, like a child from the night, to his mother, as if -that little, age-worn woman could soothe his terror as of old. - -From the door, he saw her still seated on the hearth, which looked -ominously black now and desolate. Her bent finger held the dread place -in her book, and, with her right hand, she caressed the head of the -old setter, who was crowding to her knees and whining woefully. For -the first time, Christopher heard the broken quaver of her voice. - -“Eh, Princie, what ails you, doggie?—Are you feeling it, too? There’s -a power of terrible things about, the day. Waking up of me I -mistrusted it sore, and now I’m certain sure, for three times the -kettle’s after dancing on the hearth, and I’ve seen a tall shadow cast -in the full sun.—’Tis our boy, Christy, I’m thinking. He’s gone. A -young man yet, and I to be left sitting here alone. My grief! that -I’ll never see the lad more.—Christy, Christy, the best son!—but -there, every crow thinks her own bird the white one.—Whisht, Princie; -be quiet, let you. I must be reading the prayers for my son.” - -And standing there in the sunlit doorway, Christopher knew indeed -that, by this time, it was, as she said, too late. He would never see -her more, as men see one another. Yet no sudden terror, no dread of -things unknown could wholly rob him of the consolation of her -presence, and, even as he felt this dream-scene, too, relentlessly -slip from him, he was able to savor the exquisite satisfaction of -fulfilment, the transcendent solace of release. Rest! and he had been -so harried; completion, and life had been so long! Green hills to blot -out remembrance of dusty cities, fresh winds after the smother of -narrow streets. “I’ll come back one day, be sure of that,” he’d told -her, and through all warring circumstances, he had stood committed to -that promise. Now, freely, triumphantly, he had made good his word. - - - - -FASHION AND FEMINISM - -NINA WILCOX PUTNAM - - -Hitherto, dress reform has always proved a failure. And this is -because dress reform has usually been only the effort of a few -scattered individuals to force their personal taste upon the world. -And while social consciousness is often awakened by the daring -examples of such pioneers, all real social growth comes from a -collective consciousness, which is born in a body of people, by reason -of some economic or moral pressure which affects them all. When such a -body begins to murmur of a reform, that reform is almost certain of -accomplishment. And such a murmur, concerning dress, can be heard -to-day among those women who are banded together by the fight they are -making for freedom. - -Dress seems, at first glance, to be one of the least important of the -questions which modern women are taking up: but the smallest -examination into its practical aspects reveals the fact that it -affects all their other interests—not as a mere expression of vanity, -but as a serious economic factor. - -When we women first entered factories and workshops in numbers, we met -unfair conditions on every side. This was particularly true of the -garment trades, which were among the first to employ a great many -women. And when we met this unfair treatment, women dreamed of -legislating virtue into manufacturers. But it can’t be done! And now -it is dawning upon the consciousness of a number of women that the way -to reform clothing manufacturers, textile manufacturers, etc., the way -to cut down insane speeding, overwork, underpay, is to change our -insane conception of clothing—to strive to make it a normal, useful -thing, instead of a hampering, exotic, extravagant thing, which works -one group of women to death at a miserable wage, because a far smaller -group of parasitic women wish to be arrayed like peacocks! Knowing -this to be true, one naturally turns to the fundamental question, and -asks—what _is_ dress—what is fashion? And what, indeed, is dress? Is -it simply a means of protection from cold? A concession to so-called -modesty, a means of displaying wealth, and advertising leisure? Of -attracting the opposite sex? It has been all of these in the past, and -many of the same factors are still apparent in our present-day use of -garments: but a new interpretation of the word has come in with our -new industrial conditions. Dress is an enormous economic factor the -world over, and nowhere more so than in America, where it is an -over-exploited industry, whose markets have been stretched abnormally, -not only by the increasing production of inferior articles, but by a -psychological factor, far more potent even than the law of normal -supply and demand; and that factor is Fashion: a purely hypothetical -need of change in order to meet a purely hypothetical standard, which -is entirely ephemeral and continually altered, artificially. - -Year after year, we are made to put the money we begrudge, that we can -ill afford, money we would honestly rather put into other things; -money, often, _that we have not got_, into that particular twist to -skirt or coat or hat which will keep us as ridiculous-looking as our -neighbor, while, at the same time, safe from his ridicule; in other -words, to save ourselves the discomforts of being out of style. And -yet, detesting fashion, as I think the majority of us do in our most -secret hearts, we are often hypnotized by it to such an extent that -free action is prevented. - -If the number and character could be estimated of those people who -have stayed away from entertainments for lack of a new gown, or dress -suit, or some accessory thereof, almost every human being who has ever -received an invitation would probably be included in the list. That -people stay away from church for the same reason is traditional, and a -favorite method of imprisonment has always been to take away formal -clothing, and substitute loose garments. This trick has been -successful in the instance of white slavery, for it is found that the -girls are unwilling to go out into the street in the brilliant “parlor -clothes” furnished to them. - -So deeply rooted is this fear of being wrongly dressed, and so serious -may its consequences become, that it is high time that an examination -into the forces behind the accepted forms of fashions be made, and our -slavish adherence, not only to fashion, but often to discomfort, be -shown for what it is, _a chimera which_ _we ourselves protect_, and -which gives a lot of more or less unscrupulous business men their -opportunity. - -Most people believe that fashion is a matter of our own free choice -and approval; but this is not actually the case. For there is in -existence to-day such a thorough understanding between the big combine -of designers, department stores, wholesalers, manufacturers, -textile-mill owners, etc., that our pocket-books are drained by them -as systematically and coöperatively as though they belonged to a -single corporation: and their profits actually and directly depend -upon the extent to which they can play upon our hysterical fear of not -being dressed “correctly.” Of course, the first principle of playing -their game is to get control of fashion itself, to be able to swing -the public taste by forcing constantly changing styles upon it: in -other words, garments must _not be permitted to continue in use until -they wear out_. Before a garment has come to a state of disuse, a -radically new model must be presented which will make the old one look -ridiculous by comparison. In the cheapest grades of manufactured -garments, whose purchasers, it is safe to suppose, would keep a -garment until it was worn out, by reason of poverty, the desired -change is accomplished through the use of shoddy and inferior stuff. - -The dress of the rich woman will be discarded at the slightest hint of -a change in style, while its cheaper imitations, worn by the poor, -_are made of stuff deliberately calculated to last only for a season -of three months_! Needless to say, the fact is not advertised to the -working-woman who spends her savings on a suit at a price varying from -five to eighteen dollars! - -But, to a certain extent, this scheme of constant changing has reacted -against the manufacturers, especially those engaged in articles -pertaining to dress, rather than the garment makers. These former are -completely at the mercy of the most apparently insignificant change in -fashion. As a natural result, there is a tremendous lot of bribery -coming the way of the designer and the retailer. “Swing the fashion my -way!” is the constant cry of those who make trimmings, such as -buttons, braids, fringes, laces, etc., and it makes all the difference -between success, and, sometimes, bankruptcy, to the manufacturer, -whether or not dozens of little silk buttons are being used on women’s -tailored suits, or if there are two bone buttons less on men’s coat -sleeves. And the same thing is true of the fringe maker or lace -factory. For instance, since the introduction of the narrow skirts -which women have been wearing for the past three years, the lace -business has been nearly ruined. The close-fitting dress permits of no -lace-trimmed lingerie: the ruffled petticoat is a thing of the past, -and it was to the white goods manufacturers that the imitation lace -man sold his wares. On the other hand, the introduction of pleated -chiffon, as a substitute, has raised the occupation of side-pleating -from a scattered, ill-paid basis, comparable to that of a cobbler, to -the status of a real business. - -But while change of fashion leaves one or another trade high and dry -in turn, lack of change is still more deadly, especially to the -textile mills. For two years, 1911-12, women varied the making of -their garments only very slightly. The textile mills lost thousands of -dollars in consequence, and, at last, in the summer of 1912 began a -campaign to alter conditions. Their methods were so flagrant that they -would have been funny if they had not been so disgraceful. Everywhere -they offered bribes to designers. “Draw full skirts,” they said; “draw -pleated skirts, and draped gowns and draped waists; we want to sell -our overstock!” The current fashion was taking only six or eight yards -of material to a gown, and the obvious way of improving the matter was -to establish a demand for gowns which would require fourteen to -eighteen yards instead, or gowns which would require the more -profitable full-width materials; above all, gowns which the old, -straight styles _could not be remodelled to imitate_! The bribery was -as well handled as political “favors,” and as to the result, behold -the manner in which our women are swathed in mummy fashion to-day! - -That people should wear any clothing which is not exactly suited to -their need and honest desires seems too ridiculous to be true, and yet -that is exactly what most people do, usually without thinking of the -matter. How many men really like to wear a stiff collar, or a dress -suit? Or how many like to wear dark, thick suits in summer instead of -a kind of glorified pajama? And women! How long will they continue to -wear corsets? Not one really wants to. But it is not so much these -blatant ills of dress which harass one. It is the useless accessories, -the keeping up of irrelevant trimmings and embellishments, the -elaborate fastenings, which are the real annoyance. - -Not for an instant is it suggested that people should cease to make -themselves attractive in appearance, or that uniformity of dress ought -to be adopted. On the contrary, a greater individuality is to be -desired, but, above all, comfort and convenience. One should be able -to wear what one pleases without coercion of any kind or the -impertinence of criticism from some one whose tastes happen to differ. -To one man a collar may be a comfort; to another it is an abomination. -And there should be no rule, written or unwritten, which compels -either to sacrifice his comfort and tastes to the other. - -The true feminist recognizes that one woman may like to swathe herself -in draperies, and the next may prefer the plainest, freest form of -garment; and that one should be made to feel uncomfortable and -ill-at-ease because big financial interests have approved one rather -than the other, is an outrage upon the right to mental and physical -liberty! - - - - -GERMOPHOBIA - -HELEN S. GRAY - - -Several years ago Dr. Charles B. Reed of Chicago obtained considerable -notoriety by the invention of a cat-trap or gibbet to be baited with -catnip and operated in back yards. The accounts in the newspapers -related that he had found four dangerous kinds of germs on a cat’s -whiskers and was therefore urging the extermination of cats as a -menace to health; that Dr. William McClure, of Wesley Hospital, was -examining microscopically hairs from cats’ fur to ascertain how many -different kinds of germs there were on it; and that the secretary of -the Chicago Board of Health had issued a statement that cats are -“extremely dangerous to humanity.” From Topeka came the report that -six different kinds of deadly germs had been found on a cat’s fur and -that the Board of Health had in consequence issued a mandate that -Topeka cats must be sheared or killed! But why stop with shearing -them? There are germs on their skins. And now public penholders in -banks and post-offices are under suspicion; an investigation is being -made by the Kansas Board of Health, _The St. Louis Republic_ states, -and individual penholders may have to be supplied. From time to time a -health board official or some other doctor gives out a statement for -publication condemning handshaking as a dangerous and reprehensible -practice. - -The hair of horses, cows, and dogs is full of germs, which they -disseminate. Germs are everywhere. Why should cats’ whiskers be an -exception to the rule? If Thomas and Tabby could retaliate and examine -doctors’ whiskers, doubtless numerous virulent varieties of germs -would be found there. Doctors are a menace to public health, for they -disseminate germs. Therefore, exterminate the doctors! But perhaps, -being doctors, they don’t carry germs. Their persons are sacred. Germs -are afraid of them and keep at a respectful distance. - -All the leading works on bacteriology admit that a person may have -germs of diphtheria, typhoid fever, tuberculosis, pneumonia, or any -other disease within his body without having any of those diseases. -Since that is the case, it is obvious that germs of themselves cannot -cause disease. They do no harm in a body that is in a healthy -condition. But so prejudiced is the medical profession on the subject -of germs that the true causes of disease are overlooked and -disregarded. - -Among the four kinds of germs found on a cat’s whiskers, Dr. Reed -mentions a germ “which causes a variety of infectious diseases, -including kidney disease.” As if any one ever got kidney disease -because he unwittingly swallowed some germs of the kind found in -diseased kidneys, if he had not abused those organs by gross eating or -gross drinking! But it relieves the individual of all responsibility -for his condition to put the blame on germs and the cat. There is no -personal stigma attached to such a cause; for it is commonly supposed -that anybody is liable to be attacked by germs, that, like rain that -falleth upon both the just and the unjust, germs attack both healthy -persons as well as those whose bodies are saturated with auto-toxemia. - -An inspection of the family dietary usually reveals the cause of a -man’s untimely demise. But his death is piously attributed to an -inscrutable visitation of Providence. His wife drapes herself in -crêpe, observes all the conventions of grief, and overworks her -lachrymose glands for a season. His friends pass resolutions of -condolence, lamenting that their dear brother has been “called to his -eternal rest,” a flattering implication that he had so overworked -himself during his brief span of life that he needed an eternity of -rest in which to recuperate, and was entitled to it as a reward. -Whereas the only thing overworked was his digestive organs in -disposing of his wife’s cooking. - -If deadly germs are found on cats’ whiskers, what of it? It is as -valuable a contribution to science to know how many and what kind of -germs are to be found on cats’ whiskers as to know how many devils can -be balanced on the point of a needle. Verily, a fool and his time are -soon parted. - -That a cat has germs on her fur and whiskers does not prove that she -is a menace to health; but doctors are often a menace to life and -health. Much of the surgery performed is unnecessary and frequently -results in death. Vaccination and the administering of serums and -antitoxins are frequently followed by death or impaired health. One of -the gravest charges against the prescribing of medicines is that they -suppress or mask the symptoms and do not remove the cause of the -disease, but leave the patient to continue in the error of his ways -until overtaken again by the same trouble or an equivalent that has -cropped out in some other place; and by that time the malady has -perhaps reached a fatal stage. - -In some respects doctors are like cats. They caterwaul, and -occasionally they purr. When a woman patient calls at a doctor’s -office and he does not know just what is the matter with her or what -to do to cure her, if he belongs to a certain type in the profession, -he holds her hand and purrs and is so sympathetic that she leaves his -office in a transport, walks on air, and goes home convinced that no -one understands her case as well as he does. Or else he tells her how -beautiful she looked on the operating table. After such a subtle -appeal to her vanity she pays without demur his bill of $300 or $400. - -He takes great care not to offend his patients by telling them -unpleasant truths, but instead resorts to delicate flattery. If a -woman comes to his office suffering from some ailment brought on -chiefly by eating devitalized foods, he purrs softly while he -determines the latitude and longitude of her pain and gently inquires -if she has had a shock recently. She thinks hard for a moment and -recalls that she has had, that the news of the death of a child of an -intimate friend was broken to her abruptly. Yes, that must have been -what caused her condition. - -Lacking the ability to direct patients headed for perdition by reason -of wrong living how to live so that they can regain their health while -continuing their work where they are, he sometimes recommends a change -of climate or that they take a rest. Change of scene or occupation -usually affords some slight temporary alleviation that the patients -regard as a cure. - -When patients have a cold or the grippe, instead of making plain to -them what laws of health they have violated and that their illness is -a direct result, the doctor, it not infrequently happens, tells them -that it is “going around.” Colds and grippe are consequently in the -popular mind of mysterious origin, and the victims complacently regard -themselves as blameless but unfortunate. - -It is because the medical profession teaches people to look outside of -themselves for the causes of their maladies that we see such -spectacles as Caruso, obliged to break professional engagements that -would have yielded him $100,000, ascribing his case of grippe to -external influences. “I like everything in New York except its colds -and grippe,” he is quoted as saying in an interview. “I think I can -boast that I have had the most expensive case of grippe on record. It -has cost me $100,000. The public says I am a great singer. I should be -a greater man if I were a scientist who could drive grippe out of the -country. See if you can’t drive it out of New York before I come -back.” - -Note the boast. As if ill-health and operations were something to be -proud of! Instead of telling our acquaintances of our ailments in the -expectation of getting their sympathy, we ought to be ashamed to be -sick. They may understand what internal conditions colds, grippe, and -other ailments presuppose, and have a feeling of repulsion toward us, -not of sympathy. - -The germ theory of disease is in great vogue at present with the -regular—or allopathic, as it is sometimes called—school of medicine. -Some of the leading physicians of other schools, however, predict that -the day is not far distant when the contagiousness and infectiousness -of disease through germs, vaccination, the injection of serums as -preventives or cures, and the resorting to the use of medicines by -deluded people as a substitute for correcting their habits of living, -will be generally regarded as superstitions. When that day comes, we -shall cease this Pharisaical self-righteous attitude, this dread and -suspicion of others as germ-laden, and face the truth that we build -our own diseases. - -Even some of the regulars do not hold orthodox views; for instance, -Dr. Charles Creighton, an eminent English physician. He has made a -special study of epidemics and was engaged to write an article for the -_Encyclopædia Britannica_ on vaccination. At that time he was a -believer in it, but changed his views when he investigated the -subject. What he wrote was omitted from the American editions. “As a -medical man,” he once declared, “I assert that vaccination is an -insult to common sense; that it is superstitious in its origin, -unsatisfactory in theory and practice, and useless and dangerous in -its character.” He testified before the British Royal Commission on -Vaccination that in his opinion vaccination affords no protection -whatever. He has written several books on the subject. - -If germs are not the cause of disease, then what is? To this Dr. J. H. -Tilden, of Denver, one of the most distinguished of those who do not -accept the germ theory of disease as true, makes answer as follows. I -quote excerpts taken here and there from his writings in _A Stuffed -Club Magazine_ on the subject of the causes and cure of disease, the -germ theory, contagion and infection, and immunity. - -“Disease is brought about by obstructions and inhibitions of vital -processes…. The basis is chronic auto-intoxication from food -poisoning. It is brought about by abusing the body in many ways … -by living wrongly in whatever way…. Bad habits of living -enervate—weaken—the body, and in consequence elimination is -impaired…. The inability of the organism to rid itself of waste -products brings on auto-toxemia. This systemic derangement is ready at -all times to join with exciting causes to create anything from a -pimple to a brain abscess and from a cold to consumption. Without this -derangement, injuries and such contingent influences as are named -exciting causes would fail to create disease. This is the -constitutional derangement that is necessary before we can have such -local manifestations as tonsillitis, pneumonia, and appendicitis…. -Every disease is looked upon as an individuality; which is no more the -truth than that words are made up of letters independent of the -alphabet. As truly as that every word must go back to the alphabet for -its letter elements, so must every disease go back to auto-toxemia for -its initial elements…. There can be no independent organic action in -health or disease.” - -If drugs, serums, etc., do not cure disease, what does? Correcting -whatever habits caused it; for instance, eating too much, bolting -food, neglect of bathing, ventilation, and exercise, harboring worry, -jealousy, or other destructive emotions, and living on a haphazard -dietary of carelessly and ignorantly cooked foods. “Nature cures when -there is any curing done, but nature must have help by way of removal -of obstructions to normal functioning.” There is nothing spectacular -about a real cure. It means self-discipline. - -“Germs are in all bodies in health and in disease…. I do not -recognize them as a primary or real cause of disease any more than -drafts or any such so-called causes; at most germs can be only -exciting causes…. They are innocent until made noxious by their -environment. They are victims and partakers of it. They act upon it -and are reacted upon by it. As they must be amenable to environmental -law, the same as everything else, they necessarily change when their -environment changes. Because of a change in their habitat, the germs -that are native change from a non-toxic state into one of toxicity…. -They are not something extraneous to the human organism, but are the -products of lowered vitality in the individual, of lost resistance…. -Microbes are toxic when the fluids of their habitat have become -toxic—when the resistance of the body has fallen below the point at -which the fluids maintain their chemico-physiological equilibrium and -decomposition sets in; it is at this stage that germs multiply -rapidly; they absorb the poison that is generating, and it is not -strange that their products are poisonous, for the changed bodily -fluids on which they feed are toxic…. My theory is that the toxicity -of germs is due to being saturated with poisonous gases. The germs of -typhoid fever, for example, are not poisonous until the patient is -sufficiently broken down to cause the generation of toxic gases, after -which all the fluids and solids of the body take on a septic state, -poisoned by the absorbed gas…. Bacteria are not the cause of -disease; wrong living, which puts the system into such a condition -that the bacteria can readily multiply, is the real cause; the -bacteria are simply necessary results…. Germs are scavengers. When -an environment becomes crowded with them, it means that there is a -great accumulation of waste in a state of decay…. They are normal to -a certain limit in our bodies. If they become more numerous, common -sense and reason would say that they must be a necessary factor in the -process of elimination, or, if not a necessary factor, lost resistance -has permitted them to multiply beyond the restrictions set to them by -an ideal physical condition or normal resistance.” - -To those who accept the germ theory, it seems that there must be -specific germs to account for the different types of disease. The -leaders among those who reject it are able to explain satisfactorily -without it why all sick people do not have the same disease. They give -as the reasons for variation geographical location, the domestic and -local environment, the season of the year, atmospheric conditions (e. -g., hot, humid weather favoring putrefaction both in the digestive -tract and in animal and vegetable matter outside it), defective -anatomism, congenital or acquired, injuries, age, occupation, -temperament, food, habits, and mode of living. - -“Immunization means that normal alkalinity of the fluids of the body -exists…. Health is the only immunity against disease. If there is -any state that man can be put into that will cause him to be less -liable to come under disease-producing influences than full health, -then law and order is not supreme and the world must be the victim of -caprice, haphazard, and chance.” - -“Epidemics and endemics feed upon the auto-toxemic and stop where -there are none…. The belief of the medical profession that contagion -and infection pass from one human being to another—from a sick man to -a healthy man—is an old superstition unworthy of this age. Disease -will not go from person to person, unless they are in a physical -condition that renders them susceptible and unless environmental -states favor decomposition—those of the household and the general -atmosphere where the proper amount of oxygen is deficient. So-called -contagious and infectious diseases are self-limited. If it were not -for this self-limitation, the world would be depopulated every time an -epidemic of a severe character succeeds in getting a start. But the -medical profession believes that vaccination and antitoxin do what -nature has been doing since the world began, namely, set a limit to -the spread of disease.” - -“Tuberculosis is a seed disease. The seed must come _from a previous -case_,” Dr. J. N. McCormack, official itinerant lecturer of the -American Medical Association and “mouthpiece of 80,000 doctors,” as he -terms himself, is wont to declare in the plea that he is sent out to -make all over the country for the establishment of a “national -department of health and education to bring the benefactions of modern -medical science to every household.” But if one contracts tuberculosis -from the germs of another case and he in turn from some one else, how -did the first case that ever happened originate? ask the leaders among -those who reject the germ theory. Did the causes that produced the -first case of tuberculosis, cholera, typhoid fever, measles, -diphtheria, or other diseases commonly regarded as contagious or -infectious, quit the business after producing one case, disappear, and -go out of existence, or do they still operate and cause all the cases -that occur? That troublesome first case is the missing link in the -chain of the theory; but it happened so long ago that it has been lost -sight of, and doctors are seldom embarrassed by being asked to account -for it. - -I know a druggist’s family in which all of the six children had -adenoids. Adenoids are not regarded as contagious, so far as I have -ever heard. So contagion cannot be made the scapegoat in this -instance. The children had adenoids because the mode of living was the -same for all. In like manner, when several members of a family -contract tuberculosis, diphtheria, or measles, do they not get the -disease because they all lived in the same manner and were exposed to -like influences, instead of through contagion or infection with germs? -Disease is sometimes spread, however, through the contagion of fear -and suggestion. - -The opponents of vaccination and serum therapy deny that the use of -vaccines and serums has served to check the spread of disease. They -hold that epidemics are less prevalent and less virulent now than -formerly because of improved sanitary conditions, such as drainage of -the soil, municipal disposal of garbage, street cleaning, water and -sewer systems, the consequent increased facilities for bathing and -household cleanliness, etc. - -A false theory of cause not only leads to a false theory of cure, but -diverts attention from the real issue. For example, in the Middle Ages -and later, in England people used to empty garbage and other refuse in -the yards and streets, and in consequence a plague broke out from time -to time. Instead of attributing it to the accumulated filth, they -accused the Jews of poisoning the wells. So, too, in the case of a -girl on whose neck a gland enlarged to the size of an egg; there was -at once talk as to whether it was tuberculous in nature. Her mother -wondered, if it was tuberculosis, if Minnie got it from the cat! She -had always played with the cat a great deal. In this she reflected -current medical talk in the papers. She could not understand how it -could happen. There was no tuberculosis on either side of the family, -and Minnie had always been so strong and healthy. Before she was -twenty-five there was nothing left of Minnie’s front teeth but a few -black snags—evidence of her having lived largely on sweets, starches, -and meat, and that she had not been healthy. But her mother never -thought of looking in that direction for the cause. - -So long as people are led to believe that vaccines and serums are a -safeguard, they do not seek others, but continue to live in filthy -surroundings and to have injurious habits of living. In the mad chase -after imaginary protection, real immunity is overlooked and lost sight -of. - - - - - MEASURE FOR MEASURE - - RICHARD BUTLER GLAENZER - - - AND ONE ANSWERED: Lord, - Of a truth, brave Lord, - I am all the follies and yet - I have sinned not blindly, - But bravely, as a man; so let - My punishment be brave, - Albeit courage win not Heaven. - _What hast thou done, brave man?_ - All things that man can do, brave Lord. - _Whatsoever Hell thou choose, - That Hell is thine._ - - AND ONE ANSWERED: Lord, - Of a truth, kind Lord, - I am weak but humble, and yet - I have erred not often, - And kindly have I been; so let - Thy judgment be as kind, - Howbeit meekness gain not Heaven. - _What hast thou done, kind man?_ - All things that man would do, kind Lord. - _Whatsoever Heaven thou choose, - That Heaven is thine._ - - AND ONE ANSWERED: Lord, - Of a truth, O Lord, - Who am I to answer?… And yet … - I have lived, Life-Giver, - And O, how sweet was life! so let - Its sweetness cling and lo, - I shall but live again … in Heaven. - _What hast thou done, O man?_ - Thou only knowest true, O Lord. - _Whatsoever Heaven thou choose, - That Heaven is Mine._ - - - - -THE AMERICAN FARMER AS A COÖPERATOR - -E. E. MILLER - - -When one speaks or hears of coöperation among farmers, it seems the -natural thing to think first of Denmark or Ireland. These and other -European countries have made so much greater progress in the business -organization of farmers and farm life than America has, that it is -almost inevitable that they should be held up to us as examples of -what we might but do not accomplish. Various reasons are advanced for -this American backwardness in what is unquestionably one of the great -economic movements of our time. The American farmer’s individualism -and dislike of restraint is often given as the reason. Professor G. -Harold Powell goes so far as to say that “the investment of the farmer -must be threatened by existing social and economic conditions before -he can overcome his individualism sufficiently and can develop a -fraternal spirit strong enough to pull with his neighbors in -coöperative team work.” There is no doubt much truth in this, but I am -inclined to think that lack of knowledge as to how to coöperate has -been almost as much a hindering factor as has lack of desire to -coöperate. The attempts at coöperation among farmers have been -sufficiently numerous, if they had been successful, to have made -coöperative effort in rural communities a familiar form of activity to -us all. As it is, instances of really successful coöperative ventures -among farmers, while rather impressive as an aggregate, amount to very -little indeed compared with the vast volume of yet unorganized -business carried on by them. - -Europe seems to have had wiser leaders in the coöperative work, as -well as more docile followers. The American passion for bigness has -largely ruled both leaders and followers. Where the Old World peoples -were content to begin with small organizations for a definite purpose -and let these organizations grow and develop into powerful -institutions, the farmers of America have thought in terms of a -continent, tried to organize nationwide societies to transact every -kind of business—and failed lamentably. It has been only a few years -since a great noise was made by a society which proposed to unite all -farmers in one great society which should fix a minimum price on all -farm products and so settle matters out of hand. Just a year or two -ago Farmers’ Union leaders in the South were telling the cotton -farmers that only a great national organization could be of any real -help in the marketing of their crop. The disastrous failures of the -big organizations which were going to “finance the cotton crop” and -the successes along various lines attained by some local and county -organizations have discredited these leaders who mistook rhetoric for -business sense and possibly also taught them a few things they needed -to know. - -The great trouble with farmers’ coöperative organizations in this -country has been that they were too loosely organized and attempted to -do too much. It is just beginning to dawn on the mind of the average -farmer that a coöperative business must be conducted on the same -general lines as an individual business and that he cannot secure the -benefits of coöperation without giving up some of the privileges of -individual action. He is learning, too, not to despise the day of -small things. - -The lesson has been learned by some, however, in the long years of -struggle for fair prices and fair treatment by the commercial world, -and here and there all over the country are to be found groups of -farmers who have found out the principles of business coöperation and -put them into action to their own decided profit. These organizations -are interesting not only for what they have done, but also for what -they teach. - -Take the Southern Produce Company, of Norfolk, Virginia, for example. -This association was organized in 1870 and now has 400 members. It -handles most of the truck grown in the vicinity of Norfolk, handling -for outsiders—at a fixed percentage—as well as for its own members. -It not only sells the truck the members grow, but buys their seeds, -fertilizers and other supplies. It has bought and equipped an -experimental farm near Norfolk, turning it over to the State to run, -and lately has erected a six-story office building in the city, -building and lot costing $135,000. All this has been done without -putting in a dollar except for the capital stock which is limited to -$15,000. - -Equally notable successes have been attained by the Hood River apple -growers and the citrus fruit growers of California. The organization -of these growers has not only resulted in better prices to the -growers, but in a standard quality of goods and less fluctuation of -prices in the retail markets. Since California growers learned to -market their oranges and lemons through organization, there has been -brought about a uniformity of distribution which “has resulted in a -lower retail price to the consumer and gives a larger proportion of -the retail price to the producer.” These very successful organizations -have one definite purpose—to sell the fruit their members grow. They -are organized on strictly business principles. Each member’s crop -virtually belongs to the association, and is picked, graded, packed, -and sold as the association directs. Details of cultivation and -spraying which may affect the quality of the fruit are also looked -after by the association, and the grower has no right to sell his -fruit except through the association. In the case of the California -Fruit Growers’ Exchange this right to the privilege of handling the -crop is claimed in the first place by the Local Exchange against the -grower, next by the District Exchange against the Local Exchange, and -finally by the General Exchange against the District Exchange. It is -an up-to-date business organization these men have; the grower belongs -to a Local Exchange, the Locals form District Exchanges, and these, in -turn, the General Exchange. Each is independent in matters that -concern it only, but all must submit to the general voice in matters -which may be of concern to all. - -Fruit and truck crops seem to be especially adapted to coöperative -marketing; or possibly the uncertainty of profit in their production -and the big share of the final price absorbed by the middlemen have -forced fruit and truck growers to coöperate to a greater extent than -farmers in most other lines. At any rate there are quite a few -successful coöperative associations among these growers. In Texas such -an association does a business of $1,500,000 annually. The Grand -Junction Fruit Growers’ Association, of Colorado, is another notable -success. California nut growers market their product through a -coöperative organization. Florida citrus growers claim to have raised -the net price received by growers for oranges from $1.15 in 1909-10 to -$1.96 for the season 1912-13. Western North Carolina fruit growers -have organized, as have Georgia peach growers, and fruit raisers in -many other sections. In an Alabama town a truckers’ association with -190 members has standardized its products until it obtains prices -considerably above those secured by individuals, and from a small -beginning has grown to be the most important business concern of its -town. - -These stories might be duplicated many times; and it is not too much -to say that the fruit growers and truckers are rapidly coming to -realize the benefits of coöperative organization. I do not believe it -any wild prophecy to say that within a dozen years the trucker seeking -a location will inquire into the marketing organization conducted by -his fellow truckers just as he now inquires into the locality’s -shipping facilities. And some time all the local coöperative -organizations marketing perishable truck and fruit will unite to -conduct a great central marketing exchange. Then the present-day -scarcities of certain fruits and vegetables at one town, while in -another these same products are decaying and going to waste, will be -avoided. - -Coming back from the things that may be to the things that are, it is -worth while to note that in 1911 2,120 out of a total of 6,284 -creameries in the United States were conducted on coöperative lines, -and that of 3,846 cheese factories, 349 were coöperative. In Minnesota -608 out of 838 creameries were coöperative. In Wisconsin 347 -creameries out of 1,000 and 244 cheese factories out of 1,784. - -In these as in other lines of business coöperative associations are -largely localized. A successful coöperative creamery in a locality -helps to organize other creameries near it on a coöperative basis, and -so on. Similarly, the successful coöperative rural stores of the -country are largely grouped in Minnesota and Wisconsin, having spread -from one or two unusually successful ventures in small towns. The -coöperative grain elevators of the country are mostly located in Iowa, -the Dakotas, Minnesota and Illinois, although Nebraska and Kansas have -over a hundred each. Where one farmers’ telephone line is organized -another is likely to follow, and whole counties have been covered in -this way. - -In short, the coöperative spirit is like the little leaven which -spreads and spreads until it leavens the whole lump. - -It is not only that a successful coöperative enterprise leads to the -establishment of similar enterprises in nearby communities. More -notable and striking still is the fact that a successful coöperative -enterprise in a rural community seems often to put new life into the -whole community and to give the farmers entirely new conceptions of -their own capacities and the possibilities of their vocation. - -Take, for example, the story of Svea, Minnesota, as told by a recent -visitor to that town—a visitor, by the way, who went to Svea simply -to see how the farmers there were working together and what profits -they had from so doing. I quote: - -“In Svea they have established and operated thus far without one -single failure, a coöperative creamery, a coöperative telephone -company, a coöperative grain elevator, a coöperative stock-shipping -association, a coöperative store, a coöperative insurance company, a -coöperative bank (now forming). Moreover, they also have as a result -of what we may term coöperative effort, a thoroughly equipped high -school with agricultural and domestic science teaching, a consolidated -church with a resident pastor, a school library and a State teaching -library, neighborhood social meetings three times a month under church -influences. They have made their neighborhood a reading neighborhood. -Almost every farmer takes two to four farm papers and other reading -matter in proportion. - -“In other words, the Svea farmers have become ‘business men’ as surely -as commercial men in the towns, and are doubling their profits as a -result, while they are at the same time developing a high degree of -culture and that satisfying social life, without which mere money is -valueless, while also maintaining moral and spiritual influences which -town life tends to destroy.” - -The first enterprise was the creamery which was started in 1896. It -paid so well that the coöperative telephone line came four years -later; and, having once learned how much it helped them to work -together, they have continued all along to find out new ways in which -they could coöperate for the upbuilding of the community. The -coöperative store, strictly on the Rochdale plan, was started in 1909, -and to show how coöperation pays, the experience of the town pastor -may be cited. He took $100 stock in the store, giving his note in -payment. He then went on for a year buying goods from the store at -the usual retail prices. When settlement was made, ten months -later, it was found that the dividends due him—the rebate on his -purchases—amounted to $150.60. He had, without spending a cent or -paying any extra prices for merchandise, cancelled his note and the -interest on it and acquired a balance of $44.60. In other words, if he -had bought his goods from a regular merchant, he would have paid that -merchant $150.60 in net profits, whereas by coöperating with his -neighbors and trading with himself so to speak, he was enabled to -return the whole sum to his own pocket. With such examples of the -benefits of coöperation before their eyes, it seems but natural that -the farmers of Svea should be the prosperous, progressive, -broad-minded, hopeful folks they are said to be—the sort of folks who -are able and willing to vote upon themselves a tax of $1.70 on the -hundred dollars of property to build and equip the kind of high school -they want. - -Take, as another example of how the coöperative leaven works, Catawba -County, North Carolina. The farmers and other business men of this -county decided some five years ago that they needed a county fair. -They got together and had it—a fair with liberal prizes but without -entrance or admission fees. Everything was free to all who came, and -the authorities saw to it that there was nothing to injure or deceive -anyone who came. The fakers and cheap side shows which are the big end -of some fairs were not allowed to stop in Hickory where the fair was -held. The fair was a success, and has been a success since. Last year -the townspeople did not feel inclined to contribute to it, but the -farmers had learned how to work with each other in the meanwhile and -they went ahead and had a fair just the same, out in an oak grove -surrounding a rural high school. Fifty horses and mules on exhibition, -50 pure-bred cattle and other exhibits to match. Those who have -attended Southern fairs will know at once from the livestock entries -that this was truly a good county fair. I doubt if these farmers could -have held this fair, however, if it had not been for the coöperative -creamery. This institution, established in 1910, when the farmers -found themselves developing a dairy industry without a convenient -market, has been the coöperative leaven in Catawba County. It was -started with a capital of $1,500, the money being borrowed and the -machinery purchased from a creamery “promoted” somewhere in Georgia by -the agent of a creamery-selling concern which persuaded the farmers -that if they got a creamery outfit the cows would somehow come to it. -The creamery was a success from the start; soon it began a new work of -service by handling the farmers’ eggs on a coöperative basis, teaching -them how to produce and market eggs of quality while securing more -than the regular market price for these eggs. The lesson was quickly -learned: it paid farmers to work together. Now they have a farmers’ -building and loan association, a “Sweet Potato Growers’ Association,” -rural school improvement associations, women’s clubs, and are -preparing for a coöperative laundry. The women meet and discuss the -needs of their schools—as many women do—and then lay out a plan of -action and go to work to supply the needs—as too many women do not. -The Farmers’ Union in one district recently made a complete survey of -that district and can now tell just what each farmer reads, what he -does for his neighborhood, almost what he thinks, in so far as -thoughts may be determined by actions and conditions. In short, -“Catawba is a live county,” as any North Carolinian will tell the -inquirer, and coöperation among the farmers has made it live. - -At first thought it may seem strange that the intellectual and moral -progress of a rural community should be so quickened by business -coöperation among the farmers, but a little thought will show why this -must almost necessarily be so. It is beyond question that the lack of -organization, of unity of purpose and concert of action, is as great a -hindrance to rural progress and development as is the traditional -conservatism and inertia of the individual farmer. The farmer has -simply not learned how to use all the multitudinous committees and -boards and sundry group organizations which the city dweller has found -so effective in many ways. Once the farmer gets into the habit of -working with his neighbor for a common end, he sees all sorts of -desirable ends to be worked for, and if a “divine discontent” with -existing evils or needs is present in the community—as it usually -is—it is almost certain to be no longer hemmed up in the hearts of -two or three persons but set free in the consciousness of the whole -community. Then action follows. - -The man who would improve social and moral conditions in the country -districts can make no more effective start than to organize the -farmers into coöperative business associations. The American farmer -has, it seems to me, demonstrated himself an efficient and -whole-hearted coöperator, when once he learns the trick and gets the -habit. - -And he is learning rapidly. Before me, as I write, are reports from -various Southern States of coöperative tobacco and cotton warehouses, -coöperative and semi-coöperative stores, produce-selling exchanges, -fertilizer and supply buying associations, cotton marketing -associations, coöperative buying of machinery and livestock, and so -on. There is even an account of a coöperative church—a whole -community uniting to make the church a social centre and a help to -all. The work of rural organization, either for business purposes or -for intellectual development and social improvement, has just begun; -but it is something that a beginning has been made, and I, for one, am -not yet willing to admit that the American farmer is inferior to the -farmers of any other country in either common sense or neighborly -feeling. Unless he is so deficient, he will become as good a -coöperator as any of them, for both his business interests and his -sense of neighborliness demand a new organization of country life to -fit the new conditions of our time. - - - - -RELIGION IN THE MODERN NOVEL - -LOUISE MAUNSELL FIELD - - -Of all the many accusations brought against our much abused young -twentieth century, there is none more popular than that of -materialism. For all its deficiencies, whether artistic, social or -ethical, this parrot-cry furnishes a convenient explanation; but -unfortunately for those who welcome such catch-phrases as a ready -means of avoiding any necessity for trying to exercise their disused -and rusty thinking apparatus, convenient and accurate are -seldom—perhaps never—synonymous. If this age of ours really is what -it has so frequently been called by capable judges, the Age of the -Social Conscience, that fact is in itself ample disproof of -materialism; for if conscience in its every manifestation be not -spiritual, what is? True, we have done away with the old scorn of the -body and of that generality once known as “the world,” but this is -simply the natural result of an increased knowledge which has -compelled an altered point of view, making such contempt appear rather -childish. And because the new social conscience has developed so -largely outside the orthodox church, it is not therefore any the less -religious. Indeed, it is in very great measure the immediate cause of -that re-awakened interest in what may for clearness’ sake be defined -as strictly religious ideas which is now showing itself in so many -ways and places, and especially in the modern novel. - -That this new religious interest seldom takes a dogmatic form is -probably one reason why the average reader has been and still is so -slow to recognize it—of course we are in no way concerned here with -those latter-day successors to the Elsie books which provide psychic -water-gruel for the senile-minded of all ages—yet in the stirrings of -a more or less vague discomfort he has become aware of those electric -currents of spiritual unrest which are penetrating down even to the -most respectable of the quarter-educated well-to-do. There is -something more than a little pathetic in the way these latter welcome -such an attempt to manipulate words, to stretch the ancient formulas -and render them broad enough to contain modern ethics and modern -knowledge, as was shown in Mr. Winston Churchill’s _The Inside of The -Cup_—a novel whose popularity was due at least as much to its -discussion of religious as to its treatment of social problems. For there -is no class in the community whose size, the multiplicity of books and -opportunities for learning taken into consideration, is so astonishingly -great as is that of the half and quarter educated well-to-do. - -The best of those modern novels in which the present-day religious -interest reveals itself in its most significant aspect often treat it -shyly, almost timidly. For with the crumbling of the ancient cosmogony -and its dependent beliefs the old cock-sure attitude became obsolete. The -writer no longer says, “This is the truth; no decent or sensible person -will deny it”; but instead: “This is my opinion—what experience has -given me; take it for what it is or may be worth.” Very frequently it is -only the consciousness of things spiritual which is clearly shown; their -nature, with a deeper reverence than that of yore, is left indeterminate. -Here and there appears an author whose belief is as detailed as that of -Will Levington Comfort: usually, however, it is rather a reaching out, a -sense of things unseen, the mental attitude one of obedience to Abt -Vogler’s advice: “Consider, and bow the head.” - -In this as in so many other phases of our modern thought and experience -H. G. Wells has succeeded in stating lucidly that of which the majority -of people are but more or less dimly aware. It is indeed particularly -interesting to note the growth of spiritual and religious interest in Mr. -Wells. Decidedly materialistic in much of his earlier work, it is only -when _Marriage_ is reached that we find the hero, Trafford, deploring -the fact that his wife and himself have won “no religion to give -them”—i. e. their children—“no sense of a general purpose.” And, -though foreshadowed in other stories, not until _The Passionate Friends_ -of last autumn does there come the description of a genuine religious -experience, a description which is thoroughly characteristic of that -sense of awe, of a greatness and power too vast to be expressed in -faltering, merely human speech, which is often—it might be safe to -say, always—the very crux of the religious spirit as it appears in -the modern novel. Stephen Stratton, who relates the experience, has -reached the crisis of his life and knows not where to go nor what to -do when, as he phrases it: “The great stillness that is behind and -above and around the world of sense did in some way communicate with -me … commanding me to turn my face now to the great work that lies -before mankind.” And having told him what his share in this work is to -be, “the stillness” bids him: “Make use of that confusedly striving -brain that I have lifted so painfully out of the deadness of matter.” -And Stephen, though he cries out, “But who are you?” obeys. - -Detailed at greater or less length, it is this occasional awareness of -communication with the Power outside and beyond “the world of sense” -which is the shape in which religion is most likely to appear in the -modern novel. Sometimes, as in _John Ward, M. D._, this awareness, -usually touched upon lightly, almost furtively, is clearly and -strongly emphasized, but very seldom, and then under a slightly -different aspect. The destruction of the old formulas has resulted in -an instinctive distrust of creeds, an instinctive shrinking from -anything which bears even the least appearance of an attempt to make -new ones. The situation portrayed in William Arkwright’s able, yet -curiously uneven book, _The Trend_, wherein he shows his mystic, -purely spiritual singer as escaping, horror-stricken, from an orthodox -church service and denouncing it as an insult to God, is typical, -though extreme. For the revolt against the materialism of Haeckel and -his followers—not of Darwin and Huxley, who were not materialists and -repudiated the name with the utmost vigor—has been accompanied by a -revolt against the materialism in religion which rendered it -vulnerable to the onslaughts of historical and scientific criticism. -“We claim and we shall wrest from theology,” said John Tyndall, “the -entire domain of cosmological theory.” The event has proved him a true -prophet—and helped men to disentangle religion from theology. - -The whole movement of the modern novel, indeed, has been toward a -spiritualization which embodies within itself an essentially religious -feeling; only this spiritualization not being of the monastic and -ascetic kind which so long swayed the imaginations of men, but of a -social or humanistic order, has frequently been mistaken for other -than its real self. It constitutes, too, a force active in all the -affairs of life rather than one principally confined to certain of its -details, and this fact can be glimpsed, sometimes from one angle, -sometimes from another, in the more ephemeral as well as in the best -examples of our twentieth century fiction. In an article published in -the May issue of The Forum attention was called to the change which -has taken place in the character of the fiction hero, who has lost his -idle elegance and become a worker. That this work should so often be a -part of the struggle for human betterment or a joining in the endeavor -to right some especial wrong is both a portion of and a testimony to -the idealistic spirit which quickens the modern novel, as is also the -companion fact that its drama is in many notable instances mainly a -psychic one. More and more is the inward effect thrusting the outward -event into a position of subordinate interest; the story of a murder -becomes an account not of the efforts to trace the slayer, but of the -result of the deed upon his soul. The most interesting and important -chapter of _The Devil’s Garden_ is that wherein William Dale reviews -the inner life which has been so turbulent, while the outer was so -calm; _The Debit Account_ has little to say of Jeffries’s career in -the realm of finance but very much about his mental attitude toward -himself and that “world without trifles” in which he lived; despite a -charming heroine and an absorbing plot it is the influence of failure -upon the character of Ralph Lingham which is the matter of supreme -importance in _When Love Flies out o’ the Window_. - -To call this confused mass of struggle and revolt and aspiration -“religion” may seem to many persons unjust and perhaps even a trifle -shocking; but that is because of the popular confounding of religions -which are many with religion, which is one in essence, whether it be -manifested under the Buddhistic form of quietism or the social service -activities within and without the present-day church. Modern thought -has made the old-time easy shifting of responsibility impossible, and -the changed belief which this involves, enforcing the conviction that -the world is to be saved and the Kingdom of God established on earth -not by miraculous intervention but by the earnest labor in well-doing -of many generations of devoted men and women, has had even among those -who deny it an incalculably powerful effect. It may be too that the -new humanitarianism which causes us to view with horror conditions -which our forefathers regarded with more or less equanimity and makes -reform one of the most familiar of words is to some extent due to the -desire to escape from any effort to measure and explain the Infinite -with mere finite instruments. Since the days when knowledge destroyed -the foundations of that ancient stately tower of faith and authority -which men had believed was based on truth’s very rock, this attempt to -find a working theory of life which shall not imply any dogmatic -response to the riddles of the universe has been made in directions -innumerable, and is being so made to-day; only, the way of escape by -“practical” social labor has become more popular than any other and is -a road along which travel in divers manners all sorts and conditions -of men—among them many who would vehemently and even indignantly deny -that religious and spiritual problems had anything whatever to do with -their chosen path. - -In the modern novel as in the modern world religion has come to be -more and more a matter of service and aspiration; less and less a -matter of accordance with fixed rules and formulas. And upon this, as -upon so many other aspects of life, the writer of to-day can express -himself with a freedom which only a few years ago would have brought -down torrents of wrath upon his head. What in our parents’ time would -have been said of _The Trend_, for example, or even of _A Man’s World_? - -Thus religion in the modern novel evinces itself principally in four -distinct ways: in revolt against the worn-out, cramping traditions; in -a broad humanitarianism which has increased sympathy and given a fresh -and vivid and impelling meaning to the word duty; in a quickened -spirituality that has removed punishment and reward from the hereafter -and even from the world of matter to the living human soul; and in a -reaching out, vaguely, gropingly, but never futilely, toward “the -stillness,” “the Ultimate Force,” “the Unknown Power,” or whatever -term men prefer to use in their desire to get away from the old -anthropomorphic conceptions, and yet express their consciousness of -the Infinite and Divine. For “the obstinate questioning of invisible -things” which began so soon as man developed from the primeval -ape-forms and became Man, still goes on and will go on, in all -probability, so long as the race endures; only the shape and manner of -the questioning has changed as humanity has slowly learned something -of its ability to mould its own destiny, the duty and privilege which -it possesses of working out its own salvation. There have been many -periods in the world’s history when that questioning found few to -voice it aloud, yet always after such a pause it has been renewed with -fresh and greater vigor. One of these pauses came in the last century; -to-day the questioning resounds all about us, and one of the means -through which it is being uttered most clearly is the modern novel. - - - - -GIOVANNITTI - -_Poet of the Wop_ - -KENNETH MACGOWAN - - -There are probably a lot of technical errors in Giovannitti’s -poems.[1] I didn’t notice. And perhaps that is one of the tests of -great poetry,—not the faults that you can’t find because they’re not -there, but the faults that will not be discovered. Something else -absorbs you. - -The significant thing is that here we have a new sort of poet with a -new sort of song. And doubtless because of this song it will be many -years before we see his greatness. For the song that he sings is not a -pleasant song. It is the song of the people as he learned it in the -Lawrence strike and hummed it over in the jails of Salem. He and his -song are products of something that few Americans yet understand. We -do not comprehend the labor problem of the unskilled, just as we do -not comprehend the I. W. W. that has come out of it. A poet has arisen -to explain. - -Now the I. W. W. is no mere labor union; the A. F. of L. is enough. -Giovannitti is no mere poet of labor; we have had plenty of such. He -is not singing of labor alone. He is not prating of the dignity of -work—you can’t find it in the situation the I. W. W. faces. He is no -aristocrat of handiwork, like the A. F. of L. He sings the people -behind the work—active or idle, skilled or not—“Plebs, Populace, -People, Rabble, Mob, Proletariat.” He cries the awakening of that -great mass of mankind that has always been typified as Labor because -earning its bread in the sweat of its brow was its one common -attribute—the primordial curse. He looks beyond work to emancipation: - - Think! If your brain will but extend - As far as what your hands have done, - If but your reason will descend - As deep as where your feet have gone, - - The walls of ignorance shall fall - That stood between you and your world…. - - Aye, think! While breaks in you the dawn, - Crouched at your feet the world lies still— - It has no power but your brawn, - It knows no wisdom but your will. - - Behind your flesh, and mind, and blood, - Nothing there is to live and do, - There is no man, there is no god, - There is not anything but you. - -Against him Giovannitti finds the world—the world even of his own -kind, bound in the chains of the past. The police, the law, the -Church, another age shackling this, he has met them all in -Massachusetts, arrayed against even the first steps toward his -industrial democracy. The business of his verse is to destroy. In -_The Cage_—the prisoner’s pen in which he stood for murder—he deals -with the mummy of authority. In _The Walker_ he has painted the prison -as no man, not even Wilde, has done. And the Church—even the Christ -whom so many socialists are confessing that they may be numbered with -the sheep—that also he denies. Christ, the heavy-laden carpenter, was -still a man of peace. Giovannitti has his own sermon, “The Sermon on -the Common”: “Blessed are the strong in freedom’s spirit; for theirs -is the kingdom of the earth.” - -Materialistic—like all these socialists? Giovannitti has his answer -ready for you: “While happiness be not our goal, but simply the way to -get there.” - -Neither materialism nor happiness is likely to trouble the average -American. What bothers him is “violence.” And there is no disguising -the fact that violence is an essential part of the I. W. W. and its -faith. Love is as great a part, of course; but hate must spring just -as quickly from the cruelty of the world of the few as love from the -brotherhood of the world of the many. Giovannitti and his friends want -something and they want it badly. They are ready to take it peaceably: -Giovannitti pictures the spirit of Helen Keller as the Christ of -loving forgiveness—the only true Christ—offering peace to the -grinder of the faces of the poor. But, if love and forgiveness fail, -there is another savior waiting, and a violent savior: - - … The sombre one whose brow - Is seared by all the fires and ne’er will bow - Shall come forth, both his hands upon the hilt. - -Whatever its future, the I. W. W. has accomplished one tremendously -big thing—a thing that sweeps away all twaddle over red flags and -violence and sabotage. And that is the individual awakening of -“illiterates” and “scum” to an original, personal conception of -society and the realization of the dignity and the rights of their -part in it. They have learned more than class-consciousness; they have -learned consciousness of self. The I. W. W. is making the “wop” into a -thinker. And that is what Giovannitti wrote in his _Proem_ when he -said of his own verses: - - They are the blows of my own sledge - Against the walls of my own jail. - - [1] _Arrows in the Gale._ By Arturo Giovannitti. The Hillacre - Book House. - - - - -EMERSON - -_A Mystic Who Lives Again in His Journals_[2] - -WARREN BARTON BLAKE - - -Emerson has been “discovered” again—this time in the France that he -tried hard and vainly to understand. It all began with the publication -of a critical biography by Madame Dugard in 1907. I was in Paris then, -and read it, and was most of all struck by the comically dressy -effect, in translation, of the simple lines beginning: - - Good-bye, proud world, I’m going home. - -In French, they correspond to an Emerson dressed in eighteenth century -style, with wig and sword: - - Adieu, monde orgueilleux, je retourne au foyer; - Tu n’es pas mon ami, je ne suis pas le tien… - -Yet the book is a good introduction to Emerson, and, since 1907, -Madame Dugard and others have translated several volumes of essays for -the French public. I wonder if they have won a reading—outside the -university and professionally literary groups; I wonder if Frenchmen -see far beyond what Robert G. Ingersoll called the “baked-bean side of -his genius”? As the late Perpetual Secretary of the Immortals said, -when the French Academy “crowned” the Dugard book: - - “Emerson’s influence in America, like Ruskin’s in England, - is a curious illustration of the need for an ideal which, at - certain moments, the man of action, the Anglo-Saxon, feels. - Such was the empire of contemplative monks over barbarian - chiefs and of mystics over feudal armies. It was Emerson’s - fortune to launch his ideas at a time when America was - largely without them…. Emerson, knowing that the great - danger of democracy is atrophy of the individual conscience, - set himself to preaching individualism—the necessity of a - high culture, the search for an ideal.” - - -II - -Eight years ago, when I read Mme. Dugard’s volume, I was -youthful—with all of youth’s intolerance. It seemed no mere -coincidence that Emerson’s father recorded his birth in his diary -between a dry note on the “Election Sermon” and a report of a session -of his literary club at Mr. Adams’s. Cheerful youth, not needing -reassurance concerning the excellence of this world as an abiding -place, is unlikely to set a high value on what contemporary reviewers, -even in the American religious press, found to praise in Emerson’s -essays: “Their lofty cheer, and spirit-stirring notes of courage and -hope.” I certainly had no conception of Emerson’s influence upon my -father’s generation—an influence so great that Carlyle called his -friend a new era in our history; so great that when some clergymen -complained that he was leading young men to hell, Father Taylor -remarked: “It may be that Emerson is going to hell, but I am certain -he will change the climate there, and emigration will set that way.” -Then again, I had no sympathy with Emerson because it seemed to me, in -spite of all the long words and imported transcendentalism—or, -partly, on account of them—that he didn’t “get anywhere.” (I -sometimes feel so still—but the charge is less damnatory. I do not -wonder that Moncure Conway wrote of Emerson setting free in his -heart—in his _heart_, notice—“a winged thought that sang a new song -and soared—whither?”) - -Emerson’s dependence upon intuitions and praises of them as the -springs of action and organ of inspiration conferring wisdom upon man -seemed the less respectable because I hadn’t read Bergson—who has -made intuitions more than ever fashionable. Emerson lived in the -spirit-world—a quite different place from any trodden by the student -in Paris who is at home in the world of the Sorbonne and the -Bibliothèque Nationale, and in the world of flesh-and-blood. To -healthy youth, nothing is much more repugnant than the Wordsworthian -ideal of wise passivity, while the notion of a Buddhistic Nirvana -seems murderous of “Nature”—however you define her. Moreover, I know -not how to direct my inexorable thoughts, Emerson avows, and scarcely -appears to think any direction of them needful. His best thoughts -steal upon him in silence, and Truth flies out of the window when Will -enters in by the door. “There is never a fine aspiration but is on its -way to its body or institution,” he confidently asserts. Too -confidently, it seemed to me. Emerson, aged thirty, wrote that a -system-grinder hates the truth; he loved the truth, and -therefore—therefore?—side-stepped system. It was not till much later -that he uttered the heartfelt cry: “If Minerva offered me a gift and -an option, I would say, give me continuity. I am tired of scraps…. - - “‘The Asmodæan feat be mine - To spin my sand-bags into twine.’” - -Perhaps the scrappiness of Emerson is less distressing to the youthful -mind, eternally and quite needlessly refreshed by the comedy of life -on every side of it, than the Emersonian “trick of solitariness,” that -he played as a Harvard undergraduate not less but perhaps rather more -than as the Concord sage. When Madame Dugard’s book on Emerson was -published in Paris, I sat down and wrote a critique—stored with -Roussellian analogies, à la Irving Babbitt. I was full of Rousseau -then, and I piled on sentences that I meant to be cruel and -crushing—not of Professor Babbitt, or Jean-Jacques, or Madame Dugard, -but of poor Emerson. I showed my article, unfinished, to a dear -friend—wiser than I; and then tore it up. Here is a part of the -letter I had from my friend commenting on the little essay: - - “I find your point that Emerson, the preacher of - individualism, was himself thin-blooded and barren of true - personality, interesting: whether or not it is true. I never - happened to find it put just so before, and should certainly - never have thought of it. But I suppose, after all, a - certain kind of individuality might be expressed by - impersonality as well as by any other instrument. I’ve only - glanced through the Dugard book, but the point of view seems - to be the conventional one that Emerson was too far removed - from the stress and pain of life to touch very closely - vibrant, struggling souls. As you translate, ‘he fills only - the full, reassures only the optimists.’ I suppose that is - true enough. And yet—and yet, is any life so full that it - does not need refilling; or any optimism so complete and so - unshaken that it does not need reassurance, _expression_, - from an articulate, a stronger spirit? Isn’t optimism with - many people a religious yearning rather than any truly - temperamental attribute; a thing to be struggled for, and - cherished, and reinforced from without? Whatever forces from - within may have urged Emerson toward idealism and optimism, - wasn’t he at least equally an idealist, and optimist, from - conviction, or faith, or whatever else you call the - semi-religious element? The Emersonian idealism is more, I - am sure, than the natural overflow of a serenely poetic - disposition—to which you try to reduce it. You must not - forget that essay of his on Destiny—Destiny, man’s heroic, - large-spirited friend, man’s bolster against Fate - (discouraging and enervating personage!). - - “I suppose that it is fair enough to complain that Emerson - gives light without heat, but how many writers throw off - much heat and little light—to say nothing of ‘darkness - visible’…. Not many philosophers and poets and friends of - ours yield us both forms of power. Perhaps the combination - of the two—light and, well, at least _warmth_—is the most - remarkable thing about Christ and his system.” - -I feel less ashamed of my calfish distrust and dislike of Emerson now -that I have read in President Eliot’s centenary essay on the great New -Englander his confession that he too, “as a young man,” found the -writings of Emerson “unattractive, and not seldom unintelligible, … -speculative, and visionary.” It is only after one has suffered from -living that one fully values Emerson—only as one is gradually -educated himself, in experience’s school, that one appreciates his -worth as a prophet of modern education; of the latter day social -organization, its maladies and quacks and salves; of what Dr. Eliot -calls “natural” rather than supernatural religion. - - -III - -For this descendant of a line of Yankee ministers, there is no -dividing line between the secular and the sacred. To Emerson, life is -itself sacred; and the universe no less holy than the Ark of the -Tabernacle— - - So nigh is grandeur to our dust - So nigh is God to man. - -“Christianity is wrongly conceived by all such as take it for a system -of doctrines,” he wrote in his diary as a young man—thereby -fortifying in some sort what Augustine Birrell was to say half a -century later: “You cannot, however dogmatically inclined, construct a -theology out of Emerson.” His stress was placed—as he was persuaded -Christ’s was—upon moral truth; and at thirty he wrote: “I feel myself -pledged, if health and opportunity be granted me, to demonstrate that -all necessary truth is its own evidence.” Demonstrate? Emerson never -did succeed in “demonstrating” very much. In Dr. Eliot’s words, here -was no logician or reasoner, but “a poet who wrote chiefly in prose.” -But his prose is certainly no less poetic than his poetry. The -inspiration is in both cases moral; and, to paraphrase— - - His every line, of noble origin, - Is breathed upon by Hope’s perpetual breath. - -Yet Emerson was intolerant of cant about immortality. “I notice that -as soon as writers broach this subject they begin to quote. I hate -quotations. Tell me what you know.”[3] - -Emerson demonstrates, after death, one meaning of immortality by -living again in his “Journal”—the tenth volume of which has just come -to my book-shelf. Some complain of prolixity, but to read this Journal -is to find the measure of the man: and that is all the more cheering -to the lazy reader in that Emerson is far from being immeasurable. He -set down from day to day not only the record of events and personages -who impressed him, but many stray thoughts and reflections. He swept -into his Journal all the chips from his workshop, and stored there all -the rough materials he meant to carve and fabricate and ornament. -Workshop? The word is decidedly unpoetical, and perhaps inapt; for, as -Madame Dugard points out, he made of his soul a lyre whose strings -vibrated to all the winds of the spirit (_his_ spirit, that is); and -in his Journal he notes these passing vibrations in phrases where -words like _flow_, _flee_, _flux_, _fugitive_, _fugacious_, _current_, -_stream_, _undulation_, occur and recur. Undeniably he sometimes -forced himself; he acknowledged that his talent, like the New England -soil, is good only while he works it. “If I cease to task myself, I -have no thoughts.” And adds: “This is a poor sterile Yankeeism. What I -admire and love is the generous and spontaneous soil which flowers and -fruits at all seasons.” Many of his memoranda he developed later in -the essay form—a procedure suspected by his own contemporaries[4]—but -I like the mere scraps. Very perfectly do they express the eagerly -searching, earnestly austere man: reflecting all his sincerity and -incompleteness just as the beautiful paragraphs they piled up as their -sole monuments mirror the minds of Joubert in France and Amiel in -Switzerland. There is no humbug here, though there are some few -fallacies to reward those who read principally to prove, at the -author’s expense, their own astuteness. Emerson fully realized—at -fifty—what his deficiencies were; he called himself an intellectual -chiffonier, with a Jew’s rag-bag of brocade remnants and velvets and -torn cloth-of-gold. Truth to tell, he is all this no less in his -essays than in these Journals—and is a literary architect no more than -his friend Montaigne. As he repeated his lectures, and they gained in -polish and conciseness, the defect still sometimes remained: he built -more than one excellent house without stairs. It is in momentary -flashes of intuitive communication with the great spirits—lightning -flashes that suddenly light up the black night in which we spend most -of our time—that his genius shines. Somewhere in his Journal he writes: - - “One man sees the fact or object, and another sees the power - of it; one the triangle, and the other the cone which is - generated by the revolution of the triangle.” - -He who has so often been reproached with aloofness looked at many -common facts, and saw what we see there—and beyond. His first lesson -of religion is that things seen are temporal, unseen things eternal; -yet is the temporal much for the eternally-minded, who preserves the -all-important sense of wonder. “Now that man was ready, the horse was -brought,” he writes; and continues: - - “The timeliness of this invention of the locomotive must be - conceded. To us Americans it seems to have fallen as a - political aid. We could not have held the vast North America - together which now we engage to do. It was strange, too, - that when it was time to build a road across to the Pacific, - a railroad, a ship-road, a telegraph, and in short, a - perfect communication in every manner for all - nations,—’twas strange to see how it was secured. _The - good World-Soul understands us well._” - -Nowise was Emerson a Ruskinian. To the railroad he says—“like the -courageous Lord Mayor at his first hunting, when told the hare was -coming: ‘Let it come in Heaven’s name, I am not afraid on’t.’” And -this assurance is all the more welcome as one of the not too frequent -flashes of his humor. - - -IV - -While an author is often the worst-qualified critic of individual -books or passages in his own work, he has almost always expressed -somewhere the final criticism of his total. So it is with Emerson. On -one page he defines for us the type of idealism of which he was an -exponent: - - “We are idealists whenever we prefer an idea to a - sensation…. Character is more to us…. Religion makes us - idealists.” - -On another page, he writes: - - “Malthus existed to say, Population outruns food: Owen - existed to say, ‘Given the circumstance, the man’s given. I - can educate a tiger’: Swedenborg, that inner and outer - correspond: Fourier, that the destinies are proportioned to - the attractions; Bentham, the greatest good of the greatest - number. _But what do you exist to say?_” - -It is no tragedy if this sower of good seed said no one thing, and -only repeated many unequally wise counsels, and, by the wireless -telegraph of sympathetic genius, spelled out the dots and dashes that, -for the rest of us, unschooled in science, might have remained dots -and dashes till the day of judgment. Emerson’s contemporaries greatly -needed the man and his serene preaching—so undisturbed—while - - Theist, atheist, pantheist - Define and wrangle how they list. - -To paraphrase Thureau-Dangan, Emerson’s was the empire of the -contemplative monks over barbarian axe-men and sword-bearers. To-day, -while the prosperous shudder at every murmur of social unrest, and the -not-prosperous are drunk with heady wines; while society is, as in -Emerson’s day, still “devoured by a secret melancholy,” disguised in a -hundred forms of madness; while the nations still glare at one another -from behind their breast-works, and the classes still war or hate -(with ever deepening consciousness of class): while all these things -are so, democracy’s “great dangers” may well remain the vulgarizing of -the arts, contempt of contemplation, “the atrophy of the individual -conscience.” Emerson somehow soothes this conscience without putting -it to sleep. His courageous faith in Destiny, his cheering theory of -compensations, his deathless hope, his healthy, exaggerated -individualism: here are counter-irritants for more than one of Time’s -diseases. “If thought makes free, so does the moral sentiment. The -mixtures of spiritual chemistry refuse to be analyzed.” And Emerson -did indeed “make free”; he was Emancipator, “not of black bodies, but -of the minds of white men.” - - - [2] _Journals of Ralph Waldo Emerson: 1820-1872._ With - Annotations. Edited by Edward Waldo Emerson and Waldo Emerson - Forbes. Boston: Houghton-Mifflin Company. Ten Volumes. - - [3] “Emerson refused to dogmatize about what is necessarily - obscure at present.”—John Albee, _Recollections of Emerson_. - Emerson wrote in his essay on _Experience_: “In accepting the - leading of the sentiments, it is not what we believe concerning - the immortality of the soul or the like, but _the universal - impulse to believe_, that is the material circumstance and is - the principal fact in the history of the globe.” This is not far - from the point of view of James, Bergson, and, nowadays, Sir - Oliver Lodge. If Emerson “refused to dogmatize” about the - uncertainties of the future life, he had all the same his nobler - convictions. He writes in his _Journal_: “I know my soul is - immortal if it were only by the sublime emotion I taste in - reading these lines of Swedenborg: ‘The organical body with which - the soul clothes itself is here compared to a garment, because a - garment invests the body, and the soul also puts off the body and - casts it away as old clothes (_exuviæ_), when it emigrates by - means of death from the natural world into its own spiritual - world.’” - - [4] In _Harper’s New Monthly Magazine_ for June, 1870, we read: - “Rumor attributes to Ralph Waldo Emerson a peculiar method of - composition. He keeps, it is said, a commonplace book into which - go every striking thought, curious metaphor, keen epigram, which - his own mind incubates or his various reading discovers. When he - is called on for a lecture, he goes to his commonplace book. He - culls from its pages enough of its best material for an hour’s - instruction or entertainment. Connection is immaterial….” - - - - -NOTE - -The continuation of _The World of H. G. Wells_ series, by Van Wyck -Brooks, is postponed in consequence of the war. - - - - -CORRESPONDENCE - - -_The War_ - -[TO THE EDITOR OF THE FORUM] - -DEAR SIR,—The war and the new problems created by it are engrossing -the attention of the entire British nation. Outwardly the life of -London goes on pretty much as usual. Under the surface there is a -tremendous lot of fermentation and premonition. It seems certain that -the war will be accompanied or followed by a social readjustment on a -scale hitherto undreamed of—and this readjustment will be entirely in -a democratic and socialistic direction. - -That a great financial crisis is due one can hardly doubt. So far the -weaker elements in the commercial and industrial world have been -carried along by artificial support, but that cannot go on -indefinitely. Whether the moratorium be extended or not, the crash -must come sooner or later. People are realizing this, and it has -already caused a tremendous awakening. In the end it will mean -additional surrenders on the part of the wealthy classes. The Kaiser -has solved not only the Ulster and suffrage questions, as some one -said the other day, but the whole question of social reorganization. -What would have had to be taken under ordinary circumstances will now -be given. This may seem an optimistic view of the whole thing, and may -prove unwarranted at this point or that, but on the whole I think it -will be found absolutely correct. A spirit of self-sacrifice is in the -air, and I think the German war machine will prove possessed of just -enough initial impetus to prevent that spirit from petering out -without tangible manifestation. The more the Germans win to begin -with, the longer the war becomes protracted, the more thoroughly will -the spirit for which their ruling class stands be killed in the end. - -Just how the financial precariousness of the European situation will -affect America no one can hope to foretell with any certainty. It is -possible that the distress of one continent will bring a “boom” to the -other. But I doubt it. I believe that we shall have to suffer with the -rest of the Western World, and if that proves so, it means that we -shall have an outbreak of internal strife hardly less serious than the -external strife on this side of the water. We are indeed—turn -wherever we may—on the threshold of grave and portentous events, and -may the Spirit of Life grant us all strength and patience and faith to -live through them. There is a great darkness ahead of us—an ordeal of -fire for the whole civilized portion of mankind—but beyond it awaits -us the long, sunlit day of world-wide peace. - - EDWIN BJöRKMAN - LONDON - - -[TO THE EDITOR OF THE FORUM] - -DEAR SIR,—I have just read your September editorial on War. How -powerfully and terribly you write on the subject. I hope it may be read -everywhere. - - GEORGE BURMAN FOSTER - CHICAGO - - -[TO THE EDITOR OF THE FORUM] - -DEAR SIR,—I am an old man. I watch with pain, almost with -incredulity, the spectacle that Europe presents to the world. I see -England fighting “lest the lights of freedom go out throughout the -world.” I see Germany fighting lest God and civilization be -obliterated by barbarians. I see France fighting for her honor, her -freedom, her existence. I see everywhere murder, and misunderstanding. -So I write to you to thank you for the attitude you have taken: the -big attitude. It will be remembered. It will have effects that, when -you are old, as I am to-day, will bring you contentment. You have -fought a better fight than any of the commanders in the field. - - SENEX - CINCINNATI - - -“_Piety_” - -[TO THE EDITOR OF THE FORUM] - -DEAR SIR,—Your correspondent “Twentieth Century” who writes under the -above heading in the August FORUM is surely in a bad temper. His -letter is good evidence in favor of the theory that our beliefs are -determined by our wishes. He objects strongly to the doctrines -propounded in the tract he mentions, particularly to the use of the -word “damned,” and, if he had the power, would stop the publication of -such objectionable matter. - -The only reason he gives for this is that he dislikes it very much and -won’t have Christianity of that brand at any price. - -Now why is he so hot about it? Why does he use such epithets as -“stupid,” “disgusting,” “criminal lunatics,” etc.? If these doctrines -are false, no one will be hurt by them—it may even be that some will -be restrained from evil deeds by the teaching. On the other hand, if -they are true, and no one can demonstrate their untruth, he and all -those who despise the warning may find themselves in sorry case. -Anyway Christians will try to get on without him and may be encouraged -to know that the faith is still able to arouse such violent opposition. - - J. P. DUNLOP - BERKELEY, CALIFORNIA - - -[TO THE EDITOR OF THE FORUM] - -DEAR SIR,—Thank you for sending me the proof of Mr. Dunlop’s letter. -Mr. Dunlop has evidently rigid convictions which no discussion could -modify. He may justly retort that I myself have convictions which I am -unwilling to modify. But that would not be true. I am willing to -modify any and every conviction that I have, if new evidence and new -advances in knowledge make it clear that I have been partly or wholly -at fault. But Mr. Dunlop clings fast to what he considers the faith of -his fathers, though the thinking world has long discarded the idea of -a God of Love who is supposed to punish his children for their faults -in this life by consigning them to the flames of hell, in which they -will suffer eternally the agonizing torments of fire. It is impossible -to reason with the well-meaning and sincere, but utterly ignorant, -people who are capable of believing such absurdities. - -I am glad that “Christians will try to get on without me.” I shall -certainly succeed in getting on without the so-called Christianity -which teaches that morality must depend essentially upon the fear of -hell, not upon the love of God; and I will cheerfully take the risk of -being punished for refusing to believe that God is in reality a fiend. - -Mr. Dunlop assumes that I was in a bad temper when I wrote my previous -letter. A certain _sæva indignatio_ against lies and hypocrisy, wilful -or unwilful, is entirely justified. Was Christ himself icily cold when -he swept the money-changers and brawlers from the Temple? Did he speak -in measured academic platitudes? - -Mr. Dunlop does not realize that he believes what he believes merely -because he has never used his brain, never investigated or tried to -distinguish between the essential truth and the inevitable accretions -of falsehood and folly. If he had been born in pagan times, he would -probably have remained a pagan. In one age or country he would have -sacrificed to Moloch: in another he would have worshipped Bacchus. -But, of course, he cannot understand this. - -I used the epithets “stupid,” “disgusting,” etc., because they seemed -to me the most appropriate in connection with such a travesty of -reason and religion as the tract referred to presented. And Mr. Dunlop -is quite wrong when he says that “if these doctrines are false, no one -will be hurt by them.” Generations of men, women and children have -been hurt by them; hampered and cramped and narrowed by them; -prevented from living their full, free lives, and driven from the -comprehension and sustaining power of Christ’s Christianity by such -grotesque inventions of little minds, striving to measure their God by -their own paltry standards. - -As I said before, it is time that the narrow-minded reactionaries -should be taught that they are not the pillars of the true Church and -the pillars of the ideal society that they have supposed themselves to -be; they are neither good, nor pious, nor useful. They are the real -enemies of knowledge, reason, Christ and God. They try to murder -childhood with ghastly lies about hell-fire; they try to enchain -manhood and womanhood in shackles of mediæval, nonsensical, -character-rotting superstitions. - - TWENTIETH CENTURY - NEW YORK - - -_American Industrial Independence_ - -[TO THE EDITOR OF THE FORUM] - -DEAR SIR,—The peril of dependence on foreign nations for production -and over-sea transportation is demonstrated in the European war of -1914 as never before. - -The loss of human life in this war will be appalling, the resulting -sacrifice of the fruits of the labor of generations inestimable, and -the loss of capital will be enormous. - -We must use our best judgment to prevent these disastrous conditions -from weakening our industrial capacity. This is the time when we -should think and think hard about conserving and developing industrial -independence. - -We have issued the following announcement: - - “_To American Producers_: Please report to us any - article or articles (raw material or finished product) of - use in agriculture, mining or manufacture in the United - States, for the supply of which we are dependent upon any - foreign country.” - -We shall take up every article thus reported, investigate the -possibility of successful production at home, and urge upon Americans -the desirability of such changes in our existing tariff system as -shall create new industries in every line where we are now partly or -wholly dependent on foreign countries. - - A. D. JUILLIARD - Chairman, Executive Committee, - The American Protective Tariff League. - NEW YORK - - -_Eugenics in Wisconsin_ - -[TO THE EDITOR OF THE FORUM] - -DEAR SIR,—As supplementary to your editorial on _Eugenic Tests_, -which appeared in the August issue of THE FORUM, I am submitting -herewith my editorial on the general subject, which appeared in _The -Milwaukee Daily News_ recently. As, of course, you know, Wisconsin, -at the last session of its legislature, placed on its statute books a -law requiring certain examinations and tests to be made before the -intending groom could secure a license to marry. The law provoked -widespread discussion and far from general approval. It was thought, -in some quarters, to be too drastic to be capable of full and complete -compliance. However, it is still on our statute books, and while some -of its most drastic provisions, like the laboratory tests, are not -being insisted upon, the belief is general that the law is doing some -good along new and, heretofore, untried lines. It gives notice that -something beside matrimonial misery must be a condition precedent to -the marriage relation. - -However, your editorial suggestion that popular education rather than -drastic legal enactments should be employed to secure a reasonable -standard of health preceding marriage, is undoubtedly sound and should -lead to what ought be the much-desired condition. Legislation, here as -elsewhere, is not the panacea of all the matrimonial ills of which we -know. But silence is an inexcusable crime in the premises. - - DUANE MOWRY - MILWAUKEE, WISCONSIN - - -_The Fourth Dimension_ - -[TO THE EDITOR OF THE FORUM] - -DEAR SIR,—With due deference to your valued journal, the article of -Claude Bragdon, _Learning to Think in Terms of Spaces_, in your August -number, is essentially illogical. The writer thus introduces his -subject: “A point, moving in an unchanging direction, traces out a -line; a line, moving in a direction at right angles to its length, -traces out a plane; a plane, moving in a direction at right angles to -its two dimensions, traces out a solid. Should a solid move in a -direction at right angles to its every dimension, it would trace out, -in four dimensional space, a hypersolid.” - -Now this may pass current in blackboard geometry, but does not hold -good in the abstract. The physical point is indeed extended to -represent the line, and the physical line, to represent the plane, -etc. But these concrete objects are not to be conceived as true -geometrical figures, which are not movable, for motion presupposes -sensuous experience. Only matter is movable. The true geometrical line -is not the extension of the point, nor is the cube formed by the -extension of the plane. When a point “moves” it is no longer a point, -and when a cube “moves” it becomes annihilated. - -“Student,” in a letter upon the same subject, speaks of a division of -a cube into smaller cubes. But when a part of a geometrical figure is -conceived the first figure is of necessity annihilated. - -Mr. Bragdon, after expatiating upon the vastness of the firmament, -makes this extraordinary conclusion: “Viewed in relation to this -universe of suns, our particular sun and its satellites shrink to a -point. That is, the earth becomes no-dimensional.” The last word is in -italics. Now this is manifestly a misconception, since the most minute -atom, notwithstanding its insignificance in proportion to the -universe, cannot be considered as an abstraction, which a point really -is. Those who are not satisfied with the intuitive evidence of the -limitation of space to three dimensions, solely because no logical -proof can be adduced of this limitation, would do well to read the -essay of Schopenhauer on _The Methods of Mathematics_, in which is -cited as an instance of the undue importance of logical demonstration -the controversy on the theory of parallels. The eleventh axiom of -Euclid “asserts that two parallel lines inclining toward each other if -produced far enough must meet,—a truth which is supposed to be too -complicated to pass as self-evident and thus requires a demonstration…. -_It is quite arbitrary where we draw the line between what is directly -certain and what has first to be demonstrated._” (The italics are -mine.) - -I believe with Schopenhauer, who quotes Descartes and Sir W. Hamilton -in support of his contention, that the science of mathematics has no -cultural value. Far from affording “a new way of looking at the -world,” as Mr. Bragdon tries to convince us, “its only direct use is -that it can accustom restless and unsteady minds to fix their -attention.” That such mental concentration may be woefully misdirected -is instanced in the cases of Swedenborg and Madame Blavatsky, -reference to whom by Mr. Bragdon is alone sufficient to cause a sniff -of suspicion. - -Indeed your author himself, while evidently well versed in bookish -mathematics, has been unable to free his mind of its limitations. Upon -a basis of phrases devoid of significance he builds his extravagantly -mystical speculation, which dissolves in the light of reason, “into -air, thin air.” - - PHILIP J. DORETY, M. D. - TRENTON, N. J. - - - - -EDITORIAL NOTES - - -_Soldiers of All Nations_ - -It is difficult to realize that while this note is being written, men -are dying, every moment: not in the fulness of time, for the glory of -God and their own rest; but unduly and by wanton violence, in the -prime of manhood, with the whole making and purpose of their lives -incomplete and unrenewable. They lie in strange places, and must -sleep, not uncompanioned, but uncoffined and without memorial: mere -broken bits of life-stuff, shattered from the resemblance of humanity -by machines that must be fed with the food that women travail for, and -pray for, and, losing, break their hearts. Well, may they sleep -soundly, these soldiers of all nations who will march no more to -music, nor answer the reveille at dawn! God be gracious to them, -gallant men all, if graciousness be needed where they have gone now! - - -_Paying the Cost_ - -If the death of warriors were war’s only penalty, men perhaps might be -forgiven for their battles, since heroes are made known by them. But -the world has gone to school again, to learn the lesson that is -enforced with cannons; and it knows the whole cost of war, and is -paying it, and will continue to pay it for many a year. In this -country, we have not contributed much, so far: only a hundred millions -officially, and who shall say how many millions unofficially, in -disorganized industry? But they have paid a large sum in Belgium, -where the prices are plainly marked; they have paid in France (it is -an ill winter that follows unreaped and rotting harvests); they have -paid in Austria; and the bill for the other countries is being added -up. - - -_Christianity and Civilization_ - -But it is not true that Christianity has broken down, or that -civilization has broken down, as some have said in the first flush of -their indignation and sorrow. Civilization and Christianity have -never yet been tried in the world, so they cannot very well have -broken down. What we have had, so far, has been a pseudo-Christianity -and a pseudo-civilization. It is not so much that we have been -deliberately insincere, perhaps; but we have not faced life and the -problems of life as they should be faced; we have accepted the -imitation instead of insisting upon the genuine thing; we have given -lip-worship, but not heart-worship. - - -_Rebuilding_ - -We are living, and some of us are dying, in strange, wonderful, -terrible days. There is no room for pessimism or for bravado. -Barbarism is showing us what deeds it can produce. We must answer with -deeds. - -Let no man who has held high rank in the Government of any country -think now that he has done well or deserves acclamations. So far as -his vision led him, he may have tried to do his duty, with foresight, -devotion, faithfulness. Yet he has failed. The Government which cannot -save its country from war has failed, whatever its other achievements. -The new ideas, the new hopes, have not been fully comprehended. And so -suspicion and enmity have been allowed to grow steadily, and the -thought of war has been constantly in men’s minds, as the inevitable -end to which the world was drifting. - -The thought of war should have been as impossible as the thought of -murder. The press of all nations, instead of pandering to -misunderstanding and animosities, should have educated the people, day -by day and year by year, until the curse of nationalism was lifted -from the world. - -For nationalism _has_ been a curse, and will remain a curse, so -long as devotion to one country can involve enmity to any other. We -are brothers in one boat, as we pass from the unknown to the unknown. -Let us learn to understand each other. - - -_Benedict XV_ - -The election of Cardinal della Chiesa was certainly unexpected, and it -may be hoped that this element of surprise will be extended to his -general policies. But if his Holiness continues, as Pontiff, to carry -out the principles of the Archbishop of Bologna, the Church will lose -far more than she can gain. What is needed now is not a saint or a -scholar or a skilful administrator, though saintliness and scholarship -and executive talent are admirable qualifications. If the Church is to -do anything more than merely mark time, or actually lose ground, she -requires as her head now a man of profound imagination and unswerving -courage. The tendency of the Papacy has been too much toward -mechanical routine, the neglect of new opportunities, the -discountenancing of new ideas, the refusal of new life. The creative -genius of the great artist, the incommunicable imaginative insights of -the great novelist or poet or painter, could give the Vatican a new -leadership in the spiritual affairs of mankind. We have seen the Pope -who condemned Modernism dying of a broken heart because Europe was -turned into a field of desolation and slaughter. The impotence of the -Pontiff to secure some regard for Christian teachings amongst -supposedly Christian nations, is at once the measure of the Church’s -weakness and the condemnation of her methods. In the spirit of the -Modernists, if not in the spirit of Modernism itself, Benedict XV could -remove many of the mountains that stand in the way of the direct line -for the Twentieth Century, Limited. Mountains may be picturesque: but, -in the wrong place, they are merely a nuisance. - - -_Uncensored_ - -The press has not had an easy task in attempting to gratify the -natural desire of the public for dramatic details of the war -operations. But even after making the fullest allowances for all -difficulties, whether due to the censorship, to broken communications, -or to the indiscretions of partisans, one can scarcely congratulate -the newspaper world as a whole upon its achievements. In New York, for -instance, there have been two or three papers which have maintained -reasonable standards; but most of the papers have published and -republished so-called news of a kind that should never have found -public record. Why should any journal waste time in announcing, in -large type, that “the Servians swear that the enemy will never enter -the capital so long as one house stands and one Servian lives”? This -is mere bombastic rubbish, and has nothing to do with the patriotism -and fortitude of the Servians. The appearance of perpetual “war -extras,” with no additional information, but with immense scareheads, -is another unpleasant sign of the shallowness and insincerity that we -permit in these busy days. Frothy journalism may flourish for the -moment: but the public has a better memory than it is sometimes -supposed to possess. - - -“_Civilized Warfare_” - -Some one, somewhere, appears to be laboring under a rather serious -mistake, or we should not have been exposed so frequently during the -last few weeks to the phrase “civilized warfare.” There is no such -thing, of course, as civilized warfare. All war is necessarily -barbaric in its methods, and ludicrous in its assumption of -semi-decency. When nations go out, in the name of God, to mangle and -destroy their fellow-creatures, they are reverting to the primitive -profession of murder. The glory of war is the glory of murder, however -it may be embellished by infantile brains. - -We have heard much of atrocities and “uncivilized” outrages. Probably -most of the stories are utterly false: but even if they were true, -they would only be in full accord with the whole purpose, methods, and -disgrace of war. - -Let us realize, very clearly, that war is necessarily and always -murderous and barbaric, and let us abandon the pretence that we are -shocked at the annihilation of towns, the rape of women, the slaughter -of children, the desolation of once-prosperous communities. These are -the trimmings of war. If we order the feast, let us pay for it; but -let us, in the name of all decency, give up the pretence that we are -either civilized or Christianized. - - -_Saintless Petrograd_ - -The official change from St. Petersburg to Petrograd removes the -intrusive saint from the Russian capital. The city was named after -Peter the Great, of somewhat uncouth memory, and the subsequent -sanctification by the rest of Europe was perhaps a tribute to the -religious reputation of Holy Russia. - -Now that the Ice has been broken, such cities as Florence, for -example, may begin to assert their right to be known, even in the -Anglo-Saxon world, by their real and native names. - - -_Thumbs Down_ - -In his clever, whimsical and symbolistic play, _Androcles and the Lion_, -Mr. George Bernard Shaw has fallen—or a zealous proof-reader has made -it appear that he has fallen—into the usual error of “thumbs down,” -as the death signal. - -It is strange that this mistake should be so widely prevalent, and -should even be repeated by the _Encyclopædia Britannica_. But the -error, like ’round for round and laid for lay, will no doubt pass -steadily through the years. - -However, anyone who has not yet read Mr. Shaw’s little play should do -so at once, paying special attention to Ferrovius. - - -_The Earl of Whisky_ - -The oddities of childhood are rarely understood completely, even in -these days of ingenious educational devices. The child lives and moves -and has his being in his own world. He may emerge at moments, he may -seem to understand or be understood by the great confederation of -blundering adults: but he must go back as soon as possible to the -realm of his real allegiance, where fact and fancy, dreams, doubts and -discoveries are so cunningly intermingled. - -Why do we forget our own childhood, and turn deaf ears and unseeing -eyes to the sounds and sights that once we should have comprehended so -easily? The world of flame, the glory of color, the music in the winds -and the darkness, the actuality of romance, the strange limits and -restrictions of knowledge! Can you remember when the earth stretched -twelve miles out, beyond doubt, and perhaps a little further? Or the -immense significance of double figures when the tenth birthday painted -a huge 10 across the entire sky, but nobody else particularly -noticed the phenomenon? Or the fantastic associations of certain -names from time to time, so that to live in Champagne would have -seemed a comic-opera infliction, and a Duke of Burgundy was as -Gilbert-and-Sullivanesque as a Marquess of Claret, or an Earl of -Whisky, or Baron Beer? - -Yet we have long had Sir Loin, and scarcely remember the cause of that -famous knighting; and now we have our copper kings, beef barons, pork -princes, and what not. Perhaps we are not so remote from the -whimsicalities of childhood as we have imagined, after all. - - -_Jaded Appetites_ - -A recent advertisement of a well-known New York restaurant announced: -“Whether it is in luncheon, dinner or supper, you will find in our -menu of delicious cold specialties, ready for your selection at our -buffet in the main dining room, creations to tempt the most jaded of -appetites.” - -It is comforting to know that the grossly overfed man or woman need -not starve. When the appetite fails through constant indulgence, it -can be tempted to new excesses by these “delicious cold specialties,” -and so enough nourishment may be secured to preserve life. - -It is indeed a pitiable spectacle to see the forlorn victim of -piggishness sadly regarding a menu that can no longer entice him to -abuse his stomach. Let him now take heart and visit the restaurant -that has learnt how to “tempt the most jaded of appetites.” - -It is a noble work that this restaurant is doing; one well worthy of -our civilization. - -But who will tempt the unjaded appetites of the slum-dwellers? - - - - -Transcriber’s Note: - -Words and phrases in italics are surrounded by underscores, _like -this_. Dialect, obsolete and alternative spellings were left -unchanged. - -Spelling changes: - - ‘conciousness’ to ‘consciousness’ …class-consciousness… - ‘prmitive’ to ‘primitive’ …primitive profession of murder… - -The two lines omitted from the quoted poem by Giovannitti read: - - And from its bloody pedestal - The last god, Terror, shall be hurled. - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Forum, by Various - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE FORUM *** - -***** This file should be named 55299-0.txt or 55299-0.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/5/2/9/55299/ - -Produced by Carol Brown, and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - - -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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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/license - - -Title: The Forum - October 1914 - -Author: Various - -Release Date: August 8, 2017 [EBook #55299] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE FORUM *** - - - - -Produced by Carol Brown, and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - - - - - - -</pre> - - -<!--001.png--> - -<h1 class="p4">THE FORUM</h1> - -<p class="center larger">FOR OCTOBER 1914</p> - -<h3 class="p4">THE WAR</h3> - -<p class="center"><span class="sc">Charles Vale</span></p> - -<p><span class="muchlarger">I</span><span class="sc">n</span> each of the nations now engaged in the European conflict, a large -number of people of all classes—the vast majority of people of all -classes—did not want war, and would have done all in their power to -avert it: for they knew, more or less completely, the price of war; -and they knew also, more or less completely, in spite of the -inadequacy of all the churches through all the centuries, that war -cannot possibly be reconciled with Christianity, with civilization, -with humanity, decency, and the most rudimentary common sense. But -when hostilities had actually been commenced, each of the nations was -practically a unit with regard to the prosecution of the war to its -final and terrible conclusion. With the exception of a few -professional agitators or eccentric fanatics, who have gleaned scant -sympathy for their antics, every citizen or subject of each country -has placed implicit faith in the justice of the nation’s cause and has -been prepared to give, ungrudgingly, the last full measure of -devotion. Canada, Australia, South Africa, India, and all the great -and small oversea commonwealths, colonies and dominions of Great -Britain have come forward in the time of stress to offer new strength -to the United Kingdom and new pledges of a United Empire. In the -Fatherland, every man and woman has accepted the issue as inevitable, -has held the cause of Kaiser and country as sacred and supreme, and -has shrunk from no sacrifice to ensure the fulfilment of the -long-cherished dream of victory, security and expansion. In France, -where the ghosts of the dead that von Moltke required have not yet -ceased to walk o’ nights, (they will -<!--002.png--> -have new companionship now), there -is no doubt in the mind of man, woman or child that <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">la Patrie</i> is -waging a holy war for liberty and honor against the ruthless -aggression of an arrogant and pitiless foe. In Russia, Austria, -Servia, and whatever countries may have been dragged into the vortex -week by week, there is a similar spirit, a similar belief in the -justice of the national cause and the calculated injustice of the -enemy’s plans. And in Belgium, always the victim of her unneighborly -neighbors’ feuds, a people dedicated to peace has been flung into the -hell of butchery and flames. Verily, Macbeth hath murther’d sleep!</p> - -<p>In these United States, there has been little attempt to transcend -race-limitations, so far as concerns the aliens within our borders, -and those hyphenated-Americans who have rushed with virulence into a -wordy warfare, intent, not on establishing the truth, but on giving -publicity, <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">ad nauseam</i>, to their own special, and specially -obnoxious, prejudices. The American nation, and every individual in -it, has a clear right to hold and express a definite opinion: but it -must be an opinion formed in conformity with the American character -and the American freedom from entanglements of inherited and -unreasoned bias. No other opinion is worth, here and now, a moment’s -consideration; and no other opinion should dare to voice itself in -this country, which has ties with almost all the peoples of the -world—ties of blood and friendship, but not of bloodshed and -hysteria.</p> - -<p>America alone, of the great Powers of the world, is in a position to -exercise free and calm reflection and to form a free and just -judgment. The value of her decision has already been made manifest, -through the efforts of every country involved in the war to influence -American sentiment and gain American good will. A peculiar -responsibility therefore rests upon us to avoid the banalities of the -various special pleaders, and to form our judgment soberly and in good -faith, nothing extenuating, and setting down naught in malice. And one -of the first thoughts that should occur to us, one of the most -significant and pregnant thoughts, is that which I have expressed in -my first paragraph. Europe is a house divided against itself: but each -nation in Europe has proclaimed the sanctity of its cause; each nation -conceives that it has, or is entitled to have, the special protection -<!--003.png--> -of Providence; each nation is sending its men to death and claiming -patient sacrifice from its women.</p> - -<p>What does this mean? Is there such little sense of logic in the world -that it is impossible to distinguish right from wrong, so that nation -may rise against nation, each convinced of its own probity, and each -unable to attribute anything but evil motives to its adversaries? Can -self-delusion be carried so far that black and white exchange values -according to the chances of birth and environment? Have Christianity -and civilization achieved this remarkable result, that the peoples of -the world are like quarrelsome children in a disorderly nursery?</p> - -<p>It is very clear that the world’s sense of logic must rank with the -world’s sense of humor, when presumably learned professors, unchecked -and unridiculed, take nationalism and egoism as the premises of their -argument and from them deduce, with great skill, obvious nonsense. The -lesson of incompetence and shallowness is driven home when baseless -rumors from one half of Europe are countered with fantastic inventions -fabricated by our alien patriots for the purpose of influencing public -opinion. It is the old appeal of ignorance and stupidity to ignorance -and stupidity, and the American public will not greatly appreciate the -poor compliment that has been paid to it.</p> - -<p>As an aid to impartiality and quiet thinking, let us first retrace the -immediate and superficial causes of the war. Austria, dismayed and -incensed by the murder of the heir to the throne at Serajevo on June -28, and considering the murder as the culmination of long-continued -Servian scheming and enmity, delivered to Servia an ultimatum so -framed that no nation, however small in territory or in courage, could -possibly have accepted it without reservations. The Servian reply went -to the extreme limits of concession, and an understanding should -easily have been reached on that basis. Austria, however, was -apparently resolved upon Servia’s abject submission, or upon war. She -refused to accept the reply as in any way satisfactory, and opened -hostilities.</p> - -<p>It is clear, then, that Austria was primarily responsible for the -actual commencement of the conflagration. Undoubtedly she had -provocation, of the kind that stirs tremendously the sentiment -<!--004.png--> -of the -nation involved, but is less easily understood in its full intensity -by those at a distance. But the point that should be particularly -noticed is that a country which was temporarily excited beyond all -self-control should have been able to take the initiative and plunge -Europe into war. And it should be remembered that Austria’s resentment -toward Servia was scarcely greater than the resentment of the Serbs -toward the nation that had violated the Treaty of Berlin and -permanently appropriated Bosnia-Herzegovina. Yet, in rebuttal, Austria -might well assert that she had a vested interest in the provinces to -which, in a score or so of years, she had given prosperity unsurpassed -in southeastern Europe, in place of the anarchy and ruin entailed by -four centuries of misrule, and civil and religious faction-conflicts.</p> - -<p>The first step taken, the next was assured. Austria knew perfectly -well that Russia, the protagonist in that drama of Pan-Slavism of -which several scenes have already been presented, would take immediate -steps in accordance with her rôle, and repeat her lines so sonorously -that they would echo throughout the continent. But the Dual Monarchy, -wounded and embittered, did not care: she could see before her, at the -worst, no harsher fate than she would have to face, without external -war, in a few years, or perhaps months. Only war, it seemed, could -save the dynasty from destruction and the aggregation of races from -dissolution. Relying upon the immediate help of Germany, and the -ultimate assistance of Italy (her traditional foe, but technical -ally), she refused to draw back or to temporise.</p> - -<p>In discussing the attitude of Germany, and the action of the Kaiser, -it is necessary to make full allowance for the strength and sincerity -of the German foreboding, for many a year, that the clash between Slav -and Teuton was bound to come sooner or later. The Russian forces were -being massed ostensibly to prevent Austria from coercing Servia. As -Austria had provoked the outbreak of hostilities, should she have been -left to take the consequences? Would Russia, after eliminating Franz -Josef’s heterogeneous empire, have resisted the temptation to claim -France’s help in the congenial task of humbling Germany? The situation -was not without its subtleties, after Austria had made the first -decisive move. But under what circumstances did -<!--005.png--> -Austria make that -move? Was she encouraged by the assurance of German coöperation?</p> - -<p>The point to be particularly noted is that Germany, as the ally of -Austria, was entitled to full warning of any step that would make war -inevitable. Did Austria give that warning? If not, why not? Is the -Kaiser a weakling, to be ordered hither and thither at the whim of -Franz Josef? The assumption will find few supporters. Yet it is quite -clear that the Kaiser either knew and approved of the substance and -purpose of Austria’s ultimatum, or—<i lang="la" xml:lang="la">mirabile dictu</i>—was willing to -forgive the incredible slight of being totally ignored, and commit his -country and his army to the support of an act of aggression with -regard to which he had not even been consulted.</p> - -<p>Carefully leaving the horns of this dilemma for the self-impalement of -any too-ardent enthusiast who may wish to run without reading, we pass -on to France, compelled, by the terms of her understanding with -Russia, to take her place in the firing line. Without entering into -the ultra-refinements of politics and discussing the question whether -France, or any other country, would have paid for present neutrality -and the violation of solemn engagements by subsequently being devoured -in detail, or reduced to vassalage, by a victory-swollen Germany, we -may point out that an alliance entered into primarily to safeguard the -peace of Europe and the balance of power has been the means of -dragging France into a war with which she had no direct concern. Such -is the irony of protective diplomacy!</p> - -<p>Great Britain has rested her case on the publication, without comment, -of the whole of the diplomatic exchanges that preceded her own -intervention after the violation of the neutrality of Belgium. Her -claim that she exerted her influence until the final moment in the -interests of peace is sustained beyond cavil: but the point to be -remembered particularly is whether a more decisive and uncompromising -attitude at an earlier stage would not have been preferable. Germany -would then have had no doubt as to Great Britain’s final alignment, -and with a kindly word from Italy that neutrality was the best that -could be expected from her, a reconsideration of the whole position -might -<!--006.png--> -have been forced before the final, fatal moments had passed, and -were irrevocable.</p> - -<p>It is unnecessary to prolong this cursory review of immediate causes -and conditions, nor does it greatly matter how the positions of the -different countries have been stated. The mood of a moment may add or -subtract a little coloring, without changing the fundamental facts. -But is it possible for any man, however impartial he may desire to be, -to state those facts now, accurately, clearly, and in such relation -and sequence that only one inevitable conclusion can be drawn?</p> - -<p>It may be possible, though it would be difficult: but it would not be -worth while. For the war has not been due to, and does not depend -upon, recent events; and however those events may be viewed or -summarized, the only fact of importance is the one already emphasized: -that every nation which has been drawn into the conflict counts its -cause just and its conscience clear.</p> - -<p>In the face of such unanimity of national feeling, it is absurd to -discuss superficial conditions only, or to assume that they are of any -real importance. For, apart from neutral America, and the few hundreds -of really educated and intelligent men and women in each country who -constitute the brains and conserve the manners of their nation, it is -impossible to find any just basis for criticism and judgment. The -average national is concerned with presenting an <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">ex parte</i> statement -(in which, perhaps, he believes implicitly) rather than with -discovering the actual truth, whosoever may be vindicated or -discredited. The average national may therefore be disregarded, and -the supreme appeal be made, not to the common folly of the nations, -but to the common sense of those who have risen beyond national -limitations and national littlenesses.</p> - -<p>In the first place, that much-quoted and entirely despicable -confession of faith, “My country, right or wrong, first, last and all -the time,” may well be relegated,—first, last and for whatever time -may remain before a kindly Providence blots out this incredible little -world of seething passions and ceaseless pain and cruelty,—to the -limbo of antique curiosities. Nothing can be sillier, and more -contemptible, than such pseudo-patriotism, based on utter selfishness, -utter ignorance, and abysmal stupidity. -<!--007.png--> -The country which commits a -crime, or makes a grave mistake, is in the position of an individual -who commits a crime or makes a grave mistake; and no fanfare of -trumpets or hypnotism of marching automata, helmeted and plumed, -should confuse the issue and vitiate judgment. Mere nationalism, -unregulated by intelligence, is simply one of the most irritating and -blatant forms of egoism. Nationality itself depends upon so many -complex conditions that the ordinary semi-intelligent man can scarcely -unravel the niceties of history and discover to whom his heartfelt -allegiance is really due. He therefore accepts the untutored sentiment -of his immediate environment. He is essentially provincial, not -patriotic. Alsace and Lorraine, with their various vicissitudes, may -profitably be studied by the curious, in this connection.</p> - -<p>Until provincialism, of the type which has been so prominent in recent -controversies, can be eliminated or controlled, the settlement of the -more tragic issues of the time must be undertaken boldly by those who -have indubitably grown up, forsaking leading strings and the nursery, -the toys of childhood and the irresponsibility of childhood. All the -Governments of Europe, in which a few brilliant men are undoubtedly -enrolled, have failed now, as they have failed repeatedly before, to -perform their elementary duties and save their countries from the -horrors of unnecessary war. Generation after generation, the peoples -of Europe have been carefully led by their Governments into successive -orgies of slaughter, in which the allies of one campaign have been the -enemies of the next. The whole course of European history during the -last hundred years (we need not go further back: we are not -responsible for the dead centuries) has been indeed a subject for -Olympian laughter. What has been achieved by the unending succession -of wars, with all their attendant miseries and deadly consequences? -Merely the necessity for increased armaments, constant watchfulness, -perpetual strain—and more war. Could there be a clearer proof of the -futility of war?</p> - -<p>The Governments of Europe have failed because each, in greater or less -degree, has embodied the provincialism of its own section of the armed -and suspicious world. There have been a few notable exceptions to the -general rule of conventional mediocrity: -<!--008.png--> -but where have we found the -statesman who could break away altogether from the old stupid methods, -and by the sheer force of character and principle inaugurate a new era -of civilized diplomacy, as Bismarck inaugurated a new era of veneered -barbarism? In America, we are beginning to see the value and the -fruits of government based on fairness to all nations and justice to -all individuals: but neither here, nor in Europe, has the significance -of the new statesmanship yet been fully recognized. Europe, indeed, -still regards us with more than a little suspicion, contempt, and -imperfectly concealed condescension: it has heard and seen Roosevelt, -unfortunately, and the lingering impressions of crudity have not been -weakened. Will it listen to us now, and realize that the New World has -in verity something to offer to the Old in its time of special -tribulation? For Wilson, not Roosevelt, stands for the spirit of -America, the voice of America, and her chosen contribution to the -civilization of the Twentieth Century.</p> - -<p>It seems strange, perhaps, to talk of civilization in these dark days, -when primitive passions and primitive methods have flung an -ineradicable stain of blood across a whole continent. Yet only the -coward will bend to temporary defeat, or ridicule, or pessimism. It is -the task of the strong to turn disaster into triumph, and to frame a -new international polity built on sure foundations. The diplomacy -based on national antipathies must be made impossible by the new -understanding of the criminal folly of provincialism, the new -comprehension of nation by nation. For the true causes of the present -war cannot be discovered in mere incidents of July and August. They go -further back, and are rooted in ignorance, misconception, prejudice, -selfishness.</p> - -<p>I do not wish to accuse or exonerate any of the countries that have -turned Europe into a stage for the rehearsal of Christianity’s -masterpiece, the rollicking farce <cite>Hell on Earth</cite>. There have -been enough already to inflame racial resentments and flood the press -with taunts and recriminations. Ours is a bigger and worthier task: to -assuage, not to incense; to re-create order from chaos; to prepare the -way for peace, and for what must follow peace.</p> -<!--009.png--> - -<p>Recrimination is so useless now. We have to face the future: we cannot -undo the past. We have learnt our lesson, surely, once for all: shall -the spectre of militarism again loom devilishly through such a -nightmare as Europe has endured for the last decade? Animosities and -jealousies may die out: France has forgotten Fashoda, England has -forgiven Russia for the blunder of the Dogger Bank. But the -expectation of war, the preparation for war, the whole habit and -incidence of militarism, must lead sooner or later to the clash. If -the guns were not ready, if the nations had to be drilled and armed -before they could be hurled at each others’ throats, there would be -time for reflection, for the subsidence of passions, for the revival -of dignity and decency. Militarism damns both the menacer and the -menaced. All the nations have suffered from that curse, Germany, -perhaps, the worst of all. The world has not yet forgotten Bismarck’s -gospel of blood and iron, so relentlessly preached and practised. The -inevitable results of the blood-and-iron doctrine, modernized as the -dogma of the “mailed fist,” can be seen to-day in the cataclysm that -has swept Europe. The pity of it, and the shame of it, that all the -skill of all the statesmen of the great Powers could produce no better -result than a continent divided into two armed camps, waiting for the -slaughter that was bound to come!</p> - -<p>As for Russia, and the assumed Slavonic menace, one must tread -somewhat diffidently where George Bernard Shaw has rushed in with -characteristic Shavian impetuosity. The world owes to Mr. Shaw the -discovery of a new nationality—himself; and it is impossible for any -citizen of the world to ignore the obligation. But even if Russia -achieves her never-forgotten dream of Constantinople and a purified -St. Sophia, Europe and civilization will not necessarily stand aghast, -trembling at each rumor of Cossack brutalities. Tennyson, who foresaw -the aërial navies “grappling in the central blue,” indeed proclaimed, -in one of the most execrable of his sonnets, that—</p> - -<div class="poemcontainer no-break"> - <div class="poem"> - <div class="i0">“… The heart of Poland hath not ceased</div> - <div class="i0">To quiver, though her sacred blood doth drown</div> - <div class="i0">The fields, and out of every smouldering town</div> - <div class="i0">Cries to Thee, lest brute power be increased</div> -<!--010.png--> - <div class="i0">Till that o’ergrown barbarian in the East</div> - <div class="i0">Transgress his ample bounds to some new crown:</div> - <div class="i0">Cries to Thee, ‘Lord, how long shall these things be,</div> - <div class="i0">How long this icy-hearted Muscovite</div> - <div class="i0">Oppress the region?’…”</div> - </div> -</div> - -<p>(I quote from memory, deprecating caustic correction). But, in spite -of anti-Semitic atrocities (are the hands of other nations so clean -now? They were foul once), and in spite of the blunders of a rigid -bureaucracy, the Russian nation is not necessarily a menace to -civilization: it has within it the elements of a wonderful idealism, -and whether autocracy may remain, or may not remain, as the outward -and visible form of government, the spirit of democracy is leavening -the people, and “Holy Russia” has in truth already been sanctified by -the blood of her innumerable martyrs—sometimes, perhaps, misguided -and mistaken; but offering to the world an example of idealism and -self-sacrifice that should surely dispel the nightmare of Russian -brutishness.</p> - -<p>I may record here, quite irrelevantly, my own fervent wish -(irrevocably established at the immature age of twelve years) that -Poland, with few of her limbs amputated, should be replaced upon the -map as an independent, and again powerful, nation. It was one of my -earliest dreams that I should be awakened at the dawn of a wintry day, -and urged by a delegation of Polish magnates to accept the one throne -of Europe that had been, and still should be, open to conspicuous (and -electoral) merit. That wish has not yet been gratified, and candor -compels me to attribute it to the delightful influence of the elder -Dumas, from whom I derived also my most enduring impressions of St. -Bartholomew, Catherine de Medici, Mazarin, Louis <abbr title="Thirteen">XIII</abbr>, Richelieu, -Buckingham, Louis <abbr title="Fourteen">XIV</abbr>, Louise de la Vallière, d’Artagnan, Athos, -Aramis, Porthos, and other immortals. India, I confess, held me -equally spellbound: for many months I hesitated between the succession -to Aurungzebe (why should I now spell the name differently?) and the -crown of Stanislaus. That hesitation has been fatal: I am still -throneless.</p> - -<p>Others may be throneless (the Mills of God grind steadily) before -final peace comes to the different warring nations. They have sowed in -their various ways, and will reap the ripened -<!--011.png--> -harvests. But how long -shall the childish quarrel of country with country be permitted and -encouraged by those who should have learnt a little wisdom, in this -twentieth century of perpetual miracles? Let us have done, once for -all, with petty jealousies and absurd misunderstandings. Let us blot -out, without regret and without the least compassion, the evil records -and results of insincerity and manufactured hatred. Let us extinguish, -finally and irresuscitably, those fires of malice and flagrant -nonsense that have been fed assiduously by the fools and knaves of the -world.</p> - -<p>Nowhere will you find a decent man, emancipated from the -leading-strings of prejudice and unafraid of the bludgeonings of -militarist authority, who does not condemn the present war, and all -wars, as useless, damnable, anachronistic and inexcusable. We have -learnt so much, in these later years; we have adventured in strange -ways, and silently borne strange reproaches. We have come very near to -God, and talked with Him by wireless, remedying the inconsistencies of -the prophets and filling in the gaps left blank by the poets. And -shall we still be bound by the gibes and gyves of the mediævalists? -The Middle Ages served their purpose: but why extend them to the -confusion of modern chronology? We have seen God, as no generation -before has seen Him. Let us then live, and not die, until the grave be -digged, and the night overshadow us at last.</p> -<!--no div end here because first article same page as title--> -<!--012.png--> -<div class="break"> -<h3 class="p4">SEEN THROUGH MOHAMMEDAN SPECTACLES</h3> - -<p class="center"><span class="sc">Achmed Abdullah</span></p> - -<p><span class="muchlarger">A</span><span class="sc">lthough</span> my father was a Muslim of the old Central-Asian school, a -Hegirist, of mixed Arab and Moghul blood, he had sent me to England -and the Continent for my school and university education. But boys are -much more broad-minded than grown-up men, and so my schoolmates and I -never worried about the fact that we had different customs, religion, -civilization, and atavistic tendencies.</p> - -<p>It was only after my return to the borderland of Afghanistan and -India, and after I had assumed once more native garb and speech, that -I began to feel myself an alien among those Europeans and -Anglo-Indians with whom I was brought into contact.</p> - -<p>For the first time in my life I felt the ghastly meaning of the words -“Racial Prejudice,” that cowardly, wretched caste-mark of the European -and the American the world over, that terrible blight which modern -Christianity has forced on the world. And it chilled me to the bone -and I wondered….</p> - -<p>In Europe I had known many Asiatics who visited the universities -there. And we were the equals of the Europeans, the Christians, in -intellect and culture, and decidedly their superiors, being Muslim, in -cleanliness and courage. We were not only familiar with the European -classics which were the basis of their culture, but we were also -thoroughly versed in the literature and history of India and Central -Asia, things of which they knew less than an average Egyptian -donkey-boy. We were polyglots: we had mastered half a dozen European -languages, while even a smattering of Arabic or Turki or Chinese was a -rare exception amongst them. We all of us knew at least three Asian -languages to perfection. And finally we had a practical knowledge of -English, French and German political ideals and systems, while to them -the name of even such great Asian reformers as Asoka and Akbar and -Aurangzeb were absolutely unknown.</p> - -<p>In physical strength, virility, power of endurance and recuperation -<!--013.png--> -we were immeasurably their superiors. And we were not picked men, but -plain, average Asian gentlemen.</p> - -<p>And yet, when I returned to my own land, there was that superior -smile, that nasty, patronizing attitude, that insufferable “Holier -than Thou” atmosphere about all of them whom I happened to meet.</p> - -<p>They made me feel that I was of the East and they of the West; and -they tried to make me feel—with no success—that they were the salt -of the earth, while the men of my faith and race were but the lowly -dung.</p> - -<p>Not even the bridge of personal friendship seemed able to span this -gulf, this abyss which I could feel more than I could define it; and -so I folded my tent and travelled; I studied India from South to -North, I visited Siberia, Egypt, Malta, Algeria, Turkey, Tunis, and -the Haussa country, wandering in all the lands where East and West rub -elbows, and I investigated calmly, I compared without too much bias.</p> - -<p>Finally I bent my steps Northward, to see with my own eyes and -according to the limits of my own understanding the working of -Christian civilization, and to study the dominant Western Faith in the -lands where it rules supreme.</p> - -<p>I was looking for a bridge with which to span the chasm, and I failed -miserably. Christian hypocrisy, Christian intolerance, savage -Christian ignorance frustrated me right and left.</p> - -<p>But I learned one thing, perhaps two.</p> - -<p>They spoke to me of Europe which they knew, and they spoke of India -which they did not know. They were what the world calls educated, -well-read people: and indeed they had read many books by eminent -Christian travellers, savants, and historians about the great -Peninsula. But the mirror of their souls reflected only distorted -pictures. They had no conception of the vastness of my land, they had -never heard of the great Asian conquerors and statesmen, they were -entirely ignorant of our wonderful literature.</p> - -<p>But still they spoke of India … fluently, patronizingly.</p> - -<p>They spoke of plague and cholera and famine and wretched sanitation -and cruelties unspeakable. But they did not understand me when I told -them that the teeming millions of Hindu -<!--014.png--> -peasantry somehow manage to -enjoy their careless lives to the full, and are really much more -satisfied than the European peasants or the small American farmers.</p> - -<p>I did not argue: I simply stated facts. But I discovered that it is a -titanic, heart-breaking task to prove the absurdity of anything which -the Christians have made up their minds to accept as true. I found -arrayed against me an iron phalanx of preconceived opinions and -misconstrued lessons of history. I began to understand that even -amongst educated people there can exist opinion without thought, and -that my two arch-foes were the Pharisee intolerance which is the -caste-mark and the blighting curse of the Christian the world over, -and the other Aryan vice: an unconscious generalization of those ideas -which have been adopted for the sake of convenience and self-flattery, -and in strict and delightfully naïve disregard of truth. The whole I -found to be spiced with religious hypocrisy; and is there a lower form -of hypocrisy than that which makes a man pretend for his own material -or spiritual purposes that a thing is good which in his inmost heart -he knows to be bad? The sincerity of such people is on a par with that -of him who, being debarred by a doctor from constant drinking, -proclaims that he is a reformed character and prates to his friends -about the delights of temperance.</p> - -<p>I learned that to fathom the murky depths of stupidity and intolerance -of the Christians of to-day, we should have a latter-day Moses -Maimonides amongst us, to write another <cite>Moreh Nebukim</cite>, another <cite>Guide -for the Perplexed</cite>.</p> - -<p>And then I made up my mind to attack that structure of ignorance and -misunderstanding, that jumble of generalization and hyperdeduction, -that idiotic racial self-confidence and national self-consciousness -which breeds Pharisee intolerance, which destroys individual inquiry -and unprejudiced opinion, and which sounds the death-knell of -procreativeness.</p> - -<p>The Hindu peasants say that it is a mistake to judge the quality of a -whole field of rice by testing one grain only. But the Europeans, the -Americans, who judge us have never even tested a solitary grain and -only know about its quality from hearsay.</p> -<!--015.png--> - -<p>Not that they are afraid to voice what they miscall their opinions. -Only instead of having the courage of their own convictions, they have -the courage of somebody else’s convictions, not knowing that the most -obtuse ignorance is superior to dangerous, second-hand knowledge.</p> - -<p>They are eternally quoting the words of some writer whom they think -infallible. And there was chiefly one clever little jingle which was -on the lips of everybody with whom I tried to discuss the relations -between Orient and Occident. They used it as the final proof to settle -the argument and to preclude all further appeal to the tribunal of -common sense and common verity, and it ran as follows:</p> - -<div class="poemcontainer"> - <div class="poem"> - <div class="i0a">“East is East, and West is West,</div> - <div class="i0">And never the twain shall meet.”</div> - </div> -</div> - -<p>I admire Kipling, chiefly because he is one of the few Europeans who -have studied the East with both intelligence and sympathy. From my -Oriental point of view I class his books with those of Max Müller, Sir -Alfred Lyall, Captain Sir Richard Burton, Pierre Loti, John Campbell -Oman, Victoria de Bunsen, Colonel Malleson, W. D. Whitney, William -Crooke, and two or three other Pandits.</p> - -<p>But I became sick to death of that smooth little jingle about the East -and the West. I found it everywhere, until it haunted me in my dreams.</p> - -<p>I would buy the gaudy Sunday edition of an American newspaper and I -would read the gruesome story of how a high-caste Mandchoo had beaten -and tortured his beautiful French wife … and, by the Prophet, the -picturesque account would wind up with an appeal to the intelligent -American reader not to wonder at the blue-beard Mandarin’s cruelty, -because the poet states that East is East and West is West.</p> - -<p>In the morning I would see in the <cite lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">Petit Journal</cite> how the -unspeakable Turk had invaded a peaceful Armenian settlement, had shot -the males, outraged the females, and roasted the babes over an open -fire, and how I should also suppress my natural indignation at such -atrocities, because the East is naturally the East.</p> -<!--016.png--> - -<p>And at night, before smoking the farewell cigarette of the dying day, -I would discover in <cite>The Graphic</cite> harrowing accounts of -child-marriages in Hindustan, and would be instructed that the reason -for such a barbarous custom was contained in the poet’s statement that -“never the twain shall meet.”</p> - -<p>Do you wonder that every night, in my dreams, I strangled Mr. Kipling -slowly and deliciously with a thin silken cord? But of course you do -not wonder; for I am an Afghan … and … well …</p> - -<div class="poemcontainer"> - <div class="poem"> - <div class="i0a">“East is East and West is West.”</div> - </div> -</div> - -<p class="p2 center"><abbr title="Two">II</abbr></p> - -<p>Assumed racial superiority is a foregone conclusion in the minds of -the so-called Aryans of Europe and of America.</p> - -<p>I was in Paris when the world rang with the war-glories of Nippon, and -afterwards, when for a while it seemed as if the bloodless Young Turk -revolution would meet with success.</p> - -<p>There we had at last two specific instances of Oriental nations -working out their own salvation against tremendous odds: Japan -threatened by the Russian Goliath, and Turkey a prey to the wrangling -and the selfish machinations of all Europe, of all lying Christendom.</p> - -<p>But the effect on the conceit of the Aryans was less than nothing. The -people of Europe and of America are blind to the Writing on the Wall. -They have sealed their ears against the murmuring voices of Awakening -Asia.</p> - -<p>Are they afraid to listen?</p> - -<p>Now and then, when not engaged in discussing the latest tango or -divorce case, they do read and talk about the awakening of China, the -commercial conquests and aggressive policy of Japan, and the -smouldering fires of United Islam, but without experiencing the least -abating influence on their artificially nurtured racial and religious -conceit. Peacefully and stupidly the Christians, the “white races,” -continue to misread the lessons of history and the signs of the times.</p> - -<p>They are afraid to see the brutal, naked truth.</p> - -<p>Once I watched an ostrich bury his head in the sand….</p> -<!--017.png--> - -<p>They have established the amusing dogma that the so-called White and -Christian countries are the superior countries, just because they are -White and Christian.</p> - -<p>I have established a slightly different dogma, and, being a charitable -and entirely guileless Oriental, I will make a present of it to my -Aryan friends:</p> - -<p>You Westerns feel so sure of your superiority over us Easterns that -you refuse even to attempt a fair or correct interpretation of past -and present historical events. You deliberately stuff the minds of -your growing generations with a series of ostensible events and -shallow generalities, because you wish to convince them for the rest -of their lives how immeasurably superior you are to us, how there -towers a range of differences between the two civilizations, how East -is only East, and the West such a glorious, wonderful, unique West.</p> - -<p>In <cite>Tancred</cite>, that brilliant Oriental, the Earl of Beaconsfield, in -devoting a few lines to a great Bishop of the Church of England, -really pictures the typical Christian such as he stinks in our -nostrils from Morocco to Kharbin. For the noble Jewish Peer -characterizes the Right Reverend Gentleman as a man who combined great -talents for action with very limited powers of thought, who was -bustling, energetic, versatile, gifted with an indomitable -perseverance and stimulated by an ambition that knew no repose, with a -capacity for mastering details and an inordinate passion for affairs, -who could permit nothing to be done without his interference, and who -consequently was perpetually involved in transactions which were -either failures or blunders.</p> - -<p>In material progress you have led the world for the last two or three -centuries. By the True Prophet … all of three hundred years!</p> - -<p>And like all parvenus, you are so astonished at your success, so -pleased with yourselves, that you imagine your present hegemony in the -race for material progress to be a guarantee for the future. But there -is not even the shadow of an excuse for such an assumption, unless it -be the fact that the Christian mind is diseased with racial and -religious megalomania. There is not a single historical parallel which -justifies your pleasant -<!--018.png--> -superstition that your present leadership, -which after all is of very recent birth, will show greater stability -than any of those many alien, ancient civilizations which long ago -came from the womb of eternity, to go back whence they sprang.</p> - -<p>Nations as well as men are judged by two factors: by their virtues, -and by their vices.</p> - -<p>As to virtues, what have you Christians done for the general uplift of -the world which could not be matched by a random look into the pages -of Oriental history? And as to vices, is there any degeneracy rampant -amongst us which is not equalled by the degeneracy of the Western -lands?</p> - -<p>History has an unpleasant knack of repeating itself; and the helot of -to-day has the disagreeable habit of being the master of to-morrow, -regardless of race and color and creed. I would like to return to -earth about three hundred years from to-day, just to observe how my -descendants, who will have intermarried with Chinese and Japanese, -will succeed in ruling their colonies in Europe and in America. And I -do hope that the Chinese blood of my descendants will not be too -preponderant: otherwise, taking a leaf out of European and American -colonization, and thus forcing their own food-laws on the subject -races, they might force their White and Christian subjects to eat -roast puppy-dog.</p> - -<p>Human nature is the same the world over, and there never was an -originally superior race or people. Some nations have founded powerful -civilizations which lasted for a shorter or a longer period, but it -was never the racial force which caused it, but rather the -irresistible swing of circumstances.</p> - -<p>It was Kismet.</p> - -<p class="p2 center"><abbr title="Three">III</abbr></p> - -<p>“But we are Aryans, don’t you understand?… Aryans, the salt of the -earth….”</p> - -<p>“Aryans” … I know the word, I find myself on familiar ground.</p> - -<p>My teachers at the universities of Oxford, Paris, and Berlin had -taught me that the Aryans were a Central-Asian race, a -<!--019.png--> -“white” race, -who conquered Europe and India, and who were of such superior -intellectual and physical fibre that they made themselves masters -wherever they went. And when I inquired about those Aryans who invaded -India, I was told that right there they showed their wonderful metal: -for brought face to face with teeming millions of dark aborigines, -they established a caste-system of which the higher strata represent -to this day the descendants of the white-skinned and therefore -high-minded invaders, while the sweeper, the menial, the village -laborer is the scion of the dark-skinned, conquered Dravidians.</p> - -<p>To an Oriental this is of course a ridiculous and lying assumption. -For even the purest of Aryan tribes in Hindustan, for instance the -Rajpoots, have intermarried extensively with at least two other races. -This superstition is not a new invention. It is as old as the -beginning of things, and that much-praised work, the Veda, is only a -chronicle of the ancient conceit of the Aryans, a conceit to which the -lying and barbarous intolerance of modern Christianity has given a -sharp and poisonous edge.</p> - -<p>Yet even the Veda speaks of intermarriages between the Aryans and the -original lords of the soil of India.</p> - -<p>The caste system was not a bright invention to put a lasting stamp of -inferiority on the conquered aborigines, but it is the outcome of a -slow evolutionary process, due to the machinations of Brahmin priests -who wished to preserve the profits arising from their sacerdotal -profession within a restricted circle of families. These Brahmins had -increased their ranks and influence by drawing recruits from the -devil-worshipping priests of the aboriginal jungle tribes. Thus, how -can there ever have been a question of preserving or establishing a -permanency of racial superiority through the medium of caste, since at -the very beginning of the system the race had lost its purity?</p> - -<p>No. Your wonderful Aryan kinsmen in India were absorbed by the -“inferior” races whom they conquered, just as the Normans were -absorbed by the Saxon Englishmen, the Alexandrian Greeks by the -Egyptians, the Mongols of the Golden Horde by the Chinese, just as the -strong always absorb the weak, and just as, a few hundred years hence, -we shall absorb you.</p> -<!--020.png--> - -<p>To-day Christian England is ruling India, and the English Raj is just, -fair-minded, tolerant, and equitable. This is true, and it is also -true that the last Moghuls disgraced the throne of Delhi and shattered -Hindustan. But what can you prove by it?</p> - -<p>Others have ruled India successfully before Asia had ever heard of -England.</p> - -<p>Akbar, the Moghul Emperor, enforced tolerance and justice in those -barbaric days when the life of a Jew in Europe was at the kind mercy -of an ignorant and brutal Christian rabble. He, the Muslim, built and -endowed Hindu temples and charitable institutions while his European -contemporaries were periodically burning down the synagogues and were -trying to extend the sway of the gentle Christ with the effective help -of murder and torture. He, and before him his father’s successor on -the throne of Delhi, Shir Shah, the Afghan usurper, attempted to found -an Indian empire “broad-based upon the people’s will,” long before the -days of Voltaire, Robespierre, Rousseau, and Beaumarchais. He settled -land revenue on an equitable basis while the peasants of Europe were -groaning under the heavy and humiliating burden of serfdom.</p> - -<p>You say that his successors did not live up to the high standard -established by this greatest of Moghul princes?</p> - -<p>But we find fitting parallels in the history of Christian Europe. For -were not the successors of Theodosius as degenerate as those of Akbar? -Did not, in Macaulay’s words, the imbecility and disputes of -Charlemagne’s descendants bring contempt on themselves and destruction -to their subjects?</p> - -<p>Or take the civilization of ancient Rome.</p> - -<p>It was partially saved from ruin by the Asians, the Syro-Christians, -who brought the word of the great Jewish Rabbi across the Adriatic. -Judaism is an Oriental creed, and what is your famed European -Christianity if not “Judaism for the Masses”?</p> - -<p>The Asian genius of Christ and his Hebrew apostles saved the Aryan -genius from stagnation and stupidity, and brought the first faint -glimmer of light into the barbaric darkness of Northern Europe.</p> -<!--021.png--> - -<p>The Asian Christians succeeded in Aryan Rome, and just as long as the -Asians ruled, the traditional cupidity and cruelty of Aryan Rome were -softened by the broadly tolerant humanity of Asia. But as soon as the -Syro-Christians were in the minority and the Christians of European -stock in the majority, persecution and intolerance commenced, and the -word of the great Oriental Prophet Jesus Christ was sadly mutilated -and misunderstood by that superior race, the “Whites.”</p> - -<p>But even then you could not rid yourselves of our subtle Asian -influence. I know your gifts of energy and your spirit of progress; -but we men of Asia have a power of resistance and a capacity for rapid -recuperation which you can never fathom.</p> - -<p>Could you break the spirit or the virility of the Jew? You have -tortured him, you have exiled him, and you have burnt him on the stake -for the greater glory of God … and he rules you to-day.</p> - -<p>Again, look at the history of your Europeanized Christian Church, and -observe what happened:</p> - -<p>The Asian spirit flourished again in Protestantism and the -Reformation. Many of your Protestant reformers were semi-Jewish, -semi-Oriental in spirit. Anti-Trinitarianism was preached in Siena, -and God ceased to be a mathematical problem. The Decalogue and the -Apocalypse were studied. Chairs of Hebrew philosophy and philology -were founded at French and German universities; and the Calvinists and -the Presbyterians were altogether of the old Testament, of Asia, in -spirit and sentiment.</p> - -<p>Your famous Reformation was only a return to the Ebionism of the Asian -Evangelists. One of the greatest events in your history, it was a most -complete and vindicating triumph for the spirit of that Asia which you -attempt to despise and patronize in your ignorance and intolerance.</p> - -<p>Must we sit at your feet? Shall the pupil teach the master?</p> - -<p>We taught you to read, to write, and to think. We gave you your -religion and your few ideals. We have done more for you than you can -ever do for us. We freed you from your ancient bondage of -superstitions and idolatry. We gave you the -<!--022.png--> -first sparks of science -and literature. We paved the way for your material progress.</p> - -<p>Without our help you would still be tattooed and inarticulate -barbarians.</p> - -<p>But you have been getting out of hand, and are sinking back into the -old slough of ignorance and crass intolerance.</p> - -<p>And so perhaps some day, after we Mohammedans have finished converting -Asia and Africa to the Faith of Islam (and we are doing steady work in -that direction), we may send another Tamerlane into Europe, reinforced -by an army of a few million Asians who laugh in the face of death, and -finish the job.</p> - -<p class="p2 center"><abbr title="Four">IV</abbr></p> - -<p>You speak of Oriental mystery, of Oriental romance.</p> - -<p>Are we Asians then like Molière’s bourgeois who spoke prose all his -life without knowing it? Is there really a veil of mystery about us?</p> - -<p>No, no. The Most High God did not take the trouble to create two -different types of human beings, one to work on the banks of the -Seine, and the other to sing His praises on the shore of the Ganges. -There is no veil, no mystery, no romance … except the veil of -Christian ignorance, the romance of Christian imagination, the mystery -of Christian want of desire to know.</p> - -<p>There is perhaps a latent search after knowledge and truth in your -hearts’ souls. But your inborn selfishness forces you to believe that -a healthy portion of ignorance is the best medicine against the -ravages of the dangerous malady which is called Tolerance. Just a -little effort would teach you that there is no mystery about us, no -abyss which separates you from us. But your ignorance is your bliss -and provides you with a sort of righteous bias. It also sheds a holy -and therefore eminently Christian halo around your attitude of -meddlesome interference in the affairs of Asia and North Africa. Of -course you only interfere because of your laudable intention to show -us the true path to civilization and salvation. And if accidentally -you increase -<!--023.png--> -your own power and wealth, if you impoverish the native -whom you attempt to “save,” if you incite strife where no strife -existed before you imported soldiers and bibles and missionaries and -whisky and some special brands of “white” diseases … well … Allah -is Great….</p> - -<p>The mystery which is supposed to shroud the Orient is a lying -invention of Christendom destined to give a semblance of justice to -your selfish, harmful meddlings in the affairs, religions, politics -and customs of other countries.</p> - -<p>If you wish to conquer with the right of fire and the might of sword, -go ahead and do so, or at least say so. It would be a motive which we -Muslim, being warriors, could understand and appreciate. But do not -clothe your greed for riches and dominion in the hypocritical, nasal, -sing-song of a heaven-decreed Mission to enlighten the poor native, a -Pharisee call of duty to spread the word of your Saviour, your lying -intention to uplift the ignorant Pagan.</p> - -<p>Drop your mask of consummate beatitude in the contemplation of the -spiritual joys, the Christian and therefore very sanitary plumbing you -are endeavoring to confer upon us. Stop being liars and hypocrites: -and you will cease being what you are to-day:</p> - -<p>The most hated and the most despised men in the length and breadth of -Asia and North Africa.</p> - -<p>And I am not exaggerating. I am really putting it mildly so as not to -hurt your feelings.</p> - -<p>Let me point out just one instance: the Young Turk Revolution.</p> - -<p>You, the apostles of freedom and constitutional government and half a -dozen assorted fetishes, what was your attitude then?</p> - -<p>You allowed Austria, your trusted steward of other people’s property -since the Berlin Congress of Thieves, to steal this property, the -fertile provinces of Bosnia and Herzegovina. You looked on calmly -while the Bulgar mountebank annexed Turkish territory in time of -peace. You passed resolutions, full of blatant Christian hypocrisy and -Christian lies; but you never raised a finger in our behalf, in behalf -of that justice and humanity which you proudly claim as your -caste-right. The whole -<!--024.png--> -affair was a piece of brigandage, carried on -under the much-patched cloak of that whining cant which has made -modern Christianity an ugly by-word in Asia and North Africa.</p> - -<p>You united in your endeavors to establish an independent and -constitutionally governed Roumania, a free Servia, a modern Greece and -Bulgaria, and, more recently, an autonomous Macedonia, under the -pretext that Turkey, being controlled with an iron rod by a despotic -Sultan and an intolerably exalted Sheykh-ul-Islam, was not fit to -govern Christian races.</p> - -<p>But you obstruct Mohammedan Turkey’s efforts to introduce and enforce -the very principles of liberty and popular government which in former -years you had been advocating as a <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">sine qua non</i> in the -administration of your precious Christian protégés.</p> - -<p>An ounce of baptismal water makes such a difference, does it not?</p> - -<p>I believe that I am the mouthpiece of a great majority of my -fellow-Muslim and my fellow-Asians when I state that the Jesuit policy -of Europe during the political travail of Young Turkey, when the -Osmanli attempted to crystallize his newly found liberty, will do more -to fan the red embers of fighting Pan-Islam into living, leaping -flames than any other political event since the Berlin treaty.</p> - -<p>We have suffered long enough a series of deliberate moral insults and -material injuries at the hands of selfish, canting, lying -Christianity, and we are still capable of tremendous energies when -Islam is in danger.</p> - -<p>And who can deny that Islam is in danger?</p> - -<p>Your attitude during the Balkan troubles proved to us that the liberty -which you deem necessary to the Christian Balkans is a negligible -quantity when applied to the followers of the Prophet Mohammed who -inhabit the same peninsula.</p> - -<p>And I could mention a dozen instances to prove that you yourselves are -forcing on the world the coming struggle between Asia, all Asia, -against Europe and America, against Christendom, in other words.</p> - -<p>You are heaping up material for a Jehad, a Pan-Islam, a Pan-Asia Holy -War, a gigantic Day of Reckoning, an invasion -<!--025.png--> -of a new Attila and -Tamerlane … who will use rifles and bullets, instead of lances and -spears.</p> - -<p>You are deaf to the voice of reason and fairness, and so you must be -taught with the whirling swish of the sword when it is red.</p> - -<p class="p2 center">V</p> - -<p>You claim that altruism and the virtues are the monopoly of your creed -and your race.</p> - -<p>But in reality the teachings of Jesus are not a particle more apt to -lead his followers in the golden path than are the sayings of the Lord -Buddha, the laws of Moses, the wisdom of Confucius, or the words of -the Koran. True tolerance, true altruism teaches us that what is right -in Peking may be wrong on the shores of Lake Tchaad, and what is wrong -in a Damascus bazaar may be right at a Kansas ice-cream social.</p> - -<p>Such true tolerance is far broader than the limits of professing -Christianity, than the limits of any established, cut-and-dried creed. -It is as broad as the Seven Holy Rivers of Hindustan and as vast as -Time. The creed of mutual sympathy is a very old creed: even amongst -the troglodytes chosen spirits must have known it, the red-haired -barbarians of Gaul must have heard of it, and amongst the -lizard-eating Arabs of pre-Islamic days it must have found adherents. -It is a human truth, a human principle which is the common property of -mankind East and West; but Christian hegemony in worldly affairs has -killed it, has blighted it with the curse of the cross.</p> - -<p>Intrinsic unselfishness and abstract goodness is older than the -Gospel, the Koran, the Veda, or any other religious book. Being at the -very core of that civilization from which all changes spring, it is in -itself eternally unchangeable, be it clothed in the words of the -Sermon on the Mount, the Prophet Mohammed’s three great principles of -Compassion, Charity, and Resignation, or the famed edict of the -Emperor Asoka, who many centuries before the days of Jesus declared to -the world that “a man must not do reverence to his own sect by -disparaging that of another man.”</p> -</div><!--end Mohammedan section--> -<!--026.png--> -<div class="break"> -<h3 class="p4">THE SHROUD</h3> - -<p class="center"><span class="sc">Edna St. Vincent Millay</span></p> - -<div class="poemcontainer"> - <div class="poem"> - <div class="stanza"> - <div class="i0"><span class="sc"><span class="muchlarger">D</span>eath</span>, I say, my heart is bowed</div> - <div class="i2">Unto thine,—O mother!</div> - <div class="i0">This red gown will make a shroud</div> - <div class="i2">Good as any other!</div> - </div><!--end stanza--> - <div class="stanza"> - <div class="i0">(I, that would not wait to wear</div> - <div class="i2">My own bridal things,</div> - <div class="i0">In a dress dark as my hair</div> - <div class="i2">Made my answerings.</div> - </div><!--end stanza--> - <div class="stanza"> - <div class="i0">I, to-night, that till he came</div> - <div class="i2">Could not, could not wait,</div> - <div class="i0">In a gown as bright as flame</div> - <div class="i2">Held for them the gate.)</div> - </div><!--end stanza--> - <div class="stanza"> - <div class="i0">Death, I say, my heart is bowed</div> - <div class="i2">Unto thine,—O mother!</div> - <div class="i0">This red gown will make a shroud</div> - <div class="i2">Good as any other!</div> - </div><!--end stanza--> - </div><!--end poem--> -</div><!--end poem container--> -</div><!--end The Shroud--> -<!--027.png--> -<div class="break"> -<h3 class="p4">NEW LOYALTIES FOR OLD CONSOLATIONS</h3> - -<p class="center"><span class="sc">H. A. Overstreet</span></p> - -<p><span class="muchlarger">T</span><span class="sc">o</span> most persons the conception of a godless world is the conception of -a world with the bottom dropped out. It is a world from which all the -high values, all the splendid consolations have disappeared. This is -true even for many who feel that they cannot, in reason, any longer -believe in a personal God. For all their honest disbelief, the world -has turned grey for them. It has lost its old wonder and joy. It has -become a dead world.</p> - -<p>It is interesting to ask ourselves whether all this need be true; -whether the high values and the finer consolations may not be just as -real when the belief in a personal God has vanished. With the -vanishing of that belief, of course, the whole attitude toward the -universe is altered. Hopes and comforts that were deeply and warmly of -the older order of beliefs have no place in the new order; while -loyalties and aspirations that were the breath of its life are become -meaningless and without force. But may not new loyalties and -aspirations, hopes and comforts find their place strongly and -inspiringly in the later order of belief?</p> - -<p>It will be interesting, as an answer to this question, to ask how -differently a society would behave all of whose members, disbelieving -utterly in the reality of a personal God, had no other thought of the -divine life than that it was their own larger and more ideal -existence.</p> - -<p>I remember at the time of the San Francisco earthquake passing one of -the cathedrals of the city and finding its broad stone steps, covering -a goodly portion of a city square, black with kneeling worshippers. -There could be no question of their reason for being there. They were -setting themselves right with their God, hoping that in the fervor of -their devotion he would have mercy upon them and save them from -destruction. So on shipboard in times of great danger one will find -the passengers gathered in the cabin praying to God for -deliverance,—always, to be -<!--028.png--> -sure, with the proviso, “Yet if it be thy -will that we perish, thy will be done!”</p> - -<p>These are dramatic but typical instances of what occurs constantly in -homes and churches where people pray to a personal deity. Could such -an attitude of prayer have any meaning for a man who disbelieved in a -personal deity? Obviously not. Would he cease to pray? It all depends -upon what one is to mean by prayer.</p> - -<p>Prayer of the kind indicated is an effort to secure assistance in -circumstances where the normal human means fail. Normally, for -example, if a man would have bread, he sets about to plant the proper -seed, or grind the flour, or mix the dough. He finds out, in short, -the laws that govern the production or manufacture of breadstuffs; and -he does not expect to secure his desired result until he has -accommodated himself in all the requisite ways to these laws and -conditions. If a man would save himself from a burning house, he looks -for a fire-escape, or a rope, or calls for a ladder; again -accommodating his action to the fundamental conditions of the -situation. But if the heavens are long without rain and the seed dry -up, or the fire burns away the means of escape, the man, at the end of -his human resources, calls to another power for help.</p> - -<p>Such a call for help is based upon two assumptions, which in some -respects scarcely support each other. They are the assumption, first, -that there is a power able to control to his beneficent purposes -forces that are humanly uncontrollable; but, second, that this power -will not act unless attracted by very special and fervent appeal. The -latter fact, that special appeal is needed, may be due to the God’s -impotence, his inability to be in all places at once: he does the best -he can, hurrying hither and thither from one distressing circumstance -to another. Or it may be due to his demand that his creatures shall -continually turn their minds to him, an attitude which he succeeds in -securing in them for the most part only when they are hard pressed -with danger.</p> - -<p>Stated thus baldly, it would be difficult even on the naïve planes of -religious thought to find persons who would acknowledge either that -their God was a jealous god, refusing help until all the requisite -ceremonies of abasement and supplication had -<!--029.png--> -been fulfilled, or that -he was a finite God, half distracted by the imploring voices calling -to him from all quarters of his universe. And yet, in prayer as it is -ordinarily practised, both of these views are more or less -unconsciously mingled. What prevents the emergence of their absurdity -into clear consciousness is the relatively healthy thought underlying -all prayer that if a man would secure something for himself he must -himself spend some effort in the process. <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">Ex nihilo nihil.</i> In -situations that pass beyond all his power of practical human control, -there is nothing for him to do but to give his mere effort of -adoration and hope.</p> - -<p>On the higher levels of religious experience, this semi-magical -conception of prayer grows increasingly in ill-repute. The thought is -more and more in evidence that if God wished to prevent certain -distresses, he would do so of his own beneficent accord. A request for -specific aid, in short, would insinuate in him, either a failure to -know in all circumstances what was best to be done, or an inability to -keep wholly abreast of the tasks which he ought to perform. To save -the majesty of God, prayer must become simply a turning of the mind to -him, not for specific help, but for that general uplift of spirit -which comes from the contemplation of his supreme perfection.</p> - -<p>Here obviously is the germ of a higher and radically different -conception of prayer. In the more naïve conception, help was to come -from the “power not ourselves”; in the maturer conception, help is to -come <em>through the stimulation in ourselves of our own highest -powers</em>—a stimulation effected by the turning of our minds and -spirits to the highest conceivable Reality.</p> - -<p>The efficacy of prayer, in short, in this conception of it, will lie -not in what it brings to us from without, but what it effects -within,—what powers, efforts, aspirations it develops in us. Let us -return to the kneeling worshippers. As they bowed their heads in -fervent supplication, other men and women were distributing bread and -clothing to destitute families, or were building shelters, or were -clearing the streets of débris, or were patrolling with gun on -shoulder against criminal disorder. Is it correct to say, as the older -religions have always said, that the latter were engaged wholly in -earthly affairs, while the former were entering the higher life of God -and the spirit? Or is it truer to hold that -<!--030.png--> -the digging away of débris -was a far more effective and powerful prayer to God than supplication -to him for help?</p> - -<p>The kneeling worshippers were indeed turning their minds to their -highest conceivable Reality. It was a Reality that they hoped would do -things for them. But the diggers of débris, or the distributers of -bread and clothing, were likewise, unconsciously no doubt, but in -actual effect, turning their minds to their highest Reality. Face to -face with the destruction of those things that give order and beauty -and power to life, they were thinking (in their unconscious selves) of -what a city for men and women and children <em>ought to be and could be</em>. -It ought not to be a tumbled mass of bricks and burning wood; it ought -not to be filled with starving people; it ought not to be given over -to looters and murderers; it ought to be a city clean, ordered, happy. -With their smoke-blinded eyes, they may not have seen far beyond the -immediate demands of their ideal; but ideal it nevertheless was to -which they lifted their souls in service. With all its vague -inadequacy, it was for them then and there their highest Reality, -their God—the ideal life in their members—to which they felt that -they must devote themselves with full power of brain and muscle. They -asked nothing of this their God; rather it was their God <em>that asked -everything of them</em>, that stimulated them to the full, devoted -summoning of all their essential powers.</p> - -<p>When a child lies sick unto death, what is the effective form of -prayer? If the divine life, as we have held, is our own ideal life, -prayer to such God is the tireless, unflinching effort to bring some -measure of that ideal life to realization. The death of a little child -of causes that might be controlled is hardly in keeping with the ideal -of life. Hence devotion to the ideal calls for every straining of -effort,—the loving care, the ceaseless watching, the sacrifice of -pleasure and comforts to purchase the best knowledge and skill to save -the little life. This is the essential prayer; not the bowing in -helpless misery and supplication before a God who needs to be called -from some far forgetfulness to his proper tasks.</p> - -<p>During recent winter storms, when New York was filled with hundreds of -thousands of unemployed, several hundred of these unfortunate men, as -reported by <cite>The New York Times</cite>, marched -<!--031.png--> -through the snow-filled -streets to one of the large evangelical churches where the weekly -prayer meeting was being held. As they filed in, consternation spread -among the worshippers. Their minister, however, stopped the oncoming -crowd and asked them what they wanted. “We want shelter for the night -in your church,” they said. The minister, looking at his cushioned -pews, replied that he could not permit it. “But cannot we sleep in the -basement?” they asked. No, the minister said, they could not, and he -advised them to leave the church quietly, at the same time whispering -to one of his congregation to call up the police. The police came in -due order and rough-handled the men; and the prayers to God were -resumed. Meanwhile, at another place in the city, a great body of men -and women were gathered, drawn together at the instance of the -American Association for Labor Legislation, to consider ways and means -for relieving the distressing conditions of unemployment. At the -latter meeting men spoke of municipal employment bureaus, of -scientific plans for unemployment insurance; they brought forth facts -and figures to prove the possibility of regulating business in such a -way as to prevent the alternation of slack and rush seasons. They did -not mention God. And yet one wonders whether their earnest and -forceful deliberations were not a far more fervent prayer to God, a -far more devoted yielding of themselves to the power of their ideal -selves than the windy prayer of that minister (or of his people) who -trusted his God so poorly that he called in the city’s police to help -Him out of an ugly scrape.</p> - -<p>Once the divine life is believed to be not a beneficent Person other -than ourselves to whom we may call for help, but the finer life that -lives potentially in ourselves, prayer ceases to be a semi-magic -formula applicable to an order of existence beyond our own. Prayer is -then nothing more or less than the turning of mind and spirit to the -service of the ideal that lives in us. And it is most effectually -realized not by departing from human activity, by yielding oneself to -a power not oneself; but rather by a vigorous turning to the problems -and difficulties of our life and enlisting every last shred of effort -to set them right.</p> - -<p>It follows then that there is prayer wherever there is service, -<em>service of any kind</em> that makes for life-betterment. The chemist -<!--032.png--> -who -learns a new control has received an answer to his year-long prayer; -the physician who finds the saving serum has prayed long and fervently -and has been heard of his God. The business man who finds a way of -juster coöperation with his men need never have named the word God or -joined in holy adoration. But he has prayed—to his ideal of human -brotherhood; and has prayed so vigorously that his God has heard and -answered.</p> - -<p>But in each case the God that has heard and answered has been the -deeper possibilities of these men’s own life—their ideal life—which -they, by their loyal devotion, have wrought out of mere possibility -into some manner of actuality.</p> - -<p class="p2 center"><abbr title="Two">II</abbr></p> - -<p>This in part is what prayer must mean when the old devotion to the -personal God has vanished. The last shred of its supernatural, -semi-magical connotation will have disappeared. If things worth while -are to be done; if life values are to be accomplished and preserved, -it must be by a knowledge and control of the conditions of their -accomplishment. The devotion to the ideal in us presupposes therefore -the most strenuous and persistent effort to learn these modes of -control, to understand the deep and intricate ways of life, and to -bend every power—of mind and body, of science and art—to bring life -into harmony with their fundamental demands.</p> - -<p>The situation may be illustrated by the contrast between the older and -the newer ways of offering thanks to God for great benefits received. -In the older days a man would pray, “O God, if thou wilt save the life -of my child, there shall be so many candles burning before thine -altar”; or “There shall be a new chapel added to thy house of prayer.” -The burning candles and the new chapel may have served human -purposes,—certainly the candle-makers had their small benefit of it; -but the essential thought was not service to mankind, but tribute to -God. When, however, the personal God has vanished and there is no -divine life but our own deeper and more ideal existence, how shall a -man give thanks for deliverance? Any man who has helped -<!--033.png--> -wife and nurse -and doctors to fight with all the power that human knowledge and skill -can command for the life of his child, knows that out of the deep -thanksgiving of his heart the thing that he would most wish to do -thereafter would be to bend every effort to make such saving knowledge -and skill accessible to fathers and mothers of other children, or to -extend that knowledge and develop that skill to the saving of lives -from still deeper distresses. He will build a hospital or endow a -chair in medical research, or he will send his small contribution to -some agency that makes for the amelioration of life conditions. And he -will do this not as a tribute to a God who delights in adoration, but -in simple devotion to the ideal of a more adequate human life.</p> - -<p>Or, indeed, he <em>might</em> found a church or endow a minister. For are we -to suppose that church and minister are to disappear when God the -Perfect Person no longer lives to hear the old supplications? But it -will be a very different church from the churches with which we are -familiar. The church of to-day still lingers in its animistic and -magical memories. The church services are supposed to have vital -efficacy for the saving of men’s souls, not simply in the ordinary way -of stimulating them by precept and example to better living, but by -performing for them and with them certain rites pleasing to God. There -is still in the minds of most churchmen something efficacious about -the very attendance upon divine worship. It is an act which God -enjoins and which he rewards when it is faithfully performed. It is -like the pagan custom of bringing gifts to the altar: the god demands -the gifts and rewards the bringer of gifts for his lowly obedience. It -is true that the more enlightened churches are rapidly outgrowing this -belief in the ceremonial efficacy of church service; but it would not -be difficult to show that it still persists in so great measure as -very definitely to color the word “religious” with the meaning “that -which pertains to divine ceremonial.” The sharp line of demarcation -between “religious” and “secular” is but the expression of this -animistic and supernatural survival in religion.</p> - -<p>But even churches that have largely outgrown belief in the saving -efficacy of supernatural ceremonial, who believe that attendance -<!--034.png--> -upon -church service is wholly for the sake of inspiration to better living, -seek to secure that inspiration by pointing the worshipper to the -perfect God, or to his beloved Son. One may doubtless get inspiration -from the tireless work of a Burbank, or a Curie, or a Florence -Nightingale. If the church, however, uses such sources of inspiration, -it is only by the way. Its fundamental source is the Perfect Person, -the Eternal God. The church has the special function of calling men -from their secular activities, of pointing upward to that great Guide -and Friend and Provider in whose name and through whose power they are -to live.</p> - -<p>The new type of church will indeed call men to the remembrance of the -divine life—it will point upward—but it will be their own divine -life to which it will call them. It will find their divine life in -their own ideals and in their loyal service of these ideals. Hence its -primary interest will be not in what some perfect God wants of men, -but what the God in themselves wants of them,—what types of things -they long for, what powers of mind and body they are willing to devote -to securing them. It will make far more difference to the new church -whether its communicant is fighting child labor with all his power of -mind and soul than whether he is a regular attendant upon weekly -prayers. Indeed, it will know no true and rounded prayer save actual -service. Hence its body of communicants will be first and foremost men -and women engaged in human service. The condition for admission to the -new church will be not a profession of faith but an exhibition of -deed. Does a man care enough for anything worth while to put strenuous -effort into its accomplishment; does he care for it not for his own -sake primarily but for the sake of enhancing the life of his fellows -and his world—it may be to discover a cancer cure, or to invent a -dishwasher, or to make a better school—such a man or woman is -welcomed into the new church. However circumscribed his ideal may be, -inasmuch as it is an ideal of service it is the divine in him that is -coming to life. He is already a worshipper.</p> - -<p>By this token, there will be no place in the new church for the man -who is anxious about his soul or who thinks much of what will happen -to him after death. He belongs properly in -<!--035.png--> -the congregation of -self-seekers; not in the church of the divine life.</p> - -<p>The new church, in short, will be primarily a clearing-house of -service, to which men will go not to save their souls but to save -their world. It will be a spiritual centre, so to speak, of all -service-activities; a place for comparing notes, for learning of each -other, for the heartening of one another in their worthful tasks. The -leader of such a church will be a man not only deeply interested in -and in touch with the agencies and activities of human betterment, but -versed likewise in the fundamental sciences that make for a finer -direction and control of life. His theology will be not an occult -research of supernatural relationships and powers, but physics and -chemistry, biology and sociology, ethics and philosophy—all the -fundamental approaches, in short, to the problem of human -self-realization.</p> - -<p class="p2 center"><abbr title="Three">III</abbr></p> - -<p>Yet splendid as such religious life may be conceded to be, it will -apparently lack one of the primary consolations of the older belief, -the assurance, namely, that the fundamental government of the world is -just and good. “God’s in his heaven; all’s right with the world.” If, -as we have been urging, God is not in his heaven, it may indeed, for -all we know to the contrary, be all wrong with the world. A few years -ago we were very much perturbed by certain conclusions reached by the -accredited masters of science. The universe was running down, they -said, and would end a lifeless, frozen mass. The thought of an -ever-living God was then a comfort against such ominous prophecy. If -God lives, it follows that all things of value will live, that the -world cannot go to ultimate ruin.</p> - -<p>That old prophecy, however, of a frozen and lifeless world no longer -has honor in our land. Recent discoveries of new types of energy, a -more penetrating analysis both of the mathematics and mechanics of the -situation, show the prophecy to have been made on wholly insufficient -and insecure grounds. The old dogmatic materialism has had to give way -to a critical and open-minded -<!--036.png--> -evolutionism which tends more and more -to regard the cosmic process as one of expanding power, in which the -values for which we deeply care—conscious life, purposive direction, -science, art, morality—appear to have a place of growing security and -effectiveness. And yet the evolutionism of the day, unlike the older -religious thought, finds no cosmic certainty upon which it may utterly -bank. The universe, with all the high values that have been achieved, -<em>may</em> indeed go to ruin. There is no absolute guarantee for the -future. All that modern evolutionism can say to us is that looking -over such history of the world as is accessible, and analyzing the -processes there found, it seems highly probable that the line of the -future will be a line of advance, an advance from relative -disorganization to organization, from a large degree of mechanical -indifference to increasing organic solidarity and integration, from -antagonisms and conflicts to mutuality and coöperation. But it is only -probable. There is no God who holds the destiny in his hands and makes -it certain of accomplishment.</p> - -<p>In view of this uncertainty as to the world’s government and outcome, -it may be asked whether the new type of religion will not be weaker in -moral and spiritual vigor than the old. Do not vigor and initiative -spring from hope and sure confidence in the fundamental rightness of -the world? In answer to this one has but to ask the question: in what -type of situation does the human character grow strong and -heroic,—that in which there is no doubt of the happy outcome, in -which the individual plays his part, assured that nothing can happen -wrongly; or that in which the outcome is uncertain, in which the -individual realizes that he must fight his way, knowing not whether -victory or defeat will greet him, but assured only that whatever -happens, he must fight and fight to the end? Is it unfair to say that -the old religion with its confident, childlike resting on God (“He -loves the burthen”) developed a type of character that was not, in the -mass, conspicuously heroic? “God knows best”; “It will all come out -right”; “Thy will be done”—these are not expressions of fighting men; -they are expressions of men who resign themselves to the ruling of -powers greater than themselves. A civilization characterized by such -an attitude will not be one strenuously -<!--037.png--> -alive to eliminate the sorry -evils of life. But the men who believe that the issue of the universe -is in doubt, that there is no powerful God to lead the hosts to -victory, will, if they have the stuff of men in them, strike out their -manliest to help whatever good there is in the world to win its way -against the forces of evil. A civilization of such men will be a -tough-fibred civilization, strenuous to fight, grimly ready, like the -Old Guard, to die but never surrender.</p> - -<p>There is, in short, something subtly weakening about the optimism of -the traditional religions. Like the historic soothing syrup, with its -unadvertised opiate, it soothes the distress not by curing the disease -but by temporarily paralyzing the function. “To trust God nor be -afraid” means in most cases—not all—to settle back from a too -anxious concern about the evils of the world. “God will take care of -his own!” How different is this from the attitude: “The task is ours -and the whole world’s and we must see it through!”</p> - -<p class="p2 center"><abbr title="Four">IV</abbr></p> - -<p>But from another point of view there was an element of power in the -older religion which seems at first blush to be utterly lacking in the -type of new religion we are describing. A prominent world-evangelist -of the Young Men’s Christian Association was recently lecturing to the -college students of New York City on the ethical and religious life. -It was significant to note that most of his talk to students concerned -itself with temptations and that the invariable outcome of each talk -was that the one infallible means of meeting temptation was to realize -God’s presence in one’s life, to companion with God, to feel him near -and watchful, ever sympathetic, ever ready with divine help. Students -do indeed get power from that kind of belief. They feel themselves -before an all-seeing eye, a hand is on their shoulder, a voice is in -their ear; and when the difficult moment comes they are not alone. How -utterly uncompanioned, how lonely, on the other hand, must be the -student who knows no beneficent, all-seeing, and all-caring Father. -When his difficult moment comes he stands in desolate isolation. -Victory or defeat then must hang -<!--038.png--> -upon his own puny strength and -wavering determination. It is a favorite argument with Roman Catholics -that the belief in God is the one surest guard against the sexual -irregularity of young men. Remove God, the one strong bulwark, from -their lives, and the flood of their passions will sweep them to their -destruction.</p> - -<p>Such considerations as these must indeed give one pause; yet I feel -assured that they need not hold us long. How does a man get strength -for right living? He begins—in his childhood as in the childhood of -the race—by getting it through fear. The child is told, upon pain of -punishment, not to do certain things. There will come a time when it -will know why it ought not to do these things; but in its first months -and, in a degree, through its early years, it refrains from doing them -simply by reason of the pressure of the superior power of its parents. -Later it refrains through unconscious imitation and affection. It -lives in the light and love of its parents; and it consciously and -unconsciously shapes its life after the pattern of their lives. When -difficulties press, the child flees to the mother or the father for -comfort and advice. Those are delicious days, of warm trust and joy -and loving security. The child nestles up against the stronger power -of those it loves. But the child grows to manhood and womanhood. -Whence then does it get its strength for right living? The fear of the -infant days, the imitation and affection of childhood and youth are -now transformed into a new attitude,—an understanding of the reason -in the right and the unreason in the wrong. There are many factors and -influences that now take the place of parent power and affection: the -love and admiration of one’s group, the customs of one’s people, the -stimulus of great persons. But the essential power now is the power of -<em>insight</em>—of so understanding the forces and principles of life that -one’s whole self is surrendered in deep reverence and service to the -things that ought to be. Assuredly, no character is mature until it -has reached this last stage. There is indeed something beautiful about -the boy who in the midst of temptation goes to his father and talks it -all out with him; who clings to the father’s hand to lead him safely -through the dangerous ways. But the -<!--039.png--> -boy is only on the way to moral -and spiritual maturity; he is not yet morally and spiritually mature.</p> - -<p>The doctrine that the great evangelist and the evangelical churches in -general preach is a doctrine admirably adapted to a condition of moral -and spiritual immaturity; it is a doctrine, in short, for little boys -and girls; it is not a doctrine for morally and spiritually mature men -and women. I doubt even, in fact, whether it is a doctrine for college -youths and maidens; for I note in my own relations with college men -and women that there is among them the growing consciousness of right -for right’s sake, a growing cleanness and earnestness of life; and -this is so, I take it, not because they believe such conduct and -attitude to be commanded or because they are aware of a heavenly -Father who watches, but because their eyes have been opened to see the -truth and the truth has made them free.</p> - -<p>I believe that the problem of how to teach a young man to meet -temptation is a deeply serious problem. But I believe small good will -come of falling back upon the old easy expedient of half-frightening, -half-cajoling the young man into submission by reminding him of the -all-watching eye and the all-considering heart of the great Father. -That way is so easy that it is really unfair to the victims. It is -like hypnotizing a man into morality. The way of the new religion is -the harder but more lasting, more self-respecting way of developing -the whole moral self of the boy and the youth and the man,—beginning -far back in childhood and unremittingly, understandingly continuing -the training, until when the child becomes the youth and the youth the -man, righteousness is the firm, sweet habit of his life. We human -beings have an inveterate love of shirking our tasks. We neglect the -essential moral culture of the infant and the child; we let the -moments and the days slip by in the life of the youth without putting -any hard thought upon his training in self-control, in courage, in -moral insight; and then suddenly, when signs of danger begin to show -in the young man, we grow panic-stricken and implore him to call on -God to save him. The fact is that the task was ours and we shirked it. -Ours was the responsibility; and we had no right to put it off on a -miracle-working Deity.</p> - -<p>“When half-gods go,” says Emerson, “the gods arrive.” -<!--040.png--> -When once we give -up this easy way of moral and religious hypnosis; when once we believe -that God, the watchful policeman of the universe, no longer exists, we -shall solemnly and seriously take up the task we have so long cast -upon a deity’s shoulders—<em>our</em> task of shaping and directing and -making strong the moral possibilities of the children we bring into -the world. From the old consolation, in short, of divine protection, -we shall awake to a new loyalty to our fundamental moral obligations.</p> - -<p>It is significant in this connection to note that the farther we go -back in the history of religion, the more the moral reference of -situations is secondary and the supernatural reference primary. The -ten commandments, for example, were first of all a divine behest, and -only secondarily a series of laws founded on the essential -requirements of human well-being. But as we come nearer to our own -day, the moral quality of situations tends more and more to usurp the -primacy of the old supernatural reference. The limit of such evolution -is the disappearance altogether of the supernatural, the evaluation, -ultimately, of all situations and activities in terms of their -inherent good or bad for the life of humanity and the world.</p> - -<p class="center">*   *   *   *   *  </p> - -<p>The old loyalty, in short, was the loyalty of loving children; the new -loyalty is the loyalty of strong-charactered men and women. Has the -time come for moral and spiritual maturity? To some of us there is no -longer an alternative. “When I was a child I spake as a child; I -understood as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish -things.” In the light of spiritual maturity, the god of magic, the god -of miraculous power, the god of loving protection, the god of -all-seeing care—the Parent God—must give way to the God that is the -very inner ideal life of ourselves, our own deep and abiding -possibilities of being; the God <em>in us</em> that stimulates us to what is -highest in value and power.</p> -</div><!--end Loyalties section--> -<!--041.png--> -<div class="break"> -<h3 class="p4">THE PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE</h3> - -<p class="center"><i class="decoration">August 18, 1914</i></p> - -<p class="p2"><span class="sc">My Fellow Countrymen</span>:</p> - -<p>I suppose that every thoughtful man in America has asked himself -during the last troubled weeks what influence the European war may -exert upon the United States; and I take the liberty of addressing a -few words to you in order to point out that it is entirely within our -own choice what its effects upon us will be, and to urge very -earnestly upon you the sort of speech and conduct which will best -safeguard the nation against distress and disaster.</p> - -<p>The effect of the war upon the United States will depend upon what -American citizens say and do. Every man who really loves America will -act and speak in the true spirit of neutrality, which is the spirit of -impartiality and fairness and friendliness to all concerned.</p> - -<p>The spirit of the nation in this critical matter will be determined -largely by what individuals and society and those gathered in public -meetings do and say; upon what newspapers and magazines contain; upon -what our ministers utter in their pulpits, and men proclaim as their -opinions on the streets.</p> - -<p>The people of the United States are drawn from many nations and -chiefly from the nations now at war. It is natural and inevitable that -there should be the utmost variety of sympathy with regard to the -issues and circumstances of the conflict. Some will wish one nation, -others another, to succeed in the momentous struggle.</p> - -<p>It will be easy to excite passion and difficult to allay it. Those -responsible for exciting it will assume a heavy responsibility; -responsibility for no less a thing than that the people of the United -States, whose love of their country, and whose loyalty to its -government should unite them as Americans, all bound in honor and -affection to think first of her and her interests, may be divided into -camps of hostile opinions, hot against each other, involved in the war -itself in impulse and opinion, if not in action.</p> - -<p>Such diversions among us would be fatal to our peace of mind -<!--042.png--> -and might -seriously stand in the way of the proper performance of our duty as -the one great nation at peace, the one people holding itself ready to -play a part of impartial mediation and speak the counsels of peace and -accommodation, not as a partisan, but as a friend.</p> - -<p>I venture, therefore, my fellow countrymen, to speak a solemn word of -warning to you against that deepest, most subtle, most essential -breach of neutrality which may spring out of partisanship, out of -passionately taking sides.</p> - -<p>The United States must be neutral in fact as well as in name during -these days that are to try men’s souls. We must be impartial in -thought as well as in action, must put a curb upon our sentiments as -well as upon every transaction that might be construed as a preference -of one party to the struggle before another. My thought is of America. -I am speaking, I feel sure, the earnest wish and purpose of every -thoughtful American that this great country of ours, which is, of -course, the first in our thoughts and in our hearts, should show -herself in this time of peculiar trial a nation fit beyond others to -exhibit the fine poise of undisturbed judgment, the dignity of -self-control, the efficiency of dispassionate action; a nation that -neither sits in judgment upon others nor is disturbed in her own -counsels, and which keeps herself fit and free to do what is honest -and disinterested and truly serviceable for the peace of the world.</p> - -<p>Shall we not resolve to put upon ourselves the restraint which will -bring to our people the happiness and the great lasting influence for -peace we covet for them?</p> - -<p class="quotesign"><span class="sc">Woodrow Wilson</span></p> -</div><!--end Presidents message--> -<!--043.png--> -<div class="break"> -<h3 class="p4">ATAVISM</h3> - -<p class="center"><span class="sc">Karl Remer</span></p> - -<p><span class="muchlarger">T</span><span class="sc">he</span> city had withstood its besiegers for a long time. The guns on the -mountain had poured down shot, the guns on the north and on the south -had battered the old walls. The walls had crumbled and fallen. The -walls were old and they had been considered picturesque for so long -that it was as if they had forgotten the sturdy virtues of their -youth.</p> - -<p>Through the breaches came the soldiers. Tribesmen they seemed of the -old days of the Grand Khan.</p> - -<p>The soldiers were thinking. They were not accustomed to thought. Was -it true, ran their thoughts, that their leader had promised that there -would be no looting? He had promised, this they knew, that there would -be no looting after he entered the city. What was the meaning of that -“he”? Did it mean the army or did it mean the general? Did it mean the -soldiers? There was the rumor that the general could not leave his -present quarters for three days. Rain, or snow, or ice, or drought -prevented. What was the meaning of that? Did it mean three days of -fine, bloody looting?</p> - -<p>The soldiers entered the city. Like the tribesmen of the Grand Khan -they poured in. Through one gate, through two gates, through three -gates they came. It was a sullen business and silently did they press -forward. They had not made up their minds about those three days. They -were not sure about the general. Perhaps he was playing one of his -grim jokes. Was he, perhaps, already within the city? He had promised -before many that there would be no looting. The foreigner, the -Jesus-religion man in black clothes, had stood beside him. It was hard -to tell, where foreigners were concerned, how much to believe. -Foreigners were an unusual sort of people. Most of them did not look -dangerous, but any one of them might have power. It was one of the -inexplicable things about foreigners that one could never tell the -amount of power a foreigner had by the amount he used. To have power -and not use it, to have rice and not eat it—strange men these -foreigners.</p> -<!--044.png--> - -<p>The soldiers poured into the city. Like the tribesmen of the Grand -Khan they came; but not like the tribesmen of the Grand Khan. The loot -and the fun were before them, yet they restrained themselves.</p> - -<p>The soldiers were yellow and clad in yellow, and they poured through -the gates as the yellow Yangtsze pours between its banks. Silver and -silks were before them, but the hand was withheld from the knife and a -sullen silence was around them.</p> - -<p>Some one began it. There came a curse and an answer, a taunt and a -gunshot. So it began.</p> - -<p>Here was a shop boarded, bolted, and locked. A crowd of soldiers -gathered before it. They demanded that the shop be opened. No reply -came from within. The demand was repeated and emphasized with a blow -of a rifle butt against the boards. Still there was no reply. More gun -butts fell upon the boards and they began to creak and snap. A scared -man within began to dicker for life, property, and family. He paid and -paid high—for nothing. The shop was broken open. Stripped and -wounded, the man was sent down the street. His goods became the -playthings of the soldiers. His wife lay above, outraged and stabbed. -His daughter was in the hands of other tormentors. At the command of -the soldiers, his son began carrying his father’s goods and piling -them as the soldiers directed. There was a look of death upon the -boy’s face; he was sick and weary. The soldiers demanded more silver. -The boy knew there was no more. He knew that his father had paid it -all to save the family. He was so sadly sure he would not look. The -soldiers cut him down and went their way.</p> - -<p>There was a ricksha coolie who had sunk frightened against a wall in a -side street. He had hidden his family, but he, himself, had come forth -from hiding in the hope of much work and large pay. With quaking knees -he had pulled loads of loot for the soldiers. At last the horror had -overcome him and here he cowered against a wall. He was called but he -could not move. He knew that he could not pass down the bloody streets -again. The call was repeated and still he did not move. They shot him -as he lay and took his ricksha from him. That street also, a little -street and a quiet one, had its spreading mark of red.</p> -<!--045.png--> - -<p>A poor barber lay trembling upon his bamboo bed. He had no family and -few friends. Why had he not run away? He lay thinking and thinking but -he could think of no good reason. As he lay thus they came upon his -shop. Down came the boards. He paid them all his savings, a pitifully -small sum, and they demanded his wife and children. They killed him -because he had neither the one nor the other. “For,” said they, “no -honest man is without a family.”</p> - -<p>There was a girl of eighteen whom the soldiers seized. Guile or -temporary insanity prompted her to play her part as if with pleasure. -She smiled on them and shrugged her shoulders most coquettishly. She -bandied jokes with them and made advances. A petty officer accepted -her advances and, later, had her beaten to death. The soldiers -approved. “These people must be taught,” said they, “that modesty is a -woman’s duty.”</p> - -<p>For two days the riot continued. For two nights there was no sleep but -the sleep of death. The moans of the women, the groans of the men, -fire and fresh alarms made sleep a thing that seemed years away. The -city was red and the blood flowed. Loot and the lives of men, silver -and the bodies of women, these things did the victors take as is old -custom in China. Then came the third day and the general.</p> - -<p>The foreigner in black clothes, the man of the religion of Jesus, had -lived through these two days and two nights. “One can never tell,” -said the soldiers, “what power these foreigners have.” “That is the -foreigner’s house,” said the soldiers, “let it alone.”</p> - -<p>The foreigner had lived through the two days and the two nights, but -he had not slept. He had been thinking of the promise of the general. -“There will be no looting after I enter the city”—these were the -general’s words and the man who had spoken them had not yet entered. -As a joke the speech was not bad, but too much blood and no sleep -spoils the taste for jokes.</p> - -<p>The general entered with an important noise of trumpets. Where he rode -the looting stopped. He seemed weary, however, and did not ride far. -The smoke of the many fires may have hurt his eyes. The day may have -been too hot. In any case the general seemed discreetly weary and -discreetly blind.</p> -<!--046.png--> - -<p>The man of the religion of Jesus came to the general. His words were -to the point. “Is this the way you keep promises?” he asked.</p> - -<p>The general did not like directness and he did not care to argue. -“There is no looting,” he said, and with a smile he pointed down the -street.</p> - -<p>“There is looting everywhere except before your eyes.”</p> - -<p>“There is none,” said the general. It was characteristic of him to -add, “What there is must be stopped.”</p> - -<p>“By whom?” asked the foreigner.</p> - -<p>“Take one hundred men,” said the general, “go up and down in the city. -If you see looting or outrage, cut off the guilty man’s head. As for -myself, I have seen none.”</p> - -<p>The foreigner hesitated, but thoughts came to him of the last two -days. If he did nothing, who would act? Opportunity seemed to him -duty. So in despair and rage he agreed and at the head of his hundred -he set out.</p> - -<p>They came suddenly to a corner where a soldier was searching a dead -man’s clothes. Here was guilt so plain no proof was needed. The man -was quickly sentenced and in another moment his head was off. -“Justice,” said the foreigner to himself, “must upon occasion be -swift.”</p> - -<p>They came upon a house where a widow and her young daughter lived. The -house was small and until now it had been overlooked. A noise of -scuffling caused the foreigner to look within. The younger woman lay -bruised and naked upon the floor, the mother was still struggling with -her assailant. Two heads fell and the foreigner smiled. “Payment,” -said he to himself, “is a thing dear to the Lord. Here two have paid.”</p> - -<p>The hundred and their leader came upon a half-crazed soldier who was -trying to run up a narrow street with two mattresses which he had -stolen. The mattresses brushed the sides of the buildings upon the -narrow street so that, as the man’s load struck gate or door-post upon -the one side or the other, the man reeled as a drunken man does. They -caught him and made him kneel upon those very mattresses. The hundred -went on and the man’s head was left resting softly upon the stolen -goods. The mattresses -<!--047.png--> -were becoming red. “The blood of justice is red -also,” said the foreigner.</p> - -<p>Thus did the man of the religion of Jesus and his hundred make -progress through this city of great suffering.</p> - -<p>They seized a soldier carrying a woman. She was groaning. He protested -that he was carrying her to shelter. The man had earrings and a chain -in his belt. The woman’s ears were bleeding. The good knife descended -and again punishment found guilt.</p> - -<p>They went on and as they went there came a great joy into the heart of -the foreigner. “These people,” said he to himself, “are children and -they need a lesson. By God’s help they shall have it. Many lessons are -hard but many must be learned.”</p> - -<p>They seized an old soldier who was picking up the trinkets that had -been dropped before a jewelry shop. He swore that he had robbed no -man, but the man in black decided against him and off came his head.</p> - -<p>As the hundred passed on they sent fear before them and left a trail -of red justice behind them. The joy burned brighter in the heart of -the man in black. “Have I not talked to these people of the justice of -God?” said he to himself. “Now they are seeing it. Now they will know -it to be swift and terrible. A knife with a keen blade, a judge with a -clean heart, these things this people needs.”</p> - -<p>They came upon two soldiers who were quarrelling over the division of -a sable coat. Each had an end and the altercation was proceeding over -the outstretched garment. They protested that they had bought the coat -not two hours before and that they had paid for it. One begged -piteously for his life, but the man in black shook his head.</p> - -<p>So the expedition of the hundred became a thing of blood and more -blood. The heart of the man of the religion of Jesus was filled with a -grim ecstasy. It seemed to dance within him. “Am I not,” he chanted to -himself, “a messenger of the Lord to a sinful people? With what -measure they have measured, have I measured unto them. As they have -pitied others, so have I pitied them. Blood must flow, for blood alone -can cleanse. Blood alone can cleanse.”</p> - -<p>A young soldier was caught as he climbed the stairs of a -<!--048.png--> -small house. -He was brought into the street and told to kneel. “I have heard of -your Jesus and his forgiveness,” he said; “now I know.” He knelt with -a sort of dignity, the dignity that death brings to the brave, and his -head fell.</p> - -<p>His words struck through the blood fever to the heart of the man in -black. For a second he closed his eyes and when he opened them again -he saw with his old clearness. He knew that blood is blood and shame -came over him.</p> - -<p>He sent back his hundred, saying: “Go. I have done wrong.”</p> - -<p>He came to his own house and to his own small room where a crucifix -hung above the bed. He knelt and remained for a long time with his -eyes fixed upon the figure. The words, “Father, forgive them,” came -from his lips as from the lips of a stranger. For two days and for two -nights he had not slept. He sank slowly to the floor and lay still -before the quiet figure on the cross.</p> -</div><!--end Atavism section--> -<!--049.png--> -<div class="break"> -<h3 class="p4">THE CHANGING TEMPER AT HARVARD</h3> - -<p class="center"><span class="sc">Gilbert V. Seldes</span></p> - -<p><span class="muchlarger">T</span><span class="sc">his</span> article is not intended in any sense as a reply to the -<cite>Confessions of a Harvard Man</cite> published several months ago in <span class="sc">The -Forum</span> by Mr. Harold E. Stearns. The importance of those articles, as -Mr. Stearns had reason to point out, lay not so much in what they told -about Harvard as in what they told about him. Precisely. Analyses of -the temper of Young America have their place. The temper of Harvard -itself, however, is something quite apart, and it is to that alone -that this article is devoted. The importance of it lies only in the -number of significant and true things it tells about Harvard.</p> - -<p>And that, perhaps, is importance enough. I say this in none of that -college spirit which makes a man believe that his college, because it -is his, is singled out for the peculiar attentions of the high gods -who brood over academic welfare. A change, such as I am describing, if -it took place at any other college, would be quite as important. The -fact is that it could have taken place nowhere else.</p> - -<p>Which brings us to the old Harvard and the popular misconceptions of -its character. It was supposed to create a type of man, effeminate, -detached, affecting superiority, incapable, and snobbish. Certainly -men of this order did graduate from Harvard, but the great truth is -that there was no Harvard type; there were always Harvard men, but -there was never a “Harvard man.” The importance of this distinction is -inestimable, because it points to the fundamental thing in the older -Harvard life: its insistence upon individuality. In that the old -Harvard struck deep through superficial things and came at once upon -the fundamental thing identical in democracy and in aristocracy. It -bestowed each man in accordance with his deserts and, following -Hamlet’s dictum, according to its own nobility; and gave him according -to his needs and according to his powers. Like every truly democratic -institution, Harvard was aristocratic; like every truly aristocratic -institution, Harvard was democratic. At the very moment when it was -supposed to be breeding aristocratic -<!--050.png--> -snobs, Harvard was fulfilling the -great mission of <em>democratic</em> institutions in encouraging each man to -be himself as greatly and completely as he could. At the very moment -when it was supposed to exercise a mean and narrowing influence over -its students, it was fulfilling the great mission of <em>cultural</em> -institutions in helping each man to a ripening of his powers, to -enlargement of his interests, and to widening of his sympathies. Its -effeminates went to war against dirt and danger and disease; its snobs -devoted themselves to the advancement of social justice; its detached -men became bankers and mill-owners and journalists; one of its -weaklings conquered the world. The great thing was that in all of them -the old impulse to a deep and full life remained; the tradition of -culture was beginning to prosper. So that Harvard could send out a -statesman who was interested in the Celtic revival, a littérateur with -a fondness for baseball, a financier who appreciated art and a -philosopher who appreciated life. At the same time it graduated -thousands of men who took with them into professional life and into -business life a feeling, perhaps only a memory, of the variety and -excellence of human achievement—men who without pride or shame, which -are equally snobbish, tried to substitute discipline and cultivation -for disorder and barbarity. It is no petty accomplishment.</p> - -<p>To achieve it Harvard had to stand with bitter determination against -the current sweeping toward the practical, the immediate, the -successful. At the same time it bought its cherished democracy of -thought at the price of social anarchy. The college as a body made -very little effort to protect or to comfort its individuals. It was -assumed that he who came could make his own way; if the way were hard, -so much the better! The triumph would be sweeter. The great -fraternities grew in strength, possibly because there was no -countervailing force issuing from the college itself. But there was -never a determined organized attempt to make the individual life of -the undergraduate happy or comfortable. In its place there was a huge, -inchoate, and tremendously successful attempt to make the intellectual -life of the individual interesting and productive. Each man found his -own; fought to win his place, struggled against loneliness and -despair, and emerged sturdier in spirit, younger and braver and better. -<!--051.png--> -Some fell. They were the waste products of a civilization which was -harsh, selfish in its interests, generous in its appreciations, a -microcosm of life. A pity that some should have to fall! But it would -be a greater pity if for them the battle should cease. Because the -fighting was always fair. The strength which developed in many a man -in his efforts to make a paper, or a club, or even in qualifying to -join some little group of men, was often the basis of a successful -life. With it came an intensification of personality; the absence of a -set type made the suppression of the individual at Harvard almost -impossible. I am certain that no one with a personality worth -preserving ever lost it there.</p> - -<p>I wonder whether those who speak and write about democracy at our -colleges ever realize the importance of this intellectual freedom. Mr. -Owen Johnson is not unconscious of it, yet his whole attack upon the -colleges, practically unchallenged, was on account of their lack of -social democracy. It is considered a dreadful thing among us that rich -A should not want to talk to poor B; but it would never occur to us to -be shocked if they had nothing to say to each other except small talk -about baseball or shop talk about courses. And if the choice is -between social promiscuity and intellectual freedom, we must say, “Let -their ways be apart eternally, so long as they are free.”</p> - -<p>The terrible fact is that the undergraduate in his effort to attain -social unity has sacrificed the liberty of thought. It would be -indelicate for a Harvard man, however generous, to condemn other -colleges. Let Mr. Johnson speak for Yale: “It is ruled by the tyranny -of the average, the democracy of a bourgeois commonplaceness.” And an -undergraduate wrote in <cite>The Yale Literary Magazine</cite> that “we are -accounted for as one conglomeration of body first, head next, and last -and least, soul. As one we go to chapel, as one our parental -authorities would like to see us pastured at Commons, and as one we -are educated.” For Princeton <cite>The Nassau Lit</cite> writes this -significant editorial: “It is not long before the freshman learns that -a certain kind of thinking, too, is quite necessary here, and from -that time on, until graduation, the same strong influence is at work, -until the habit of <em>conforming</em> has become a strongly ingrained second -<!--052.png--> -nature…. Four years of this … results in a certain fixity of -ideas…. We are brought up under the sway of what seems to us a -rather bourgeois conventionality.”</p> - -<p>Apart from the fact that the term “bourgeois,” contradictory to the -aristo-democratic ideal in essence, occurs in two of these statements, -I do not think that they call for extended comment. These things, at -least, no man has been able to say of Harvard; even to this day there -remains a fierce, jealous, almost joyous tradition of intellectual -freedom—in spite of all!</p> - -<p>I say “in spite of all,” because I am now leaving the old Harvard and -am about to record the deep conversion of recent years which says a -prosperous and Philistine No to everything the old Harvard has said, -and which is surrendering its spirit to the very forces against which -the old Harvard made its arm strong and its heart of triple brass. I -do not mean that Harvard will cease to be great; I do mean that it may -cease to be Harvard. It is hard to deal with a phenomenon of this sort -solely by means of actualities. I am describing the disintegration of -a social background, the subsidence of one tone and the emergence, not -yet complete, of another. But, yielding to the present insistence upon -“facts,” I shall name a number of significant developments which -indicate the nature of what I have called the changing temper at -Harvard.</p> - -<p>They are of two orders, social and intellectual. In the first group we -have the senior and freshmen dormitories; a new insistence upon class -lines; a new emphasis upon college spirit and with it a disquieting -resurgence of that great abomination, “college life”; a change of -attitude toward our much maligned “Harvard indifference” and “Harvard -snobbery.” In the second class come the group system as opposed to the -free elective system, the failure of cultural activities, the contempt -for dilettantism, the emergence of the scholar. The last phenomenon is -mentioned out of no overbearing desire to be either thorough or fair; -it has a significance of its own.</p> - -<p>Superficially the most striking of these changes is the extraordinary -importance attached to class lines. It will be remembered that when -President Wilson tried to reform Princeton with the Oxford system as a -model, he was balked by precisely this feeling -<!--053.png--> -of class unity. At -Harvard the thing was not unknown; but it was not important. Princeton -men rejoice that their freshmen are compelled to wear caps, black -shirts and corduroy trousers for the first three months of the year, -so that no snobbery may develop! To the healthy Harvard man this seems -sheer insanity—democracy run to seed. Such solicitude for promiscuity -seems to intend a horrible mistrust of something, and certainly a -beautiful misapprehension of what democracy means. I am speaking not -from mere personal experience, but from that of generations of Harvard -men, when I say that it has been possible for a man to go through his -four years without knowing more than ten men in his own class -intimately, yet acquiring all that college could give by knowing the -finest spirits in a whole college cycle. The new order will change all -this. It will not forbid a man to seek his acquaintances outside his -class; but it will suggest and presently it may insist that his duty -to his class can only be fulfilled by cultivating the acquaintance of -all who entered college on the same day as he. We may live to see the -time when Harvard will emulate the Yale man’s boast that he knew all -his classmates (but one) by their first names!</p> - -<p>The outward forms of this change are the senior and freshmen -dormitories. The former resulted from the great schism of 1909 when -the Gold Coast was defeated in the vote for class officers by the -poorer men living in and about the Yard. It was considered intolerable -that a class should be so divided and a decided effort was made to get -the rich society men to live in the Yard, beside their poorer -fellow-students, during their senior year. This has been a great -success! A group of men, friends for three years, bound by steady -companionship and natural affinities, occupy one entry of Hollis. -Another group, equally bound by totally different sympathies and -activities, occupy another. They nod to each other as they come from -class. If a man in one group is taking the same course in Engineering -as a man in the other, they may discuss a problem or denounce a -“stiff” hour exam. in common. There their ways part. It seems -inconceivable that the heads of a great college should have been able -to believe that the mere accident of adjacent rooms could actually be -the basis, or even the beginnings, of a -<!--054.png--> -true democratic spirit of -fraternity. And—let me anticipate—<em>if the -college had not ignominiously failed in its effort to supply a true -basis of fraternity, it would not now be driven to a method so -childish and so artificial as that of class grouping</em>.</p> - -<p>But if the senior dormitories are merely silly, what can be said of -the plan to house all the freshmen together in a group of buildings -far removed from the centre of college activities? It is not here a -question of whether they “will work,” but of the spirit which prompted -their foundation. They will not be as bad as their opponents may -imagine, because nothing will break down the tradition of free -intercourse, and the man who writes or the man who jumps will -inevitably seek out his own. But it is certainly a weakening of -Harvard’s moral fibre that an effort should be made to “help along” -the freshmen, instead of compelling them to fight their own way. That -the change really drives into the spirit of Harvard can be judged by -these significant instances of the attitude taken toward the new -scheme by graduates, undergraduates, and by the college authorities. -First consider the testimony of an alumni organization secretary. In a -conversation he said, “We have found it the hardest thing in the world -to persuade graduates that Harvard needs freshmen dormitories. They -are perfectly willing to subscribe for dorms, but they balk at the -freshmen restriction.” Among the undergraduates there exists a -peculiar feeling of relief that they came to Harvard before the -buildings were up. Even those who defend them and say that they “will -be a good thing for the freshies,” do not regret that the “good thing” -was not for them. Articles have been written in undergraduate -publications defending them, but I do not know a single man in the -present (1914) senior class who passionately regrets that they were -not built four years ago. And finally from the college itself came -distinct and explicit denial that there is any intention of tucking -the freshmen into bed at nine o’clock each night. <em>Hein!</em></p> - -<p>And the result: a wonderful renaissance of the demand for “college -spirit.” College spirit is, of course, nothing in the world but -undergraduate jingoism. The desire to cheer his team is one which no -man can afford to miss, but it points to an undeniable falling off in -democracy when the “rah-rah” spirit can dominate -<!--055.png--> -a college and call -those who will not yield to it unfaithful and unworthy. Under that -tyranny Harvard is already beginning to suffer. Further, men are -beginning to be urged to do things not because they want to do them, -but for Harvard’s sake. They are urged to back their teams for the -sake of the college and its reputation. It will seem incredible, but -there actually appeared in the columns of an undergraduate publication -an ominous exhortation “not to be behind Yale” in showing our spirit.</p> - -<p>Disagreeable as these things are, they are inconsidered trifles beside -the change of attitude which has taken place in regard to the serious -work of the college. I cling, in spite of successive disillusions, to -the belief that <em>the function of the college is to create a tradition of -culture</em>: it is not to create gentlemen or scholars unless it can effect -the combination of both, and it is certainly not to prepare men for -success <em>in business</em>. Success in life is a different matter. College -should not spoil a man for life; it should enable him to appreciate -life, make him “able and active in distinguishing the great from the -petty.” That is what culture means; and that is precisely what Harvard -has decided not to do. Emphasis there has borrowed from emphasis -everywhere. The advantage of President Lowell’s system of course -grouping is that the undergraduate is no longer able to take 17 -uncorrelated courses and achieve a degree; he must know a good deal -about one thing at least. But aside from the obvious fact that a great -many freshmen are incapable of choosing their life work and choose -what is easiest for them, the group system has a terrible defect. It -has come about that men choose their group from worthy or unworthy -reasons and consider that they have acquired all the good of a college -career if they have done creditable work in that particular group. The -other courses are merely “fillers.” The majority of men are content to -concentrate, to narrow their interests, and the whole meaning of -college, which is to prepare the way for future enlargement of -sympathies, has been lost. Figures cannot be cited for or against this -assertion. But some tendencies now discernible at Harvard may be -illuminating.</p> - -<p>First, the scholar has emerged. He has become respectable; he has also -become a specialist, Economics, Government and the practical sciences -being the favored groups. Second, there has -<!--056.png--> -grown up a great and loud -contempt for the dilettante and æsthete. I hope these words will not -be misunderstood. The dilettante at Harvard is any man who writes, -thinks, talks well, is not particularly athletic and does not go to -the moving-picture shows which have become the chief attraction at the -Harvard Union. (This last, by the way, is not fantasy but fact; the -“movie” has proved the great agent for class solidarity at Harvard). -An æsthete at Harvard is one who has any diversity of interests and -activities. At Harvard it is almost a crime to be interested in art, -anarchism, literature, music, pageantry, dancing, acting; to write -poetry or fiction, to talk English, to read French (except de -Maupassant) for pleasure. Mr. Eric Dawson, whose article in <cite>The Yale -Lit</cite> I have already quoted, advises the Yale man to keep it darkly -secret “if he cares for etchings, prefers Beethoven to Alexander’s -Ragtime Band, and Meredith to Meredith Nicholson.” It is a terrible -commentary on Harvard’s intellectual life that the words should be -applicable now.</p> - -<p>They are. Within the past three years the degeneration of every -cultural activity has been persistently rapid. <cite>The Lampoon</cite> alone -resists, and it is marked by its satire on all the new movements. The -Socialist Club was founded in 1909. Its boast that it included the -active intelligence of the college was always a gross exaggeration, -but it was in itself active and intelligent. This year it is -practically dead; free, incisive thinking has gone out of fashion. The -Dramatic Club started at about the same time with high ideals and even -higher achievement. Its record for the past two years has been one of -protracted failure. (There is some excuse; other organizations have -taken some of its most talented actors.) The activity is too -“detached” for Harvard men of the brave new stripe. Even more -disastrous has been the career of <cite>The Harvard Monthly</cite>—<cite>The Atlantic -Monthly</cite> of the colleges—which was founded about thirty years ago and has had on its boards such men as George Santayana, Professor -George P. Baker, Robert Herrick, Norman Hapgood, and a host of other -distinguished men. It always lacked popular appeal, but there were -always enough men at Harvard to produce a superior magazine and almost -enough readers to make the production -<!--057.png--> -worth while. Within the last few -years it has been found almost impossible to keep the <cite>Monthly</cite> going, -and its dissolution is imminent. It may combine with <cite>The Advocate</cite>, -another paper of other ideals, once graced with infinite wit, now -failing because that too is out of fashion. It is possible that these -activities may revive, that succeeding generations will take up the -slack. That is the work of individuals. The creation of a receptive -body is the work of the college, and that has been forgotten.</p> - -<p>And if you ask what the Harvard man is doing, what he is talking -about, while these activities are being ruined before his eyes, the -answer is not merely as Mr. Stearns gave it, that the Harvard man -talks smut. So do most other men. The terrible thing is that the -Harvard man talks very little else that is worth listening to. -Lectures, cuts, assignments, exams, and shows; baseball, daily news (a -mere “Did you see that?” conversation), steam engines; girls, parties, -class elections, piffling nonsense—that is the roster of the college -man. I am terribly conscious of the intolerable stupidity of -“intellectual” conversation; I do not wish that conversation at -college should consist of nothing but considerations of the Fourfold -Root. But it does seem rather unfortunate that the men who are, -theoretically, to be the leaders of the next generation, should never -talk or think about art, should have <em>no</em> interest in ideas, should be -ignorant of philosophy and impatient of fine thinking, should use -their own tongue as a barbarous instrument, should be loud and vulgar -of speech, commonplace in manner, entirely lacking in distinction of -spirit and mind.</p> - -<p>The college has failed to make intelligent activity the basis of -democracy; there is no community of interest in things of the mind or -spirit and that is why artificial means, with the peril they bring to -the individual, are resorted to. How far President Lowell is -responsible for that which has happened in his administration is a -question I cannot answer. He has seen the signs of his time; he has -warned Harvard of the terrible danger which has come to it with the -decadence of individual study and independent reading. He is trying to -make intellectual activity the basis of Harvard’s democracy at the -very moment when he is -<!--058.png--> -the ablest of those who in reality help to -sustain all that I have here ventured to criticise.</p> - -<p>It has been in no reactionary spirit. I have not intended to say that -Harvard actually produces the type I have described. The truth is that -it does so little to refine what it gets. The care of the superior -individual, which always results in the greatest benefit to all, has -ceased to engross the college. The new order will not be of the same -heterogeneous excellence. That change all suffer, and all resent. -Granted that the new Harvard will be glorious and great, was there not -room, besides all the State colleges and the technical schools, for -its intransigeant detachment, its hopeless struggle for a “useless” -culture? It will be said that for such a training men should go to -smaller colleges, like Amherst, where they will receive the special -attention they may deserve. But I think of what William James said -once of Harvard, and I wonder what Harvard men, and what the country, -will do when they realize that it can never be said again:</p> - -<p>“The true Church was always the invisible Church. The true Harvard is -the invisible Harvard in the souls of her more truth-seeking and -independent and often very solitary sons…. As a nursery for -independent and lonely thinkers … Harvard still is in the van…. -Our undisciplinables are our proudest product!”</p> -</div><!--end Harvard section--> -<!--059.png--> -<div class="break"> -<h3 class="p4">THE NEW STEERAGE</h3> - -<p class="center"><span class="sc">Francis Byrne Hackett</span></p> - -<p><span class="muchlarger">E</span><span class="sc">leven</span> hundred of us, perhaps twelve hundred, were booked steerage -from Liverpool to New York. We had been brought to the dock at noon, -away from our friends, though we heard the vessel was not to leave -till five. On the other side of a stone pier rose the huge -<i class="name">Lusitania</i> with her four funnels. Everyone on our tender moved -expectantly forward. There was an official cry: “Britishers first!” -The chosen of the Lord! But the horde of ignorant foreigners came -surging ahead. Miscellaneously we crowded up the gangway. Another -gangway sloped for us on to the <i class="name">Lusitania</i>. Several British policemen -and stewards faced us to keep us in line. At so many guardian angels -we began to feel depressed.</p> - -<p>Medical inspection. The instant we put foot on the deck of the -<i class="name">Lusitania</i>, this was our first business.</p> - -<p>“Have your Inspection Tickets ready.” Before we could inquire what was -going to happen, it was happening. We were passed in a slow trickle -between two officials. “Take off your hat.” “Take off your glasses.” I -stood blinking while the doctor deftly plucked up my eyelids. He waved -me ahead, my ungranulated eyelids made harsh by the handling. Hundreds -were before us on the deck, and those from behind began to press on -our heels with the inevitable “myself first” impulse of human beings. -We were a medley of races, Swedes, Greek, English and Welsh, Irish, -Russian Jews, Poles, mute Lithuanian peasants, and men from a Northern -race who turned out to be Finns. It was almost as cosmopolitan as the -Third Avenue Elevated. We advanced with repeated hesitations and -conscious slowness. A woman turned white in the crush and had to be -helped to a seat near an open porthole. In front of me, a 12-year-old -boy, dead beat, leaned against his big brother—and under his arm, if -you please, wearily hugged a camp stool. “Why doesn’t he sit on the -stool?” The mother, a thin, strained, admirable creature, whose face -showed the fine wrinkles of a life too intent, allowed me to open the -stool for him. From his low seat he rewarded me more -<!--060.png--> -than once with a -look of confidence and smiling good-nature. They had travelled by rail -all night, the mother volunteered, from a town in Wales. They were on -their way at last to join the father in California. “I have two more -in California”—the mother pointed to her children, who cheerfully -smiled.</p> - -<p>Women and children. During that weary wait I observed them here and -there, standing submissively for three-quarters of an hour. At length, -after the long halt, the tension was relieved, and we moved again, -this time past another doctor. “Take off your hat.” The doctor had -apparently to inspect the unnaturalized polls on which that morning we -had paid a four dollar tax. He was a man of great perception, the -doctor, and the actual examination was an affair of split seconds. On -completing the circuit of the deck our yellow Inspection Tickets -(given to us at the office in the morning when we had paid our $37.50 -for the passage) received their first stamp. The Cunard Line accepted -us as healthy live stock.</p> - -<p>My Inspection Ticket said Room H 22, and a steward took me there. -There were seven other occupants. Most of them were taking their ease -in their berths and smoking. They were all English or American. I -responded to their cheery hello, but their carbonic gas was strong, -and the portholes proved to be immovable. I sat down on a lower berth, -bumped my head against the top one, and had hardly room for my knees -in the aisle. My carbonic gas did not improve the air. I felt -discouraged, and went out. Nearby I saw a most capacious 4-berth room, -and there was a vacancy in it. Henri Bergson says that “life proceeds -by insinuation.” I felt less gloomy. I found the bedroom steward and -asked him whether I could be changed. He was amicable but not quite -concrete, a bit of a Jesuit. About this time word flashed by that we -were back at the Landing Stage for the cabin passengers: deferring the -affairs of moment, I went on deck.</p> - -<p>We all pushed aft for a good view, only to find a rope stretched -across the deck, and a grim sailor guarding it. “That’s all the scope -you get.” We flattened back against one another. And they let down a -beautiful canopied gangway for the upper classes.</p> -<!--061.png--> - -<p>Braided officers stood in a row to receive, on a nice clear deck. All -the stewards were lined up in fresh white coats. Against the sky line -we studied the new angles of hat plumes. On they stepped with leisured -gait, with an air of distinguished fatigue. “The daughters of Zion are -haughty and walk with stretched forth necks, walking and mincing as -they go.” Indifferently they handed their light burdens to the now -demure stewards. I looked around at my comrades back of the rope. A -child in arms next to me chortled as he bandaged his mother’s eyes. -She gently removed the bandage, only to be blinded again. Behind me, a -buxom Swede looked open-eyed at her feathered sisters abaft. -Everywhere the interest was intense and simple. I turned again to -envisage the daughters of Zion. As in another world they moved—a -world where policemen are unnecessary, where stewards are -spring-heeled, where officers stand in line, where eyelids are not -officially scrutinized nor polls inspected, where the gangway has a -canopy and weariness is consoled. I admired “the bravery of their -anklets, and the cauls and the crescents; the pendants, and the -bracelets and the mufflers.” Must it not be delightful, said I to -myself, to merit so much attention from everyone, and to be so -prettily arrayed? Must it not be pleasant to have eyelids so immune, -and to have a quite uninspected poll?</p> - -<p>The last piece of first-class baggage rolled aboard. Giant hawsers -strained, and were released. It was departure. From my coign at a deck -porthole the Landing Stage came into focus. I confess I exclaimed. As -far as the eye could reach, on the water and street levels, the glance -of thousands on thousands was rivetted on the vessel as she cautiously -edged away. It was a beautiful afternoon, the sky innocently blue. All -indifferent to us in the background stood the massive city of -Liverpool, concentrated on affairs, but no less indifferent to the -city itself ranged this childlike, almost awestruck, army of -curiosity, silently intent on us as we receded into the river. From -our porthole (I was joined by a Syrian) we could not help a glow of -pride. My companion was not able to vent his feelings in English, but -he was quite moved. His was an Indian-like head—high cheekbones, thin -lips, hard, beady eyes. He dwelt on the vast crowd, ejaculating -“ah-ye-ye-ye,” and clucking his tongue. I smiled at his -<!--062.png--> -solid wonderment. -Then he craned out of the porthole to view the water far, far below. I -followed suit. He pointed down, and gave a significant, cheerfully -reckless laugh. I laughed, too. We were in for it, and no mistake.</p> - -<p>The steamer’s first evening was spent, doing nothing, out in the -Mersey. The tide was in some way blameworthy. It seemed inefficient of -nature, but as we lay opposite Liverpool the night-lights came out, -definite and serene and friendly, and I took out my mental clutch.</p> - -<p>Time came for supper. I reserved for the morning the mysteries of the -cuisine. I had earlier gone below to the pantry, after some talk with -a humane steward, and to my surprise I had been allowed to help myself -to a cup of tea.</p> - -<p>The first evening was one of extraordinary activity. Still in their -best clothes, around our half of the entire deck poured streams and -streams of passengers. It was almost impossible to tread one’s way. -And in several places these streams turned themselves into dancing -whorls, where volunteers with a concertina had appeared. I happen to -like the concertina, and I enjoyed it during five entire days, though -not so much the concertina as the movement of life which it promoted. -There were never any deck sports, nor games, nor organized -distraction. But, except for one awful seasick period, there was -endless dancing and singing. On this first evening I stood in the -rings that framed the waltzers, and my blood raced with their -pleasure. The Swedes in particular took part much and well. They -occasionally ventured on those new forms, but only for dancing -reasons. When Swedes really want to hug each other, they do it openly -and for its own sake.</p> - -<p>To increase the friendliness of the evening, everyone was willing to -talk a little. I chatted with a Russian, a Greek, an Englishwoman and -an Englishman. He was a young and unhappy Englishman, and in disgust -at the ignorant foreigner. I later learned that he made up the -difference and was allowed to go second class.</p> - -<p>At 9 p.m., tired of repeated searches for my bedroom steward (he was -dishing out in the pantry most of the time), I went to the assistant -chief steward of the third class to see if I could be -<!--063.png--> -transferred to -the 4-berth room. He’d see, he said in a serious bass voice, he’d let -me know. At 9.30 p.m. he again told me he’d see. Whether he has yet -seen or not I have no means of discovering. At 10 p.m. I took the -berth, with the consent of the other men in the cabin. I gave my tip -to the bedroom steward, as I guessed he was the less Tammanyized. The -assistant chief steward was a strong character, free from numerical -superstition. He asked 13 cents for five penny stamps.</p> - -<p>In my room the bedding proved simple—a coarse white bag of straw for -mattress, and one dark blue horse blanket for clothing. A small pouch -of straw served as pillow. No linen, of course, and no frills of any -kind. There was an iron spring frame. I found it ascetic but clean. -The single blanket was not enough. I used my rug, and my fellow -passengers used overcoats and rugs, too. The mattresses, I was told, -serve just one trip. They are dumped overboard as soon as the steamer -is out to sea on the return voyage. In my bed I was the only living -creature present.</p> - -<p>Those who rose early had advantages. They had first use of the tin -basin in their own room, or of the bowls in the general washing room. -They had a bid for the solitary bath tub in male steerage. They were -up in time to be allowed to walk all the way aft, and look down the -wide lane of jade and white in the wake of the <i class="name">Lusitania</i>. And they -were in time for the first sitting.</p> - -<p>Those who did not rise early had to listen to the tramplings that -began long before sunrise. Despite this, I got up late. Fifty of us -waited over half an hour outside an iron grill at the head of the -dining room stairs. The dining room is quite inadequate, so there had -to be four sittings—first come, first served. When we reached below -we took seats where we could. There was an understanding, however, by -which Britishers were grouped together. This was made effectual by -stewards who stood where the ways parted, and thrust Jews and Poles -and mid-Europeans to one side, and Britishers and Scandinavians to the -other.</p> - -<p>On the whole, the food during the trip was edible. I could not eat the -bacon or the beef. I did not try the eggs. The tea was vile and -usually not very hot. The coffee was vile. But the bread, served in -individual loaves, was most palatable. The -<!--064.png--> -Swedish bread was excellent. -The oatmeal was edible, even with the wretchedly thin condensed or -dried milk. We had herrings and at another time sausages, and both -were fair. The potatoes were always excellently boiled and good of -their kind, but the browned potatoes were invariably overcooked and -not fit to serve. The cold meats for supper could be eaten. The boiled -rice was insipid. The stewed prunes and stewed apricots were -palatable. I had very good baked beans and navy beans, good pea soup -and fair broth. I had no complaints to make of the food. I never -decided whether it was butter or margarine, but I ate it willingly. It -certainly had not that callously metallic taste that margarine used to -have.</p> - -<p>The service was on bold, wholesale lines. Twenty sat at each table, -and there were two equipments of bread and butter, sugar, salt, pepper -and vinegar. A disconsolate plant decorated each table. One steward -took charge of each ten people. I sat at a different table practically -every time, and most of my companions were delightfully obliging and -unaggressive. Only those who so wished had to stand up and harpoon -their bread roll. There were a few tiresome people who damned the food -and failed to pass the salt. The stewards were elusive, or rather that -one-tenth part of a steward who was your share. I regretted on one -occasion to discover egg shells in my dessert, and the next day I was -pained to find a knob of beef in my stewed apples. My sympathetic -steward remarked: “Puts you a bit off, don’t it?” It do.</p> - -<p>From about five in the morning till eleven at night these stewards are -working. Work is a good thing. It is strange that the stewards look -unhealthy and fatigued. It is due to the inherent inferiority of -stewards.</p> - -<p>Queenstown was the distraction for several hours on the first day out. -The Cunard and White Star Lines have just discerned that the harbor is -unsafe for big boats. At what point of profit, I wondered, would -Queenstown harbor suddenly and miraculously become safe again?</p> - -<p>As we left the coast of Ireland there came an unctuous swell upon the -sea. You would not think it could upset anyone, but when I ascended -after dinner I was horrified. Rows of passengers lay where they were -stricken, all too evidently ill, ghosts of -<!--065.png--> -their braver selves. The -stewards were in the dining room and could not come, and did not come, -for well over an hour. For well over an hour no effort at all was made -to clean the decks. I now understood this grave disadvantage of third -class, to which the company itself contributes. But there was much -kindness to the decimated, and much tolerance. Later I admired -immensely the work of the matrons. I seldom met three more splendid, -capable, sympathetic women. There were superior passengers who -despised the childishness with which simpler people gave in. I myself -laughed when I saw a girl lying with complete abandon plumb on top of -another girl. The grim sailor heard me and muttered: “Only an ignorant -person’d laugh at anyone was seasick.”</p> - -<p>During this distressing hour a Russian came flying to the master at -arms. “The doctor! the doctor!” “You can’t have the doctor,” said the -man in blue, not unkindly. “We can’t help seasickness. It’s got to be -expected.” “The doctor! Not seaseek! dead!” He made a ghastly face. -“Oh, all right,” said the master-at-arms, and we went straight below.</p> - -<p>Terrific pleading calls shook the cabin. “Sonya! Sonya!” The -master-at-arms walked right in, and emerged supporting a sack-like -girl, very white and inert. “You could cut the air with a knife,” -murmured the weary master-at-arms. He assisted her on deck, and she -was wooed to consciousness.</p> - -<p>At this time, on the enclosed deck, there was much commotion. A -striking red-haired Jewess, clad in green, had fainted and was put -sitting on a bench. A venerable Jew appealed to her excitedly while an -earnest young soul at the other side cried for water. It made me -furious to see the limp woman propped up, but they were evidently -playing according to the rules of a different league. The water at -last came and much to my surprise the earnest soul put it to her own -lips. But not to drink it. In her the Chinese laundryman had an -efficient rival. She was the most active geyser I ever saw. After a -time there was a feeble motion of protest, to the regret of the -delighted spectators.</p> - -<p>On the open deck during this weather the Jews monopolized one corner. -I counted thirty of them huddled inseparably together in their misery, -like snakes coiled in the cold. As they began -<!--066.png--> -to recover, a leg would -wiggle from under one blanket, and a head be thrust out from under -another. Later they sat up and drank their tea out of glasses, -nibbling the sugar. They soon littered the place with apple peels and -orange peels. After generations of inhibition they probably needed to -be told that they were permitted by a merciful dispensation to use the -sea as a waste basket.</p> - -<p>As the sea fell slumberously still, life recovered its audacity. Again -the decks became clamorous, multitudinous. People thronged the -promenade, or swarmed on the benches that do duty for deck chairs. -They began smoking everywhere again, and out came the stewards and the -Black Crowd to enjoy a sociable cigarette. There was little to do but -talk, until the dancing began. The grim sailor looked pityingly on -Babel, as he patrolled the Second Class partition. He was for smaller -ships. “On a smaller ship,” he deigned to remark, “you can come up and -throw your weight around.”</p> - -<p>Differences in manners obtruded. The third day out a youth emerged -whom I took to be a swineherd from the beech forests of Croatia. He -was not handsome. His fringe encroached upon his little eyes. His chin -was unformed. Up over his trousers, as if he had just waded through -the piggery, his socks were drawn. There he stood, plastic youth, a -hand in his pocket, pivotting a heel, surveying the world through his -own hirsute thatch. Suddenly, deliberately, he blew his nose -Adam-like. A Swedish woman next me turned livid. “De dirty pig.” I -felt myself the brother of a Swede. The Croatian saw us but beheld us -not. His mouth ajar, he ruminated afresh on the fleshpots of Croatia. -Raw material, simple even to the verge of our ancestral slime. I -prayed “God be with thee,” and looked elsewhere.</p> - -<p>That evening amid the throng which waited for admittance to the dining -room appeared a Greek. The glaring electric light concentrated on that -swart face, flung-out chest, and bared neck. He was incredibly -blasphemous and incredibly self-important. “Seventy-five dollars, see. -American money!” He showed his money to us, and gave a chuckle. His -lip curled. “They only Hunkies,” indicating his companions who -connected themselves with him by slavish eyes. “I in America before, -Christ, yes!” -<!--067.png--> -His eye roved boldly, and he showed his white teeth. -“I got more money still, you bet your life. When I get over I marry no -Hunkie. I marry Henglish girl. Yeh, Christ, you bet!” He antagonized -us, and yet we watched him eagerly. He lapped up our interest. -Overcome with the savor of attention, he incontinently spat. I drew -away. “It’s a’ right,” he said half-obsequiously, “I know what I do. I -no’ spit on American.” He felt too much kinship to spit on an -American.</p> - -<p>So things happen, but only in the steerage. At the door of the café -below, you will not find a Polish count informing the steward: “I -marry a Henglish girl. No penniless Hunkie for me.” Nor will the -first-class steward answer: “Who cares? Who’ll buy a beer?”</p> - -<p>In all these days, among all these peoples, there was no friction. -Some youths did start to make boisterous fun of two barefooted Italian -women, walking up and down in bright petticoat and kerchief. But the -Italians smiled and skipped back and sat down, and there was no more -“fun.” Between congruous people intercourse was easy and frank. The -fresh-hued Scandinavians were exceptionally lively. A little English -group revolved quietly together, with a private afternoon teapot for -central sun. Another little group, including two girls in service, a -cotton spinner and a grocery clerk, often sat in the prow and talked -amiably about anything from the food on board to their notion of a -God. They say that “sociability proceeds from weakness.” Steerage, at -any rate, is highly sociable. In some cases it was also frankly -amatory. The attractive girls, so soon well known, seemed to have no -fear of the predatory males. They took each other lightly. But at 9.30 -p.m., all the feminine kind, even the rebellious, had to leave their -conquests and go below. This rule was enforced to the letter.</p> - -<p>Two days before landing we had another medical experience. We learned -that American citizens in the third class were immune from smallpox -and need not be troubled on that score, but that aliens in the third -class must all be vaccinated. It was said there were ways of evading -this, but I found none. For several hours we were assembled while the -women filed in. After an hour in line, our turn came to enter the -surgery improvised in the companionway. -<!--068.png--> -On a table flamed a number of -small spirit lamps, over which the stewards sterilized the metal -scrapers. I bared my arm, as per orders from a pasty youth. The doctor -answered my queries by taking my arm, scraping it gently and applying -the lymph. “It is not our law,” he said politely. “Take this chap,” -motioned a bullet-headed assistant, and I was shoved to another group. -“Rub it off,” whispered a friendly scullion, but I let it stay, out of -curiosity. The new group crowded around another big table. An -additional hour’s standing brought up my turn to answer the clerk’s -questions. He recorded on the manifesto that I was destined for -Brooklyn and had friends. This was added to the facts I had provided -when I engaged passage. I was now catalogued for Ellis Island.</p> - -<p>The day before landing there was, I believe, another medical -inspection. We got in line for it, but the crowd simply disregarded -the stewards, and I never even saw the doctor. On that evening the -barriers were partly down, and the Goths and Huns invaded two decks.</p> - -<p>It was Friday morning before we came into the yellow waters of the -harbor, and passed under the cliffs of Manhattan. Already a fissure -had appeared in the steerage. On one side, separated from us more and -more, went the naturalized citizens, each armed with his papers. On -the other, we aliens congregated, to be shipped in due time to Ellis -Island.</p> - -<p>It was an inhuman morning, a morning of harrowing strain and -confusion. Though the inspection of baggage amounted to nothing in -itself, especially as there had been no preliminary declaration, there -was the uncertainty, and the three hours’ delay. Searching for -baggage, waiting for inspectors, hectored and shouted at, the poorer -immigrants reminded one of Laocoön. And then we had to wait for the -boat to Ellis Island, and we had to lug our hand baggage with us for -the hours that were to come. This fact alone made the day an ordeal -for all except the strongest, a brute ordeal to which wealthier folk -would not submit for two successive days.</p> - -<p>On the Ellis Island boat we were crammed like cattle. “Move up, I say, -move up. God! move UP, you damned kike!” So spoke our burly exemplar -of American citizenship. -<!--069.png--> -We “moved up” until the last square foot of -floor was shut off from sight by close-packed bodies. We coöperated -with the U. S. Government as well as we could to provide conditions -for another Slocum disaster. When such a disaster does occur on one of -these old boats, every editor in the country will demand with -magnificent emphasis: “Fix the responsibility!” Let us by all means -wait till the steed is stolen.</p> - -<p>Ellis Island basked in the sun. It was handsome and trim and restful, -after the swarming pier. We entered the fine examination building -single file, always lugging our suitcases and bundles and bags and -wraps and boxes and babies.</p> - -<p>Medical inspection, a real inspection this time. We passed through a -cleverly arranged aisle, and at each angle a new doctor in khaki -sought for blemishes. I finally impinged on a man who asked me if I -could see well without my glasses. I answered: “Not at all.” He leaned -over, and made two crosses in blue chalk on my raincoat. At the exit -from this trap an attendant wrote another little piece on my raincoat, -“Vis.,” short for vision. I was allowed to lay down my bags, and sit -and wait for half an hour.</p> - -<p>When the special examiners were ready, we were led up a corridor and -shown into a bright room. Around the walls were men and boys in all -stages of dress and undress, as at a bathing beach.</p> - -<p>“Ken you read English?” I said yes. “Read that over there.” A familiar -oculist test card hung on the wall. Being already so tired that I -would have welcomed deportation, I resentfully choked out: “B, T B R, -F E B D,” and so on. “All right, doc.,” said the attendant, and a -civil man at a high desk silently handed me an initialled slip. -Outside this was taken, and my dilapidated Inspection Ticket was -stamped “Specially Examined.” I had passed the test, and went back for -my baggage to the ante-room. A woman there, flushed and petulant, -commented on her being examined. The attendant turned away -contemptuously. “Aw, she’s ben hittin’ the pipe, or somethin’.”</p> - -<p>Up the steps into the great hall I proceeded. It resembled a big -waiting room, where to my delight benches ran the length of the room. -It was now nearly three, and I had neglected to eat -<!--070.png--> -anything all day. -In the particular bench decided by my Inspection Ticket, I -emphatically sat down.</p> - -<p>At the far end of these benches ran a long screen at right angles. In -that screen were a number of gates. Each gate was guarded by a seated -official with our manifestoes on the desk before him. Through those -gates we immigrants were being sieved into the United States.</p> - -<p>At last I was in the sieve. The guardian of the gate was kind of -voice. “You have a brother in Brooklyn, eh?” “How much money have you -got?” I was not asked to show it. “All right, pass on. No, there is -nothing further. You can go as far as you like now!” Two of us from -the <i class="name">Lusitania</i> whipped down the steps, bags and all, and delivered up -our Inspection Tickets at a last, final door. The sun shone outside. -The air was fresh. The light danced on the sea. There were no more -policemen, stewards, masters-at-arms, doctors, baggage examiners, -attendants, inspectors. I drew a deep breath, and tried to forget the -benefits of civilization.</p> - -<p>On the ferry to New York there mingled future Americans from the -Anchor Line and the Red Star Line, as well as from the Cunard. Already -I could find only a few of my former companions. Some had gone before. -Some were still on the Island. In the present crowd they were -absorbed, obliterated. The little world of the <i class="name">Lusitania</i> was already -annexed by America, as a little meteor is annexed by the burning star. -I regretted this absorption, this obliteration. For six days I had -belonged to them, and they had belonged to me. I thought of their -geniality, their simplicity, their naturalness, their long-suffering. -I was sorry to say good-bye.</p> -</div><!--end Steerage section--> -<!--071.png--> -<div class="break"> -<h3 class="p4">THE C. T. U.</h3> - -<p class="center"><span class="sc">George Cram Cook</span></p> - -<p><span class="muchlarger">T</span><span class="sc">he</span> battle began Monday morning when Assistant Professor Clark seated -himself facing the President in the President’s office.</p> - -<p>“I want permission,” said the lanky, trim-bearded young man, “for Vida -Martin, who is here raising money for the striking button-cutters of -Manistee, to speak in Assembly Hall.”</p> - -<p>The President’s grey eyes opened a little wider, then narrowed -shrewdly. He swung a little in his swivel chair, and pulled his -graceful iron-grey moustache. Then he said gently: “Would you regard -it as proper for the University to take sides to that extent in an -industrial dispute?”</p> - -<p>“We listened to Judge Graham’s Menace of Syndicalism.”</p> - -<p>“An address which was general. This is a specific conflict.”</p> - -<p>“Judge Graham talked about it.”</p> - -<p>“In illustration of his general point. Miss Martin, I understand, -talks of nothing else. She is an extreme radical—a professional -firebrand. I am surprised to find a man of your standing in sympathy -with her ideas.”</p> - -<p>“I’m not—altogether,” replied Clark. “That is scarcely a sufficient -reason for not listening to them. I want our students to hear her side -of the case—undistorted.”</p> - -<p>“We cannot lend unsound cases the weight of university authority,” -said the President.</p> - -<p>“Judge Graham’s case was thoroughly unsound,” said Clark. “Vida Martin -is, as you say, an extreme radical. But we have listened to an extreme -reactionary. If it is the policy of the University not to take sides, -it cannot invite him to speak and refuse to let her. Her subject, I -ought to say, is general—the Ideals of Syndicalism. As to her -soundness: she knows industrial unionism from the inside—her own -experience as organizer. She knows its leaders personally. All Judge -Graham knows is his own prejudice against labor and some newspaper -stories.”</p> -<!--072.png--> - -<p>The President swung back to his desk and arranged some papers.</p> - -<p>Clark sat there looking irritatingly thorough.</p> - -<p>“What made you take the responsibility of discussing this with Vida -Martin?” the President demanded.</p> - -<p>“I met her on the train from Manistee last night. I used to know her -at Hull House. She spoke of the dismissal of Brooks and Gleason here -last year for insisting on their right to express their real ideas, -and made the sweeping claim that there is no free speech in any -American university. I said I’d disprove that by getting Assembly Hall -for her. If she can’t have it, it seems to bear out her charge against -us.”</p> - -<p>“Haven’t you yourself enjoyed freedom of speech here?”</p> - -<p>“Yes, I have. But frankly, I’m afraid I’ve never had anything to say -that was dangerous.”</p> - -<p>“Afraid! Your talk with Miss Martin seems to have had a singular -effect on your point of view.”</p> - -<p>“It has,” admitted Clark. “I never put such new life into the thinking -of any student as she put into mine last night. Six years ago in -Chicago she was not unlike me. If the labor movement makes her what -she is and the University makes me what I am—there’s something wrong -with the University. I think we should try to understand her.”</p> - -<p>“By all means—those of us who have not already done so.”</p> - -<p>Clark smiled.</p> - -<p>“Understanding her is one thing,” said the President, nettled, “and -giving her violent doctrines such sanction by the University as you -propose is quite another. You’ve been carried off your feet. When you -regain your balance you’ll thank me for not granting this wild request -of yours. Is there anything further you wish to say?”</p> - -<p>Clark rose to go. “Only that I regret this failure—of the -University.”</p> - -<p>“It’s not the University that’s in danger of failing, Mr. Clark,” said -the President significantly.</p> - -<p>Having sufficiently endangered his career to no purpose, Mr. Clark -strode out of the Liberal Arts’ Building, past the black bulletin -boards on which the announcement of Vida Martin’s -<!--073.png--> -lecture would not -appear. He marched down the old flagstone walk beneath the oaks and -budding maples and across to the hotel—a three-story brick building -painted slate-grey.</p> - -<p>There, with a local labor leader and the editor of a Bohemian paper -who were helping her organize her meeting for the following night, he -found Vida Martin, a trim, strong woman of thirty, not yet at the -height of her vivid powers.</p> - -<p>She handed Clark the first draft of a handbill. To his dismay it -announced as the place of her meeting—Assembly Hall.</p> - -<p>“That’s gone to the printers,” she said casually.</p> - -<p>“I—I’m sorry,” said Clark. “I have misled you. My confidence in the -University’s impartiality was misplaced. You must let me stand the -difference in your printing bill. You have been refused the use of -Assembly Hall.”</p> - -<p>Vida Martin smiled at him the smile of a wicked minx. “You didn’t -mislead me a bit, dear Kenton Clark,” she said. “I have already -engaged the Opera House for to-morrow night.”</p> - -<p>Dear Kenton Clark stared at the handbill. “Engaged the Opera House and -printed Assembly Hall on your dodgers!”</p> - -<p>She nodded. “My æsthetic sense,” she explained. “I thought how nice it -would look to have a cunning red line through ‘Assembly Hall’ and -‘Opera House’ stamped on in red with a rubber stamp. Don’t you love to -use a rubber stamp?”</p> - -<p>As the guile of the agitator dawned on him he started to disapprove.</p> - -<p>“It’s just a shame,” she said, catching his expression, “for me to -come contaminating the innocent professorial mind with the spectacle -of fighting tactics.”</p> - -<p>He laughed. “The professorial mind isn’t wholly infantile. The -University deserves what you’re going to give it. I shall announce -your meeting in my classes.”</p> - -<p>“Have you something else to do when you lose your job? Do you know -that one of your Regents, H. P. Denton, owes his appointment to Steve -Treadley of the Manistee Button Factory?”</p> - -<p>“Rather than be controlled by considerations like that I <em>will</em> -lose my job!” Clark replied hotly.</p> -<!--074.png--> - -<p>That was the mood in which he marched to his eleven o’clock lecture.</p> - -<p>After it, at noon, he came down the central walk amid the sweaters and -corduroys and fresh-filled pipes of the gossiping throng which carries -books in straps, books in green bags, and books in spilly armfuls. His -friend Guthrie of the English Department overtook him.</p> - -<p>“What’s this about Vida Martin?” Guthrie inquired. “They say you’re -lambasting the University because it won’t let her set up her soap-box -in Assembly Hall.”</p> - -<p>“Subtract the cheap fling and you have the idea,” Clark answered.</p> - -<p>Guthrie shook his fine, big head. “Well,” he reflected, “you’re -unmarried. But it isn’t a chip you have on your shoulder. It’s a log.”</p> - -<p>“John,” said Clark, “your education is hideously defective. You’ve got -to meet Vida Martin and learn what a soapbox is. Come to lunch with -her now.”</p> - -<p>Guthrie said he couldn’t because his wife was expecting him.</p> - -<p>“Telephone her and come,” insisted Clark.</p> - -<p>With an adventurous sense of breaking with routine and doing something -interestingly dangerous, Guthrie telephoned, and came.</p> - -<p>Five minutes after he met her he was quarrelling like an old friend -with Vida Martin—over Thompson and Geddes’ “rustic reinterpretation” -of evolution. Vida would none of it, holding that Nature’s creative -centres are now great cities—where evolution is kept entirely too -busy making a new kind of soul in women to bother with bugs and -things.</p> - -<p>Of the woman’s revolution Guthrie had a literary knowledge, but in his -cooped life Vida was the first who embodied it—the first who viewed -life with the unshockable tolerance of science, the first whose mental -background was wholly non-theological, the first even who was wholly -conscious of her economic independence and its implications. The new -ideas and feelings alive in her made him see the paleness of what he -had got from those plays, novels, and sociology books. The quiet -fearlessness with which she gave him and Kenton Clark to understand -that she had -<!--075.png--> -laid aside ready made morality, “the parasite code of -woman subordinate,” took his scholarly breath. She had replaced it, he -gathered, not with another code, but with a habit of discrimination -“confronting apparent good and evil with armed light—the Ithuriel -spear of woman free.” So unprofessorily the professor phrased it when -the thoughts she stirred in him began to sing. He was not aware of it, -but they sang the sooner because her heavy black hair had copper -glints in it and the joy of thinking made her eyes such wells of -light.</p> - -<p>“I’ve been thirteen years here in my treadmill,” he said to her as he -was leaving. “You, from your wonderful cities, make me realize that I -have taught all the life out of my old knowledge. I need new contacts -with the life of to-day. I must have more significant things to teach. -I want to see all I can of you while you’re here, and then—it would -help to keep in touch with you and your world through letters.”</p> - -<p>He started to ask her and Clark to dinner, but reflected that he must -first go home and lead up to that.</p> - -<p>“There’s a living soul,” said Kenton Clark when Guthrie had gone.</p> - -<p>“And with a flickering creativeness,” Vida added. “I wonder if -anything could gather the flickers into a flame?”</p> - -<p>“A passion for a woman,” Clark surmised.</p> - -<p>“Or a cause.”</p> - -<p>Afterwards they remembered her saying that, and looking back it seemed -a premonition.</p> - -<p class="p2 center"><abbr title="Two">II</abbr></p> - -<p>When he reached home that afternoon, Guthrie expended half an hour’s -skilled energy in overcoming Mrs. Guthrie’s instinctive objections to -the unusual, and the dinner invitation went over the telephone to -Clark and Vida Martin.</p> - -<p>Guthrie’s mind was full of glow and movement. His impulse was to draw -in from Vida Martin as with a deep inhalation all the modernity he had -missed—not merely her thoughts but her way of thinking, her inner -feeling and her technique of conveying -<!--076.png--> -it. Her manner he felt to be -not her own unaided invention but a social growth—a collaboration of -many men and women moving in the same direction. He felt a need of -moving with them.</p> - -<p>The most tangible thing for him was an accent of sincerity in Vida -which compelled her listener into an answering sincerity. He coveted -the secret of that social power—the power of being and doing that. It -rested down on a greater democracy than he had known—upon her sense -of oneness with others, her feeling of non-superiority, her -assumption: “You and I are fundamentally alike.”</p> - -<p>He wanted to be with her long enough to catch that feeling, to have -and to use it, giving it forth in turn to others. What a power to fill -his students with! The teacher in him craved that secret of living. He -wanted it to transmit; he wanted it as seed to sow in a more human -seminar than he had yet conducted.</p> - -<p>It meant scrutinizing, accepting and conveying the actual human truth -about one’s own feelings and motives—without thought of whether they -were or were not admirable. It meant the acceptance of one’s self as -the most authentic human document—a desire and firm resolution not to -embellish or in any way falsify that text in the mind of another.</p> - -<p>One couldn’t do that and continue to set one’s self up professor-like -as an example to youth. The power could be exerted only by taking -youth completely into his confidence. Only one’s real, uncensored -thoughts and impulses as they sprang out of one’s own nature had that -quality he sought. He felt that he needed the help of Vida, with her -long habit of truthful self-revelation, in learning to read that -intricate, much disregarded text—himself.</p> - -<p>In his new spirit he spoke to Mrs. Guthrie about the secret he wanted -to acquire from Vida Martin, hoping to rouse in Anna a desire to -acquire it for herself.</p> - -<p>But Anna Guthrie was not prepared to take John’s grouping of himself -and her as two human beings who had something to learn from a third. -She was hurt that her husband should find in another woman something -valuable which she herself lacked, and she thought him perfectly -brutal in the bald way he -<!--077.png--> -came out with it. Things like that which -would hurt people ought to be concealed. She herself concealed such -things.</p> - -<p>“Practising sincerity is like making a bargain,” Guthrie reflected. -“It takes two. Not everyone is ready for it.”</p> - -<p>To Vida arriving with Clark for dinner, Mrs. Guthrie was -conventionally gracious—a manner she put on as she took off the -all-over apron which protected her next to best dress in the hot -kitchen. The green young Bohemian girl there was chiefly useful to -Mrs. Guthrie as a topic of heartfelt conversation.</p> - -<p>Vida avoided it by starting some talk with Lucy and Harold, aged ten -and eight, who sat at a little table behind her. By the time she had -them laughing Mrs. Guthrie’s prejudice began to thaw.</p> - -<p>Their father noted their expressiveness with Vida. “They get it too,” -he reflected. “They’re more human than I’ve realized. Anna and I have -had too much the ideal of a child as a little obeying machine.”</p> - -<p>When Mrs. Guthrie heard that the evening paper had a story about -Vida’s exclusion from the University and Clark’s insubordination, she -was perturbed by the question: “What will the President’s wife say of -my having such a woman to dinner?”</p> - -<p>The discussion which gave that dinner its importance sprang from -Guthrie’s deploring, <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">à propos</i> of the danger of Clark’s dismissal, -the fact that a professor could not act in accordance with his own -judgment in such a matter without endangering his position. He gave a -dozen instances of tyranny which seemed to have created in him only a -sort of reflected personal resentment against particular presidents -and regents.</p> - -<p>“Why do you scholars allow the power to remove you to be placed in the -hands of outsiders like the regents?” asked Vida, whose mind worked -promptly from individuals to the system they stood for.</p> - -<p>“Oh, that can’t be changed,” said Guthrie, off-hand.</p> - -<p>“Why not?” she challenged.</p> - -<p>“It’s as natural as sunrise,” he said. “We’re all controlled through -bread and butter channels.”</p> -<!--078.png--> - -<p>“Other classes of workers are testing out ways of controlling their -own bread and butter. Bread and butter freedom is precisely what the -world now needs and seeks. Are university professors less capable of -thought than button-cutters?”</p> - -<p>“No,” said Clark. “But less capable of concerted action. We’re too -confoundedly jealous and individualistic to work together.”</p> - -<p>“How do you know that?” Vida demanded. “Have you ever tried it? With -things as they are you certainly can’t fulfil your social function. -You’ll either have to get together and secure your freedom or remain -in a position where you cannot really influence your students.”</p> - -<p>“But they do influence them!” protested Mrs. Guthrie.</p> - -<p>“About all the students look to us for,” said Clark, “is credits. A -credit costs on the average so much time and attention. A little more -and they resent your overcharge, a little less and they gloat because -they’ve been able to underpay.”</p> - -<p>“Imagine their having such an attitude toward a live man dealing with -live ideas!” exclaimed Vida. “Toward Bernard Shaw, for instance, -lecturing on the necessity of extending to unmarried women the right -to have children!”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Guthrie looked apprehensively at Lucy and then at the young -Bohemian girl who was bringing in the dessert. “Fortunately,” she -said, “our professors do not care to deal with things like that.”</p> - -<p>“No,” said Vida, “they prefer to let society continue unwarned its -present insane treatment of illegitimacy.”</p> - -<p>“There’s no question about our lack of freedom,” said Guthrie hastily, -“nor about our need of it. But what means do you suggest to us, Miss -Martin, for gaining it?”</p> - -<p>“Well,” said Vida, “here’s Kenton Clark, one of the best economists in -the country, in danger of being kicked out for recommending my -lecture. Brooks and Gleason went the same way last year. Who kicks you -out?”</p> - -<p>“The President,” said Guthrie. “He holds his authority, however, from -omnipotent Regents who can kick <em>him</em> out—and frequently do.” -That idea seemed rather pleasant to Guthrie. He smiled at it.</p> -<!--079.png--> - -<p>“Why don’t you elect your own Regents and your own President—as -Americans should?” asked Vida. “Why not insist that you shall be -removable only by vote of your own colleagues? It’s absurd that a body -of men as highly trained as a university faculty should not be -self-governing.”</p> - -<p>“Yes, yes,” said Guthrie, “it is absurd. But here’s the existing -system. What force is capable of transforming it?”</p> - -<p>“Organization,” said Vida, fresh from her button-cutters. “How many -college teachers are there?”</p> - -<p>“Twenty-eight thousand,” said Guthrie. “Five thousand of ‘em women.”</p> - -<p>“But not five thousand of ’em men,” said Kenton Clark with a malicious -chuckle.</p> - -<p>“They would be—with power,” said Vida. “I’d like to see it. The -scholar would become a real force. It would be good to see thinking -married again to doing, after the long divorce that has made them both -sterile.”</p> - -<p>“There’s plenty of powder lying loose in discontented faculties,” -Clark mused. “If only it could be rammed together and—touched with -flame.”</p> - -<p>“Be the flame!” cried Vida. “A movement nation-wide may sweep out from -John Guthrie and Kenton Clark.”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Guthrie pushed back her chair energetically, indicating that -dinner was over. “Shall we go to the parlor?” she said. The three were -so absorbed they did not hear.</p> - -<p>“Could we get a dozen men who’d hold together, Guthrie?” said Clark.</p> - -<p>“There are more than a dozen—twice that many—radicals in the -faculty,” said Guthrie. “Whether they’d hold together——”</p> - -<p>“The Regents would have to think a bit before they fired a dozen men,” -said Clark.</p> - -<p>He and Guthrie tried to see how to get the substance of the labor -union idea without taking the name or the form. Vida told them the -name was immaterial, the form essential. “You can’t get the strength -of organization without organizing,” she said.</p> - -<p>Their instinct was against applying the working-class method -<!--080.png--> -to their -profession. They raised the difficulty of equal pay for unequal work -and mulled around over it till Vida gave them up. “You’ve been too -carefully selected,” she said. “It’s temperamental. No real -revolutionist becomes a college professor.”</p> - -<p>That set Clark and Guthrie persuading her of the advantages of the -union—which college teachers certainly had the brains to perceive.</p> - -<p>“Yes,” said Vida, “but the will to achieve them, the spirit to fight -for them, the power to make sacrifices for them?”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Guthrie sprang up. The movement, which drew all eyes to her, -placed her unintentionally near Vida. “I don’t want Harold and Lucy -sacrificed!” she cried.</p> - -<p>Her primeval cry made Vida’s hand leap out and press hers for an -instant. Mrs. Guthrie wavered between hostility to Vida’s doctrines -and the attraction of that wave of sympathy which swept her like a -physical force.</p> - -<p>“The wives of the button-cutters are facing that to-night,” said Vida, -her voice deepening. “Don’t you see why, Mrs. Guthrie? Through the -present danger they seek the children’s greater safety.”</p> - -<p>“Sit down, Anna,” said Guthrie. “This talk is going to lead to -something.”</p> - -<p>“It shouldn’t!” exclaimed Mrs. Guthrie. “It must not!” She turned to -Vida. “The men who take the first steps—they will lose their -positions. My husband’s salary is all we have. For a father of a -family—it would be criminal. We can live very well as we are, John, -as we always have. The Regents have even appointed a committee to see -about raising salaries.”</p> - -<p>“Our despotism is benevolent,” said Clark, “—if we’re submissive -enough.”</p> - -<p>“Our positions are insecure <em>now</em>,” said Guthrie. “To hold them -some of us have to sacrifice the best that’s in us.”</p> - -<p>“If it’s that or the children——” said Mrs. Guthrie.</p> - -<p>“Don’t worry, Anna,” said Guthrie. “If we go into this it will be -because we see it will make us more secure, not less.”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Guthrie went to the children’s table, leaned over Lucy’s chair, -and drew the girl’s head against her breast.</p> -<!--081.png--> - -<p>“What do you think, Lucy?” asked Vida.</p> - -<p>“Papa ought not to have to do his work wrong to get money for us to -live,” said Lucy. She rose and went to her father, who put his arm -around her and hugged her.</p> - -<p>Harold made a dive for the other arm. “I’ve got six dollars in my -bank, Papa,” he said. “I’ll get along without the Indian suit and only -buy the bow and arrow.”</p> - -<p class="p2 center"><abbr title="Three">III</abbr></p> - -<p>In one of his classes next day Professor Guthrie, <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">à propos</i> of a -literary-historical question of intellectual freedom, talked of the -survival in American university government of the heretic-expelling -machinery of the theocratic seventeenth century college. He said no -professor who had a mind and spoke it was safe, and recommended the -lecture of the syndicalist leader Vida Martin that night as promising -to develop some new ideas on academic freedom.</p> - -<p>It had never occurred to the students, accepting things as they found -them, that it did not exist.</p> - -<p>Vida’s handbills appeared with the cunning red line through “Assembly -Hall.” Groups of students on the steps talked of the button-cutters’ -strike, of syndicalism, of Judge Graham and Vida Martin. There was hot -denunciation and defence of Professor Guthrie’s daring new ideas. He -had stated the argument in the preface of Shaw’s <cite>Getting Married</cite>. -The insulation between the university and the thought of the living -world was broken.</p> - -<p>A newspaper clipping about Vida Martin’s activity in university -circles reached Regent H. P. Denton of Manistee, who caught a train -from there that afternoon and called upon the President.</p> - -<p>Some of the professors in the Opera House that night were furious at -Vida Martin’s attack—the contrast she drew between striking -button-cutters and submissive professors—her characterization of them -as thinkers who dare not think. It seemed unjust to them because their -submissiveness was a life-long habit and unconscious.</p> -<!--082.png--> - -<p>Some who realized this said it was stinging but salutary.</p> - -<p>Hostile or friendly they felt the speaker’s personal force—the -unfamiliar union in her mind of carefulness and fire.</p> - -<p>During the lecture one ambitious assistant professor left to inform -the President that he had been attacked in an alleged exposure of a -connection between factory owners of Manistee and the Board of -Regents.</p> - -<p>The student president of the Y. W. C. A. who had recently acquired a -taste for being shocked was disappointed because Vida advanced none of -the ideas she was supposed to entertain regarding free love.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Guthrie was in the dress circle with her husband and Clark. -Reporters were watching them as the probable centre of a new storm in -the faculty.</p> - -<p>When Vida came to that “militant union which can restore the scholar’s -dignity and through the fearlessness of freedom make the university -teacher a living force as in the days of Abelard,” she surprised Clark -and Guthrie by relating it closely to the syndicalist ideal. The -organized college teachers should ultimately form a section of that -part of the “one big union” which controlled education—a body of six -hundred thousand teachers. She looked ahead to a far, fine goal. -“Aside from its present, practical, fighting advantages,” she said, -“this organization is a necessity as germ of a social organ essential -to the future. It should be the crown of the crafts composing -industrial society, not aloof from the working-class in disdainful -superiority, but understanding its solidarity with all—free but -responsible, governed not from without as now by the economic control -of another class represented by Regents, but from within by the high -technical conscience of the guild.” There a bigger vision of it opened -to her unexpectedly. She spoke as awed by something mystic in her own -unforeseen words. “The Scholars’ Guild,” she repeated. “It might -become the central organ of the world’s new mind!”</p> - -<p>That closed her lecture religiously. While the bulk of the audience -was moving out—full of little explosions of argument—a number of -instructors and young professors gathered around the lecturer near the -stage door under the balcony. She found -<!--083.png--> -them surcharged with facts, -and feelings, about the way they were governed.</p> - -<p>When Mr. and Mrs. Guthrie reached the group, Sanders of the sociology -department was talking energetically about recent magazine criticism -of universities. “It’s unpenetrative,” he said. “They seem unable to -see anything but undemocratic student fraternities. They don’t get in -as far as the fundamental undemocracy of unelected governing -bodies—much less to the revolutionary idea of a craft organization of -teachers.”</p> - -<p>“The last is new,” said a statistics man. “The editor of -<cite>Science</cite> has been hammering for years on election of president by -faculty.”</p> - -<p>“The University of Washington has a big committee working on -undemocratic government,” said Hastings the mathematician.</p> - -<p>“So’s Illinois,” said some one.</p> - -<p>“Cornell’s talking of letting full professors vote for a third of its -board of trustees,” said a professor of engineering.</p> - -<p>“Wouldn’t it be better,” said Vida, “if you put yourselves in a -position to compel such an elementary right as self-government, -instead of waiting to have a third of it bestowed—perhaps?”</p> - -<p>“Certainly,” said the engineer. “The right is only secure if based on -our own power to get and hold it.”</p> - -<p>“We ought to have got together last year when Brooks and Gleason were -fired,” said Hastings.</p> - -<p>“Better late than never,” muttered Sanders. “We might save the next -man.”</p> - -<p>“Yes,” said Searles of the French section, “but what some of us want -to know is why we have not heard of this militant union. It’s all -right in the right hands. But who’s responsible for the idea? When and -where did it start? Whom can one write to about it? Why isn’t it -represented in our own faculty?”</p> - -<p>Vida set her lips and looked at Clark and Guthrie. The iron was hot.</p> - -<p>Clark struck. “It started in this faculty last night,” he said. -<!--084.png--> -The -attention of the group, which included two newspaper men, centred upon -him. “I was one of those present.”</p> - -<p>There was a little thrill at the courage of his declaration. Vida -loved him for it.</p> - -<p>“I was another,” said Professor Guthrie.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Guthrie caught his arm. “John!” she exclaimed beseechingly. The -word filled the group with a sense of drama and danger.</p> - -<p>“As senior in that discussion,” said Guthrie, unshaken, “I regard it -as my duty now to invite others who feel possibilities in a movement -for freer government to meet and consider plans.”</p> - -<p>“When?” asked Searles promptly.</p> - -<p>“And where?” Two or three spoke at once.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Guthrie turned away despairingly and sank down in a theatre seat. -The thing was going.</p> - -<p>“I suggest my rooms now,” said Clark.</p> - -<p>“I will join you there as soon as I have taken Mrs. Guthrie home,” -said Guthrie. The footsteps of the pair echoed in the emptied -auditorium as they went out.</p> - -<p>The college teachers asked Vida Martin to give them the benefit of her -organizing experience, and nine of them went to Clark’s rooms.</p> - -<p>There two of them, one a specialist on the American revolution, -cautiously declined to commit themselves to any action at that time, -but the revolutionists increased their number from two to seven.</p> - -<p>They threshed their way through a lot of instinctive, irrational -objections to formal organization, and planned to dragnet the faculty -for members. In a few days, as things were going, they could make -their position impregnable.</p> - -<p>That the organization they sought was essentially a union of their -craft became so clear that a scorn of disguising names like league, -association, and federation prevailed even against the statistician’s -sarcastic suggestion that they dub themselves “Brain Workers, No. 1.”</p> - -<p>“Professors’ Union” was rejected, not on account of its openness to -ridicule, but because it did not include instructors -<!--085.png--> -and assistants. -In order not to exclude small institutions “college” prevailed over -“university.”</p> - -<p>When they went home that night, glowing with their new communal hope, -Guthrie was chairman and Clark secretary of the first local of the C. -T. U.</p> - -<p class="p2 center"><abbr title="Four">IV</abbr></p> - -<p>The brunt of battle fell next day on Guthrie. His eleven o’clock -lecture was interrupted by a messenger with a note asking him to call -at the President’s office at noon.</p> - -<p>When he faced the Ruler in his swivel chair, that representative of -things as they are was friendly of manner but meant business.</p> - -<p>“I want to talk to you about you and Clark,” he said. “I have asked -for Clark’s resignation, and I am extremely anxious not to have to ask -for yours.”</p> - -<p>“Clark dismissed!” exclaimed Guthrie. He realized that the President -was striking too quickly for them, and groped for defence.</p> - -<p>“I warn you fairly that the Regents are behind me,” said the -President. “You have your choice of severing with that preposterous -organization formed in Clark’s rooms last night or with the -University.”</p> - -<p>“You may not find it so simple a matter to dismiss teachers merely -because they choose to form an organization,” said Guthrie, -stiffening. “It is an open acknowledgment that freedom of action does -not exist. Moreover, it is not two men you dismiss, if any, but—a -considerable number.”</p> - -<p>“I have reason to think not,” replied the President.</p> - -<p>Guthrie was weakened by his lack of information, and by the fear that -his colleagues had gone to pieces.</p> - -<p>“Make no mistake,” said the President. “I am prepared to dismiss -<em>seven</em>—if necessary. There are other reasons for your own dismissal. -You supported Clark in his insubordination with regard to Vida -Martin.”</p> - -<p>“Since you did refuse to let her speak in the University what was -there wrong in saying so?”</p> -<!--086.png--> - -<p>“Clark’s tone. And yesterday you came out astonishingly for -sex-radicalism. The student president of the Y. W. C. A. came to me -and protested, saying a professor in this institution had no right to -corrupt the youth of the State with any such doctrine as unmarried -motherhood.”</p> - -<p>“Because I presented Shaw’s argument!” exclaimed Guthrie indignantly. -“If you are going to adopt this girl’s point of view you will be -compelled to maintain the position that the ideas of the most -conspicuous living English writer shall not be mentioned to students -of English in this University!”</p> - -<p>“Well, Guthrie, you must know where the fathers and mothers of this -State would stand in a fight about that. You cannot expect the -University to rise higher than its source, and its source is the -community.”</p> - -<p>“The University has no reason for existence unless it rises higher -than the rest of the community,” said Guthrie. “It is nothing if it is -not able to lift itself out of the community’s inertia and maintain -itself against the community’s prejudice. If you had not condemned -without inquiry that organization formed last night, you might find -that it contains the possibility of raising the faculty into precisely -that commanding position.”</p> - -<p>“I know the purpose of your organization, Professor Guthrie. Its -success would mean the end of all directing authority. An executive -could not discipline men upon whose votes he was dependent for -continuance in his position.”</p> - -<p>“That is absurd,” said Guthrie scornfully. “An English premier, -dependent upon a parliamentary majority, possesses power enough to -govern the British Empire. He is not able to dismiss members of -Parliament. There’s no reason why the head of a university should have -any such power. There is altogether too much disciplining of teachers -for acting on their own honest convictions.”</p> - -<p>“I won’t argue that matter of opinion,” said the President. “The fact -is plain that you have placed yourself at the head of an organization -directed squarely against the legally constituted authority of this -University, and unless you drop it you go.”</p> - -<p>Guthrie sat silent, facing what he felt must be a vain sacrifice of -himself—and nothing gained for his cause. He heard -<!--087.png--> -the rushing click -of typewriters through the closed door of an adjoining office. Their -frequent tiny bells of warning gave him a sense of time moving too -fast, events crowding too close.</p> - -<p>The President rose and walked slowly up and down the room. “Can you -afford it, Guthrie?” he said kindly. “How about your life insurance? -Will it lapse if you stop payment? How about your house? Still paying -for it?”</p> - -<p>“You are remarkably well informed as to my private affairs,” said -Guthrie coldly.</p> - -<p>“You have given me reason to be. Your children are approaching their -most expensive years. How about their education? Do you want Harold -and Lucy Guthrie to sink back into the untrained, ignorant class?”</p> - -<p>“That’s the fiendish cruelty of this!” cried Guthrie. He saw the eager -face of Harold offering to sacrifice his little Indian suit. “That’s -where you’ve got me,” he said despondently. “No wonder one of the -Regents offered to double Clark’s salary if he would marry. There’s -something hellish in a system that makes a slave of a man through the -needs of his children!”</p> - -<p>“It is doubtful if any other university will want you when it becomes -known why you left here,” mused the President. “Don’t do it, Guthrie. -You’ve been a living influence with our students. Many an old grad. is -grateful to you for kindling in him here a life-long love of letters. -You ought to go on doing that for twenty years.”</p> - -<p>“It’s just because I do not want to stop being a living influence—— -A man must grow or ossify. Yesterday a new world of thought, a new -secret of living, a new sincerity, came to birth in my mind. You want -me to kill it. That is not being a living influence. That is spiritual -infanticide. It means my extinction as a free teacher. And deserting -that organization I helped to form last night—that means dishonor!”</p> - -<p>“No,” said the President emphatically. “You cannot be expected to -sacrifice your career and your family because you happened to be -carried away in a dramatic moment worked up by a professional -agitator. You’ll see that within a month. This means your salvation -from some wild ideas and wilder conduct.”</p> -<!--088.png--> - -<p>With an air of relaxing from strain the President dropped back easily -in his chair. “That woman must be clever, Guthrie. Isn’t she?”</p> - -<p>“She’s more than clever,” said Guthrie. “She’s a brave and skilful -fighter for a great cause—a thing I cannot be. I cannot even face -what every married button-cutter faces when he goes on strike!”</p> - -<p>Partially realizing how low Guthrie was sinking in his own estimation, -the President was not the man to let sympathy keep him from gaining -his end. “Well, Guthrie,” he said, “I take it that chiefly on account -of your children I may count on your withdrawing from the College -Teachers’ Union.” He smiled. “I say nothing more about the -sex-radicalism, for I feel sure you will yourself see the need of -soft-pedalling that in the classroom and in public. I am heartily glad -you are still going to be with us.”</p> - -<p>Guthrie went out of the President’s office like a man who has been -drugged. With an instinct to hide from every eye, he sought the -noonday solitude of his seminar room, let the door lock behind him, -and at the head of the long green table sank into that chair they -called the chair of English.</p> - -<p>There, in the hour of his degradation, he felt prophetically the ennui -of the next twenty years—the dead thoughts he would there utter and -reiterate—the bored young faces——</p> - -<p>What had become of the interestingness of ideas? Where was that -passion for the hard and glorious quest of the true truth within? Why -had he been so fiercely bent on shaping new channels for his energy? -He had no energy. His thwarted force flowed away from his will where -it meant health and conquest into a morbid intensity of emotion—the -road to melancholia.</p> - -<p>He stiffened up. There was one pain he must meet now. There was that -desire to hide to overcome—a self-revelation harder than any he had -ever thought to make. There was shame to endure. “I have to tell her,” -he said.</p> - -<p>He rose and left his solitude, went down the deserted central walk, -and over to the drab-colored hotel. He looked between the open double -doors into the dining room. There were -<!--089.png--> -a dozen people. At the table -by the window in the corner where he had sat with them two days before -were Kenton Clark and Vida. They beckoned eagerly to Guthrie.</p> - -<p>He found himself strangely unwilling to cross alone the moderately -large square room. Its floor of alternate light and dark wooden strips -seemed like a great open space in which something evil must happen. He -yielded to the irrational fear which impelled him to slip around close -to the wall.</p> - -<p>Without waiting for him to take off his overcoat or sit down, Clark -flashed news of his own dismissal—too much aglow with the war they -were going to wage to perceive anything wrong with Guthrie.</p> - -<p>“Searles wanted all six to resign!” said Clark in a low, eager voice. -“Corking spirit, but we decided not. Six is too few. With six more—! -If we’d only had a little more time! Never mind. The idea is sound. -We’ll put it through. We’re going to raise a fund. I’ll give my whole -time to it as organizer. Sit down, man, sit down!”</p> - -<p>Guthrie shook his head.</p> - -<p>Vida rose with sudden solicitude, came close and laid her hand on his -arm. “What has happened to you, Mr. Guthrie?” she asked, so low that -Clark barely heard.</p> - -<p>“You are happy people,” said Guthrie, for a moment permitting her -searching eyes to fathom his. “You will fight beautifully. I have -failed you. The children were too much for me. I have caved in. I keep -my job. I’m done for.”</p> - -<p>He turned away, unable to endure their eyes. “Good-bye,” he said, and -started back along the wall.</p> - -<p>Clark sprang up, napkin in hand, knocking a knife to the floor. “Oh, -here!” he protested.</p> - -<p>Vida, with compassionate eyes on the retreating figure of Guthrie, -stopped Clark with a gesture.</p> - -<p>“That’s final,” she said. “He’s crushed. There’s no use torturing him.”</p> -</div><!--end C T U section--> -<!--090.png--> -<div class="break"> -<h3 class="p4">THE CARDINAL’S GARDEN</h3> - -<p class="center"><i class="title">Villa Albani</i></p> - -<p class="center"><span class="sc">Witter Bynner</span></p> -<div class="poemcontainer"> -<div class="poem"> -<div class="i2"><span class="muchlarger">H</span><span class="sc">ere</span> in this place which I myself did plan,</div> -<div class="i0">With poplars, oaks and fountains,—and with sculpture,</div> -<div class="i0">The rounded body of the soul of beauty—</div> -<div class="i0">Here in this garden, by my own command</div> -<div class="i0">I sit alone under the freshening twilight.</div> -<div class="i2">Not to my eyes shall be made visible</div> -<div class="i0">Ever again morning or noon or twilight,—</div> -<div class="i0">Not to my eyes—which are my servants now</div> -<div class="i0">No longer, save as servants in the grave.</div> -<div class="i0">But to my forehead and my finger-tips</div> -<div class="i0">The days give touch of bud and opening</div> -<div class="i0">And of their bloom and of their hovering fall.</div> -<div class="i2">The morrow shall be born with sighs and rain,</div> -<div class="i0">But this is peace, this twilight, this is pause</div> -<div class="i0">Between the sunny and the rainy day,</div> -<div class="i0">Pause for the elements, and pause for me,</div> -<div class="i0">As though it were a silver brook that ran</div> -<div class="i0">Between a blinded day and blinded night,—</div> -<div class="i0">Between the dust of life and the dust of death.</div> -<div class="i2">Why shall I sit here? Why are colonnades</div> -<div class="i0">And paths and pagan statuaries more</div> -<div class="i0">Adroitly dear to my unseeing eyes</div> -<div class="i0">Than all the beaded letters of the Books</div> -<div class="i0">And colorings of all the bended Saints?</div> -<div class="i0">Because I hear the stealing feet of peace</div> -<div class="i0">Among these marbles more than anywhere,</div> -<div class="i0">Than in that cell itself where I have been</div> -<div class="i0">True Christian and exemplar of the Creed</div> -<div class="i0">To my own heart. There, not a Cardinal</div> -<div class="i0">In a red pageantry of holiness</div> -<div class="i0">Before all comers, but a penitent</div> -<!--091.png--> -<div class="i0">In humble nakedness before my God,</div> -<div class="i0">I found the potency of Jesus Christ….</div> -<div class="i2">And yet it is not there but here that I</div> -<div class="i0">Find peace. Sometimes I think that Hell hath set</div> -<div class="i0">An outer court for me within my garden,</div> -<div class="i0">That it may mock me better in its own!</div> -<div class="i0">But whether Hell or rank mortality,</div> -<div class="i0">This garden which I builded for my body</div> -<div class="i0">Is the one garden now wherein my soul</div> -<div class="i0">Finds comfort, benediction of the twilight.</div> -<div class="i0">There in my cell, drawn on the walls, arise</div> -<div class="i0">Old memories of craft and violence,</div> -<div class="i0">Of lust for carven images of beauty:</div> -<div class="i0">How in the night I sent my men to take</div> -<div class="i0">That obelisk which I had offered twice</div> -<div class="i0">Its value for and been refused,—to bring</div> -<div class="i0">That obelisk and set it in my garden.</div> -<div class="i0">The Prince of Palestrina never dared</div> -<div class="i0">(Such has my might been) to recover it!</div> -<div class="i0">Still I can see him gaping at the trick</div> -<div class="i0">And wishing he might strangle me, the trickster!</div> -<div class="i0">And though these eyes that cannot see would make</div> -<div class="i0">Me now no quick report if that same obelisk</div> -<div class="i0">Should be abstracted on a newer night,</div> -<div class="i0">Yet how these fingers and this heart would know!</div> -<div class="i2">Why shall my tears fall, as I sit among</div> -<div class="i0">My oaks and poplars, fountains and my sculptures,</div> -<div class="i0">Before my cypresses and Sabine hills?</div> -<div class="i0">Have I not seen them all a thousand times?</div> -<div class="i0">Are they not vanity? Would I behold</div> -<div class="i0">Them more? Life, to an aged Cardinal,</div> -<div class="i0">Blind and enfeebled, should but celebrate</div> -<div class="i0">The Sacrifice of Jesus Christ who died.</div> -<div class="i0">Time should grow short for prayer and preparation.</div> -<div class="i0">Why is it then that life has seemed to pace</div> -<div class="i0">More than enough its little path of vigil,</div> -<div class="i0">But not to know the endless path of beauty</div> -<div class="i0">Beyond the entrance and the mere beginning!</div> -<!--092.png--> -<div class="i0">Pray for us sinners now and at the hour</div> -<div class="i0">Of death!… And, even while thou prayest, I,</div> -<div class="i0">Who should incessantly be praying also,</div> -<div class="i0">I who am Cardinal and might be Pope,</div> -<div class="i0">Sit with my blind eyes full of Pagan glory!—</div> -<div class="i0">Sappho, Apollo and Antinous,</div> -<div class="i0">And Orpheus parting from Eurydice!</div> -<div class="i2">First falls the breath before the drop of rain.</div> -<div class="i0">Before the rain shall follow, I have strength,</div> -<div class="i0">Praise God, still to support myself among</div> -<div class="i0">These marble temples, columns and museums,</div> -<div class="i0">These deities of beauty and of time.</div> -<div class="i0">Hail, Mary full of grace, the Lord is with Thee!</div> -<div class="i0">The obelisk is here. It has not been</div> -<div class="i0">Retaken. Pray for us now and at the hour</div> -<div class="i0">Of death! And I shall enter at my door</div> -<div class="i0">And seek the chimney-piece and stand before</div> -<div class="i0">My young Antinous from Tivoli,</div> -<div class="i0">With lotos in his hair and hands, who once</div> -<div class="i0">Belonged to Hadrian. And I shall touch</div> -<div class="i0">Again the garment of Eurydice,—</div> -<div class="i0">And wonder—when that final mortal touch</div> -<div class="i0">Summons Eurydice, summons my soul,</div> -<div class="i0">And when she turns and enters and is dark—</div> -<div class="i0">If Christ shall follow her and sing to her.</div> -</div><!--end poem--> -</div><!--end poem container--> -</div><!--end Cardinals Garden section--> -<!--093.png--> -<div class="break"> -<h3 class="p4">LADY ANOPHELES</h3> - -<p class="center"><span class="sc">E. Douglas Hume</span></p> - -<p><span class="muchlarger">I</span> <span class="sc">hold</span> -no brief for the mosquito. She has always treated me as a mere -restaurant, and I have provided her with so many meals that I feel all -obligations to be already on her side. Also, her extreme talkativeness -is almost as objectionable as her voracious appetite. Any one who has -been kept awake by her buzz-z-z, buzz-z-z, buzz-z-z, on a tropical -night must have come to the conclusion that “good will to all men” can -never be strained to include good will to all insects. Moreover, the -fact that the lady of the species alone feasts upon blood seems a -reflection on the female sex. Yet, so it is: her husband is a harmless -vegetarian.</p> - -<p>All the same, when a sense of justice is strong, one does resent the -misdemeanors of man being laid at the door of even the most -exasperating insect. Certainly the sturdiest viewpoint of disease is -to regard it as the outcome of inattention, personal or general, to -one or other of nature’s observances. Instead, nowadays, parasitic -organisms are blamed for most of the aches and pains of humanity, -while their distributors are searched for in the realm of insects and -animals. The mosquito has, perhaps, fallen a prey to her own weakness. -Had she talked less, it is possible that she might have evaded her -doubtful celebrity. As it is, she stands accused of being concerned -with a no less formidable array of maladies than elephantiasis, yellow -fever, dengue, and malaria.</p> - -<p>Let us here concern ourselves with the last-mentioned, and the hungry -suspect, whose name has been coupled with the disease, her Ladyship -Anopheles.</p> - -<p>She may at once be singled out from her fellows by her habit of -discreet silence and her odd proclivity for standing on her head when -resting and feeding. Other mosquitoes remain on all fours, or rather, -all sixes, when dining. This acrobatic insect is, as everyone knows, -accused of inoculating her human prey with a protozoon, or microscopic -animal organism, which in its turn is held responsible for the heats -and chills, the aches, the pains, the languor, all the miseries of -malaria. The idea is a simple one, -<!--094.png--> -requiring little intelligence to -be understood. Is it rude to ask, what wonder that it has become -popular? Less marvel, too, when one reflects that the theory is -safeguarded by dividing Anophelines into a variety of groups, and -claiming that the guilty must be the right sort, and yet further, the -right sort duly infected.</p> - -<p>Now, the means of infection must come about through the insect having -feasted on a malarial subject. That its subsequent bite might poison -the healthy sounds a contingent by no means unlikely. The drawback to -this probability is that the mosquito possesses the feminine -characteristic of fastidiousness. Malarial subjects are the very ones -avoided by her hungry Ladyship. Here I may interject that I am not -writing of insects under control. What a famished mosquito may or may -not eat during the course of an experiment, I am not concerned with. I -refer to mosquitoes in a natural state, and personal experience has -made me observe that the one benefit of malaria consists in the -freedom it confers from mosquito bites. Though these insects are in -the habit of treating me as a very Ritz or a Carlton among -restaurants, periods of malaria always freed me from their ravages. -They like their food to be of the best, and the blood freest from -fever is the provender for their delectation. During nineteen years of -tropical life, my mother never experienced a single attack of malaria; -yet she was always the chief <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">pièce de résistance</i> for every mosquito -within her vicinity. It may be noticed that the individuals least -susceptible to malaria are those most feasted upon by mosquitoes, -including the suspects, though whether these be <i class="species">Anopheles Umbrosus</i>, -<i class="species">Anopheles Maculatus</i>, <i class="species">Anopheles Christophersi</i>, <i class="species">Anopheles -Albimanus</i>, <i class="species">Anopheles Argyritarsis</i>, or any others of high-sounding -title, I should certainly not presume to discriminate.</p> - -<p>Why should this general evidence count for less than the few -experimental cases upon which the mosquito theory is built up? These -latter are mostly conspicuous by their weakness. Take, for example, -the mosquito-proof hut placed at Ostia, and inhabited for three months -by Dr. Sambon, Dr. Low, Mr. Terzi, and their servants. What analogy -does this well-ventilated erection, raised above the soil, bear to -many of the insanitary homesteads -<!--095.png--> -of the Campagna? What analogy is -there between its healthy inhabitants, further fortified by zest for a -theory in dire need of proof, and the permanent dwellers in those -unpropitious surroundings? If we admit strength in the case of the -infected mosquitoes sent to the London Tropical School, whose stings -are said to have produced attacks of fever in the late Dr. Thurburn -Manson and Mr. George Warren, we must also remember that Abele Sola in -the Santo Spirito Hospital in Rome, according to the account quoted by -Herms in his <cite>Malaria: Cause and Control</cite>, is claimed to have fallen a -victim to this disease from the bites of mosquitoes that had developed -from larvæ in his own room, and therefore could not be reckoned as -infected. Moreover, they numbered hardly any Anophelines, and of the -very few present, it was not known whether any stung the patient. Yet, -according to the modern theory, Anophelines alone could have been -responsible for the mischief. The proverbial grain of salt seems a -necessary condiment for the cases of experimenters.</p> - -<p>In the short space at our disposal, we are not concerning ourselves -with the micro-organism, first discovered in Algiers by Dr. Laveran, -and considered to be the parasite of malaria. Without in the least -committing oneself to a general belief in the germ-theory of disease, -there may, here and there, be maladies produced by parasites. Yet, -apparently, fever, bearing all the clinical symptoms of malaria, may -occur without the presence in the blood of such organisms, no matter -whether parasitic or inbred. On page 8 of the Medical Report of the -Federated Malay States’ Government reference is made to an unusual -swarm of sandflies, and the following commentary is given. “Whether -sandfly fever exists we are not prepared to say, but many cases -<em>with all the clinical symptoms</em> were noted and <em>no malarial parasite -was detected</em> on blood examination.” Hence the sandflies come under -suspicion! Might not another moral be drawn, and that is that fever -may be due to causes less crude than the inoculation of parasites by -objectionable insects?</p> - -<p>The conditions that produce mosquitoes seem to be the same as the -conditions that produce malaria, and, in any case, it is these that -must be attacked, no matter whether Lady Anopheles be proved innocent -or in any measure guilty. The mysteries that -<!--096.png--> -surround the subject, the -occasional outbursts of disease when areas have been drained, the -usual method of improvement, the occasional betterment of health when -the reverse process of flooding has taken place, may possibly be -explained by the law of subsoil water. Dr. Charles Creighton writes in -his <cite>History of Epidemics in Britain</cite> (p. 278): “According to that -law, the dangerous products of fermentation arise from the soil when -the pores of the ground are either getting filled with water after -having been long filled with air, or are getting filled with air after -having been long filled with water. It is the range of the fluctuation -in the ground-water, either downwards or upwards, that determines the -risk to health.”</p> - -<p>However, far be it from me to descant upon the mysterious causes of -malaria. My object is only to try to prove the unwisdom of rivetting -attention upon the anopheline mosquito. Deductions as to her innocence -may be drawn from the accusations endeavoring to prove her guilty. We -are told how noticeable among troops the difference in fever rate has -been between those that slept on shore and those that remained on -board ship in malarious districts. But as the mosquito is free to come -aboard too, how does that statement tell against her? I remember a -host of such insect invaders on the <i class="name">Sydney</i>, the French mail boat, -when anchored at feverish Saigon. We carried a shipload away with us, -and when out at sea they feasted on me to such an extent that I -arrived at Singapore looking as though stricken with a rash, but -otherwise none the worse for their greediness.</p> - -<p>Again I was scarred for a long period after the venomous attacks of -mosquitoes and sandflies combined at Kuala Klang, on the Malay coast, -in its old days of fever, before it started a new sanitary career -under the name of Port Swettenham. Yet these myriad bites produced -fever of no sort, although I was at that time pronounced a malarial -subject. I did not remain in Kuala Klang long enough to be affected by -its unhealthiness; but, had Lady Anopheles been justly blamed, the -terrible biting I underwent should have taken effect, irrespective of -my removal. On the contrary, my own experience of fever was connected -entirely with locality and never with mosquitoes. Intermittent fever, -the genuine article, with its burnings, its icings, its whole programme -<!--097.png--> -of miseries, had me constantly in its grip during residence at a -particular house in Kuala Lumpur, the Capital of the Federated Malay -States. My one compensation was freedom from mosquito bites. When I -left that abode, fever left me, and soon after mosquitoes began to -feed on me again with infinite relish. What matter? It was a proof of -sound blood, freedom from that worse scourge, malaria!</p> - -<p>To turn from the personal to what is far more important, the general, -let us consider the Medical Reports from that haunt of malaria, the -Malay Peninsula.</p> - -<p>The year 1911 in the Federated Malay States held the unpleasant -distinction of being particularly malarious. The mosquito theorists -explained as cause a great influx of, often, unhealthy coolies from -India, and much clearing of land, which distributed the mosquitoes, -and drove them into the houses and among the inhabitants. But, if -mosquitoes be culpable, why should this same year have also been -particularly unhealthy in regard to most diseases, phthisis excepted? -Yet the Medical Report for 1912 shows that, concomitantly with a fall -in malaria, 1,010 fewer cases of dysentery were this year treated in -hospital. There were 77 notified cases of smallpox, as against 286 in -1911; 29 cases of cholera, as against 620; and 5,676 cases of -beri-beri, as against 6,402. The greater prevalence of disease in -general in 1911 surely shows that the causes for its specific forms -must be deeper seated than mere insect bites. Yet so dominating is the -fashion to rivet attention on such factors as these that fundamental -troubles, even when known, appear often to be unheeded.</p> - -<p>The F. M. S. Medical Report for 1912 provides a good instance, taken -from the portion dealing with the Institute for Medical Research, -Kuala Lumpur.</p> - -<p>On page 25 it states that the occurrence of several cases of bubonic -plague in and near Kuala Lumpur rendered it advisable to consider the -possibility of the disease appearing as an epidemic and measures to -avert such a calamity. A short paragraph refers to reported cases of -plague, and then follow nearly four pages devoted to rats. Toward the -bottom of the fourth page come the pregnant words: “Nearly 50 per -cent. of the plague-infected rats came from the small stretch of Ampang -<!--098.png--> -Street, about 150 yards long.” The short description of this small -area surely reveals a source of danger. “At the back of most of the -houses there is a kitchen or bathing-place from which an open brick -drain, covered with planks, runs through the house to the front of the -shop and under the pavement of the five-foot way into one open drain -at the side of the street. The plank covering of the house-drain is -usually buried beneath sacks of grain or other heavy articles, so that -the drain is not often cleaned. The open cement street-drain forms a -convenient highway for rats, which can readily gain access to the -house by the unprotected house-drains leading into it. Some eighty -yards away the main drain empties into the Klang River, here a shallow -and muddy stream with irregular, foul banks covered with reeds, rank -grass and collections of garbage.” Now, who could expect rats to keep -well in the vicinity of such a drain “not often cleaned,” and such a -river, “shallow and muddy,” with “foul banks covered with collections -of garbage”? Surely gratitude is due to the rodents, who, being nearer -the level of the bad conditions, get ill first, and thus give human -beings a fair warning of the sickness likely also to be their due, -unless surroundings are made healthy for all animals, four-legged and -two-legged. Yet, actually the Report has not a commentary upon these -palpable ills, and, though it has by no means exhausted itself on the -subject of rats, proceeds to vary the topic with fleas, the -meteorological conditions that affect these high-jumpers, and the uses -of guinea-pigs as flea-traps. The results of searching questions to -medical men on the subject of flea bites are even given. “Of eighteen -who replied one stated that he had never been bitten by a flea in his -life” (p. 31). Most people must wish they were equally lucky. But not -a single mention again of the uncleaned drains and the river choked -with garbage during the course of pages all the more diverting because -intended so seriously.</p> - -<p>When such open evils can be so ignored, what wonder that the more -occult sources of malaria should not be arrived at? And when will they -be understood while accusations against particular insects require to -be held in reverence as dogmas? In the F. M. S. Report for 1911 Dr. -Sansom allows (p. 3) “there exists in the minds of a great many people -a doubt whether the -<!--099.png--> -mosquito carries malaria or any other disease”; -and proceeds to add “until this heresy has been corrected.” Heresy -indeed! Is not free thought the first fundamental of science? Having -thus labelled disbelief in his theory, Dr. Sansom in his next Report -for 1912 has to admit (p. 5), “I have visited many (rubber) estates -where anti-malarial work has not been completed <em>or even begun</em>, -so that infection remains as bad or nearly as bad as ever, yet, from -the time the laborers have been fed, down has come the death-rate.” If -food has so much to do with the trouble, why lay all the blame on Lady -Anopheles?</p> - -<p>And just as too little food helped to make the coolies ill, is it not -likely, if it be not rude to ask, that too much food was part cause -for the malaria that troubled the prosperous members of the community -of Kuala Lumpur, the Federal Capital, so long as a need of drainage -left much to be desired in their surroundings? Who acquainted with the -Far East does not recall the many courses of the Chinese cook, and the -constant refilling of the champagne glass at dinner parties? There -seems small wonder that the carnivorous feeder and spirituous drinker -from a chilly latitude should fall a victim in the East to malarial -and other fevers: and this without any assistance from Lady Anopheles -or her sister mosquitoes. To her a meed of praise would seem due, for -where the mosquito exists there is proof of a need of drainage, -clearance, and general sanitary attention. But man, who has stoned the -prophets throughout the ages, equally execrates the insects that come -as warnings.</p> - -<p>That non-proven is the verdict upon Lady Anopheles’ guilt seems well -shown by Dr. Fraser’s Report, incorporated with the general Medical -Report for the Federated Malay States for the year 1911.</p> - -<p>After rather shakily chanting the orthodox creed of the mosquito -theory, Dr. Fraser negatives faith by fact in the most heretical -manner. “It appears to have been assumed on inadequate grounds,” he -writes, “that a small number of malaria-carrying species in an area is -necessarily associated with a low incidence of the disease. Certain -observations made in the course of the present inquiry would appear to -controvert this view. On some estates where the maximum spleen and -parasite rates prevailed -<!--100.png--> -few anophelines of any sort were to be found, -while in other areas, where malaria-carrying anophelines were -numerous, these rates were low. Also it was noted that where different -classes of laborers were under identical conditions so far as the -mosquito factor is concerned, such as free and indentured laborers on -the same estate, the parasite rates varied widely in the two groups. -It is clear that factors affecting the general well-being of laborers, -such as the quality of the food supply, housing, etc., are by no means -negligible in the prevention of malaria, as they are equally not -negligible in the prevention of other diseases. To these factors -attention must be directed as well as to measures which aim at the -reduction of mosquitoes, if the disease is to be combated successfully -in the conditions which obtain in this country.”</p> - -<p>Precisely! We must attend to general sanitation and personal hygiene, -and then, having removed the beam from our own eye, we may be able to -see clearly to cast out the mote in the eye of the Lady Anopheles.</p> -</div><!--end Anopheles--> -<!--101.png--> -<div class="break"> -<h3 class="p4">SUMMONS</h3> - -<p class="center"><span class="sc">Mary Lerner</span></p> - -<p><span class="muchlarger">W</span><span class="sc">ith</span> -the velvet springiness of turf under his feet, the sense of urge -and strain, as of something inexorably drawing him, relaxed at last; -the blind hurry slackened. Out of the whirl came quiet and ordered -perception, out of the breathless confusion, peace. And the years -which his journey seemed to have consumed ran together and were as a -single night. Between white cloud-fleets, the Irish sky began to show -blue as Mary’s cloak, and the soft May morning was sweet with dripping -green things,—thorn and gorse and heather. Christopher knew from the -well-remembered “feel” of the air that the west wind was due to resume -its hearty music. Almost out of sight above, a lark sang, and he could -see innumerable swallows diving and skimming. At once, the old rhyme -of <cite>The Seven Sleepers</cite>, forgotten these thirty years, rose to his -lips like a bubble to the surface of a stream;—</p> - -<div class="poemcontainer"> - <div class="poem"> - <div class="i0a">“The corncrake and the watersnake,</div> - <div class="i0">The cuckoo and the swallow,</div> - <div class="i0">The bee, the bat, the butterfly—”</div> - </div><!--end poem--> -</div><!--end poem container--> - -<p>All these tiny sleepers were awake to-day; himself awake, too, and -aware, with some super-awareness, of the last stages of his -oft-promised journey home, achieved at length after the long, -oppressive interval of weariness and restraint. This interval was fast -receding now, and he made no effort to recall it, for he was eager to -slough off all memory of that heavy weakness as well as all shackles -of solicitous and hampering devotion. He’d had his will at last, -however, though how he could not well imagine; and here he was, free -of them all,—comely, stylish wife; modern, masterful daughters. They -could spare themselves the pain of drawing long faces over him; he’d -no mind to give up with his visit home unpaid.</p> - -<p>A good, dutiful family, no doubt, God have them in his care; but this -was a time when a man must cut free of all bonds of maturer years and -turn to the land that gave him birth,—and to -<!--102.png--> -his mother, long -unvisited, but by no means forgotten. Many a money-order had crossed -the counter at the country post-office, and of late, many a cheque. -But the first years had been bitterly hard, and all the years -breathlessly busy. That land over-seas took you and drove you whether -or no; but its rewards were adequate.</p> - -<p>Foot-loose on the old sod now, no longer earthbound but light with a -marvellous buoyancy, the reek of peat in his nostrils, the corncrake’s -homely tune in his ears. His eyes strained forward for familiar -landmarks, carrying always before them the expectant image of a white -cot in a green hollow. Uplifted by an exhilaration that seemed -stranger to any possible fatigue, he pressed on again, this time with -a pleasant sense of anticipation in place of the former gnawing -avidity, keenly alive to the delights of this long-desired green -world, brilliant with sunshine yet fresh from frequent rains, and -rocked with the rising wind.</p> - -<p>At last the silver stretches of the Shannon appeared, and a certain -well-known white ribbon of road, winding among farms. As he went, the -trees began to take on the look of friendly faces;—tall beeches, -whispering limes, blackthorn bushes, white with blossom. A field of -gorse, ablaze with yellow spikes of bloom, sent out its heavy -bitter-sweet perfume. Grassy hills, lined with grey stone walls, -beckoned him, each with its happy memory.—The brook! where trout hung -under the bank and water-cress wove its green mazes. The sight of its -pebbly bed recalled the chilly prickle of gooseflesh on adventurous -legs. He leaned over the rude railing to watch its spring rush, giving -himself to its cool voice, its freshness on his face. He felt clean -now at last of the dusty breath of cities.—Here, too, were the elder -bushes, all abloom. To think of the “scouting guns” he’d hollowed out -of their pithy stalks, filling them with water by means of a -piston-like wadded stick to discharge on good-natured passersby!</p> - -<p>The happy sense of expectancy quickened. He topped a sudden rise, and -there, secure between two steep hillsides, drowsed the object of his -quest; a low, stone cot, whitewashed, with thatched roof and -overhanging eaves. What beds under that cosy roof!—of live-plucked -goose feathers (well he remembered grappling -<!--103.png--> -the kicking bird between -his knees!), mounted on heavily “platted” straw, and yielding such -sleep as no bed in the new world could afford. As he looked, the high -wind seemed suddenly stilled, and everything appeared to wait -breathlessly. From the chimney, a thread of smoke crept up, straight -as a string in the quiet air.</p> - -<p>Then, along the lane, he suddenly descried a group of children, whom -he knew at once for his youngest sister’s. Impatient of this reminder -of a new day and a new generation, he drew aside till they should have -passed, for he was passionately desirous that, for to-day at least, -everything should seem as it had been. The children charged past, -laughing and calling, fair heads and dark, apple cheeks and clear -eyes, as if there were no stranger within miles of them. And their -heedless youth and vivid life made him all at once an alien and unreal -creature.</p> - -<p>Thrusting aside this unwelcome impression, Christopher pressed on to -the house. A little old man with a black cutty between his lips was -taking the sun in the garden, his narrow shoulders humped under a -shiny coat. Christopher cast a careless glance at him; <em>his</em> father, -though not tall, was a personable man, a man of thews and solidity. -This old one would be some charity guest of his mother’s.—“Ye’ll have -us eaten out of house and home with your beggars,” his father used to -protest. “Every tramp between here and Gingleticooch has you covered -with blessings. I wonder we don’t be rolling in gold, the good wishes -we do be enj’ying.”</p> - -<p>At the gate, Christopher caught the scent of wild hedge-roses, of -sweet-briar and hawthorn, spilling a fragrance as of honeysuckle. At -once the years rolled back, the old boyish yearnings kindled. His -mother!—her arms would be open to him still, despite all delays and -neglect. She was never the one to “fault” him, whatever the blame. As -he neared the low doorway, he glimpsed the blue ware on the dark oak -dresser, the black, shining kettle on the hob, the long table spread -with homespun white linen. On the trimly swept hearth, turf glowed, -and beside it, his mother sat in her high-backed chair, bending over -her heavy prayer-book.</p> - -<p>Through all the years he had thought of her as a tall woman -<!--104.png--> -still in -the prime of her days, though he knew well she was long past seventy, -and though she had reported herself in laborious letters as “growing -down like a cow’s tail.” All images of her had flaunted a blue and -yellow print, French calico, which had delighted his childhood; blue -as cornflowers and hung with golden chains. To her years he had -conceded grey hair, softly waving under a lacy cap above a face still -fresh and pink.</p> - -<p>She wore to-day no chain-decked gown of cornflower blue, no roses in -her withered cheeks. A cap, indeed, did crown her, coarse, but -lily-white, and it shook ceaselessly with the trembling of her head. -Yet, though her face was seamed beyond recognition and her full grey -eyes sunken under lids plucked into innumerable tiny wrinkles, he knew -at once that it was she; and the sight of her shrivelled body caused a -contraction to close about his own frame. Her hands, twisted, spidery, -and corded with blue veins, clutched at his heart. Where were the -strong, firm hands that had so often lifted and soothed him,—dragged -him home howling, too, and soundly smacked him?—He found himself -longing for that heavy hand on his shoulder as for the kiss of his -beloved.</p> - -<p>He crossed the flags and spoke her name, holding out eager arms. Just -then, the house-door blew back with a clap and she turned her head and -looked past him unseeingly, shivering a little as at the sharp -mountain wind.</p> - -<p>“She does not know me,” he thought, conscience-stricken. “My -fault!—how could she? I’ll not be alarming her with a stranger’s -face.” Then, as she dropped her dim eyes to her book again: “She -cannot see far. ’Tis old and weak her eyes are—she thinks it’s -himself. I’ll go see can I find and prepare him; ’twill be best for -him to break the news.”</p> - -<p>So great was the comfort the place bestowed, however, that he must -watch her a few minutes, drawing near behind her chair. The years fell -away and he felt as if he had recovered the very heart of his lost -youth. A little four-legged stool stood close beside her skirts, and -he longed to sit at her knee as he used, leaning his head against her -and staring into the dull glow of the peat. The old ballads she used -to sing to him there!—fresh conned from sheets bought at the fair and -set to tunes of her -<!--105.png--> -own adaptation; the stories of “the people” who -steal and change children; the saucer of cream you must set out All -Hallows’ Eve for the fairies; the long Christmas candle of welcome, -which burned before the open door against the coming of the Infant -Saviour. What prayers grew on that hearth-stone!—rosaries for May -nights, litanies. The rigors of fasting and abstinence he had known; -black fasts, too, cheerfully kept. There had been then no timorous -seeking of dispensation.—A question of health? Nonsense; a question -of backsliders and turncoats! Men lived not by bread alone in those -days, but by “the faith,” valiantly.</p> - -<p>Drawn to her irresistibly, he looked over her shoulder at the swaying -book, eager to mark her special May devotion to Our Lady.—Would she -be saying, “Hail, holy Queen, Mother of Grace,” or reiterating, -“Morning Star, Pray for us; Health of the Weak, Pray for us; Comforter -of the Afflicted——”? He bent his head to the black-marged page. She -was tracing with tremulous finger, “Prayers for the Dead.”</p> - -<p>A chill breath touched him and he drew back a little. For whom did her -old eyes read the prayer? Eager to share her mourning, he gently laid -hand on her bony shoulder, but she did not turn at his touch; only -bent her head the lower over her book and let a little rising murmur -escape her moving lips.</p> - -<p>At her failure to respond, he shuddered with a sudden uncanny sense of -remoteness. Then a terrible desolation seized him. “She’s not herself -any more, that’s it; childish, and they never told me. I’m too late, -then. She’ll never see me more. And I meant to come, always; God -knows, I meant to come.”</p> - -<p>Fearing to alarm the quiet figure with an outburst of the grief that -choked him, he slipped out and sought the old bench under the hedge. -Here the tranquillity of the little farm laid a soothing hand on -him,—the sight of the speckledy hens pecking in the long grass; the -white goats tethered at a safe distance from sheltered heaps of -potatoes; a red cow, deep in the lush grass of the meadow, who swung -her head threateningly at a decrepit setter that limped across her -path. For a moment, looking at the old dog, he thought: “That’ll be -Sojer; he’ll know me.” But at once, with newly swelling heart, he -realized that many springs had -<!--106.png--> -drifted the white blossom of the thorn -across old Sojer’s grave. A friendly yearning made him rise and seek -this other dog, so like the companion of barefoot jaunts; a descendant -of the old fellow’s, no doubt,—a bond across the hostile years.</p> - -<p>At the touch of his hand, the setter cowered away, shivering in every -limb, his dark soft eyes full of anguished terror. When Christopher -tried to speak reassuringly, the dog set up a sobbing whine, and, -struggling to uncertain feet, hobbled for the house with his -red-feathered tail between his legs.</p> - -<p>On Christopher, as he stood there in the sunny morning, a chill dark -descended, and he felt isolated beyond the farthest star. Foreboding -shuddered through him, but he cried obstinately, “No, I’ll not accept -it! It can’t have come to me yet.” But, in spite of his gallant -refusal, he turned, like a child from the night, to his mother, as if -that little, age-worn woman could soothe his terror as of old.</p> - -<p>From the door, he saw her still seated on the hearth, which looked -ominously black now and desolate. Her bent finger held the dread place -in her book, and, with her right hand, she caressed the head of the -old setter, who was crowding to her knees and whining woefully. For -the first time, Christopher heard the broken quaver of her voice.</p> - -<p>“Eh, Princie, what ails you, doggie?—Are you feeling it, too? There’s -a power of terrible things about, the day. Waking up of me I -mistrusted it sore, and now I’m certain sure, for three times the -kettle’s after dancing on the hearth, and I’ve seen a tall shadow cast -in the full sun.—’Tis our boy, Christy, I’m thinking. He’s gone. A -young man yet, and I to be left sitting here alone. My grief! that -I’ll never see the lad more.—Christy, Christy, the best son!—but -there, every crow thinks her own bird the white one.—Whisht, Princie; -be quiet, let you. I must be reading the prayers for my son.”</p> - -<p>And standing there in the sunlit doorway, Christopher knew indeed -that, by this time, it was, as she said, too late. He would never see -her more, as men see one another. Yet no sudden terror, no dread of -things unknown could wholly rob him of the consolation of her -presence, and, even as he felt this dream-scene, too, relentlessly -slip from him, he was able to savor the exquisite -<!--107.png--> -satisfaction of -fulfilment, the transcendent solace of release. Rest! and he had been -so harried; completion, and life had been so long! Green hills to blot -out remembrance of dusty cities, fresh winds after the smother of -narrow streets. “I’ll come back one day, be sure of that,” he’d told -her, and through all warring circumstances, he had stood committed to -that promise. Now, freely, triumphantly, he had made good his word.</p> -</div><!--end Summons--> -<!--108.png--> -<div class="break"> -<h3 class="p4">FASHION AND FEMINISM</h3> - -<p class="center"><span class="sc">Nina Wilcox Putnam</span></p> - -<p><span class="muchlarger">H</span><span class="sc">itherto</span>, -dress reform has always proved a failure. And this is -because dress reform has usually been only the effort of a few -scattered individuals to force their personal taste upon the world. -And while social consciousness is often awakened by the daring -examples of such pioneers, all real social growth comes from a -collective consciousness, which is born in a body of people, by reason -of some economic or moral pressure which affects them all. When such a -body begins to murmur of a reform, that reform is almost certain of -accomplishment. And such a murmur, concerning dress, can be heard -to-day among those women who are banded together by the fight they are -making for freedom.</p> - -<p>Dress seems, at first glance, to be one of the least important of the -questions which modern women are taking up: but the smallest -examination into its practical aspects reveals the fact that it -affects all their other interests—not as a mere expression of vanity, -but as a serious economic factor.</p> - -<p>When we women first entered factories and workshops in numbers, we met -unfair conditions on every side. This was particularly true of the -garment trades, which were among the first to employ a great many -women. And when we met this unfair treatment, women dreamed of -legislating virtue into manufacturers. But it can’t be done! And now -it is dawning upon the consciousness of a number of women that the way -to reform clothing manufacturers, textile manufacturers, etc., the way -to cut down insane speeding, overwork, underpay, is to change our -insane conception of clothing—to strive to make it a normal, useful -thing, instead of a hampering, exotic, extravagant thing, which works -one group of women to death at a miserable wage, because a far smaller -group of parasitic women wish to be arrayed like peacocks! Knowing -this to be true, one naturally turns to the fundamental question, and -asks—what <em>is</em> dress—what is fashion? And what, indeed, is dress? Is -it simply a means of protection from cold? A concession to so-called -modesty, a -<!--109.png--> -means of displaying wealth, and advertising leisure? Of -attracting the opposite sex? It has been all of these in the past, and -many of the same factors are still apparent in our present-day use of -garments: but a new interpretation of the word has come in with our -new industrial conditions. Dress is an enormous economic factor the -world over, and nowhere more so than in America, where it is an -over-exploited industry, whose markets have been stretched abnormally, -not only by the increasing production of inferior articles, but by a -psychological factor, far more potent even than the law of normal -supply and demand; and that factor is Fashion: a purely hypothetical -need of change in order to meet a purely hypothetical standard, which -is entirely ephemeral and continually altered, artificially.</p> - -<p>Year after year, we are made to put the money we begrudge, that we can -ill afford, money we would honestly rather put into other things; -money, often, <em>that we have not got</em>, into that particular twist to -skirt or coat or hat which will keep us as ridiculous-looking as our -neighbor, while, at the same time, safe from his ridicule; in other -words, to save ourselves the discomforts of being out of style. And -yet, detesting fashion, as I think the majority of us do in our most -secret hearts, we are often hypnotized by it to such an extent that -free action is prevented.</p> - -<p>If the number and character could be estimated of those people who -have stayed away from entertainments for lack of a new gown, or dress -suit, or some accessory thereof, almost every human being who has ever -received an invitation would probably be included in the list. That -people stay away from church for the same reason is traditional, and a -favorite method of imprisonment has always been to take away formal -clothing, and substitute loose garments. This trick has been -successful in the instance of white slavery, for it is found that the -girls are unwilling to go out into the street in the brilliant “parlor -clothes” furnished to them.</p> - -<p>So deeply rooted is this fear of being wrongly dressed, and so serious -may its consequences become, that it is high time that an examination -into the forces behind the accepted forms of fashions be made, and our -slavish adherence, not only to fashion, but often to discomfort, be -shown for what it is, <em>a chimera which -<!--110.png--> -we ourselves protect</em>, and -which gives a lot of more or less unscrupulous business men their -opportunity.</p> - -<p>Most people believe that fashion is a matter of our own free choice -and approval; but this is not actually the case. For there is in -existence to-day such a thorough understanding between the big combine -of designers, department stores, wholesalers, manufacturers, -textile-mill owners, etc., that our pocket-books are drained by them -as systematically and coöperatively as though they belonged to a -single corporation: and their profits actually and directly depend -upon the extent to which they can play upon our hysterical fear of not -being dressed “correctly.” Of course, the first principle of playing -their game is to get control of fashion itself, to be able to swing -the public taste by forcing constantly changing styles upon it: in -other words, garments must <em>not be permitted to continue in use until -they wear out</em>. Before a garment has come to a state of disuse, a -radically new model must be presented which will make the old one look -ridiculous by comparison. In the cheapest grades of manufactured -garments, whose purchasers, it is safe to suppose, would keep a -garment until it was worn out, by reason of poverty, the desired -change is accomplished through the use of shoddy and inferior stuff.</p> - -<p>The dress of the rich woman will be discarded at the slightest hint of -a change in style, while its cheaper imitations, worn by the poor, -<em>are made of stuff deliberately calculated to last only for a season -of three months</em>! Needless to say, the fact is not advertised to the -working-woman who spends her savings on a suit at a price varying from -five to eighteen dollars!</p> - -<p>But, to a certain extent, this scheme of constant changing has reacted -against the manufacturers, especially those engaged in articles -pertaining to dress, rather than the garment makers. These former are -completely at the mercy of the most apparently insignificant change in -fashion. As a natural result, there is a tremendous lot of bribery -coming the way of the designer and the retailer. “Swing the fashion my -way!” is the constant cry of those who make trimmings, such as -buttons, braids, fringes, laces, etc., and it makes all the difference -between success, and, sometimes, bankruptcy, to the manufacturer, -whether or not -<!--111.png--> -dozens of little silk buttons are being used on women’s -tailored suits, or if there are two bone buttons less on men’s coat -sleeves. And the same thing is true of the fringe maker or lace -factory. For instance, since the introduction of the narrow skirts -which women have been wearing for the past three years, the lace -business has been nearly ruined. The close-fitting dress permits of no -lace-trimmed lingerie: the ruffled petticoat is a thing of the past, -and it was to the white goods manufacturers that the imitation lace -man sold his wares. On the other hand, the introduction of pleated -chiffon, as a substitute, has raised the occupation of side-pleating -from a scattered, ill-paid basis, comparable to that of a cobbler, to -the status of a real business.</p> - -<p>But while change of fashion leaves one or another trade high and dry -in turn, lack of change is still more deadly, especially to the -textile mills. For two years, 1911-12, women varied the making of -their garments only very slightly. The textile mills lost thousands of -dollars in consequence, and, at last, in the summer of 1912 began a -campaign to alter conditions. Their methods were so flagrant that they -would have been funny if they had not been so disgraceful. Everywhere -they offered bribes to designers. “Draw full skirts,” they said; “draw -pleated skirts, and draped gowns and draped waists; we want to sell -our overstock!” The current fashion was taking only six or eight yards -of material to a gown, and the obvious way of improving the matter was -to establish a demand for gowns which would require fourteen to -eighteen yards instead, or gowns which would require the more -profitable full-width materials; above all, gowns which the old, -straight styles <em>could not be remodelled to imitate</em>! The bribery was -as well handled as political “favors,” and as to the result, behold -the manner in which our women are swathed in mummy fashion to-day!</p> - -<p>That people should wear any clothing which is not exactly suited to -their need and honest desires seems too ridiculous to be true, and yet -that is exactly what most people do, usually without thinking of the -matter. How many men really like to wear a stiff collar, or a dress -suit? Or how many like to wear dark, thick suits in summer instead of -a kind of glorified pajama? And women! How long will they continue to -wear corsets? -<!--112.png--> -Not one really wants to. But it is not so much these -blatant ills of dress which harass one. It is the useless accessories, -the keeping up of irrelevant trimmings and embellishments, the -elaborate fastenings, which are the real annoyance.</p> - -<p>Not for an instant is it suggested that people should cease to make -themselves attractive in appearance, or that uniformity of dress ought -to be adopted. On the contrary, a greater individuality is to be -desired, but, above all, comfort and convenience. One should be able -to wear what one pleases without coercion of any kind or the -impertinence of criticism from some one whose tastes happen to differ. -To one man a collar may be a comfort; to another it is an abomination. -And there should be no rule, written or unwritten, which compels -either to sacrifice his comfort and tastes to the other.</p> - -<p>The true feminist recognizes that one woman may like to swathe herself -in draperies, and the next may prefer the plainest, freest form of -garment; and that one should be made to feel uncomfortable and -ill-at-ease because big financial interests have approved one rather -than the other, is an outrage upon the right to mental and physical -liberty!</p> -</div><!--end Fashion section--> -<!--113.png--> -<div class="break"> -<h3 class="p4">GERMOPHOBIA</h3> - -<p class="center"><span class="sc">Helen S. Gray</span></p> - -<p><span class="muchlarger">S</span><span class="sc">everal</span> -years ago Dr. Charles B. Reed of Chicago obtained considerable -notoriety by the invention of a cat-trap or gibbet to be baited with -catnip and operated in back yards. The accounts in the newspapers -related that he had found four dangerous kinds of germs on a cat’s -whiskers and was therefore urging the extermination of cats as a -menace to health; that Dr. William McClure, of Wesley Hospital, was -examining microscopically hairs from cats’ fur to ascertain how many -different kinds of germs there were on it; and that the secretary of -the Chicago Board of Health had issued a statement that cats are -“extremely dangerous to humanity.” From Topeka came the report that -six different kinds of deadly germs had been found on a cat’s fur and -that the Board of Health had in consequence issued a mandate that -Topeka cats must be sheared or killed! But why stop with shearing -them? There are germs on their skins. And now public penholders in -banks and post-offices are under suspicion; an investigation is being -made by the Kansas Board of Health, <cite>The St. Louis Republic</cite> states, -and individual penholders may have to be supplied. From time to time a -health board official or some other doctor gives out a statement for -publication condemning handshaking as a dangerous and reprehensible -practice.</p> - -<p>The hair of horses, cows, and dogs is full of germs, which they -disseminate. Germs are everywhere. Why should cats’ whiskers be an -exception to the rule? If Thomas and Tabby could retaliate and examine -doctors’ whiskers, doubtless numerous virulent varieties of germs -would be found there. Doctors are a menace to public health, for they -disseminate germs. Therefore, exterminate the doctors! But perhaps, -being doctors, they don’t carry germs. Their persons are sacred. Germs -are afraid of them and keep at a respectful distance.</p> - -<p>All the leading works on bacteriology admit that a person may have -germs of diphtheria, typhoid fever, tuberculosis, pneumonia, or any -other disease within his body without having any of -<!--114.png--> -those diseases. -Since that is the case, it is obvious that germs of themselves cannot -cause disease. They do no harm in a body that is in a healthy -condition. But so prejudiced is the medical profession on the subject -of germs that the true causes of disease are overlooked and -disregarded.</p> - -<p>Among the four kinds of germs found on a cat’s whiskers, Dr. Reed -mentions a germ “which causes a variety of infectious diseases, -including kidney disease.” As if any one ever got kidney disease -because he unwittingly swallowed some germs of the kind found in -diseased kidneys, if he had not abused those organs by gross eating or -gross drinking! But it relieves the individual of all responsibility -for his condition to put the blame on germs and the cat. There is no -personal stigma attached to such a cause; for it is commonly supposed -that anybody is liable to be attacked by germs, that, like rain that -falleth upon both the just and the unjust, germs attack both healthy -persons as well as those whose bodies are saturated with auto-toxemia.</p> - -<p>An inspection of the family dietary usually reveals the cause of a -man’s untimely demise. But his death is piously attributed to an -inscrutable visitation of Providence. His wife drapes herself in -crêpe, observes all the conventions of grief, and overworks her -lachrymose glands for a season. His friends pass resolutions of -condolence, lamenting that their dear brother has been “called to his -eternal rest,” a flattering implication that he had so overworked -himself during his brief span of life that he needed an eternity of -rest in which to recuperate, and was entitled to it as a reward. -Whereas the only thing overworked was his digestive organs in -disposing of his wife’s cooking.</p> - -<p>If deadly germs are found on cats’ whiskers, what of it? It is as -valuable a contribution to science to know how many and what kind of -germs are to be found on cats’ whiskers as to know how many devils can -be balanced on the point of a needle. Verily, a fool and his time are -soon parted.</p> - -<p>That a cat has germs on her fur and whiskers does not prove that she -is a menace to health; but doctors are often a menace to life and -health. Much of the surgery performed is unnecessary and frequently -results in death. Vaccination and the administering of serums and -antitoxins are frequently followed by -<!--115.png--> -death or impaired health. One of -the gravest charges against the prescribing of medicines is that they -suppress or mask the symptoms and do not remove the cause of the -disease, but leave the patient to continue in the error of his ways -until overtaken again by the same trouble or an equivalent that has -cropped out in some other place; and by that time the malady has -perhaps reached a fatal stage.</p> - -<p>In some respects doctors are like cats. They caterwaul, and -occasionally they purr. When a woman patient calls at a doctor’s -office and he does not know just what is the matter with her or what -to do to cure her, if he belongs to a certain type in the profession, -he holds her hand and purrs and is so sympathetic that she leaves his -office in a transport, walks on air, and goes home convinced that no -one understands her case as well as he does. Or else he tells her how -beautiful she looked on the operating table. After such a subtle -appeal to her vanity she pays without demur his bill of $300 or $400.</p> - -<p>He takes great care not to offend his patients by telling them -unpleasant truths, but instead resorts to delicate flattery. If a -woman comes to his office suffering from some ailment brought on -chiefly by eating devitalized foods, he purrs softly while he -determines the latitude and longitude of her pain and gently inquires -if she has had a shock recently. She thinks hard for a moment and -recalls that she has had, that the news of the death of a child of an -intimate friend was broken to her abruptly. Yes, that must have been -what caused her condition.</p> - -<p>Lacking the ability to direct patients headed for perdition by reason -of wrong living how to live so that they can regain their health while -continuing their work where they are, he sometimes recommends a change -of climate or that they take a rest. Change of scene or occupation -usually affords some slight temporary alleviation that the patients -regard as a cure.</p> - -<p>When patients have a cold or the grippe, instead of making plain to -them what laws of health they have violated and that their illness is -a direct result, the doctor, it not infrequently happens, tells them -that it is “going around.” Colds and grippe are consequently in the -popular mind of mysterious origin, and -<!--116.png--> -the victims complacently regard -themselves as blameless but unfortunate.</p> - -<p>It is because the medical profession teaches people to look outside of -themselves for the causes of their maladies that we see such -spectacles as Caruso, obliged to break professional engagements that -would have yielded him $100,000, ascribing his case of grippe to -external influences. “I like everything in New York except its colds -and grippe,” he is quoted as saying in an interview. “I think I can -boast that I have had the most expensive case of grippe on record. It -has cost me $100,000. The public says I am a great singer. I should be -a greater man if I were a scientist who could drive grippe out of the -country. See if you can’t drive it out of New York before I come -back.”</p> - -<p>Note the boast. As if ill-health and operations were something to be -proud of! Instead of telling our acquaintances of our ailments in the -expectation of getting their sympathy, we ought to be ashamed to be -sick. They may understand what internal conditions colds, grippe, and -other ailments presuppose, and have a feeling of repulsion toward us, -not of sympathy.</p> - -<p>The germ theory of disease is in great vogue at present with the -regular—or allopathic, as it is sometimes called—school of medicine. -Some of the leading physicians of other schools, however, predict that -the day is not far distant when the contagiousness and infectiousness -of disease through germs, vaccination, the injection of serums as -preventives or cures, and the resorting to the use of medicines by -deluded people as a substitute for correcting their habits of living, -will be generally regarded as superstitions. When that day comes, we -shall cease this Pharisaical self-righteous attitude, this dread and -suspicion of others as germ-laden, and face the truth that we build -our own diseases.</p> - -<p>Even some of the regulars do not hold orthodox views; for instance, -Dr. Charles Creighton, an eminent English physician. He has made a -special study of epidemics and was engaged to write an article for the -<cite>Encyclopædia Britannica</cite> on vaccination. At that time he was a -believer in it, but changed his views when he investigated the -subject. What he wrote was omitted from the American editions. “As a -medical man,” he once declared, “I assert that vaccination is an -insult to common sense; that -<!--117.png--> -it is superstitious in its origin, -unsatisfactory in theory and practice, and useless and dangerous in -its character.” He testified before the British Royal Commission on -Vaccination that in his opinion vaccination affords no protection -whatever. He has written several books on the subject.</p> - -<p>If germs are not the cause of disease, then what is? To this Dr. J. H. -Tilden, of Denver, one of the most distinguished of those who do not -accept the germ theory of disease as true, makes answer as follows. I -quote excerpts taken here and there from his writings in <cite>A Stuffed -Club Magazine</cite> on the subject of the causes and cure of disease, the -germ theory, contagion and infection, and immunity.</p> - -<p>“Disease is brought about by obstructions and inhibitions of vital -processes…. The basis is chronic auto-intoxication from food -poisoning. It is brought about by abusing the body in many ways … by -living wrongly in whatever way…. Bad habits of living -enervate—weaken—the body, and in consequence elimination is -impaired…. The inability of the organism to rid itself of waste -products brings on auto-toxemia. This systemic derangement is ready at -all times to join with exciting causes to create anything from a -pimple to a brain abscess and from a cold to consumption. Without this -derangement, injuries and such contingent influences as are named -exciting causes would fail to create disease. This is the -constitutional derangement that is necessary before we can have such -local manifestations as tonsillitis, pneumonia, and appendicitis…. -Every disease is looked upon as an individuality; which is no more the -truth than that words are made up of letters independent of the -alphabet. As truly as that every word must go back to the alphabet for -its letter elements, so must every disease go back to auto-toxemia for -its initial elements…. There can be no independent organic action in -health or disease.”</p> - -<p>If drugs, serums, etc., do not cure disease, what does? Correcting -whatever habits caused it; for instance, eating too much, bolting -food, neglect of bathing, ventilation, and exercise, harboring worry, -jealousy, or other destructive emotions, and living on a haphazard -dietary of carelessly and ignorantly cooked foods. “Nature cures when -there is any curing done, but nature -<!--118.png--> -must have help by way of removal -of obstructions to normal functioning.” There is nothing spectacular -about a real cure. It means self-discipline.</p> - -<p>“Germs are in all bodies in health and in disease…. I do not -recognize them as a primary or real cause of disease any more than -drafts or any such so-called causes; at most germs can be only -exciting causes…. They are innocent until made noxious by their -environment. They are victims and partakers of it. They act upon it -and are reacted upon by it. As they must be amenable to environmental -law, the same as everything else, they necessarily change when their -environment changes. Because of a change in their habitat, the germs -that are native change from a non-toxic state into one of toxicity…. -They are not something extraneous to the human organism, but are the -products of lowered vitality in the individual, of lost resistance…. -Microbes are toxic when the fluids of their habitat have become -toxic—when the resistance of the body has fallen below the point at -which the fluids maintain their chemico-physiological equilibrium and -decomposition sets in; it is at this stage that germs multiply -rapidly; they absorb the poison that is generating, and it is not -strange that their products are poisonous, for the changed bodily -fluids on which they feed are toxic…. My theory is that the toxicity -of germs is due to being saturated with poisonous gases. The germs of -typhoid fever, for example, are not poisonous until the patient is -sufficiently broken down to cause the generation of toxic gases, after -which all the fluids and solids of the body take on a septic state, -poisoned by the absorbed gas…. Bacteria are not the cause of -disease; wrong living, which puts the system into such a condition -that the bacteria can readily multiply, is the real cause; the -bacteria are simply necessary results…. Germs are scavengers. When -an environment becomes crowded with them, it means that there is a -great accumulation of waste in a state of decay…. They are normal to -a certain limit in our bodies. If they become more numerous, common -sense and reason would say that they must be a necessary factor in the -process of elimination, or, if not a necessary factor, lost resistance -has permitted them to multiply -<!--119.png--> -beyond the restrictions set to them by -an ideal physical condition or normal resistance.”</p> - -<p>To those who accept the germ theory, it seems that there must be -specific germs to account for the different types of disease. The -leaders among those who reject it are able to explain satisfactorily -without it why all sick people do not have the same disease. They give -as the reasons for variation geographical location, the domestic and -local environment, the season of the year, atmospheric conditions (e. -g., hot, humid weather favoring putrefaction both in the digestive -tract and in animal and vegetable matter outside it), defective -anatomism, congenital or acquired, injuries, age, occupation, -temperament, food, habits, and mode of living.</p> - -<p>“Immunization means that normal alkalinity of the fluids of the body -exists…. Health is the only immunity against disease. If there is -any state that man can be put into that will cause him to be less -liable to come under disease-producing influences than full health, -then law and order is not supreme and the world must be the victim of -caprice, haphazard, and chance.”</p> - -<p>“Epidemics and endemics feed upon the auto-toxemic and stop where -there are none…. The belief of the medical profession that contagion -and infection pass from one human being to another—from a sick man to -a healthy man—is an old superstition unworthy of this age. Disease -will not go from person to person, unless they are in a physical -condition that renders them susceptible and unless environmental -states favor decomposition—those of the household and the general -atmosphere where the proper amount of oxygen is deficient. So-called -contagious and infectious diseases are self-limited. If it were not -for this self-limitation, the world would be depopulated every time an -epidemic of a severe character succeeds in getting a start. But the -medical profession believes that vaccination and antitoxin do what -nature has been doing since the world began, namely, set a limit to -the spread of disease.”</p> - -<p>“Tuberculosis is a seed disease. The seed must come <cite>from a previous -case</cite>,” Dr. J. N. McCormack, official itinerant lecturer of the -American Medical Association and “mouthpiece of 80,000 -<!--120.png--> -doctors,” as he -terms himself, is wont to declare in the plea that he is sent out to -make all over the country for the establishment of a “national -department of health and education to bring the benefactions of modern -medical science to every household.” But if one contracts tuberculosis -from the germs of another case and he in turn from some one else, how -did the first case that ever happened originate? ask the leaders among -those who reject the germ theory. Did the causes that produced the -first case of tuberculosis, cholera, typhoid fever, measles, -diphtheria, or other diseases commonly regarded as contagious or -infectious, quit the business after producing one case, disappear, and -go out of existence, or do they still operate and cause all the cases -that occur? That troublesome first case is the missing link in the -chain of the theory; but it happened so long ago that it has been lost -sight of, and doctors are seldom embarrassed by being asked to account -for it.</p> - -<p>I know a druggist’s family in which all of the six children had -adenoids. Adenoids are not regarded as contagious, so far as I have -ever heard. So contagion cannot be made the scapegoat in this -instance. The children had adenoids because the mode of living was the -same for all. In like manner, when several members of a family -contract tuberculosis, diphtheria, or measles, do they not get the -disease because they all lived in the same manner and were exposed to -like influences, instead of through contagion or infection with germs? -Disease is sometimes spread, however, through the contagion of fear -and suggestion.</p> - -<p>The opponents of vaccination and serum therapy deny that the use of -vaccines and serums has served to check the spread of disease. They -hold that epidemics are less prevalent and less virulent now than -formerly because of improved sanitary conditions, such as drainage of -the soil, municipal disposal of garbage, street cleaning, water and -sewer systems, the consequent increased facilities for bathing and -household cleanliness, etc.</p> - -<p>A false theory of cause not only leads to a false theory of cure, but -diverts attention from the real issue. For example, in the Middle Ages -and later, in England people used to empty garbage and other refuse in -the yards and streets, and in consequence -<!--121.png--> -a plague broke out from time -to time. Instead of attributing it to the accumulated filth, they -accused the Jews of poisoning the wells. So, too, in the case of a -girl on whose neck a gland enlarged to the size of an egg; there was -at once talk as to whether it was tuberculous in nature. Her mother -wondered, if it was tuberculosis, if Minnie got it from the cat! She -had always played with the cat a great deal. In this she reflected -current medical talk in the papers. She could not understand how it -could happen. There was no tuberculosis on either side of the family, -and Minnie had always been so strong and healthy. Before she was -twenty-five there was nothing left of Minnie’s front teeth but a few -black snags—evidence of her having lived largely on sweets, starches, -and meat, and that she had not been healthy. But her mother never -thought of looking in that direction for the cause.</p> - -<p>So long as people are led to believe that vaccines and serums are a -safeguard, they do not seek others, but continue to live in filthy -surroundings and to have injurious habits of living. In the mad chase -after imaginary protection, real immunity is overlooked and lost sight -of.</p> -</div><!--end Germophobia--> -<!--122.png--> -<div class="break"> -<h3 class="p4">MEASURE FOR MEASURE</h3> - -<p class="center"><span class="sc">Richard Butler Glaenzer</span></p> - -<div class="poemcontainer"> - <div class="poem"> - <div class="stanza"> - <div class="i0"><span class="muchlarger">A</span><span class="sc">nd one answered</span>: Lord,</div> - <div class="i0">Of a truth, brave Lord,</div> - <div class="i0">I am all the follies and yet</div> - <div class="i0">I have sinned not blindly,</div> - <div class="i0">But bravely, as a man; so let</div> - <div class="i0">My punishment be brave,</div> - <div class="i0">Albeit courage win not Heaven.</div> - <div class="i0"><em>What hast thou done, brave man?</em></div> - <div class="i0">All things that man can do, brave Lord.</div> - <div class="i0"><em>Whatsoever Hell thou choose,</em></div> - <div class="i0"><em>That Hell is thine.</em></div> - </div><!--end stanza--> - <div class="stanza"> - <div class="i0"><span class="sc">And one answered</span>: Lord,</div> - <div class="i0">Of a truth, kind Lord,</div> - <div class="i0">I am weak but humble, and yet</div> - <div class="i0">I have erred not often,</div> - <div class="i0">And kindly have I been; so let</div> - <div class="i0">Thy judgment be as kind,</div> - <div class="i0">Howbeit meekness gain not Heaven.</div> - <div class="i0"><em>What hast thou done, kind man?</em></div> - <div class="i0">All things that man would do, kind Lord.</div> - <div class="i0"><em>Whatsoever Heaven thou choose,</em></div> - <div class="i0"><em>That Heaven is thine.</em></div> - </div><!--end stanza--> - <div class="stanza"> - <div class="i0"><span class="sc">And one answered</span>: Lord,</div> - <div class="i0">Of a truth, O Lord,</div> - <div class="i0">Who am I to answer?… And yet …</div> - <div class="i0">I have lived, Life-Giver,</div> - <div class="i0">And O, how sweet was life! so let</div> - <div class="i0">Its sweetness cling and lo,</div> - <div class="i0">I shall but live again … in Heaven.</div> - <div class="i0"><em>What hast thou done, O man?</em></div> - <div class="i0">Thou only knowest true, O Lord.</div> - <div class="i0"><em>Whatsoever Heaven thou choose,</em></div> - <div class="i0"><em>That Heaven is Mine.</em></div> - </div><!--end stanza--> - </div><!--end poem--> -</div><!--end poem container--> -</div><!--end Measure for Measure--> -<!--123.png--> -<div class="break"> -<h3 class="p4">THE AMERICAN FARMER AS A COÖPERATOR</h3> - -<p class="center"><span class="sc">E. E. Miller</span></p> - -<p><span class="muchlarger">W</span><span class="sc">hen</span> -one speaks or hears of coöperation among farmers, it seems the -natural thing to think first of Denmark or Ireland. These and other -European countries have made so much greater progress in the business -organization of farmers and farm life than America has, that it is -almost inevitable that they should be held up to us as examples of -what we might but do not accomplish. Various reasons are advanced for -this American backwardness in what is unquestionably one of the great -economic movements of our time. The American farmer’s individualism -and dislike of restraint is often given as the reason. Professor G. -Harold Powell goes so far as to say that “the investment of the farmer -must be threatened by existing social and economic conditions before -he can overcome his individualism sufficiently and can develop a -fraternal spirit strong enough to pull with his neighbors in -coöperative team work.” There is no doubt much truth in this, but I am -inclined to think that lack of knowledge as to how to coöperate has -been almost as much a hindering factor as has lack of desire to -coöperate. The attempts at coöperation among farmers have been -sufficiently numerous, if they had been successful, to have made -coöperative effort in rural communities a familiar form of activity to -us all. As it is, instances of really successful coöperative ventures -among farmers, while rather impressive as an aggregate, amount to very -little indeed compared with the vast volume of yet unorganized -business carried on by them.</p> - -<p>Europe seems to have had wiser leaders in the coöperative work, as -well as more docile followers. The American passion for bigness has -largely ruled both leaders and followers. Where the Old World peoples -were content to begin with small organizations for a definite purpose -and let these organizations grow and develop into powerful -institutions, the farmers of America have thought in terms of a -continent, tried to organize nationwide societies to transact every -kind of business—and failed -<!--124.png--> -lamentably. It has been only a few years -since a great noise was made by a society which proposed to unite all -farmers in one great society which should fix a minimum price on all -farm products and so settle matters out of hand. Just a year or two -ago Farmers’ Union leaders in the South were telling the cotton -farmers that only a great national organization could be of any real -help in the marketing of their crop. The disastrous failures of the -big organizations which were going to “finance the cotton crop” and -the successes along various lines attained by some local and county -organizations have discredited these leaders who mistook rhetoric for -business sense and possibly also taught them a few things they needed -to know.</p> - -<p>The great trouble with farmers’ coöperative organizations in this -country has been that they were too loosely organized and attempted to -do too much. It is just beginning to dawn on the mind of the average -farmer that a coöperative business must be conducted on the same -general lines as an individual business and that he cannot secure the -benefits of coöperation without giving up some of the privileges of -individual action. He is learning, too, not to despise the day of -small things.</p> - -<p>The lesson has been learned by some, however, in the long years of -struggle for fair prices and fair treatment by the commercial world, -and here and there all over the country are to be found groups of -farmers who have found out the principles of business coöperation and -put them into action to their own decided profit. These organizations -are interesting not only for what they have done, but also for what -they teach.</p> - -<p>Take the Southern Produce Company, of Norfolk, Virginia, for example. -This association was organized in 1870 and now has 400 members. It -handles most of the truck grown in the vicinity of Norfolk, handling -for outsiders—at a fixed percentage—as well as for its own members. -It not only sells the truck the members grow, but buys their seeds, -fertilizers and other supplies. It has bought and equipped an -experimental farm near Norfolk, turning it over to the State to run, -and lately has erected a six-story office building in the city, -building and lot costing $135,000. All this has been done without -putting -<!--125.png--> -in a dollar except for the capital stock which is limited to -$15,000.</p> - -<p>Equally notable successes have been attained by the Hood River apple -growers and the citrus fruit growers of California. The organization -of these growers has not only resulted in better prices to the -growers, but in a standard quality of goods and less fluctuation of -prices in the retail markets. Since California growers learned to -market their oranges and lemons through organization, there has been -brought about a uniformity of distribution which “has resulted in a -lower retail price to the consumer and gives a larger proportion of -the retail price to the producer.” These very successful organizations -have one definite purpose—to sell the fruit their members grow. They -are organized on strictly business principles. Each member’s crop -virtually belongs to the association, and is picked, graded, packed, -and sold as the association directs. Details of cultivation and -spraying which may affect the quality of the fruit are also looked -after by the association, and the grower has no right to sell his -fruit except through the association. In the case of the California -Fruit Growers’ Exchange this right to the privilege of handling the -crop is claimed in the first place by the Local Exchange against the -grower, next by the District Exchange against the Local Exchange, and -finally by the General Exchange against the District Exchange. It is -an up-to-date business organization these men have; the grower belongs -to a Local Exchange, the Locals form District Exchanges, and these, in -turn, the General Exchange. Each is independent in matters that -concern it only, but all must submit to the general voice in matters -which may be of concern to all.</p> - -<p>Fruit and truck crops seem to be especially adapted to coöperative -marketing; or possibly the uncertainty of profit in their production -and the big share of the final price absorbed by the middlemen have -forced fruit and truck growers to coöperate to a greater extent than -farmers in most other lines. At any rate there are quite a few -successful coöperative associations among these growers. In Texas such -an association does a business of $1,500,000 annually. The Grand -Junction Fruit Growers’ Association, of Colorado, is another notable -<!--126.png--> -success. California nut growers market their product through a -coöperative organization. Florida citrus growers claim to have raised -the net price received by growers for oranges from $1.15 in 1909-10 to -$1.96 for the season 1912-13. Western North Carolina fruit growers -have organized, as have Georgia peach growers, and fruit raisers in -many other sections. In an Alabama town a truckers’ association with -190 members has standardized its products until it obtains prices -considerably above those secured by individuals, and from a small -beginning has grown to be the most important business concern of its -town.</p> - -<p>These stories might be duplicated many times; and it is not too much -to say that the fruit growers and truckers are rapidly coming to -realize the benefits of coöperative organization. I do not believe it -any wild prophecy to say that within a dozen years the trucker seeking -a location will inquire into the marketing organization conducted by -his fellow truckers just as he now inquires into the locality’s -shipping facilities. And some time all the local coöperative -organizations marketing perishable truck and fruit will unite to -conduct a great central marketing exchange. Then the present-day -scarcities of certain fruits and vegetables at one town, while in -another these same products are decaying and going to waste, will be -avoided.</p> - -<p>Coming back from the things that may be to the things that are, it is -worth while to note that in 1911 2,120 out of a total of 6,284 -creameries in the United States were conducted on coöperative lines, -and that of 3,846 cheese factories, 349 were coöperative. In Minnesota -608 out of 838 creameries were coöperative. In Wisconsin 347 -creameries out of 1,000 and 244 cheese factories out of 1,784.</p> - -<p>In these as in other lines of business coöperative associations are -largely localized. A successful coöperative creamery in a locality -helps to organize other creameries near it on a coöperative basis, and -so on. Similarly, the successful coöperative rural stores of the -country are largely grouped in Minnesota and Wisconsin, having spread -from one or two unusually successful ventures in small towns. The -coöperative grain elevators of the country are mostly located in Iowa, -the Dakotas, Minnesota and Illinois, although Nebraska and Kansas have -<!--127.png--> -over a hundred each. Where one farmers’ telephone line is organized -another is likely to follow, and whole counties have been covered in -this way.</p> - -<p>In short, the coöperative spirit is like the little leaven which -spreads and spreads until it leavens the whole lump.</p> - -<p>It is not only that a successful coöperative enterprise leads to the -establishment of similar enterprises in nearby communities. More -notable and striking still is the fact that a successful coöperative -enterprise in a rural community seems often to put new life into the -whole community and to give the farmers entirely new conceptions of -their own capacities and the possibilities of their vocation.</p> - -<p>Take, for example, the story of Svea, Minnesota, as told by a recent -visitor to that town—a visitor, by the way, who went to Svea simply -to see how the farmers there were working together and what profits -they had from so doing. I quote:</p> - -<p>“In Svea they have established and operated thus far without one -single failure, a coöperative creamery, a coöperative telephone -company, a coöperative grain elevator, a coöperative stock-shipping -association, a coöperative store, a coöperative insurance company, a -coöperative bank (now forming). Moreover, they also have as a result -of what we may term coöperative effort, a thoroughly equipped high -school with agricultural and domestic science teaching, a consolidated -church with a resident pastor, a school library and a State teaching -library, neighborhood social meetings three times a month under church -influences. They have made their neighborhood a reading neighborhood. -Almost every farmer takes two to four farm papers and other reading -matter in proportion.</p> - -<p>“In other words, the Svea farmers have become ‘business men’ as surely -as commercial men in the towns, and are doubling their profits as a -result, while they are at the same time developing a high degree of -culture and that satisfying social life, without which mere money is -valueless, while also maintaining moral and spiritual influences which -town life tends to destroy.”</p> - -<p>The first enterprise was the creamery which was started in 1896. It -paid so well that the coöperative telephone line came four years -later; and, having once learned how much it helped -<!--128.png--> -them to work -together, they have continued all along to find out new ways in which -they could coöperate for the upbuilding of the community. The -coöperative store, strictly on the Rochdale plan, was started in 1909, -and to show how coöperation pays, the experience of the town pastor -may be cited. He took $100 stock in the store, giving his note in -payment. He then went on for a year buying goods from the store at the -usual retail prices. When settlement was made, ten months later, it -was found that the dividends due him—the rebate on his -purchases—amounted to $150.60. He had, without spending a cent or -paying any extra prices for merchandise, cancelled his note and the -interest on it and acquired a balance of $44.60. In other words, if he -had bought his goods from a regular merchant, he would have paid that -merchant $150.60 in net profits, whereas by coöperating with his -neighbors and trading with himself so to speak, he was enabled to -return the whole sum to his own pocket. With such examples of the -benefits of coöperation before their eyes, it seems but natural that -the farmers of Svea should be the prosperous, progressive, -broad-minded, hopeful folks they are said to be—the sort of folks who -are able and willing to vote upon themselves a tax of $1.70 on the -hundred dollars of property to build and equip the kind of high school -they want.</p> - -<p>Take, as another example of how the coöperative leaven works, Catawba -County, North Carolina. The farmers and other business men of this -county decided some five years ago that they needed a county fair. -They got together and had it—a fair with liberal prizes but without -entrance or admission fees. Everything was free to all who came, and -the authorities saw to it that there was nothing to injure or deceive -anyone who came. The fakers and cheap side shows which are the big end -of some fairs were not allowed to stop in Hickory where the fair was -held. The fair was a success, and has been a success since. Last year -the townspeople did not feel inclined to contribute to it, but the -farmers had learned how to work with each other in the meanwhile and -they went ahead and had a fair just the same, out in an oak grove -surrounding a rural high school. Fifty horses and mules on exhibition, -50 pure-bred cattle and other exhibits to match. Those who have -attended Southern fairs will -<!--129.png--> -know at once from the livestock entries -that this was truly a good county fair. I doubt if these farmers could -have held this fair, however, if it had not been for the coöperative -creamery. This institution, established in 1910, when the farmers -found themselves developing a dairy industry without a convenient -market, has been the coöperative leaven in Catawba County. It was -started with a capital of $1,500, the money being borrowed and the -machinery purchased from a creamery “promoted” somewhere in Georgia by -the agent of a creamery-selling concern which persuaded the farmers -that if they got a creamery outfit the cows would somehow come to it. -The creamery was a success from the start; soon it began a new work of -service by handling the farmers’ eggs on a coöperative basis, teaching -them how to produce and market eggs of quality while securing more -than the regular market price for these eggs. The lesson was quickly -learned: it paid farmers to work together. Now they have a farmers’ -building and loan association, a “Sweet Potato Growers’ Association,” -rural school improvement associations, women’s clubs, and are -preparing for a coöperative laundry. The women meet and discuss the -needs of their schools—as many women do—and then lay out a plan of -action and go to work to supply the needs—as too many women do not. -The Farmers’ Union in one district recently made a complete survey of -that district and can now tell just what each farmer reads, what he -does for his neighborhood, almost what he thinks, in so far as -thoughts may be determined by actions and conditions. In short, -“Catawba is a live county,” as any North Carolinian will tell the -inquirer, and coöperation among the farmers has made it live.</p> - -<p>At first thought it may seem strange that the intellectual and moral -progress of a rural community should be so quickened by business -coöperation among the farmers, but a little thought will show why this -must almost necessarily be so. It is beyond question that the lack of -organization, of unity of purpose and concert of action, is as great a -hindrance to rural progress and development as is the traditional -conservatism and inertia of the individual farmer. The farmer has -simply not learned how to use all the multitudinous committees and -boards and sundry -<!--130.png--> -group organizations which the city dweller has found -so effective in many ways. Once the farmer gets into the habit of -working with his neighbor for a common end, he sees all sorts of -desirable ends to be worked for, and if a “divine discontent” with -existing evils or needs is present in the community—as it usually -is—it is almost certain to be no longer hemmed up in the hearts of -two or three persons but set free in the consciousness of the whole -community. Then action follows.</p> - -<p>The man who would improve social and moral conditions in the country -districts can make no more effective start than to organize the -farmers into coöperative business associations. The American farmer -has, it seems to me, demonstrated himself an efficient and -whole-hearted coöperator, when once he learns the trick and gets the -habit.</p> - -<p>And he is learning rapidly. Before me, as I write, are reports from -various Southern States of coöperative tobacco and cotton warehouses, -coöperative and semi-coöperative stores, produce-selling exchanges, -fertilizer and supply buying associations, cotton marketing -associations, coöperative buying of machinery and livestock, and so -on. There is even an account of a coöperative church—a whole -community uniting to make the church a social centre and a help to -all. The work of rural organization, either for business purposes or -for intellectual development and social improvement, has just begun; -but it is something that a beginning has been made, and I, for one, am -not yet willing to admit that the American farmer is inferior to the -farmers of any other country in either common sense or neighborly -feeling. Unless he is so deficient, he will become as good a -coöperator as any of them, for both his business interests and his -sense of neighborliness demand a new organization of country life to -fit the new conditions of our time.</p> -</div><!--end American Farmer section--> -<!--131.png--> -<div class="break"> -<h3 class="p4">RELIGION IN THE MODERN NOVEL</h3> - -<p class="center"><span class="sc">Louise Maunsell Field</span></p> - -<p><span class="muchlarger">O</span><span class="sc">f</span> -all the many accusations brought against our much abused young -twentieth century, there is none more popular than that of -materialism. For all its deficiencies, whether artistic, social or -ethical, this parrot-cry furnishes a convenient explanation; but -unfortunately for those who welcome such catch-phrases as a ready -means of avoiding any necessity for trying to exercise their disused -and rusty thinking apparatus, convenient and accurate are -seldom—perhaps never—synonymous. If this age of ours really is what -it has so frequently been called by capable judges, the Age of the -Social Conscience, that fact is in itself ample disproof of -materialism; for if conscience in its every manifestation be not -spiritual, what is? True, we have done away with the old scorn of the -body and of that generality once known as “the world,” but this is -simply the natural result of an increased knowledge which has -compelled an altered point of view, making such contempt appear rather -childish. And because the new social conscience has developed so -largely outside the orthodox church, it is not therefore any the less -religious. Indeed, it is in very great measure the immediate cause of -that re-awakened interest in what may for clearness’ sake be defined -as strictly religious ideas which is now showing itself in so many -ways and places, and especially in the modern novel.</p> - -<p>That this new religious interest seldom takes a dogmatic form is -probably one reason why the average reader has been and still is so -slow to recognize it—of course we are in no way concerned here with -those latter-day successors to the Elsie books which provide psychic -water-gruel for the senile-minded of all ages—yet in the stirrings of -a more or less vague discomfort he has become aware of those electric -currents of spiritual unrest which are penetrating down even to the -most respectable of the quarter-educated well-to-do. There is -something more than a little pathetic in the way these latter welcome -such an attempt to manipulate words, to stretch the ancient formulas -and render -<!--132.png--> -them broad enough to contain modern ethics and modern -knowledge, as was shown in Mr. Winston Churchill’s <cite>The Inside of The -Cup</cite>—a novel whose popularity was due at least as much to its -discussion of religious as to its treatment of social problems. For there -is no class in the community whose size, the multiplicity of books and -opportunities for learning taken into consideration, is so astonishingly -great as is that of the half and quarter educated well-to-do.</p> - -<p>The best of those modern novels in which the present-day religious -interest reveals itself in its most significant aspect often treat it -shyly, almost timidly. For with the crumbling of the ancient cosmogony -and its dependent beliefs the old cock-sure attitude became obsolete. The -writer no longer says, “This is the truth; no decent or sensible person -will deny it”; but instead: “This is my opinion—what experience has -given me; take it for what it is or may be worth.” Very frequently it is -only the consciousness of things spiritual which is clearly shown; their -nature, with a deeper reverence than that of yore, is left indeterminate. -Here and there appears an author whose belief is as detailed as that of -Will Levington Comfort: usually, however, it is rather a reaching out, a -sense of things unseen, the mental attitude one of obedience to Abt -Vogler’s advice: “Consider, and bow the head.”</p> - -<p>In this as in so many other phases of our modern thought and experience -H. G. Wells has succeeded in stating lucidly that of which the majority -of people are but more or less dimly aware. It is indeed particularly -interesting to note the growth of spiritual and religious interest in Mr. -Wells. Decidedly materialistic in much of his earlier work, it is only -when <em>Marriage</em> is reached that we find the hero, Trafford, deploring -the fact that his wife and himself have won “no religion to give -them”—i. e. their children—“no sense of a general purpose.” And, -though foreshadowed in other stories, not until <cite>The Passionate Friends</cite> -of last autumn does there come the description of a genuine religious -experience, a description which is thoroughly characteristic of that -sense of awe, of a greatness and power too vast to be expressed in -faltering, merely human speech, which is often—it might be safe to -say, always—the very crux of the religious -<!--133.png--> -spirit as it appears in -the modern novel. Stephen Stratton, who relates the experience, has -reached the crisis of his life and knows not where to go nor what to -do when, as he phrases it: “The great stillness that is behind and -above and around the world of sense did in some way communicate with -me … commanding me to turn my face now to the great work that lies -before mankind.” And having told him what his share in this work is to -be, “the stillness” bids him: “Make use of that confusedly striving -brain that I have lifted so painfully out of the deadness of matter.” -And Stephen, though he cries out, “But who are you?” obeys.</p> - -<p>Detailed at greater or less length, it is this occasional awareness of -communication with the Power outside and beyond “the world of sense” -which is the shape in which religion is most likely to appear in the -modern novel. Sometimes, as in <cite>John Ward, M. D.</cite>, this awareness, -usually touched upon lightly, almost furtively, is clearly and -strongly emphasized, but very seldom, and then under a slightly -different aspect. The destruction of the old formulas has resulted in -an instinctive distrust of creeds, an instinctive shrinking from -anything which bears even the least appearance of an attempt to make -new ones. The situation portrayed in William Arkwright’s able, yet -curiously uneven book, <cite>The Trend</cite>, wherein he shows his mystic, -purely spiritual singer as escaping, horror-stricken, from an orthodox -church service and denouncing it as an insult to God, is typical, -though extreme. For the revolt against the materialism of Haeckel and -his followers—not of Darwin and Huxley, who were not materialists and -repudiated the name with the utmost vigor—has been accompanied by a -revolt against the materialism in religion which rendered it -vulnerable to the onslaughts of historical and scientific criticism. -“We claim and we shall wrest from theology,” said John Tyndall, “the -entire domain of cosmological theory.” The event has proved him a true -prophet—and helped men to disentangle religion from theology.</p> - -<p>The whole movement of the modern novel, indeed, has been toward a -spiritualization which embodies within itself an essentially religious -feeling; only this spiritualization not being of the monastic and -ascetic kind which so long swayed the imaginations -<!--134.png--> -of men, but of a -social or humanistic order, has frequently been mistaken for other -than its real self. It constitutes, too, a force active in all the -affairs of life rather than one principally confined to certain of its -details, and this fact can be glimpsed, sometimes from one angle, -sometimes from another, in the more ephemeral as well as in the best -examples of our twentieth century fiction. In an article published in -the May issue of The Forum attention was called to the change which -has taken place in the character of the fiction hero, who has lost his -idle elegance and become a worker. That this work should so often be a -part of the struggle for human betterment or a joining in the endeavor -to right some especial wrong is both a portion of and a testimony to -the idealistic spirit which quickens the modern novel, as is also the -companion fact that its drama is in many notable instances mainly a -psychic one. More and more is the inward effect thrusting the outward -event into a position of subordinate interest; the story of a murder -becomes an account not of the efforts to trace the slayer, but of the -result of the deed upon his soul. The most interesting and important -chapter of <cite>The Devil’s Garden</cite> is that wherein William Dale reviews -the inner life which has been so turbulent, while the outer was so -calm; <cite>The Debit Account</cite> has little to say of Jeffries’s career in -the realm of finance but very much about his mental attitude toward -himself and that “world without trifles” in which he lived; despite a -charming heroine and an absorbing plot it is the influence of failure -upon the character of Ralph Lingham which is the matter of supreme -importance in <cite>When Love Flies out o’ the Window</cite>.</p> - -<p>To call this confused mass of struggle and revolt and aspiration -“religion” may seem to many persons unjust and perhaps even a trifle -shocking; but that is because of the popular confounding of religions -which are many with religion, which is one in essence, whether it be -manifested under the Buddhistic form of quietism or the social service -activities within and without the present-day church. Modern thought -has made the old-time easy shifting of responsibility impossible, and -the changed belief which this involves, enforcing the conviction that -the world is to be saved and the Kingdom of God established on earth -not by miraculous intervention but by the earnest labor in well-doing -<!--135.png--> -of many generations of devoted men and women, has had even among those -who deny it an incalculably powerful effect. It may be too that the -new humanitarianism which causes us to view with horror conditions -which our forefathers regarded with more or less equanimity and makes -reform one of the most familiar of words is to some extent due to the -desire to escape from any effort to measure and explain the Infinite -with mere finite instruments. Since the days when knowledge destroyed -the foundations of that ancient stately tower of faith and authority -which men had believed was based on truth’s very rock, this attempt to -find a working theory of life which shall not imply any dogmatic -response to the riddles of the universe has been made in directions -innumerable, and is being so made to-day; only, the way of escape by -“practical” social labor has become more popular than any other and is -a road along which travel in divers manners all sorts and conditions -of men—among them many who would vehemently and even indignantly deny -that religious and spiritual problems had anything whatever to do with -their chosen path.</p> - -<p>In the modern novel as in the modern world religion has come to be -more and more a matter of service and aspiration; less and less a -matter of accordance with fixed rules and formulas. And upon this, as -upon so many other aspects of life, the writer of to-day can express -himself with a freedom which only a few years ago would have brought -down torrents of wrath upon his head. What in our parents’ time would -have been said of <cite>The Trend</cite>, for example, or even of <cite>A Man’s World</cite>?</p> - -<p>Thus religion in the modern novel evinces itself principally in four -distinct ways: in revolt against the worn-out, cramping traditions; in -a broad humanitarianism which has increased sympathy and given a fresh -and vivid and impelling meaning to the word duty; in a quickened -spirituality that has removed punishment and reward from the hereafter -and even from the world of matter to the living human soul; and in a -reaching out, vaguely, gropingly, but never futilely, toward “the -stillness,” “the Ultimate Force,” “the Unknown Power,” or whatever -term men prefer to use in their desire to get away from the old -anthropomorphic conceptions, and yet express their consciousness of the -<!--136.png--> -Infinite and Divine. For “the obstinate questioning of invisible -things” which began so soon as man developed from the primeval -ape-forms and became Man, still goes on and will go on, in all -probability, so long as the race endures; only the shape and manner of -the questioning has changed as humanity has slowly learned something -of its ability to mould its own destiny, the duty and privilege which -it possesses of working out its own salvation. There have been many -periods in the world’s history when that questioning found few to -voice it aloud, yet always after such a pause it has been renewed with -fresh and greater vigor. One of these pauses came in the last century; -to-day the questioning resounds all about us, and one of the means -through which it is being uttered most clearly is the modern novel.</p> -</div><!--end religion section--> -<!--137.png--> -<div class="break"> -<h3 class="p4">GIOVANNITTI</h3> - -<p class="center"><cite>Poet of the Wop</cite></p> - -<p class="center"><span class="sc">Kenneth Macgowan</span></p> - -<p><span class="muchlarger">T</span><span class="sc">here</span> -are probably a lot of technical errors in Giovannitti’s -poems.<span class="lock"><a name="fnanchor_1" id="fnanchor_1"></a><a href="#footnote_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a></span> -I didn’t notice. And perhaps that is one of the tests of -great poetry,—not the faults that you can’t find because they’re not -there, but the faults that will not be discovered. Something else -absorbs you.</p> - -<p>The significant thing is that here we have a new sort of poet with a -new sort of song. And doubtless because of this song it will be many -years before we see his greatness. For the song that he sings is not a -pleasant song. It is the song of the people as he learned it in the -Lawrence strike and hummed it over in the jails of Salem. He and his -song are products of something that few Americans yet understand. We -do not comprehend the labor problem of the unskilled, just as we do -not comprehend the I. W. W. that has come out of it. A poet has arisen -to explain.</p> - -<p>Now the I. W. W. is no mere labor union; the A. F. of L. is enough. -Giovannitti is no mere poet of labor; we have had plenty of such. He -is not singing of labor alone. He is not prating of the dignity of -work—you can’t find it in the situation the I. W. W. faces. He is no -aristocrat of handiwork, like the A. F. of L. He sings the people -behind the work—active or idle, skilled or not—“Plebs, Populace, -People, Rabble, Mob, Proletariat.” He cries the awakening of that -great mass of mankind that has always been typified as Labor because -earning its bread in the sweat of its brow was its one common -attribute—the primordial curse. He looks beyond work to emancipation:</p> - -<div class="poemcontainer"> - <div class="poem"> - <div class="stanza"> - <div class="i0">Think! If your brain will but extend</div> - <div class="i2">As far as what your hands have done,</div> - <div class="i0">If but your reason will descend</div> - <div class="i2">As deep as where your feet have gone,</div> - </div><!--end stanza--> - <div class="stanza"> - <div class="i0">The walls of ignorance shall fall</div> - <div class="i2">That stood between you and your world.<a name="omitted" id="omitted"></a>…</div> - </div><!--end stanza--> -<!--138.png--> - <div class="stanza"> - <div class="i0">Aye, think! While breaks in you the dawn,</div> - <div class="i2">Crouched at your feet the world lies still—</div> - <div class="i0">It has no power but your brawn,</div> - <div class="i2">It knows no wisdom but your will.</div> - </div><!--end stanza--> - <div class="stanza"> - <div class="i0">Behind your flesh, and mind, and blood,</div> - <div class="i2">Nothing there is to live and do,</div> - <div class="i0">There is no man, there is no god,</div> - <div class="i2">There is not anything but you.</div> - </div><!--end stanza--> - </div><!--end poem--> -</div><!--end poemcontainer--> - -<p>Against him Giovannitti finds the world—the world even of his own -kind, bound in the chains of the past. The police, the law, the -Church, another age shackling this, he has met them all in -Massachusetts, arrayed against even the first steps toward his -industrial democracy. The business of his verse is to destroy. In -<cite>The Cage</cite>—the prisoner’s pen in which he stood for murder—he deals -with the mummy of authority. In <cite>The Walker</cite> he has painted the prison -as no man, not even Wilde, has done. And the Church—even the Christ -whom so many socialists are confessing that they may be numbered with -the sheep—that also he denies. Christ, the heavy-laden carpenter, was -still a man of peace. Giovannitti has his own sermon, “The Sermon on -the Common”: “Blessed are the strong in freedom’s spirit; for theirs -is the kingdom of the earth.”</p> - -<p>Materialistic—like all these socialists? Giovannitti has his answer -ready for you: “While happiness be not our goal, but simply the way to -get there.”</p> - -<p>Neither materialism nor happiness is likely to trouble the average -American. What bothers him is “violence.” And there is no disguising -the fact that violence is an essential part of the I. W. W. and its -faith. Love is as great a part, of course; but hate must spring just -as quickly from the cruelty of the world of the few as love from the -brotherhood of the world of the many. Giovannitti and his friends want -something and they want it badly. They are ready to take it peaceably: -Giovannitti pictures the spirit of Helen Keller as the Christ of -loving forgiveness—the only true Christ—offering peace to the -grinder of the faces of the poor. But, if love and forgiveness fail, -there is another savior waiting, and a violent savior:</p> -<!--139.png--> - -<div class="poemcontainer"> - <div class="poem"> - <div class="i2">… The sombre one whose brow</div> - <div class="i0">Is seared by all the fires and ne’er will bow</div> - <div class="i0">Shall come forth, both his hands upon the hilt.</div> - </div><!--end poem--> -</div><!--end poem container--> - -<p>Whatever its future, the I. W. W. has accomplished one tremendously -big thing—a thing that sweeps away all twaddle over red flags and -violence and sabotage. And that is the individual awakening of -“illiterates” and “scum” to an original, personal conception of -society and the realization of the dignity and the rights of their -part in it. They have learned more than -<a name="chg1" id="chg1"></a>class-consciousness; they have learned consciousness of self. The I. W. -W. is making the “wop” into a thinker. And that is what Giovannitti -wrote in his <cite>Proem</cite> when he said of his own verses:</p> - -<div class="poemcontainer"> - <div class="poem"> - <div class="i0">They are the blows of my own sledge</div> - <div class="i2">Against the walls of my own jail.</div> - </div><!--end poem--> -</div><!--end poem container--> - -<p class="footnote"> <a name="footnote_1" id="footnote_1"></a> -<a href="#fnanchor_1"><span class="muchsmaller">[1]</span></a> - <cite>Arrows in the Gale.</cite> By Arturo Giovannitti. The Hillacre - Book House.</p> -</div><!--end Giovannitti section--> -<!--140.png--> -<div class="break"> -<h3 class="p4">EMERSON</h3> - -<p class="center"><cite>A Mystic Who Lives Again in His Journals</cite><span class="lock"><a name="fnanchor_2" id="fnanchor_2"></a><a href="#footnote_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a></span></p> - -<p class="center"><span class="sc">Warren Barton Blake</span></p> - -<p><span class="muchlarger">E</span><span class="sc">merson</span> -has been “discovered” again—this time in the France that he -tried hard and vainly to understand. It all began with the publication -of a critical biography by Madame Dugard in 1907. I was in Paris then, -and read it, and was most of all struck by the comically dressy -effect, in translation, of the simple lines beginning:</p> - -<div class="poem"> - <div class="i0">Good-bye, proud world, I’m going home.</div> -</div> - -<p>In French, they correspond to an Emerson dressed in eighteenth century -style, with wig and sword:</p> - -<div class="poem" lang="fr" xml:lang="fr"> - <div class="i0">Adieu, monde orgueilleux, je retourne au foyer;</div> - <div class="i0">Tu n’es pas mon ami, je ne suis pas le tien…</div> -</div> - -<p>Yet the book is a good introduction to Emerson, and, since 1907, -Madame Dugard and others have translated several volumes of essays for -the French public. I wonder if they have won a reading—outside the -university and professionally literary groups; I wonder if Frenchmen -see far beyond what Robert G. Ingersoll called the “baked-bean side of -his genius”? As the late Perpetual Secretary of the Immortals said, -when the French Academy “crowned” the Dugard book:</p> - -<p class="blockquote">“Emerson’s influence in America, like Ruskin’s in England, - is a curious illustration of the need for an ideal which, at - certain moments, the man of action, the Anglo-Saxon, feels. - Such was the empire of contemplative monks over barbarian - chiefs and of mystics over feudal armies. It was Emerson’s - fortune to launch his ideas at a time when America was - largely without them…. Emerson, knowing that the great - danger of democracy is atrophy of the individual conscience, - set himself -<!--141.png--> - to preaching individualism—the necessity of a high culture, - the search for an ideal.”</p> - -<p class="p2 center"><abbr title="Two">II</abbr></p> - -<p>Eight years ago, when I read Mme. Dugard’s volume, I was -youthful—with all of youth’s intolerance. It seemed no mere -coincidence that Emerson’s father recorded his birth in his diary -between a dry note on the “Election Sermon” and a report of a session -of his literary club at Mr. Adams’s. Cheerful youth, not needing -reassurance concerning the excellence of this world as an abiding -place, is unlikely to set a high value on what contemporary reviewers, -even in the American religious press, found to praise in Emerson’s -essays: “Their lofty cheer, and spirit-stirring notes of courage and -hope.” I certainly had no conception of Emerson’s influence upon my -father’s generation—an influence so great that Carlyle called his -friend a new era in our history; so great that when some clergymen -complained that he was leading young men to hell, Father Taylor -remarked: “It may be that Emerson is going to hell, but I am certain -he will change the climate there, and emigration will set that way.” -Then again, I had no sympathy with Emerson because it seemed to me, in -spite of all the long words and imported transcendentalism—or, -partly, on account of them—that he didn’t “get anywhere.” (I -sometimes feel so still—but the charge is less damnatory. I do not -wonder that Moncure Conway wrote of Emerson setting free in his -heart—in his <em>heart</em>, notice—“a winged thought that sang a new song -and soared—whither?”)</p> - -<p>Emerson’s dependence upon intuitions and praises of them as the -springs of action and organ of inspiration conferring wisdom upon man -seemed the less respectable because I hadn’t read Bergson—who has -made intuitions more than ever fashionable. Emerson lived in the -spirit-world—a quite different place from any trodden by the student -in Paris who is at home in the world of the Sorbonne and the -Bibliothèque Nationale, and in the world of flesh-and-blood. To -healthy youth, nothing is much more repugnant than the Wordsworthian -ideal of wise passivity, while the notion of a Buddhistic Nirvana -seems murderous of -<!--142.png--> -“Nature”—however you define her. Moreover, I know -not how to direct my inexorable thoughts, Emerson avows, and scarcely -appears to think any direction of them needful. His best thoughts -steal upon him in silence, and Truth flies out of the window when Will -enters in by the door. “There is never a fine aspiration but is on its -way to its body or institution,” he confidently asserts. Too -confidently, it seemed to me. Emerson, aged thirty, wrote that a -system-grinder hates the truth; he loved the truth, and -therefore—therefore?—side-stepped system. It was not till much later -that he uttered the heartfelt cry: “If Minerva offered me a gift and -an option, I would say, give me continuity. I am tired of scraps….</p> - -<div class="poemcontainer"> - <div class="poem"> - <div class="i0a">“‘The Asmodæan feat be mine</div> - <div class="i0">To spin my sand-bags into twine.’”</div> - </div><!--end poem--> -</div><!--end poem container--> - -<p>Perhaps the scrappiness of Emerson is less distressing to the youthful -mind, eternally and quite needlessly refreshed by the comedy of life -on every side of it, than the Emersonian “trick of solitariness,” that -he played as a Harvard undergraduate not less but perhaps rather more -than as the Concord sage. When Madame Dugard’s book on Emerson was -published in Paris, I sat down and wrote a critique—stored with -Roussellian analogies, à la Irving Babbitt. I was full of Rousseau -then, and I piled on sentences that I meant to be cruel and -crushing—not of Professor Babbitt, or Jean-Jacques, or Madame Dugard, -but of poor Emerson. I showed my article, unfinished, to a dear -friend—wiser than I; and then tore it up. Here is a part of the -letter I had from my friend commenting on the little essay:</p> - -<p class="blockquote">“I find your point that Emerson, the preacher of - individualism, was himself thin-blooded and barren of true - personality, interesting: whether or not it is true. I never - happened to find it put just so before, and should certainly - never have thought of it. But I suppose, after all, a - certain kind of individuality might be expressed by - impersonality as well as by any other instrument. I’ve only - glanced through the Dugard book, but the point of view seems - to be the conventional one that Emerson -<!--143.png--> - was too far removed - from the stress and pain of life to touch very closely - vibrant, struggling souls. As you translate, ‘he fills only - the full, reassures only the optimists.’ I suppose that is - true enough. And yet—and yet, is any life so full that it - does not need refilling; or any optimism so complete and so - unshaken that it does not need reassurance, - <em>expression</em>, from an articulate, a stronger spirit? Isn’t - optimism with many people a religious yearning rather than - any truly temperamental attribute; a thing to be struggled - for, and cherished, and reinforced from without? Whatever - forces from within may have urged Emerson toward idealism - and optimism, wasn’t he at least equally an idealist, and - optimist, from conviction, or faith, or whatever else you - call the semi-religious element? The Emersonian idealism is - more, I am sure, than the natural overflow of a serenely - poetic disposition—to which you try to reduce it. You must - not forget that essay of his on Destiny—Destiny, man’s - heroic, large-spirited friend, man’s bolster against Fate - (discouraging and enervating personage!).</p> - -<p class="blockquote">“I suppose that it is fair enough to complain that Emerson - gives light without heat, but how many writers throw off - much heat and little light—to say nothing of ‘darkness - visible’…. Not many philosophers and poets and friends of - ours yield us both forms of power. Perhaps the combination - of the two—light and, well, at least <em>warmth</em>—is the most - remarkable thing about Christ and his system.”</p> - -<p>I feel less ashamed of my calfish distrust and dislike of Emerson now -that I have read in President Eliot’s centenary essay on the great New -Englander his confession that he too, “as a young man,” found the -writings of Emerson “unattractive, and not seldom unintelligible, … -speculative, and visionary.” It is only after one has suffered from -living that one fully values Emerson—only as one is gradually -educated himself, in experience’s school, that one appreciates his -worth as a prophet of modern education; of the latter day social -organization, its maladies and quacks and salves; of what Dr. Eliot -calls “natural” rather than supernatural religion.</p> -<!--144.png--> - -<p class="p2 center"><abbr title="Three">III</abbr></p> - -<p>For this descendant of a line of Yankee ministers, there is no -dividing line between the secular and the sacred. To Emerson, life is -itself sacred; and the universe no less holy than the Ark of the -Tabernacle—</p> - -<div class="poemcontainer"> - <div class="poem"> - <div class="i0">So nigh is grandeur to our dust</div> - <div class="i0">So nigh is God to man.</div> - </div><!--end poem--> -</div><!--end poem container--> - -<p>“Christianity is wrongly conceived by all such as take it for a system -of doctrines,” he wrote in his diary as a young man—thereby -fortifying in some sort what Augustine Birrell was to say half a -century later: “You cannot, however dogmatically inclined, construct a -theology out of Emerson.” His stress was placed—as he was persuaded -Christ’s was—upon moral truth; and at thirty he wrote: “I feel myself -pledged, if health and opportunity be granted me, to demonstrate that -all necessary truth is its own evidence.” Demonstrate? Emerson never -did succeed in “demonstrating” very much. In Dr. Eliot’s words, here -was no logician or reasoner, but “a poet who wrote chiefly in prose.” -But his prose is certainly no less poetic than his poetry. The -inspiration is in both cases moral; and, to paraphrase—</p> - -<div class="poemcontainer"> - <div class="poem"> - <div class="i0">His every line, of noble origin,</div> - <div class="i0">Is breathed upon by Hope’s perpetual breath.</div> - </div><!--end poem--> -</div><!--end poem container--> - -<p>Yet Emerson was intolerant of cant about immortality. “I notice that -as soon as writers broach this subject they begin to quote. I hate -quotations. Tell me what you know.”<span class="lock"><a name="fnanchor_3" id="fnanchor_3"></a><a href="#footnote_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a></span></p> -<!--145.png--> - -<p>Emerson demonstrates, after death, one meaning of immortality by -living again in his “Journal”—the tenth volume of which has just come -to my book-shelf. Some complain of prolixity, but to read this Journal -is to find the measure of the man: and that is all the more cheering -to the lazy reader in that Emerson is far from being immeasurable. He -set down from day to day not only the record of events and personages -who impressed him, but many stray thoughts and reflections. He swept -into his Journal all the chips from his workshop, and stored there all -the rough materials he meant to carve and fabricate and ornament. -Workshop? The word is decidedly unpoetical, and perhaps inapt; for, as -Madame Dugard points out, he made of his soul a lyre whose strings -vibrated to all the winds of the spirit (<em>his</em> spirit, that is); and -in his Journal he notes these passing vibrations in phrases where -words like <em>flow</em>, <em>flee</em>, <em>flux</em>, <em>fugitive</em>, <em>fugacious</em>, <em>current</em>, -<em>stream</em>, <em>undulation</em>, occur and recur. Undeniably he sometimes -forced himself; he acknowledged that his talent, like the New England -soil, is good only while he works it. “If I cease to task myself, I -have no thoughts.” And adds: “This is a poor sterile Yankeeism. What I -admire and love is the generous and spontaneous soil which flowers and -fruits at all seasons.” Many of his memoranda he developed later in -the essay form—a procedure suspected by his own -contemporaries<span class="lock"><a name="fnanchor_4" id="fnanchor_4"></a><a href="#footnote_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a></span> -—but I like the mere scraps. Very perfectly do they -express the eagerly searching, earnestly austere man: reflecting all -his sincerity and incompleteness just as the beautiful paragraphs they -piled up as their sole monuments mirror the minds of Joubert in France -and Amiel in Switzerland. There is no humbug here, though there are -some few fallacies to reward those who read principally to prove, at -the author’s expense, their own astuteness. Emerson fully realized—at -fifty—what his deficiencies were; he called himself an intellectual -chiffonier, -<!--146.png--> -with a Jew’s rag-bag of brocade remnants and velvets and -torn cloth-of-gold. Truth to tell, he is all this no less in his -essays than in these Journals—and is a literary architect no more -than his friend Montaigne. As he repeated his lectures, and they -gained in polish and conciseness, the defect still sometimes remained: -he built more than one excellent house without stairs. It is in -momentary flashes of intuitive communication with the great -spirits—lightning flashes that suddenly light up the black night in -which we spend most of our time—that his genius shines. Somewhere in -his Journal he writes:</p> - -<p class="blockquote">“One man sees the fact or object, and another sees the power - of it; one the triangle, and the other the cone which is - generated by the revolution of the triangle.”</p> - -<p>He who has so often been reproached with aloofness looked at many -common facts, and saw what we see there—and beyond. His first lesson -of religion is that things seen are temporal, unseen things eternal; -yet is the temporal much for the eternally-minded, who preserves the -all-important sense of wonder. “Now that man was ready, the horse was -brought,” he writes; and continues:</p> - -<p class="blockquote">“The timeliness of this invention of the locomotive must be - conceded. To us Americans it seems to have fallen as a - political aid. We could not have held the vast North America - together which now we engage to do. It was strange, too, - that when it was time to build a road across to the Pacific, - a railroad, a ship-road, a telegraph, and in short, a - perfect communication in every manner for all - nations,—’twas strange to see how it was secured. <em>The - good World-Soul understands us well.</em>”</p> - -<p>Nowise was Emerson a Ruskinian. To the railroad he says—“like the -courageous Lord Mayor at his first hunting, when told the hare was -coming: ‘Let it come in Heaven’s name, I am not afraid on’t.’” And -this assurance is all the more welcome as one of the not too frequent -flashes of his humor.</p> - -<p class="p2 center"><abbr title="Four">IV</abbr></p> - -<p>While an author is often the worst-qualified critic of individual -books or passages in his own work, he has almost always -<!--147.png--> -expressed -somewhere the final criticism of his total. So it is with Emerson. On -one page he defines for us the type of idealism of which he was an -exponent:</p> - -<p class="blockquote">“We are idealists whenever we prefer an idea to a - sensation…. Character is more to us…. Religion makes us - idealists.”</p> - -<p>On another page, he writes:</p> - -<p class="blockquote">“Malthus existed to say, Population outruns food: Owen - existed to say, ‘Given the circumstance, the man’s given. I - can educate a tiger’: Swedenborg, that inner and outer - correspond: Fourier, that the destinies are proportioned to - the attractions; Bentham, the greatest good of the greatest - number. <em>But what do you exist to say?</em>”</p> - -<p>It is no tragedy if this sower of good seed said no one thing, and -only repeated many unequally wise counsels, and, by the wireless -telegraph of sympathetic genius, spelled out the dots and dashes that, -for the rest of us, unschooled in science, might have remained dots -and dashes till the day of judgment. Emerson’s contemporaries greatly -needed the man and his serene preaching—so undisturbed—while</p> - -<div class="poemcontainer"> - <div class="poem"> - <div class="i0">Theist, atheist, pantheist</div> - <div class="i0">Define and wrangle how they list.</div> - </div><!--end poem--> -</div><!--end poem container--> - -<p>To paraphrase Thureau-Dangan, Emerson’s was the empire of the -contemplative monks over barbarian axe-men and sword-bearers. To-day, -while the prosperous shudder at every murmur of social unrest, and the -not-prosperous are drunk with heady wines; while society is, as in -Emerson’s day, still “devoured by a secret melancholy,” disguised in a -hundred forms of madness; while the nations still glare at one another -from behind their breast-works, and the classes still war or hate -(with ever deepening consciousness of class): while all these things -are so, democracy’s “great dangers” may well remain the vulgarizing of -the arts, contempt of contemplation, “the atrophy of the individual -conscience.” Emerson somehow soothes this conscience without putting -it to sleep. His courageous faith in Destiny, his cheering theory of -compensations, his deathless hope, his healthy, -<!--148.png--> -exaggerated -individualism: here are counter-irritants for more than one of Time’s -diseases. “If thought makes free, so does the moral sentiment. The -mixtures of spiritual chemistry refuse to be analyzed.” And Emerson -did indeed “make free”; he was Emancipator, “not of black bodies, but -of the minds of white men.”</p> - -<p class="p2 footnote"> <a name="footnote_2" id="footnote_2"></a> -<a href="#fnanchor_2"><span class="muchsmaller">[2]</span></a> - <cite>Journals of Ralph Waldo Emerson: 1820-1872.</cite> With - Annotations. Edited by Edward Waldo Emerson and Waldo Emerson - Forbes. Boston: Houghton-Mifflin Company. Ten Volumes.</p> - -<p class="footnote"> <a name="footnote_3" id="footnote_3"></a> -<a href="#fnanchor_3"><span class="muchsmaller">[3]</span></a> - “Emerson refused to dogmatize about what is necessarily - obscure at present.”—John Albee, <cite>Recollections of Emerson</cite>. - Emerson wrote in his essay on <cite>Experience</cite>: “In accepting the - leading of the sentiments, it is not what we believe concerning - the immortality of the soul or the like, but <em>the universal - impulse to believe</em>, that is the material circumstance and is - the principal fact in the history of the globe.” This is not far - from the point of view of James, Bergson, and, nowadays, Sir - Oliver Lodge. If Emerson “refused to dogmatize” about the - uncertainties of the future life, he had all the same his nobler - convictions. He writes in his <cite>Journal</cite>: “I know my soul is - immortal if it were only by the sublime emotion I taste in - reading these lines of Swedenborg: ‘The organical body with which - the soul clothes itself is here compared to a garment, because a - garment invests the body, and the soul also puts off the body and - casts it away as old clothes (<i lang="la" xml:lang="la">exuviæ</i>), when it emigrates by - means of death from the natural world into its own spiritual - world.’”</p> - -<p class="footnote"> <a name="footnote_4" id="footnote_4"></a> -<a href="#fnanchor_4"><span class="muchsmaller">[4]</span></a> - In <cite>Harper’s New Monthly Magazine</cite> for June, 1870, we read: - “Rumor attributes to Ralph Waldo Emerson a peculiar method of - composition. He keeps, it is said, a commonplace book into which - go every striking thought, curious metaphor, keen epigram, which - his own mind incubates or his various reading discovers. When he - is called on for a lecture, he goes to his commonplace book. He - culls from its pages enough of its best material for an hour’s - instruction or entertainment. Connection is immaterial….”</p> - -<h3 class="p4">NOTE</h3> - -<p>The continuation of <cite>The World of H. G. Wells</cite> series, by Van Wyck -Brooks, is postponed in consequence of the war.</p> -</div><!--end Emerson section--> -<!--149.png--> -<div class="break"> -<h3 class="p4">CORRESPONDENCE</h3> - -<p class="p2 center"><i class="title">The War</i></p> - -<p class="center smaller">[TO THE EDITOR OF THE FORUM]</p> - -<p><span class="sc">Dear Sir</span>,—The war and the new problems created by it are engrossing -the attention of the entire British nation. Outwardly the life of -London goes on pretty much as usual. Under the surface there is a -tremendous lot of fermentation and premonition. It seems certain that -the war will be accompanied or followed by a social readjustment on a -scale hitherto undreamed of—and this readjustment will be entirely in -a democratic and socialistic direction.</p> - -<p>That a great financial crisis is due one can hardly doubt. So far the -weaker elements in the commercial and industrial world have been -carried along by artificial support, but that cannot go on -indefinitely. Whether the moratorium be extended or not, the crash -must come sooner or later. People are realizing this, and it has -already caused a tremendous awakening. In the end it will mean -additional surrenders on the part of the wealthy classes. The Kaiser -has solved not only the Ulster and suffrage questions, as some one -said the other day, but the whole question of social reorganization. -What would have had to be taken under ordinary circumstances will now -be given. This may seem an optimistic view of the whole thing, and may -prove unwarranted at this point or that, but on the whole I think it -will be found absolutely correct. A spirit of self-sacrifice is in the -air, and I think the German war machine will prove possessed of just -enough initial impetus to prevent that spirit from petering out -without tangible manifestation. The more the Germans win to begin -with, the longer the war becomes protracted, the more thoroughly will -the spirit for which their ruling class stands be killed in the end.</p> - -<p>Just how the financial precariousness of the European situation will -affect America no one can hope to foretell with any certainty. It is -possible that the distress of one continent will bring a “boom” to the -other. But I doubt it. I believe that we shall have to suffer with the -rest of the Western World, and if that proves so, it means that we -shall have an outbreak of internal strife hardly less serious than the -external strife on this side of the water. We are indeed—turn -wherever we may—on the threshold of grave and portentous events, and -may the Spirit of Life grant us all strength and patience and faith to -live through them. There is a great darkness ahead of us—an ordeal of -fire for the whole civilized portion of mankind—but beyond it awaits -us the long, sunlit day of world-wide peace.</p> - -<p class="quotesign"><span class="sc">Edwin Björkman</span></p> -<p class="p0 indent"><span class="sc">London</span></p> -<!--150.png--> - -<p class="p2 center smaller">[TO THE EDITOR OF THE FORUM]</p> - -<p><span class="sc">Dear Sir</span>,—I have just read your September editorial on War. How -powerfully and terribly you write on the subject. I hope it may be read -everywhere.</p> - -<p class="quotesign"><span class="sc">George Burman Foster</span></p> -<p class="p0 indent"><span class="sc">Chicago</span></p> - -<p class="p2 center smaller">[TO THE EDITOR OF THE FORUM]</p> - -<p><span class="sc">Dear Sir</span>,—I am an old man. I watch with pain, almost with -incredulity, the spectacle that Europe presents to the world. I see -England fighting “lest the lights of freedom go out throughout the -world.” I see Germany fighting lest God and civilization be -obliterated by barbarians. I see France fighting for her honor, her -freedom, her existence. I see everywhere murder, and misunderstanding. -So I write to you to thank you for the attitude you have taken: the -big attitude. It will be remembered. It will have effects that, when -you are old, as I am to-day, will bring you contentment. You have -fought a better fight than any of the commanders in the field.</p> - -<p class="quotesign"><span class="sc">Senex</span></p> -<p class="p0 indent"><span class="sc">Cincinnati</span></p> - -<p class="p2 center">“<i class="title">Piety</i>”</p> - -<p class="center smaller">[TO THE EDITOR OF THE FORUM]</p> - -<p><span class="sc">Dear Sir</span>,—Your correspondent “Twentieth Century” who writes under the -above heading in the August <span class="sc">Forum</span> is surely in a bad temper. His -letter is good evidence in favor of the theory that our beliefs are -determined by our wishes. He objects strongly to the doctrines -propounded in the tract he mentions, particularly to the use of the -word “damned,” and, if he had the power, would stop the publication of -such objectionable matter.</p> - -<p>The only reason he gives for this is that he dislikes it very much and -won’t have Christianity of that brand at any price.</p> - -<p>Now why is he so hot about it? Why does he use such epithets as -“stupid,” “disgusting,” “criminal lunatics,” etc.? If these doctrines -are false, no one will be hurt by them—it may even be that some will -be restrained from evil deeds by the teaching. On the other hand, if -they are true, and no one can demonstrate their untruth, he and all -those who despise the warning may find themselves in sorry case. -Anyway Christians will try to get on without him and may be encouraged -to know that the faith is still able to arouse such violent opposition.</p> - -<p class="quotesign"><span class="sc">J. P. Dunlop</span></p> -<p class="p0 indent"><span class="sc">Berkeley, California</span></p> -<!--151.png--> - -<p class="p2 center smaller">[TO THE EDITOR OF THE FORUM]</p> - -<p><span class="sc">Dear Sir</span>,—Thank you for sending me the proof of Mr. Dunlop’s letter. -Mr. Dunlop has evidently rigid convictions which no discussion could -modify. He may justly retort that I myself have convictions which I am -unwilling to modify. But that would not be true. I am willing to -modify any and every conviction that I have, if new evidence and new -advances in knowledge make it clear that I have been partly or wholly -at fault. But Mr. Dunlop clings fast to what he considers the faith of -his fathers, though the thinking world has long discarded the idea of -a God of Love who is supposed to punish his children for their faults -in this life by consigning them to the flames of hell, in which they -will suffer eternally the agonizing torments of fire. It is impossible -to reason with the well-meaning and sincere, but utterly ignorant, -people who are capable of believing such absurdities.</p> - -<p>I am glad that “Christians will try to get on without me.” I shall -certainly succeed in getting on without the so-called Christianity -which teaches that morality must depend essentially upon the fear of -hell, not upon the love of God; and I will cheerfully take the risk of -being punished for refusing to believe that God is in reality a fiend.</p> - -<p>Mr. Dunlop assumes that I was in a bad temper when I wrote my previous -letter. A certain <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">sæva indignatio</i> against lies and hypocrisy, wilful -or unwilful, is entirely justified. Was Christ himself icily cold when -he swept the money-changers and brawlers from the Temple? Did he speak -in measured academic platitudes?</p> - -<p>Mr. Dunlop does not realize that he believes what he believes merely -because he has never used his brain, never investigated or tried to -distinguish between the essential truth and the inevitable accretions -of falsehood and folly. If he had been born in pagan times, he would -probably have remained a pagan. In one age or country he would have -sacrificed to Moloch: in another he would have worshipped Bacchus. -But, of course, he cannot understand this.</p> - -<p>I used the epithets “stupid,” “disgusting,” etc., because they seemed -to me the most appropriate in connection with such a travesty of -reason and religion as the tract referred to presented. And Mr. Dunlop -is quite wrong when he says that “if these doctrines are false, no one -will be hurt by them.” Generations of men, women and children have -been hurt by them; hampered and cramped and narrowed by them; -prevented from living their full, free lives, and driven from the -comprehension and sustaining power of Christ’s Christianity by such -grotesque inventions of little minds, striving to measure their God by -their own paltry standards.</p> - -<p>As I said before, it is time that the narrow-minded reactionaries -should be taught that they are not the pillars of the true Church and -the pillars of -<!--152.png--> -the ideal society that they have supposed themselves to -be; they are neither good, nor pious, nor useful. They are the real -enemies of knowledge, reason, Christ and God. They try to murder -childhood with ghastly lies about hell-fire; they try to enchain -manhood and womanhood in shackles of mediæval, nonsensical, -character-rotting superstitions.</p> - -<p class="quotesign"><span class="sc">Twentieth Century</span></p> -<p class="p0 indent"><span class="sc">New York</span></p> - -<p class="p2 center"><i class="title">American Industrial Independence</i></p> - -<p class="center smaller">[TO THE EDITOR OF THE FORUM]</p> - -<p><span class="sc">Dear Sir</span>,—The peril of dependence on foreign nations for production -and over-sea transportation is demonstrated in the European war of -1914 as never before.</p> - -<p>The loss of human life in this war will be appalling, the resulting -sacrifice of the fruits of the labor of generations inestimable, and -the loss of capital will be enormous.</p> - -<p>We must use our best judgment to prevent these disastrous conditions -from weakening our industrial capacity. This is the time when we -should think and think hard about conserving and developing industrial -independence.</p> - -<p>We have issued the following announcement:</p> - -<p class="blockquote">“<i class="title">To American Producers</i>: Please report to us any - article or articles (raw material or finished product) of - use in agriculture, mining or manufacture in the United - States, for the supply of which we are dependent upon any - foreign country.”</p> - -<p>We shall take up every article thus reported, investigate the -possibility of successful production at home, and urge upon Americans -the desirability of such changes in our existing tariff system as -shall create new industries in every line where we are now partly or -wholly dependent on foreign countries.</p> - -<p class="sigright"> -<span class="sc">A. D. Juilliard</span><br /> -Chairman, Executive Committee,<br /> -The American Protective Tariff League.</p> - -<p class="p0 indent"><span class="sc">New York</span></p> - -<p class="p2 center"><i class="title">Eugenics in Wisconsin</i></p> - -<p class="center smaller">[TO THE EDITOR OF THE FORUM]</p> - -<p><span class="sc">Dear Sir</span>,—As supplementary to your editorial on <cite>Eugenic Tests</cite>, -which appeared in the August issue of <span class="sc">The Forum</span>, I am submitting -herewith my editorial on the general subject, which appeared in <cite>The -Milwaukee -<!--153.png--> -Daily News</cite> recently. As, of course, you know, Wisconsin, -at the last session of its legislature, placed on its statute books a -law requiring certain examinations and tests to be made before the -intending groom could secure a license to marry. The law provoked -widespread discussion and far from general approval. It was thought, -in some quarters, to be too drastic to be capable of full and complete -compliance. However, it is still on our statute books, and while some -of its most drastic provisions, like the laboratory tests, are not -being insisted upon, the belief is general that the law is doing some -good along new and, heretofore, untried lines. It gives notice that -something beside matrimonial misery must be a condition precedent to -the marriage relation.</p> - -<p>However, your editorial suggestion that popular education rather than -drastic legal enactments should be employed to secure a reasonable -standard of health preceding marriage, is undoubtedly sound and should -lead to what ought be the much-desired condition. Legislation, here as -elsewhere, is not the panacea of all the matrimonial ills of which we -know. But silence is an inexcusable crime in the premises.</p> - -<p class="quotesign"><span class="sc">Duane Mowry</span></p> -<p class="p0 indent"><span class="sc">Milwaukee, Wisconsin</span></p> - -<p class="p2 center"><i class="title">The Fourth Dimension</i></p> - -<p class="center smaller">[TO THE EDITOR OF THE FORUM]</p> - -<p><span class="sc">Dear Sir</span>,—With due deference to your valued journal, the article of -Claude Bragdon, <cite>Learning to Think in Terms of Spaces</cite>, in your August -number, is essentially illogical. The writer thus introduces his -subject: “A point, moving in an unchanging direction, traces out a -line; a line, moving in a direction at right angles to its length, -traces out a plane; a plane, moving in a direction at right angles to -its two dimensions, traces out a solid. Should a solid move in a -direction at right angles to its every dimension, it would trace out, -in four dimensional space, a hypersolid.”</p> - -<p>Now this may pass current in blackboard geometry, but does not hold -good in the abstract. The physical point is indeed extended to -represent the line, and the physical line, to represent the plane, -etc. But these concrete objects are not to be conceived as true -geometrical figures, which are not movable, for motion presupposes -sensuous experience. Only matter is movable. The true geometrical line -is not the extension of the point, nor is the cube formed by the -extension of the plane. When a point “moves” it is no longer a point, -and when a cube “moves” it becomes annihilated.</p> - -<p>“Student,” in a letter upon the same subject, speaks of a division of -a cube into smaller cubes. But when a part of a geometrical figure is -conceived the first figure is of necessity annihilated.</p> - -<p>Mr. Bragdon, after expatiating upon the vastness of the firmament, -<!--154.png--> -makes this extraordinary conclusion: “Viewed in relation to this -universe of suns, our particular sun and its satellites shrink to a -point. That is, the earth becomes no-dimensional.” The last word is in -italics. Now this is manifestly a misconception, since the most minute -atom, notwithstanding its insignificance in proportion to the -universe, cannot be considered as an abstraction, which a point really -is. Those who are not satisfied with the intuitive evidence of the -limitation of space to three dimensions, solely because no logical -proof can be adduced of this limitation, would do well to read the -essay of Schopenhauer on <cite>The Methods of Mathematics</cite>, in which is -cited as an instance of the undue importance of logical demonstration -the controversy on the theory of parallels. The eleventh axiom of -Euclid “asserts that two parallel lines inclining toward each other if -produced far enough must meet,—a truth which is supposed to be too -complicated to pass as self-evident and thus requires a demonstration…. -<em>It is quite arbitrary where we draw the line between what is directly -certain and what has first to be demonstrated.</em>” (The italics are -mine.)</p> - -<p>I believe with Schopenhauer, who quotes Descartes and Sir W. Hamilton -in support of his contention, that the science of mathematics has no -cultural value. Far from affording “a new way of looking at the -world,” as Mr. Bragdon tries to convince us, “its only direct use is -that it can accustom restless and unsteady minds to fix their -attention.” That such mental concentration may be woefully misdirected -is instanced in the cases of Swedenborg and Madame Blavatsky, -reference to whom by Mr. Bragdon is alone sufficient to cause a sniff -of suspicion.</p> - -<p>Indeed your author himself, while evidently well versed in bookish -mathematics, has been unable to free his mind of its limitations. Upon -a basis of phrases devoid of significance he builds his extravagantly -mystical speculation, which dissolves in the light of reason, “into -air, thin air.”</p> - -<p class="quotesign"><span class="sc">Philip J. Dorety, M. D.</span></p> -<p class="p0 indent"><span class="sc">Trenton, <abbr title="New Jersey">N. J.</abbr></span></p> -</div><!--end correspondence--> -<!--155.png--> -<div class="break"> -<h3 class="p4">EDITORIAL NOTES</h3> - -<p class="p2 center"><i class="title">Soldiers of All Nations</i></p> - -<p><span class="muchlarger">I</span><span class="sc">t</span> is difficult to realize that while this note is being written, men -are dying, every moment: not in the fulness of time, for the glory of -God and their own rest; but unduly and by wanton violence, in the -prime of manhood, with the whole making and purpose of their lives -incomplete and unrenewable. They lie in strange places, and must -sleep, not uncompanioned, but uncoffined and without memorial: mere -broken bits of life-stuff, shattered from the resemblance of humanity -by machines that must be fed with the food that women travail for, and -pray for, and, losing, break their hearts. Well, may they sleep -soundly, these soldiers of all nations who will march no more to -music, nor answer the reveille at dawn! God be gracious to them, -gallant men all, if graciousness be needed where they have gone now!</p> - -<p class="p2 center"><i class="title">Paying the Cost</i></p> - -<p><span class="sc">If</span> the death of warriors were war’s only penalty, men perhaps might be -forgiven for their battles, since heroes are made known by them. But -the world has gone to school again, to learn the lesson that is -enforced with cannons; and it knows the whole cost of war, and is -paying it, and will continue to pay it for many a year. In this -country, we have not contributed much, so far: only a hundred millions -officially, and who shall say how many millions unofficially, in -disorganized industry? But they have paid a large sum in Belgium, -where the prices are plainly marked; they have paid in France (it is -an ill winter that follows unreaped and rotting harvests); they have -paid in Austria; and the bill for the other countries is being added -up.</p> - -<p class="p2 center"><i class="title">Christianity and Civilization</i></p> - -<p><span class="sc">But</span> it is not true that Christianity has broken down, or that -civilization has broken down, as some have said in the first flush of -their indignation and sorrow. Civilization and Christianity -<!--156.png--> -have -never yet been tried in the world, so they cannot very well have -broken down. What we have had, so far, has been a pseudo-Christianity -and a pseudo-civilization. It is not so much that we have been -deliberately insincere, perhaps; but we have not faced life and the -problems of life as they should be faced; we have accepted the -imitation instead of insisting upon the genuine thing; we have given -lip-worship, but not heart-worship.</p> - -<p class="p2 center"><i class="title">Rebuilding</i></p> - -<p><span class="sc">We</span> are living, and some of us are dying, in strange, wonderful, -terrible days. There is no room for pessimism or for bravado. -Barbarism is showing us what deeds it can produce. We must answer with -deeds.</p> - -<p>Let no man who has held high rank in the Government of any country -think now that he has done well or deserves acclamations. So far as -his vision led him, he may have tried to do his duty, with foresight, -devotion, faithfulness. Yet he has failed. The Government which cannot -save its country from war has failed, whatever its other achievements. -The new ideas, the new hopes, have not been fully comprehended. And so -suspicion and enmity have been allowed to grow steadily, and the -thought of war has been constantly in men’s minds, as the inevitable -end to which the world was drifting.</p> - -<p>The thought of war should have been as impossible as the thought of -murder. The press of all nations, instead of pandering to -misunderstanding and animosities, should have educated the people, day -by day and year by year, until the curse of nationalism was lifted -from the world.</p> - -<p>For nationalism <em>has</em> been a curse, and will remain a curse, so -long as devotion to one country can involve enmity to any other. We -are brothers in one boat, as we pass from the unknown to the unknown. -Let us learn to understand each other.</p> - -<p class="p2 center"><i class="title">Benedict <abbr title="Fifteen">XV</abbr></i></p> - -<p><span class="sc">The</span> election of Cardinal della Chiesa was certainly unexpected, and it -may be hoped that this element of surprise will -<!--157.png--> -be extended to his -general policies. But if his Holiness continues, as Pontiff, to carry -out the principles of the Archbishop of Bologna, the Church will lose -far more than she can gain. What is needed now is not a saint or a -scholar or a skilful administrator, though saintliness and scholarship -and executive talent are admirable qualifications. If the Church is to -do anything more than merely mark time, or actually lose ground, she -requires as her head now a man of profound imagination and unswerving -courage. The tendency of the Papacy has been too much toward -mechanical routine, the neglect of new opportunities, the -discountenancing of new ideas, the refusal of new life. The creative -genius of the great artist, the incommunicable imaginative insights of -the great novelist or poet or painter, could give the Vatican a new -leadership in the spiritual affairs of mankind. We have seen the Pope -who condemned Modernism dying of a broken heart because Europe was -turned into a field of desolation and slaughter. The impotence of the -Pontiff to secure some regard for Christian teachings amongst -supposedly Christian nations, is at once the measure of the Church’s -weakness and the condemnation of her methods. In the spirit of the -Modernists, if not in the spirit of Modernism itself, Benedict <abbr title="Fifteen">XV</abbr> could -remove many of the mountains that stand in the way of the direct line -for the Twentieth Century, Limited. Mountains may be picturesque: but, -in the wrong place, they are merely a nuisance.</p> - -<p class="p2 center"><i class="title">Uncensored</i></p> - -<p><span class="sc">The</span> press has not had an easy task in attempting to gratify the -natural desire of the public for dramatic details of the war -operations. But even after making the fullest allowances for all -difficulties, whether due to the censorship, to broken communications, -or to the indiscretions of partisans, one can scarcely congratulate -the newspaper world as a whole upon its achievements. In New York, for -instance, there have been two or three papers which have maintained -reasonable standards; but most of the papers have published and -republished so-called news of a kind that should never have found -public record. Why should any journal waste time in announcing, in -large type, that “the Servians -<!--158.png--> -swear that the enemy will never enter -the capital so long as one house stands and one Servian lives”? This -is mere bombastic rubbish, and has nothing to do with the patriotism -and fortitude of the Servians. The appearance of perpetual “war -extras,” with no additional information, but with immense scareheads, -is another unpleasant sign of the shallowness and insincerity that we -permit in these busy days. Frothy journalism may flourish for the -moment: but the public has a better memory than it is sometimes -supposed to possess.</p> - -<p class="p2 center">“<i class="title">Civilized Warfare</i>”</p> - -<p><span class="sc">Some</span> one, somewhere, appears to be laboring under a rather serious -mistake, or we should not have been exposed so frequently during the -last few weeks to the phrase “civilized warfare.” There is no such -thing, of course, as civilized warfare. All war is necessarily -barbaric in its methods, and ludicrous in its assumption of -semi-decency. When nations go out, in the name of God, to mangle and -destroy their fellow-creatures, they are reverting to the <a -name="chg2" id="chg2"></a>primitive -profession of murder. The glory of war is the glory of murder, however -it may be embellished by infantile brains.</p> - -<p>We have heard much of atrocities and “uncivilized” outrages. Probably -most of the stories are utterly false: but even if they were true, -they would only be in full accord with the whole purpose, methods, and -disgrace of war.</p> - -<p>Let us realize, very clearly, that war is necessarily and always -murderous and barbaric, and let us abandon the pretence that we are -shocked at the annihilation of towns, the rape of women, the slaughter -of children, the desolation of once-prosperous communities. These are -the trimmings of war. If we order the feast, let us pay for it; but -let us, in the name of all decency, give up the pretence that we are -either civilized or Christianized.</p> - -<p class="p2 center"><i class="title">Saintless Petrograd</i></p> - -<p><span class="sc">The</span> official change from St. Petersburg to Petrograd removes the -intrusive saint from the Russian capital. The city -<!--159.png--> -was named after -Peter the Great, of somewhat uncouth memory, and the subsequent -sanctification by the rest of Europe was perhaps a tribute to the -religious reputation of Holy Russia.</p> - -<p>Now that the Ice has been broken, such cities as Florence, for -example, may begin to assert their right to be known, even in the -Anglo-Saxon world, by their real and native names.</p> - -<p class="p2 center"><i class="title">Thumbs Down</i></p> - -<p><span class="sc">In</span> his clever, whimsical and symbolistic play, <cite>Androcles and the Lion</cite>, -Mr. George Bernard Shaw has fallen—or a zealous proof-reader has made -it appear that he has fallen—into the usual error of “thumbs down,” -as the death signal.</p> - -<p>It is strange that this mistake should be so widely prevalent, and -should even be repeated by the <cite>Encyclopædia Britannica</cite>. But the -error, like ’round for round and laid for lay, will no doubt pass -steadily through the years.</p> - -<p>However, anyone who has not yet read Mr. Shaw’s little play should do -so at once, paying special attention to Ferrovius.</p> - -<p class="p2 center"><i class="title">The Earl of Whisky</i></p> - -<p><span class="sc">The</span> oddities of childhood are rarely understood completely, even in -these days of ingenious educational devices. The child lives and moves -and has his being in his own world. He may emerge at moments, he may -seem to understand or be understood by the great confederation of -blundering adults: but he must go back as soon as possible to the -realm of his real allegiance, where fact and fancy, dreams, doubts and -discoveries are so cunningly intermingled.</p> - -<p>Why do we forget our own childhood, and turn deaf ears and unseeing -eyes to the sounds and sights that once we should have comprehended so -easily? The world of flame, the glory of color, the music in the winds -and the darkness, the actuality of romance, the strange limits and -restrictions of knowledge! Can you remember when the earth stretched -twelve miles out, beyond doubt, and perhaps a little further? Or the -immense -<!--160.png--> -significance of double figures when the tenth birthday painted -a huge 10 across the entire sky, but nobody else particularly noticed -the phenomenon? Or the fantastic associations of certain names from -time to time, so that to live in Champagne would have seemed a -comic-opera infliction, and a Duke of Burgundy was as -Gilbert-and-Sullivanesque as a Marquess of Claret, or an Earl of -Whisky, or Baron Beer?</p> - -<p>Yet we have long had Sir Loin, and scarcely remember the cause of that -famous knighting; and now we have our copper kings, beef barons, pork -princes, and what not. Perhaps we are not so remote from the -whimsicalities of childhood as we have imagined, after all.</p> - -<p class="p2 center"><i class="title">Jaded Appetites</i></p> - -<p><span class="sc">A recent</span> advertisement of a well-known New York restaurant announced: -“Whether it is in luncheon, dinner or supper, you will find in our -menu of delicious cold specialties, ready for your selection at our -buffet in the main dining room, creations to tempt the most jaded of -appetites.”</p> - -<p>It is comforting to know that the grossly overfed man or woman need -not starve. When the appetite fails through constant indulgence, it -can be tempted to new excesses by these “delicious cold specialties,” -and so enough nourishment may be secured to preserve life.</p> - -<p>It is indeed a pitiable spectacle to see the forlorn victim of -piggishness sadly regarding a menu that can no longer entice him to -abuse his stomach. Let him now take heart and visit the restaurant -that has learnt how to “tempt the most jaded of appetites.”</p> - -<p>It is a noble work that this restaurant is doing; one well worthy of -our civilization.</p> - -<p>But who will tempt the unjaded appetites of the slum-dwellers?</p> -</div><!--end editorial notes--> - -<div class="tnote"> -<h4>Transcriber’s Note</h4> - -<p>Dialect, obsolete and alternative spellings were left -unchanged.</p> - -<p>Footnotes were moved to the end of the section to which they -pertain.</p> - -<p>Raised caps replaced dropped caps at the beginning of -each article and poem.</p> - -<p>Spelling changes:</p> - -<p> ‘conciousness’ to <a href="#chg1">‘consciousness’</a> …class-consciousness…<br /> -  ‘prmitive’ to <a href="#chg2">‘primitive’</a> …primitive profession of murder…</p> - -<p>Two lines were <a href="#omitted">omitted</a> by the editor of <span class="sc">The Forum</span> in the poem by Giovannitti. The omitted lines read:</p> -<div class="poem"> -<div class="i0">And from its bloody pedestal</div> -<div class="i2"> The last god, Terror, shall be hurled.</div> -</div> -</div><!--end transcriber note--> - - - - - - - -<pre> - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Forum, by Various - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE FORUM *** - -***** This file should be named 55299-h.htm or 55299-h.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/5/2/9/55299/ - -Produced by Carol Brown, and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - - -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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