I had heard so much about this Rabbi Tagore and his message of calm for
our hustling, feverish life, that I thought I would try to put some of
that stuff into practice.
"Shut out the clamour of small things. Withdraw into the deep quiet of
your soul, commune with infinite beauty and infinite peace. You must be
full of gladness and love for every person and every tiniest thing.
Great activity and worry is needless--it is poison to the soul. Learn to
reflect, and to brood upon eternal beauty. It is the mystic who finds
all that is most precious in life. The flowers of meditation blossom in
his heart." I cut out these words and pasted them in my hat. I have
always felt that my real genius lies in the direction of philosophic
calm. I determined to override the brutal clamour of petty things.
The alarm clock rang as usual at 6.30. Calmly, with nothing but lovely
thoughts in my mind, I threw it out of the window. I lay until eight
o'clock, communing with infinite peace. I began to see that Professor
Tagore was right. My wife asked me if I was going to the office. "I am
brooding upon eternal beauty," I told her.
She thought I was ill, and made me take breakfast in bed.
I usually shave every morning, but a moment's thought will convince you
that mystics do not do so. I determined to grow a beard. I lit a cigar,
and replied "I am a mystic" to all my wife's inquiries.
At nine o'clock came a telephone call from the office. My employer is
not a devotee of eternal calm, I fear. When I explained that I was at
home reading "Gitanjali," his language was far from mystical. "Get here
by ten o'clock or you lose your job," he said.
I was dismayed to see the same old throng in the subway, all the
senseless scuffle and the unphilosophic crowd. But I felt full of
gladness in my new way of life, full of brotherhood for all the world.
"I love you," I said to the guard on the platform. He seized me by the
shoulders and rammed me into the crowded car, shouting "Another nut!"
When I reached the office my desk was littered with a hundred papers.
The stenographer was at the telephone, trying to pacify someone. "Here
he is now," I heard her say.
It was Dennis & Company on the wire.
"How about that carload of Bavarian herrings we were to have yesterday
without fail?" said Dennis.