I sometimes come to the conclusion that it is in Winter that a
Philosopher has his several trials. That is, of course, a married
Philosopher. For of the other sort I take no account, seeing that with
their mode of life they have little need of Philosophy, unless, indeed,
it be esteemed so lowly a remedy as to be put at the beck and call of
men for evils they invite to themselves. Philosophy I hold to be a
Patent Medicine of the higher sort, which is to be taken only for those
afflictions brought us by others, and by which we are enabled to assuage
our own misery through inspecting from an elevated plane the folly, or
extravagance, or weakness of those who have afflicted us. It is a
mental jack-screw by which we wind ourselves up to a height from which
we can look down on lacks in others. To lose sight of our own pain
after shooting down a flight of steps, in grave pitying contemplation
of the stupidity of the chambermaid who left the bar of soap on the
first step--that is your true Philosophy. And the man who forgets to
rub his back, through pitying her ignorance, is the true philosopher.
It is a quality from the gods, and whether exhibited over the minor
calamity of soap, or the graver distress to which the married
Philosopher too often falls heir, shows its origin in a heavenly calm.
To him, I think I have said, this calm has its severe trial in the
winter; but now that I think of it again, if I were writing this in
the summer, I should say that season was the severest. Indeed, thinking
of it still further, I am puzzled to decide on any season that does
not bring to him the severest trials of his heavenly serenity. The
other night Mrs. Boyzy, as she slipped one of the little stockings off
the wooden ball, which has served our children for so many years and
so many purposes--from filling out a croquet set, to the braining of
their parents--her kindly, and to me still beautiful face, lighting
up with a smile, said: "We are having a real gay winter in Staunton,
dear." Alas, I knew it well, Between High Teas and Blue Teas, and
Ladies' Lunches and Bands of Twenties, I knew it well. I knew it from
the number of times that I have had to steal in like a thief in the
night, at my own side gate and make my way into a cold set-out in the
nursery, while a High Tea was progressing down stairs accompanied by
the hum of feminine voices. I knew it from the cold nights I have had
to carry our eldest daughter to her club, with the dreary reflection
that it was to be still colder later, when young Jones or young Tompkins
would have to bring her home; and when Mrs. Boyzy would wake me from
my slumber and in dressing gown and slippers I would shiver behind the
front door till young Jones and she, after much low murmuring, would
separate, and the light of the family would consent to come inside.
I knew it. I always know it, 'being a victim of dyspepsia--from the
bonbons and other gim-cracks which are served out at my family table
after these lunches and teas, and which are persistently served out
until, as my wife calls it, they are "finished." Had I not that very
evening had served to me a piece of fruit-cake made, I believe, when
our eldest girl was in short dresses! I knew it from the short party
calls which have rattled like bird-shot against the Boyzy mansion, to
the utter wreck of my quiet evenings with Mrs. Boyzy--a woman that I
had much rather talk to than all the callers in the world. And all
this that I knew so well, was put by that estimable woman under the
head of a "real gay winter." Before I could apply the elevating mental
jack-screw that raises me above all earthly troubles, I could not help
feeling that the inquiry was pretty much like asking a scrambling
lobster boiling in the pot, if he was not having a real gay evening?
I am afraid I mentioned--some such impression to my wife, for I was
soon astonished by finding that I was instrumental in the whole
business. "But, my dear," she replied, "we have to do it. Every one
does it." We! I was astonished to find that instead of being a victim
I had been an accessory, perhaps the chief criminal, in bringing it
about. A few questions from the ever-ready partner of my joys soon
convinced me that if I had not been a great criminal, it was only
through lack of time and opportunity. Did I have any idea of what was
due to the position of my family in society? What would become of our
children's "prospects"? What sort of life would my family lead--and
here the severe inflection of her voice convinced my crime-stricken
conscience that nothing but a miracle--and Mrs. Boyzy--could have saved
my family from utter social destruction if I had been allowed to have
my way. Happily, by this time, Philosophy had come to my aid, and
looking through its beautifying and mellowing mist, all was changed.
The teas and the lunches and the clubs appeared in the brightest tints;
the shivering waits behind the front door changed into evening strolls
into tropical gardens; the gray sprinkled hair of my wife changed into
the sunny auburn of her youth, and she once more stood in the little
church of our old home listening to the words, "For better or for
worse." Happy the married Philosopher who wears around his neck with
an even temper and an understanding mind, this talisman of happiness
devised by far-seeing men of other days--"For better or for worse."
Man cannot harm him nor Womankind disappoint him.
* * * * *
I have been sitting up by the bedside of a dying Adjective. It was not
through pity that I sat there, but through hate. For I detest an
Adjective. It is the father of lies, the author of affectation and the
progenitor of all exaggeration. They should be remitted to limbo with
all the other crudities of youth. I have listened to the point of
exasperation, through an evening, to the absurd use of adjectives by
young girls of education and with some claims to good taste. Somehow
it sometimes comes to me, that this use of adjectives is the besetting
sin of the female conversationalists of this day. Some young fellows
unsex themselves so far as to follow the bad example, but the majority
of that sex substitute oaths for adjectives, which is a social habit
on too low a plane for criticism here. But on all sides in the social
conversation of the young people of this day, it seems to be agreed
to give good, plain, strong English the go-by and to indulge in the
embroidery of adjectives. Tawdry adjectives such as 'beautiful',
'lovely,' 'horrid', 'awful', and the like worn tinsel. I suppose I
might venture the assertion without fear of contradiction, that this
is the stock in trade in most young girls in qualifying their
conversation. The use of that tinsel gives a wholly unreal tone to
what is being said and is so pregnant with affectation as to be
tiresome. Between slang and adjectives, it is hard to choose, both are
so detestable from a woman's lips. The difference is that the adjective
insidiously captures the refined mind, while slang only holds captive
the coarse mind. In a plain and intended to be truthful statement of
any occurrence, the injection of three or four adjectives will change
the whole tenor of narration, and give it a vraisemblance of untruth
which it is hard for the hearer's mind to erase. As a matter of fact,
an adjective ought to be a thought, not a word. A fact should be stated
without embroidery, and we should think whether it is beautiful, lovely,
and the like. There are many thoughts in the human mind that are not
translatable into words. They may have been in some other language
long gone, but they are not so in ours. As those words have gone into
oblivion, so should the majority of our English adjectives follow them.
I have forgotten to tell the patient I have been sitting up with. It
is the adjective 'tasty.' Years ago Mrs. Boyzy set her foot down on
this word, and as in duty bound, I also set my foot down. Whether our
two feet have stamped the unhappy adjective out, or from some other
cause that I know not of, its end has certainly come. As in all fierce
popular outbreaks against long existing oppression, the weakest and
most insignificant of the oppressors are often the first to fall, so
this unexaggerative, unaggressive, ill-sounding little adjective is
the first to die. Let us hope that an early day be appointed unto the
others to follow it.
* * * * *
Have you ever watched a man going down? It is an interesting study,
and a unique one, for the reason that no other animal has language by
which to express the various stages at which he arrives before dropping
out of the Procession of Life. Nor has any animal so many contrivances
with which to dodge and play at hide and seek with Death. The earthly
affection which abides in man, seems to overmaster all the other
emotions--faith, hope, everything,--and he who firmly believes in a
future existence is found as frantic in his efforts to delay its coming,
as the veriest agnostic. Then faith seems to be a theological treasure
of this earth, rather than a treasure of the future. The man with no
tie to bind his soul to this planet is as reluctant to leave it as he
who has the strongest ties of friendship, love and fatherhood. All
mankind seem to have that dread of it which their children have of
being put in a dark closet. But I am not going to investigate the
mysterious dread of death, or the even more mysterious attachment to
life. I am merely recalling to my memory men whom I have seen stagger
awhile and then fall out of the line of life. There is no more pathetic
sight to me, than a man when he first finds that he is failing. Like
a child, he cannot understand it. This strange feeling that he has
never had before; that pain that must come from this or that--they are
all so new to him. He cannot realize that he is failing, and least of
all can he realize the dread truth that it is time for him to fail.
To a man's own mind he is always at that mythical stage, his "prime,"
as long as health lasts. It is piteous to hear his excuses for his
failing body--it was this imprudence, it was that cold, it was too
much or too little exercise--he cannot understand that it is the herald
of the Messenger, and that a little way off through the mist he might
see the Messenger himself holding the Lotus flower in his hand. It is
more piteous still to see him, like a captured animal, seeking some
way of escape through the bars. He must get a horse--it is only exercise
he wants; he must have a longer vacation--it is only rest he wants;
he must have more society--it is only recreation he needs; he must
have less society--it is only quiet he requires. His blindness is
inexplicable. He will walk in a garden and point out to you a tree
that cannot last longer than such a time; he will point to a worn-out
beast of burden that must die at such a time; he knows the death date
of everything that springs from earth except himself. In his blind
hope he grasps at the worst of straws. No new universal panacea comes
out that he does not seize on it, and that he is not sure, for a little
while is doing him good. At last he weakens in the struggle and is
taken to the rear. The procession of Life moves on; he never joins it
again. If all this had happened to only one man, the World would be
in tears. As it happens to all men, the World hardly gives it a thought.
But to him, that One Man is all the world, and it is hard to get his
thoughts away from himself. As the Procession of Life passes on, and
the hum of its marching columns grows fainter on his ears, let us hope
that there may come to him that unworldly quiet that Death pityingly
sends in advance, and amid which Hope steals noiselessly away from the
bedside to make room for Faith. And in which he may take the pale
flower from the hand of the Messenger, and following him through the
dawn of a new birth, see another Hand, holding out to him the purple
amaranth of Eternal Life.