[Sidenote: Simplicity and Harmony are Ultimate]
Simplicity and harmony are the ultimate conditions to be attained in
all things. In literature, and in music, and in oratory, and in
painting, and in mechanics, and in life, simplicity is at once the
greatest charm, and the best evidence of merit. In mechanics, a _simple
little device_ usually perfects the great labor-saving machine. In
chemistry, a _simple little ingredient_ may give culminating power to a
world-building or a world-destroying compound. In oratory, a _simple
and impassioned appeal_ is most potent to move the multitude to action;
and in menticulture, the _simple and direct application of the germ
cure_, may be able to effect a millennium in social evolution within a
generation. Stranger things have happened! Because it has not happened,
is no reason why it should not happen. In fact, there are logical
reasons why the habit of repression should have smothered any idea of
germ cure, till Science placed an analogy in physics before our eyes;
especially because the false hypothesis of original (or natural) sin,
has been persistently advanced as a law of our being.
[Sidenote: Germ Cure not Understood]
Christ taught the germ cure, and hinted at no other as an alternative.
In the sermon on the mount; in his talks by the Sea of Galilee; and in
his rebuke of the devil in the desert, there was no note of indecision
suggested. _Do_ and _be_ and _get_ were unmistakable commands. But
these commands were given in a gentle manner, to half-doubting
disciples, and faintly echoed by them to an incredulous world, that had
not learned the power of mind over matter, or over itself; and hence
the world waited for Science to prove even greater possibilities,
before giving heed to the _simple_ commands of the Great Teacher in the
manner he commanded.
[Sidenote: Order of Responsibility]
One of the great weaknesses of the age in which we live is the ignoring
of first principles, and a reaching out for the remote or unattainable.
In the matter of home responsibilities, and in menticulture, this is
most apparent. The order of responsibility is--the mind,--the body--the
mind of the child--the body or health of the child--and so on in the
sequence of relationship in the family, in the community, in the
nation, and in the world; not with selfish discrimination against the
more remote, but with zealous care of the nearer relationships. This
order, however, is rarely observed. We weed the garden, but do not weed
the mind. We pass laws to punish any who strike, or rob, or corrupt a
citizen, but there is no law to protect the abused or neglected
children of drunken or incompetent parents, except in extreme cases.
Breeders of fine animals take the greatest pains to guard all the
conditions surrounding their stock, and at the same time encourage
family alliance with consumptive plutocrats.
[Sidenote: _Laissez Faire_ Superseded]
The antiquated and primitive doctrine of _laissez faire_, has been
replaced by those of Division of Labor, and of Protection, in the cases
of the strong who have demanded them, or who have purchased them
through legislative cupidity; but still obtains in the cases of the
weak and non-assertive.
[Sidenote: Strength Protected Weakness Unprotected]
The truant subjects of great nations, scattered in foreign lands, are
hedged about with protection equal to an imperial guard; and thousands
of men and millions of money are sacrificed to revenge an insult to, or
protect the property of a claimant citizen at the Antipodes; while
hundreds and thousands of the producers at home are starving and dying,
because of the maladministration of the first principles of economies,
and the _laissez faire license_ given to selfish and unscrupulous
competition.
Arrogant commerce, and the already-powerful, have no end of protection;
but the mind, the health, the child, and the producer, are left to the
tender mercy of chance, or are hampered by crushing conditions of abuse
and neglect contrary to every law of growth; and thus it must be; until
we adopt the germ cure, as a principle of menticulture, and
Emancipation, as the first evidence of intelligence and respectability.
[Sidenote: Wasting Precious Time]
In self-administration, the far-away habit is quite as prevalent as in
the administration of Society. Men and women slave and save, to furnish
means for sending missionaries to India, to release the Indian mind of
imagined evils, while they crawl about servile to anger or worry, or
both anger and worry. They set their ideal of happiness at an
indefinite height, always out of reach. They hide their Heaven behind
the curtain of death, and refuse to look for it within the precincts of
their own heart. They waste precious time in speculating as to the form
and attributes of the Cause of all things, its residence and
disposition, while they smother under the pall of inappreciation, the
best evidence of its existence, and the most potent workings of its
power, within themselves. And all this because they work from the wrong
end, and are dull to the efficacy of growth from the basis of
Emancipation.
Their method of life is like the unraveling of a snarled skein from the
middle. They fumble futilely at the snarl, and accomplish little, if
anything, when they ought first to release the end within themselves,
and follow the cord from that beginning, along the line of growth and
organization, to the condition of unrestricted freedom, and
usefulness,--the condition of Emancipated Brotherhood.
[Sidenote: Nations Founded About an Idea]
Religions are founded, fraternal societies are formed, armies are
marshalled, and nations are grown about a sympathetic idea, to which
the majority subscribe. The aim is always the same: growth, protection,
harmony, happiness, Heaven. But the growth is slow, the protection is
only partial, the harmony is incomplete, perfect happiness is
impossible, and Heaven is indefinite and remote; because their
organization tolerates selfishness as a necessary "mark of Cain,"
instead of being built on the foundation of Emancipation.
All true calculation must recognize a unit of value; in menticulture
the only true unit is Emancipation.
In harmony, instruments cannot be tuned from several standards; there
must be one key-note; and harmony in menticulture can only come from
the key-note--Emancipation.