We found we were a bit tied in the Middle West, caught somewhat whether
we liked it or not, in the meshes of possession. Steve and I had liked
it much out on the Southern California strand.... When one reads in the
earlier book,[12] the stress that we put on building that big stone
house on Lake Erie; this felicitous hejira may disconcert.
[12] _Child and Country._
The fact is, we wearied of possession. We found ourselves yearning
for that beauty which is unconfined. We were athirst for new things,
a different break of seasons and taxes.... The world was so full of
people who could build and buy and own and insure, that we decided we
should be doing the things that the others could not. We were glad to
have built the house for the other fellow. We had to do it. We learned
how to run it well, in and out--but it was a stone house. When a man
builds a stone house with walls eighteen inches thick, he must leave a
hole to get out; also he must be sure that he isn't building on his own
chest.... In true Hive spirit, we renounced at the highest moment of
possession.
The crowd cannot be seen by one who stands in the crowd. On the same
basis a man cannot see the relation of his house to the road or garden
from the inside of the house. The world must be regarded from outside
to be seen as a whole. The New Race is determined to see it so. This
_outside_ is none other than the mystical viewpoint of all world
artists and builders.
One does not know what friends are, until one discovers that the secret
of friendship is not in getting but in giving. No one knows what love
is until he reverses all the laws that the many follow now. I do not
mean lawlessness. I mean the higher law that is found at last by the
quester after goodness, beauty and truth. We have to finish with the
world as it is before we set out in quest of a better country.... We
found that we had to become active servants of a finer ideal than
householding at its highest. We determined to do more than to dream
this ideal; we set about to make a better country. At worst, we work
for our children.
It came to us many times before we moved that we were forever
done with things as they are; that we had come to the end of show
and property-measure and hoarding; to the end of the love of self
which destroys the vision for friendship; to the end of domesticity
which holds one's neighbour as prey or rival; to the end of civic
identification, or relation with any federated commonwealth, which
fancies its existence threatened by the prosperity of other political
bodies. No heat about it.
We came to the edge of the Lake in vanloads; we went away with bags....
I turned from the eastern distance on the bluff, on one of the last
days, and looked at the vined study and the big stone house, the elms
so strong and green about it. I remembered the early picture of all
this. It began from Stevenson's _Treasure of Franchard_, many years
ago,--how old Dr. Duprez went out in the morning and tried grapes and
plums with the dew on them, sniffing the perfumes of his own yard,
dwelling in his own orchards.
I remember one day before building that the man came to us about the
young trees. He had pictures of them in books--blooms and fruits of
such colours that nature would never be guilty of--all the fruits I
heard of as a boy--white grapes that never grow in this country, purple
ones that grow whether you care or not....
The trees were coming on now, many with ripening fruit. The grove of
elms was a matter of collateral, as the bank would say. The break-water
had caught up thousands of yards of sand. It worked--the old struggle
of wasting banks forgotten until a greater storm. The honeysuckles that
were planned to climb the bars of the study windows, had to be trimmed
now for any light at all. The wistaria trailed admirably and imposed
upon the front the sense of years.
... We had planned to have all the fruits; some of the finest were now
in flower. We came with many clothes, underwear and outerwear, wool and
dark things. We left with a few light effects in our hands--to find a
place where white garments might be worn in peace. We came with a great
idea of food--game and fishes, meats, poultry, many cans and vegetables
and desserts. We went away with a taste for graham bread and butter--a
spread of honey, a glass of milk. We came with a fear of disease for
the children, fear of colds, fear of losing something, or having
something taken away, doubtless having the fear of death and accident.
We went away with a clear idea of what death is and the advantage of
it, children and adults alike.
Young children rode the horse that had a reputation for being
wild-spirited and very much a man's mount. We had seen the deep places
of the Lake fill with sunshine. We came with parasols and awnings and
protections against the sun. Most of us would like to have worn nothing
but a breech-clout had the town permitted; and the only time we had
found the world hard to bear, was the long grey Spring days of rain.
Sunlight--it is closer to God and happiness and manhood and every
delight than words can suggest. The more you know of it, the more you
need; the more you love it, the more its mysterious excellence unfolds.
I know what sunstroke is, and what the sickness from heat is. It's a
vile state of the body, or vile clothing that stifles the body. When
one is well and has learned to come back to the Father of Lights--there
is no fear in his heart. I used to wear a helmet and dark glasses, but
no more--eyes stronger than ever. I look for the sun in the morning and
stare up from the sand into his face at high noon. There is nothing the
matter with sunlight. The sadness and the sickness is with those who
bring their quilts and cloaks to hide it from their flesh....
It's all in synthesis. The end of bulk possession is pain.... We
started in with many flowers. We ended with roses. It's all in the
tea-rose.... By careful selection of thoughts over a little period, we
can come into the joy of flowers in other people's gardens. There are
brave men who allow you to walk in their orchards; and there are many
who work hard to raise fruits for a price. There is much joy, if you
really look at it, in building a house for another fellow.
We start with the brute materials--beginning with the clay itself.
Our cultivations become more intensive through the years. All life is
so. We take the extract of a thing at last--a shelf of books where
formerly we wanted a roomful--somebody's else little rented bungalow,
where formerly we wanted an estate. We realise, at last, that there is
an essence to be obtained from the extract, an oil from the essence--a
spirit at last from the oil. The whole story is in that--synthesis.
Slowly, at last, we begin to set ourselves free. We descend into
matter; learn its lessons and laws, rise like a plant through the
darkness to the light, integrating force to meet and cope with the new
and lighter element. I held up seven little books in one hand--weighing
no more than a new novel.
"It's all in these," I said to the Chapel. "One could put these in his
bag and have it all."
... And then at last, I went down alone and empty-handed to the shore,
meditated on God with sun and sand and flowing airs.... All matter
is scaffolding which falls away. A man thinks he builds a house for
himself, but no sooner has he put on the last tile than death or the
open road calls. He chooses his climate and grows out of it. He thinks
he must possess, that he must hoard against a rainy day, and he gathers
the stuff of death about him. If he cannot rise, death covers him
for the time. Dr. Duprez didn't speak of the care of his orchard, or
his garden. It was all _story_ to me. Dear R.L.S. He didn't dream
of the work of the hand necessary to keep up an orchard, and have a
connoisseur's joy for a few summer days of the year. He didn't tell
of the parasites, the sprinklings, the arsenates and pumps, nor of
the little winged migrators that sit on the hills, waiting for the
potatoes to come up. The call comes to possess nothing. It had better
be answered.
11