novelist Richardson and their correspondence has a certain mortuary
interest. For Young’s letters are as gloomy as his verses; they are
largely taken up with predicting his own speedy death, which, however,
Richardson awaited in vain, as the aged poet survived him. In his own
last moments Richardson may have felt something akin to resentment at
having wasted his sympathy on one who would attend his funeral.
We look backward too much and we look forward too much. Thus we miss
the passing moment. In our regrets and apprehensions, we miss the only
eternity of which man can be absolutely sure, the eternal Present. For
it is always NOW.
As Browning’s clever Bishop Blougram remarked:
Do you know, I have often had a dream
(Work it up in your next month’s article)
Of man’s poor spirit in its progress, still
Losing true life forever and a day
Through ever trying to be and ever being--
In the evolution of successive spheres--
Before its actual sphere and place of life,
Halfway into the next, which having reached
It shoots with corresponding foolery
Halfway into the next still, on and off!
As when a traveller, bound from North to South,
Scouts fur in Russia; what’s its use in France?
If France spurns flannel; what’s its need in Spain?
If Spain drops cloth, too cumbrous for Algiers!
Linen goes next, and last the skin itself,
A superfluity in Timbuctoo.
When, through his journey, was the fool at ease?
When Thoreau was questioned as to his beliefs in a life beyond the
grave, he answered impatiently, “Oh, one world at a time.”
I was deeply impressed in reading Dr. Cushing’s admirable biography of
Sir William Osler, to see that the physician and philosopher laid the
greatest stress on living one day at a time. That was his summary of
the art of living, for all those who wished to accomplish as much as
possible, and retain their peace of mind: Live one day at a time.
I remember, when I was twenty years old, I wasted many good hours in
speculating on what I should do after graduation from college, which
event was two years ahead. An old man told me not to give it a moment’s
thought: “You cannot decide what to do till the emergency comes.”
Meanwhile there was the daily work. The best way to prepare for the
future was to do that well, rather than waste one’s energies on idle
worry.
“Give us this day our daily bread.”
There are always gloomy prophets who cannot enjoy the present moment,
because they are so sure trouble is coming. The winter of 1917–1918
was the coldest in my recollection; and many said, “Well, the climate
is changing and we must not expect any mild winters.” Then came the
winter of 1918–1919, which was the mildest in my recollection. And
how distinctly I recall conversations like the following. Along about
Christmastide, I would say, “What a beautiful winter!” and in every
instance, without a single exception, I got the reply, “Just wait.
We’ll catch it later.” Then when the weather continued sweet all
through January, I made the same remark to different individuals,
and always got a warning for my pains. But the evil came not at all.
My friends had determined to be miserable. They could not enjoy a
lovely mild season, for in its loveliness they shook with the chill of
apprehension.
The fear of life is the favourite disease of the twentieth century.
Too many people are afraid of tomorrow--their happiness is poisoned
by a phantom. Many are afraid of old age, forgetting that even if
they should lose their bodily vigour, weakness itself may minister to
the development of the mind and spirit. In the words of the aged poet
Waller,
The soul’s dark cottage, battered and decayed,
Lets in new light through chinks that time has made.
Stronger by weakness, wiser men become,
As they draw near to their eternal home.
Let the scientists worry about our origin--slime, monkeys, what not;
let the prophets worry about our future--“the decline of western
civilisations,” and what not. Some people are alarmed because in nine
thousand billion years the sun’s fuel may give out. Instead of chagrin
over our past, and alarm over our future, suppose we consider our
opportunity.
Listen to Emerson: “Write it on your heart that every day is the best
day in the year. No man has earned anything rightly until he knows that
every day is doomsday. Today is a king in disguise. Today always looks
mean to the thoughtless, in the face of a uniform experience that all
good and great and happy actions are made up precisely of these blank
todays. Let us not be deceived, let us unmask the king as he passes.”
Our Lord, in his daily conversations, was always drawing the attention
of his listeners away from vague speculations, to the present moment
and the present opportunity. To such absurd enquiries as, “Whose wife
shall she be in heaven?” he said, “God is not the God of the dead, but
of the living.” To the man who said that he must postpone action until
he had attended a funeral, the Master replied crisply, “Let the dead
bury the dead and come and follow me.” And after an enumeration of the
various worries about the future with which men and women torment their
minds, he said, “Take no thought for the morrow.” Do not worry about
the future. He added, significantly, that if we are determined to look
for trouble, we can find it today without waiting for tomorrow.
X
CITY AND COUNTRY
It is generally assumed that the country is more romantic, more
poetical than the city; but it would not be so easy to prove this,
if one were put to the test. “God made the country and man made the
town,” said William Cowper, which meant simply that he preferred rural
life. It is rather amusing to consider that in our age, which is so
often called the age of machines, and when many people are afraid that
simplicity and individuality will be lost, country places, mountain
scenery, and the wilderness are more popular than ever before.
Now there are fashions in outdoor nature just as there are fashions
in clothes. Today everyone must profess a love for mountains whether
one really likes them or not; for mountains are very fashionable.
Switzerland is the playground of the world; and the inhabitants make
a larger income off their barren rocks than most communities make off
fertile and productive plains.
But it is only within two hundred years that mountains have been
generally admired. Before that time they were usually regarded as ugly
excrescences, both disagreeable and dangerous; and at the best they
were no more to be regarded as objects of beauty than pimples. English
gentlemen who made the Grand Tour in the seventeenth century thought
the Alps were disgusting; they were a monstrous and abominable barrier
that must be crossed before the traveller could reach the smiling
landscape of Italy.
When Addison wrote home from his travels in 1701, he said that he had
had “a very troublesome journey over the Alps. My head is still giddy
with mountains and precipices; and you can’t imagine how much I am
pleased with the sight of a plain!” Such a remark would injure the
reputation of a modern pilgrim; but Addison made it in perfect good
faith, and with no apology.
Perhaps some of our contemporary love of wild scenery is owing to
the comfortable circumstances in which we behold it; transportation,
tunnels, fine hotels, luxuries of every description enable us to view
mountains in security and serenity; but if we had to pass over them in
acute discomfort and in constant danger, our attitude might be more
like Addison’s. This by no means explains why the once “horrid” has
become fashionable; but it helps to explain the modern love of wild
scenery.
Had Addison been told that two centuries later people would build
hotels on the edge of Alpine precipices, he would have dismissed the
idea as a silly dream; no one would put a roadhouse there. “But, Mr.
Addison, I am not talking of roadhouses. These hotels are not on the
way to something else; they are not a means, they are an end. People
will travel three thousand miles from California to New York, sail
three thousand miles from New York to Europe just to spend the summer
in a mountain hotel, where it costs twenty dollars a day--” he would
have regarded the coming generation as idiotic.
It was Thomas Gray, author of the _Elegy_, who was one of the first
English travellers to see the beauty of the Alps, and it was he
therefore who is originally responsible for making them fashionable.
He and Horace Walpole drove over the mountains in a chaise, and Gray
wrote to his friend West, “Not a precipice, not a torrent, not a cliff,
but is pregnant with religion and poetry. There are certain scenes that
would awe an atheist into belief.” This was a new note in literature.
It is my belief that mountains and wild scenery are more appreciated
today by citified folk who love them for the change and novelty than
they are by those who are forced to live among them all the time. When
I was young, I walked with three of my college mates from New Haven to
the White Mountains; it was a fine expedition, and took us some three
weeks. I remember toward twilight on a certain day we entered a gorge
and passed through into a place surrounded by austere mountains.
A farmer addressed us: “Where do you boys come from?”
“Connecticut.”
He slowly and solemnly repeated the word CONN-ECT-ICUT--as though he
were saying MESOPOTAMIA, and added, “My, I’d like to see Connecticut.”
We told him it was not so very remarkable.
“We have no such mountains as these in Connecticut.”
He replied, “Oh, damn these mountains! I’m sick of the sight of them.”
And it appeared that he had never been out of that valley.
I spend a quarter of my life in the country, and love it, but if I had
to choose between living all my life in the country or in a large city,
I should choose the city immediately. And I believe this is true of
most people.
A crowd of unemployed some years ago stood in line at the Detroit city
hall. A man came up and offered every one in turn good wages, good
food, a good place to sleep, and plenty of fresh air, if he would take
for the summer a job on a farm. Every one of the men laughed at him.
Some of us more fortunate folks are irritated by this, for in America
everybody thinks that everybody else ought to be a farmer. But the
truth is that man does not live by bread alone. People do not live in
order to live--merely for healthy surroundings and good food. They want
excitement, they want something interesting. Who can blame them? Don’t
you feel that way yourself?
We should all contribute to the Fresh Air Funds, because little
children of the slums ought to have a chance to see unimpaired nature.
But very few of the children would be willing to stay there, and in
some cases after a few days they are homesick for their native filth.
The city is one continuous theatre, admission free; the street is the
best playground in this world. There is a fire, a street fight, the
appearance of policemen, an arrest, an automobile accident--all the day
and all the night, “something doing.”
Thus it is not at all strange that the majority prefer the crowded
conditions of the slums to the fresh air of the country; for other
things being equal, isn’t that about the way we all feel?
XI
AGE BEFORE BEAUTY
This frequently-heard statement is a left-handed compliment; like
many conventional tributes, it carries a smirk rather than a smile.
Underneath the formal and hollow homage paid to the ancient the
preference is of course elsewhere. It is somewhat like the so-called
complimentary vote given to the “favourite son” at a political
convention, which no one takes seriously, not even the son. Nothing
would perhaps more shockingly disconcert the ballot-casters than to
have their candidate receive other than local support.
In the expression Age Before Beauty, it is implied that the two are
incompatible; you cannot have both. Yet upon a little reflexion it will
appear that the vast majority of objects that receive human attention
become more and more beautiful with the accumulation of years. I can
think of only two classes of things that are more beautiful in their
early than in their later existence.
I refer first to all varieties of animal life, including man; second to
all objects whose main purpose is practical usefulness.
It ought to be obvious that kittens, puppies, baby lions, boys and
girls are fairer to look upon than aged cats, rheumatic hounds,
toothless lions, decrepit men, and time-worn harridans--such as
guide you to your seat in the Paris theatres. It is true that the
ecclesiastical poet, Dr. Donne, made a couplet comforting to some whose
youth is only a memory.
Nor Spring nor Summer’s beauty hath such grace
As I have seen in one autumnal face.
But you will observe he said “one” not many; and he had in mind not
a number of charming old ladies, but just one. No doubt there are a
sufficient number of exceptions to give added stability to the rule.
Browning said the reason why youth is so fair is that it would be
intolerable without it; beauty is youth’s only asset. Nature makes
boys and girls lovely to look upon so they can be tolerated until they
acquire some sense. As soon as they are able to pull their weight
in the work of the world and in the intellectual clearing-house of
society, then grace and beauty depart. Thus mature people who have
no brains and no sense are the last word in futility. They are as
ridiculous as old apple-blossoms which for some reason never went into
fruition.
The second class of objects which are beautiful only in youth are
those which are built mainly for use. The purpose of an automobile is
to go. A motor car one year old is better than when ten years old; it
is also more attractive to the eye. I suppose Americans are the only
people in the world who often buy new cars. If an Englishman has a
car that carries him satisfactorily, he keeps it; the American “turns
it in.” There is no more striking evidence of the “prosperity” of the
American people than the twofold fact of the abundance of new cars, and
also--amazing, when you think about it--that the tremendously efficient
T-model Ford was not sufficiently lovely to pay for its continued
manufacture.
When I was a boy, the number of my acquaintances whose fathers owned a
horse and carriage could be counted on the fingers of one hand, like
those who now own a steam yacht; the fact that the old Ford car is not
“good enough” indicates how times have changed. For the proper epitaph
for the T-model we should have to adapt the words of Shakespeare, which
he put into a funeral oration:
But yesterday the Ford T-model might
Have stood against the world; now lies it there,
And none so poor to do it reverence.
Beauty and newness are inseparable in the case of bicycles,
grocery-wagons, machinery, steamboats, factory buildings, flannel
shirts, shoes, typewriters, trousers, socks; with all of these articles
age means ugliness. In mechanical objects there is no charm in the
accumulation of years.
But cathedrals, trees, mountains, castles, manor-houses, college lawns,
violins, with the increase of age take on not only dignity but beauty.
A thirteenth-century cathedral is more lovely than a glossy new church;
an old tree is more beautiful than any sapling; the ancient turf in the
quads of Oxford is fairer to behold than the graded front yard of a new
house in Dakota.
Why do hundreds of thousands of Americans travel gladly in Europe
every summer? Mainly for one thing. It is that their Yankee eyes may
have the sensation of seeing objects which the wear of centuries has
made beautiful. Many of us Americans have had the natural habit of
associating beauty with newness; the new hat, the new clothes, the new
motor car, the new stadium. It is worth while to discover that there
are innumerable objects where age, instead of being a humiliation and
a “depreciation,” is not only an asset, but a thing of beauty whose
loveliness increases.
Boys and girls brought up in the slums naturally regard newness as
essential to beauty and worth; the Fresh Air Fund should, if possible,
take them not only to fresh woods and fields, but illuminate their
minds with the sight of buildings whose age, instead of tarnishing, has
made them surpassingly attractive. Henry James, in one of his novels,
has a boy from the London slums entertained overnight in an English
country house. This is what he saw as he looked out of his window in
the early morning.
“He had never in his life been in the country--the real country, as
he called it, the country which was not the mere ravelled fringe of
London--and there entered through his open casement the breath of
a world enchantingly new and after his feverish hours unspeakably
refreshing; a sense of sweet sunny air and mingled odours, all
strangely pure and agreeable, and of a musical silence that consisted
for the greater part of the voices of many birds. There were tall quiet
trees near by and afar off and everywhere.... There was something in
the way the grey walls rose from the green lawn that brought tears to
his eyes; the spectacle of long duration unassociated with some sordid
infirmity or poverty was new to him; he had lived with people among
whom old age meant for the most part a grudged and degraded survival.
In the favored resistance of Medley was a serenity of success, an
accumulation of dignity and honour.”
XII
CHURCH UNITY
I have in mind a tiny country village containing one large Catholic
church and four small Protestant churches--Baptist, Methodist,
Presbyterian, Episcopal. The Catholic church holds services every
Sunday, every holy day and on many other occasions; these services are
well attended. Although the four Protestant churches are very small
they are not small enough; some of them have long periods when they are
not opened at all, and the others are never crowded.
It is not surprising that there should be many sects and denominations
among Protestants, for the central principle of Protestantism is
individual judgment, which makes uniformity neither possible nor
desirable; and, indeed, in large cities it is a good thing that we have
so many and such a variety of sectarian church services.
For the variety is not in religious faith; they are all following the
same religion. The variety is in the form of worship, what I call
religious etiquette.
There are many people who on account of their parentage and early
associations love an elaborate ritual, with the clergy in uniform, the
vested choir, etc. There are other persons, equally devout, who are
repelled by ritualism; they like to see the minister in mufti and to
have a service as informal and simple as possible. There are those who
would be shocked by the language used by certain soap-box exhorters,
but if they cannot endure these things they might remember that God
has to listen to them, and take them as a compliment. Perhaps that is
what is meant by the Divine Patience. These people feel religiously at
home only in a dignified and elaborate service. But there are others
who in a “high” church feel as if they were at an opera; their senses
may be touched, but their hearts are cold. They are spectators, not
worshippers.
How fortunate it is then that in every city of reasonable size every
Protestant has the power of choice. If one church service or preacher
“gets on his nerves” he can go elsewhere, where his precious nerves
will be soothed rather than ruffled, and he can worship God with an
etiquette to which he is accustomed.
When a young man and woman become engaged to be married it is extremely
probable that during the courtship they will at one time or another
discuss religion; the girl will probably ask the man for his views on
the subject.
During the engagement of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett, when
their communications had to be mainly through the post office, she
wrote out her religious views, and he immediately responded in an
unequivocal manner. Four years later he used these two letters as
the basis of his poem _Christmas Eve_. Elizabeth pointed out the
various characteristics of Christian worship, from Roman Catholics to
Unitarians, saying that despite the irritating features in many church
services she could worship in any of them, though she preferred those
of the Dissenters. She was one of those rare persons who combine the
most passionate convictions with the largest tolerance. Too often
religious convictions produce bigoted narrow-mindedness; too often
tolerance is merely a complimentary description of indifference.
There can be, then, genuine church unity without uniformity, and I
repeat that in large cities this is well.
But there are, anyhow, two instances where Protestant churches should
combine and agree on uniformity as well as on unity. These two are
foreign missions and small country towns. The advantage of the former
needs no argument; among the many advantages of the latter is one,
often overlooked. The minister can omit in his public preaching all
nonessential parts of his belief and confine his preaching sermons to
the very heart of the Gospel.
I have the best of reasons for knowing this can be successfully
accomplished, because in the small corner of Michigan where I am now
writing we manage it every Sunday afternoon.
Huron City, on the nail of the “thumb” in Michigan, was in 1865 a very
much larger town than it is today. In the old times of lumbering, when
the vast pine forests came down to the shore of Lake Huron, this Huron
City was a scene of fierce and profitable activity. But after the
terrible forest fires of 1871 and 1881 the whole region passed from a
timber to an agricultural district, not without difficulty. Gradually
the people left and in most cases literally took their houses with
them. Today Huron City has no post office, no railroad, no telegraph.
It is composed of a schoolhouse, a Methodist church, a general store, a
community house, two or three farmers’ dwellings and our summer home. I
love it with all my heart.
Every year the Methodist pastor, who has two churches besides this one
under his charge, yields me the courtesy of his Huron City Methodist
pulpit for the summer, and here we have a service every Sunday
afternoon to which farmers and “resorters” come from many miles around.
The point that I wish to emphasise is that in all isolated communities
like this it is not only desirable but possible for members of widely
different churches and denominations to unite. In order to find out how
many religious sects were represented in the audience we distributed
cards on which the members of the congregation were asked to write
their names, home town and church. Here are the results on the last
three Sundays:
Adventists, 2; Baptists, 57; Roman Catholics, 42; Community churches,
11; Congregational, 39; Episcopalian, 83; Evangelical, 30; Jew,
6; Latter Day Saints, 6; Lutheran, 29; Methodist, 549; Moravian,
1; Presbyterian, 170; German Reform, 13; Christian Scientist, 12;
Swedenborgian, 2; Unitarian, 3; Universalist, 1; United Brethren, 1;
United Church of Canada, 4; members of no church, 8.
XIII
POLITICAL HISTORY
The majority of intelligent men and a considerable number of
intelligent women enjoy reading authoritative and well-written books on
political history. I recommend to them the political history of Great
Britain and Ireland during the last fifty years. I do not know of any
country or period--anyhow, since the French Revolution in 1789--that
affords so much interesting material for serious consideration. And
this for two reasons.
First, I do not believe there has ever been a country or an epoch when
so many distinguished men played so prominent parts in politics.
Second, I do not know of any time or place where we have so much
definite, precise and intimate information supplied with so much detail
by the leading actors themselves.
Consider the following list of statesmen: Gladstone, Disraeli, Bright,
Parnell, Morley, Bryce, Campbell-Bannerman, Chamberlain, Balfour,
Salisbury, Roseberry, Asquith, McCarthy, Healy, O’Connor, Lloyd
George, Haldane, Grey, Birrell, Baldwin, MacDonald, Churchill.