YOUTH AND THE NEW WORLD 
 
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 THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY PRESS 
 
 8 ARLINGTON STREET, BOSTON (17) 
 
YOUTH AND THE 
 NEW WORLD 
 
 ESSAYS FROM THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY 
 
 EDITED BY 
 
 RALPH PHILIP BOAS 
 
 Head of the English Department 
 Central High School, Springfield, Mass. 
 
 Atlantic 
 
 BOSTON 
 
Copyright, 1921, by 
 THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY PRESS, INC. 
 
PREFACE 
 
 THE purpose of this book is to acquaint young men and 
 women with some of the problems that concern America. 
 Whether these problems are to be solved even partially de 
 pends, in no small degree, upon whether youth recognizes 
 what they are, before they lead him to a place where he can 
 only wish that "he might have known." Man is master of 
 his fate only when he holds some of the cards in his own 
 hand. 
 
 It is hoped that this book will be of special use in those 
 classes in English composition the fundamental purpose of 
 which is the training of young people in the search for and 
 the presentation of ideas. The editor has found in his own 
 experience in the teaching of English composition that 
 students write best when they are stimulated to self- 
 expression by ideas that seem to them important and 
 pertinent to their own interests and ability. 
 
 The relation of youth s new time to the experience of age; 
 education, which for so many years is his major interest; 
 the spirit of America, and especially disputed points of 
 economic and political organization; the changing nature of 
 our population, with its difficulties of adjustment of racial 
 elements; the new and growing importance of women in 
 the state; the problem of international organization; and, 
 finally, the importance of spiritual values these are the 
 themes which the essays in this book illustrate. 
 
 Those essays have been chosen which seem most likely to 
 set young people thinking, to challenge them to hold opin 
 ions of their own, and to stimulate them to a search for 
 further knowledge. In general, it is presumed that the 
 
 456122 
 
vi PREFACE 
 
 reader has already some point of contact with the subject 
 matter of the essays; that in no case is the material intro 
 ductory to completely new experience. Indeed, it is hoped 
 that one of the chief values to be obtained from the study 
 of these essays is the awakening in the reader of the realiza 
 tion that he often plays an unconscious part in the settle 
 ment of the most critical problems of the community. As a 
 result he may, perhaps, be impelled to take an active part 
 in social and civic life, so that he may determine the condi 
 tions of the society in which he lives, instead of being a 
 mere pawn in the game. 
 
 The editor suggests the following method for the use of 
 this book in the English classroom. It is, of course, only 
 one of many possible methods. 
 
 Ask the students to read a single essay, or a group of re 
 lated essays. The first exercise should be an attempt to 
 make certain that the student really knows what the writer 
 of the essay is talking about. Students need, above every 
 thing, the power to read intelligently, that is, with the 
 highest possible standard of accuracy. The essays all con 
 tain ideas which are worthy of mastery in themselves. 
 When the thought of the essay is mastered, comes the 
 time for discussion of everything relevant : style, structure, 
 method of approach, truth of idea, pertinency of idea, ob 
 jections, appreciations, illustrations. Interested students 
 will want to continue reading in other "Atlantic" articles 
 noted in the bibliography, or in books and magazines which 
 they may discover for themselves. Mastery of content, 
 then, is followed by discussion of content, usually oral. 
 Then comes the time for formal composition, oral and 
 written. Let the students bring to class a list of possible 
 subjects or possible problems. Let them make the prob 
 lems definite and practical: speeches that might be deliv 
 ered in actual life; articles, editorials, leaflets, pamphlets, 
 
PREFACE vii 
 
 work that might be published in a real newspaper or maga 
 zine. The subjects ought to cover all kinds of composi 
 tion : exposition, argument, stories, speeches, descriptions, 
 narrative essays and sketches, personal essays, poems, ora 
 tions. When the united class-effort has produced a large 
 number of subjects, "plenty to write about," the hardest 
 task of the teacher is done. Students will usually do well 
 enough if they see a reason for writing and if they have 
 "something to say." 
 
 But composition is not necessarily the end. This kind of 
 work leads readily enough into the study of literature. 
 These essays deal with themes of recurring interest, themes 
 which poets, dramatists, and novelists have never tired of 
 using. Students will recognize with some surprise, and not 
 a little interest, that great poets, essayists, and all the rest, 
 who lived in other days and in other lands, have written 
 about the same questions which men write about in the 
 " Atlantic " to-day. And this is to say nothing of the pos 
 sible inculcation of the habit of browsing in old " Atlantics " 
 and devouring new ones a salutary habit productive of 
 the "delight and instruction" which Horace said was the 
 end and aim of literature. 
 
 The editor wishes to express his thanks to the authors 
 who kindly gave him permission to reprint these essays 
 from the "Atlantic," to Mr. Ellery Sedgwick, the editor of 
 the "Atlantic," and to Mr. Charles Swain Thomas, the 
 editor of the Educational Department of the Atlantic 
 Monthly Press, for cordial cooperation and indispensable 
 assistance. 
 
YOUTH AND THE NEW WORLD 
 

INTRODUCTION 
 
 THIS book is for young people who intend to take a share 
 in life. It is for young people who want to know themselves 
 and their time, but who do not gird at principles and insti 
 tutions as outworn, just because they are old, or assume 
 that principles and institutions are right, just because they 
 are novel. Every right-minded young man or woman wants 
 to understand the point of view of his elders, and to profit 
 by their experience; but he wants also to be sure that he is 
 seeing the path ahead. 
 
 This book does not provide a complete introduction to 
 what men are thinking. But it does provide an introduc 
 tion to some of the most important questions that face this 
 and the next generation important because all of them 
 have affected every generation of which we have record. 
 
 In all times youth is faced with the problem of adjusting 
 his own life, principles, pleasures, and hopes to the accumu 
 lated experience of the past and the aims and wishes of his 
 parents. In every generation men have to face the problem 
 of education. They may refuse to overhaul old systems, 
 and may exalt prejudices and customs into eternal princi 
 ples; but even though they stagnate, they forge one more 
 link in the ever-present question: "How shall youth be 
 taught what the world knows?" Every generation has to 
 face questions of political and social organization. The 
 principles that shall guide legislators, executives, and 
 judges are fixed in their general nature, but in specific cases 
 are adjusted to public opinion. The United States is 
 
INTRODUCTION 
 
 fortunate in its written Constitution, but the interpretation 
 of that Constitution varies with the years. Every genera 
 tion must settle for itself the principles of its economic life, 
 the relation of employer to employee, the responsibilities of 
 economic power to the state, the very structure of economic 
 life itself. Since the foundation of the Union, every genera 
 tion has had to face the fact that the people of the United 
 States come from varying racial stocks. Problems of the 
 relation of the newcomer to the old citizen have always 
 called for settlement. Problems of international adjust 
 ment have always been present. For centuries men have 
 endured wars and remade the map of the known world, in 
 our time with more widely reaching effects than ever before. 
 The place of women in political, social, and economic life is 
 a recurring problem, at no time so insistent as in our day. 
 And, finally, and most important because they lie at the 
 heart of the whole matter, questions of religious adjustment 
 must be faced by every generation. These problems will 
 not be settled in a year or in a lifetime. They will, perhaps, 
 never be settled while men are men. But youth must face 
 them and solve what he can, or lead the blind life of one 
 driven by forces of which he is only dimly aware, chafing at 
 bonds of the very existence of which he is only vaguely 
 conscious. 
 
 II 
 
 YOUTH AND AGE 
 
 The young generation is rising in a period of violent 
 change and readjustment, born of war and destruction. 
 Old standards seem to have vanished; no new standards 
 seem to have developed. To him who loves the past, the 
 present seems to be racing downhill. The older generation 
 charges that the youth of to-day is careless, heedless, and 
 
INTRODUCTION 3 
 
 callous. It maintains that modern youth knows little chiv 
 alry or modesty; that it has little respect for age or for 
 achievement; that it is intent only upon its own pleasures, 
 and that these pleasures are often reckless and some 
 times shocking. The older generation sees youth driving 
 automobiles wildly, dancing disgracefully, talking slang- 
 ily, and jibing irreverently at parental manners and 
 morals. 
 
 The older generation is bewildered. It cannot under 
 stand the freedom of youth. It agrees with foreign observ 
 ers, that American children have the worst manners in the 
 world; that they are thoroughly spoiled; and that, intent 
 upon pleasure and oblivious to duty, they are driving 
 straight to destruction. For these evils they offer no rem 
 edy, not even the one which youth is first to suggest, that 
 .. laxity of manners in youth can most easily be corrected by 
 firmness of control by parents. Can it be that the older 
 generation is disintegrating under the same influences that 
 affect youth? 
 
 One difficulty with the whole discussion is that the older 
 generation acts as both judge and jury. It brings the 
 charges, tries the culprit, and would very much like to im 
 pose the sentence, if it could think of one suitable. Even 
 were youth allowed to testify in its own behalf, poor youth 
 would be at the disadvantage of never having known its 
 parents w r hen they, too, were a younger generation. Time 
 was when conservatives shuddered at the waltz as they 
 now shudder at the fox-trot, and bemoaned the breaking 
 down of all bounds and barriers. But though the world has 
 changed before, it never has changed at the whirling speed 
 of the last half-dozen years. 
 
 In the end the issue simplifies itself. Be it good or bad, 
 this generation is our generation, and cannot be anybody 
 else s. (The task of youth is not to argue but to create. Its 
 
4 INTRODUCTION 
 
 opportunity is tremendous, nothing less than the chance to 
 erect for itself in a plastic time its own standards and ideals. 
 In most periods the creative desire of youth has to fight 
 repression and prejudice; to-day the older generation begs 
 of youth only that it be creative, and that it do not waste 
 its energy in purposeless living. 
 
 The real issue then is this: are young people of to-day 
 sufficiently self-reliant to be masters of their own age and 
 to work out their own ideals? If they intend to face this 
 issue they must take the advice of the old Greek, "Know 
 thyself." Youth cannot travel very far until, to some ex 
 tent at least, it knows where it is weak and where it may 
 become strong. And, most important of all, youth must 
 know the best of the past. The wisest man is not he who 
 suggests most new things, but he who, building upon the 
 firm foundation of the past and making full use of tried 
 principles, best helps to readjust the world in which he 
 lives to new times and new conditions. 
 
 Ill 
 
 EDUCATION 
 
 Men have been more interested in education during these 
 last years than they have been for many generations. Old 
 systems need overhauling. Some parts will have to be 
 scrapped, so many believe; others would like to scrap 
 everything. 
 
 The problem of modern education has been growing 
 .more complex with the increasing complexity of modern 
 life. Sixty years ago, men were not greatly worried about 
 education. Most children learned reading, writing, and 
 arithmetic, and some geography and history. Many never 
 went to school at all; many went only a small part of the 
 
INTRODUCTION 5 
 
 year. Every boy and girl learned as many things outside of 
 school as inside. If a child lived in the country, he did doz 
 ens of chores, and he learned about plants and animals in 
 the fields and woods. A boy helped his father with the 
 farming; a girl helped her mother with the housework. 
 The city boy lived within an hour s walk of real country, 
 which hardly knew that the city existed except as it pro 
 vided a market for produce and a centre for trading. Now 
 there seem to be comparatively few boys and girls on farms, 
 and those who are there know the city better than they 
 know the woods. City children, confined in flats and apart 
 ment houses, have no wood to chop, no gardens to weed, no 
 cows to milk, no hens to feed. If they are to learn anything 
 about the world that feeds them, clothes them, and warms 
 them, they must learn it out of books. Now more children 
 go to school for more weeks of the year; and parents, 
 alarmed at what children do not know, demand that the 
 schools teach more and more subjects. 
 
 Knowledge has increased immensely during the last 
 sixty years. New sciences have risen, new languages and 
 literatures have been discovered, new histories have been 
 unearthed. With the enormous extension of business and 
 the growth of great manufacturing plants, dozens of new 
 professions have risen. The chemist, the biologist, the 
 teacher, the accountant, the sales-manager, the sanitary 
 engineer, the road-builder, and dozens of others demand 
 special training. The boy who is going into business wants 
 a business education ; the girl who expects to marry wants 
 training in home economics. The old professions, medicine, 
 law, and the ministry, have vastly extended their range. 
 Meanwhile the old "liberal" education, the training in 
 fundamentals, mathematics, languages, history, philos 
 ophy, science, literature, still remains as the core of our 
 educational system. This education did its work well, and 
 
6 INTRODUCTION 
 
 does its work better as time goes on. It is definite, it has a 
 firmly based tradition, it has experienced teachers, and it 
 has the support of history and experience. 
 
 And yet the established system of education is under 
 going violent attack. There are two reasons. 
 
 In the first place, the old education did not aim to give 
 boys and girls immediate practical training in earning. It 
 assumed that people had other things to live for than a job, 
 other moments to be filled than the hours of work. And so 
 sometimes it failed to give young people any practical 
 knowledge whatever, and they found that they were not 
 ready at all for the indispensable task of earning their 
 living. 
 
 In the second place, the old education never dreamed of 
 being useful to everybody. It was built for the people who 
 could use it, who, at any rate, thought that they could use 
 it. But now everybody must be educated. Americans have 
 decided to try the experiment of giving everybody an edu 
 cation, from the baby in the Montessori kindergarten to 
 the doctor of philosophy in the graduate school. That ex 
 periment means that education must fit hundreds of differ 
 ent kinds of people. It must fit immigrant children who 
 cannot speak English; native-born children who may never 
 have to earn a living; all sorts of children who must earn 
 their living as soon as the state will allow them to leave 
 school; weak children, strong children, bright children, dull 
 children; children who come from homes where there are 
 books and magazines, correct speech, and courteous man 
 ners; and children who never see books at home, hear only 
 incorrect English, and know only the manners of the street. 
 
 But schools move slowly, and young people are im 
 patient. Nor do teachers agree. Some want to keep as 
 much of the old as they can ; others would like to try every 
 novelty. 
 
INTRODUCTION 7 
 
 All current educational questions, however, can be re 
 duced to a few issues. How much of the old education is 
 valuable and should be preserved? How many of the new 
 ideas of education are valuable and should therefore be 
 adopted? How much direct training should be given to 
 help young people earn their living? How much attention 
 should the schools pay to education for those hours when a 
 man is not earning his living? Is securing a foundation of 
 liberal training more valuable than a plunge into business? 
 How can schools be so adjusted that individuals who do not 
 fit into groups may develop freely? How can education 
 reach those who cannot go to school? It is questions like 
 these which lie at the heart of the " seven-and-seventy 
 jarring creeds" of educational theorists. 
 
 While the world changes, education will change. Young 
 people of to-day will decide the education of to-morrow. 
 To do your task intelligently and carefully means that you 
 must understand your own education so far as your ex 
 perience allows. You must know the ivhy s as well as the 
 how s of school and college, so that you can have faith in 
 the education to which you submit yourselves. 
 
 "Meanwhile there is this life here. * Poor as it is, good 
 as it is, your education is still your education. Your par 
 ents regard it as the greatest gift in their power; it costs 
 more than any other one civic enterprise. Are you making 
 the most of it? 
 
 IV 
 
 THE LIFE OF THE NATION 
 
 The United States has known two great periods of crisis. 
 At the end of the eighteenth century, our form of govern 
 ment was decided after a period of difficult argument and 
 compromise. In the sixties of the nineteenth century was 
 
8 INTRODUCTION 
 
 fought a great civil war, to determine whether the union 
 formed under the Constitution could or could not be dis 
 solved at the will of the states. And now we face another 
 crisis, a crisis in the determination of our national ideals. 
 We are in the process of defining Americanism. The old day 
 of individualism is past. The last frontier has disappeared. 
 New social and industrial questions press for a solution 
 questions bewildering in their complexity, searching in 
 their penetration to the very roots of society. A dozen new 
 programmes for social reconstruction are being advocated, 
 the understanding of any one of which would require 
 months of study. For young people principles are more 
 important than programmes; an understanding of facts as 
 they are in this country is more important than framing 
 constitutions for Utopia. Americanism is in process of 
 definition, and in the long run it is you who will define it. 
 You will define it in terms of social life. As representatives 
 of this generation, you will have to settle once and for all 
 whether democracy is possible in social relations. You will 
 have to decide whether Americanism means that a com 
 munity shall be split into groups heedless of each other s 
 existence except when faced by common danger, or that 
 each group in the community shall be, not only aware of the 
 existence of another, but responsible for it and willing to 
 work with it. The problem of the organization of the com 
 munity for mutual helpfulness in solving civic problems is 
 the basic problem of social democracy. It is a new problem, 
 for it is only within the memory of living men that groups 
 in American communities have, to any serious extent, be 
 come rigidly specialized. Now we have an employing class 
 and an employed class, an educated class and an unedu 
 cated class, a rich class and a poor class, a leisure class and 
 a working class, a skilled class and an unskilled class. The 
 Americanism of the future must decide whether it wants 
 
INTRODUCTION 
 
 . 
 
 "class-consciousness" or "community-consciousness." In 
 these days of transition are being started the forces that 
 will quietly but inevitably work out the democracy of the 
 future. 
 
 And you will define Americanism in terms of political 
 life. We are a nation of over 100,000,000 people, and we 
 govern ourselves. It is obvious that some knowledge of the 
 elaborate and intricate machinery of popular governmenf 
 is necessary, if one would do more than blindly cast a vote. 
 Whether voters have knowledge or not, however, our 
 political organization will be constantly readjusted to new 
 conditions. Our party system, the quality of the men who 
 run for office, the kind of citizens who are allowed to vote 
 as the country grows, these matters call constantly for at 
 tention. The government of an American city means the I 
 administration of a huge cooperative business enterprise, j. 
 The political Americanism of the future will be defined in ) 
 terms of such enterprises. It will have concrete application, 
 not only to city governments, but to every department and 
 function of civic life. Every Congress elected, every law 
 passed, every amendment to the Constitution, forge links 
 in political democracy. For Americanism is no theory or 
 ideal, but the spirit of America embodied in the practical 
 working out of political and social institutions. 
 
 But, after all, you will discover that men accept American 
 political conditions without much question. You will find 
 a much harder task when you come to define America in 
 terms of economic conditions. For here you come face to 
 face with the daily life about you. The laborer swinging 
 his pickaxe, the machinist bending over his lathe, the farmer 
 plodding behind his cultivator, the grocer "putting up 
 orders," the executive surrounded by stenographers and 
 secretaries, coin, banks, bills, checks, strikes, lockouts, 
 unemployment, chambers of commerce, labor-unions, agi- 
 
10 INTRODUCTION 
 
 tators on street-corners, luxury, hunger, waste, thrift 
 all these and a hundred other phenomena of the daily 
 workaday life challenge your knowledge. What are these 
 throngs of people passing by, this welter of machinery and 
 organization, these dark, gloomy, lined faces, these bright, 
 happy, ambitious faces? Where did they come from? 
 Where are they going? Have they always been so? Is any 
 one planning a change, dreaming a change, fighting a 
 change? Where does our food come from? How do we pay 
 for it? Why do prices rise and fall? Why do people worry 
 about earning a living? How are you going to earn a living? 
 Who earns your living now? What should you do if you 
 had to "go to work" to-morrow? There is nothing more 
 fascinating than the exploration of our daily life, so com 
 monplace and so complex. Can you unravel some of the 
 secrets of the workaday world? They lie about you in the 
 very room in which you read this. The paper on which 
 these words are printed is the outcome of a whole history 
 of economic forces, processes, inventions, hopes, dreams, 
 achievements. 
 
 And emerging from this welter of economic forces is the 
 most insistent question in the life about us, the question of 
 the relation of men to their work. The "industrial revolu 
 tion," which began with the last century, is at the height 
 of its tide. More and more, individualism has passed away, 
 until now no man can earn his living independently of his 
 fellow men. The manufacturer is dependent, not only upon 
 the labor that he employs, but upon the labor that mines 
 coal and runs the railways. Huge combinations of labor 
 and capital have arisen, until at times it seems as if men 
 were mere servants of the machines and the institutions 
 they have created. 
 
 The new generation faces the problem of industrial free 
 dom that is, of such adjustment in industrial affairs that 
 
INTRODUCTION 11 
 
 it shall not be the slave of money, machines, or combinations 
 either of labor or of capital; that it shall have the chance to 
 earn its living under conditions which will respect its health 
 and its personality; that industry shall be so ordered that 
 the joy of human creation and personal creation shall not 
 be stifled ; and that each man who works with his hands or 
 with his brains shall receive his full share of what he pro 
 duces. A stupendous problem, in the solving of which 
 there is opportunity for stupidity, arrogance, bigotry, and 
 shallow thinking, but opportunity too for unselfishness, 
 fairmindedness, and the highest constructive thinking. 
 
 But industrial problems are not all-important. You 
 cannot define Americanism without taking into account 
 the problem of the immigrant. We are a nation of mixed 
 ancestry, faced now more than ever with the creation of a 
 common speech and a common ideal. The smallest town 
 has its "immigrant problem," its problem of assimilation 
 into community life of newcomers alien in blood, language, 
 and tradition. The admission of aliens into America, their 
 distribution in America, their place in industry, their 
 influence upon American customs and habits, and, above 
 all, the preservation of their best ideals and their assimila 
 tion of our best ideals these are matters vitally affecting 
 the future development of the American spirit. 
 
 And now you are ready for a better knowledge of what it 
 means to be a citizen of the United States, of what issues 
 must be decided, what roads must be opened, what wrongs 
 must be righted, what prejudices must be jarred loose, 
 what old ideals must be strengthened, what new ideals 
 must be built. America is deciding her future, the future in 
 which you must live. Will you be "master of your fate"? 
 
12 INTRODUCTION 
 
 INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS 
 
 The new generation bears upon its shoulders the burden 
 of peace, the burden of readjustment of boundaries, of 
 economic life, of international organization. For a time 
 the world may quietly settle down to the business of living; 
 but beneath the inactivity of the usual, the nations will, as 
 in times past, be making ready for change and reorganiza 
 tion. The problem of the new generation is to find a means 
 whereby those changes, when they come, may be accom 
 plished without the medium of war. Meanwhile, and per 
 haps for many years, the world is in tumult. The rising 
 generation must steer America through. No longer is isola 
 tion possible. American provincialism is gone, and, whether 
 we will or not, we must share in the troubles of European 
 civilization. 
 
 The international complexities of our time are not wholly 
 European. South and Central America are growing in 
 wealth and power. Their relations to the United States 
 will have to be revised. Japan is rising in the Far East. As 
 her empire grows, international good-feeling will be inevit 
 ably strained, and all the good-will and patience of the 
 world will be called into use. India and China, Russia and 
 Germany, Ireland and Mexico all these, and many other 
 countries, will require of the new generation knowledge, 
 understanding, judgment, foresight. 
 
 In the past, nations have not prized international know 
 ledge; they have left to a few men the management of in 
 ternational affairs. In the years to come, a few men will 
 still have to manage these affairs, but they must, if the 
 world is not to be destroyed by war, know that behind 
 them is knowledge and understanding, to which they will 
 
INTRODUCTION IS 
 
 be held accountable. To build up this knowledge is the 
 task of youth, to build up a realization that modern civil 
 ization is inextricably interwoven into a society of nations, 
 voluntary or involuntary. 
 
 Questions of international relations students cannot dis 
 cuss as they can those questions which lie close to their 
 daily experience. Here they must acquire information, 
 learn facts, avoid broad generalizations, and remember that 
 foreign nations are composed of individuals, not of execu 
 tives and diplomats, and that these individuals are men of 
 like "dimensions, senses, affections, passions" to them 
 selves. But they must also remember that these men have 
 histories and backgrounds different from those of the 
 United States, and that all the world is not willing to sub 
 mit to our form of political organization. The man who 
 attempts to remould the world to his heart s desire will 
 bring misery to the world and disappointment to himself. 
 The true international statesman is he who recognizes that 
 real service lies in helping others to help themselves within 
 their own conditions and limitations, different though they 
 be from his own way of life. 
 
 VI 
 
 THE NEW POSITION OF WOMEN 
 
 The new position of women is not a matter of suffrage or 
 of "rights." It is not a matter of argument. It is a fact. 
 Women are now entering new fields of economic and politi 
 cal life. They are earning their living in ways once thought 
 improper; they are sharing in the responsibilities of the 
 community in ways once thought impossible. Argument as 
 to the right and wrong of the new position of women does 
 not alter the fact that it is here, and that it has become a 
 matter to reckon with in any attempt to understand the 
 complex organization of modern life. 
 
14 INTRODUCTION 
 
 The new generation cannot wholly know the barriers of 
 custom and tradition, which women had to break down 
 before they attained their new position. They cannot fully 
 realize how an apparently resistless movement was pre 
 ceded by a long period of advocacy of bitterly fought 
 principles. They cannot fully visualize the organization of 
 the old society, where the position of women was so differ 
 ent from what it is now. 
 
 And yet they are faced with a hundred new problems, 
 which are the legacy from those old conditions. It is true 
 that these problems face mature men and women with more 
 insistence than young people. Still young people can pre 
 pare for the experiences which are to come later. They can 
 try to re-create in their minds a picture of the old society 
 and the share that women had in it. They can form that 
 picture from their reading and from talks with their par 
 ents. They can try to understand the revolt from the old 
 conditions. They can come to know the vigorous personal 
 ities who led that revolt. They can try to understand the 
 principles and programmes of the new movement as it 
 developed: how people fought over questions of woman 
 suffrage, and hardly noticed the silent change that was 
 taking place in economic life. They can find out what 
 work women are doing to-day, what influence they have, 
 what movements they are engaged in, what they intend to 
 do, to what degree they consciously plan group-action. 
 And with some of this information in hand, they can at 
 tempt to weigh good and bad, to try to find out to what 
 extent the new is desirable and better than the old. What 
 have women lost by the change? what have they gained? 
 what things are good? what are bad? 
 
 Most important of all, students will have to decide their 
 own attitude toward this part of life. Every girl will have 
 to take a share in new responsibilities, powers, and oppor- 
 
INTRODUCTION 15 
 
 tunities; every young man will have to understand that in 
 the coming years women will not quietly follow men, but 
 will insist upon as free and genuine a partnership with men 
 as they can command. 
 
 VII 
 
 RELIGION AND PERSONAL LIFE 
 
 Behind the problems of the community stand the prob 
 lems of the individual. And though it is true that the day 
 has passed when individual righteousness can be urged as 
 the only solution of civic problems, since individual right 
 eousness, to be effective, must be transmuted into civic 
 action, yet we are all too ready to forget that as "the man 
 on the street" is, so in the long run, in spite of leaders and 
 prophets, will the community be. 
 
 Of all the personal problems which affect the community, 
 the problem of religious belief, affiliation, and action is the 
 greatest. European civilization is based upon a religious 
 interpretation of life; and nearly every group that came to 
 America was either actuated by religious impulses or was 
 strongly marked by religious faith. The problem of the 
 new world is to decide what to do with the religion of its 
 fathers, the religion which, too often, it has forgotten or 
 abandoned. 
 
 It is not a question of church-attendance or church-sup 
 port which youth faces; it is a question of outlook upon life, 
 of personal belief, and of action based upon that belief. 
 Shall religion survive as a dynamic force in American life? 
 Fixing blame for its present decline does not help the 
 matter. The question is one of action. Are young people 
 going to neglect religious forces as guides of We? Can they 
 develop new forces, which will do for society what the old 
 ones did? What is the hope for religion in America? Are 
 
16 INTRODUCTION 
 
 we doomed to a century of groping after truth through 
 novel cults and vague emotionalisms? Or are the faiths 
 which have survived for many centuries to remain, rising 
 triumphant over change and wandering, firm in their vision 
 of truth? 
 
 These are hard questions. And yet they must be an 
 swered if we are to be our own masters. For when all is said 
 and done, this remains that the life of the spirit endures, 
 and in the long run men are wise, just, merciful, and up 
 right, not as they fear punishment and hope for reward, 
 but as they share to some extent in the Eternal spirit of 
 wisdom and virtue. 
 
THE OTHER SIDE 
 
 MARGARET SHERWOOD 
 
 LIKE every other attentive reader of our periodical lit 
 erature, I am increasingly aware of our persistent exposure 
 of sin and wrong-doing in high places and in low; like many 
 another attentive reader, I am growing a bit rebellious 
 against this constant demand and supply in the matter of 
 information regarding recent evil. Have we not grown over- 
 alert in the search for this special kind of news? We take 
 vice with our breakfast porridge; perjury with our after- 
 dinner coffee; our essayists vie with one another in seeing 
 who can write up the most startling story of crime; and it is 
 a bankrupt family nowadays that cannot produce one mem 
 ber to expose civic or political corruption. Undoubtedly 
 much genuine ethical impulse lies back of all this; undoubt 
 edly, too, much of the picturesque and spectacular treat 
 ment springs from a desire to startle, and ministers, in 
 many a reader who would scorn paper-covered fiction, to a 
 love of the sensational. Surely it must seem to the people 
 of other countries that we take pride in the immensity of 
 our sins, as we take pride in Niagara, in the length of the 
 Mississippi, in the extent of our western plains. 
 
 Many may be, and must be, the good effects of throwing 
 the searchlight upon dark places; but the constant glare of 
 the searchlight bids fair to rob us of our normal vision of 
 life. My poor mind has become a storehouse of misdeeds 
 not my own. I am sick with iniquity; I walk abroad under 
 the shadow of infamy, and I sup with horrors. I shrink 
 from meeting my friends not that they are not the best 
 people in the world, but I dread lest they pour into my ears 
 
18 THE OTHER SIDE 
 
 some newly acquired knowledge of wrong-doing. For me, 
 as for others, the sun of noonday is clouded by graft, brib 
 ery, treachery, and corruption; and I fear to close my eyes 
 in the dark because of the pictured crimes that crowd be 
 fore them. Suppose poor Christian had had to drag after 
 him, not only his own bag of transgressions, but those of 
 Mr. Worldly Wiseman, Mr. Facing-both-ways, and all the 
 denizens of Vanity Fair, what chance would he ever have 
 had of getting out of the Slough of Despond? 
 
 It is not that I wish to shirk; I am not afraid of facing 
 anything that I ought to know, and I have not the slightest 
 doubt that we are all, in great measure, responsible for our 
 neighbors sins. But I am not sure that we are taking the 
 wisest way to mend them. It seems to me incontestable 
 that, with the large issues of individual and of national well- 
 being in mind, we are overdoing the exposure, and slighting 
 the incentives to right action; emphasizing the negative at 
 the expense of the positive; and that, with our weakening 
 convictions regarding the things that are right, it is danger 
 ous to go on loudly proclaiming the things that are wrong. 
 We are much in the position of a village improvement 
 society which has pulled down a bridge because it is rotting, 
 and is impotent to build another and a better. We have 
 invested our national all in wrecking machinery, and have 
 nothing left for constructive tools. It is said that in our ex 
 plosive setting forth of civic and national wrong-doing, we 
 are all too prone to stop with the explosion, as if mere know 
 ledge of these things would set them right. Mere knowledge 
 never yet set anything right; only the ceaselessly active, 
 creative will can fashion a world of law out of chaos. 
 
 Of the criticism often made that exposure of wrong should 
 be followed, more closely than is done here, by constructive 
 action, if anything is to be really effected, it is not my task 
 to speak. The aspect of the matter which interests me es- 
 
THE OTHER SIDE 19 
 
 pecially concerns the youth of the land; it is the educational 
 aspect. Not through loud wailing over evil can a nation be 
 built, but through resolute dwelling with high ideals. In j 
 certain ugly tendencies of recent years among the young, 
 as, for instance, the unabashed sensuality of much of the 
 modern dancing, may we not detect, perhaps, a cynical 
 assumption that life is at basis corrupt a natural result 
 of continued harping on evil things, and of failure to keep 
 before them images of moral beauty? Our magazine writ 
 ers would be far better employed, if, instead of making our 
 ears constantly resound with reports of civic iniquities, 
 they were, part of the time at least, studying Plato s "Re 
 public," and filling mind and soul with the hope of the per 
 fect state. Wrong things we dare hope are of small and 
 fleeting consequence as compared with the right; it is 
 not the sin of Judas Iscariot, but the righteousness of his 
 Master, that has brought the human race a gleam of hope 
 and possible redemption. When I was told, not long ago, 
 of a student in one of our great universities who had elected 
 " Criminology 16," I could not help reflecting that he might 
 far better have taken Idealistic Philosophy 1. 
 
 Whether or not our study of evil should be lessened, our 
 study of the good needs to be vastly strengthened. We are 
 losing the vision! " Your old men shall dream dreams, your ( 
 young men shall see visions," said the prophet, in promising 1 
 wonders in the heavens and in the earth, after his account 
 of fasting, weeping, mourning, and beating the breast. 
 There is a time for beating the breast and for tearing the 
 hair, and of this we have had our day; but perpetual sitting 
 upon the ash-heap and howling will not raise the walls of 
 state. Sitting there may, in time, even become a luxury; 
 can it be that we are doing so much of it partly because it 
 is easier, and because the heaven-sent task of building up 
 and shaping is too hard for us? 
 
20 THE OTHER SIDE 
 
 Take away from youth the power of seeing visions, of 
 dreaming dreams, and you take away the future. It would 
 behoove us to remember, perhaps, that the eras of great 
 deeds have not been eras of analysis, but eras when the 
 creative imagination was at work. Yet our modern mental 
 habit is overwhelmingly a habit of analysis, for which 
 science, in teaching us to pick the world to bits, is partly, 
 though not wholly, responsible. It has brought us an im 
 mense amount of interesting information; it has brought 
 also a danger whose gravity we can hardly estimate, in the 
 constant lessening of the synthetic power. The power to 
 image, to fashion high ideals, and to create along the line of 
 the imagining, is weakening, instead of growing more strong. 
 In the glorious days of Queen Elizabeth, in the unparalleled 
 days .of Periclean Athens, great ideals formed themselves 
 before men s eyes and great achievements followed; emo 
 tion, hope, vision, shaped human nature to great issues. I 
 wonder what influence those perfect marble representations 
 of perfect form had upon the very bodies of the youths and 
 the maidens of Athens, what creative force they exercised 
 - the imaginative grasp of the perfect reaching forward 
 toward perfectness in the human being. I wonder what 
 influence the character of Sir Philip Sidney alone, with 
 "high-erected thoughts seated in a heart of courtesy," has 
 had upon succeeding generations of English youth. "A man 
 to be greatly good," said Shelley, "must imagine intensely 
 and comprehensively." 
 
 Here my quarrel with our present intellectual trend and 
 our present system of education becomes more acute. We 
 are not only losing the habit of mind that fosters idealism, 
 but we are more and more breaking with the past. The 
 door of that storehouse of noble thought and noble example 
 is being slowly but firmly closed, and there is little in mod 
 ern teaching that can meet the inroads made by the devas- 
 
THE OTHER SIDE 21 
 
 tating knowledge of evil of which we have been speaking; 
 little that can build up where this tears down. Study of 
 Greek life, with its incomparable power of shaping exist 
 ence toward the beautiful, is all but cast aside; most unfor 
 tunately now, when, with the rush of ignorant peoples to 
 our shores, it might have a far-reaching potency never at 
 tained before. The ignorance of contemporary youth re 
 garding that other and finer loveliness of "Gospel books" 
 is amazing. More and more we are stripped of the humani 
 ties; the incredulity of science in contemplating philosophy, 
 art, literature, as part of the educational curriculum, is full 
 of menace. There has never been, I think, in the history of 
 the civilized world, a time when people were so anxious to 
 cast off the past. In our eager Marathon race of material 
 and physical progress, we want to go as lightly equipped 
 as possible. The aeroplane carries small luggage; our light 
 modern mind is ever ready to throw overboard even its 
 precious heritage, in its eagerness for swift flight. As earlier 
 days have reverenced the old, we reverence the new, and 
 are all too insistently contemporaneous. 
 
 We need, as we never needed before, a broader and deeper 
 study of history, of philosophy, of literature; for most of 
 our young, a knowledge of the mental and spiritual past 
 of the race is of far greater importance than a knowledge 
 of the physical past, at the amoeba stage, or any other. 
 Science, much as it can do for us, can never meet our deep 
 est need ; the world of imaginative beauty and the world of 
 ethical endeavor are apart from its domain. It has no 
 spring to touch the will, yet that which has, the magnificent 
 inheritance of our literature, is more and more neglected 
 for the latest machinery that applied science has devised, 
 or the most recent treatise on insect, bird, or worm. It is 
 well to study insect, bird, and worm, for they are endlessly 
 interesting; but I maintain that neither the full sum of 
 
22 THE OTHER SIDE 
 
 knowledge concerning them, nor even the ultimate fact 
 about the ultimate star, can be a substitute for knowledge 
 of the idealism of Thomas Carlyle, of the categorical imper 
 ative of Kant for that study of the humanities which 
 means preserving, for the upbuilding of youth, that which 
 was best and finest in the past, as we go on toward the 
 future. 
 
 If the swift retort should come, from those who think the 
 present the only era of attainment and the physical world 
 the only source of wisdom, that the past is full of villainies, 
 of lapses from high standards, one can but say that, for 
 ethical purposes, our study should be frankly a selective 
 study, emphasizing the fine and high, subordinating the 
 evil. There is no hypocrisy in such selection; there is delib 
 erate choice of the higher upon which to dwell, as a forma 
 tive power, quickening feeling and imagination. I have 
 heard it said that a woman, by resolute dwelling on things 
 noble and pure, may shape the inner nature of her unborn 
 child, and I have faith to believe it. Even so should the 
 nation yet to be be shaped by resolute dwelling on the good. 
 It was not all cowardice, as many a present writer thinks, 
 that led the mothers of earlier days to say little to their 
 sons and daughters regarding evil things, and much regard 
 ing right things. Doubtless greater frankness would have 
 been better, yet I doubt if our protracted dwelling on the 
 evil will produce better results. 
 
 Should anyone object that this emphasis on the good 
 means suppression of the truth, we can but reply that, for the 
 rational soul, the truth is not necessarily the mechanically 
 worked-out sum of all the facts. That we have forgotten 
 the distinction between fact that which has indeed come 
 to pass, but which may be momentary and truth, which 
 endures, is one of the many signs of what William Sharp 
 calls the " spiritual degradation " of our time. Much of our 
 
THE OTHER SIDE 23 
 
 modern thinking and teaching, much of our realistic fiction, 
 rests upon a failure to make the distinction; much that is 
 indisputable in individual instances of wrong-doing may 
 be, thank God! false in the long run. 
 
 "That is not true, scientifically true," we hear often in 
 regard to some fine hope or aspiration of the race; but in the 
 real import of the term there is no such thing as scientific 
 truth. It is a pity that a word of such profound and dis 
 tinctive meaning should come to be more and more exclu 
 sively identified with the observation of physical phenom 
 ena, and the formulation of physical laws, whereas the very 
 root-meaning of the word true, from Anglo-Saxon treowe, 
 signifying faithful, gives justification for the idealist s be 
 lief that vital truth is partly a matter of the will, not of 
 mere perception and of intellectual deductions drawn there 
 from. We have need of deeper truth than that of mere fact; 
 and the truth that shall set us free is a truth of choice, of 
 selection; it embraces that part of human thought and 
 human experience which is worth keeping. 
 
 Faithfulness to the best and finest in the past and in the 
 present, rather than horrified gaping at the present s worst, 
 is the attitude that means continued and bettered life; for 
 we become what we will. What are we offering, in the way 
 of concrete examples, or of finely expressed thought about 
 virtue, to the young, to the ignorant nations that are pour 
 ing in upon us, that will help them form their vision of the 
 perfect? With our narrowing knowledge of the greater past, 
 our choice of heroes becomes more and more local and na 
 tional; yet our hierarchy of sacred dead is too small to afford 
 that variety of heroic action and heroic choice that should 
 always be kept before the minds of youth. We teach them 
 that George Washington never told a lie; we teach them 
 something and there could be nothing better of Lin 
 coln; but those two figures are lonely upon Olympus, and 
 
24 THE OTHER SIDE 
 
 the great tragic story of the way in which Lincoln faced the 
 greatest crisis in our history will not alone suffice to help 
 the everyday citizen shape his thought and action toward 
 constructive idealism. The lesser heroes of our young re 
 public have acquitted themselves nobly in this struggle 
 and in that, but the struggles have been too closely akin in 
 nature to give the embryo hero that breadth and depth of 
 nurture that he requires. We need an enlarged vision of 
 history, and the sight of great men of all ages faithful to 
 small tasks as to great; we need the companionship of he 
 roes of other times and of other nations, and not of military 
 heroes alone. Saint Francis with his unceasing tenderness 
 to man and beast, Father Damien at work among the lepers, 
 might far better occupy the pages of our magazines, than 
 the pictured deeds of criminals and the achievements of 
 contemporary multi-millionaires. 
 
 If we need a wider range of concrete examples of the good, 
 we need still more a wider range of nobly expressed ideals. 
 Our thought grows narrow ; we smother for lack of breath 
 ing space. Benjamin Franklin s philosophy was far from 
 grasping the best of life, yet we remember him better than 
 we do our Emerson, whose plea for spiritual values as the 
 only real ones is lost in the louder and louder groaning of 
 the wheels of our machinery. The idealism that is taught 
 the young in Sunday schools is too often inextricably bound 
 up with unnecessary theology; and many and many a pupil, 
 in discarding the latter, discards the other also. The ideal 
 of success upheld in much journalistic admonition is often 
 rather mean and low; the young of this country need no 
 printed incentives to urge them into commercialism and 
 the victories of trade. The best influences that are being 
 brought to bear upon them are those which concern social 
 responsibilities and the needs of the poor. Yet all this 
 thought and endeavor should supplement and not super- 
 
THE OTHER SIDE 25 
 
 sede, as it is doing, a deep concern with the things of the 
 spirit; and no admonition regarding hygiene for one s self 
 or others is a substitute for 
 
 A sense sublime 
 
 Of something far more deeply interfused, 
 Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns, 
 And the round ocean, and the living air, 
 And the blue sky, and in the mind of man; 
 A motion and a spirit, that impels 
 All thinking things, all objects of all thought, 
 And rolls through all things. 
 
 The great things of the past in all nations, history can 
 teach us; the possible, both literature and philosophy can 
 teach us. We must forego no noble expression of idealistic 
 faith, lest we impoverish our own souls, and beggar those 
 who come after us. The pure intellectual passion of 
 Bacon s "Advancement of Learning," the noble stoicism of 
 Marcus Aurelius, the spiritual vision of Plato, of Spenser, 
 the heroic strain of Wordsworth s "Liberty Sonnets" and 
 of his "Happy Warrior," Shelley s ardent and generous 
 sympathy, Browning s dynamic spiritual force, should 
 make up part of our life and thought, checking our insistent 
 impulse toward mechanical things, and correcting the evil 
 within and without. More than anything else, we need a 
 revival of interest in great poetry. 
 
 "Now therein of all sciences," said Sir Philip Sidney, "is 
 our poet the monarch. For he doth not only show the way, 
 but giveth so sweet a prospect into the way as will entice any 
 man to enter it. ... He cometh to you with words set in 
 delightful proportion, either accompanied with, or prepared 
 for, the well-enchanting skill of music; and with a tale, for 
 sooth, he cometh unto you, with a tale which holdeth 
 children from play, and old men from the chimney-corner, 
 and, pretending no more, doth intend the winning of the 
 mind from wickedness to virtue." 
 
26 THE OTHER SIDE 
 
 The poet s " perfect picture " of the good, the great image, 
 causes noble passion, wakes us out of our "habitual calm/ 
 and stirs us almost beyond our possibilities. The Imagina 
 tion is the miracle-working power in human nature; through 
 it alone can the human soul come to its own. Only that 
 which is fine and high can feed it aright, while baseness can 
 make of it a destructive tool of terrible power. As I think 
 back to childhood, I can remember the devastating effect 
 that one tale of cruelty had upon my mind, haunting me by 
 day in vivid pictures, turning my dreams to horror, and 
 making me, while the obsession lasted, believe that the 
 world of grown folk must be all alike cruel. So, too, the 
 compelling vision of the good came through concrete in 
 stances; and the people, both the living and the dead, in 
 whom I passionately believed, shaped all my faith. 
 
 The imagination of youth there is no power like it, no 
 machine that can equal it in dynamic force, nothing so full 
 of power, so full of danger. We become that which we look 
 upon, contemplate, remember; it is for this that I dread the 
 ultimate effect of the long, imaginative picturing of our 
 neighbor s sins now presented in our periodicals. Images of 
 evil can hardly help dimming and tarnishing the bright 
 ideals of youth; is there no way with all our modern wis 
 dom can we find no way of limiting our exposure of 
 crime to the people who can be of service in helping check 
 it, and keeping it from those who cannot help, but can only 
 be silently hurt? A moment, an hour of some fresh vision, 
 and a child s destiny is perhaps decided for good or for ill. 
 One afternoon s reading of Spenser made the boy Keats a 
 poet; who, knowing the potency of brief experience in the 
 flush of youth, can doubt the lasting wrong wrought again 
 and again by the sudden shock of contact with things evil? 
 
 Many images of wrong must of necessity come to the 
 young; let them not be multiplied in our feverish and mor- 
 
THE OTHER SIDE 27 
 
 bid fashion of to-day. Above all, let them be crowded out 
 by constant suggestion of noble images and noble thought, 
 which will work both consciously and subconsciously, 
 shaping the dream when the dreamer is least aware. To 
 hold up before the ardent and impressionable young that 
 which they may become in strength, in purity, would surely 
 be better than placing before them this perpetual moving- 
 picture show of our civic and national transgressions. I can 
 but believe, as I read article after article of exposure, that 
 this continued presentation to youth of the unholy side of 
 life, with our increasing tendency to make education a mere 
 matter of the intellect and of the eye, is bound to lessen the 
 moral energy of the race. Would it not be better if we were 
 more diligent in searching history, philosophy, literature, 
 for "whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are 
 lovely, whatsoever things are of good report," and in bid 
 ding the young think on these things? 
 

 A LETTER TO THE RISING GENERATION 
 
 CORNELIA A. P. COMER 
 
 FROM the dawn of time, one generation has cried reproof 
 and warning to the next, unheeded. "I wonder that you 
 would still be talking. Nobody marks you," say the young. 
 "Did you never hear of Cassandra?" the middle-aged 
 retort. 
 
 Many of you young people of to-day have not heard of 
 Cassandra, for a little Latin is no longer considered essen 
 tial to your education. This, assuredly, is not your fault. 
 You are innocent victims of a good many haphazard edu 
 cational experiments. New ideas in pedagogy have run 
 amuck for the last twenty-five years. They were introduced 
 with much flourish of drums; they looked well on paper; 
 they were forthwith put into practice on the helpless young. 
 It has taken nearly a generation to illustrate their results in 
 flesh and blood. Have they justified themselves in you? 
 
 The rising generation cannot spell, because it learned to 
 read by the word-method; it is hampered in the use of dic 
 tionaries, because it never learned the alphabet; its English 
 is slipshod and commonplace, because it does not know the 
 sources and resources of its own language. Power over 
 words cannot be had without some knowledge of the classics 
 or much knowledge of the English Bible but both are 
 now quite out of fashion. 
 
 As an instance of the working-out of some of the newer 
 educational methods, I recall serving upon a committee to 
 award prizes for the best essays in a certain competition 
 where the competitors were seniors in an accredited college. 
 In despair at the material submitted, the committee was 
 
A LETTER TO THE RISING GENERATION 29 
 
 finally forced to select as " best " the essay having the fewest 
 grammatical errors and the smallest number of misspelled 
 words. The one theme that showed traces of thought was 
 positively illiterate in expression. 
 
 These deficiencies in you irritate your seniors, but the 
 blame is theirs. Some day you will be upbraiding your in 
 structors for withholding the simple essentials of education, 
 and you will be training your own children differently. It is 
 not by preference that your vocabulary lacks breadth and 
 your speech distinction. In any case, these are minor in 
 dictments, and, when all is said, we older ones may well ask 
 ourselves whether we find our minds such obedient, soft- 
 footed servants of the will as to make it clear that the edu 
 cational procedure of our own early days is to be indorsed 
 without reserve. 
 
 Your seniors also find themselves irritated and depressed 
 because modern girls are louder-voiced and more bouncing 
 than their predecessors, and because their boy associates 
 are somewhat rougher and more familiar toward them than 
 used to be thought well bred. But even these things, dis 
 tasteful as they are, should not be the ground of very bitter 
 complaint. It requires more serious charges than these to 
 impeach the capacity and intentions of those who are soon 
 to be in full charge of this world. Every generation has 
 with one important abatement the right to fashion its 
 own code of manners. 
 
 The final right of each generation to its own code depends 
 upon the inner significance of those manners. When they 
 express such alterations in the fibre of the human creature 
 as are detrimental to the welfare of the race, then, and per 
 haps then only, are our criticisms completely justified. 
 
 From the generation earlier than my own still survive 
 gentlewomen who are like old lace and opals, gentlemen all 
 compounded of consideration and courtliness. Their graces 
 
30 A LETTER TO THE RISING GENERATION 
 
 are not due to their length of life, but to the lights by which 
 they have lived. They are adorable. None of us born since 
 the Civil War approach them in respect to some fine name 
 less quality that gives them charm and atmosphere. Yet, if 
 we are not less stanch and unselfish than they, I take it we 
 also have not failed in giving the world that nourished us 
 its due. 
 
 Is the quality of the human product really falling off? 
 That is the humiliating question you must ask yourselves. 
 If the suspicion that runs about the world is true, then, 
 youngsters, as you would elegantly phrase it, it is "up to 
 you." 
 
 One of the advantages of living long in the world is that 
 one steadily acquires an increasingly interesting point of 
 view. Even in middle life one begins to see for one s self 
 the evolution of things. One gets a glimpse of the proces 
 sion of events, the march of the generations. The longer an 
 intelligent being lives, the more deeply experience con 
 vinces him that there is a pattern in the tapestry of our 
 lives, individual as well as national and racial, at whose 
 scope we can only guess. 
 
 Yet the things we actually see and can testify to are 
 profoundly suggestive. I know of my own knowledge how 
 greatly the face of life in this country has altered since my 
 own childhood. It is neither so simple nor so fine a thing as 
 then. And the type of men of whom every small commun 
 ity then had at least half a dozen, the big-brained, big- 
 hearted, " old Roman " men, whose integrity was as unques 
 tioned as their ability, is almost extinct. Their places are 
 cut up and filled by smaller, less able, often much less 
 honest men. It is not that the big men have gone to the 
 cities for they are not there; it is not that they left no 
 descendants for in more cases than I care to count, the 
 smaller, less able, less honest men are their own sons. 
 
A LETTER TO THE RISING GENERATION 31 
 
 These latter frequently make as much money in a year as 
 their fathers did in ten, and show less character in a life 
 time than their fathers did in a year. 
 
 The causes of this are too complicated to go into here; 
 but so far as you young people just coming on the stage are 
 concerned, the result of this change of type in American 
 life and American men is to make life a far harder problem. 
 The world is itself smaller; it is harder for the individual to 
 live by his own light. The members of the body politic are 
 much more closely knit together in the mesh of common 
 interest to-day than ever before. While political scandals, 
 graft, and greed have always existed, there never has been 
 a time when low standards in business and politics have so 
 assailed the honor and integrity of the people as a whole, 
 by tempting them, through fear of loss, to acquiesce in the 
 dishonesty of others. If better standards are to prevail, it 
 is you who must fight their final battles. Your wisdom, 
 patience, and moral earnestness are going to be taxed to the 
 breaking-point before those battles are won. Have you the 
 muscle for that fight? 
 
 Evidence in regard to the falling-off in the human pro 
 duct is necessarily fragmentary and chaotic. Let us run 
 over a few of the points your elders have observed and re 
 corded against you. 
 
 Veteran teachers are saying that never in their expe 
 rience were young people so thirstily avid of pleasure as 
 now. "But," one urges, " it is the season when they should 
 enjoy themselves. Young people always have they 
 always will." "Yes," they answer, "that is true, but this 
 is different from anything we have ever seen in the young 
 before. They are so keen about it so selfish, and- so 
 hard!" 
 
 Of your chosen pleasures, some are obviously corroding 
 to the taste; to be frank, they are vulgarizing. It is a mat- 
 
32 A LETTER TO THE RISING GENERATION 
 
 ter of ordinary comment that the children of cultivated 
 fathers and mothers do not, nowadays, grow up the equals 
 of their parents in refinement and cultivation. There must, 
 then, be strong vulgarizing elements outside the home, as 
 well as some weakness within, so to counteract and make 
 of little worth the gentler influences of their intimate life. 
 How can anything avail to refine children whose taste in 
 humor is formed by the colored supplements of the Sunday 
 paper, as their taste in entertainment is shaped by contin 
 uous vaudeville and the moving-picture shows? These 
 things are actually very large factors in children s lives to 
 day. How should they fail of their due influence on plastic 
 human material? Where the parents at the formative age 
 saw occasional performances of Booth, Barrett, Modjeska, 
 and "Rip Van Winkle," the children go to vaudeville, and 
 go almost constantly. While most vaudeville performances 
 have one or two numbers that justify the proprietors claim 
 of harmless, wholesome amusement, the bulk of the pro 
 gramme is almost inevitably drivel, common, stupid, or 
 inane. It may not be actually coarse, but inanity, stupid 
 ity, and commonness are even more potent as vulgarizing 
 influences than actual coarseness. Coarseness might repel; 
 inanity disintegrates. 
 
 "I don t approve," your fathers and mothers say anx 
 iously, "but I hate to keep Tom and Mary at home when 
 all the other children are allowed to go." These parents are 
 conscientious and energetic in looking after Tom s teeth 
 and eyes, Mary s hair, tonsils, and nasal passages, but seem 
 utterly unconscious that mental rickets and curvature of 
 the soul are far more deforming than crooked teeth and 
 adenoids. 
 
 Our ancestors spoke frequently of fortitude. That virtue 
 was very real and very admirable to them; we use the word 
 too little; you, not at all. The saving grace of their every- 
 
A LETTER TO THE RISING GENERATION 33 
 
 day hardships has vanished. "Even in a palace, life may 
 be led well!" One wonders how Marcus Aurelius would 
 have judged the moral possibilities of flats or apartment 
 hotels? When one gets light by pushing a button, heat by 
 turning a screw, water by touching a faucet, and food by 
 going down in an elevator, life is so detached from the 
 healthy exercise and discipline which used to accompany 
 the mere process of living, that one must scramble energet 
 ically to a higher plane or drop to a much lower one. 
 
 When the rising generation goes into the militia, it is, 
 old officers tell us, "soft" and incompetent, unpleasantly 
 affected by ants and spiders, querulous as to tents and 
 blankets, and generally as incapable of adapting itself to 
 the details of military life as one would expect a flat-reared 
 generation to be. The advocates of athletics and manual 
 training in our schools and colleges are doing their utmost 
 to counteract the tendency to make flabby, fastidious bod 
 ies, which comes from too-comfortable living; but the task 
 is huge. 
 
 Much more ado is made over this business of training the 
 mind and body to-day than ever before. From the multi 
 plied and improved machinery of education, it would seem 
 that we must be far in advance of our fathers. But where 
 are the results in improved humanity? The plain truth 
 seems to be that the utmost which can be done for the child 
 to-day is not enough to counterbalance the rapidly growing 
 disadvantages of urban life and modern conditions. Vast 
 increase in effort and in cost does not even enable the race 
 to keep up with itself. Forging ahead at full speed, we are 
 yet dropping woefully behind. 
 
 Training is not a matter of the mind and body only. 
 More fundamental to personality than either is the educa 
 tion of the soul. In your up-bringing this has been pro 
 foundly neglected and here is your crudest loss. Of the 
 
34 A LETTER TO THE RISING GENERATION 
 
 generation of your fathers and mothers it may be generally 
 affirmed that they received their early religious training 
 under the old regime. Their characters were shaped by the 
 faith of their fathers, and those characters usually remained 
 firm and fixed, though their minds sometimes became the 
 sport of opposing doctrines. They grew up in a world that 
 was too hastily becoming agnostic as a result of the dazzling 
 new discoveries of science. It was a shallow interpretation 
 that claimed science and religion as enemies to the death. 
 So much is clear now. But, shallow or not, such was the 
 thought of the seventies. The rising generation of that day 
 had to face it. A great many young people then became 
 unwilling martyrs to what they believed the logic of the 
 new knowledge. It was through inability to enlarge their 
 ideas of Him, to meet the newly disclosed facts about his 
 universe, that they gave up their God. They lost their faith 
 because imagination failed them. 
 
 The clamor and the shouting of that old war have already 
 died away; the breach between science and religion is 
 healed; the world shows more and more mysterious as our 
 knowledge of it widens, and we acknowledge it to be more 
 inexplicable without a Will behind its phenomena than with 
 one. But that period of storm and stress had a practical 
 result; it is incarnated in the rising generation. 
 
 In the wrack of beliefs, your parents managed to retain 
 their ingrained principles of conduct. Not knowing what 
 to teach you, they taught you nothing whole-heartedly. 
 Thus you have the distinction of growing up with a spirit 
 ual training less in quantity and more diluted in quality 
 than any "Christian" generation for nineteen hundred 
 years. If you are agnostic-and-water, if you find nothing in 
 the universe more stable than your own wills what 
 wonder? Conceived in uncertainty, brought forth in mis 
 giving how can such a generation be nobly militant? 
 
A LETTER TO THE RISING GENERATION 35 
 
 Before it occurred to me to analyze your deficiencies and 
 your predicament thus, I used to look at a good many 
 members of the rising generation and wonder helplessly 
 what ailed them. They were amiable, attractive, lovable 
 even, but singularly lacking in force, personality, and the 
 power to endure. Conceptions of conduct that were the 
 very foundations of existence to decent people even fifteen 
 years their seniors, were to them simply unintelligible. 
 The word "unselfishness," for instance, had vanished from 
 their vocabularies. Of altruism, they had heard. They 
 thought it meant giving away money if you had plenty to 
 spare. They approved of altruism, but " self-sacrifice " was 
 literally as Sanskrit to their ears. They demanded ease; 
 they shirked responsibility. They did not seem able to 
 respond to the notion of duty as human nature has always 
 managed to respond to it before. 
 
 All this was not a matter of youth. One may be undevel 
 oped and yet show the more clearly the stuff of which one 
 is made. It was a matter of substance, of mass. You can 
 not carve a statue in the round from a thin marble slab; the 
 useful two-by-four is valueless as framing-timber for ships; 
 you cannot make folks out of light-weight human material. 
 
 When these young persons adopted a philosophy, it was 
 naive and inadequate. They talked of themselves as " social 
 ists," but their ideas of Socialism were vague. To them it 
 was just an ism that was going to put the world to rights, 
 without bothering them very much to help it along. They 
 seemed to feel that salvation would come to them by read 
 ing Whitman and G. B. S., or even the mild and uncertain 
 Mr. H. G. Wells; and that a vague, general good-will toward 
 man was an ample substitute for active effort and self -sac 
 rifice for individuals. Somebody, some day, was going to 
 push a button, and presto ! life would be soft and comfort 
 able for everybody. 
 
36 A LETTER TO THE RISING GENERATION 
 
 Of Socialism in general I confess myself incompetent to 
 speak. It may, or it may not, be the solution of our acutely 
 pressing social problems. But if men are too cheap, greedy, 
 and sordid to carry on a republic honestly, preserving that 
 equality of opportunity which this country was founded to 
 secure, it must be men who need reforming. The more ideal 
 the scheme of government, the less chance it has against the 
 inherent crookedness of human nature. In the last analy 
 sis, we are not ruled by a "government,* but by our own 
 natures objectified, moulded into institutions. Rotten men 
 make rotten government. If we are not improving the 
 quality of the human product, our social system is bound to 
 grow more cruel and unjust, whatever its name or form. 
 
 "But of course you believe," said one pink-cheeked young 
 Socialist, expounding his doctrine, "that the world will be a 
 great deal better when everybody has a porcelain bathtub 
 and goes through high school. Why why, of course, you 
 must believe that!" 
 
 Dear lad, I believe nothing of the kind! You yourself 
 have had a porcelain bathtub from your tenderest years. 
 You also went through high school. Yet you are markedly 
 inferior to your old grandfather in every way, shallower, 
 feebler, more flippant, less efficient physically and even 
 mentally, though your work is with books, and his was with 
 flocks and herds. Frankly, I find in you nothing essential 
 to a man. God knows what life can make of such as you. I 
 do not. Your brand of Socialism is made up of a warm heart, 
 a weak head, and an unwillingness to assume responsibility 
 for yourself or anybody else in short, a desire to shirk. 
 These elements are unpleasantly common in young Social 
 ists of my acquaintance. I know, of course, that a very 
 passion of pity, a Christlike tenderness, brings many to 
 that fold; but there are more of another kind. It was one of 
 the latter who was horrified by my suggestion that he 
 
A LETTER TO THE RISING GENERATION 37 
 
 might have to care for his parents in their old age. It would 
 interfere too much, he said, with his conception of working 
 out his own career! 
 
 What can one say to this? The words character and duty 
 convey absolutely nothing to young people of this type. 
 They have not even a fair working conception of what such 
 words mean. Did I not dispute a whole afternoon with an 
 other young man about the necessity for character, only 
 to learn at the end of it that he did n t know what character 
 was. He supposed it was "something narrow and priggish 
 
 like what deacons used to be." And he, mind you, was in 
 his twenties, and claimed, ore rotundo, to be a Whitmanite, 
 a Shavian, and a Socialist. Also, he was really intelligent 
 about almost everything but life which is the only thing 
 it is at all needful to be intelligent about. 
 
 The culte du moi is one thing when it is representative, 
 when one rhapsodizes one s self haughtily as a unit of the 
 democratic mass, as Whitman undoubtedly did ; and quite 
 another when it is narrowly personal, a kind of glorification 
 of the petty, personal attributes of young John Smith, used 
 by him to conceal from himself the desirability of remodel 
 ing his own personality ; but that is what young John Smith, 
 who calls himself a Whitmanite, is making of it. I knew one 
 of these young persons I trust his attitude is exceptional 
 
 who refused special training for work he wanted to do, 
 on the ground that he was "repelling interference with his 
 sacred individuality." 
 
 Twenty years ago there were faint-hearted disciples of 
 Whitman who took him as an antidote for congenital unas- 
 sertiveness. His insistence on the value of personality 
 supplied something needed in their make-up, and they 
 found in wearing a flannel shirt and soft tie a kind of spirit 
 ual gymnastic that strengthened the flabby muscles of 
 their Ego. The young Whitmanites of to-day have no 
 flabby muscles in their Ego. 
 
38 A LETTER TO THE RISING GENERATION 
 
 The same temperamental qualities operate when they 
 name themselves Shavians. Their philosophy was set 
 forth lucidly in an article in the "Atlantic" for February, 
 1909. 1 Its keynote is the liberation of the natural will, with 
 the important modifications that the natural will must hold 
 itself to an iron responsibility in its collisions with other 
 wills, must not obstruct the general good of society or the 
 evolution of the race. To the unphilosophic eye, these 
 modifications look suspiciously like duties the old, old 
 duties to God and man. Why go around Robin Hood s barn 
 to arrive at the point where our ancestors set out? If the 
 exercise were mentally strengthening, the detour might be 
 justified; but the evidence of this is decidedly incomplete. 
 
 It may easily happen that the next twenty years will 
 prove the most interesting in the history of civilization. 
 Armageddon is always at hand in some fashion. Nice lads 
 with the blood of the founders of our nation in your veins, 
 pecking away at the current literature of Socialism, taking 
 out of it imperfectly understood apologies for your temper 
 aments and calling it philosophy where will you be if a 
 Great Day should really dawn? What is there in your way 
 of thought to help you play the man in any crisis? If the 
 footmen have wearied you, how shall you run with the 
 horsemen? In one way or another, every generation has to 
 fight for its life. When your turn comes, you will be tossed 
 on the scrap-heap, shoved aside by boys of a sterner fibre 
 and a less easy life, boys who have read less and worked 
 more, boys who have thought to some purpose and have 
 been willing as you are not to be disciplined by life. 
 
 If you point out to one of these young Whitmanshaws 
 the fact that the Ten Commandments are concrete sugges 
 tions for so conducting life that it will interfere as little as 
 possible with " the general good of society and the evolution 
 1 " The Philosophy of Bernard Shaw," by Archibald Henderson. 
 
A LETTER TO THE RISING GENERATION 39 
 
 of the race," and that the Golden Rule is a general principle 
 covering the same ground, he will tell you that the Ten 
 Commandments and the Golden Rule are bad because they 
 are promulgated on Authority, and nobody must take 
 things on Authority for Mr. Shaw says so! One must 
 find it all out for himself. If you suggest that it is possible 
 to regard Authority as the data collected by those who have 
 preceded him along the trail, telling him what they found 
 out about the road, so as to save him from trouble and dan 
 ger; if you maintain that it is as unscientific to reject pre 
 vious discoveries in ethics as in engineering, he may be 
 silenced, but he will not be convinced, for his revolt is not 
 a matter of logic but of feeling. He wants to do as he 
 pleases. He desires to be irresponsible, and he will adopt 
 any philosophy which seems to him to hold out a justifica 
 tion of irresponsibility, as he will adopt any theory of social 
 organization which promises to relieve him of a man s work 
 in the world. I am not exaggerating the shallowness of this 
 attitude. 
 
 All educated young people are not " intellectuals." Most 
 of them are perfectly contented without any articulate 
 philosophy as an apology for their inclinations. There is 
 also a considerable body of them who are already painfully 
 commercialized, even in their school-days. On the whole, 
 the kind of young Socialist who resents the idea of having to 
 care for his parents in their helpless age is less of a menace 
 to society as now constituted than the kind of young indi 
 vidualist who boasts how much money he acquired during 
 his college course by making loans to his classmates upon 
 the security of their evening clothes and watches. The lat 
 ter, hard as nails and predatory, has already moulded him 
 self into a distinctly anti-social shape; the former is still 
 amorphous, still groping. There is yet a chance that he 
 may make a man. 
 
40 A LETTER TO THE RISING GENERATION 
 
 I am not a philosopher. I know only so much as the man 
 in the street may know, the rough-and-ready philosophy 
 that is born in us all. Just so long as any system of educa 
 tion or any philosophy produces folks that are folks, wisdom 
 is justified of her children. That system has earned the 
 right to stand. This point is not debatable. Even the new 
 prophets concede it. For the end of all education, the busi 
 ness of all living, is to make men and women. All else is 
 vain toil. The old conditions produced them; the new do 
 not. 
 
 Certain qualities go to the making of any human being 
 whom other human beings esteem. Certain ingredients are 
 as necessary to a man as flour and yeast to bread, or iron 
 and carbon to steel. You cannot make them any other way. 
 There is a combination of steadiness of purpose, breadth of 
 mind, kindliness, wholesome common sense, justice, per 
 haps a flash of humor, certainly a capacity for the task in 
 hand, that produces a worth-while person. The combina 
 tion occurs in every rank in life. You find it as often in the 
 kitchen as in the parlor; oftener, perhaps, in the field than 
 in the office. The people who are so composed have spiritual 
 length, breadth, thickness ; they are people of three dimen 
 sions. Everybody feels alike about them, even you young 
 sters. For this saving grace I have noticed about you 
 you do, after all, know whom to like when types are put 
 before you in the flesh. Never by any chance do you waste 
 your real admiration on the one-dimension people who, like 
 points, have "position but no magnitude," or on the two- 
 dimension people who, like planes, "have length and 
 breadth but no depth." You frankly don t care much for 
 the kind of creature your own ideas would shape. You 
 want people to be stanch, patient, able, just as much as if 
 you were not repudiating for yourselves the attitudes which 
 produce these things. 
 
A LETTER TO THE RISING GENERATION 41 
 
 Force, personality, the power to endure: these our fath 
 ers had; these you are losing. Yet life itself demands them 
 as much as it ever did. For though we may be getting soft 
 and losing our stamina (another word which, like fortitude, 
 has gone out of fashion), the essential elements of life re 
 main unchangeable. Life is not, and is not meant to be, a 
 cheap, easy matter, even for flat-dwellers. It is a grim, hard, 
 desolate piece of work, shot through with all sorts of exquis 
 ite, wonderful, compensating experiences. 
 
 Consider the matter of your own existence and support 
 that you accept with such nonchalant ease. Every child 
 born into the world is paid for with literal blood, sweat, 
 tears. That is the fixed price, and there are no bargain sales. 
 Years of toil, months of care, hours of agony, go to your 
 birth and rearing. What excuse have you, anyhow, for 
 turning out flimsy, shallow, amusement-seeking creatures, 
 when you think of the elements in your making? The price 
 is paid gladly. That is your fathers and mothers part. 
 Yours is, to be worth it. You have your own salvation to 
 work out. It must be salvation, and it must be achieved by 
 work. That is the law, and there is no other. 
 
 Our rushing, mechanical, agitated way of living tends to 
 hide these root-facts from you. Years ago I asked a young 
 girl, compelled for reasons of health to spend her winters 
 away from her home, how she filled her days. "It takes a 
 good dealjof time to find out what I think about things," 
 she answered, explaining thereby, in part, the depth in her 
 own character as well as the shallowness in whole groups of 
 others. In simpler days, when there was more work and less 
 amusement, there was more time for thinking, and thinking 
 is creative of personality. Some of it must go to the making 
 of any creature who counts at all, as must also some actual 
 work. Also and you ought to know this and to be able to 
 rejoice in it the other great creative elements in person- 
 
42 A LETTER TO THE RISING GENERATION 
 
 ality are responsibility and suffering. The unshapen lump 
 of raw human material that we are cannot take on lines of 
 identity without the hammer, the chisel, the drill that 
 comparison must certainly be as old as the art of moralizing, 
 but it has not lost its force. 
 
 Sometimes you prattle confidently of growth by "devel 
 opment, * as if that were an affair of ease. It is only experi 
 ence, the reaction of our activities on the self, which devel 
 ops; and experience has immense possibilities of pain. Have 
 you forgotten what you learned in your psychology con 
 cerning the very kernel of selfhood ? " We measure ourselves 
 by many standards. Our strength and our intelligence, our 
 wealth and even our good luck, are things which warm our 
 heart and make us feel ourselves a match for life. But 
 deeper than all such things, and able to suffice unto itself 
 without them, is the sense of the amount of effort we can 
 put forth . . . as if it were the substantive thing which we 
 are, and those were but the externals which we carry. . . . 
 He who can make none is but a shadow; he who can make 
 much is a hero." 
 
 We are, obviously, here to be made into something by 
 life. It seizes and shapes us. The process is sometimes 
 very pleasant, sometimes very painful. So be it. It is all in 
 the day s work, and only the worthless will try to evade 
 their proper share of either pain or pleasure. To seek more 
 of the former would be bravado, as to accept less would be 
 dishonor. The whole matter is of such a simplicity that 
 only the suspicion of a concerted, though unconscious, at 
 tempt of an entire generation to get the pleasure without 
 the due pain of living, would justify such a definite state 
 ment of it here. 
 
 The other day I beheld a woman whose husband earns 
 something less than two hundred dollars a month, purchas 
 ing her season s wardrobe. Into it went one hat at fifty 
 
A LETTER TO THE RISING GENERATION 43 
 
 dollars and another at thirty dollars. Her neighbors in the 
 flat-building admired and envied. One of the bolder won 
 dered. "Well, I can t help it," said Mrs. Jones. "I just 
 tell Mr. Jones life is n t worth livin if I can t have what 
 I want." This, you see, was her way of "liberating the nat 
 ural will." 
 
 The truth is that life is n t worth livin if you can have 
 what you want unless you happen to be the exceptional 
 person who wants discipline, responsibility, effort, suffering. 
 
 From the thought of Mrs. Jones and her hats, I like to 
 turn to a certain volume of memoirs, giving a picture of 
 New England life in the first half of the nineteenth century. 
 It is an incomparable textbook on the art of getting the 
 most out of living. It sets forth, in such concrete, vivid 
 fashion as to kindle the most reluctant imagination, the 
 habits and virtues of a plain-living, high-thinking, purpose 
 ful day. The delightful lady who is the subject of it found 
 three dresses at a time an ample outfit, and six days sewing 
 a year sufficed for her wardrobe; but she had "a noble pres 
 ence and what would have been called stately manners, had 
 they not been so gracious." 1 Before the age of twenty she 
 had read "all the authors on metaphysics and ethics that 
 were then best known, "and throughout life she kept eagerly 
 in touch with the thought of the day. This did not inter 
 fere with her domestic concerns, as they did not narrow 
 her social life. If she arose at 4 A.M. to sweep the parlors, 
 calling the domestics and the family at six, it was that she 
 might find time for reading during the morning, and for en 
 tertaining her friends in the evening, as she habitually did 
 some three times a week. She managed a large house and a 
 large family, and her wit, cultivation, and energy enriched 
 life for everybody who knew her. She had "no higher aim 
 
 1 Recollections of My Mother. By Susan I. Lesley, Boston: Houghton 
 Mifflin Co. 
 
44 A LETTER TO THE RISING GENERATION 
 
 than to light and warm the neighborhood where God had 
 placed her." She and her sisters "had never dreamed of a 
 life of ease, or of freedom from care, as anything to be de 
 sired. On the contrary, they gloried in responsibility with 
 all the intensity of simple and healthy natures." 
 
 That day is gone, not to return, but its informing spirit 
 can be recaptured and applied to other conditions as a 
 solvent. If that were done, I think the Golden Age might 
 come again, even here and now. 
 
 No generalizations apply to all of a class. Numerically, 
 of course, many of the rising generation are fine and com 
 petent young people, stanch, generous, right-minded, seek 
 ing to give and to get the best in life and to leave the world 
 better than they found it. I take it, any young person who 
 reads the "Atlantic" will have chosen this better part 
 but, suppose you had n t ! Suppose you discovered your 
 self to be one of those unfortunates herein described? De 
 prived of the disciplinary alphabet, multiplication-table, 
 Latin grammar; dispossessed of the English Bible, most 
 stimulating of literary as well as of ethical inheritances ; de 
 spoiled of your birthright in the religion that made your 
 ancestors ; destitute of incentives to hardihood and physical 
 exertion; solicited to indolence by cheap amusements, to 
 self-conceit by cheap philosophies, to greed by cheap 
 wealth what, then, is left for you? 
 
 Even if your predicament were, without relief, as dire as 
 this, you would at least have the chance to put up a won 
 derful fight. It would be so good a thing to win against 
 those odds that one s blood tingles at the thought. But 
 there are several elements which alter the position. For one, 
 the lack of a definite religious training is not irreparable. 
 
 This is not a sermon, and it is for others to tell those how 
 to find God who have not yet attained unto Him; but it is 
 certain that the mature world around you, with which you 
 
A LETTER TO THE RISING GENERATION 45 
 
 are just coming into definite relation, is morally very much 
 alive just now. That its moral awakening is not exactly on 
 the lines of previous ones does not make it less authentic or 
 contagious. Unless you are prematurely case-hardened, it 
 is bound to affect you. 
 
 Then you are young. It is quite within your power to 
 surprise yourselves and discomfit the middle-aged prophets 
 of evil who write you pages of warnings. The chance of 
 youth is always the very greatest chance in the world, the 
 chance of the uncharted sea, of the undiscovered land. 
 
 The idealism of the young and their plasticity in the 
 hands of their ideals have carried this old world through 
 evil days before now. It has always been held true that, so 
 long as you are under twenty-five, you are not irrevocably 
 committed to your own deficiencies. I wonder if you realize 
 that for you, first among the sons of men, that period of 
 grace has been indefinitely extended? 
 
 The brain-specialists and the psychologists between 
 them have given in the last ten years what seems conclus 
 ive proof of the servitude of the body to the Self; they have 
 shown how, by use of the appropriate mechanism in our 
 make-up, we can control to a degree even the automatisms 
 of our bodies; they have demonstrated the absolute mas 
 tery of will over conduct. Those ancient foes, Heredity and 
 Habit, can do very little against you, to-day, that you are 
 not in a position to overcome. Since the world began, no hu 
 man creatures have had the scientific assertion of this that 
 you possess. Many wise and many righteous have longed 
 to be assured of these matters, and have agonized through 
 life without that certainty. Saints and sages have achieved 
 by long prayer and fasting the graces that you, apparently, 
 may attain by the easy process of self-suggestion. 
 
 Coming as this psychological discovery does, in the mid 
 dle of an age of unparalleled mechanical invention and dis- 
 
46 A LETTER TO THE RISING GENERATION 
 
 covery, it is almost is it not? as if the Creator of men 
 had said: "It is time that these children of mine came to 
 maturity. I will give them at last their full mastery over 
 the earth and over the air and over the spirits of themselves. 
 Let us see how they bear themselves under these gifts." 
 
 Thus, your responsibility for yourselves is such an utter 
 responsibility as the race has never known. It is the ulti 
 mate challenge to human worth and human power. You 
 dare not fail under it. I think the long generations of your 
 fathers hold their breath, to see if you do less with certainty 
 than they have done with faith. 
 
THIS OLDER GENERATION 
 
 RANDOLPH S. BOURNE 
 
 I READ with ever-increasing wonder the guarded defenses 
 and discreet apologies for the older generation which keep 
 filtering through the essays of the "Atlantic." I can even 
 seem to detect a growing decision of tone, a definite assur 
 ance of conviction, which seems to imply that a rally has 
 been undertaken against the accusations which the younger 
 generation, in its self-assurance, its irreverence for the old 
 conventions and moralities, its passion for the novel and 
 startling, seemed to be bringing against them. The first 
 faint twinges of conscience felt by the older generation have 
 given place to renewed homily. There is an evident anxiety 
 to get itself put on record as perfectly satisfied with its 
 world, and desirous that its sons and daughters should learn 
 anew of those peculiar beauties in which it has lived. Swept 
 off its feet by the call to social service and social reform, it 
 is slowly regaining its foundation, and, slightly flushed, and 
 with garments somewhat awry, it proclaims again its be 
 lief in the eternal verities of Protestant religion and conven 
 tional New England morality. 
 
 It is always an encouraging sign when people are rendered 
 self-conscious and are forced to examine the basis of their 
 ideals. The demand that they explain them to skeptics al 
 ways makes for clarity. When the older generation is put on 
 the defensive, it must first discover what convictions it has, 
 and then sharpen them to their finest point in order to pre 
 sent them convincingly. There are always too many 
 unquestioned things in the world, and for a person or class 
 to have to scurry about to find reasons for its prejudices is 
 
48 THIS OLDER GENERATION 
 
 about as healthy an exercise as one could wish for either of 
 them. To be sure, the reasons are rarely any more than ex 
 post facto excuses supports and justifications for the pre 
 judices rather than the causes thereof. Reason itself is very 
 seldom more than that. The important point is that one 
 should feel the need of a reason. This always indicates that 
 something has begun to slide, that the world is no longer so 
 secure as it was, that obvious truths no longer are obvious, 
 that the world has begun to bristle with question marks. 
 
 One of the basic grievances of this older generation against 
 the younger of to-day, with its social agitation, its religious 
 heresy, its presumptive individuality, its economic restless 
 ness, is that all this makes it uncomfortable. When you 
 have found growing older to be a process of the reconcilia 
 tion of the spirit to life, it is decidedly disconcerting to have 
 some youngster come along and point out the irreconcilable 
 things in the universe. Just as you have made a tacit agree 
 ment to call certain things non-existent, it is highly discom 
 moding to have somebody shout with strident tones that 
 they are very real and significant. When, after much strug 
 gling and compromise, you have got your world clamped 
 down, it is discouraging to have a gale arise, which threat 
 ens to blow over all your structure. Through so much of 
 the current writing runs this quiet note of disapprobation. 
 These agnostic professors who unsettle the faith of our 
 youth, these " intellectuals who stick a finger in everybody s 
 pie in the name of social justice," these sensation-mongers 
 who unveil great masses of political and social corruption, 
 these remorseless scientists who would reveal so many of 
 our reticences why can t they let us alone? Can they not 
 see that God s in his heaven, all s right with the world? 
 
 Now I know this older generation, which doth protest so 
 much. I have lived with it for the last fifteen years, ever 
 since I began to wonder whether all was for the best in the 
 
THIS OLDER GENERATION 49 
 
 best of all possible worlds. I was educated by it, grew up 
 with it. I doubt if any generation ever had a more docile 
 pupil than I. What they taught me, I find they still believe, 
 or at least so many of them as have not gone over to the 
 enemy, or been captured by the militant youth of to-day. 
 Or, as seems rather likely, they no longer precisely believe, 
 but they want their own arguments to convince themselves. 
 It is probable that, when we really believe a thing with all 
 our hearts, we do not attempt to justify it. Justification 
 comes only when we are beginning to doubt it. 
 
 By this older generation, I mean, of course, the mothers 
 and fathers and uncles and aunts of the youth of both sexes 
 between twenty and thirty who are beginning their profes 
 sional or business life. And I refer of course to the comfort 
 able or fairly comfortable American middle class. Now this 
 older generation has had a religion, a metaphysics, an ethics, 
 and a political and social philosophy, which have reigned 
 practically undisputed until the appearance of the present 
 generation. It has at least never felt called upon to justify 
 itself. It has never been directly challenged, as it is to-day. 
 In order to localize this generation still further, we must see 
 it in its typical setting of the small town or city, clustered 
 about the institutions of church and family. If we have any 
 society which can be called "America," it is this society. 
 Its psychology is American psychology; its soul is America s 
 soul. 
 
 This older generation, which I have known so well for 
 fifteen years, has a religion which is on the whole as pleasant 
 and easy as could be devised. Though its members are the 
 descendants of the stern and rugged old Puritans, who 
 wrestled with the devil and stripped their world of all that 
 might seduce them from the awful service of God, they have 
 succeeded in straining away by a long process all the re 
 pellent attitudes in the old philosophy of life. It is unfair 
 
50 THIS OLDER GENERATION 
 
 to say that the older generation believes in dogmas and 
 creeds. It would be more accurate to say that it does not 
 disbelieve. It retains them as a sort of guaranty of the 
 stability of the faith, but leaves them rather severely alone. 
 It does not even make more than feeble efforts to reinter 
 pret them in the light of modern knowledge. They are use 
 less, but necessary. 
 
 The foundation of this religion may be religious, but the 
 superstructure is almost entirely ethical. Most sermons of 
 to-day are little more than pious exhortations to good con 
 duct. By good conduct is meant that sort of action which 
 will least disturb the normal routine of modern middle-class 
 life : common honesty in business lif e, faithfulness to duty, 
 ambition in business and profession, filial obligation, the 
 use of talents, and always and everywhere simple human 
 kindness and love. The old Puritan ethics, which saw in the 
 least issue of conduct a struggle between God and the devil, 
 has become a mere code for facilitating the daily friction 
 of conventional life. 
 
 Now one would indeed be churlish to find fault with this 
 devout belief in simple goodness, which characterizes the 
 older generation. It is only when these humble virtues are 
 raised up into an all-inclusive programme for social reform 
 and into a philosophy of life that one begins to question, 
 and to feel afar the deep hostility of the older generation to 
 the new faith. 
 
 Simple kindness, common honesty, filial obedience, it is 
 evidently still felt, will solve all the difficulties of personal 
 and social life. The most popular novels of the day are 
 those in which the characters do the most good to each 
 other. The enormous success with the older generation of 
 "The Inside of the Cup," "Queed," and "V.V. s Eyes" is 
 based primarily on the fact that these books represent a 
 sublimated form of the good old American melodramatic 
 moral sense. 
 
THIS OLDER GENERATION 51 
 
 And now comes along Mr. Gerald Stanley Lee with his 
 " Crowds," what a funny, individualized, personal- 
 responsibility crowd he gives us, to be sure, and his pan 
 acea for modern social ills by the old solution of applied 
 personal virtue. Never a word about removing the barriers 
 of caste and race and economic inequality, but only an urg 
 ing to step over them. Never a trumpet-call to level the 
 ramparts of privilege, or build up the heights of opportun 
 ity, but only an appeal to extend the charitable hand from 
 the ramparts of heaven, or offer the kindly patronage to the 
 less fortunate, or most dazzling of all throw away, in 
 a frenzy of abandonment, life and fortune. Not to con 
 struct a business organization where dishonesty would be 
 meaningless, but to be utopianly honest against the busi 
 ness world. In other words, the older generation believes in 
 getting all the luxury of the virtue of goodness, while con 
 serving all the advantages of being in a vicious society. 
 
 If there is any one characteristic that distinguishes the 
 older generation, it is this belief that social ills may be cured 
 by personal virtue. Its highest moral ideals are sacrifice 
 and service. But the older generation can never see how 
 intensely selfish these ideals are, in the most complete sense 
 of the word selfish. What they mean always is, " I sacrifice 
 myself for you," " I serve you," not, " We cooperate in work 
 ing ceaselessly toward an ideal where all may be free and 
 none may be served or serve." These ideals of sacrifice and 
 service are utterly selfish, because they take account only 
 of the satisfaction and moral consolidation of the doer. 
 They enhance his moral value; but what of the person who 
 is served or sacrificed for? What of the person who is done 
 good to? If the feelings of sacrifice and service were hi any 
 sense altruistic, the moral enhancement of the receiver 
 would be the object sought. But can it not be said that 
 for every individual virtuous merit secured by an act of 
 
52 THIS OLDER GENERATION 
 
 sacrifice or service on the part of the doer, there is a corre 
 sponding depression on the part of the receiver? Do we not 
 universally recognize this by calling a person who is not 
 conscious of this depression a parasite, and the person who 
 is no longer capable of depression a pauper? It is exactly 
 those free gifts, such as schools, libraries, and so forth, which 
 are impersonal or social, that we can accept gratefully and 
 gladly; and it is exactly because the ministrations of a 
 Charity Organization Society are impersonal and business 
 like, that they can be received willingly, and without moral 
 depression, by the poor. 
 
 The ideal of duty is equally open to attack. The great 
 complaint of the younger against the older generation has 
 to do with the rigidity of the social relationships into which 
 the younger find themselves born. The world seems to be 
 full of what may be called canalized emotions. One is " sup 
 posed" to love one s aunt or one s grandfather in a certain 
 definite way, at the risk of being " unnatural." One gets al 
 most a sense of the quantitative measurement of emotion. 
 Perhaps the greatest tragedy of family life is the useless 
 energy that is expended by the dutiful in keeping these 
 artificial channels open, and the correct amount of current 
 running. It is exactly this that produces most infallibly the 
 rebellion of the younger generation. To hear that one ought 
 to love this or that person; or to hear loyalty spoken of, as 
 the older generation so often speaks of it, as if it consisted 
 in an allegiance to something which one no longer believes 
 in this is wiiat soonest liberates those forces of madness 
 and revolt that bewilder spiritual teachers and guides. It is 
 those dry channels of duty and obligation through which no 
 living waters of emotion flow that it is the ideal of the 
 younger generation to break up. They will have no net 
 work of emotional canals that are not brimming, no duties 
 that are not equally loves. 
 
THIS OLDER GENERATION 53 
 
 But when they are loves, you have duty no longer mean 
 ing very much. Duty, like sacrifice and service, always im 
 plies a personal relation of individuals. You are always 
 doing your duty to somebody or something. Always the 
 taint of inequality comes in. You are morally superior to 
 the person who has duty done to him. If that duty is not 
 filled with good-will and desire, it is morally hateful, or at 
 very best, a necessary evil one of those compromises 
 with the world which must be made in order to get through 
 it at all. But duty without good-will is a compromise with 
 our present state of inequality, and to rake duty to the 
 level of a virtue is to consecrate that state of inequality 
 forevermore. 
 
 It is the same thing with service. The older generation 
 has attempted an insidious compromise with the new social 
 democracy by combining the words "social" and "service." 
 Under cover of the ideal of service, it tries to appropriate to 
 itself the glory of social work, and succeeds in almost con 
 vincing itself and the world that its Christianity has always 
 held the same ideal. The faithful are urged to extend their 
 activities. The assumption is that, by doing good to more 
 individuals, you are thereby becoming social. But to speak 
 of "social democracy," which of course means a freely 
 cooperating, freely reciprocating society of equals and 
 "service," together, is a contradiction of terms. For, 
 when you serve people or do good to them, you thereby 
 render yourself unequal with them. You insult the demo 
 cratic ideal. If the service is compulsory, it is menial and 
 you are inferior. If voluntary, you are superior. The differ 
 ence, however, is only academic. The entire Christian 
 scheme is a clever but unsuccessful attempt to cure the 
 evils of inequality by transposing the values. The slave 
 serves gladly instead of servilely. That is, he turns his mas 
 ter into a slave. That is why good Christian people can 
 
54 THIS OLDER GENERATION 
 
 never get over the idea that Socialism means simply the 
 triumph of one class over another. To-day the proletarian 
 is down, the capitalist up. To-morrow the proletarian will 
 be up and the capitalist down. To pull down the mighty 
 from their seats and exalt them of low degree is the highest 
 pitch to which Christian ethics ever attained. The failure 
 of the older generation to recognize a higher ethic, the ethic 
 of democracy, is the cause of all the trouble. 
 
 The notorious Victorian era, which in its secret heart this 
 older generation still admires so much, accentuated all the 
 latent individualism of Christian ethics, and produced a 
 code which, without the rebellion of the younger generation, 
 would have spiritually guaranteed forever all moral caste 
 divisions and inequalities of modern society. The Protest 
 ant Church, in which this exaggerated ethic was enshrined, 
 is now paying heavily the price of this debauch of ethical 
 power. Its rapidly declining numbers show that human na 
 ture has an invincible objection to being individually saved. 
 The Catholic Church, which saves men as members of 
 the BelovedjjCommunity, and not as individuals, flourishes. 
 When one is saved by Catholicism, one becomes a demo 
 crat, and not a spiritual snob and aristocrat, as one does 
 through Calvinism. The older generation can never under 
 stand that superb loyalty which is loyalty to a community 
 a loyalty which, paradoxical as it may seem, nourishes 
 the true social personality in proportion as the individual 
 sense is lessened. The Protestant Church, in its tenacious 
 devotion to the personal ideal of a Divine Master, the 
 highest and most popular Christian ideal of to-day, 
 shows how very far it still is away from the ideals and 
 ethics of a social democracy, a life lived in the Beloved 
 Community. 
 
 The sense of self-respect is the very keystone of the per 
 sonality in whose defense all this individualistic philosophy 
 
THIS OLDER GENERATION 55 
 
 has been carefully built up. The Christian virtues date 
 from ages when there was a vastly greater number of mor 
 ally depressed people than there is now. The tenacious sur 
 vival of these virtues can be due only to the fact that they 
 were valuable to the moral prestige of some class. Our 
 older generation, with its emphasis on duty, sacrifice, and 
 service, shows us very clearly what those interests were. I 
 deliberately accuse the older generation of conserving and 
 greatly strengthening these ideals, as a defensive measure. 
 Morals are always the product of a situation; they reflect a 
 certain organization of human relations, which some class 
 or group wishes to preserve. A moral code or set of ideals is 
 always the invisible spiritual sign of a visible social grace. 
 In an effort to retain the status quo of that world of inequali 
 ties and conventions in which they most comfortably and 
 prosperously live, the older generation has stamped, 
 through all its agencies of family, church, and school, upon 
 the younger generation, just those seductive ideals which 
 would preserve its position. These old virtues, upon which, 
 however, the younger generation is already making guerilla 
 warfare, are simply the moral support with which the older 
 generation buttresses its social situation. 
 
 The natural barriers and prejudices by which our elders 
 are cut off from a freely flowing democracy are thus given 
 a spiritual justification, and there is added for our elders the 
 almost sensual luxury of leaping, by free grace, the barriers, 
 and giving themselves away. But the price has to be paid. 
 Just as profits, in the socialist philosophy, are taken to be 
 an abstraction from wages, through the economic power 
 which one class has over another, so the virtues of the older 
 generation may be said to be an abstraction from the virtue 
 of other classes less favorably situated from a moral or per 
 sonal point of view. Their swollen self-respect is at the ex 
 pense of others. 
 
56 THIS OLDER GENERATION 
 
 How well we know the type of man in the older genera 
 tion who has been doing good all his life! How his person 
 ality has thriven on it! How he has ceaselessly been storing 
 away moral fat in every cranny of his soul! His goodness 
 has been meat to him. The need and depression of other 
 people have been, all unconsciously to him, the air that he 
 has breathed. Without their compensating misfortune or 
 sin, his goodness would have wilted and died. If good 
 people would earnestly set to work to make the world uni 
 formly healthy, courageous, beautiful, and prosperous, the 
 field of their vocation would be constantly limited, and fin 
 ally destroyed. That they so stoutly resist all philosophies 
 and movements which have these ends primarily in view 
 is convincing evidence of the fierce and jealous egoism 
 which animates their so plausibly altruistic spirit. One sus 
 pects that the older generation does not want its vocation 
 destroyed. It takes an heroic type of goodness to under 
 mine all the foundations on which our virtue rests. 
 
 If then I object to the ethical philosophy of the older gen 
 eration, on the ground that it is too individualistic, and, 
 under the pretense of altruism, too egoistic, I object to its 
 general intellectuality as not individual enough. Intellect 
 ually the older generation seems to me to lead far too vege 
 tative a life. It may be that this life has been lived on the 
 heights, that these souls have passed through fires and 
 glories, but there is generally too little objective evidence 
 of this subjective fact. If the intuition that accompa 
 nies experience has verified all the data regarding God, 
 the soul, the family, and so forth, to quote one of the 
 stanchest defenders of the generation, this verification 
 seems to have been obtained rather that the issues might be 
 promptly disposed of and forgotten. Certainly the older gen 
 eration is rarely interested in the profounder issues of life. 
 It never speaks of death the suggestion makes it uncom- 
 
THIS OLDER GENERATION 57 
 
 fortable. It shies in panic at hints of sex-issues. It seems res 
 olute to keep life on as objective a plane as possible. It is no 
 longer curious about the motives and feelings of people. It 
 seems singularly to lack the psychological sense. If it gos 
 sips, it recounts actions, effects; it rarely seeks to interpret. 
 It tends more and more to treat human beings as moving 
 masses of matter instead of as personalities filled with po 
 tent influence, or as absorbingly interesting social types, as 
 I am sure the younger generation does. 
 
 The older generation seems no longer to generalize 
 although it gives every evidence of having once prodi 
 giously generalized, for its world is all hardened and definite. 
 There are the good and the criminal, and the poor, the 
 people who can be called nice, and the ordinary people. 
 The world is already plotted out. Now I am sure that the 
 generalizations of the truly philosophical mind are very 
 fluid and ephemeral. They are no sooner made than the 
 mind sees their insufficiency and has to break them up. A 
 new cutting is made, only in turn to be shaken and rear 
 ranged. This keeps the philosopher thinking all the time, 
 and it makes his world a very uncertain place. But he at 
 least runs no risk of hardening, and he has his eyes open to 
 most experience. 
 
 I am often impressed with the fact that the older genera 
 tion has grown weary of thinking. It has simply put up the 
 bars in its intellectual shop-windows and gone off home to 
 rest. It may well be that this is because it has felt so much 
 sorrow that it does not want to talk about sorrow, or so 
 much love that to interpret love tires it, or repulsed so many 
 rude blows of destiny that it has no interest in speaking of 
 destiny. Its flame may be low for the very reason that it 
 has burned so intensely. But how many of the younger 
 generation would eagerly long for such interpretations if 
 the older would only reveal them! Ajid how little plausible 
 
58 THIS OLDER GENERATION 
 
 is that experience when it is occasionally interpreted! No, 
 enthusiasm, passion for ideas, sensuality, religious fervor 
 all the heated weapons with which the younger generation 
 attacks the world, seem only to make the older generation 
 uneasy. The spirit, in becoming reconciled to life, has lost 
 life itself. 
 
 As I seethe older generation going through its daily round 
 of business, church, and family life, I cannot help feeling 
 that its influence is profoundly pernicious. It has signally 
 failed to broaden its institutions for the larger horizon of the 
 time. The church remains a private club of comfortable 
 middle-class families, while outside there grows up, without 
 spiritual inspiration, a heterogeneous mass of people with 
 out ties, roots, or principles. The town changes from a 
 village to an industrial centre, and church and school go 
 through their time-honored and listless motions. The world 
 widens, society expands, formidable crises appear, but the 
 older generation does not broaden; or, if it does, the 
 broadening is in no adequate proportion to our needs. The 
 older generation still uses the old ideas for the new problem. 
 Whatever new wine it finds must be poured into the old 
 bottles. 
 
 Where are the leaders among the older generation in 
 America who, with luminous faith and intelligence, are 
 rallying around them the disintegrated numbers of idealis 
 tic youth, as Bergson and Barres and Jaures have done in 
 France? A few years ago there seemed to be a promise of a 
 forward movement toward Democracy, led by battled vet 
 erans in a war against privilege. But how soon the older 
 generation became wearied in the march! What is left now 
 of that shining army and its leader? Must the younger gen 
 eration eternally wait for the sign? 
 
 The answer is, of course, that it will not wait. It must 
 shoulder the gigantic task of putting into practice its ideals 
 
THIS OLDER GENERATION 59 
 
 and revolutionary points of view as wholeheartedly and 
 successfully as our great-grandfathers applied theirs and 
 tightened the philosophy of life which imprisons the older 
 generation. The shuddering fear that we in turn may 
 become weary, complacent, evasive, should be the best 
 preventive of that stagnation. We shall never have done 
 looking for the miracle, that it shall be given us to lighten, 
 cheer, and purify our "younger generation," even as our 
 older has depressed and disintegrated us. 
 
EDUCATION: THE MASTERY OF THE ARTS 
 OF LIFE 
 
 ARTHUR E. MORGAN 
 
 THROUGHOUT the long ages during which education has 
 been of the very essence of life, by endless selection and by 
 the relentless test of time a natural educational method has 
 emerged, which has a wonderful record of successful appli 
 cation under widely varying conditions. We are not sailing 
 on an uncharted sea; for although innovators have come 
 and gone, their practices warping or thwarting the lives 
 which have come under then- influence, always the sound 
 historic method has survived, being wrought ever more 
 firmly into our lives. 
 
 The other day I visited a school where this method is 
 being used with success. It consists in the practice of the 
 arts of life, sometimes with the assistance of the teacher, 
 sometimes by the pupils working out points of technic with 
 each other, when the teacher is not present. Occasionally the 
 teacher will reprove or punish, most often because pupils 
 have become too interested and boisterous for her comfort. 
 Once I saw her bring a new problem to the class, and direct 
 attention to its solution; but in the main the day s work is 
 initiated and sustained by the interest of the pupils. We 
 have here two of the fundamentals of sound education: 
 that its method shall include and mainly consist of the 
 practice of the arts of life, under the direction and inspira 
 tion of competent teachers; and that effort shall be initiated 
 and maintained, not primarily by outward discipline, but 
 by the guided interest and aspiration of the pupil. The 
 curriculum of this school is very old, the best data indica- 
 
THE MASTERY OF THE ARTS OF LIFE 61 
 
 ting that it has been in continuous use, almost without 
 change, for one or two million years. 
 
 I had been watching a mother cat and her kittens. A cat 
 must be able to catch food, to fight, and to distinguish be 
 tween fighting and playing; and these necessities indicate 
 what to it are some of the principal arts of life to be mas 
 tered. As I observed the group, the kittens in play would 
 repeatedly attack the mother, she would retaliate, and then 
 would come a tussle, in which the kittens would use all the 
 ability they possessed in efforts to parry and strike, to bite 
 and claw, continually imitating the mother. Sometimes 
 the mother would begin the play, but usually the kittens, 
 not only would begin, but w r ould continue with such inter 
 est and vigor that, when the mother, tired out, wanted to 
 stop the game, she would have to punish the kittens se 
 verely before they would admit that the lesson period was 
 over. Once, a mouse she had caught became the subject of 
 a lesson, the kittens trying to capture it while it attempted 
 to escape. 
 
 As I watched this family at its lessons, I thought of 
 changes in its curriculum which would be made by those 
 innovators who in the past few generations have been teach 
 ing human children in accordance with weird theories of 
 education. We might reasonably expect their first dictum 
 to be that we must not trust to the interests of the kitten; 
 that what it needs is to be compelled to do hard, disagree 
 able tasks; that it must, under duress, take great pains in 
 developing uninteresting, useless technic, for the sake of 
 mental discipline. Perhaps it would be desirable to compel 
 the kitten to stand on its head ! This would be sufficiently 
 unpleasant and useless, and the discipline so acquired 
 might be * carried over into other fields, so that later, when 
 the grown cat should see a mouse, it might be possessed of a 
 firm, continuing resolve to catch it. The fact that it would 
 
62 EDUCATION 
 
 not have learned how to catch mice would be a minor dis 
 advantage, which could be overlooked. 
 
 This analogy of the kittens is not trivial. The instincts 
 of the child, although more complicated, represent the re 
 sultant of selective tendencies acting through the ages. Ed 
 ucation is not an institution devised and adopted by men, 
 and kept alive by ceaseless vigil. It is an innate process of 
 human life, as inherent as is physical development from 
 infancy to maturity. Educational stimuli do not need to 
 be produced and transmitted to the child by external appli 
 cation. They unfailingly originate within him, just as surely 
 as do hunger and thirst. They may be awakened, guided, 
 controlled, trained; inhibitions may be removed; but in the 
 main they work according to their own laws. To have faith 
 in creation as it expresses itself in the instinctive demand of 
 youth for education; to sit at the feet of childhood and to 
 learn its ways; to use to the utmost, and to direct wisely, its 
 resources of interest and desire this is educational wis 
 dom. To ignore these great resources, to assume that we 
 must work with childhood as with clay, expecting no innate 
 determining activity on its part, but merely moulding it to 
 fit a preconceived conventional type this is educational 
 tragedy. 
 
 The theories which educational innovators of recent cen 
 turies have forced upon us are to no small extent a direct by 
 product of the doctrine of total depravity. Though the doc 
 trine itself has been abandoned by men of modern outlook, 
 yet its implications continue to control our conventional 
 educational system. To orthodox American educators, a 
 child s tendencies are essentially unreliable and are largely 
 bad. These men require that the child shall be drilled in 
 useless subject-matter, that his life shall be fitted to an 
 intellectual strait- jacket, and that he shall smother his deep- 
 rooted love for adventure and inquiry, accepting their 
 
THE MASTERY OF THE ARTS OF LIFE 63 
 
 statements as final authority; and when the spirit of youth 
 rebels, and its life, thwarted in normal growth, expresses 
 itself in unlovely ways, their remedy is to turn the screws 
 still tighter. 
 
 This point of view was admirably expressed by a writer 
 in the "Atlantic." 
 
 "From beginning to end, discipline permeated the cur 
 riculum of the school of yesterday. The interests of the in 
 dividual pupil were rarely, if ever, consulted. The work 
 assigned was to be done. The question of its appeal, of its 
 difficulty, of its practical value to the particular pupil, was 
 not even open for discussion. And what splendid men and 
 women this old-fashioned, not always agreeable, disciplinary 
 education developed!" 
 
 A great number of men who have another outlook be 
 lieve that the present-day dissipation of youthful energy is 
 due to the fact that the subject-matter of the conventional 
 school has very little relation to actual life. They credit 
 boys and girls with at least a small amount of that same 
 common sense which inclines mature people to refuse to be 
 interested in that which, they believe, in no way concerns 
 them. They believe also that, as the faculties of men grow 
 gradually through use, so the ability to exercise discern 
 ment, initiative, and self-restraint is more likely to be 
 well developed if the youth gradually assumes the direction 
 of his own interests, than if he remains under complete in 
 tellectual subordination during his school-life and then 
 suddenly is given full responsibility for himself. But in the 
 view of the conventional school man our present trouble 
 with dissipated energies does not result from too much 
 ignoring of interests. In the article quoted above we find 
 this confession: "Many of us are forced to believe, and with 
 all our hearts, that at the root of this deplorable situation 
 lies a widespread acceptance of this modern doctrine of 
 yielding to the interests of youth." 
 
64 EDUCATION 
 
 Unfortunately, a reaction from this doctrine of making 
 a tragedy of youth by almost totally ignoring its interests, 
 has carried some men and women to an acceptance of 
 educational anarchy. One educator of prominence has ex 
 pressed this attitude in substantially the following terms: 
 
 When God creates a child, He endows him with tenden 
 cies and instincts which, if allowed free play, will lead to his 
 perfect development. Every child is a new creation, differ 
 ing from every other. Except as he may have become ab 
 normal through unfortunate environment, he has a sacred 
 right of freedom, of developing just what is in him. The 
 teacher in his finiteness cannot foresee the child s possibili 
 ties and has no right to direct how his life should grow. His 
 sole duty is to furnish a full, free environment, where the 
 child can become just what it is in him to become, without 
 let or hindrance. He should have little discipline except 
 as he craves it, few obligations that he does not desire and 
 prefer to assume. It is the teacher s duty to set before the 
 child truth, wisdom, the good and the beautiful, leaving him 
 free to choose, trusting to his instincts for the selection of 
 what is best for him. In this way only can the untold possi 
 bilities of life be fulfilled. Society owes it to the child to 
 give him this environment, and not to demand any serv 
 ices in return until the child s maturity. 
 
 It would seem that nothing but sheer lack of sympathy 
 and imagination would lead one whole-heartedly to accept 
 the former philosophy, and that nothing but the dreamers 
 utter disregard of hard facts would make possible the com 
 plete acceptance of the latter. Infancy, childhood, and 
 youth represent a transition from nearly complete incom 
 petence to maturity. It is not by holding dogmatically to 
 an attitude, but by a continual exercise of imagination, 
 sympathy, and common sense, that this ever- varying con 
 dition can be met. At no time can the instincts and the 
 
THE MASTERY OF THE ARTS OF LIFE 65 
 
 spontaneous interests of the child be ignored without most 
 serious consequences; and at no time should these interests, 
 frequently casual or trivial, and supported by a frail, imma 
 ture will, without some degree of reinforcement, direction, 
 and control, be allowed to determine his activities. Certain 
 basic human qualities, such as integrity, courage, and 
 patience, have been proved so universally to be desirable; 
 and others, such as dishonesty, cruelty, obscenity, are so 
 unfailingly destructive of personal and social welfare, that 
 within certain indefinite limits, which liberal common sense 
 must endeavor to ascertain, we are bound to use our best 
 efforts to direct the course of youthful development. An 
 acknowledgment of this duty should in no wise weaken a 
 profound reverence for the hidden possibilities of youth, 
 or the resolution to allow these possibilities to develop ac 
 cording to their own laws, and without our inhibitive 
 interference. 
 
 The innovators who would almost totally ignore the 
 interests of childhood have had for a few generations al 
 most entire control of the educational machinery of 
 America; but although they could for a time control the 
 machinery, the instinct for education in youth was too 
 strong to be killed. While they thought that they were the 
 educators of the country, they were, in fact, but filling in a 
 few of the gaps in the educational system. 
 
 For instance, the ordinary life of early New England 
 furnished occasion for the development of many qualities 
 which go to make good men. Home industry supplied most 
 material necessities. To become able to produce them re 
 quired extensive technical training. It was getting this 
 training in the home, with the discipline it implied, which 
 constituted the major part of the young New Englander s 
 education; and the problem of the school was so to supple 
 ment this home-environment that the home and the 
 
66 EDUCATION 
 
 school taken together would furnish the conditions neces 
 sary to produce the completely developed man. We miss 
 the point when we single out from the whole circle that 
 small arc which consisted of formal schooling, and style it 
 New England education. The dean of the college of educa 
 tion in one of our largest universities recently remarked 
 that, during his boyhood on the farm, he had but three 
 months in the year of schooling, which left nine months for 
 him to get an education. 
 
 ~~Ks education through home arts has declined, people 
 have begun to realize that the school-house has received too 
 much credit, and the barn not enough. So we are beginning 
 to reproduce the latter in our educational system, as wit 
 ness our farm-schools, trade-schools, mechanics institutes, 
 and the modern trend toward "practical" education. Just 
 now we have a feud between the barn and the school-house. 
 Some of the men who have rediscovered the barn, and are 
 building these "practical" schools, and even some of our 
 advanced technical schools, despise any training that can 
 not be measured in terms of the pocketbook. As for our 
 classical men, they usually have denied even the existence 
 of the barn as an educational institution. In the few cases 
 in which they have seen the need of training in the arts of 
 life, they have looked upon it as more or less menial, suited 
 only to those who are to become hewers of wood and draw 
 ers of water. 
 
 Recently I observed a most pathetic instance of this tra 
 ditional attitude. In a large eastern city is a group of men 
 and women who consider themselves, and are accepted as, 
 the acme of American culture. Their own boys are edu 
 cated in classical secondary schools, known throughout the 
 country for their fine traditions. In these schools, aside 
 from athletics and a small amount of manual training, 
 
THE MASTERY OF THE ARTS OF LIFE 67 
 
 there is little training in the coordination of muscle, nerve, 
 and brain, or in initiative and self-reliance. The education 
 is largely that of a priest, a lawyer, or a gentleman of one or 
 two hundred years ago. But these same men, realizing that 
 some children should have a different kind of training, many 
 years ago created a trade-school to which they send " de 
 serving boys of limited means." Here I found sound, nor 
 mal boys in a "practical " atmosphere, getting a " practical " 
 education. They had conventional school-work of the 
 grammar grades, and in addition learned to be printers, 
 machinists, carpenters, and farmers. 
 
 The great city is only three miles away, with its museums, 
 music, operas, libraries, and all that a centre of American 
 culture can give; yet each boy leaves the school grounds 
 only two to four times a year. If a boy, after months of this 
 complete isolation, goes to the city without permission, he 
 is subject to dismissal. It would be impossible to design 
 furniture more cheaply, drearily ugly than that in the 
 dining-room. The chairs, which cost sixty-five cents each, 
 are like those that can be bought in any cheap furniture 
 store. The dormitory is a huge barn-like room, with long 
 rows of little white cots, absolutely the only other individ 
 ual furniture in the room being a harness-hook on the wall 
 for each boy, where he may hang his clothes. 
 
 This is a literally truthful account of a "practical" 
 school, sending out American boys into life in American 
 cities. The master is a man of substantial native ability, 
 who would react quickly to any opportunity for better 
 things; but he has little voice in determining policies. The 
 school is financed and controlled by men who represent the 
 cream of American culture, graduates of a great and grand 
 old University, where their classical training was dominated 
 by the " humanities." 
 
68 EDUCATION 
 
 As I left the institution I thought of Lanier s plaint: 
 
 Alas, for the poor to have some part 
 In yon sweet living lands of art, 
 Makes problem not for head, but heart. 
 Vainly might Plato s brain revolve it: 
 Plainly the heart of a child could solve it. 
 
 The East is not alone at fault. In a large Western city an 
 endowment of five million dollars recently has been pro 
 vided to found a trade-school. The head of this institution 
 has complete freedom of action. He requires every working 
 boy who enters the institution to be actively engaged in the 
 particular trade in which he studies, and his school- work 
 is confined to adding to his expertness in that trade. When 
 I asked whether this system did not narrow the pupil and 
 prevent the development of larger appreciation of life, I re 
 ceived the reply that it might be unfortunate for these boys 
 to have appreciations developed which would make them 
 discontented with their lot. The head of this institution 
 accepts enthusiastically the spirit of the German educa 
 tional system. 
 
 In this same city I found a typical stereotyped classical 
 secondary school, where the chief object would seem to be 
 to eliminate contact with life. To do this more effectively, 
 the school is placed so far out of the city that it takes two 
 hours each day to go and come. No use is made of the 
 country space except to provide an athletic field, and the 
 curriculum has made practically no concessions to know 
 ledge that men have gained during the last century. Wher 
 ever possible, this institution has adopted the forms and 
 terminology of the great English public schools. Wealthy 
 business men send their boys there to prepare them for 
 college. 
 
 The two phases of education ought never to have been 
 separated, and it is because we habitually adopt current 
 
THE MASTERY OF THE ARTS OF LIFE 69 
 
 ideas rather than create our own that we have continued to 
 think of them as distinct, and as requiring separate institu 
 tions. In planning the education of a child it is our duty 
 deliberately to determine as fully as possible what expe 
 riences and environments are necessary in order that he 
 may come to his fullest development. Some of these we 
 may reasonably expect him to have in his everyday life. 
 Others he will not have unless we intentionally provide for 
 them. The whole duty of the educator is this to supple 
 ment the ordinary contacts of life with others, so that the 
 entire environment will develop to the fullest the possibili 
 ties of the child. It follows that the content of formal edu 
 cation cannot be fixed, but must change continually, so as 
 always to supplement and complete the continually vary 
 ing environment and experiences of everyday life. With 
 the unprecedented rapidity of changes in the modern world, 
 only by intentional, keen analysis of the situation, by main 
 taining a perpetual inventory, can we hope to make the 
 necessary adjustments. Only live fish can swim upstream 
 in the present-day educational current; and educational 
 duty cannot be fulfilled by industrious labor in the ways of 
 yesterday. 
 
 For education, as it has come down through the ages, 
 consists always of learning how to live to-day through mas 
 tery of the arts of life of to-day; and in the arts of life I 
 would include every normal ability or competence of body 
 and of mind. That educational system is incomplete which 
 does not keep open the vistas of life in every direction. 
 Nothing that is essential to a fully developed life, and 
 is not being acquired elsewhere, can safely be omitted. We 
 cannot ignore material interests. Whether we consider 
 artist, professional man, or laborer, the embarrassments 
 and inefficiency of everyday life are decreased, and its free 
 dom enlarged, by the possession of a working knowledge of 
 
70 EDUCATION 
 
 commercial usages, of the art of being solvent, of apprais 
 ing accurately one s possessions, of correctly measuring and 
 judging material values. Every man should be master of 
 the elementary principles and technic of ordinary business 
 affairs. 
 
 When the home does not teach good manners the school 
 should do so. In so far as the home opens up the possibili 
 ties of literature, or of any other field, the school need not. 
 The religious Me cannot be ignored. Aspirations, high 
 ideals of conduct, wonder, humility, and reverence before 
 Me and the source of Me, consecration to convictions, un 
 selfishness, love of our fellow men, the relation of moral 
 standards to industry all these can be considered or en 
 couraged without offense in almost any school. A realiza 
 tion of the need of intellectual integrity and independence 
 cannot always be imparted without offense, but the need is 
 vital to any sound system of education. Given this range 
 of interests, training in religious doctrines may be left safely 
 to other agencies. 
 
 We should try to inspire the habit of searching out what 
 is the burden of the world s wisdom and judgment in 
 reference to the main issues of life. This demands a live 
 knowledge of history, literature, and biography. We 
 should develop the habit of questioning and examining ac 
 cepted beliefs, whether of common knowledge, or in science, 
 business, morals, or other fields. Youth should be encour 
 aged to work out for itself tentative standards of economic, 
 moral, and spiritual values; to pay heed to its use of time 
 and resources; to define its attitude toward industry and 
 social life, toward the live issues of the day, and toward life 
 itself. No educational system is complete if its aim is so to 
 engross the attention of men and women, either in indus 
 trial, professional, or social life, or in the pursuit and en 
 joyment of culture, that they will not have time to ask 
 
THE MASTERY OF THE ARTS OF LIFE 71 
 
 themselves the question, "What is it all about? " To have 
 asked this question, and to have reached a satisfactory at 
 titude, which is not out of harmony with modern knowledge, 
 is necessary to a teacher who is to direct wisely the aspira 
 tions of youth. 
 
 Any educational system is seriously at fault which does 
 not develop a habit of laying claim to life s fine resources. 
 The environment of the child should result in opening eyes 
 and mind to natural phenomena, to life-processes and hab 
 its of plants and animals, to the data of geology, of physics, 
 and of astronomy; and to the appeal of good literature, 
 poetry, history, and of the various forms of art. We should 
 include in our programme the development of social rela 
 tionships, interests, and responsibilities. Habits should be 
 acquired of effective expression, of cbnsiderateness and 
 goodwill, and of the elimination of social friction through 
 the medium of courtesy, good manners, and "good form," 
 this good form to consist of consummate skill in living the 
 Golden Rule, not of proficiency in the mannerisms of an ex 
 clusive social class. 
 
 Independence, originality, and initiative are mighty 
 factors in human progress, but they find little opportunity 
 for development in obedient poring over the prescribed 
 daily lesson in the classroom. In many individual cases 
 these high qualities actually survive eight or twelve years 
 of routine plodding in our conventional schools eloquent 
 testimony as to how nearly ineradicable they are. The 
 spirit of adventure, so nearly universal in youth, commonly 
 is thwarted at every turn. Yet this is one of its finest gifts; 
 when it has gone, life s greatest promise is past. An educa 
 tional system should nurture and direct this spirit, bring 
 ing it to expression in a daring to aim at high standards, in 
 adventures into new fields of action, thought, and know 
 ledge; in a desire for the hard, strenuous things which 
 
72 EDUCATION 
 
 temper and stabilize character. The sporting instinct of 
 youth demands these difficult tasks, and life is stale when 
 they cannot be found. 
 
 While youth has these fine qualities so strongly rooted, it 
 frequently lacks the wisdom or outlook to define the objects 
 of its enthusiasms, and commonly adopts those of surround 
 ing groups or individuals. To the father or teacher these 
 qualities are treasures handed over to his keeping, for him 
 to direct toward whatever ends he will. If he fails to direct 
 them at all, or endeavors to suppress them because they do 
 not fit a routine programme, they find objects for them 
 selves, often on those low planes which commonplace life 
 everywhere suggests. 
 
 / v In the end it is the mastery of all these arts of life, and 
 not Greek and Latin, algebra and geometry, that is educa 
 tion. As we bear this fact clearly in mind, the relative im 
 portance of subjects begins to change, to become greater or 
 less, as they contribute to the final result. To-day Amer 
 ican education is breaking free from its impediments, and is 
 groping its way back to the ages-old method of learning by 
 practising the arts of life. 
 
 The following description is of incidents that have come 
 within my experience, all during the last few months, though 
 not all in the same school. They do not portray a system, 
 but only casual intimations of a new day. 
 
 In a certain primary school I found many of the little 
 children keeping chickens and selling eggs. With eggs sell 
 ing for fifty cents a dozen, even the younger children had 
 learned all the common divisions of fifty. As they had not 
 yet mastered the intricacies of pounds and bushels, the 
 youngest bought feed in small quantities, a few cents* 
 worth at a time. The older children, who were able to cal 
 culate the cost, took the part of dealers. A boy of high- 
 school age was wholesaler, buying feed by the ton for all 
 
THE MASTERY OF THE ARTS OF LIFE 73 
 
 chickens and cattle, and selling it in lots of twenty pounds 
 or less. They built playhouses, made and decorated holiday 
 dresses, and made crude pottery. Definite comparison of 
 these children with children in conventional schools indi 
 cated, not only superior development of hand and eye and 
 better developed initiative, but also that they were further 
 advanced in the subject-matter of the conventional school. 
 At a bank administered by pupils in the school building, 
 checks were cashed in payment for purchases and for labor 
 or other services. Every pupil had money on deposit. 
 Standard accounting methods were used, and a daily bal 
 ance was kept of each pupil s account. 
 
 During the past winter the main school building, formerly 
 used as a hotel, had burned down. In erecting the new 
 building the boys of high-school age had done about sixty 
 per cent of the work, outside of school hours, this labor hav 
 ing a value of about fifteen thousand dollars. In printing, in 
 editing the school newspaper, and in gardening, the same 
 enterprise was apparent. 
 
 Some of the day pupils, who are children of foreign labor 
 ers and soon will drop out of school, receive credit for pro 
 gress in the manner of making beds, caring for baby, and 
 sweeping the house. Under the teaching of a competent 
 doctor and a nurse, the girls take care of babies in various 
 families in the town, this work being designated as mother- 
 craft. Arrangements are made for the boys and girls to be 
 guests of educated people of moderate means, getting 
 glimpses of refined living conditions. These people have 
 not forgotten that to the immigrant child the interior of 
 a well-to-do American home is as unfamiliar as a Chinese 
 temple. 
 
 The headmaster and his wife live on the campus in a 
 carefully furnished house. Pupils who are to meet the mas 
 ter find him there in the living-room before a fireplace, and 
 
74 EDUCATION 
 
 for the time being are his guests. A class in domestic 
 science was combined with one in commercial arithmetic. 
 In groups of two the young people of high-school age chose 
 building lots in various parts of the city, made deals for 
 purchasing the lots, worked out problems of taxes and 
 special assessments as applied to them, determining the 
 apportioning of taxes among such interests as education, 
 police protection, and sanitation, and then planned houses 
 to be built on them. The domestic-science teacher helped 
 in planning the arrangement and in furnishing the rooms. 
 
 On looking into the classwork I found a great variety of 
 progress. In grammar-school subjects, such as arithmetic, 
 spelling, and grammar, each pupil progressed as his own 
 abilities determined. Pupils who had done good work were 
 "on self-reliance." Stopping one boy at his work, I asked 
 him what that meant, and he replied: " You see, when you 
 are on self-reliance you can do as you please. I had grad 
 uated from the seventh grade in history and geography, 
 but I was only jn the sixth grade in arithmetic. Now that I 
 am on self-reliance, I can spend all the time I want to on 
 arithmetic, and can catch up." 
 
 In a class that seemed proof against uny interest in lit 
 erature two boys, who were caring for the cows, asked if 
 they might, as their work in English, read government 
 bulletins on Holstein cattle. Starting with this, their atten 
 tion was attracted to parts that might have been written 
 better. Comparison was made with the style of classic 
 authors, stories of keen interest to boys being taken as 
 examples, and before the season was half over they found 
 themselves reading good literature with the beginnings of 
 appreciation. I found much reading of good books, and 
 much effort at original composition. 
 
 All this and much more I have seen during recent 
 months. In many schools over the United States one meets 
 
THE MASTERY OF THE ARTS OF LIFE 75 
 
 flashes of sanity as expressed in devices for modernizing 
 school methods and aims, and these are now leading to an 
 orderly presentation of fundamental principles. Life s 
 activities, whether social, industrial, creative, or cultural, 
 are made up of a few great fundamental arts or occupations. 
 Whether or not life as a whole is a success depends on 
 whether or not these activities are pursued successfully. 
 The aim of education is to prepare for and bring about their 
 successful following. "Certain acquirements, such as skill in 
 reading, writing, and numbers, and the possession of the 
 fundamental facts in any field of knowledge, constitute the 
 tools of life, without which men cannot function effectively. 
 Every well-considered action and every sound deduction of 
 reason must be dependent upon the possession of skill and 
 knowledge, or, to use a more formal expression, upon the 
 possession of the necessary technic and of the pertinent 
 data. This underlying preparation must be secured, if not 
 by interesting adventures, then by patient drill and drudg 
 ery. Yet we should value such accomplishment somewhat 
 as we do money, considering it not as valuable in itself, but 
 as an almost indispensable medium of accomplishment. 
 
 Just as money when possessed for its own sake is a burden, 
 so any knowledge is a useless impediment, which cannot, 
 when occasion offers, function in some normal activity or 
 appreciation, or in some sound deduction. The educational 
 process should consist, not primarily in gaining this infor 
 mation, but in the practice of the arts or occupations of 
 life. Obviously, then, the school must enable the arts of 
 life to be practiced. It should furnish the inspiration and 
 the occasion for each child to undertake adventures in 
 which he is or can be interested, and by means of which he 
 will acquire some of the necessary habits, skill, knowledge, 
 and initiative which will fit him to live. It should be the 
 business of the teacher so to inspire the choice of projects or 
 
76 EDUCATION 
 
 adventures, and so to direct the work,that in the doing of it 
 these qualities will be developed. A child might take for a 
 project making a garden, building a boat, or preparing for 
 college. Several pupils may work upon a group -project; or 
 they may have more than one at a time. Through the pu 
 pil s interest in such projects, related subject-matter will be 
 introduced. The choice of an adventure is of prime import 
 ance only as it furnishes for a longer or shorter time the best 
 instrumentality for the child s development. 
 
 Drill and routine cannot be eliminated and leave training 
 normal or complete. But generally they can be given value 
 in the pupil s estimation. Pupils learn most effectively and 
 with the minimum loss of time if taught through, rather 
 than in opposition to, their interests. Boys and girls do not 
 always rebel against drudgery, indeed, what could ex 
 ceed in routine and drudgery pulling a sled up hill, over and 
 over again, for half a day? but they do object when it has 
 no obvious connection with that which they value. If we 
 find a final residuum of drill which cannot be made inci 
 dental to a project, such as drill in the rudiments of arith 
 metic or in spelling, we still can take away the deadliness of 
 the drudgery if we will use the resources of human nature. 
 
 Recently the colored man who mows my lawn changed 
 his basis from time-work to piece- wort. When I came to pay 
 him at his old rate for work done in a surprisingly short 
 time, he protested, "Boss, I thought I was working by the 
 job, and you know nobody works by the hour like he does 
 by the job." Few of us can work with keen zest at a task of 
 endless repetition, where the degree of excellence of the 
 work done has no bearing on the compensation. Only a fool 
 would enjoy spending his life in sweeping back the tide. 
 Sane men and sane boys demand results commen 
 surate with the investment. We give a boy his spelling 
 lesson, an hour a day, month after month and year after 
 
THE MASTERY OF THE ARTS OF LIFE 77 
 
 year. He knows that no excellence of service will relieve 
 that drudgery, and he has not the experience or capacity 
 necessary for a vital appreciation of final profit in the far- 
 off years. Suppose that, in case we must teach spelling by 
 the book, we give him a list of a hundred or two hundred 
 words which he must master during the month, and tell 
 him that, when they are learned, his spelling period during 
 the remainder of the month will be free for his own pleas 
 ures, or for work he likes? So can even the residuum of 
 drudgery be made lighter, and the keenness of life main 
 tained. 
 
 In the school of the future the mastery of the arts or 
 occupations of life will be the end and aim of education. 
 The method of education will be the practice of those arts. 
 Subject-matter and technic will furnish the tools needed in 
 acquiring and exercising this mastery. Projects will furnish 
 the occasion to awaken and maintain the interest and the 
 incentive for effort in acquiring subject-matter and technic, 
 and in practising the occupations of life. By recognizing 
 the inherent spontaneity of the interests and aspirations of 
 childhood, the greatest of educational assets will be com 
 manded. The school of the future will be protean. It will 
 overflow into all parts of the community, utilizing farm, 
 home, factory, store, and office. There will be time for 
 team-work, for group-play, for class- work, but much of the 
 time will be spent singly or in groups, with the teachers 
 guidance, in working out the project, with its ramifications 
 into literature, mathematics, science, history, physical 
 labor, and business dealings. 
 
INTERCOLLEGIATE ATHLETICS AND 
 THE WAR 
 
 L. B. R. BRIGGS 
 
 WHEN America declared war on Germany, nothing, not 
 even our money, disappeared faster than our college athle 
 tic teams. This is a war of which students are quick to see 
 the meaning; and while certain mechanics seize the opportu 
 nity for an increased pay that will allow their comforts to re 
 main undiminished and will strengthen their hold on po 
 litical power, thousands of young men, with everything that 
 would seem to promise worldly comfort, stake instantly, 
 and as a matter of course, their hopes and their lives at 
 the first call of the " voice without reply." And this they do 
 for a war in which the part played by romance as the 
 word is commonly understood seems unprecedentedly 
 small. An athlete would be expected to accept, out of hand, 
 the sporting challenge of old-fashioned warfare to lead 
 mad cavalry charges, to match himself like a knight of old 
 with every newcomer, as man against man; but outside of 
 certain naval activities, and of aviation, that supreme test 
 of sportsmanship in life and death, the call of this war is a 
 call, first, to the unrelieved monotony of the camp, and next, 
 to the unrelieved horror of the machine-gun and the gas- 
 bomb. These pampered boys, who insisted on special train 
 ing-tables, who craved special or limited trains, who had to 
 be kept good-natured and happy before big games by auto 
 mobile rides and musical comedies, and who, if victorious, 
 would have felt slighted without complimentary dinners; 
 boys coached by men who scorned street cars and scarcely 
 used their legs except on the field; boys waited on by a 
 
ATHLETICS AND THE WAR 79 
 
 series of stewards called managers, and supported by sec 
 ond teams who required eatable and drinkable rewards of a 
 service which they struggled for the honor of performing 
 these boys gave proof unmistakable that they were not 
 spoiled, that they still were men, or, rather, were men at 
 last; that they could leave all and follow an ideal which 
 some of us saw in only a few of them, which probably only 
 a few of them saw in themselves. This war has come nearer 
 justifying our methods in intercollegiate athletics than we 
 had thought possible. 
 
 Nevertheless, our methods had tremendous faults of 
 which we were aware, some of us dimly, some of us 
 plainly, and of which we seemed unable to rid them. 
 Reforming athletics is about as hard as reforming society. 
 A convulsion may reform either; and a convulsion has come. 
 What seemed to coaches and players the biggest thing in 
 life so vital that every smallest part of it was of almost 
 sacred import is, for the time being, scarcely important 
 enough for its own health. Coaches once moved heaven and 
 earth to prove eligible a man whom nothing but the annihi 
 lation of four or five other candidates for the same position 
 would tempt them to use in a big game. Now, with 
 every need of every man who can play at all, eligibility 
 has taken a back seat, where it belongs. Now, such under 
 graduates and coaches as remain may be conceived of as 
 studying economy. Once, nobody was surprised if a man 
 ager contended that it was squabs and victory or chickens 
 and crushing defeat. Now, a team is lucky if it gets the 
 necessities of life, lucky in being a team at all, and is grate 
 ful for mere existence. 
 
 Fevers used to be treated by bleeding; if the patient sur 
 vived, he had to be built up. Our patient is so reduced that 
 he needs building up; it is for us, and for those whom we 
 represent, to prescribe the nature and the amount of his 
 
80 ATHLETICS AND THE WAR 
 
 nourishment. Some years ago, just as I was leaving Cam 
 bridge to discuss at New Haven the dates for certain games, 
 a misguided enthusiast chased me into the street to say, 
 "We ve licked em; and you can get any date you want." 
 Not we, but events, have "licked" intercollegiate athletics. 
 We, that is to say, our colleges, acting together, may 
 do with them almost as we please. 
 
 "Acting together," I have said, not in every detail, but in 
 spirit. If we fail to learn from the wai> if the great moments 
 of the great world paralyze us, and we do nothing with the 
 opportunities, infinitely smaller yet great in their kind, of 
 the college athletic world, we shall join the crowded ranks 
 of those who, whether too inert to act or too blind to see, 
 have "lost their chance." 
 
 What is our chance? Those of us and this should 
 mean all of us who have not lost the interests of youth 
 love sport for sport s sake, and victory as the crown of 
 sport; we love also that personified ideal which is intensely 
 real, the college which, either by tradition or by accident, 
 has become our Alma Mater; and we love to see our Alma 
 Mater upheld, not merely as an institution of learning 
 where mature scholars may prosecute research, but as a 
 school where boys become men through all things that fitly 
 minister to then* physical, mental, moral, and spiritual life. 
 
 Among these things is manly sport, which at college finds 
 its supreme expression in upholding the supremacy of the 
 Alma Mater. In the right kind of game between Yale and 
 Harvard, for example, every player wears his college colors 
 much as a knight in tourney wore the colors of his lady. 
 This high and simple truth has been put out of sight, 
 and almost out of life, by the parasites that have over 
 grown it. "Our chance" is to keep it clear in the eyes and 
 strong in the hearts of our students, to associate athletics 
 with honor in the best sense of the word, with honor and 
 
ATHLETICS AND THE WAR 81 
 
 not with notoriety. Against us are the quick transiency of 
 college generations, the lopsidedness of a boy s growth to 
 manhood, the more vulgar of human ambitions, the desire 
 of the public for excitement, and what Matthew Arnold 
 would call the " ignobleness " of the American newspaper. 
 All these hostile forces have united to some extent in our 
 present coaching system, even when that system is intelli 
 gent, disciplinary, and in divers ways morally strong. 
 
 The important attacks on intercollegiate sport have come 
 from earnest men who fail to see its meaning: rightly dis 
 gusted with its commercial aspects, feeling little sympathy 
 with athletics except for health, they are naturally irrita 
 ted by what seems to them a colossal substitution of sham 
 for reality, prostituting what should be a means to health 
 by making it an end in itself, and an end that defeats the 
 end to which it should be a means, by endangering rather 
 than ensuring the health for which alone it exists. Mean 
 while, they allege, it robs study, scamps the performance of 
 daily duty, magnifies physical prowess, nurses luxury, and 
 is at best only an intermittent check on vice, which between 
 periods of training rides triumphant. - The very thought of 
 thousands who squander money for tickets to games, the 
 very sight of thousands who find games of absorbing inter 
 est in a world "so full of a number of things," bears annoy 
 ing witness to the mad folly of the American public and to 
 the pusillanimous irresponsibility of American institutions 
 of learning that cater to this folly. Such is the feeling of 
 those to whom the inner light of intercollegiate athletics 
 burns dim at best, and not at all when obscured by outward 
 circumstances. Moreover, even if these persons are, as I 
 believe them to be, in great part wrong, they speak some 
 patent truths that every responsible lover of his college 
 cannot but deplore. 
 
 Met one by one, the obstacles that I have named seem 
 
 7 
 
82 ATHLETICS AND THE WAR 
 
 surmountable. Though by the time one set of students is 
 half educated, it gives place to another, this is no more the 
 law of the athletic field than of the classroom. In the class 
 room also we must adapt ourselves to the lopsidedness of a 
 boy s development. There too we see, if we have eyes, the 
 meaner and the more vulgar ambitions in their aggressive 
 campaign for mastery. The only athletic difficulties not 
 familiar to college teachers are what may be called the 
 public difficulties, the difficulties that arise from the ex 
 ploiting of skill and personal qualities, until football stars 
 have as little privacy as stars of musical comedy or the film, 
 with whom publicity means money and position. Is it 
 strange that the possibilities of publicity in money and 
 position should penetrate the minds of football stars? 
 
 The chief evils of athletic publicity are, as everybody 
 knows, extravagant expenditures, dishonest proselyting, 
 the upsetting of relative values, and the kind of lionizing 
 that turns the heads of boys, not to speak of those girls 
 with whom football heroes are socially superior matinee 
 idols. Some honorable means of abolishing or greatly de 
 creasing these evils must be found if intercollegiate athletics 
 are to be a thoroughly wholesome part of our academic life. 
 
 A pretty good case may be argued for publicity. In place 
 of brawls between town and gown, we now have college 
 feeling spread for miles about. Boys get interested in the 
 college whose teams they see, and aspire to attend it. Col 
 lege games for college students only would be snobbish. 
 College games are good recreation for any spectator; and 
 spectators are harmless and lucrative. Privacy nobody ex 
 pects in these days. Any girl who announces her engage 
 ment sees her photograph in the public prints ; any society 
 girl who sells cake at a fair for charity or bathes at Palm 
 Beach, any young drummer who manages the floor at a 
 lodge dance, may read all about it (with illustrations) . Why 
 
ATHLETICS AND THE WAR 85 
 
 should college athletes, who do skilfully what people love to 
 see, be treated with a delicate consideration which few of 
 them or of their friends would appreciate? 
 
 Moreover, if the corporation of a university accepts a 
 gift for a stadium that costs three times the amount of the 
 gift, and expects the athletic association to pay two or three 
 hundred thousand dollars for the completion of the sum, 
 and interest on every dollar of the principal until it can pay 
 the dollar, the athletic association is obliged to get money. 
 It must get money also for keeping in condition fields, build 
 ings, and boats, and for supporting crews that cost much 
 and bring in nothing. Given a building like the Yale Bowl, 
 or even like the Harvard Stadium, with nothing to 
 take care of it, the athletic association cannot rise wholly 
 superior to commercial standards. You may beg, you may 
 tax the students, and blackmail the faculty, in support of 
 your team; or you may charge for admission and sell a great 
 many tickets. 
 
 The responsibilities of structures designed for from five 
 to fifteen times as many spectators as there are men in the 
 university, are varied and great. You cannot live a cottage 
 life in a hotel. Once in pursuit of money, you are tempted 
 by all the devices of business. It pays to advertise; it pays 
 to pay enough for securing coaches who will turn out teams 
 that people will pay to see. Then, as militarism makes na 
 tions outbid one another in armament, football makes 
 colleges outbid one another in coaching, until the various 
 positions on the gridiron are parceled out among specialists 
 in football, much as the various organs of the body are par 
 celed out among specialists in medicine. 
 
 Professor Corwin reminds us that it has cost two or three 
 thousand dollars a boy to put an eleven on the field for 
 a Yale-Harvard game. Even so, if seventy-five thousand 
 tickets are sold at two dollars each, the game is good 
 
84 ATHLETICS AND THE WAR 
 
 business ; and at a Yale-Harvard game, the spectator sees 
 more for two dollars than he usually sees at the theatre. But 
 whoever is in New Haven on the eve of the game and at 
 tempts to calculate roughly the total amount of money 
 spent in getting to the game and living near it, is appalled, 
 if not temporarily sickened. I name New Haven because 
 the Bowl is so big; obviously the responsibility is no more 
 Yale s than Harvard s. All the evils of publicity feed one 
 another. The crowd needs the Bowl, and the Bowl needs 
 the crowd. Notoriety brings good gate-receipts, and gate- 
 receipts bring notoriety. Notoriety also begets proselyting, 
 open or disguised. Reputable alumni of colleges often half 
 deceive themselves when, by free tuition and pleasant per 
 quisites, they persuade a schoolboy to honor their Alma 
 Mater among all the venerable suitors for his athletic hand ; 
 nor is it easy for a poor and ambitious boy to put Satan 
 behind him, when Satan assumes the guise of a reputable 
 alumnus paying tribute of flattery and of money to his skill. 
 Finally, some students get better discipline and more 
 education from athletics than from any other academic ex 
 perience, thus furnishing a new argument for our methods 
 in football, baseball, and rowing. On this singular reversal 
 of propriety, the coach s natural comment is, " Brace up the 
 Faculty, or I shall continue to do what it can t." No doubt 
 the Faculty needs bracing; but, as the late Professor Royce 
 remarked, "When the band is playing for a procession to the 
 last open practice, it is difficult to interest Freshmen in the 
 syllogism." The fault is not wholly the Faculty s; still less 
 is it the boys . All of us Faculty, alumni, and American 
 public had nourished a young giant until he made a 
 grown giant s demands. Now he has suddenly shrunk; and 
 nobody believes in overfeeding him again. Not merely the 
 Faculty, but the great body of serious undergraduates, 
 even the athletes themselves, with their new light on rela- 
 
ATHLETICS AND THE WAR 85 
 
 live values, do not hesitate to say that things should 
 never again be as they have been. 
 
 Relative values may easily be upset. One false start in 
 one large college may knock over our new and unsteady 
 structure like a house of cards. No captain with money in 
 the treasury likes to accept the danger of defeat; expert 
 help is scarce, and, according to the law of demand and 
 supply, no coach of the first rank is paid too much. " It is a 
 crucial season. Can t we have X. Y. for just this year?" 
 Here begins anew the coaching system. Or, " The men can 
 not find room together at the big dining-halls ; and some of 
 them are irregular in their meals. Can t we have an eating- 
 place where we can all meet?" Here revives the training- 
 table. 
 
 It is easy to reduce income and thus to find a ready reply 
 to such petitions. Whether we get an income from admis 
 sion tickets or from solicited subscriptions, we can readily 
 cut it down; but whether or not we cut down our income, 
 we can and should cut down our expenses. We at Harvard, 
 who have probably been among the worst offenders, have 
 in late years checked the lavish and foolish multiplication 
 of gift sweaters at the close of the season, and have been 
 less unthrifty in certain other matters. Yet in preparing 
 teams and crews we have spent money like water. 
 
 In reconstruction, the first obvious reform is the aboli 
 tion of the training- table. In some colleges it was abolished 
 years ago, with no obvious loss of success and with much 
 saving of money. It used to be maintained, first as a means 
 of furnishing suitable diet to men in training, next, as a 
 stimulant to esprit de corps. Men play concertedly, it was 
 argued, if they eat concertedly, if at table they become 
 intimate with each other s ways of talking and thinking. 
 The interpsychological communion thus established seems 
 too carnal to amount to much. It is probably worth some- 
 
86 ATHLETICS AND THE WAR 
 
 thing; yet not thinking of the great ordeal every minute, 
 not taking your shop to all your meals, is also worth some 
 thing; and as for food, the evidence, I understand, is in 
 favor of a more natural diet, a diet more like other men s 
 than that of the old training-table. 
 
 After the manner of the proposed League to Enforce 
 Peace, rival colleges must agree to limit the cost of coach 
 ing, must stick to the agreement, and must not annually 
 suspect their rivals of not sticking to it. Reduction in cost 
 would probably mean reduction to one coach for each of the 
 major sports, perhaps to one coach for baseball and foot 
 ball. Some persons favor strictly amateur coaching. Theo 
 retically we all favor it, just as, theoretically, we all favor 
 peace; practically, you get better results with a coach who, 
 being paid for certain work, performs it, and, being responsi 
 ble to certain persons, is ultimately controlled by them. 
 Few suitable amateurs have both the means and the time. 
 There is no objection to a professional as such, if he is a 
 clean professional and knows his profession; there are many 
 objections to transient amateurs, who, doing the college 
 a favor, feel responsible to nobody; who may be tempted 
 under "expenses paid" to all kinds of graft; who may en 
 tertain their friends, mentionable and unmentionable, at 
 hotels, and send unanalyzable bills to the athletic associa 
 tion. Year in and year out, the amateur who has his ex 
 penses paid is more demoralizing than the professional 
 responsible to his employers and to his job. The right kind 
 of amateur with leisure is the best coach of all, and may 
 from time to time be found in any one sport at any one col 
 lege; but the right kind of amateur the right kind of any 
 thing is rarely a man of leisure; and careful direction of 
 athletic sport takes time. 
 
 It is a sort of purple dream with some enthusiasts that a 
 director of athletics belongs in the Faculty. I am one of 
 
ATHLETICS AND THE WAR 87 
 
 these purple dreamers. In the West we should not be 
 dreamers at all; for the dream has become a reality. So it 
 has here and there in the East; but elsewhere in the East 
 the suggestion of it is derided. No first-rate man, we are 
 told, would go into such a business as coaching for an in 
 definite period ; nobody in the Faculty would regard a coach 
 as belonging there. Getting used to the idea may take time ; 
 but there are men, potential coaches, who might expedite 
 the process; and there are other men, potential Faculties, to 
 whom the doctrine that mind and body should be trained 
 together, each helping the other, is neither startling nor 
 novel. These men understand that no minister and no dean 
 begins to have the opportunity of the coach in the higher 
 education for life, if not for learning; and they can at least 
 conceive of an educated man, preferably with medical train 
 ing, whose interest in youth and in those things to which 
 spirited youth responds most eagerly will never die till he 
 himself shall die; of a man who sees in the position of ath 
 letic director an opportunity, constant and far-reaching, a 
 career of absorbing responsibility and fascinating hard 
 work. 
 
 Such a conceivable man in such a conceivable Faculty 
 will be a professional in the sense in which other professors 
 are professional. He will be an educated man, working for 
 money and for something better than money, at an institu 
 tion of enlightened learning. He will not pit athletics 
 against study or students against Faculty. For some de 
 tailed work he will hire subordinates, responsible to him 
 and through him to the Faculty. If he is regarded as so 
 cially inferior, he will bide his time until all sensible persons 
 see that he is not, and that there is no sufficient reason why 
 he should be. 
 
 This idea, as I have said, is not original or even new; it is 
 newer in the East than in the West. Eventually something 
 
88 ATHLETICS AND THE WAR 
 
 like it will come to stay. A position of incomparable in 
 fluence, a position that it is a high honor to fill, will not re 
 main inferior in everything but salary. It waits only for the 
 right man and for that recognition from the higher powers 
 which is the first step toward getting him. 
 
 Again, this war should teach us to stop petty bickerings 
 and to treat each other as honest gentlemen. Colleges 
 whose boys fight side by side for the mightiest cause that 
 ever shook the world, can we live again in constant fear 
 that someone will take advantage of us in a game unless we 
 take advantage of him first? When we play again, can we 
 afford to begin except as friend and friend, as host and 
 guest? 
 
 As to students let us not forget that, after two or three 
 years of a certain policy, they will gravely tell their elders 
 that "it has always been so." Alumni are harder to con 
 vince, some even objecting to pleasant social relations be 
 tween rival teams before a game as what never would have 
 been tolerated in their day, in the golden era of bad feeling. 
 Newspapers may be incorrigible; but reporters are human, 
 and nearly always respond to frankness and courtesy. Col 
 lege teams will not play so finished a game as they played 
 once; admission fees may be reduced for the public, possibly 
 abolished for the students; but, with the world at peace, the 
 time will never come when a game between such rivals as 
 Yale and Princeton, or Yale and Harvard, or Princeton and 
 Harvard, will not warm the blood of any graduate who has 
 not quite forgotten what it was to be young. 
 
 Intercollegiate athletics are brought face to face with the 
 problem that confronts America, and by the same tremen 
 dous force, the war for the mastery or the liberation of the 
 world. Like America, they will stand or fall according as 
 they choose between luxury and simplicity, trickery and 
 integrity, the senses and the spirit. 
 
SOME BLANK MISGIVINGS 
 
 GEORGE BOAS 
 
 I AM sitting in Carruthers Hall giving an examination in 
 Elementary English Composition. To be sure, I have no 
 business here, for this is a university which enjoys the 
 Honor System. These young Americans before me are dis 
 tinguished from almost all others: they are allowed to use 
 their sense of right and wrong; they punish their own offend 
 ers. The force of public opinion is enough to prevent cheat 
 ing. And yet I am here. It is suggested by my superiors 
 that my help may be wanted. 
 
 And so here I come at nine o clock, and here I sit behind 
 the desk on the raised platform. It is fortunate that it is 
 raised, one can see appeals for aid so much more easily. My 
 knowledge that I must lend a helping hand prevents my 
 concentrating on this very delightful volume of Propertius, 
 which I have brought along to make my altruism seem less 
 aggressive. My presence must not be misinterpreted. It 
 would never do to let the students think that I am watching 
 them. 
 
 What a mass of ritual for something so simple! I some 
 times think that it was the ritual which attracted me to 
 this dismal profession. To ascend a platform every day, to 
 lecture, to see one s words being eagerly copied into note 
 books, to be applauded at the end of the semester, to be 
 called " Professor," all these are signs of majesty. And then, 
 to make out examinations by whose results a boy s life may 
 be determined: this surely is a Nietzschean existence. Here 
 is one s opportunity to exercise one s Will to Power. 
 
 Before me sit one hundred and fifty men who have taken 
 
90 SOME BLANK MISGIVINGS 
 
 my course for a year. They are now trying to answer 
 questions in such a way as to show me that they know 
 more than I think they do. Some of them will surprise me, 
 and I shall know that my questions were ill-chosen. Most 
 of them will live up to my expectations, however, and as I 
 plod through their books, I shall see my early predictions 
 verified. 
 
 Hopkins will return to me my every thought, phrased in 
 my most individual manner; he will stand forth as a man 
 whose generous mind disdains a failure to agree with an 
 authority. Clarkson will jumble "clearness " with "empha 
 sis/* "coherence" with "unity," and write page after page 
 in self-exposure. Mason will denounce everything he has 
 heard this term as so much rubbish, and rage violently 
 against all instruction. I sympathize with Mason. Smith 
 will misinterpret each question and weep over my unfair 
 ness in flunking him. Lyons will write calmly and quietly a 
 book of sense, not brilliant, not original, but honest and 
 correct. Wheelwright will have a great deal of brilliance 
 and very little correctness. And so it goes. Before one of 
 the three hours is up, Wilson will slap his papers together, 
 briskly throw them on my desk, wish me a happy vacation, 
 and stride out swinging his hat. He too will wonder at my 
 unfairness in a week or two. 
 
 There is Baker in the back row showing distress signals. 
 Baker is an excellent mining engineer, but, curiously 
 enough, he can never tell whether and how an essay achieves 
 the indispensable quality of unity. This is indeed unfortu 
 nate, for when Baker s shaft at Motion, Arizona, caves in, 
 he will bitterly regret that a knowledge of the one thing 
 that might have saved him is forever a sealed book. True, 
 Baker may never attain a mine. Not if a degree is a pre 
 requisite. For he has no chance whatsoever of passing his 
 English, and passing his English is a prerequisite to a 
 degree. 
 
SOME BLANK MISGIVINGS 91 
 
 For all his stupidity, I saw Baker on the hills one day, 
 flat on his belly, tickling a little blue lizard with a blade of 
 dry grass. Out of his pocket was sticking a corner of "The 
 Golden Age." His is no simple soul. But it has no room for 
 English I. And now he sits with wrinkled forehead over an 
 examination that is totally unintelligible. God grant him a 
 sight of his neighbor s book! 
 
 Baker is typical of so many of these students. Plucked 
 out of the river of events in the full flush of their youth, 
 from mountain villages, from prairie ranches, from orange 
 groves, from wheatfields, they have been set down in a 
 community whose one purpose is said to be "the intellect 
 ual life." It has been done with full confidence in the im 
 plied theory of values. My colleagues and I are sure that 
 "the intellectual life" is the best life, and that its suprem 
 acy ought to be realized by all. We have no misgivings 
 about refusing our approval to him who tickles blue lizards 
 but knows not rhetoric. For we say that we are teaching 
 him "how to think." Of course we are committed to this 
 programme. The world has learned how to think for many 
 centuries in just this way. We cannot "fly in the face of 
 tradition." For me to hazard the remark that mining en 
 gineering involves as much thought as English composition 
 would be treachery to my chosen task. And yet this new 
 and unwearied country might have been given the chance 
 to develop its own tradition. 
 
 There is Roberts over in the corner. He will industriously 
 answer my ten questions and consume three hours in doing 
 it. His book will be clear, complete, sensible, and dull. 
 Roberts is one of these people who will be called "schol 
 arly." He will go to Harvard for graduate work, and will 
 agree with Corssen that Virgil s name derives from vergiliK, 
 "a name for the Pleiades as rising at the end of spring 
 (vergo)," and is not Gallic in origin. He will write treatises 
 
92 SOME BLANK MISGIVINGS 
 
 on "Some Disputed Points in Milton s pre-Hortonian 
 Poems." He will then acquire a reputation as an authority 
 on "the young Milton." When he is forty-five, the Modern 
 Language Association will publish his paper on "Analogues 
 of the Vision on the Guarded Mount in Celtic Folk Ballads." 
 At sixty he will startle the world by his magnum opus, "A 
 Comparison of the Hells of Milton and of Dante," and will 
 die. Already he knows things quce vix intelligat ipse Modes- 
 tus. He loves to talk about words and, though only a Fresh 
 man, has written a sonnet to M. Valerius Probus, who in 
 troduced the asterisk into western Europe. 
 
 Not an unaccomplished person is Roberts. But dull, 
 hopelessly dull. Why is he here? He knows all this stuff 
 and despises me for teaching it. Day after day he has sat 
 before me with cold eyes, wondering how I could be so 
 childish as to talk about unity, coherence, and emphasis. 
 He does not openly rebel. He has not the originality. He 
 simply looks uninterested. If he is forced to study English 
 I, he will. But, mark you, he will not be a partner in the 
 crime. 
 
 That man will be a credit to his college. The Department 
 of English will send him to Harvard with personal letters to 
 the Great. And when he shall have died, the world will be 
 neither richer, nobler, nor wiser for his having been in it. 
 I have never seen Roberts tickle a blue lizard. But he does 
 know how to think. 
 
 I cannot see that we teach these people anything. There 
 is no doubt that some of them are getting better marks now 
 than they did at the beginning of the year. But that may 
 be because I am more tired. Most of them end as they be 
 gan, bad, mediocre, or good. They were born that way and 
 they will die that way. And my task has been, as I see it 
 now, simply to give them a chance to exercise their native 
 talent. 
 
THE CALUMNIATED COLLEGIAN 
 
 MARY LEAL HARKNESS 
 
 " EDUCATION formerly meant an ability to write polished 
 Latin verse, to think in terms incomprehensible to the mob, 
 and to feel a proper disdain for all things material; to-day 
 it is being given the meaning of an ability to take one s part 
 in industry, in business, and in the operation of the farm. 
 
 "The best-educated man of yesterday was the most help 
 less, where business was concerned. He knew much about 
 the personal habits of the trilobite, could give accurate in 
 formation concerning the sources of the drama and poetry 
 of the ancient Greeks. . . . But he knew less than nothing 
 of making and selling things, while his knowledge of the 
 farm came of memorized bits of pastoral and rustic poetry." 
 
 As I read the illuminating and veracious newspaper arti 
 cle whose opening paragraphs were adorned with the above 
 choice statements of educational truth, I regretted that this 
 valuable contributor to journalistic literature and public in 
 formation could not also behold the mental picture which 
 the closing quotation especially brought before my own 
 vision. 
 
 One summer day the grocer s delivery horse balked in 
 front of our house. Of all obstreperous quadrupeds, he was 
 the very balkiest horse that I ever saw. The delivery boy 
 swore and wept, he petted and patted, he lashed and pulled, 
 he exhausted every device known to delivery boys, and the 
 beast moved not. A crowd assembled, the sort of crowd 
 which such an attraction always draws, "practical" men 
 and boys all, and, I 11 dare be sworn, not a user of gram 
 mar pure and undcfiled in the whole collection. And they 
 
94 THE CALUMNIATED COLLEGIAN 
 
 told all they knew about balky horses, and did all they 
 knew, as well; but the horse remained unmoved. Then the 
 college professor of our family, a Latin professor, as it 
 chanced, and of the vintage which our valued writer on 
 education would probably term "of yesterday," looked out 
 of his library window and contemplated the situation. But 
 not for long. He rose without remark, sought his carriage 
 house, procured a rope, advanced to the middle of the 
 street, spoke gently to the grocer s boy and his steed, at 
 tached the rope at the points where it would do the most 
 good and the animal proceeded down the street. There 
 was some surprised and admiring comment from the by 
 standers, I remember, to which the professor made not 
 much response. It is barely possible that this brilliant 
 exhibition of what is supposed to typify "efficiency" was 
 the product of "memorized bits of pastoral and rustic 
 poetry"; but the only explanation he vouchsafed to his 
 family was: "I learned that trick when I was a boy on Jim 
 Henderson s farm. He used to keep the meanest horses 
 that ever grew." 
 
 If the sort of stuff which I have quoted as a prelude to 
 my prospective remarks were the only specimen of it that 
 I had ever read or heard, or if the family incident just re 
 lated were the only evidence that could be offered of its 
 preposterous absurdity, the prospective remarks could 
 hardly be worth the making. But, as a matter of fact, that 
 sort of stuff is being written and said a great deal, and the 
 multitude seems blind to the numerous facts that flatly 
 contradict such declarations of the failure of the college- 
 bred to "connect with" what certain modern thinkers are 
 pleased to term "life." 
 
 The article in question was written as a preliminary to a 
 rather important educational conference, which I myself 
 attended. From this outline of its purpose and general 
 
THE CALUMNIATED COLLEGIAN 95 
 
 tendency one might have supposed the sole purpose of the 
 conference to be the inauguration of a grand movement for 
 the uplift and culture of rural communities through a gen 
 eral policy, which the following sentence fairly well typi 
 fies: "They will, also, have pig and social clubs." 
 
 A week later I attended another educational meeting at 
 which the highest educational official in his state proclaimed 
 in a long speech the gospel of "More corn roots and no 
 Latin roots," and "Down with higher mathematics," with 
 all else that leads to college, but "does not prepare for prac 
 tical life." At both these meetings there were earnest, and 
 and not a few, groups of men and women engaged in the 
 discussion of the advancement of higher education and the 
 promotion of honest educational standards and ideals; but 
 their meetings were accorded a brief space in obscure nooks 
 in the daily papers, while the exponents of "pig and social 
 clubs " shared the front pages with Mexico, and the pictured 
 faces of organizers of tomato clubs beamed from every 
 local journal. And a prominent paper, commenting editor 
 ially and approvingly upon one man s suggestion "to limit 
 mathematics in the public schools to what the farmers, 
 bankers, and others in commercial life need in their or 
 dinary business," and to "throw the rest overboard, and 
 have the children taught the three thousand or four thou 
 sand ordinary words they are likely to use," and to have 
 "the fifteen thousand others more or less technical cast 
 into the junk heap," said of such suggestions that "they 
 ought to have, and we believe will have, universal ap 
 proval." 
 
 Again, in one of the most highly esteemed of the maga 
 zines to which I subscribe, I found an editorial in praise of 
 the new style of college commencement adopted in a north 
 western state, at which, with appropriate "scientific" com 
 ment, a young woman in a becoming big apron did a family 
 
96 THE CALUMNIATED COLLEGIAN 
 
 washing, a youth in butcher s raiment cut up a dead sheep, 
 and a future broncho-buster gave an exhibition of colt- 
 breaking all on the commencement stage, to the im 
 mense delight of an audience assembled in apprehension of 
 some hours of exposition of baccalaureate plans for the 
 regeneration of humanity. The editorial eulogy of the 
 innovation closed as follows: "It is always interesting to 
 listen to a person who knows what he is talking about, 
 whatever that may be; but the number of people who can 
 talk well on what they do not know is naturally limited." 
 
 Is it always interesting to listen to a person who knows 
 what he is talking about? If that editor really imagines so, 
 he evidently has never listened to an uninterrupted ninety- 
 minute description of how a notable housekeeper makes 
 strawberry preserves. And I would defy any human being 
 to prove that she does not know what she is talking about, 
 for I have tested her preserves too often. But her recital of 
 her methods does not inspire an appetite for more. 
 
 Among the oft-quoted adages is one that there cannot be 
 so much smoke without some fire. But I have had occasion 
 in my life to observe the fallibility of proverbs. And all of 
 us have seen, if I mistake not, dense clouds of moral smoke 
 where there was no real fire at all; or, if there was, it did 
 not originate from the victim s own chimney. 
 
 So it is my opinion that the murky fumes now obscuring 
 from clear view the real work of the college and collegian 
 rise from no fire of collegiate kindling. Less metaphorically, 
 I do not believe that it is from any real failure of the college 
 or its product to make good, that the present attack upon it 
 has arisen. It is rather the instinctive desire of a multitude 
 of half -educated men and women to justify their own un 
 lettered state by proclaiming a new cultural salvation, 
 easily attained and "just as good" as the old kind that 
 came with tears and midnight oil. Their mode of proving 
 
THE CALUMNIATED COLLEGIAN 97 
 
 it just as good and a good deal better, is to select a few 
 cases of failures in life, group them advantageously for 
 public view, and announce, " College education did this." 
 I heard an enthusiastic propagator of the "new education" 
 for women distinctly charge it to the college women of her 
 state that there were hundreds and even thousands of un 
 happy women in the city of Atlanta who did not know how 
 to sweep a floor properly. 
 
 "You college women are neglecting the vital things of 
 life, my dears," she said, in an affecting peroration. And 
 from recent reading of the daily papers I cull two flowers of 
 thought, one from an educator of some prominence, the 
 other from a trashy story running serially on the "Women 
 and Society " page. The educator, speaking on vocational 
 training, "showed by figures and several illustrations that 
 there are many whose life-work is not in harmony with 
 their talents," according to the newspaper s report. " There 
 is no higher work, the speaker said, than to lead a child into 
 those fields of activities which will make satisfied men and 
 women. He is of the opinion that the focusing of attention 
 by schools on the professions is doing great harm to the 
 country." 
 
 The speakers in the second extract are two disillusioned 
 female college graduates. 
 
 " It often seems to me, said Marian reflectively, that 
 going to college unfits a girl for contact with the real world 
 more than anything else could possibly do. A college cam 
 pus has a way of building ideals that are almost certain to 
 get knocked into a cocked hat. 
 
 " *I agree with you, sighed Miss Barton; the bumps that 
 come after a girl s graduation hurt all the more because 
 college has made her a highly sensitive being. . . . Be 
 lieve me, the truly happy and contented people are the 
 lowbrows and the roughnecks, if you will allow me to use 
 two very expressive terms/ 
 
98 THE CALUMNIATED COLLEGIAN 
 
 I should apologize for seeming to take seriously this bit of 
 profound philosophy if it did not fairly represent much 
 that is constantly appearing, expressed with hardly less 
 crudeness, in far more aristocratic literary environment. 
 Many of the mishaps of this story s peculiarly idiotic 
 heroine are traced to the fact that "she left college with no 
 training to do any particular work "; and the thing is signifi 
 cant from just this: that the author tosses the statement 
 off glibly from time to time for a truth accepted as proved 
 by modern society. 
 
 It would be possible, I dare say, to brand the statement 
 not proved by the popular statistical method that is, by 
 tabulated lists of male college graduates who have become 
 presidents of the United States and others in authority, 
 and of female college graduates who have achieved an 
 average of over two and a half children each. But that 
 method does not appeal to me, because I consider the truth 
 thus vindicated, however indubitable, about the least im 
 portant argument in the case for the college. 
 
 I am inclined, rather, to hark back to the words of a cer 
 tain Augustan poet, whose cheerful wisdom and plain, hard 
 sense make it seem to me a thousand pities that all the 
 tomato-canners and pig-club officials should go down to 
 old age in total innocence of his philosophy and even of his 
 existence. For I am sure that they, and their immediate 
 educational advisers as well, if they knew a few of the 
 things he said and did, and if they did not know that they 
 were said in Latin and done in Rome or thereabouts, would 
 class him among the "efficient." (Although it might per 
 haps disagree with them to discover that he animadverted 
 severely upon the teaching of mathematics in Roman 
 schools, merely to supply "what the farmers, bankers, and 
 others in commercial life need in their ordinary business"; 
 for when once "this gangrene of care for money " has eaten 
 
THE CALUMNIATED COLLEGIAN 99 
 
 into the soul, he said, how can we expect great literature, 
 and its natural accompaniment, great ideals of citizenship, 
 ever to find birth there?) But, although about as hard- 
 headed and practical as a poet ever gets to be, he wrote 
 these words, which I suspect that it does take something 
 rather beyond the pig-club intelligence to recognize as prac 
 ticality in its essence : 
 
 "You see with what effort of mind and soul you strive to 
 avoid what you believe to be the greatest evils, a small for 
 tune and humiliating defeat at the polls. Will you not learn 
 from and listen to and believe a wiser teacher, so that you 
 will not care for the things which you foolishly admire and 
 wish for? " 
 
 The college seems to me to-day s "wiser teacher"; not 
 an agency to train undeveloped boys and girls for some 
 particular money-making vocation before they yet know 
 their own tastes or powers, but to give them a sufficient 
 apprehension of life s true values to judge fairly what 
 things are perhaps worth the bruises and weariness of pur 
 suit "over seas, over rocks, and through fire." Even if it 
 were true that college graduates are not making money, 
 moving great enterprises, "doing things," in short, it 
 would still be true that they have the best equipment for 
 the many-sidedness of real life which the world has yet 
 learned to compress into the few early years allotted to 
 schoolroom preparation for living. It is absurd to expect 
 full preparation for any of its walks or vicissitudes from 
 those few years, however spent; but those who have spent 
 them in college contain the smallest proportion "whose 
 life-work is not in harmony with their talents," and they 
 come nearer than any others to holding the specific for be 
 ing "truly happy and contented people." 
 
 In the last analysis the whole question comes down to 
 this: What do we mean when we talk about "life" and 
 
100 THE CALUMNIATED COLLEGIAN 
 
 about things that are "vital"? It appears that perhaps 
 those who sling these terms with the greatest freedom and 
 frequency disagree with me entirely as to their meaning. 
 It is then a not unimportant matter to decide whether the 
 thing that is vital to you is your stewed or stuffed, or es- 
 calloped tomato, or your state of mind, which stays with 
 you a good deal longer than the tomato stays on your plate 
 or the memory of its flavor stays in your grateful soul 
 even if you fletcherize. In short, is the only vital thing to 
 you the making and possession of some things that you can 
 eat up, and wear out, and smash? 
 
 I know that eloquent and impassioned articles have been 
 written to prove that the whole happiness of mankind is 
 balanced upon the delicate fulcrum of digestion; that one 
 lurking disease-germ in a carpet that knows not the vac 
 uum cleaner can destroy whole cities and who denies it? 
 But can anyone with brains in his head, and even a rudi 
 mentary tendency toward fair-mindedness, deny also that 
 it is possible for life to be perfectly miserable to many a 
 consumer of a scientifically chosen and cooked dinner, eaten 
 with feet resting upon a floor swept and garnished with all 
 the ceremonials of domestic-science propriety? I make no 
 claim that the college graduate can by exalted thought stay 
 the ravages of the typhoid germ or neutralize the pangs of 
 indigestion; but I hereby protest that he has largely escaped 
 the one-sided mental development which sees "life" only 
 in food and sanitation, and the various material elements 
 which they represent. 
 
 One of the greatest absurdities of the whole attack upon 
 college training is the constant assumption that its finished 
 product has been immured somewhere all his school-life 
 long, whereby he has been absolutely cut off from contact 
 with everything but books, and those books leading solely 
 to the learned professions. Not every boy now serves an 
 
THE CALUMNIATED COLLEG?,A?s 101 
 
 apprenticeship in equine and bovine management on some 
 relative s farm; but even in these days it is the very excep 
 tional boy or girl who does not daily come into contact with 
 all manner of details of what we are pleased to term "prac 
 tical life." And in the college preparatory school, and still 
 more in college, there are numerous forms of "student 
 activities," theoretically distinct from, but always growing 
 out of, the school curriculum, which develop and train execu 
 tive ability in matters of business and industry, if we think 
 special training in those things so tremendously important. 
 
 The college graduate does not, and never did, in this 
 country at least, come down from the commencement plat 
 form a spectacled dyspeptic, who has a "proper disdain for 
 all things material," and is "helpless where business is con 
 cerned." Who has it been to any really great extent but the 
 college graduates who have made all the western states 
 rank high at once for their educational standards and for 
 their business, agriculture, and industry? And, be it re 
 membered, they were graduates of a day when colleges 
 were much more narrowly classical than now. 
 
 Again, it is of no little significance that the form of social 
 work generally admitted to have come nearer to a solution 
 of the hard problem of urban poverty, ignorance, and vice 
 than any other, is for the most part prosecuted under the 
 name of the College Settlement Association. Even in the 
 cities where settlement work does not actually bear the 
 college name, it is still largely directed by college-bred 
 women and men, with college-bred ideals. I reverse the 
 common form of expression, and name the women first, be 
 cause I believe that it is universally admitted that this 
 great work is essentially woman-devised and woman- 
 executed, although it has had the valuable cooperation of 
 many thoughtful and educated men. But I also believe 
 what is not so generally recognized that it is only the 
 
102 THE CALUMNIATED COLLEGIAN 
 
 gradually diffused effect of college training upon the Amer 
 ican female mind which has ever made women think that 
 they can do such great things as these, no matter though 
 some of the actual workers are not themselves holders of 
 collegiate degrees. Higher education has been so nearly the 
 sole agency in the awakening of women to a consciousness of 
 their powers and their duties, that it fills me with amaze 
 ment and consternation to see the strength of the present 
 movement to imprison their mental activities within a 
 narrow technical training, which boasts that its highest aim 
 is the intensive application of that training "in the home. " 
 
 The President of the National Women s Trade Union 
 League of America wrote to me last spring: "We are espe 
 cially grateful to you, because the newer education . . . 
 which is being given to boys is being denied to girls on the 
 theory that they are only potential wives and mothers. If 
 this distinction is disastrous in the world at large by depriv 
 ing the girl of such an education as can give the greatest 
 intellectual strength, it is still more disastrous in the in 
 dustrial world. That the working women themselves realize 
 this is proved by the action taken by them at their con 
 vention in St. Louis." 
 
 This action was, in brief, an expression of their appre 
 ciation of the fact that the thing which above all places 
 them at the mercy of unscrupulous employers is their igno 
 rance and consequent intellectual ineffectiveness. 
 
 Almost simultaneously with this letter came one from a 
 member of the Wellesley College Faculty, who, writing to 
 me of the fire there, said: "Yes, College Hall is a great loss 
 to Wellesley, but the splendid human values which the 
 emergency brought forth still fill me with a sense of elation. 
 The vindication of the value of training for women which 
 that experience afforded seems to me a new glory for the 
 annals of the college." 
 
THE CALUMNIATED COLLEGIAN 103 
 
 These unsolicited verdicts from persons dealing inti 
 mately with two opposite and representative classes of 
 women need no special comment to a reading public fa 
 miliar with the story of the conduct of Wellesley girls and 
 teachers during the fire and after it; familiar too with the 
 difficulty always experienced in uniting uneducated work 
 ing-women for an intelligent defense of their own interests. 
 
 I do not see how a serious person, when he thinks of these 
 things, can view with other than alarm the powerful pres 
 ent tendency to lower the general level of American in 
 tellectuality by teaching that education means merely the 
 introduction of certain creature comforts into slum dwell 
 ings and remote farmhouses, which now know them not. 
 With the movement for a general diffusion of culture and 
 decent living in these backward and neglected portions of 
 our population, no one can have anything but the most 
 ardent sympathy. But that real culture, or any truly high 
 standard of living, can be secured by a method that openly 
 proclaims all processes of pure intellect inferior in educa 
 tional value and utility for life to mechanical processes and 
 material results, seems to me a thesis not even worthy of 
 argument. 
 
 You will have secured a desirable thing when you 
 have the housekeeper of the slum district educated up to 
 the charms of clean floors and windows, and to the intended 
 function of the bathtub; you will have secured something 
 equally desirable when you shall have brought into the 
 barren life of the uncultivated farmer and his wife an ap 
 preciation of the aesthetic possibilities of a rustic abode. 
 
 It will be even better, possibly, when you have provided 
 for them and their children those wholesome amusements 
 and opportunities for social intercourse which human na 
 ture craves and in proper measure should have. But an 
 education deliberately so planned that in the very nature 
 
104 THE CALUMNIATED COLLEGIAN 
 
 of things it must stop just there, will never reduce the num 
 ber "whose life-work is not in harmony with their talents," 
 nor will it assure "satisfied men and women." Men and 
 women are never satisfied, if satisfaction depends merely 
 upon what they have; and while the new educational plan 
 may perhaps increase the earning capacity of the cheaper 
 class of wage-earners and the crop-raising capacity of the 
 farmer, it can hardly fail also to increase what I believe to 
 be the most deadly thing in nearly all ranks of society to 
 day the desire to be merely comfortable, to have "pretty 
 things," and, above all, to be entertained and amused. 
 And in increasing that by a measure of gratification of it, it 
 must inevitably, and soon, increase the resultant discon 
 tent and restlessness; because that measure is never great 
 enough to keep pace with the ever-expanding desire. There 
 is no remedy for that discontent but the well-filled mind; 
 vocational training must consent to add to itself the studies 
 which give that, and to grant the full time which those 
 studies require, or its present spectacular success, in landing 
 certain deft-fingered young persons in what are, for young 
 persons, well-paid positions, will soon be known for the 
 humbug that it is, and the present popular applause be 
 turned into hisses. 
 
 Finally, it |seems to me not too much to say that, if 
 society would protect itself from extinction through the 
 hideous agency of deadly boredom alone, it must take 
 active measures to preserve and multiply the college grad 
 uate. For it is a tremendous fallacy that the possessor of 
 only the trained hand can hope with any well-founded 
 confidence to be included in that desirable company which 
 is both interesting and interested. For the hand can lose 
 its cunning, and even where its continued skill perhaps may 
 keep its owner happily entertained, common candor must 
 admit that there is no assurance of the same joyous effect 
 upon that owner s associates. 
 
THE CALUMNIATED COLLEGIAN 105 
 
 This fact holds true in all walks of life, and irrespective of 
 sex. If you could persuade every woman in Atlanta to 
 sweep a floor properly, I doubt much if she could still be 
 guaranteed an agreeable companion for a rainy Sunday. 
 If you could teach every "white wing" in any city to re 
 move the dirt of the streets in the most dustless and sani 
 tary manner known to science, I still question whether you 
 would wish him to come to your library for an evening of 
 uplifting conversation. And he would be equally lacking in 
 resources for se/f-entertainment in his unemployed hours. 
 
 So we come to one of the gravest charges that can be 
 brought against the "new education": that, while it may 
 bring jobs to men and women when they are young, it pro 
 vides nothing for the man or woman retired from that job 
 by age. If there is anything beneath the stars more pitiable 
 than the elderly man or woman with no active purpose left 
 in life, and no intellectual resources from which to draw 
 occupation and interest, I have not yet seen it. On the other 
 hand, there is nothing which so effectively robs the pros 
 pect of old age of its terrors as the sight of the scholarly 
 wearer of whitened hair, which crowns a head still vigorous 
 and young through the happy preservative agency of a 
 trained and much-used intellect. Incidentally, it is not an 
 infrequent thing to behold the owner of such a head making 
 his own garden, or milking his own Jersey cow, or display 
 ing ample efficiency to start a balky horse. 
 
 No mechanical process can guarantee to us an interesting 
 life, or insure us against boredom. But just because it is 
 something more than a mechanical process, a college edu 
 cation of the right sort comes nearer doing this than any 
 other agency we know certainly nearer than any drill in 
 cow-milking or scientific cooking. Its value to us and to the 
 future of our country is beyond estimation. If the time 
 ever comes when "vital" is taken to be synonymous with 
 
106 THE CALUMNIATED COLLEGIAN 
 
 "lucrative"; when the life of the mind and the training of 
 the mind are set below those of the body; when intelligence, 
 as a means to a full and satisfying life, is superseded by 
 prophylaxis and hygiene then we may well wish that 
 we had listened to a wiser teacher. 
 
RELIGIO MAGISTRI 
 
 HENRY NOBLE MACCRACKEN 
 
 WHAT is the faith of the teacher? What the secret 
 strength that sustains his spirit through unprofitable jour 
 neys? What the unfailing source that will keep his mind 
 serene through the long hours of drudging over dusty fields, 
 the dry farming of the soul, savoring little of the fresh 
 activities of his own world? 
 
 For there must be some religio magistri: some magnetic 
 quality in the teacher s chosen way to point his compass 
 true; some energy inherent, which is justified in the men 
 and women we have ourselves known, who have sought 
 great teaching above all other aspirations, building and 
 establishing with skill the enduring bases of this last, not 
 least, of the great professional services of civilization. 
 
 It is intolerable that we should be asked to state this 
 faith of ours in terms of money, first and last; yet the world 
 is to blame if we accept its price for us, and we find our 
 selves of small account. The publicity given to college and 
 university "drives" flatters only the unthinking; the suc 
 cess of these will be but a mere pittance in the budget of the 
 profession. In Poughkeepsie, in the week of this writing, 
 the Board of Education has been obliged to vote a strict 
 enforcement of all contracts with teachers ; there are vacan 
 cies in every school in the city, and unwilling workers are 
 being held to tasks they no longer desire lest the whole sys 
 tem give way. The empty schoolrooms of this year are, 
 moreover, few compared with what we dread for the 
 autumn of 1921, when the normal schools will have grad 
 uated the smallest classes in many years. Then, just as the 
 
108 RELIGIO MAGISTRI 
 
 American people, aghast at the revelations of illiteracy, of 
 provincialism, of class and racial hatred, the daughters 
 of ignorance, will be calling for teachers, there will be 
 none to answer. 
 
 For the first time in the history of our profession, we have 
 accepted the money- value at which the public has priced us 
 as an index of our worth. What irony is it that we who 
 have always placed our profession above all, we who have 
 never sought great rewards, whose work is, in the larger 
 sense, disinterested, should be thrust forward as beggars, 
 whining for an alms! What a joke and what a tragedy 
 these parades of college boys carrying banners inscribed 
 "FEED THE PROF"; when college girls masquerade on 
 Fifth Avenue in their grandmothers gowns, and alumnse 
 hire out as cooks and waitresses "for the benefit of the 
 Faculty " ! Could they degrade the great tradition further? 
 
 It is most characteristically American that, confronting 
 such a situation as this, we should seek the remedy of en 
 dowment campaigns and other means of enhancing the 
 money-value of teachers. We turn, as Kipling said we al 
 ways do, a keen, untroubled gaze home to the instant need 
 of things. But having gone thus far, and being in a fair 
 way to go further, we think we have solved the problem 
 through things. There is need of a different emphasis, 
 however. The economic solution is primary, it is true. We 
 must pay our teachers enough to maintain them. There is 
 little comfort in being told that you are a natural-born 
 teacher when you cannot obtain a natural living. Every 
 college in the land faces this situation, and must continue 
 to face it squarely. If the increased tuition fees of edu 
 cation, barely commensurate with increased maintenance 
 costs, will not supply the additional income for needed 
 salary increases, our colleges must supply them in some 
 other way. But this done, they cannot leave the other 
 undone. 
 
RELIGIO MAGISTRI 109 
 
 More lasting and more vital than external stabilization 
 of the professor s market- value must be his faith in his call 
 ing. If we cannot find it, if we cannot reaffirm it, our cause 
 is lost in advance. Subsidies and endowments will never 
 make teachers essential to the people s life. Take away the 
 religio magistri, and teaching becomes no longer a profession. 
 
 The teacher cannot, as does the scholar, find a retreat of 
 the spirit away from the perils and perplexities of the pres 
 ent life. The philologist described by Gilbert Murray finds 
 consolation far from the world, in the kingdom of ancient 
 letters. His salvation is conferred by mighty spirits of the 
 past, which free him from the body of his present death. No 
 such refuge could ever be a teacher s source of power. He 
 may seek rest and recreation through the study of the class 
 ics, with the romantic Hellenist of Oxford; but his faith 
 must spring, like truth of old, out of the earth in which 
 he toils, the product of his own work and life. Else he could 
 make no headway against the doubts that assail him; he 
 must surrender the battlefield once and for all. The teach 
 er s faith must be, not of the past, but of the living pres 
 ent; not of the completed thought of the ages, but of the 
 process of the great to be; otherwise the doubts win. 
 
 More dangerous, because more insidious, enemies than 
 the wolf at the door, are the^foes of the teacher s spirit. 
 We can restore to the profession some self-respect through 
 adequate salaries, though we may not in our lifetime over 
 take the economic supremacy which the industrial elements 
 of democracy have already won. At least, teachers will not 
 starve. But what if we destroy the one liberty which should 
 be guaranteed every man joy in labor? A widespread 
 but furtive envy of intelligence circulates sneers about "col 
 lege professors." Parents of pupils encourage an atmos 
 phere of criticism and opposition in the classroom. Gov 
 erning boards and administrative autocrats virtually compel 
 
110 RELIGIO MAGISTRI 
 
 organization by teachers in defense of their tenure of office. 
 Under such conditions, it will take more than the promise 
 of a livelihood to beguile young aspirants to successful 
 careers in the field of teaching. A reward must be shown 
 which will make the workers at one with their work be 
 cause it is in itself worthy. 
 
 Can we make them believe in its reality? For there are 
 great doubts. The teacher of to-day, young and well train 
 ed, eager for the highest service, is confronted by three 
 barriers, irreducible and baffling. They may, for want of 
 better names, be called educational economics, bio-psycho 
 logical determinism, and propagandism long words, but 
 the forces they describe have no familiar names. 
 
 Let us consider the economic situation of contemporary 
 education. Here is a scene a thousand times repeated in 
 the American schoolroom of to-day. The teacher has begun 
 work with her class. A group of eager pupils faces her from 
 the forms impressionable minds ready for the adventure 
 of learning. Then the shadow fills the doorway. The school 
 principal says, " I m sorry, but the superintendent of 
 schools has told me to double the number of children in 
 every room." Of course, sixty is an impossible number for 
 teaching in one room. But there are the other children. 
 Where shall they go? And the golden opportunity is gone. 
 
 This is no imaginary scene. It happens equally in the 
 country districts, where the remote district schools are be 
 ing given up, and even more in the congested sections of 
 the great cities. Conditions like these make mockery of 
 the plans and dreams of the ambitious teacher. Is it any 
 wonder that most of the energy of the teaching staff is 
 dissipated by worry over the bare economy of the subject? 
 
 This attitude finds its natural reflection in the national 
 conception of education. The departments of education 
 in universities concern themselves primarily, of necessity, 
 
RELIGIO MAGISTRI 111 
 
 with school-management and administration, with the sta 
 tistics and finance of the industrial organization. The 
 problem of putting twenty-five million children through 
 school on an inadequate scheme offers problems so complex 
 that it is little wonder that our educational specialists are 
 still concerned with the business of education, and have 
 scarcely risen to a conception of education as a science, to 
 say nothing of an art. Worst of all, the immense sums in 
 volved, the powers connected with the erection and use of 
 the great buildings, and the profitable connections of stud 
 ies and textbooks, all contribute toward the development 
 of a type of personality that may be called the educational 
 politician. He costs the profession more in the destruction 
 of morals than all the efficiency experts, the economists, 
 and the statisticians of education can replace. The result 
 of his control of educational policy has been to drive out of 
 the profession the highest type of teacher; because teachers 
 have been considered, not as individuals, but as units in 
 schemes, and have been made the playthings of boards of 
 education and of district leaders. 
 
 The same economic determinism follows the teachers 
 through the higher grades of the profession. They are al 
 ways between the devil of poverty not alone in salary, 
 but in departmental equipment and resources for research 
 and the deep sea of the student tide. Just as soon as 
 their equipment and salary become adequate to their de 
 partmental needs, they are inundated with an increased 
 student body, and the old plan of overwork and under- 
 equipment is resumed. Thus teachers are driven, uncon- 
 senting, to think of students, not as persons, but in terms of 
 units, hours, semesters, and credits; the intimate personal 
 contact of teacher and pupil becomes impossible, and the 
 old academic traditions become mere memories. 
 
 Determinism of a different sort introduces even more 
 
112 RELIGIO MAGISTRI 
 
 serious questions for the teachers. They have lived under 
 the impression that the bough was inclined as the twig was 
 bent; that, by training, the young idea could be taught to 
 shoot; that the child would not depart from the path he 
 was taught to go in. Brave maxims! But are they true? 
 Steadily, year by year, psychological studies of ability and 
 biological studies of heredity take away from the teachers 
 their claim to a share in character-formation. Teachers 
 must reconcile themselves to learning that they cannot, by 
 taking thought, add a cubit to the mental stature of their 
 students. The child becomes father of the man in a new 
 sense, most fatal to the ambitious hopes of his teachers. 
 College, we learn from the army psychologists, adds practi 
 cally nothing to the general abilities of any boy. There are 
 two classes of minds the fit and the unfit; education nei 
 ther helps the one nor harms the other in any appreciable 
 degree. The truth is exaggerated here, of course, but the 
 problem involved strikes teachers in almost this form. And 
 when the psychologists are reinforced by the biologists, 
 with their heredity chromosomes and gametes; by the en- 
 vironmentists, who laugh at the thirty months of college 
 scattered among vacations and week-ends, and ask what 
 possible mental adaptations can take place under such 
 handicaps, the teachers faith may struggle bravely against 
 the assaults, but can you wonder that they feel sometimes 
 like a Lost Battalion? 
 
 The heaviest assault is in reserve. The world has discov 
 ered the great half-truth that prejudices of youth last 
 longer than those of the middle miles. So the world comes 
 to the school-door with its propaganda. It begins mildly 
 enough: simple souls conceive the idea that if we educate 
 we must educate "for" something. The aim of education 
 is not the growth of the student s powers into maturity; it 
 includes their application as the teacher may direct. The 
 
RELIGIO MAGISTRI 113 
 
 student is no longer to be dismissed at the school-door; the 
 teacher must lead him to the gate of opportunity and must 
 see to it that he rings the bell. 
 
 We began some years ago to educate for character, and 
 we sent to our boys at Christmas-time " School, College and 
 Character"; we progressed into education for service, and 
 sent them by the thousand to hear John R. Mott at student 
 conventions; we read Dunn and Barnard, and trained our 
 teachers to educate for citizenship; the vocationalists came 
 down upon us, and we tried hard to educate for the needs of 
 life. Books with these titles, and many more, stand on the 
 teachers shelves, each an idea decayed into a slogan. 
 
 Herbert Spencer taught us long ago to educate for life; 
 he pointed out that the education of any age could but re 
 flect the social aspiration of the group that it served. But 
 neither he nor any of the great Victorian writers on educa- 
 cation conceived a period which would have to struggle 
 with so many isms as does ours. Both at top and at bottom 
 of 9ur scale we see new academies founded, whose primary 
 object is not knowledge but propaganda, and not propa 
 ganda but action, and direct action at that. The Rand 
 School represents one type, closely affiliated with an organ 
 ized political party. The trade-unions of the West are open 
 ing up schools for the children of union workers. Schools of 
 social research, which begin with a bill of rights for aca 
 demic freedom, too soon tend to become schools where prop 
 aganda is substituted for research. In a different mode we 
 have the Ferrer and the Socialist Sunday Schools. Across 
 the river from my home is the Libertarian Academy, or In 
 ternational School for the Education of the Children of 
 Radicals. On the other side of the fence, the Protection 
 and Security Leagues are equally vociferous in a campaign 
 to inculcate patriotism. The Non-Partisan League of 
 North Dakota recently intimated gently to professors of 
 
114 RELIGIO MAGISTRI 
 
 the state university that it might be well for them to join a 
 trade-union, and most of the faculty complied. 
 
 Education as propaganda is the sum of all: no time for 
 discussion, no time for research; above all, no time for dis 
 passionate consideration of both sides. Teachers are asked 
 to be pleaders on one side or the other, appointed no longer 
 on the basis of character and ability, but on the basis of 
 official subscription to one party or the other. 
 
 Even where impartiality is supposed to exist, the method 
 of the classroom reminds me of a journey I once took 
 through Bulgaria. We had been held in Constantinople 
 during a plague outbreak. When finally the Orient Express 
 was allowed to leave, Bulgaria permitted it to pass through 
 her territory only on condition that the train should not 
 connect with Bulgarian soil. So, at the frontier, the train 
 was literally sealed: the ventilators were closed, the doors 
 were locked, and soldiers sat in the corridor with guns ready 
 for business, to shoot anyone who lifted a window as much 
 as an inch. 
 
 Such a miserable quarantine is that to which some par 
 ents would condemn our teachers of to-day; and trustees, 
 like gendarmes, are held accountable to resist the intrusion 
 of fresh air from without. When such powers as these fight 
 against the faith of teachers, it is quite beside the point to 
 argue, as some members of the profession have recently 
 done, that the teacher is not all that he should be. A little 
 plain talk from Sir Oracle will not improve matters. It is 
 rather a source of wonder that, these foes of the spirit 
 should have caused, upon the whole, no greater disintegra 
 tion in the educational armies of America. It is not low sal 
 aries primarily that have caused the break-up of faculties in 
 several colleges in the last two years : it is educational tyr 
 anny. And if we are to restore teaching to a place among 
 the professions, we must not merely proclaim boldly our 
 
RELIGIO MAGISTRI 115 
 
 teacher s faith, but we must put our teacher s religion into 
 practice and leave the issue to the God of Battles. All honor 
 to those who have not yet bowed the knee to the Baal of 
 propaganda, the Moloch of the mob, and the Gogmagog, 
 the stuffed bolster, of the bio-psychological deter minists. 
 In defiance of the great doubts, teachers can but nail their 
 theses to the door, and leave the issue to time. 
 
 To the cathedral door, then, with our religio magistril 
 The teacher s articles of faith are three: he believes in his 
 subject; he believes in his pupil; he believes in himself. 
 
 In his subject, first, that it is the best of all possible sub 
 jects under the sun for study, research, and application. 
 The teacher must be convinced, like any other salesman, of 
 the value of the commodity in which he deals. Of the 
 teachers I have known whose teaching was a failure, the 
 greater number seemed to have lost faith in their subject. 
 It is the one great law of teaching, that it goes by infection. 
 Many a half -hear ted pupil, unwillingly or unwittingly drag 
 ged into chemistry, has caught fire from the flaming zeal 
 of the teacher. 
 
 Of course, the teacher s faith can never proceed from 
 half -knowledge. Your book-canvasser who repeats his 
 parrot knowledge of the grand, illustrated, authoritative 
 history of the war, and tries to simulate an interest in the 
 edition which he has not read, is the type of untrained 
 teacher that infests our schools. When we realize that less 
 than a quarter of our six hundred thousand teachers have 
 any real knowledge of then- science, and only a tenth of 
 these have a first-hand acquaintance with authority or 
 experiment in any field, we realize how much is parrot- 
 study, how little fact or reason, in American education. 
 
 So true is this, and so defective our system of education 
 in its failure to make the teacher a learned person, that our 
 
116 RELIGIO MAGISTRI 
 
 more scholarly group is in violent reaction against this 
 state of things, and insists that there is nothing to teach 
 ing; that teaching is but pseudo-science. If a man knows 
 something, really knows it, they say, he can teach it he 
 cannot help teaching it. This goes with Plato s glorifica 
 tion of knowledge as virtue, and is reading into knowledge 
 something, it seems to me, which it does not ordinarily con 
 tain. The irritation against departments and professors 
 of education among university professors the country over 
 is due, in the first instance, to the utter failure of both 
 public and private education to train and hold its teachers, 
 and to raise them from a conception of teaching as mere 
 occupation up to the professional point of view. 
 
 Certainly this may be conceded: that if any one of us 
 will turn time s flight backward and ask himself this ques 
 tion, "Who was my greatest teacher?" he must confess, I 
 think, that the first merit of his best teacher was acquaint 
 ance with and love for his subject. And this love was not 
 diverted by thought of application to life, by vocational 
 advantage or propaganda, but was a pure love of the sub 
 ject for its own sake, for the delight of its discoveries, the 
 neatness of its inventions, the harmony and perfection of 
 its laws, the intricacy and smooth workings of its processes. 
 The love was that of a good chauffeur for his motor, of a 
 captain for his ship. What does he care where he sails her, 
 your old mariner? Only let her be staunch and true, sea 
 worthy and responsive to helm, and he will love her for bet 
 ter, for worse. Such is Gilbert Murray s "Religio Gram- 
 matici," to which I referred, in which your scholar proves 
 triumphantly and conclusively that nothing in the world is 
 so worth doing as settling Hoti s business. What he actu 
 ally proves is, of course, that he is a great teacher, and that 
 in teaching teachers as Murray does, he revitalizes his 
 subject. 
 
RELIGIO MAGISTRI 117 
 
 Faith in one s subject is, of course, apt to harden into its 
 excess, bigotry. Nine tenths of all faculty quarrels are due to 
 the secret contempt with which one professor views the sub 
 ject-matter of his neighbor s course. Rara avis the teacher 
 who commends the subject-matter of another depart 
 ment. Here and there, it is true, one sees signs of a better 
 understanding, chiefly through the influence of national 
 associations. The sciences, in particular, have shown signs 
 of some real fraternizing within the curriculum. Botany 
 frankly acknowledges its debt to chemistry and physics; 
 so must physiology. But the feeling is not always recipro 
 cal, and physical chemistry views with grave suspicion the 
 heresies that may arise through botanists who meddle with 
 osmosis. 
 
 And so it goes round the faculty. One would think, for 
 instance, that the languages would welcome departments 
 of comparative literature. As it has turned out, the sister 
 languages have had to form a kind of league of nations, 
 with an Article X to prevent unlawful seizure of the com 
 mon territory. The history of academic toleration is a 
 short one, and full of petty wars. Teachers must give up 
 such bigotry, and proclaim instead the common dignity of 
 all fruitful learning, free trade over all frontiers, reciprocity, 
 and mutual understanding. The present crisis in the pro 
 fession will not be in vain, if such a result is obtained. 
 
 And the teacher must have faith in his students. He must 
 trust their growth as the farmer trusts sun and rain and 
 soil to work their sestival miracle. Because his potato crop 
 has failed, will the farmer despair? On the contrary, the 
 farmer, knowing that farming is a highly hazardous busi 
 ness, and subject to great losses and great gains, becomes 
 philosophical, and leaves the event in other hands. Profes 
 sor Royce was accustomed to recommend mathematics as 
 a preparation for philosophy; agriculture might provide the 
 better discipline. 
 
118 RELIGIO MAGISTRI 
 
 Your average teacher seldom, if ever, looks on teaching 
 as a hazardous occupation. He wants perfection all the 
 time, and grumbles if he does not get it. There are teachers 
 like Professor Lounsbury who, as he became more and more 
 the scholar, lost faith in his pupils, and contented himself 
 with making epigrams upon "the incredible capacity of the 
 student mind to resist the intrusion of knowledge," and his 
 famous "a few more pearls, gentlemen. * There are also 
 Northrops of Yale and Wrights of Harvard, who are held 
 in loving veneration by college generations responding to 
 their faith in them, and looking back to them as the great 
 personalities of their university. 
 
 Lack of faith in youth, refusal to see in education the 
 usual risk of crops, presumptuous assumption of all the re 
 sponsibility, these are the failings of the teacher who loses 
 hold of this cardinal article of the retigio magistri. And it is 
 precisely here that the teacher makes his great mistake. 
 Instead of adopting nature s laws as his great analogy, he 
 is all too apt to assume the r61e, not of teacher, but of 
 tyrant of the classroom, and by a false discipline to force 
 results. The effect is inevitable. It is, as Leatherstocking 
 said, "agin nater," and the end is death. 
 
 Your true teacher loves youth for its own sake, as he 
 loves his subject; he keeps himself young among his lads; 
 he sees through their eyes the importance of the matters 
 that engross them; he brings into the classroom all this 
 wealth of allusion which this knowledge gives him. I think 
 of old Doctor Furnivall at eighty-six, one of the great 
 teachers, though not in classes or set schools. I can see 
 him now, out with his girls on the Thames, coxswain of 
 their eight-oared shell, one with them in all their life, his 
 Shakespeare and Chaucer Societies forgot, his hated snob- 
 ocracy pigeon-holed, teacher and friend of half London. 
 When his associates raised a fund on his seventy-fifth birth- 
 
RELIGIO MAGISTRI 119 
 
 day, all he would accept was a second-hand eight-oared 
 shell for his girls and a paid-up cremation ticket. 
 
 The teacher s faith in his students receives its reward in 
 vicarious ways only. Through their achievements he lives. 
 Professor John Bassett Moore said the other day: "When 
 I learned that there were many members of the Peace 
 Conference who considered as the most brilliant and best- 
 trained diplomat in Paris my pupil Wellington Koo of the 
 China Mission, I had my unalloyed reward." 
 
 Such pleasure is akin to that of the creative artist; but 
 the art in which the teacher makes his impression is that 
 of life itself, and always through the personality which he 
 has trained. The true teacher withholds his hand from the 
 temptation to guide his student. He distrusts profoundly 
 the current discussions of vocational guidance. He believes 
 in bureaus of vocational statistics, and would lay before 
 his students the whole world of his day, with every oppor 
 tunity it may afford. But he believes that, just as an im 
 prisoned youngling robin, that has never seen flight of a 
 bird, will fly on the first trial, by instinct, out of the opened 
 cage, so the effective impulses that stimulate the choice of 
 careers and the quest for success are deeply rooted in per 
 sonality, and should be held sacred by parent and teacher 
 alike. This, indeed, is the ultimate test of the teacher s 
 faith in his student. 
 
 It is even more important that the religio magistri in 
 clude faith in himself. There is no true teaching without it. 
 The only discipline worth the name is discipleship, which 
 cannot come unless the teacher himself inspires, not only 
 affection, but admiration. Sincerity, the one thing needful 
 in real art, begins and ends with the teacher s faith in him 
 self. It is the secret of a William Graham Sumner. One may, 
 indeed, affirm that the art of teaching rests wholly upon 
 this foundation. Teaching is something, but enthusiasm 
 
120 RELIGIO MAGISTRI 
 
 is everything, as Goethe said. It is certainly the secret of 
 personality. 
 
 In his passion for perfection for your teacher is al 
 ways a perfectionist the teacher too often fails to respect 
 himself or his calling. He subjects his own best capacities 
 to trivial and wasteful compliance with irrelevancies. He 
 is too ready to leave his real work at the first demand; he 
 cries for committee work, the petty detail of administra 
 tive routine, the civic forum, and the thousand and one 
 little snares which destroy his love and usefulness for his 
 prime functions. Your true teacher must be about his 
 Father s business, teaching; he has time scarcely for marks 
 or the rules of faculties; he has to be fenced round, pro 
 tected, forgiven by the less gifted. For him rules are made 
 to be broken, and there is no known record of a great teacher 
 who was not at war with the faculty rules of his time. 
 
 Faith in one s self is most needed, perhaps, by the 
 teacher of younger pupils. Children are quickest to detect 
 any loss of self-confidence. Adolescent youth, on the other 
 hand, responds most sensitively to responsibility placed in 
 its own hands; while the post-graduate student leans most 
 upon the teacher s faith in subject-matter. But, for pupils 
 of any age, the teacher s faith must be in himself as teacher, 
 not in any other capacity. He may sigh to take part in a 
 more active citizenship, or may envy the productive scholar, 
 but he must press forward to the mark of his own high call 
 ing. He cannot, of course, be a teacher without keeping 
 abreast of his time; he must study and probably produce 
 some scholarly work, if his treatment of subject-matter is 
 to be fresh. But he will never be puzzled as to which treas 
 ure lies closest to his heart. 
 
 It is often charged against the young women teachers 
 who comprise three fourths of the nation s staff, that they 
 choose the profession only in the expectancy of leaving it 
 
RELIGIO MAGISTRI 121 
 
 early for marriage. This may be true. It is also true that 
 thousands of young men teach a short time before entering 
 other professions. The lives of the greatest Americans al 
 most always contain such periods. But all this has but 
 little to do with the standards that can be upheld. It is 
 perfectly possible, as our army proved, to build up morale 
 in a force whose term is short. The problem must be ap 
 proachable from another angle. If school administrations, 
 boards of education, and parents associations will seek to 
 prove that the community has faith in the teacher, it will 
 not be hard for teachers to obtain faith in themselves. 
 
 If the community fails in this duty, there is but one alter 
 native left to the teachers to organize in defense against 
 the community, and to demand, not only the salaries which 
 the work deserves, but that share in civic responsibility 
 which their service merits. Teachers will then be accused 
 of greed and selfishness, of desertion of the high standards 
 of their calling. Such censure will be unjust. If public 
 opinion responds only to the power of group-interests, if 
 disinterested service is forgotten, who will be to blame 
 when the teachers join the other organized groups of labor 
 in the civil war of class interests? The writer hopes that no 
 such action will be taken; he believes that all gains of war 
 are, in the final analysis, Pyrrhic victories. But we are 
 drifting, and it may soon be too late to work for the true 
 faith. 
 
 Misbegotten self-esteem, like the false knight of the 
 " Faerie Queene," steals the accoutrements of the knight of 
 the true faith and fools the world. Not so that faith of the 
 born leader which is fortified by conviction that one s work 
 is essential, that one s subject is indispensable, that one s 
 students will be loyal; and having done all, stands. Such 
 leaders of the teacher s faith we need to-day. The right 
 wing of our school army has been broken in by the threat of 
 
1*2 RELIGIO MAGISTRI 
 
 economic disaster; the left wing has disintegrated under 
 the insidious filtration that is corrupting the integrity of 
 our profession. It is time to move forward with our centre 
 to the attack. 
 

 OUR VILLAGE 
 
 WILLIAM PETERS REEVES 
 
 HOURS from any city, our village has changed little since 
 fifty years ago. It had then a hotel, and the country round 
 about was so wild that visitors from the city came in the 
 summer for a change. Now, most of the great oak forests 
 have been cut for railway-ties, the game has been shot, the 
 bass may rarely be caught in the river. Hills that cut off 
 the horizon are dotted with sheep ; from the tops one gets a 
 sweep of country with few farmhouses in sight. There are 
 cities beyond; there is no sense of remoteness, such as one 
 feels in looking to the north and knowing that one might go 
 to the Arctic Circle without seeing a town. 
 
 Our isolation is, therefore, not geographical. We are in 
 the midst of what a facetious editor of the nearest city calls 
 "the garden spot of the world." Powerful limousines oc 
 casionally go through the village, showing a mild curiosity 
 and large interests behind and beyond. The single track of 
 railroad fills the valley at irregular intervals with unneces 
 sary shrieks of freight engines; sonorous passenger whistles 
 multiply warnings for bridge and station on the more 
 familiar hours, or insolently rouse the sleeping villagers 
 when the midnight train goes through without stop. Trav 
 elers rarely get off; salesmen supply our simple wants once 
 or twice a year, between trains : there is no hotel, nor would 
 their commissions justify staying over-night. There is not 
 even a boarding-house. 
 
 The village is not interested in strangers to the extent of 
 putting them up for the night. It has nothing to offer. 
 There are no struggling manufactories needing capital; 
 
124 OUR VILLAGE 
 
 there are no resources inviting capital. The villagers own 
 their plain frame houses, built many years ago. Five new 
 houses have been added in thirty years. Our taxes, less an 
 amount barely necessary to run the school and street- 
 lamps, go to the county and state. We have no paved 
 streets, no sewerage system, no police or fire department. 
 A private corporation, with most limited liability, furnishes 
 water. All I get from taxes is a feeble natural gas-light 
 below on the unmade street ; but when the village could no 
 longer pay a man to put out the street-lamps, the gas com 
 pany shut off the gas. We then went out at night with 
 lanterns. 
 
 We are all poor. Two or three villagers with independent 
 means go and come; no one knows or cares, for their in 
 fluence is negligible. No captain of industry commands 
 anybody. There is no labor-problem, for there is no labor. 
 A few able-bodied workmen may now and then be engaged, 
 if they have nothing more important to do, and if they feel 
 like working. When it is not loaned on mortgage, the vil 
 lage carpenter keeps a heavy balance in the bank. He has 
 helped many a less energetic friend, without security and 
 without return. We have no labor-union, perhaps because 
 there are no employers of labor. I may get help when I am 
 my own contractor and head- workman. I may practise any 
 trade without boycott. Infrequent periods of such improve 
 ment furnish innocent excitement. Little checks change 
 hands, neighbors stop to comment; night brings a sense of 
 exquisite fatigue. One jingles money for unforeseen nails 
 and bolts and paint. At other times one may go for weeks 
 with only a bit of silver for church. 
 
 Occasionally an ancient oak must come down. An up 
 start red oak shows but ninety-seven rings; a white oak 
 felled the other day had two hundred and sixty-five rings; 
 where are other trees that were living in Milton s time? 
 
OUR VILLAGE 125 
 
 Up in the garret, to stop squirrel-holes, I noticed that all 
 the rafters and beams were of white oak. And the stone of 
 the house was quarried from a local hillside. Infinite labor 
 it took to saw and hew those timbers from the fellow of the 
 white oak ; men in the village to-day do not quarry the local 
 stone, trim the huge blocks, and swing them on to two-foot 
 walls, the prize of my modest possessions. Our two new 
 houses came from mail-order concerns, machined from the 
 thinnest lumber that will hold a house together. 
 
 Two small general stores maintain a rivalry begun gen 
 erations ago. The village humorist and historian entered 
 one the other day with a copy of the village paper printed 
 in the eighteen-fifties. " I see in this paper that you adver 
 tise photographs of the village. I should like to buy some." 
 The proprietor walked over to an old cherry cabinet, and 
 from a drawer took out photographs faded and yellow with 
 age. The man of humor gravely inspected them. "Well," 
 he finally remarked, " I see it pays to advertise. * 
 
 The newspaper-presses and type, and the building con 
 taining them, have all disappeared. The village tinker, who 
 could mend a watch or gun or sewing-machine, is dead, and 
 no one takes his place. Anciently there were three churches, 
 each with a full congregation militantly active in urging a 
 special form of truth. Two churches now more than answer 
 the need, and only in days of acute national crisis have they 
 been crowded. 
 
 Only two classes of people may live in our village content 
 edly: those who have ample resources of occupation and 
 interest within themselves, and those who have and crave 
 none. There is no ready-made amusement. We have no 
 saloon, no theatre, no moving-picture show. There is no 
 community playground or athletic field. There is no club. 
 In front of a stairway of a fraternal order, buggies and 
 sleighs will be hitched on an occasional night. Once a year, 
 
126 OUR VILLAGE 
 
 one church will give the annual supper; once a year, the 
 other church will give the annual supper. Women gather 
 weekly, to sew for mountain whites. The school-board 
 meets once a month, or oftener if the itch, measles, or 
 other epidemic threatens; and between solemn prophecies 
 on the state of the nation and personal criticism of the 
 Powers, votes the budget for salaries and the gas-bill. At 
 election time results of the 144 votes are posted, no longer 
 showing an even balance of straight tickets, but highly 
 eclectic groups. 
 
 The village is not gregarious. The common cause and 
 common labor of the pioneer have changed to furtive am 
 bitions and concealed purposes. Intensive individualism 
 successfully withstands all attempts at cooperation, in time 
 of peace. In war, without announcement, without noise or 
 argument, the village exceeded its quota of men and money 
 in every count, revealing unity, hard cash, and patriotism 
 unguessed by anyone. 
 
 The lack of express community spirit had grieved more 
 eager souls. Several years ago the parson brought back 
 from the East ambitious plans for community welfare. 
 There were many committees appointed, as on music, 
 dramatics, lectures, sport. Soon complaints were lodged 
 that the orchestra kept people awake, and no one can deny 
 that the village regards sleep, beginning at ten o clock, sun- 
 time, as of more importance than the playing of an orches 
 tra never so sure of itself as to put the audience at ease. 
 
 What, it will be asked, do we accomplish in such anti 
 social contentment? We read. The metropolitan press con 
 sumes from one to three hours a day; magazines fill several 
 days a month; but books are the serious business of life. 
 We read many books, big books, works in volumes, through. 
 A literary man in a narrow city flat will write a book in less 
 time than a villager will master one. But the villager se- 
 
OUR VILLAGE 127 
 
 lects with canny choice; the best seller has little significance 
 for him; he may still be reading Gibbon. A girl in the vil 
 lage school asked for the best edition of Chatterton. 
 Fashion in books works little change in our taste; one may 
 read Tennyson without impeachment; and while our sense 
 of humor is too delicately poised to tolerate a Browning 
 Society, there are those who find comfort in the legal en 
 tanglements of his old Italian law-case. The larger spirits 
 of the past seem to satisfy. " I can read, * said one villager, 
 "almost anything but new books. Old men inform," he 
 went on with Baconian antithesis, "new men disturb." 
 
 The village is little given to litigation. No attorney s 
 sign may be seen. Years ago we had our last cause celebre. 
 It was about a piano. The school-board had purchased an 
 instrument that would not stay in tune. The issue came up 
 when the tuner in despair asked whether the piano was at 
 concert or international pitch. No one knew. The tuner 
 made remarks that led the board to think that they had 
 been swindled. The last payment was refused, and the 
 dealer sued. 
 
 The case came to trial before the local justice. The plain 
 tiff s lawyer, a large man with long hair, which he roached 
 up masterfully in his argument, wore a white clerical cravat 
 and long black frock-coat. He listened to witnesses with 
 good-natured tolerance. When our musical expert took the 
 chair, a timid woman who had never been in court, 
 the lawyer roused himself. "You say that you are a pro 
 fessional musician and that you know all about pianos. 
 Will you kindly tell this court how many keys there are on 
 this piano that the board bought and refuses to pay for? 
 You cannot? You don t know how many keys there are on 
 it? You presume to come here, under oath, and pose as a 
 musical expert, and can t tell how many keys there are on 
 a piano?" He motioned to his assistant to take down the 
 
128 OUR VILLAGE 
 
 testimony. "Well, perhaps you can tell us the pitch of this 
 piano? You don t know what pitch it is? Is n t the pitch of 
 a piano important? You have a piano? You know what 
 pitch it is? Concert pitch very good. Now you say you 
 don t know the pitch of the piano in litigation, and you 
 claim to be a musical expert." Again the assistant takes 
 testimony. "How old is this piano? You don t know that 
 either? Are n t you familiar with the types and styles of 
 pianos? You are. You could tell an old piano from a new 
 one? You could; yes, one does n t have to pretend to be a 
 musical expert or study under Liszt to do that. But you 
 don t know how old this piano is? How s that? An obso 
 lete type? Too old to guess at? That 11 do." 
 
 The board won the case, for the clerk deposed that a 
 piano at international pitch had been ordered, and the 
 tuner could not affirm that the piano was at any pitch, or 
 that, if tuned to a pitch, it would stay there over-night. 
 
 The other case never came to court. A city man had 
 loaned a farmer money, taking a mortgage on the stock and 
 fifteen tons of hay. Late the next spring hay had doubled 
 in value, and with the note unpaid the city man came up to 
 foreclose. He made a satisfied examination of the stock, 
 and then saw that the mow was empty. 
 
 "Where s the hay you put up as security? " 
 
 "Well I gawnteed to keep the stock in good condition, 
 and I fed em the hay." 
 
 We do not live on excitement. One or two men are mem 
 bers of city clubs, and are drawn periodically into the fever 
 ish and noisy life. Their example is not approved. As none 
 of us makes money, the fine art of living lies in saving what 
 we can. Pleasure is in making an old coat do another year, 
 not in buying a new one. There can be no real enjoyment 
 in paying club dues, smoking expensive cigars, drinking 
 costly drinks, when the wife, with intelligent care, saves ten 
 
OUR VILLAGE 129 
 
 cents a pound on coffee, and no one can tell the difference. 
 Nor do our club-men come back apparently benefited : how 
 ever gay and pleasant clubs may be within, a certain de 
 pression always accompanies the man home. 
 
 So, in our village, we do without everything the live, 
 active, accomplishing world regards as necessary. We read 
 Gibbon, eat light suppers, and go to bed early. But child 
 hood is still the great miracle with us; angels, we know, live 
 in our houses, and we look out upon a world of misery and 
 pain, grieving that our arms do not reach beyond the 
 village. 
 
THE SUBURB DE LUXE 
 
 EDWABD YEOMANS 
 
 AUTOMOBILES are streaming in from all sides to the sta 
 tion, and are engaged at the platform in their everlasting 
 business of disgorging well-dressed and highly polished men 
 and women for the nine o clock train. 
 
 Newspapers are selling fast. It is the beginning of an 
 other day, and a most auspicious beginning, because the 
 day begins in Toppington. If you can begin your day in 
 Toppington, you have begun it right; and if you can end it 
 there also, in a tuxedo, you can fill it up with anything, and 
 it must be a profitable day. 
 
 There is an air of glad well-being on the platform; shoes 
 have been polished in basements by the man who does the 
 shoes; clothes have been taken from closets full of very well- 
 pressed and very recent clothes; and breakfast has been of 
 the ritualistic sort with the crusts trimmed off the toast, 
 the cream particularly rich, the cantaloupes especially lus 
 cious, the coffee in extra large cups, the omelette scuffled. 
 
 The children have come in with the governess, made 
 their morning salutations, been kissed and jollied, and taken 
 their seats at a side table. There have been gracious re 
 marks and inquiries as to how everybody slept, and plans 
 hurriedly suggested for golf or other engagements in the 
 afternoon. 
 
 Everybody is very sure that this is the height of family 
 life, and that here the foundations of society are laid in the 
 concrete of good form. 
 
 The motor whirls up to the front door, and amid hurried 
 messages, kisses, and cigarette smoke, the males briskly 
 enter the shiny car and buzz away to the train. 
 
THE SUBURB DE LUXE 131 
 
 "Good morning, good morning; beautiful day! How is 
 Natalie this morning? Oh, so glad to know she is better. 
 And now you will be leaving soon for California. We go in 
 January, but to Florida. No, the links in Florida are in 
 ferior, but Kate demands that Gulf air and the early 
 tomatoes and strawberries." 
 
 "What do you think of Wilson s drool this morning? 
 Going to the smoker? Well, so long, old top." 
 
 Or "Hello, Joe back again, eh? How long at a time 
 do you pretend to live a serious life? You certainly are a 
 bum. Where were you? Well, French Lick s the only place 
 for you brokers. Did you see Jim there? He made a big 
 killing, I hear, and is fixed for life. Bully for him! And I 
 am especially glad for Helen and the kiddies, who have been 
 down to brass tacks lately only two servants, and Jim 
 fixing his own furnace and blacking his own boots." 
 
 Or from Harry, very highly dressed and very twitchy 
 and jerky about the head, with roving eyes and a flannel 
 mouth : " My dear boy, where the hell have you been? Oh, 
 you re the predatory rich, all right ! But see here, for God s 
 sake, what about that gas stock? Sh! Come here, man; 
 I m going to talk to you." 
 
 From a bright and natty lady: "Good morning, doctor. 
 I did so want to see you after church yesterday to thank 
 you for that beautiful sermon." 
 
 The doctor smiles, a smile as old as Toppington; a 
 smile that represents the worst that Toppington can do to a 
 man, and the doctor says: 
 
 "I had you in mind and that sweet family of yours. 
 How is Rosalie this morning? Give her my love; she s a 
 dear, dear child, and very close to all our hearts. 
 
 " No, my suggestion to the House Committee regarding 
 whiskey at the Golf Club w^as was well, I actually 
 think they resented it, and so, of course, I dropped the 
 
132 THE SUBURB DE LUXE 
 
 matter. For it is furthest from my desire to offend anyone 
 in this dear place. 
 
 "Is that Caroline? Dear me, did she really move to 
 Roseville? I have often wondered how her father and 
 mother survived that. And they do look older, don t you 
 think so? But Helen, Rose, and Catherine are a great com 
 fort. They are maintaining the fine old Toppington tradi 
 tion; they are very dear girls, very dear girls, very close to 
 all our hearts. 
 
 "Yes, I go in town Mondays, to look over our mission 
 parish. Really, I regret the fact that our Toppington peo 
 ple take so casual an interest in this beautiful charity. I am 
 sometimes afraid I do not quite f ulfil my obligation here by 
 pointing out a little more clearly the disparity between some 
 of my friends here and some of them there, as regards 
 income." 
 
 "Yes, but, doctor, nothing could be done about it, of 
 course; it is just one of those things, you know, that happen 
 to be so, don t you think?" 
 
 "Oh, yes, I know it; I think so; but those people are a 
 little too much forgotten, perhaps, and I frequently have 
 cause to think that they may remind us of their presence 
 some day in an embarrassing manner. Did you ever think 
 of that? And, you know, nothing is so embarrassing as to 
 be confronted with an importunate widow, for instance, 
 who kicks on the door and keeps screaming, * Justice ! 
 
 "But, my dear, I mustn t worry you with my doubts. 
 My best wishes for you always. Good-bye." 
 
 At that point the train grinds to a halt, with a resolute 
 expression of taking into New York a group of people who 
 add all the salt to that otherwise tasteless stew. Very im 
 portant gentlemen, saying very important things and think 
 ing priceless thoughts, take their seats and open their pa 
 pers; and even more important ladies on their way to 
 
THE SUBURB DE LUXE 133 
 
 Lord and Taylor s, or leaving for a little change in Lake- 
 wood or Asheville settle into places and talk about noth 
 ing with great animation. 
 
 Two men in spats and gloves, and with the "club-car" 
 faces of commerce, after looking over the paper, hurriedly 
 begin to discuss the situation. 
 
 "One would suppose, now the war is over and the neces 
 sity for improvements and extensions is very great, the 
 railroads would begin buying; but they don t seem to want 
 to begin, for some reason." 
 
 "Why, don t you see," says the other pink-faced wor 
 shiper of Baal, "it s this way: the railroads, and the other 
 interests too, for that matter, don t propose to do anything 
 to promote employment until the labor- world comes to its 
 senses on wages. They propose to show labor where it gets 
 off at." 
 
 "Well, that sounds reasonable to me. I only hope they 
 don t show us first. You know I sometimes say to my wife: 
 * Carrie, what would you do now if we busted higher than a 
 kite if we had to come to living on five thousand dollars 
 a year, say about a tenth of what it costs us now? 
 * Where would we live? she asks. 
 * Well, suppose we had to move to Newark or Jersey 
 City? 
 
 * Don t talk utter nonsense, she says, and be sure to 
 engage two staterooms on the Limited to Santa Barbara 
 for Friday, the twentieth. 
 
 "But I can t help thinking of folks in Petrograd these 
 days, who used to do about the same things we do but 
 are doing something very different now: standing hours in 
 line for black bread. Two staterooms to Santa Barbara on 
 the Limited!" 
 
 One of the wives in front, overhearing this outburst, 
 turns about and with a flashing eye says to her husband s 
 friend: 
 
134 THE SUBURB DE LUXE 
 
 "John is n t the sport he used to be, is he? What s the 
 matter with him, anyhow? I think it was that book by 
 Jane Addams about children and the city streets. I Ve had 
 a lot of trouble with him since that. Brace up, John; just 
 because you are virtuous, or dyspeptic, or senile, or some 
 thing, do you expect me to join the Christian Endeavor 
 Society?" 
 
 And so the conversation develops, indicating on the part 
 of the men a certain faint-hearted respect for history, in 
 spite of their repugnance for change; but revealing the 
 women as defiant, and unchastened by any least apprecia 
 tion of what is taking place in the world. 
 
 The entire package of humanity, done up in several dark- 
 green steel cars, is injected into New York and ejected from 
 New York daily. It stays long enough to move the little 
 levers that divert a great deal of the wealth earned by thou 
 sands of poor folks into the channels that irrigate Topping- 
 ton and sustain its beaming countenance. It is a nickel-m- 
 the-slot machine raised to its highest power. 
 
 In the club car forward, groups of absorbed gentlemen, 
 shrouded in tobacco smoke, play cards while the train rushes 
 through more and more inferior suburbs as it approaches 
 the city. They never look out of the windows. They might 
 get a hint from Greenwood Cemetery as it flies past, mak 
 ing hideous gestures with its obelisks and granite deformi 
 ties. They are polished people, operating in polished 
 grooves things outside have no interest and excite no 
 curiosity. A man from Roseville may meet a man from 
 Toppington on business, or through mutual friends; he may 
 get a word on that occasion; but it is the only occasion on 
 which he will.- Thereafter he will get the fishy eye or the 
 far-away gaze of the preoccupied man. 
 
 For Toppington is very much preoccupied; its engage 
 ments are imperative. It has an intense sense of its re- 
 
THE SUBURB DE LUXE 135 
 
 sponsibilitics. It is part of the two per cent who own sixty 
 per cent of the wealth of the country. Its idol is ability 
 ability to maintain about that proportion of ownership. It 
 is actually reptilian in its hissing anger against the oppo 
 nent of orthodoxy. It is capable, with complete compla 
 cency, of defeating every effort to make this war anything 
 but a frightful catastrophe with no actual moral value. It 
 is draped in all sorts of flowing sentimentalism; and be 
 neath that drapery is a hardness and selfishness beyond 
 belief. 
 
 It poisons its own children with the insidious sense of 
 caste of the low value of real work and the high value of 
 mental dexterity and sleight-of-hand. It produces mental 
 invalids full of the immorality of self-pity and the vulgarity 
 of parade. 
 
 If this war means anything, it means that the Topping- 
 tons of this country will be left by the tide, and will dry up, 
 like strangled jelly-fish, in the sun of a new adjustment that 
 will appraise people according to their actual contribution 
 to the wealth and welfare of the nation. 
 
SENTIMENTAL AMERICA 1 
 
 HENRY SEIDEL CANBY 
 
 THE Oriental may be inscrutable, but he is no more puz 
 zling than the average American. We admit that we are 
 hard, keen, practical, the adjectives that every casual 
 European applies to us, and yet any book-store window 
 or railway news-stand will show that we prefer sentimental 
 magazines and books. Why should a hard race if we are 
 hard read soft books? 
 
 By soft hooks, by sentimental books, I do not mean only 
 the kind of literature best described by the word "squashy." 
 I doubt whether we write or read more novels and short 
 stories of the tear-dripped or hyper-emotional variety than 
 other nations. Germany is or was full of such soft 
 stuff. It is highly popular in France, although the excellent 
 taste of French criticism keeps it in check. Italian popular 
 literature exudes sentiment; and the sale of "squashy" fic 
 tion in England is said to be threatened only by an occa 
 sional importation of an American "best-seller." W T e have 
 no bad eminence here. Sentimentalists with enlarged hearts 
 are international in habitat, although, it must be admitted, 
 especially popular in America. 
 
 When a critic, after a course in American novels and 
 magazines, declares that life, as it appears on the printed 
 page here, is fundamentally sentimentalized, he goes much 
 deeper than "mushiness" with his charge. He means, I 
 think, that there is an alarming tendency in American fic 
 tion to dodge the facts of life or to pervert them. He 
 means that in most popular books only red-blooded, 
 
 1 Reprinted by permission of, and arrangement with, Henry Seidel 
 Canby. 
 
SENTIMENTAL AMERICA 137 
 
 optimistic people are welcome. He means that material 
 success, physical soundness, and the gratification of the 
 emotions have the right of way. He means that men and 
 women (except the comic figures) shall be presented, not as 
 they are, but as we should like to have them, according to 
 a judgment tempered by nothing more searching than our 
 experience with an unusually comfortable, safe, and pros 
 perous mode of living. Everyone succeeds in American 
 plays and stories if not by good thinking, why then by 
 good looks or good luck. A curious society the research 
 student of a later date might make of it an upper world 
 of the colorless, successful, illustrated by chance-saved 
 collar advertisements and magazine covers; an under world 
 of grotesque scamps, clowns, and hyphenates drawn from 
 the comic supplement; and all red-blooded hero and 
 modern gargoyle alike always in good humor. 
 
 I am not touching in this picture merely to attack it. It 
 has been abundantly attacked ; what it needs is explanation. 
 For there is much in this bourgeois, good-humored Amer 
 ican literature of ours which rings true, which is as honest an 
 expression of our individuality as was the more austere 
 product of ante-bellum New England. If American senti 
 mentality does invite criticism, American sentiment de 
 serves defense. 
 
 Sentiment the response of the emotions to the appeal 
 of human nature is cheap, but so are many other good 
 things. The best of the ancients were rich in it. Homer s 
 chieftains wept easily. So did Shakespeare s heroes. Adam 
 and Eve shed "some natural tears" when they left the 
 Paradise which Milton imagined for them. A heart acces 
 sible to pathos, to natural beauty, to religion, was a chief 
 requisite for the protagonist of Victorian literature. Even 
 Becky Sharp was touched once by Amelia s moving 
 distress. 
 
138 SENTIMENTAL AMERICA 
 
 Americans, to be sure, do not weep easily; but if they 
 make equivalent responses to sentiment, that should not be 
 held against them. If we like "sweet" stories, or "strong " 
 which means emotional stories, our taste is not thereby 
 proved to be hopeless, or our national character bad. It 
 is better to be creatures of even sentimental sentiment, 
 with the author of " The Rosary," than to see the world only 
 as it is portrayed by the pens of Bernard Shaw and Anatole 
 France. The first is deplorable; the second is dangerous. I 
 should deeply regret the day when a simple story of honest 
 American manhood winning a million and a sparkling, 
 piquant sweetheart lost all power to lull my critical faculty 
 and warm my heart. I doubt whether any literature has 
 ever had too much of honest sentiment. 
 
 Good Heavens! Because some among us insist that the 
 mystic rose of the emotions shall be painted a brighter pink 
 than nature allows, are the rest to forego glamour? Or 
 because, to view the matter differently, psychology has 
 shown what happens in the brain when a man falls in love, 
 and anthropology has traced marriage to a care for prop 
 erty rights, are we to suspect the idyllic in literature wher 
 ever we find it? Life is full of the idyllic; and no anthropolo 
 gist will ever persuade the reasonably romantic youth that 
 the sweet and chivalrous passion which leads him to mingle 
 reverence with desire for the object of his affections, is 
 nothing but an idealized property sense. Origins explain 
 very little, after all. The bilious critics of sentiment in lit 
 erature have not even honest science behind them. 
 
 I have no quarrel with traffickers in simple emotion 
 with such writers as James Lane Allen and James Whit- 
 comb Riley, for example. But the average American is not 
 content with such sentiment as theirs. He wants a more 
 intoxicating brew to be persuaded that, once you step 
 beyond your own experience, feeling rules the world. He 
 
SENTIMENTAL AMERICA 139 
 
 wants I judge by what he reads to make sentiment at 
 least ninety per cent efficient, even if a dream-America, 
 superficially resemblant to the real, but far different in tone, 
 must be created by the obedient writer in order to satisfy 
 him. His sentiment has frequently to be sentimentalized 
 before he will pay for it. And to this fault, which he shares 
 with other modern races, he adds the other heinous sin of 
 sentimentalism, the refusal to face the facts. 
 
 This sentimentalizing of reality to invent a term is 
 far more dangerous than the romantic sentimentalizing of 
 the "squashy" variety. It is to be found in sex-stories, 
 which carefully observe decency of word and deed, where 
 the conclusion is always in accord with conventional moral 
 ity, yet whose characters are clearly immoral, indecent, and 
 would so display themselves if the tale were truly told. It is 
 to be found in stories of "big business," where trickery and 
 rascality are made virtuous at the end by sentimental bap 
 tism. If I choose for the hero of my novel a director in an 
 American trust; if I make him an accomplice in certain acts 
 of ruthless economic tyranny; if I make it clear that at first 
 he is merely subservient to a stronger will, and that the acts 
 he approves are in complete disaccord with his private 
 moral code why then, if the facts should be dragged to 
 the light, if he is made to realize the exact nature of his 
 career, how can I end my story? It is evident that my hero 
 possesses little insight and less firmness of character. He is 
 not a hero ; he is merely a tool. In, let us say, eight cases out 
 of ten, his curve is already plotted. It leads downward 
 not necessarily along the villain s path, but toward moral 
 insignificance. 
 
 And yet, I cannot end my story that way for Americans. 
 There must be a grand moral revolt. There must be resist 
 ance, triumph, and not only spiritual, but also financial re 
 covery. And this, likewise, is sentimentality. Even Booth 
 
140 SENTIMENTAL AMERICA 
 
 Tarkington, in his excellent "Turmoil," had to dodge the 
 logical issue of his story; had to make his hero exchange a 
 practical literary idealism for a very impractical, even 
 though a commercial, utopianism, in order to emerge ap 
 parently successful at the end of the book. A story such as 
 the Danish Nexo s "Pelle the Conqueror," where pathos 
 and the idyllic, each intense, each beautiful, are made con 
 vincing by an undeviating truth to experience, would seem 
 to be almost impossible of production just now in America. 
 
 It is not enough to rail at this false fiction. The chief 
 duty of criticism is to explain. The best corrective of bad 
 writing is a knowledge of why it is bad. We get the fiction 
 we deserve, precisely as we get the government we deserve 
 or perhaps, in each case, a little better. Why are we 
 sentimental? When that question is answered, it is eas 
 ier to understand the defects and the virtues of American 
 fiction. And the answer lies in the traditional American 
 philosophy of life. 
 
 To say that the American is an idealist, is to commit a 
 thoroughgoing platitude. Like most platitudes, the state 
 ment is annoying because, from one point of view, it is in 
 disputably just, while from another it does not seem to fit 
 the facts. With regard to our tradition, it is indisputable. 
 Of the immigrants who since the seventeenth century have 
 been pouring into this continent, a portion large in number, 
 larger still in influence, has been possessed of motives which, 
 in part at least, were idealistic. If it was not the desire for 
 religious freedom that urged them, it was the desire for 
 personal freedom; if not political liberty, why then eco 
 nomic liberty (for this too is idealism), and the opportunity 
 to raise the standard of life. And of course all these motives 
 were strongest in that earlier immigration which has done 
 most to fix the state of mind and body which we call being 
 American. I need not labor the argument. Our political 
 
SENTIMENTAL AMERICA 141 
 
 and social history supports it; our best literature demon 
 strates it; for no men have been more idealistic than the 
 American writers whom we have consented to call great. 
 Emerson, Thoreau, Hawthorne, Whitman was idealism 
 ever more thoroughly incarnate than in them? 
 
 And this idealism to risk again a platitude has been 
 in the air of America. It has permeated our religious sects, 
 and created several of them. It has given tone to our think 
 ing, and even more to our feeling. I do not say that it has 
 always, or even usually, determined our actions, although 
 the Civil War is proof of its power. Again and again it has 
 gone aground roughly when the ideal met a condition of liv 
 ing a fact that will provide the explanation for which I 
 seek. But optimism, "boosting," muck-raking (not all of 
 its manifestations are pretty), social service, religious, muni 
 cipal, democratic reform, indeed the "uplift" generally, is 
 evidence of the vigor, the bumptiousness of the inherited 
 American tendency to pursue the ideal. No one can doubt 
 that in this generation we believe, at least, in idealism. 
 
 Nevertheless, so far as the average individual is con 
 cerned, with just his share and no more of the race- 
 tendency, this idealism has been suppressed, and in some 
 measure perverted. It is this which explains, I think, Amer 
 ican sentimentalism. 
 
 Consider, for example, the ethics of conventional Amer 
 ican society. The American ethical tradition is perfectly 
 definite and tremendously powerful. It belongs, further 
 more, to a population far larger than the "old American" 
 stock, for it has been laboriously inculcated in our schools 
 and churches, and impressively driven home by newspaper, 
 magazine, and book. I shall not presume to analyze it save 
 where it touches literature. There it maintains a definite 
 attitude toward all sex-problems: the Victorian, which is 
 not necessarily, or even probably, a bad one. Man should 
 
142 SENTIMENTAL AMERICA 
 
 be chaste, and proud of his chastity. Woman must be so. 
 It is the ethical duty of the American to hate, or at least to 
 despise, all deviations, and to pretend for the greater 
 prestige of the law that such sinning is exceptional, at 
 least in America. And this is the public morality he believes 
 in, whatever may be his private experience in actual living. 
 In business, it is the ethical tradition of the American, in 
 herited from a rigorous Protestant morality, to be square, 
 to play the game without trickery, to fight hard but never 
 meanly. Over-reaching is justifiable when the other fellow 
 has equal opportunities to be "smart"; lying, tyranny 
 never. And though the opposites of all these laudable prac 
 tices come to pass, he must frown on them in public, deny 
 their Tightness even to the last cock-crow especially in 
 the public press. 
 
 American political history is a long record of idealistic 
 tendencies toward democracy, working painfully through a 
 net of graft, pettiness, sectionalism, and bravado, with con 
 stant disappointment for the idealist who believes, tradi 
 tionally, in the intelligence of the crowd. American social 
 history is a glaring instance of how the theory of equal dig 
 nity for all men can entangle itself with caste distinctions, 
 snobbery, and the power of wealth. American economic 
 history betrays the pioneer helping to kick down the ladder 
 that he himself had raised toward equal opportunity for 
 all. American literary history especially contemporary 
 literary history reflects the result of all this for the 
 American mind. The sentimental in our literature is a 
 direct consequence. 
 
 The disease is easily acquired. Mr. Smith, a broker, finds 
 himself in an environment of "schemes" and "deals" in 
 which the quality of mercy is strained, and the wind is de 
 cidedly not tempered to the shorn lamb. After all, business 
 is business. He shrugs his shoulders and takes his part. 
 
SENTIMENTAL AMERICA 143 
 
 But his unexpended fund of native idealism if, as is most 
 probable, he has his share seeks its due satisfaction. He 
 cannot use it in business; so he takes it out in a novel or a 
 play where, quite contrary to his observed experience, ordi 
 nary people like himself act nobly, with a success that is 
 all the more agreeable for being unexpected. His wife, a 
 woman with strange stirrings about her heart, with motions 
 toward beauty, and desires for a significant life and rich, 
 satisfying experience, exists in day-long pettiness, gossips, 
 frivols, scolds, w r ith money enough to do what she pleases, 
 and nothing vital to do. She also relieves her pent-up ideal 
 ism in plays or books in high-wrought, "strong" novels, 
 not in adventures in society such as the kitchen admires, 
 but in stories w r ith violent moral and emotional crises, 
 whose characters, no matter how unlifelike, have "strong" 
 thoughts, and make vital decisions; succeed or fail signifi 
 cantly. Her brother, the head of a wholesale dry-goods 
 firm, listens to the stories the drummers bring home of night 
 life on the road, laughs, says to himself regretfully that the 
 world has to be like that; and then, in logical reaction, de 
 mands purity and nothing but aggressive purity in the 
 books of the public library. 
 
 The hard man goes in for philanthropy (never before so 
 frequently as in America); the one-time "boss" takes to 
 picture-collecting; the railroad wrecker gathers rare edi 
 tions of the Bible; and tens of thousands of humbler Amer 
 icans carry their inherited idealism into the necessarily 
 sordid experiences of life in an imperfectly organized 
 country, suppress it for fear of being thought "cranky" or 
 "soft," and then, in their imagination and all that feeds 
 their imagination, give it vent. You may watch the process 
 any evening at the movies or the melodrama, on the trolley- 
 car or in the easy chair at home. 
 
 This philosophy of living, which I have called American 
 
144 SENTIMENTAL AMERICA 
 
 idealism, is in its own nature sound, as is proved in a hun 
 dred directions where it has had full play. Suppressed 
 idealism, like any other suppressed desire, becomes un 
 sound. One does not have to follow Freud and his school 
 into their sex-pathology in order to believe that. And here 
 lies the ultimate cause of the taste for sentimentalism in the 
 American bourgeoisie. An undue insistence upon happy 
 endings, regardless of the premises of the story, and a crav 
 ing for optimism everywhere, anyhow, are sure signs of a 
 "morbid complex," and to be compared with some justice 
 to the craving for drugs in a " dry " town. We must look for 
 psychological as well as economic and geographical causes 
 for mental peculiarities exhibiting themselves in literature. 
 No one can doubt the effect of the suppression by the Puri 
 tan discipline of that instinctive love of pleasure and lib 
 eral experience common to us all. Its unhealthy reaction is 
 visible in every old American community. No one who faces 
 the facts can deny the result of the suppression by commer 
 cial, bourgeois, prosperous America of our native idealism. 
 The student of society may find its dire effects in politics, in 
 religion, and in social intercourse. The critic cannot over 
 look them in literature; for it is in the realm of the imagina 
 tion that idealism, direct or perverted, does its best or its 
 worst. 
 
 Sentiment is not perverted idealism. Sentiment is ideal 
 ism of a mild and not too masculine variety. If it has sins, 
 they are sins of omission, not commission. Our fondness 
 for sentiment proves that our idealism, if a little loose in the 
 waist-band and puffy in the cheeks, is still hearty, still cap 
 able of active mobilization, like those comfortable French 
 husbands whose plump and smiling faces, careless of glory, 
 careless of everything but thrift and good living, are never 
 theless figured on a page whose superscription reads, " Dead 
 on the field of honor." 
 
SENTIMENTAL AMERICA 145 
 
 The novels, the plays, the short stories, of sentiment may 
 prefer sweetness, perhaps, to truth, the feminine to the 
 masculine virtues, but we waste ammunition in attacking 
 them. There never was, I suppose, a great literature of 
 sentiment, for not even the " Sentimental Journey "is truly 
 great. But no one can make a diet exclusively of "noble" 
 literature; the charming has its own cosy corner across from 
 the tragic (and a much bigger corner at that). Our un 
 counted amorists of tail-piece song and illustrated story 
 provide the readiest means of escape from the somewhat 
 uninspiring life that most men and women are living just 
 now in America. 
 
 The sentimental, however, whether because of an 
 excess of sentiment softening into "slush," or of a morbid 
 optimism, or of a weak-eyed distortion of the facts of life, 
 is perverted. It needs to be cured, and its cure is more 
 truth. But this cure, I very much fear, is not entirely, or 
 even chiefly, in the power of the "regular practitioner," the 
 honest writer. He can be honest; but if he is much more 
 honest than his readers, they will not read him. As Profes 
 sor Lounsbury once said, a language grows corrupt only 
 when its speakers grow corrupt, and mends, strengthens, 
 and becomes pure with the m. So with literature. We shall 
 have less sentimentality in American literature when our 
 accumulated store of idealism disappears in a laxer genera 
 tion; or when it finds due vent in a more responsible, less 
 narrow, less monotonously prosperous life than is lived by 
 the average reader of fiction in America. I would rather see 
 our literary taste damned forever than have the first alter 
 native become as it has not yet a fact. The second, in 
 the years of w r orld-war, we placed, unwillingly, perhaps un 
 consciously, upon the knees of the gods. 
 
 All this must not be taken in too absolute a sense. There 
 are medicines, and good ones, in the hands of writers and of 
 
146 SENTIMENTAL AMERICA 
 
 critics, to abate, if not to heal, this plague of sentiment alism. 
 I have stated ultimate causes only. They are enough to 
 keep the mass of Americans reading sentimentalized fiction 
 until some fundamental change has come, not strong enough 
 to hold back the van of American writing, which is steadily 
 moving toward restraint, sanity, and truth. Every honest 
 composition is a step forward in the cause; and every 
 clear-minded criticism. 
 
 But one must doubt the efficacy, and one must doubt the 
 healthiness, of reaction into cynicism and sophisticated 
 cleverness. There are curious signs, especially in what we 
 may call the literature of New York, of a growing sophis 
 tication that sneers at sentiment and the sentimental alike. 
 "Magazines of cleverness" have this for their keynote, 
 although as yet the satire is not always well aimed. There 
 are abundant signs that the generation just coming for 
 ward will rejoice in such a pose. It is observable now in 
 the colleges, where the young literati turn up their noses 
 at everything American, magazines, best-sellers, or one- 
 hundred-night plays, and resort for inspiration to the 
 English school of anti- Victorians : to Schnitzler with his 
 brilliant Viennese cynicism; less commonly, because he is 
 more subtle, to Anatole France. Their pose is not altogether 
 to be blamed, and the men to whom they resort are mod 
 els of much that is admirable; but there is little promise 
 for American literature in exotic imitation. To see our 
 selves prevailingly as others see us may be good for mod 
 esty, but does not lead to a self-confident native art. And 
 it is a dangerous way for Americans to travel. We cannot 
 afford such sophistication yet. The English wits experi 
 mented with cynicism: in the court of Charles II, laughed 
 at blundering Puritan morality, laughed at country man 
 ners, and were whiffed away because the ideals they laughed 
 at were better than their own. Idealism is not funny, 
 
SENTIMENTAL AMERICA 147 
 
 however censurable its excesses. As a race we have too 
 much sentiment to be frightened out of the sentimental 
 by a blase cynicism. 
 
 At first glance the flood of moral literature now upon us 
 social-conscience stories, scientific plays, platitudinous 
 "moralities " that tell us how to live may seem to be an 
 other protest against sentimentalism. And that the French 
 and English examples have been so warmly welcomed here 
 may seem another indication of a reaction on our part. I 
 refer especially to those "hard" stories, full of vengeful 
 wrath, full of warnings for the race that dodges the facts of 
 life. H. G. Wells is the great exemplar, with his sociological 
 studies wrapped in description and tied with a plot. In a 
 sense, such stories are certainly to be regarded as a protest 
 against truth-dodging, against cheap optimism, against 
 " slacking, * whether in literature or in life. But it would be 
 equally just to call them another result of suppressed ideal 
 ism, and to regard their popularity in America as proof of 
 the argument which I have advanced in this essay. Exces 
 sively didactic literature is often a little unhealthy. In 
 fresh periods, when life runs strong and both ideals and 
 passions find ready issue into life, literature has no burden 
 some moral to carry. It digests its moral. Homer digested 
 his morals. They transfuse his epics. So did Shakespeare. 
 His world is predominantly moral; but his stories are not 
 forged into machines contrived to hammer home neglected 
 truth. 
 
 Not so with the writers of the social-conscience school. 
 They are in a rage over wicked, wasteful man. Their novels 
 are bursted notebooks sometimes neat and orderly note 
 books, like Mr. Galsworthy s or our own Ernest Poole s, 
 sometimes haphazard ones, like those of Mr. Wells, but al 
 ways explosive with reform. These gentlemen know very 
 well what they are about, especially Mr. Wells, the lesser 
 
148 SENTIMENTAL AMERICA 
 
 artist, perhaps, as compared with Galsworthy, but the 
 shrewder and possibly the greater man. The very senti 
 mentalists, who go to novels to exercise the idealism that 
 they cannot use in life, will read these unsentimental sto 
 ries, although their lazy impulses would never spur them on 
 toward any truth not sweetened by a tale. 
 
 And yet, one feels that the social attack might have been 
 more convincing if free from its compulsory service to fic 
 tion; that these novels and plays might have been better 
 literature if the authors did not study life in order that they 
 might be better able to preach. Wells and Galsworthy also 
 have suffered from suppressed idealism, although it would 
 be unfair to say that perversion was the result. So have our 
 muck-rakers, who, very characteristically, exhibit the dis 
 order in a more complex and a much more serious form, 
 since to a distortion of facts they have often enough added 
 hypocrisy and commercialism. It is part of the price we pay 
 for being sentimental. 
 
 The American sentimentalists, two million readers strong, 
 are intrenched behind ramparts of indifference, which no 
 shrapnel fire of criticism or countermine of honest writing 
 can ever destroy. We can take a trench or two, blow up 
 some particularly obnoxious citadel, and trouble their secu 
 rity by exploding bombs of truth; but defeat must come 
 finally from within their own lines. 
 
 If I am correct in my analysis, we are suffering here in 
 America, not from a plague of bad taste merely, nor only 
 from a lack of real education among our myriads of readers, 
 nor from decadence least of all, this last. It is a disease 
 of our own particular virtue which has infected us ideal 
 ism, suppressed and perverted. A less commercial, more 
 responsible America, perhaps a less prosperous and more 
 spiritual America, will hold fast to its sentiment, but be 
 weaned from its sentimentality. 
 
A CRITICISM OF TWO-PARTY POLITICS 
 
 J. N. LARNED 
 
 AMERICANS have taken from Englishmen the opinion 
 that two political parties, in contention for the power to 
 make and administer law in a representative democracy, 
 produce conditions that yield a better average of govern 
 ment than can be got from the strifes and differences of 
 more numerous parties, with none among them able to com 
 mand a majority of the popular vote. 
 
 For this conclusion the English have one important rea 
 son which loses weight in American thought. Their form of 
 popular government is an evolutionary product of two- 
 party conditions. It took its shaping from the fact that two 
 political parties had been alternating in the control of the 
 British House of Commons for a long period prior to the 
 practical withdrawal of administrative prerogatives from 
 the Crown by that House. This has been the fact, indeed, 
 since English parties of a strictly political character began 
 to exist; and it gave apparent assurance that a responsible 
 ministerial administration of government erected on the 
 support of a majority in the Commons would be unlikely 
 ever to lack that majority, from one or the other party, for 
 its base. It was an assurance that held good for about a 
 century and a half. Latterly it has been weakened, and 
 possibly it has expired, since British ministries have had to 
 obtain their executive commission from a coalition of par 
 ties quite frequently in recent years. 
 
 In this country the conditions are very different. The 
 architects of its government, not attempting, like the Eng 
 lish, to join the facts and forces of a republican system to 
 
150 TWO-PARTY POLITICS 
 
 the theory and forms of an hereditary monarchy, discarded 
 the latter, creating in its place a distinct and independent 
 executive authority, which passes from person to person at 
 fixed times, and which issues from the people directly. By 
 this, and by further provisions in our Federal Constitution 
 relating to the election and succession of our presidents and 
 vice-presidents, the continuity of executive authority in our 
 government is made secure. No dead-lock of factions in 
 Congress can cast doubt on the constitutional authority of 
 the President to administer existing law, by depriving him 
 of a supporting majority in either House, or in both; but a 
 British ministry in the same situation would exercise a 
 questionable and much weakened authority, though it 
 acted under the commands of the king. Factious divisions 
 may paralyze legislation as mischievously in Congress as in 
 Parliament; but such paralysis cannot affect administrative 
 government in the United States, as it may affect that side 
 of British government in some conceivable situations. 
 
 The most important of English considerations in favor of 
 two-party politics has, therefore, no weight for us. What 
 others do we find to persuade us, as most of us seem to be 
 persuaded, that a melee of parties, in the French and Ger 
 man manner of politics, would bring evils on us, which we 
 must take care to avoid by keeping ourselves marshaled as 
 entirely as possible in two great opposing hosts? We have 
 had long experience of the bipartite organization of politics 
 and its mighty dueling; and, in late years especially, we 
 have been attentive observers of the more scrimmaging 
 style of political warfare in other countries. We ought to be 
 well prepared to draw evidence from both and weigh it in a 
 fair-minded way. The present writing is an attempt and an 
 invitation to treat the question thus, and learn perhaps in 
 doing so how important it is. 
 
 One fact which stands indisputably to the credit of a bi- 
 
A CRITICISM 151 
 
 sected partisanship in politics is this : the whole business of 
 government is simplified and made easier for those who con 
 duct it, when all differences in the popular will, which they 
 are expected to execute, are so nearly gathered up by two 
 agencies of organization that one or the other of these must 
 be able to confer full authority at any given time. It is 
 needless to say that the ministry which takes such authority 
 from a single dominant party has every advantage, of 
 assured tenure, of defined policy, of confident and cour 
 ageous feeling, over any ministry which acts in depen 
 dence on some precarious combination of separately power 
 less political groups. It has a distinctly mapped course to 
 pursue. Its measures are substantially fore-planned for it. 
 It knows what to expect, of support and opposition alike, 
 and its measures are furthered almost as much by the con 
 centred organization of antagonisms as by their support. 
 These conditions are plainly the most favorable to an easy 
 and effective working of the apparatus of government; and 
 this fact is decisive of the question, no doubt, in the judg 
 ment of most people who take a practical part in political 
 affairs. 
 
 Such a judgment, however, surely rests on inadequate 
 grounds. Something more than ease and effectiveness in the 
 working of government demands to be taken into account . 
 The quality of the result has a prior claim to consideration ; 
 and results accomplished with least difficulty and most fa 
 cility are quite likely to be not the best. For this reason I 
 suspect that the school of practical "politics " does not give 
 the right training in judgment for a right decision of this 
 question of parties in government; and I fear that prevail 
 ing views on the question have come mainly from that 
 school. 
 
 It may be said that the assured support in measures of 
 government, the confident feeling, the definite programme, 
 
152 TWO-PARTY POLITICS 
 
 are conducive to deliberate and judicious action, as well as 
 to ease and facility in it which is true in theory, and 
 ought to be true always in fact; but the same conditions are 
 contributory also to influences on political action which 
 work powerfully against its fidelity of service to the public 
 good. Many motives, both noble and base, from the purest 
 in altruism to the meanest in selfishness, may inspire the 
 ambition for political authority and power; but it is cer 
 tain that the lower promptings are more energetic than the 
 higher, and prick men on to more arduous striving for the 
 coveted prize. In our American political experience there 
 has been no fact more glaringly manifested than this, unless 
 it is the fact that our two-party system is stimulating and 
 helpful to the sordid political ambitions and discouraging 
 to the nobler aims. 
 
 A common phrase in our political talk and writing ex 
 plains why this is so. One or the other of our two contend 
 ing parties is always subject to description as " the party in 
 power." The power of government is always the power of a 
 party, shifted to and fro between the two organizations of 
 political rivalry as the prize of a lottery, which has its 
 annual, biennial, and quadrennial drawings at the polls. 
 For a given term, the one party or the other ordinarily re 
 ceives complete possession of that tremendous power, to 
 the utmost of its range. It is power to make and administer 
 law, to levy, collect, and expend public revenues, to under 
 take and carry on public works, to hold the stewardship of 
 public property, to grant public franchises, to fill public 
 offices, to distribute public employments to be, in fact, 
 for a given term, the public of cities, of states, and of the 
 great nation, in all the handling of their stupendous cor 
 porate affairs. To obtain a realizing conception of the im 
 mensity of power which this involves, and of the diabolical 
 temptations and invitations it offers, not only to conscious 
 
A CRITICISM 153 
 
 dishonesty, but to selfishness in all forms, is to know why 
 our politics are corrupted as they are. 
 
 By giving these awful masses of corrupting opportunity 
 always into the possession of one or the other of two party 
 organizations, we draw what is corrupt and corruptible in 
 the country into almost irresistible leagues for the control 
 ling of both. Men of one sort are induced to devote their 
 lives to the practice of the arts of political engineering which 
 have produced the "machine * organization of party and 
 brought it to a marvelous perfection. Men of another sort 
 are made willing to be cogged wheels in the machine, some 
 as congressmen, some as state legislators, some as aldermen, 
 some as executive officials, but all, on their appointed axes, 
 going round and round in obedient responsiveness to the 
 hand which turns the mandatory crank, making law, en 
 forcing law, or stifling law, as the "boss" commands. 
 
 The construction, the maintenance, and the operation of 
 the machine are attended by heavy cost; and this brings a 
 third order of men into the wide circle of corruption which 
 it spreads. These are its patrons the liberal subscribers 
 for such profitable products, of legislation from one hopper, 
 of chloroformed law from another, and of public jobs from 
 a third, as it is prepared to turn out on demand. They 
 finance the expensive "plants" of the two parties, with all 
 their advertising shows and stage-plays for the captivation 
 of weak-minded voters, and they receive in return friendly 
 statutes and tariffs, and public franchises and contracts, 
 and official connivances and negligences, which accomplish 
 public pocket-picking on the biggest conceivable scale. The 
 total result is a state of rottenness in American politics 
 which has become a stench in the nostrils of the world. 
 
 If our two parties represented a natural bisection of politi 
 cal opinion in the country, such effects might seem curable; 
 but they do so no longer, although there was that sponta- 
 
154 TWO-PARTY POLITICS 
 
 neous cleavage in their origin, both in England and with us. 
 Parties in English politics had their rise in the struggle be 
 tween a disfranchised class and a ruling class, and that was 
 fought to its practical finish forty years ago. In OUT own 
 case, when the Federal Union took form, a single wide cleft 
 in political public opinion was opened by the conflict be 
 tween national and provincial trends of feeling, producing 
 the Federal and Anti-Federal parties of early American pol 
 itics. In the next generation that contention between 
 nationalizing policies and provincial exaggerations of "state 
 rights " ran into and was reinforced by the sectional slavery 
 question, prolonging and embittering the duel of parties 
 until it culminated in the sectional Civil War. Both of the 
 questions at issue having then been settled by a judgment 
 beyond appeal, a decade or so sufficed for the practical 
 clearing from our politics of all that was residual from the 
 old state of things, and we entered on new conditions, which 
 brought new problems and new diversities of mind into our 
 political life. 
 
 There has been nothing of conflict since, in actual belief 
 or opinion, that could carry forward the old division of par 
 ties on one continuous line, as it has been carried to the pres 
 ent day. On the first large general question that arose, 
 which was the question of the monetary standard, the 
 "silver question," there was so little intellectual sincer 
 ity in the final championship of the gold standard by the 
 party which carried it into law, that the stand of that party 
 on the question was in doubt almost till the opening of the 
 decisive campaign of 1896. On each side of the question 
 there was a considerable body of genuine opinion; but 
 neither side of that opinion was coincident with either side 
 of the old two-party division of voters in the nation. Both 
 of the old parties were ruptured temporarily by the new 
 issue, which carried a few companies of recalcitrant Demo- 
 
A CRITICISM 155 
 
 crats into independent revolt or into the Republican ranks, 
 and vice versa; but the greater mass of the combatants in 
 that fight had the banner that they fought under deter 
 mined for them, primarily by the cold tactical calculations 
 of party leaders, and finally by the sweep of that blind par 
 tisan spirit that unreasoning vis inertia? of human tem 
 per which keeps men running, like other animals, in herds. 
 
 It must be remembered that what we mean when we 
 speak of the "party spirit" has no reference to any motive 
 that is inspired by an object a belief, a social interest, a 
 social right or a social wrong which a party may be 
 formed to promote or resist, but is the fanatic devotion 
 which seems to be so easily diverted to the party itself, as 
 an object of attachment distinct from its instrumental use. 
 There have been times and occasions when this motiveless 
 zealotry had a naked exhibition, divested of everything in 
 the nature of a rational cause originating, even, in no 
 more than a color or a name. A famous instance is that of 
 the factions of the Roman circus, which Gibbon describes 
 in the fortieth chapter of the "Decline and Fall." Rightly 
 considered, the lesson to be taken from the story of those 
 factions, which arose in connection with the colors (white, 
 red, green, and blue) of the liveries worn by drivers in the 
 Roman chariot-races, is one of the most important that 
 history affords. 
 
 In the party spirit which made that exhibition (and other 
 exhibitions hardly less puerile and revolting, in other times 
 and places) the fundamental quality is the senselessness, 
 the objectless inanity, of the association that inspired it. 
 That, in fact, is what constitutes a party spirit, whenever 
 and however it becomes generated in a party, with no in 
 spiration from a cause that the party is made use of to sup 
 port. Acting, as it does, with the weight and momentum of 
 a mass of people, and with utter unreason, this motiveless 
 
156 TWO-PARTY POLITICS 
 
 zealotry is the most mischievous of all the mischief -makings 
 that have come from empty or idle human brains. Its 
 malign influence in history has actually been unequaled by 
 any other. More or less it has perverted all human associa 
 tion, especially in those spheres of it which passion can most 
 easily invade. Its worst workings have not been in politics, 
 but in the religious organizations of the world. It may be 
 doubtful whether religious or political divisions have been 
 most creative of this senseless party spirit, which perverts 
 the rational uses of party; but it is certain that religious 
 contentions have enraged it most, and produced the most 
 revolting examples of its malignant power. By an easy 
 degradation, the religious spirit has always been prone to 
 lapse into partisanship, and then religious and political 
 partisanships have sought unions that begot a demonism in 
 humanity, which reveled in savage tyrannies and horrible 
 wars. 
 
 Those fiendishly passionate developments of the party 
 spirit belong, perhaps, to the past, and illustrate a danger 
 that cannot seem imminent at the present day. We may 
 reasonably hope that our social growth has left them behind. 
 But no human disposition so insensate can be tolerated and 
 cultivated, as this continues to be, without immense mis 
 chiefs of some nature to the race. If mischiefs from its 
 primitive violence are disappearing, the very narcotizing of 
 it has produced equally bad, if not worse, ones of paralysis, 
 to replace them. Now it is threatening, not to our social 
 peace, but to the vital energies in our social life. So far as a 
 sectarian party spirit enters the churches, it deadens the 
 religious spirit; and so far as a political organization is held 
 together and actuated by something else in the feeling of its 
 members than an earnestness of opinion on questions of the 
 public good, it is infected with a party spirit that is sure 
 death to the public spirit on which democracies depend as 
 
A CRITICISM 157 
 
 the breath of their life. Who can doubt that such an infec 
 tion is rank in both of the alternative parties that control 
 American politics to-day? Look at the facts of their history 
 since the close of the Civil War! 
 
 One of these two parties came out of that war much in 
 jured in credit and character; the other with an immense 
 prestige. W T hile the war lasted, the supporting of the gov 
 ernment was a duty so imperious to large majorities of the 
 people, that it forbade any obstinacy of opposition to 
 measures taken in the conduct of the war. By this cause the 
 Republican Party, having control of the government, ac 
 quired a great number of adherents who agreed in little but 
 their common determination to keep the Union intact, 
 with no concession to the doctrines that had set secession 
 and rebellion afoot. By the same cause the Democratic 
 party, in critical opposition to the government, drew into 
 its membership every shade of opinion that was weaker in 
 Unionism or sympathetic with the secessionist attack. 
 
 Many Republicans of that period were intensely opposed 
 to the greenback issue of legal-tender paper money, which 
 eased the financing of the war and doubled its cost, while 
 enriching a few by inflated prices and distressing the many. 
 Other Republicans were forced to grit their teeth with 
 anxiety and anger as they watched the tariff-making of the 
 war years, and saw pilfering protective duties stealing in 
 under cover of the great revenue needs of the time, and the 
 industries of the country being captured by monopolists, 
 who have fattened on them ever since. In the last year of 
 the war, when reconstruction questions were rising, a prob 
 able majority in the Republican party was with President 
 Lincoln in opinions opposed to the entire immediate in 
 corporation of the whole body of recent slaves in the voting 
 constituency of the states to be reconstructed. On all these 
 points of public policy, especially on the latter, there were 
 
158 TWO-PARTY POLITICS 
 
 thousands in the Democratic Party who held precisely the 
 same views. The ending of the war raised these matters at 
 once to an importance above everything else in national 
 affairs, and every rational consideration in politics made 
 attention to the treatment of them the foremost duty of the 
 time. 
 
 Why, then, were not agreeing citizens brought together, 
 from what had been the Republican Party and the Demo 
 cratic Party, to form new combinations for dealing with the 
 issues of the new situation the questions of reconstruc 
 tion, of protective duties, and of money? A simply rational 
 and natural instinct in politics would have drawn voters 
 who had real opinions into such combinations, in order to 
 represent themselves effectively in Congress on one or more 
 of the issues that appealed to them most strongly; and the 
 result would undoubtedly have saved the country from two 
 decades or more of drifting, blundering, unrighteous legis 
 lation, which enriched a class at the expense of the mass and 
 demoralized American life in a hundred ways. What pre 
 vented, of course, was the bondage of the Anglo-American 
 mind to the inherited two-party idea of practical politics, 
 and the antagonism of party spirit, which that idea pro 
 motes and excites. Even the few Republicans and Demo 
 crats who broke away from their respective parties, to do 
 battle for Lincoln s reconstruction policy, or for sound 
 money, or against protective tariffism, even those few 
 made their fight as guerrillas, " mug- wumps," independents, 
 and attempted no party organization. The general body 
 of their fellow believers stayed with the old banners, expos 
 tulating loudly from time to time against the roadways of 
 their march, and suffering a succession of disgusts as they 
 arrived at such achievements as carpet-bag government in 
 the Southern States, Bland and Sherman silver bills, Mc- 
 Kinley and Dingley tariffs, and the like. And still, to this 
 
A CRITICISM 159 
 
 day, the columns of our two-party campaigning are sub 
 stantially unbroken, and men who agree in opinion on the 
 greater matters of public concern are facing one another in 
 antagonistic organizations, instead of standing shoulder to 
 shoulder for some effective promotion of their beliefs. 
 
 Of course, no effective expression of public opinion on any 
 question of public policy, or any principle of right, is possi 
 ble under conditions like these; and what must be the effect 
 on the political attitude of the citizen-mind, on its 
 thoughtful interest in public questions, and on the intelli 
 gent sincerity of action inspired by it, when the expres 
 sion of political opinion is so hampered or suppressed? Un 
 questionably the effect has been, and is increasingly, to 
 deaden public opinion as a political force, and to engender 
 the senseless party spirit in its place. 
 
 In the presidential election of 1908, the pronouncements 
 of purpose and promised policy by the two chief parties, on 
 all questions brought forward in the canvass, were substan 
 tially and practically the same. On the regulation of inter 
 state railway traffic and of so-called trusts; on tariff revi 
 sion; on currency reform; on questions between labor and 
 capital; on the conservation of natural resources and the 
 improvement of the waterways of the country, there was no 
 difference of material import in what was proposed. Both 
 parties contemplated some prolongation of American rule 
 in the Philippines, with ultimate independence of the islands 
 in view, and disagreed only as to making or not making 
 their ultimate independence the subject of an immediate 
 pledge. Actually nothing of conflict in the principles or 
 projects of policy set forth by these two parties could make 
 the choice between them a matter of grave importance to 
 any citizen when he cast his vote. It was manifest that they 
 existed no longer as organizations of opposing opinion, but 
 had degenerated into competing syndicates for the capture 
 
160 TWO-PARTY POLITICS 
 
 of political power. Thus the citizen who exercised a thought 
 ful judgment on the public questions of the day was actu 
 ally driven to determine his vote, as between these parties 
 (one or the other of which would inevitably be "the party 
 inf power"), by|something else than that judgment; by 
 something of a feeling that grows easily into the mischiev 
 ous spirit that finally cares for nothing in politics but the 
 party and the party s success. 
 
 The minor parties in our politics, Prohibitionist, 
 Socialist, Populist, which justify their existence by spe 
 cial aims, are respectable as parties because consistently 
 formed and coherent by the force of real motives of union; 
 but they promise no disturbance of the demoralizing cer 
 tainty, in every election, that undivided power, of legisla 
 tion or administration or both, will go to one or the other 
 team of the professional players in the two-party game. 
 
 What, then, could be thinner and poorer than the exhibi 
 tion that we make now in our politics? Our parties mean so 
 little; represent so faintly and vaguely the public mind; 
 offer so little invitation or stimulation to thought on public 
 questions and to well-considered action in politics; furnish 
 so perverted an agency for receiving and executing any 
 mandate from the people ! Is it not time to reconsider our 
 traditional belief in the two-party organization of politics, 
 and question whether something that would be better in 
 the whole effect might not, after all, be obtained from a 
 structure of parties more flexible than in the pattern that 
 England gave us? 
 
 The natural cleavage between conservative and pro 
 gressive, or liberal, opinion, which originated the two-party 
 division in English and American politics, gave origin, like 
 wise, to the more numerous political parties of the Euro 
 pean continent. But, while Englishmen and Americans 
 have made one mixture of all tinctures of conservative polit- 
 
A CRITICISM 161 
 
 ical opinion, and another mixture of all degrees of progres 
 sive liberality, the French, German, and other Europeans, 
 have not been satisfied with so crude and careless a lumping 
 of their differences of judgment on public questions, but 
 have subdivided their main divisions of party in a rational 
 and, we may say, a scientific way. After entering upon an 
 experience of representative government, they soon discov 
 ered that moderate and extreme dispositions, whether con 
 servative or progressive, may separate men by wider 
 differences of view than arise between the moderately con 
 servative and the moderately progressive man; and that 
 there is a considerable breadth of ground within the range 
 of the latter s differences, on which men from both sides can 
 act together more effectively for what they desire in gov 
 ernment than by action on either side of the prime division. 
 Recognition of this fact tends naturally to the formation 
 of at least three parties of a comprehensive character (not 
 limited, that is, to single specific objects), namely: one on 
 the conservative slope of opinion, one on the progressive, 
 and a third on an area between these. 
 
 This was so natural an organization of politics that the 
 continental Europeans, coming into the enjoyment of repre 
 sentative institutions much later than the English, fell into 
 it as if there was nothing else to be done; and in the seating 
 of their legislatures they found a natural name for the 
 natural parties that took form. According to the places in 
 which the parties became grouped, at the right or the left of 
 the presiding officer s chair, or in front of it, they came to be 
 known as the party of the Right, the party of the Left, the 
 party of the Centre; or simply the Right, the Left, and the 
 Centre. Generally, at the outset of the introduction of par 
 liamentary institutions on the Continent, conservative 
 opinion had the strongest representation in the legislative 
 bodies, and its deputies took the seats that gave them the 
 12 
 
162 TWO-PARTY POLITICS 
 
 name of the Right. The naming then established became 
 fixed in European use. 
 
 For the simple politics of the Swiss Republic the three 
 parties of this most natural division Right, Left, and 
 Centre have sufficed for many years. In most countries 
 of Europe, however, the Right and Left parties, especially 
 the latter, are subject to fissures that produce Right Centre 
 and Left Centre parties, and frequently others, taking 
 different names, with branchings, moreover, on the Left, of 
 parties like the Socialist, which acknowledge no fundamen 
 tal relationship with parties on that side, but stand on 
 ground of their own. No doubt this segmentation of parties 
 has been practiced excessively in Latin and German coun 
 tries, and has been often troublesome in the conduct of gov 
 ernment; but the question to be considered is, whether the 
 transient difficulties so caused have ever been comparable 
 in seriousness with the deep-seated evils that arise in our 
 politics from the hard-and-fast crystallization of our two 
 historic parties, and the fixed fact that one or the other will 
 always win the corrupting prize of power. 
 
 Experience of a systematically representative govern 
 ment was opened in France in 1876, when the Constitution 
 of the Third Republic went into effect. The first elections 
 to the Chamber of Deputies gave the supporters of this 
 republican Constitution great majorities; against hostile 
 Bonapartists, Bourbon monarchists, and anarchists; but 
 the presidency had been filled by previous election in the 
 National Assembly, and Marshal MacMahon, who occu 
 pied it, was extremely anti-republican in his views. Discord 
 between the majority in the Chamber and the ministries 
 selected by the President was inevitable, and it resulted in 
 the resignation of MacMahon at the end of January, 1879. 
 The Republicans, however, were far from forming a com 
 pact political party. Their deputies were divided into so 
 
A CRITICISM 163 
 
 many groups or varieties, that Dr. Lowell, in his account of 
 " Goverment and Parties in Continental Europe" mentions 
 only five of "the most important," which bore the follow 
 ing names : Left Centre, Republican Left, Republican Union, 
 Radical Left, and Extreme Left. The group which called 
 itself Republican Union, headed by Gambetta, though it 
 was not a majority of the Chamber in its own numbers, yet 
 exercised a practical dominance, which it maintained for a 
 number of years. 
 
 Considering the formidable difficulties that attended the 
 establishing of republican government in France, from roy 
 alist and imperialist antagonisms, from the originally open 
 hostility of Rome, from the discouraging memory of two 
 failures in the past, from the recent loss of national prestige, 
 and from ever-impending dangers in the feeling between 
 Germany and France have we any good reason for sup 
 posing that a two-party organization in the conflicts in 
 volved would have brought the country through them with 
 better success? The same generation that suffered the 
 crushing downfall of the Second Empire, and had reason for 
 well-nigh despairing of France, has been able to found and 
 build on that great ruin a well-ordered radical democracy, 
 and make it one of the substantial political powers of the 
 world. At the same time, however, these people have not 
 hesitated to take up, and apparently to give a lasting treat 
 ment to, such hazardous undertakings as the secularizing of 
 public education, the separation of the State from an 
 anciently established Church, and the subjection of its reli 
 gious orders and societies to civil law. 
 
 What greater achievements in the workmanship of poli 
 tics has our time produced? And what other country in our 
 generation has suffered tribulations so many and so dis 
 tracting as the workers at these formidable tasks have been 
 tormented by meanwhile? When I call to mind the Bou- 
 
164 TWO-PARTY POLITICS 
 
 langer intoxication, the Panama Canal failure and its scan 
 dals, the madness of the Dreyfus iniquity, the Morocco 
 trouble, and the almost paralyzing strike of postal and tele 
 graph employees, the safe passing of the French democracy 
 through all these merciless testings, in the period of its or 
 ganization and schooling, claims my wondering admiration. 
 
 In the corresponding period what do we show of political 
 achievement that will make good any boast of a better 
 working of government under the two-party organization 
 of our democracy? A few years prior to the undertaking of 
 republican government in France we passed, as a nation, 
 through the greatest of our trials, when, at stupendous cost 
 of life and suffering, we rescued our Federal Union from 
 rupture, and then applied ourselves to the reconstruction of 
 society and government in eleven shattered states. I have 
 alluded already to the fact that a probable majority of the 
 party then all-powerful in possession of the government 
 was favorable to the policy of reconstruction which Presi 
 dent Lincoln had begun to carry out before his death. By 
 the loss of his sane influence and by the passions which his 
 murder excited, an ascendency in the party was transferred 
 suddenly to its radical and vindictive minds and tempers, 
 and the party as a whole (or nearly so), with its whole irre 
 sistible power, was swept by them into their recklessness of 
 dealing with these gravest problems of our history. It was 
 so swept by the habit of solidified party action (dignified in 
 our talk of it as "loyalty" to party) which is cultivated and 
 educated in us by the two-party prejudice of our minds. 
 
 Suppose that we had been habituated in that period to 
 the more natural three-party division of opinion and dis 
 position, wjth or without subdivisions, and accus 
 tomed to the organized occupation of a middle ground in 
 our politics, the ground for a "Right Centre" and a 
 "Left Centre," where moderate Republicans and mod- 
 
A CRITICISM 165 
 
 erate Democrats would be in readiness at all times to throw 
 the weight of their moderation against extremes of action 
 on either side! Can anyone doubt that a much saner and 
 more effective reconstruction would have been given to the 
 states disordered by rebellion? that they would have been 
 spared the abominations of the "carpet-bag" regime, and 
 the nation spared the shame of it? that race antagonism in 
 those states would not have been what it is, and that the 
 condition and prospects of their colored population would 
 have been infinitely better to-day? 
 
 Apply the surmise, again, to the treatment in our politics 
 of those most vital of economic questions, the questions of 
 tariff! There have always been three attitudes of people 
 on this subject: one proceeding from opinion formed in 
 telligently, by study and thought; another from opinion 
 adopted carelessly, without knowledge; the third from dic 
 tation of self -interests, considered alone. As these have been 
 mixed and lumped in both of our parties, by strains of party 
 influence which obscured the subject, no fair opportunity 
 has been afforded for the instructing of ignorance or for the 
 combating of selfishness in dealing with the matter. Is it 
 not more than probable that such subsidiary groupings in 
 party organization as European constituencies have found 
 practicable would have given many more openings to such 
 opportunity, and would have saved us from some, at least, 
 of the oppressive tribute which protected greed, helped by 
 ignorance and thoughtlessness, has been able to levy on us 
 for scores of years? 
 
 To my mind it appears more than probable that, in the 
 treatment of all serious situations and all questions of high 
 importance, we should fare better if no single organization 
 of party could always, as a rule, control the determination 
 of them. Ordinary legislation need not be rendered more 
 difficult by some articulation of our political parties in the 
 
166 TWO-PARTY POLITICS 
 
 European manner, requiring majorities in legislative bodies 
 to be made up and handled in two or three sections, and not 
 in a ready-made, unchangeable mass. If agreement on the 
 graver matters became slower of attainment and less easy, 
 it could not often fail to be made wiser and more just by the 
 disputation through which it came. Admit everything of 
 hindrance and inconvenience in government that can be 
 charged against that rational articulation of parties, and 
 what force can we feel in it, as against the intolerable evils 
 which our contrary practice has brought upon us? That 
 the worst of those evils are not curable without some loosen 
 ing of the rigidity of our two-party organizations is the 
 conclusion to which I am driven. Briefly, let me rehearse 
 the reasons for this conclusion : 
 
 1. A serviceable expression of public opinion in politics 
 through no more than two organs of its collected utterance 
 is possible only when some single question, or group of re 
 lated questions, is overriding all others in the general mind. 
 In common circumstances the citizen who tries to exercise 
 an intelligent and useful judgment in his political action 
 needs more latitude of choice than between the two cate 
 gories of collective opinion, on everything in public affairs, 
 which two rival parties put forth. By voting with one or the 
 other of these parties, he represents himself in government 
 as a full indorser of all that its category declares, and he is 
 fortunate, indeed, if his vote does not falsify half of his 
 judgments and beliefs. Of course, there is no practicable 
 organization of political opinion, for collective expression, 
 that will avoid some considerable compromise and sacrifice 
 of personal judgments by every citizen; but our system im 
 poses the maximum of falsification on our suffrages, instead 
 of the least. How much this causes of depression and weak 
 ening in the political working of large classes of minds 
 on the activity of their interest in public matters, on the 
 
A CRITICISM 167 
 
 earnestness of their convictions, and on the vigor of the ex 
 pression given to them cannot be known; but there can 
 be no doubt that the effect goes seriously deep. 
 
 2. By so organizing our political action that the whole 
 power of government, with all that it carries of stupendous 
 opportunity for nefarious private gain at public expense, 
 must go undividedly to one or the other of two lastingly 
 established parties, we make it inevitable that irresistible 
 leagues of self-seekers will acquire control of those parties, 
 with nefarious designs. Such control is always made visible 
 to us in the perfected machination of our party organiza 
 tions. We shall never make them otherwise than machines 
 until the corrupting opportunities they offer for exploita 
 tion are minimized by some disintegration of the power now 
 solidified in them. 
 
 3. Nothing effective to this end is accomplished simply 
 by independent voting, because the weight of the inde 
 pendent vote has to go, just as the partisan vote goes, to the 
 tipping, one way or the other, of the two-party beam. The 
 better motive in it can often improve immediate results. It 
 can menace, admonish, rebuke, one or the other of the oli 
 garchies of party at a given election. In this way it is of ex 
 cellent occasional service, in improving nominations for 
 office and in securing an election of the better; but it can 
 never advance us by a step toward escape from that 
 which makes machines of our political parties, to hold them 
 down to two in number, with the guaranteed prize of all 
 governmental power to be striven for between them, and 
 with every possible motive for the selfish and unscrupulous 
 use of that power invited into combinations for handling it. 
 
 4. As the focal points of political organization are neces 
 sarily in cities, it is there, naturally, in American municipal 
 government, that our two-party system of politics shows its 
 working most flagrantly to our shame. Municipal govern- 
 
168 TWO-PARTY POLITICS 
 
 ment is, therefore, the present subject of our most earnest 
 undertakings of political reform. We are making great 
 endeavors to create something in the nature of municipal 
 politics, distinct from and independent of the two-party 
 national politics, in order that some degree of home rule 
 may be realized, and local interests may have some measure 
 of consideration in the treatment of local affairs. But what 
 reasonable hope can we entertain of success in this endeavor, 
 so long as the two-party organization is what it is, and the 
 cities are the inevitable seats of its management; where its 
 mastery of the agencies of political action are most easily 
 exercised, and where the interested influences that work for 
 it and with it have likewise their principal seats? 
 
 In England, the showing of effects in municipal govern 
 ment from these causes is becoming the same as in the 
 United States. Ever since Parliament became democra 
 tized by successive extensions of the popular suffrage, in 
 1867 and 1884, the organizations of the two dominating 
 parties have been growing steadily machine-like, taking on 
 the structure and character of our own; and with equal 
 steadiness the municipalities have been falling under their 
 control. M. Ostrogorsky bears witness to these facts, in his 
 remarkably thorough study of "Democracy and the Organi 
 zation of Political Parties," published in 1902. He wrote 
 then of English municipal politics: "There already appears 
 a general phenomenon, . . . the indifference to municipal 
 matters which is growing up among the citizens. They 
 inevitably leave the burden of their duty to the common 
 weal to be borne by the political parties who have monopo 
 lized local public life. . . . The first effect of this state of 
 things is strikingly manifested in the decline of the intellec 
 tual and, to some extent, moral standard of the personnel 
 of the town councils. . . . Devotion to the party being, 
 under the Birmingham system [of party organization], the 
 
A CRITICISM 169 
 
 first qualification for admission to honors, it inevitably 
 became before long the principal condition of such admis 
 sion. . . . On the occasion of my first tour in the prov 
 inces [in 1889] I pretty often heard it said that good men* 
 (the Tories said * gentlemen ) would not stand for the town 
 council; but on visiting the same towns after an interval of 
 six years I was much struck by the tone of melancholy and 
 sometimes of exasperation in which the effects of the intro 
 duction of politics into municipal affairs were spoken of." 
 
 5. Through every influence it exerts, the two-party sys 
 tem is weakening or vitiating the public opinion and the 
 public spirit which are the vitalizing forces in democracy, 
 and lending itself powerfully to a substitution of the purely 
 partisan spirit, which all history has proved to be the most 
 pestilent by which human society can be infected. 
 
 Our bondage to the inexorable old system has been re 
 lentless for so many generations that release from it had 
 seemed impossible until a little time ago, when Western 
 "insurgency" showed its head. Now there appear some 
 glimmerings of encouragement of the hope that our politics 
 may yet develop a Centre, with its Right and Left wings, 
 disjomtable from necessary connection with the extremes of 
 Right and Left. 
 
THE VALUE OF EXISTING TRADE-UNIONISM 
 
 CHAKLES NORMAN FAY 
 
 DURING the thirty years from 1879 to 1909 I was at the 
 head successively of several corporations employing from 
 two hundred to two thousand working people. Like most 
 believers in democracy, I originally believed also in the or 
 ganization of labor; in the right of the working men, singly 
 weak, to strengthen themselves by union in any honest 
 effort for their own betterment. I believed that organiza 
 tion, bringing to the front the ablest minds among their 
 number, would tend to educate the working people in the 
 economics of labor, to their own good and that of the com 
 munity. Results, however, have been disappointing. The 
 management of trade unions appears to have become like 
 that of city politics an affair of personal self-interest 
 rather than of the public good. This conclusion is drawn 
 from various personal experiences, and from public docu 
 ments to which I shall hereafter refer. 
 
 I came into contact with organized labor when, about 
 1899, a small typewriter factory in Chicago which I con 
 trolled, employing some two hundred and fifty men, joined 
 the National Association of Manufacturers, consisting of 
 over three thousand of the largest employers in the United 
 States. At the moment I found its attention preoccupied 
 with the matter of union labor. A great dread of labor- 
 unions swept over employers about 1900, and the National 
 Association of Manufacturers, the Anti-Boycott Associa 
 tion, the Metal Trades Association, the Typothetse, and 
 many local associations were formed, largely for the pur 
 pose of defense. Labor conditions grew worse; strikes, 
 
VALUE OF EXISTING TRADE-UNIONISM 171 
 
 original and sympathetic, multiplied, until many employers 
 moved their works out of the city, and many others, includ 
 ing our concern, opened negotiations with various country 
 towns for removal thither. We joined the Anti-Boycott 
 Association about 1901, and I became a member of the 
 committee in charge of the litigation begun by this associa 
 tion in the Chicago courts. I was made, about the same 
 time, the vice-president for Illinois of the National Associa 
 tion of Manufacturers, and subsequently the chairman of 
 its special committee on strike insurance. 
 
 My company s factory was unionized in 1903, for the 
 first time in its nine years of existence, and forthwith was 
 "struck" by six unions affiliated with the Chicago Federa 
 tion of Labor. The union demands included an eight-hour 
 day instead of ten hours, an advance of twenty per cent in 
 wages, the handing over of shop rules and discipline to a 
 union committee, the sanctioning of sympathetic strikes, 
 the closed shop, and a number of lesser requirements. 
 
 Our company was young. Engaged as we were in a fierce 
 competition with the so-called Typewriter Trust, and other 
 large typewriter-makers, whose works were without excep 
 tion in country towns, and who paid lower wages for ten 
 hours a day, the narrow margin of profits that we had at 
 tained would have vanished instantly, and we should have 
 started at once toward bankruptcy. I stated these facts to 
 the union leaders, and invited them to put an expert on our 
 books to verify my assertion. They replied that they could 
 not bother with our books; that we could "cook" our ac 
 counts to suit ourselves; and anyhow, they did not care to 
 deal with weak concerns. If we could not do business in 
 Chicago under union conditions, we^had better get out of 
 business or out of Chicago. 
 
 "What then of our men whom you have just unionized? " 
 I asked. "Would you destroy their jobs forthwith?" 
 
172 VALUE OF EXISTING TRADE-UNIONISM 
 
 "They must sacrifice themselves for the cause of labor," 
 was the reply; and the poor fellows did. As the business 
 agents left, they whistled, and most of the men dropped 
 their tools and marched out. 
 
 Before this there had been a fortnight of negotiations, 
 during which I looked about for help. I tried to join the 
 Metal Trades and the Employers Associations, and to get 
 under their collective-bargain umbrella; but I found no 
 room there. These associations were controlled by the larger 
 local factories such as the harvester, ice-machine, and elec 
 trical works, with whose methods, scale of operations, sales, 
 and seasons, our little typewriter factory had practically 
 nothing in common. Labor conditions which were toler 
 able to them were to us about as deadly as the union de 
 mands. So I found myself, with a heavy heart, compelled 
 to make my fight alone. 
 
 A few months before, I had met on the railway train one 
 of the Studebakers of South Bend, whose factory had re 
 cently passed through a strike, of which he told me as 
 follows : 
 
 "There had never been any unions in South Bend until 
 the organizers came from Chicago to organize our men. As 
 soon as this was done, they called a strike. Then* demands 
 seemed to us impossible. So we called the men together, and 
 I made them a speech. I said to them, We have got along 
 with you men, from father to son, for thirty years, and have 
 never had any trouble until these strangers came in to make 
 it. Now you have put up to us demands that we believe are 
 impossible. You, of course, believe the other way. And 
 what you believe, any other body of men are likely to be 
 lieve. If we can t get along with you, we can t get along 
 with anybody else. Therefore, we are not going to try to 
 supply your places or to run this factory unless we run it 
 with you. We shall simply shut down and give you a 
 
VALUE OF EXISTING TRADE-UNIONISM 173 
 
 chance to look around for a better job. If you don t suc 
 ceed in finding one and wish to come back, the old job is 
 ready for you, on the old conditions, whenever men enough 
 decide to come to work to run the shops. If you never come 
 back the shops will stay closed. 
 
 " So we shut down and left simply the watchmen there, 
 as at night. We employed no strike-breakers, and there was 
 no hard feeling. After a few weeks the older men began to 
 think and argue, and, in the course of two months, the 
 strike gradually faded out. The men came back, a few at a 
 time, work started up, and we have been non-union ever 
 since. No property was wrecked and no men killed, and we 
 have had nothing to regret." 
 
 Mr. Studebaker s narrative impressed me strongly, and 
 when I faced a similar situation I followed his lead exactly. 
 We paid off the men and inclosed in every pay-envelope a 
 letter stating that we should not fill the men s places, but 
 merely wait until they found out that all the unions in 
 Chicago could not furnish them another job; after which, if 
 they chose to come back, the old jobs would be ready, 
 under the old conditions. If they found other work and did 
 not return in a reasonable length of time, we should feel 
 free to start up with new employees, first giving each man 
 ten days notice so that he could, if he chose, apply for his 
 old situation. 
 
 So the shop remained closed for nearly eight weeks. 
 The unions picketed it in the meantime, but without reason. 
 After six weeks the majority of the men indicated that they 
 wished to return to work, and we gave them the agreed ten 
 days notice. Before starting up, as many of the men ex 
 pressed the fear of slugging, we agreed to put the property 
 under the protection of the courts, and applied for an in 
 junction restraining the unions and our union employees 
 from picketing, intimidation, and violence. 
 
174 VALUE OF EXISTING TRADE-UNIONISM 
 
 Nevertheless, on the day that work was resumed, two 
 men were slugged. We caught the sluggers, brought them 
 before the court, had them sentenced, and then had the 
 sentence suspended during good behavior. We also fur 
 nished our men with police escort to and from work. 
 
 These precautions ended all difficulties. The majority of 
 our employees privately told their foremen that they had 
 had no grievances, and had joined the union only because 
 they were afraid to stay out. As soon as they felt themselves 
 protected by the law, they quit the unions and returned to 
 work. 
 
 None of them except the pickets received strike benefits 
 from the unions while the strike lasted, although they had 
 been told w T hen joining the unions that a large war-fund 
 had been laid by in previous years in anticipation of this 
 year of struggle, from which they should benefit. 
 
 When our strike was announced in the papers, the Chi 
 cago manager of a detective agency called to see me, stat 
 ing that his office made a specialty of handling strikes, and 
 that he could give me advance information of every move 
 ment made against our company. I expressed some doubt 
 as to his ability to do so. He replied about as follows: 
 
 "These union leaders are all grafters; they will take 
 money from you, or from me, from the politicians, and from 
 the men anywhere they can get it. Our agency practi 
 cally owns an official in every important union in America. 
 We will give you detailed typewritten reports of the pro 
 ceedings of the executive and finance committees of the 
 six unions with which you are concerned. When you start 
 up, the unions will slip a union man in your shop to reor 
 ganize it. We will slip one of our operatives in there, too, 
 and he will keep you informed as to what the union man is 
 doing." 
 
 He finally persuaded me to accept his services, and for 
 
VALUE OF EXISTING TRADE-UNIONISM 175 
 
 nearly six months I received his daily reports, whose accu 
 racy, regarding our strike at least, was sufficiently verified 
 by my knowledge of the facts from our own side. The 
 financial statements, which came in twice a month, showed 
 that but one fifth of the union war-fund came back to the 
 men, mostly in the shape of pay for pickets, while four fifths 
 went in salaries and expenses of the organization. The lar 
 gest single items were the bills of a certain lawyer, perhaps 
 the most conspicuous champion of down-trodden labor in 
 America, aggregating many thousands of dollars, paid him 
 for defending sluggers and fighting injunctions against 
 violence and intimidation of non-union men. Our strike 
 collapsed in about eleven weeks, but according to these 
 statements our pickets, who disappeared from the neighbor 
 hood entirely about that time, were continuing to draw pay 
 when I stopped taking the statements some three months 
 after. As the business agents were frequently seen about 
 our neighborhood, and must have known that the pickets 
 were not there, the interesting query arises who got the 
 money that was charged as paid for the services of the 
 latter? 
 
 Another interesting item in the financial report was two 
 dollars per man paid to the organizers for organizing our 
 shop. To cover this, each man had been charged an initia 
 tion fee of three dollars, and about fifty of our men failed to 
 pay it. After the collapse of the strike the business agents 
 proposed to me to "call it off," provided the company 
 would pay the union the amount of these defaulted initia 
 tion fees a proposal quite in keeping with the whole 
 miserable performance. 
 
 When we finally started up as a non-union shop, desiring 
 to keep out union spies while filling a few vacancies, we 
 advertised anonymously for men of the six trades, in three 
 different ways, thus running eighteen "ads" at once: for 
 
176 VALUE OF EXISTING TRADE-UNIONISM 
 
 union men, closed shop; for non-union men, non-union 
 shop; and for men, open shop. Nearly a hundred applicants 
 answered both union and non-union advertisements and 
 were, of course, rejected; but the far more interesting de 
 velopment was the fact that, out of about one thousand ap 
 plications received by mail, over eight hundred and fifty 
 were for the non-union job. Many wrote strongly, eager for 
 steady work from which they could not be called by busi 
 ness agents every little while. Even from the "polishers," 
 supposed to be solidly unionized, of fifty-one applications, 
 thirty-one were for the non-union job. This "straw vote" 
 satisfied me that our little shop, at least, could ignore the 
 unions; and it did. 
 
 Meantime the work of the Anti-Boycott Association was 
 going on in Chicago and the vicinity. Its purpose was to 
 enforce the common and statute law regarding conspiracy 
 and combination in restraint of trade against the labor- 
 unions. The strikes of 1901 to 1903 afforded a favorable 
 opportunity, and Chicago a good strategic point for its 
 operations. Several important injunction suits were 
 brought, and fought through the local committee of which 
 I was a member. The moral effect of the protection of the 
 courts upon the laboring population was so marked that, 
 during the years from 1900 to 1903, not far from one hun 
 dred injunctions were taken out in Chicago and the vicinity. 
 It became well understood among employers that the ma 
 jority of employees, even union men, preferred to remain at 
 work if protected; naturally the hostility of the unions to the 
 issuing of injunctions by the courts grew bitter, and still 
 persists. 
 
 Eventually less aggressive counsels prevailed in the Na 
 tional Association of Manufacturers. Suggestions of a great 
 fighting association of employers and the formation of a 
 
VALUE OF EXISTING TRADE-UNIONISM 177 
 
 large war-fund, of extensive lockouts and the like, came to 
 nothing. Collective bargaining accomplished little. The 
 Studebaker method of non-resistance, involving merely 
 ability to shut down, appealed to me as the best defense 
 against professional trade unionism. I therefore proposed at 
 the annual meeting of the National Association of Manufac 
 turers a method of conferring that ability on every mem 
 ber: namely, a plan for mutual strike insurance, permitting 
 any member to insure against loss of profits and waste of 
 fixed charges during idleness caused by strikes. 
 
 The Honorable Carroll D. Wright, Commissioner of 
 Labor, had published, in 1901, the first report of the De 
 partment of Commerce and Labor on Strikes and Lockouts, 
 covering the years 1881 to 1900. The averages from this 
 report indicated that such insurance could be written at 
 a premium of less than one per cent per annum. 
 
 The association listened to the suggestion and appointed 
 a committee on strike insurance, of which I was made chair 
 man; and in that capacity I conducted an extensive corre 
 spondence, sending out printed interrogatories to the entire 
 membership of the association, which yielded much valu 
 able information among other things the fact that union 
 labor was universally found to be from thirty to forty per 
 cent less efficient than non-union labor. 
 
 I then thought, and still think, strike insurance an abso 
 lutely lawful, cheap, and practical method of cooperation 
 among employers, which, if generally adopted, would put 
 professional labor leaders clean out of business. For an 
 employer need only say to the business agents, "Go ahead 
 and strike. It will cost me nothing. I am insured, and I will 
 shut down and go fishing until the men feel like going to 
 work again." 
 
 But my associates, like myself, had had their experience 
 in 1903; and had found out that unionism had not entirely 
 
 13 
 
178 VALUE OF EXISTING TRADE-UNIONISM 
 
 superseded the laws of supply and demand. They answered 
 my committee substantially as follows: "Your proposals are 
 sound, but not worth while. We do not have strikes very 
 often. When business is good, and we want men, we have to 
 bid up for them; when it is bad and we do not want them, 
 they come around after us. We prefer to take our chances, 
 and if a strike comes, meet it in our own way. Organized or 
 not, we can and will pay labor only what trade justifies." 
 
 In short, by 1904, to these representative employers, over 
 three thousand of the largest in the land, organized labor 
 was no longer the devouring monster of 1900, but had 
 shrunk to a mere gadfly of trade, at which the patient ox of 
 industry might indeed switch an uneasy tail, but against 
 which it was scarcely worth while to screen him. 
 
 Later on, our company dropped out of the National 
 Association of Manufacturers and of the Anti-Boycott 
 Association, and my personal contact with the labor organ 
 izations ceased. I now relate these experiences merely as a 
 "story" to lead the reader on to a far more important and 
 convincing array of facts found in certain public documents, 
 namely: 
 
 The Second Report of the Commissioner of Labor, on 
 Strikes and Lockouts from 1881 to 1905; the Report of 
 the Senate Committee on the Course of Prices and Wages 
 from 1900 to 1907; of the Census Bureau on Manufactures 
 brought down to 1905; and the advance bulletins of the 
 Census of 1910. 
 
 According to the first-mentioned report, there were in the 
 United States in 1905, besides transportation companies, 
 some 216,262 wage-paying concerns, employing 6,157,751 
 workers. In 1881 the workers numbered 4,257,613; so that 
 for the twenty-five years included their average number 
 may be assumed as 5,200,000. During this period there 
 
VALUE OF EXISTING TRADE-UNIONISM 179 
 
 were no less than 36,757 strikes (not counting those of less 
 than a day), involving 181,407 concerns, and 1546 lockouts, 
 involving 18,547 concerns. Neglecting the lockouts and ex 
 cluding railroad employees, 8,485,600 persons were thrown 
 out of employment by strikes, for an average period of 25.4 
 days. These totals are large enough to form the basis of 
 reliable percentages and sound conclusions. Assuming the 
 low normal of 250 working days per annum, we may figure 
 the total time lost by strikes during that twenty-five years 
 as two thirds of one per cent of normal working time an 
 almost negligible fraction. 
 
 Of the establishments involved, 90 per cent were " struck " 
 by organized, and but 10 per cent by unorganized labor. 
 
 Organized labor won or partly won in 65 per cent, and un 
 organized labor in 44 per cent, of strikes undertaken. 
 
 Lockouts averaged 85 days hi duration, against 25.4 days 
 for strikes. Employers won or partly won in 68 per cent of 
 the lockouts begun. 
 
 Sixty -seven per cent of all strikes concerned wages, hours, 
 and other primary questions between employers and their 
 men; 33 per cent concerned recognition of the unions, and 
 other secondary questions between employers and the 
 unions, as distinguished from the men. But, during the 
 twenty-five years, as labor-organization progressed, this 
 proportion changed steadily and significantly. In 1881, for 
 instance, wage-questions caused 71 per cent of the strikes, 
 and "recognition" but 7 per cent. In 1905 the figures were 
 respectively 37 and 36 percent. As the percentage of strikes 
 for recognition rose, the percentage of victories fell, from 
 the grand average of 65 percent for the twenty-five years, to 
 52 per cent in 1904 and 1905, the last two years. 
 
 Substantially no strikes were undertaken for sanitary 
 conditions, or against dangerous machinery, child or female 
 
180 VALUE OF EXISTING TRADE-UNIONISM 
 
 labor, and the like "welfare" questions, which the labor 
 leaders have practically left to the philanthropists. 1 
 
 To-day, after fifty years of organization, we may say 
 roughly that 70 per cent of the industrial workers and 90 
 per cent of all wage-earners remain non-union and may be 
 presumed not to favor strike-machines. The enormous 
 majority of wage-workers neither unionize nor strike, but 
 prefer to remain at work and settle their wage-questions 
 and working conditions for themselves directly with their 
 employers. 
 
 In valuing the widely differing results of strike-effort, 
 that is, the efficiency of trade-unions, certain general con 
 siderations must be borne in mind. "The destruction of the 
 poor is their poverty." All an employer needs to win any 
 ordinary strike is the ability merely to shut down, and wait 
 until starvation does its work. This he knows perfectly well. 
 
 1 Strikes succeeded according to their causes as follows: 
 For higher wages 69 per cent 
 
 For shorter hours 61 " 
 
 For recognition 57 " 
 
 Against reduction of wages 48 " 
 Sympathetic strikes 23 " " 
 
 The building trades developed 39 per cent of all strikes and 55 per cent 
 of all lockouts. 
 
 During the whole twenty-five years, 45 per cent of all male and 28 per 
 cent of all female employees have struck, averaging one strike each. The 
 maximum number on strike in any one year was 563,143 in 1902, or about 
 one hand in every ten. On the average, but one hand in fifty struck each 
 year. 
 
 The Federation of Labor (see its reports) claimed 692,000 members in 
 1890, 1,500,000 in 1905, and 1,700,000 in 1910. Including unions not in 
 the Federation, perhaps 2,000,000 may be assumed as the present member 
 ship, and 750,000 as the average membership, of all the unions in the 
 United States, for the twenty-five years ending in 1905; this last being, 
 say, 15 per cent of the "industrial" wage-workers, and but 5 per cent of 
 the entire wage-working population. It made, however, 90 per cent of the 
 trouble. 
 
VALUE OF EXISTING TRADE-UNIONISM 181 
 
 But low wages, long hours, and such primary questions be 
 tween him and his men are seldom worth to him a shut 
 down, or a fight to keep running. They mean merely in 
 creased cost of labor which, like that of material, can 
 generally be added to prices, and the burden passed along 
 to the consumer. Indeed, the large majority of increases 
 and decreases, the natural fluctuations of wages and prices, 
 take place automatically under the law of supply and 
 demand; and differences come to the striking point, as we 
 have seen, only two thirds of one per cent of the time 
 which is too seldom to count much. Ordinarily, therefore, 
 the employer is indifferent, and easily yields wages and 
 hours demanded. He is seldom the tyrant blood-sucker of 
 helpless laboring men, women, and children that union 
 leaders and muck-rakers love to depict; with rare exceptions 
 he is a pretty decent fellow, who likes his working people, 
 and willingly pays full going wages, and runs as short hours 
 as his trade will permit. 
 
 Of prime importance to him, on the other hand, is the 
 kind of work he gets for wages paid during the 99 J per cent 
 of the time between strikes. "No man can serve two mas 
 ters : for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or he 
 will hold to the one, and despise the other." When "recog 
 nition" means that employees must take orders from hah* a 
 dozen different unions instead of from the man who pays 
 them; that old and faithful hands must unionize or leave; 
 that sympathetic strikes and boycotts and refusal to handle 
 non-union material may unexpectedly and uselessly involve 
 him in the troubles of distant strangers; in short, that 
 brains, foresight, and energy may any day be ripped out of 
 his business, as a scullion rips the vitals from a fish, and it 
 must broil helpless on the gridiron of competition, all of 
 this being exactly what "recognition" does mean, verily 
 the employer is bound to fight or lock out, if he can. But 
 
182 VALUE OF EXISTING TRADE-UNIONISM 
 
 first, with property and trade at stake, he carefully consid 
 ers his position. 
 
 He cannot fight or lock out, but must yield for the nonce, 
 when, as in the building trades, time is of the essence of his 
 obligations, with important work to be finished by a day 
 certain; or when he is financially so weak that he must keep 
 going or fail. He cannot yield or lock out, but must fight, 
 when, as in the railroad and other public service, the law 
 and franchises enforce continuous operation, yet limit prices 
 for service; or when, as of late in the soft-coal and garment 
 trades, competition is so intense as to have precisely the 
 same effect. The poor chap ponders long, and often decides 
 wrongly. But the labor leaders are held back by no finan 
 cial responsibility of their own or of their unions. The union 
 men may suffer individually, but the leaders comfortable 
 salaries run on, and union treasuries are on tap. The leaders 
 personal importance increases enormously during a strike, 
 while for the grafters among them and union history 
 is full of graft the strike is their greatest opportunity. 
 
 The student can understand, then, why there were ten 
 strikes to one lockout, and nine union strikes to one called 
 by unorganized labor; why labor has won the majority of 
 strikes so far, and lost the majority of lockouts; why, as 
 they strike more and more for "recognition" and like sec 
 ondary causes, the unions win less and less; and why the 
 leaders fight three times as desperately, and hold their un 
 lucky followers out three times as long, for "recognition," 
 involving their own power and prestige, as for wages, con 
 cerning only the men yet, nevertheless, lose oftener in 
 the end. One can understand, too, why, when trade condi 
 tions compel reductions of wages or demand shop discipline 
 and efficiency, capital takes a stand and labor is compara 
 tively helpless. 
 
 And finally one can understand why as Allan Pinker- 
 
VALUE OF EXISTING TRADE-UNIONISM 183 
 
 ton said of the Mollie McGuires thirty years ago "Or 
 ganized labor is organized violence." It must always be. 
 So long as the great majority of laborers remain outside the 
 unions, and a majority of those inside are there only 
 through fear, terrorism becomes the only means of prevent 
 ing free competition in labor and the settlement of strikes 
 according to the real attractiveness, or the contrary, of 
 labor conditions. Samuel Gompers is credited by a recent 
 New York daily with the remark, "Organized labor with 
 out violence is a joke." It seems impossible that he should 
 have said such a thing, but the thing itself is true of existing 
 trade-unionism. 
 
 Seeing then that labor is at actual "war" with capital 
 but two thirds of one per cent of the time; and that even 
 then organized labor wins but three times to unorganized 
 labor s twice, what, after all, is all this colossal organization 
 worth to labor? What is the net value of three wins to two 
 during less than one per cent of the time? Does this minute 
 increase of efficiency justify the cost of organization during 
 the remaining ninety-nine per cent? 
 
 The labor leaders will answer that organization is the 
 sole foundation of good wages all the time. Well, is it? Let 
 us turn to the Senate Report on W T ages and Prices for the 
 following testimony: 
 
 While from 1900 to 1907 the average price of 25 leading 
 commodities advanced 17 per cent, farm labor, entirely un 
 organized, advanced from 60 to 67 per cent. Ribbon and 
 hosiery mill-labor, poorly organized, two thirds of whose 
 strikes failed (see strike report) advanced respectively 44 
 and 36 per cent; railway labor, highly organized, advanced 
 as follows: trainmen 33 per cent, machinists 30 per cent, 
 engineers 20 per cent, miscellaneous 18 per cent; building- 
 trades labor, over-organized, advanced but 32 per cent; 
 cabinet-makers, well-organized, advanced but 20 per cent. 
 
184 VALUE OF EXISTING TRADE-UNIONISM 
 
 Another comparison from the same report of wages paid 
 in 1907 in different cities and countries, shows that union 
 carpenters earned in Philadelphia $21 per week, in Louis 
 ville $18, in Baltimore $21, in Chicago $27.50, in London, 
 England, $10.65. Union compositors earned in Philadelphia 
 43 cents per hour, in Chicago 67 cents, in San Francisco 80 
 cents. 
 
 That is to say, of the different classes considered by the 
 Senate Committee, entirely unorganized, unskilled labor 
 gained most in wages, badly organized labor came next, 
 and the best organized and strongest of all union labor, the 
 railway engineers, gained least; while laborers of the same 
 unions at one and the same time, in different cities of the 
 same country, drew widely different and apparently incon 
 sistent rates of wages for the same work. 
 
 How can these contradictory facts be accounted for on 
 the theory that unionism is the foundation of wage-scales? 
 It is not. Actually, they are fixed, the world over, by local 
 conditions of supply, demand, and efficiency; and trade- 
 unionism has had about as much effect upon them, broadly 
 speaking, as has had that magnificent fake, the protective 
 tariff. 
 
 If unionism cannot, what then can secure for the work- 
 ingman high wages, that is, a high standard of living? The 
 answer is plain nothing but efficiency: high-producing 
 power conferred on labor by conjunction with brains and 
 capital. This almost axiomatic proposition is prettily dem 
 onstrated by the 1905 Census Report on Manufactures, 
 which shows : 
 
 That small establishments whose annual product amount 
 ed to $5000 or less employed 1.9 per cent of the labor, drew 
 1.6 per cent of the pay-roll, and produced 1.2 per cent of 
 the total output. 
 
 That middle-sized concerns, with from $100,000 to 
 
VALUE OF EXISTING TRADE-UNIONISM 185 
 
 $200,000 annual product, employed 18.8 per cent of the 
 labor, drew 18.3 per cent of the wages, and produced 14.4 
 per cent of the output. 
 
 That large concerns with $1,000,000 or more annual 
 product employed 25.6 per cent of the labor, drew 27.2 per 
 cent of the pay-roll, and produced 38 per cent of the output. 
 
 Evidently the little fellow who is "crushed by the trust " 
 and goes to work for it, "no longer free but a mere slave," 
 draws more pay than before, as it grows bigger, and his 
 efficiency grows with it. A little of the resulting saving 
 comes to him direct; a little goes to the trust; but the bulk 
 of it comes to you and me, to everybody, himself included, 
 in reduction of prices and cost of living. That is the law of 
 trade. 
 
 How much ought to come to him direct? What should be 
 his share of the increment of his productive value due, not 
 to himself, but to capital and brains? Not much! Like the 
 "unearned increment" on real estate, most of it rightfully 
 belongs to the community; and one way or another the 
 community gets it. What, then, are those "rights of labor, " 
 which labor is to get when Mr. Gompers s prophecy of the 
 final domination of muscle over mind is realized? Probably 
 labor itself would define them as an even "divide," master 
 and man alike, all round. Well, what would that amount 
 to? Here is a crude guess. 
 
 The census of 1910 gives the total wealth of the nation as 
 about $107,000,000,000, of which about one quarter was in 
 the land; which last, the nation neither made nor saved. 
 The rest was in worldly goods produced by all, and saved 
 by some of us. It amounts to, say, $983 each for every man, 
 woman, and child in the United States; or, say, $4500 per 
 family. At the usual capitalistic return of 5 per cent, this 
 would yield $225 per annum, or 61 cents per day per family. 
 That is, were all the brains and property of the country to 
 
186 VALUE OF EXISTING TRADE-UNIONISM 
 
 continue as now at the service of labor, and were it to work 
 as hard as now, and were each family head to draw 61 cents 
 per day greater average pay, labor would get everything 
 nothing left for capital, brains, and time spent in evolution 
 of the commercial situation. 
 
 Labor would probably turn upon Gompers and say, "Is 
 that all? Where are our rights our automobiles and 
 Scotch castles, our golf and idle days?" And some wiser 
 man than Edward Bellamy would answer, "Those things 
 are not on the cards, boys. You will each have to turn out 
 many hundred times more work than you are doing every 
 day in order to pass such luxuries around." The boys 
 would probably reply, "If 61 cents a day extra, and hard 
 work for life, is all there is in it, we will take a vacation and 
 spend our $4500 apiece right now, and have one good time 
 while it lasts." 
 
 As a matter of fact, there are no "rights," there is no 
 enormous profit stolen from its daily toil, which labor does 
 not get. The whole wealth of the country, its accumulation 
 of three centuries, was $80,000,000,000 in 1910, land-values 
 neglected. The farm products of that year were $9,000,000,- 
 000, the industrial products $15,000,000,000, and the pre 
 cious metals $126,000,000; probably, all in all, we produced 
 $25,000,000,000 of value last year. The savings of three 
 centuries, then, are barely three years product! and they, 
 too, are perishable. The food and merchandise disappear in 
 a year; the roads, rolling-stock, and machinery in ten years; 
 the buildings, say, in thirty. All must be renewed from year 
 to year. The world really lives from hand to mouth, its 
 toiling millions consuming at least 97 per cent of all they 
 produce. A few millions of workers of rare industry and 
 thrift, a few hundred thousand of still rarer brain and en 
 ergy, gather together the small fraction that remains, and 
 concentrate it by the world- wide machinery of modern 
 
VALUE OF EXISTING TRADE-UNIONISM 187 
 
 commerce in a few favored countries for themselves, 
 as they fondly suppose, but really, under a mightier intelli 
 gence than theirs, mainly for the use and benefit of labor, 
 which works and thinks as little as possible, and saves 
 hardly at all. 
 
 Let us inquire now what are the plainly evident interests 
 of wage-working people, and upon them try to build logical 
 and useful principles of association with those of their 
 fellow men who, possessing brains, will always also control 
 capital. Those interests are, as I see them : 
 
 Employment. The laborer must have a job, furnished 
 him by someone else, for he has not the ability to create one 
 for himself. It must be continuous; for his time is all he has, 
 and every day lost is so much pay gone forever. He, him 
 self, should be the last man to interrupt or cripple his own 
 job; nor should it be subject to interruption by quarrels of 
 other men with other jobs in which he has no concern. 
 
 Freedom to work. If employment fails, does not pay, or is 
 unsuitable, it is absolutely vital that the laborer shall be 
 free to seek any other employment or locality, without 
 being shut in or out by union walls. It is best for him, as 
 for the community, that labor, like capital, should be liquid, 
 free to flow where most needed; in ample supply everywhere, 
 in stagnation nowhere. 
 
 Th e highest going wages, regularly paid. As " going " wages, 
 the world over, practically absorb the product of each coun 
 try, it is idle to attempt to secure more. The only way the 
 laborer can induce, or indeed enable, his employer to 
 pay the highest wages is to produce the utmost in return, 
 and make him prosperous. For, though it does not follow 
 that a prosperous business always pays the highest wages, a 
 losing business practically never does. Therefore, up to the 
 point of healthy fatigue, the workman in his own interest 
 
188 VALUE OF EXISTING TRADE-UNIONISM 
 
 should put his heart and back into his work, in fullest accord 
 with the brain that creates and pays for his job; doing his 
 level best to increase output and decrease unit-cost to his 
 employer and to the community. 
 
 As labor seldom saves, and figures ahead only from pay 
 day to pay-day, pay-days must be regular and frequent, 
 and the work steady. The employer, to be ideal, must be 
 strong, and successful; in short, a capitalist, independent as 
 far as possible of the troubles of other business concerns. 
 
 If these are the interests of labor, they are plainly identi 
 cal with those of capital and of the community. There will 
 always remain, to be determined justly, however, the ques 
 tions, what are "going wages" and "healthy fatigue. " 
 
 These are questions of fact and of individual capacity, 
 whose determining factors, in spite of all our contrivances, 
 will probably always be those of supply, demand, and effi 
 ciency in open market namely, of competition : questions 
 whose mastery demands more study than average working 
 people are capable of. Nevertheless, to satisfy "Labor" 
 which nowadays "wants to know," and would cut loose 
 from simple and sound old methods that labor-competi 
 tion is inevitable, as well as immediately and ultimately just, 
 and yet to mitigate as far as may be, its harshness, " Capi 
 tal" might well, it seems to me, utilize the fine principle of 
 brotherhood, of strength in union among laboring people; 
 devising for the larger industries, with its greater intelli 
 gence, a form of union among employees, more logical than 
 present unionism, wage-contracts more just to the individ 
 ual, and more efficient than present collective bargaining, 
 and last, but not least, a practical method of enforcing such 
 contracts on both sides. For it is useless to make contracts 
 which cannot be enforced. The law will not compel a 
 laborer to work, and neither he nor his union has any prop 
 erty good for damages resulting from his breach of contract. 
 
VALUE OF EXISTING TRADE-UNIONISM 189 
 
 When the pinch comes, the union leaders calmly say they 
 "cannot hold the men" (which is perfectly true), and that 
 is the end of their contracts mere ropes of sand! 
 
 Capital prefers, therefore, to hire from day to day, and 
 take its chances of getting such labor as it wants in the open 
 market. If, now, labor desires that capital shall bind itself 
 by long-term contracts to stay out of the open market, and 
 deal only with particular bodies of laborers, it is not only 
 justice, but common sense, that the latter also shall be 
 bound, and that their side of the contract as well as capital s 
 shall be guaranteed by property. 
 
 To accomplish all this, let us suppose that the employer 
 first, in order to disentangle his concern from the labor 
 troubles of others, himself quits all employers associations, 
 and proposes to his employees to form a union of their own, 
 not tied to other unions and their wars; offering each man 
 who joins it a written contract providing : 
 
 1. For its termination only on three months notice by 
 either party, or by common consent. 
 
 2. For steady work, without strike or lockout, while 
 trade conditions permit. 
 
 3. For the highest efficiency consistent with healthy 
 fatigue, and corresponding highest "going" wages; reason 
 able maximum scales of efficiency and wages, to be proposed 
 by the employer as conditions change from time to time, 
 employees falling below maximum efficiency to draw re 
 duced wages in proportion to performance. 
 
 4. For the prompt acceptance or rejection, by representa 
 tive members of the union, of trade conditions, scales of 
 efficiency and maximum wages, working rules, etc., from 
 time to time announced or proposed by the employer; full 
 est facilities for investigation thereof to be afforded by him. 
 
 5. For the creation of a joint guarantee fund, equal, say, 
 to five per cent of each employee s wages, to be contributed 
 
190 VALUE OF EXISTING TRADE-UNIONISM 
 
 on pay-days, one half by him and one half by the employer, 
 and placed in trust to accumulate at interest; its sum to be 
 divided between himself and the employer if he quits or is 
 discharged with the three months notice, or by mutual con 
 sent; or to be forfeited entire by or to him, if he quits or is 
 discharged without the three months notice, during his first 
 fifteen years employment. After fifteen years he may at 
 any time either retire, and withdraw the whole as a savings 
 fund, or retire on a pension representing it, upon giving the 
 three months notice. 
 
 Employees who prefer not to join such a union are not to 
 be forced to do so, or to quit other unions; but to remain 
 without benefits, as ordinary employees by the day. Those 
 who join and sign contracts are, of course, free to quit or 
 strike without notice, if they think it worth while to forfeit 
 their half of the guaranty fund. In case of a deadlock be 
 tween the employer and the union representative, the em 
 ployer as well as the men, if dissatisfied with existing scales 
 or conditions, must give notice and wait three months be 
 fore lockout or strike, or forfeit the guaranty funds. Indi 
 vidual men preferring not to give notice would, of course, 
 hold their jobs and their guaranty funds. 
 
 At the end of the three months notice, should the dead 
 lock continue, the men would draw their shares of the ac 
 cumulated guaranty fund, and go their ways, sacrificing 
 their pension-standing, etc. The employer would have to 
 build up a new force. Probably both sides would try the 
 ordinary endurance test, to see which would yield first; the 
 men better financed than usual, and the employer having 
 had three months for finishing work in process and prepar 
 ing to shut down, with his share of the guaranty fund as a 
 financial anchor to windward. The possibility of strikes 
 would not be abolished, but would, in my judgment, be 
 greatly lessened under this plan. Nothing clears the judg 
 ment like financial responsibility. 
 
VALUE OF EXISTING TRADE-UNIONISM 191 
 
 Such a form of unionism would, it seems to me, promote 
 as well as human contrivance can the common interests of 
 labor and capital, namely, continuous employment, free 
 dom for labor to flow where wanted, high efficiency and 
 high wages under healthy conditions; and would add to the 
 general blessings of industrial peace the special blessings of 
 thrift and insurance. A prominent Western actuary recently 
 laid before his employer friends a plan under which the em 
 ployer s half of such a five per cent guaranty fund would 
 more than suffice, and might be used during the first fifteen 
 years to pay the premiums upon a death, accident, and 
 sickness insurance policy in one of the standard companies, 
 covering (in lieu of employers liability) the same scale 
 of benefits that is now provided for working men under the 
 admirable German Compulsory Insurance laws. At the end 
 of the fifteen years, the accumulations of the employee s 
 half of the fund and interest would suffice to take the place 
 of the insurance policy, which could then be dropped; and 
 thereafter the whole fund would accumulate, to provide the 
 same benefits, and a savings fund or retiring pension at the 
 employee s option. 
 
 He would, however, sacrifice all the accumulations and 
 the two and a half per cent of his wages, should he break his 
 contract and quit without notice; or should he, in case of 
 accident or injury, elect to abandon his contract benefits, 
 and hold his employer liable under existing laws a strong 
 reason for doing neither. 
 
 Would the men sign such contracts, offering incompar 
 ably greater benefits to themselves and the community 
 than are offered by existing trade-unions, laws, and chari 
 ties? If we may forecast their probable action from the 
 foregoing statistics, most of them would. It is certain, how 
 ever, that no union man would do so if the present union 
 leaders could prevent. Prying capital and labor apart with 
 
192 VALUE OF EXISTING TRADE-UNIONISM 
 
 a wedge of class-hatred, and inserting themselves between, 
 is now their gainful, conspicuous, and interesting vocation. 
 Permanent, peaceful, and profitable relations between em 
 ployer and employee would put them out of power. There 
 fore, when Mr. Taylor, by long experiment, finds ways for 
 men to do vastly more work with less effort, and draw much 
 more pay, Mr. Mitchell promptly repudiates for labor the 
 idea of doing so much for the money. If Mr. Perkins offers 
 Steel Corporation shares to its employees on easy payments, 
 so that they may be directly interested in its success and in 
 the profits from their own toil, Mr. Morrison denounces the 
 offer as bribery, and those who accept it as traitors to their 
 class. 
 
 So there you have the issue sharply defined. However 
 sordid the motives of capital, its methods have been enor 
 mously beneficial to the race. It has learned that human 
 efficiency means abundance for human need, and abundance 
 low prices, and low prices larger trade, and larger trade 
 greater profits. With the purely selfish purpose of garner 
 ing these profits, capital has for a century produced and 
 supplied to the race, in return for its daily toil, an ever-in 
 creasing store of the necessaries and luxuries of life. 
 
 On the other hand, labor, equally selfish but less intelli 
 gent, everywhere and always fights efficiency, discipline, 
 scientific management; in short, fights every means of in 
 creasing output and reducing unit-cost. Everywhere and 
 always, strange as it may seem, labor stands for monopoly, 
 violence, and coercion, and against personal independence. 
 The non-union man has no right to life, liberty, and the 
 pursuit of a job. At the very moment of time when the 
 world demands of capital the utmost commercial freedom, 
 the widest competition, the greatest energy, the cheapest 
 and best service, labor stands for the exact opposite for 
 tyranny, combination in restraint of trade, high cost, in- 
 
VALUE OF EXISTING TRADE-UNIONISM 193 
 
 efficiency, and sloth. To sum up, in hauling the heavy load 
 of human existence, it is the admitted principle and pur 
 pose of organized labor to balk and not to pull. 
 
 A priori, and from the broad experience, personal and 
 national, cited above, the conclusion comes to me irresisti 
 bly, that the principle is false, the purpose wrong, and the 
 result inevitable; in fine, that existing trade-unionism is of 
 no value, to itself or to the community, and must make 
 way for something better. 
 
 14 
 
THE ECONOMIC NECESSITY OF 
 TRADE-UNIONISM 1 
 
 JOHN MITCHELL 
 
 THOSE who declare themselves to be in favor of trade- 
 unionism in the abstract, but opposed to it in the concrete, 
 are not unlike the Western farmer who announced that he 
 was unreservedly in favor of the construction of railroads, 
 but unalterably opposed to the running of trams. Trade- 
 unions were formed for a definite purpose; they have well- 
 defined policies and methods of procedure; they are great 
 democratic institutions, administered by practical men, 
 who are earnestly and successfully striving for the ameliora 
 tion of the conditions of the poor. 
 
 In its fundamental principle, trade-unionism is a recogni 
 tion of the fact that under modern industrial conditions the 
 individual unorganized workingman cannot bargain ad 
 vantageously with the employer for the sale of his labor. 
 Since the workingman has little or no money in reserve and 
 must sell his labor immediately; since, moreover, he has no 
 knowledge of the market and no skill in bargaining; since, 
 finally, he has only his own labor to sell, while the employer 
 engages hundreds or even thousands of men and can easily 
 do without the services of any one of them, the workingman, 
 if bargaining on his own account and for himself alone, is at 
 an enormous disadvantage. Trade-unionism recognizes the 
 fact that under such conditions the workingman becomes 
 
 1 The omitted portions of this essay deal with the relations of labor- 
 unions to the Sherman Anti-Trust Act and to the problem of rising prices. 
 The essay is, in general, a reply to Professor J. Laurence Laughlin s 
 " Monopoly of Labor" in the Atlantic Monthly for October, 1913. 
 
AN ECONOMIC NECESSITY 195 
 
 more and more helpless, because the labor that he sells, 
 unlike other commodities, is a thing which is of his very life 
 and soul and being. 
 
 In the individual contract between a powerful employer 
 and a single workingman the laborer secures the worst of 
 the bargain. He is progressively debased because of wages 
 insufficient to buy nourishing food, because of hours of 
 labor too long to permit of sufficient rest, because of condi 
 tions of work destructive of moral, mental, and physical 
 health; and, finally, because of danger from accident and 
 disease, which kill off the workingman or prematurely age 
 him. The individual bargain or individual contract between 
 employers and employees means that the condition of the 
 economically weakest man in the industry is often that 
 which the average man must accept. Therefore, there can 
 be no permanent prosperity to the wage-earners, no real, 
 lasting progress, no consecutive improvement in conditions, 
 until the principle is firmly and fully established that, in 
 industrial life, especially in enterprises on a large scale, the 
 settlement of wages, hours of labor, and all essential con 
 ditions of work, shall be made between employers and 
 employees collectively, and not between employers and 
 employees individually. 
 
 The policy of collective bargaining, as advocated by the 
 unions, recognizes and teaches the interdependence of labor 
 and capital. It is the bridge that spans the gulf which mod 
 ern industrialism has created between the workingman and 
 the employer. It is necessary only to attend a joint confer 
 ence between the representatives of any of the great trade- 
 unions and the representatives of employers or employers 
 associations, when wage-agreements are under discussion, 
 to be convinced that there are no more antagonisms en 
 gendered, and no more ill-feeling displayed, than there are 
 
196 TRADE-UNIONISM 
 
 between any other groups of men meeting in conference for 
 the purpose of buying and disposing of a commodity which 
 one must have and the other must sell. 
 
 The organized workingman, as a rule, is not hostile to the 
 employer of labor; he does not entertain any feelings of 
 hatred against the man who has honorably acquired wealth. 
 The workingman understands full well that his wages must 
 come from the earnings of industry; therefore he is inter 
 ested in the successful conduct of industry. In common with 
 many other good citizens, he may fear that there is some 
 danger to society, and to the institutions of our country, in 
 the possession of enormous wealth by a few men; and he re 
 gards as immoral the acquirement of wealth through the 
 payment of less than living wages and the imposition of un 
 just conditions of employment. 
 
 It is true that in their wage-conferences the employers 
 and the organized workingmen are not always able to 
 agree, and that strikes or lockouts occur. It is equally true 
 that strikes and lockouts occur in trades and industries in 
 which the workers are not organized. Indeed, many of the 
 most bitterly contested strikes of which we have any record 
 have been inaugurated and conducted by non-union men. 
 Fresh in the memories of all are the reports of the scenes at 
 tending strikes of non-unionists at McKee s Rocks and 
 Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, at Paterson, New Jersey, and at 
 Lawrence, Massachusetts. If one desires to learn the truth 
 in regard to the causes that make for class-hatreds, let him 
 mingle with the non-union men employed in some of our 
 great industries. These men, denied by their employers the 
 right of organization, compelled to work long hours for low 
 wages, frequently hate their employers with an intensity 
 that results in scenes of turmoil and disorder when strikes 
 take place. 
 
 Trade-unions strive for peace based upon industrial right- 
 
AN ECONOMIC NECESSITY 197 
 
 eousness. A strike, nevertheless, is of itself neither illegal 
 nor immoral. On the contrary, a strike may be, and often 
 is, a manifestation of a wholesome, yea, even a divine, dis 
 content. Said Abraham Lincoln, in a speech delivered at 
 Hartford, Connecticut, in 1860: "Thank God, we have a 
 system of labor where there can be a strike. Whatever the 
 pressure, there is a point where the workingman may stop." 
 
 Quite apart, however, from constitutional and legal con 
 siderations, it must be obvious to all thoughtful men and 
 women, especially those who are familiar with the struggles 
 of the wage-earning masses for more humane conditions of 
 employment, for better living opportunities, that it would 
 be ethically wrong to consider labor and the products of 
 labor as if they were one and the same thing. It must be 
 clear that associations formed for the sole purpose of pro 
 tecting and promoting the welfare of the men and women 
 and children who labor should not be placed by the law in 
 the same category with monopolies or combinations or 
 ganized for profit, and be condemned as unlawful conspira 
 cies in restraint of trade. 
 
 "Organizations of labor," says Samuel Gompers, Presi 
 dent of the American Federation of Labor, "have their 
 origin in human need, they seek human welfare and better 
 ment, they have to do with human labor-power. Capitalis 
 tic monopolies have their origin in desire for great profit, 
 they seek economic control and the elimination of competi 
 tive rivals, they deal in material things the products of 
 labor, wealth. Between wealth and labor there is a vital 
 and fundamental difference, an understanding of which is 
 essential to those upon whom falls the responsibility of deal 
 ing with matters influencing the freedom of men. Wealth 
 consists in material things which are external, useful, and 
 appropriable. Wealth is that which a man has not what 
 he is. To classify skill, knowledge, labor-power as wealtlris 
 
198 TRADE-UNIONISM 
 
 an error that has crept into the thinking of some economists 
 and political scientists. It is an error conducive to grave 
 injury to the working people. These attainments or attri 
 butes are not possessions of the individual: they are the 
 individual, and cannot be separated from personality. Cul 
 tivation of powers and ability increases and enriches the 
 resourcefulness and efficiency of the individual; but these 
 things are subjective and immaterial, and are not in them 
 selves wealth. The individual may be able and powerful, 
 and therefore fortunate, but it does not necessarily follow 
 therefrom that he is wealthy. The wealth that he may 
 produce is separate and distinct from himself. It follows, 
 then, that to apply to voluntary associations of working 
 people (commonly called labor-organizations), which are 
 concerned with individuals and their powers, the same 
 regulations that are applied to organizations manipulating 
 the products of labor, would lead to mischievous results 
 and perversion of justice." 
 
 Unrestricted competition of labor that is, non-union 
 ism finds its natural and inevitable sequence in the 
 sweat-shop and the slum; it finds its logical expression at 
 Lawrence, at Paterson, at McKee s Rocks, at Bethlehem, 
 and in the mining fields of West Virginia. Unrestricted 
 competition of labor is portrayed by Millet, and depicted 
 by Markham in "The Man with the Hoe." 
 
 The suggestion, heard in more than one quarter, that 
 trade-unionism is in conflict with the law and the state, or 
 that trade-unionists wage war on society, has no founda 
 tion in fact. Trade-unionism stands for the constructive 
 development of society; it seeks the more equitable distribu 
 tion of wealth, in order that all our people may develop to 
 the extent of their highest and best possibilities. In contra 
 diction to the dire apprehensions sometimes expressed by 
 critics and opponents of trade-unionism, listen to the words 
 
AN ECONOMIC NECESSITY 199 
 
 of the great English statesman, William E. Gladstone: 
 "Trade-unions are the bulwarks of modern democracies *; 
 to those of Wendell Phillips: "I rejoice at every effort 
 workingmen make to organize. I hail the labor movement; 
 it is my only hope for democracy. Organize and stand to 
 gether; let the nations hear a united demand from the la 
 boring voice!" Again, hear Thorold Rogers, during his life 
 Professor of Political Economy at the University of Ox 
 ford : " I look to the trade-unions as the principal means for 
 benefiting the working classes"; and Mr. Taft, when Presi 
 dent of the United States: "Time was when everybody who 
 employed labor was opposed to the labor-union; when it 
 was regarded as a menace. That time, I am glad to say, has 
 largely passed away, and the man to-day who objects to 
 the organization of labor should be relegated to the last 
 century." 
 
 Notwithstanding the splendid work and the great 
 achievements of the organized wage-earners in protecting 
 those in our social and industrial life who are least able to 
 protect themselves, efforts are constantly being made to 
 discredit and destroy the trade-unions. Open foes and pro 
 fessing friends alike have sought their undoing, the former 
 by siege or assault, the latter by insidious attempts to 
 divert them from the course they have pursued so success 
 fully. And yet every year the unions grow in strength, in 
 numbers, and in influence; they grow in the affections of 
 the wage-earners; they grow in the respect of fair-minded 
 employers; they grow in the esteem of right-thinking men 
 and women everywhere. 
 
 The critics of trade-union policy have suggested that the 
 employer "introduce into his shops carefully worked-out 
 plans for helping the operatives to rise in life, to better 
 conditions by welf are-work, to encourage savings and thrift, 
 to introduce the stimulus of profit-sharing." I have no 
 
200 TRADE-UNIONISM 
 
 desire or disposition to detract from the value of welfare- 
 work; on the contrary, I wish to commend every employer 
 who undertakes, at his own expense, to improve and make 
 more pleasant and wholesome the conditions under which 
 his employees work. Welfare-work, however, is not a sub 
 stitute for wages. If the employer desires to supplement the 
 wages agreed to between himself and the union, such action 
 is not inimical to trade-unionism and may be of great value 
 to all concerned; but the workingmen will not be lured by 
 any device from their allegiance to trade-unionism; they 
 will not accept welfare-work or profit-sharing in lieu of just 
 wages and the right to organize; they will not, and should 
 not, depend upon Lords Bountiful and Ladies Charitable; 
 they prefer to depend upon themselves and their trade- 
 unions as the means through which to work out their 
 economic salvation. 
 
THE ETHICS OF SPECULATION 
 
 CHARLES F. DOLE 
 
 THE preachers and moralists call this a materialistic age- 
 They deplore the mad rush of multitudes to "get rich" 
 quickly. They call attention to the colossal fortunes which 
 have been piled up by the kings of finance and industry, at 
 the expense of the poor, within a single generation. 
 
 Everyone agrees that this eager pursuit of wealth is 
 somehow related to speculative methods in business. A con 
 siderable class of men are known as speculators. The great 
 stock and produce exchanges in every big city are centres of 
 feverish speculation. The quotations and fluctuations of 
 stock are published in all the newspapers. Farmers in dis 
 tant country towns, ministers, often women, watch these 
 quotations, telegraph orders to their brokers, and lie awake 
 nights in alternate hope or fear. Periods of panic sweep like 
 storms over the market, new deals are made, and fortunes 
 are won or lost in a day. Tragedies, suicides, nervous pros 
 tration, and insanity follow these speculative fluctuations 
 of value in the staples and the wealth of the world. Every 
 one is interested perforce in this aspect of modern business. 
 The successes and the ruin involved in both great and small 
 speculation appeal to the popular imagination, sometimes 
 with a wholesome alarm, and again, more dangerously, with 
 a zest to enter into the arena and take its gilded ventures. 
 It is difficult to see how the fineness of moral standards, the 
 delicacy of spiritual insight, the ideals of public service, or 
 the purity of domestic life can help suffering blight in the 
 prevalence of an atmosphere of speculation. 
 
 We are generally agreed that what is known as gambling 
 
202 THE ETHICS OF SPECULATION 
 
 is pernicious and demoralizing to both winners and losers; 
 that is, it is "wicked." We manage occasionally to catch in 
 the meshes of our system of law the frequenters of gambling- 
 houses or Chinese dives, and we have largely driven the 
 lottery out of existence and made it disreputable. We are 
 waging a legal battle against pool-selling, and public opin 
 ion is already attacking the nuisance of the "bucket-shop," 
 which fatally lures multitudes of the poor to loss and many 
 a young clerk to dishonor and ruin. Where now is the 
 dividing line between undisguised gambling and the enor 
 mous transactions on the stock exchange? In other words, 
 is speculation always gambling? And if not, if speculation is 
 sometimes right, when does it cease to be right and become 
 wrong? Moreover, what, precisely, is the harm in gambling 
 itself, a new crime in the world, unknown as such to our 
 fathers, provided one can afford to lose the amount of 
 the stakes? These questions, important as they are, are not 
 so simple as they may at first appear. 
 
 Let us be sure that we approach our question with candor 
 and without any cant. We must admit, to begin with, that 
 we are all materialists, though we hope that we are not 
 mere materialists.! All civilization proceeds upon material 
 foundations. Wealth is evidently the sum of .the outward 
 values by which man on his physical side holds the earth./ 
 It is a kind of power, whether held individually or by 
 society. We learn all higher and spiritual values, justice, 
 integrity, faithfulness the conduct of "the simple life" 
 itself through the accurate and honest use of material 
 values. If it is not unworthy to love to exercise power, it 
 cannot be unworthy to be pleased to handle wealth. 
 
 Again, there can be no harm in liking to "get rich" 
 quickly. Let us call things by their right names. Avarice, 
 greed, injustice are wrong; they hurt society and dwarf a 
 man s own soul. But we are made to enjoy success in what- 
 
THE ETHICS OF SPECULATION 203 
 
 ever we do. Does not a farmer like to have a grand crop 
 a hundredfold over what he put into the ground? Does not 
 every fisherman like to strike a school of mackerel or blue- 
 fish? All inventions and the labor-saving application of 
 natural powers are simply means to bring about the most 
 rapid production of wealth. The complaint never ought to 
 be that riches are produced too rapidly, but that they are 
 not fairly distributed. 
 
 Moreover, there is doubtless a speculative element, a fac 
 tor of venture or "chance," in all human enterprises. This 
 element, called wrongly sometimes "a gamble," was quite as 
 prevalent in the primitive industries as it is anywhere to 
 day. Hunting and fishing were largely matters of "luck." 
 The early unscientific agriculture seemed to depend on a 
 series of lucky chances. There are some kinds of business 
 to-day that are from their nature especially speculative : for 
 example, mining, and the establishment of a thousand and 
 one new undertakings in food and clothing and domestic 
 furniture/ The telephone was thus, at first, a great specula 
 tive venture. But this element of hazard did not make it 
 wrong to buy its stock at a few dollars a share. In fact, if 
 some people had not believed in it and risked their money, 
 the w T orld would have had to wait indefinitely for the use of 
 this wonderful new instrument of civilization. We suspect 
 that even Mr. Emerson would have been pleased with the 
 results, if he had trusted the proceeds of one of his lectures 
 in the infant enterprise. 
 
 ^Alongside of, and involved with, this unknown element of 
 venture, "chance," or speculation in all human enterprise, 
 is the constant factor of intelligence, skill, forethought, pur 
 pose, experience all of them names for some form of 
 effort, activity, and cost. We draw on the more or less un 
 known forces of nature, which continually challenge us to 
 watchfulness, to patience, to accurate investigation, to the 
 
204 THE ETHICS OF SPECULATION 
 
 use of all our faculties and our energy. The best, or most 
 successful, man is he who invests, and ventures the utmost 
 skill and force of will in his enterprise. 
 > A profound law governs the processes of civilization. 
 The law is that the civilized man always tends to minimize 
 the variable element, or the risks of his business, and to de 
 pend more and more largely upon the use of clearly defined 
 and intelligible means, the result of his own observation and 
 of the widening experience of the race. Everything indus 
 trial becomes a science^ The expert endeavors to predict 
 how much gold or copper will be produced to every ton of 
 the ore. Science teaches the farmer or the fisherman the 
 conditions upon which he may quite confidently expect the 
 largest possible yield. We shall have occasion presently to 
 refer again to this significant law of progress in industrial 
 civilization, whereby all legitimate business tends to be 
 come less a mere speculation and more completely a science. 
 
 Let us now try to see just what the mischief is in gam 
 bling. Here is a familiar sport of all barbarous peoples. 
 The savage wants excitement, and finds it in venturing 
 everything that he owns, even his wife or his own person. 
 The idle classes in a modern city gamble likewise for excite 
 ment, to titillate their jaded nerves. Thus, bridge-whist, 
 with its genteel stakes, represents the survival of a very 
 ancient form of barbarism. 
 
 Gambling needs to be distinguished from good sport, as 
 also from good business. In true sport the element of intel 
 lect, patience, attention, activity, rises in value, and the 
 factor of chance declines. The better the sport, the greater 
 the activity of body or mind, the less the need of extra or 
 factitious excitement. The players in the football game or 
 at chess need least of all to bet on their own success. 
 They have "fun" enough in the effort itself. It is the idle 
 minds with lazy and unintellectual games, or the hangers- 
 
THE ETHICS OF SPECULATION 205 
 
 on, watching the games of others, who buy a cheap excite 
 ment by betting on the sport. Theirs is not true sport. In 
 fact, the more the brains or the skill are used in a sport, the 
 less use have any civilized players for going over into the 
 field of gambling. Pure gambling is based on ignorance; it 
 deals in what we call "chance." Thus, throwing dice is a 
 pure gambling game, for the reason that intelligence has no 
 possible exercise in its use. On the other hand, the more 
 skill or intelligence enters into a sport, the greater becomes 
 the folly of those who, with little or no skill, put up their 
 stakes on the mere chances of the game. 
 
 What harm, however, is there if the players like to en 
 hance their fun by the excitement of putting up stakes? 
 One easy answer is that the friendly or neighborly instinct 
 in us is more or less offended in pocketing even a small gain 
 at another s loss. This is a rational instinct, which grows 
 stronger and more sensitive as one becomes more humane 
 and kindly, and especially as we set before ourselves the 
 ideal of living on terms of good-will with all men. 
 
 /But the supreme objection to gambling in all its forms, 
 whether in sport or in sj^eculative business, is that it works 
 harm and loss to society^ As soon as any practice or con 
 duct is found to be socially hurtful, it thereby becomes 
 wrong, whatever men may have thought of it before. Does 
 not all morality rise to consciousness through the fact of 
 social advantage or injury? Now, the long and costly expe 
 rience of mankind bears uniform testimony against gam 
 bling, till at last the verdict of civilization has become as 
 nearly unanimous as human judgment can be, that it is an 
 intolerable nuisance. It is a dangerous and unsocial form of 
 excitement; it hurts character, demoralizes industry, breeds 
 quarrels, tempts men to self-destruction; and it works 
 special injustice to women and children. We may not know 
 precisely why morphine preys upon the nervous system and 
 
206 THE ETHICS OF SPECULATION 
 
 has to be labeled "poisonous." The fact is the main consid 
 eration. So with the stimulus or excitation of gambling. 
 Grant that I profess myself willing to pay for my fun. The 
 fun is degrading, like the prize fight or bear-baiting. 
 
 But suppose, says the casuist, that the players have 
 plenty of good-humor, and self-control enough not to take 
 unreasonable risks. Suppose that mildest form of gambling, 
 the raffle at a church fair, where a hundred people take 
 tickets to pay for a piano, and then cast lots surely a 
 scriptural method to determine who shall have the quite 
 indivisible prize. The answer is that, at the best, you, the 
 enlightened leaders of public opinion, who set up your tiny 
 stakes and raffle in church lotteries, are playing about the 
 edge of the very precipice which your own laws have marked 
 "dangerous" for the public. Who are you, who ask the spe 
 cial privilege of doing what you deem it foolish or wicked for 
 common people to do? Moreover, the more "reasonable" 
 you make the stakes of respectable gaming, or of gambling 
 speculation, the tamer the game is. If you want extra ex 
 citement beyond what grows out of the normal use of skill 
 and intelligence, you must bid high enough to hurt you a 
 little when you come to lose. In other words, the psycho 
 logical principle that underlies all craving for factitious 
 excitements makes "reasonable" gambling either worthless 
 for the purpose of excitement, or else a practical impos 
 sibility. The truth is that the normal interests, of society 
 grow continually more cooperative or mutual, Gambling, 
 on the other hand, is by its nature divisive and there 
 fore unsocial. It sets meum over against tuum, my gain 
 against another s loss. Even in its more refined forms, this 
 tendency in gambling threatens petty jealousies, suspicion, 
 and alienation. 
 
 It is a dry task and comparatively unprofitable merely 
 to say, "Thou shalt not." Let us pass over now to the more 
 
THE ETHICS OF SPECULATION 207 
 
 fruitful and constructive side of our subject. Let us trace 
 the grand and positive law that determines and inspires all 
 legitimate business. Let us define what is good business, 
 and we shall at once set all kinds of bad business aside. 
 The simple law, governing all social activity, is that each 
 individual ought in some way to render at least an equiva 
 lent service for all that he draws or uses out of the common 
 wealth. If you live in society, you must perform some use 
 ful function whereby to justify your existence. If the indi 
 vidual cell in the body only uses up and exhausts energy, 
 without contributing any corresponding service, here is the 
 beginning of death, menacing the whole body. If the tiny 
 cell functions abnormally, putting its force or its substance 
 to hurtful uses, here is a sort of fever or disease. Give ac 
 count of yourself, says the body of society to every mem 
 ber or part; show what you are about; of what use you are; 
 why you should eat and drink and be clothed out of the 
 life-blood of society. 
 
 The Day of Judgment is coming sooner than many peo 
 ple are aware. The multitudes of the working people of the 
 world are pressing with a new significance these searching 
 and inevitable questions of social justice. There is no such 
 thing to-day as individual independence or national inde 
 pendence. All men in all nations are dependent upon one 
 another, involved in a vast network of mutual services and 
 obligations. There is nothing to which a man, whether a 
 capitalist or a workman, can point and say, "This is all 
 mine. I created it."; All the men in the world who are of 
 any use, besides a host of the inventors and toilers of past 
 ages, stand behind every act of creation or discovery or 
 manufacture and claim their share in it. It is idle merely 
 to " say grace " over our food. It is necessary to give thanks 
 in the only way, under God s laws, by which we can render 
 efficient thanks, namely, by trying at least, with all our 
 
208 THE ETHICS OF SPECULATION 
 
 might, to do our part to keep up the mighty tide of the cir 
 culation of the life of the world. This is to give thanks to 
 God through our mutual service to one another. So far 
 from high position or wealth exempting anyone from this 
 law, the obligation is only made greater. This ought to be 
 obvious enough to everyone who has ever begun to ask the 
 question, "Where does my living come from? " 
 
 It is easy at once to illustrate how this law actually ap 
 plies to one after another of the trades and professions by 
 which men "earn a living." Every trade and occupation as 
 it comes up to-day for judgment is either approved or re 
 pudiated according to the answer of the men who carry it 
 on to the question, "How are you serving society?" The 
 farmers, for example, and a whole line of honest tradesmen, 
 easily answer this question. But what if the farmer only 
 raises rye or corn to turn into whiskey? Men s consciences 
 already are righteously vexed over such issues as this. The 
 teachers and educators easily pass the judgment seat. But 
 suppose the teacher works for his hire and not for the sake 
 of his pupils? The good doctors and nurses evidently justify 
 their calling. The lawyers must pass examination at a more 
 tremendous bar than any of their courts. Are they serving 
 justice and helping to make justice prevail in the world? 
 No glory of splendid fees will protect the man who has 
 to say, No, to this master question. The ministers and 
 churches may well tremble at the new judgment. Either 
 their religion must make life in every way richer, or else the 
 world has no further use for them. 
 
 We are ready now to distinguish between that which is 
 socially useful and that which is injurious in business. Any 
 honest man ought to have the satisfaction of knowing that 
 his business carries some wholesome use or service for his 
 fellows. For example, our grocer or our baker may be sure, 
 if honest, that he serves society by the distribution of its 
 
THE ETHICS OF SPECULATION 209 
 
 products, as truly as ever soldier or policeman is supposed 
 to serve it. His purpose to this effect gives him the same 
 dignity as any honorable profession gives its members. 
 
 Suppose, now, a man gets his living by gambling. Pos 
 sibly he keeps a gambling house, or he may be a "profes 
 sional" gambler, or he may have made lucky guesses or bets 
 in the stock market. His living certainly comes out of the 
 toil of the people who work in fields and factories, or, any 
 how, out of the people who, by the use of their directing 
 intelligence or by their wisdom or their active virtue, add 
 in some way to the value and worth of life.- This man has 
 done neither. Every successful gambling transaction of his 
 has simply put moneys into his pocket which other people 
 somewhere have earned. Why is not this the essence of 
 stealing? Everyone would see that this is so, if the more 
 subtle gambling transactions were not veiled behind the 
 vastly impersonal character of modern business. The man 
 who lives by gambling speculations sees his winnings, while 
 unfortunately he is rarely able to look into the faces of the 
 people who are made poorer by the fact of his parasitism. 
 
 The imagination that revolts at the idea of hurting a man 
 is not yet sufficiently trained to revolt at the idea of preying 
 upon a corporation, upon a city, upon the national govern 
 ment, upon the corporate body of human society. The fact 
 remains that the men whose business consists only in some 
 form of betting upon the daily fluctuations of the values of 
 the world evidently take from society, that is, from all of 
 us, that for which they give no honorable return. 
 
 Pure gambling, however, as a means of livelihood, is 
 practically almost impossible. The unwritten laws of the 
 world are against it. As has often been said, it is not so much 
 wickedness as folly. The gamblers, whether at the faro 
 table or in the bucket shops, obviously have to support the 
 group of parasites who in turn wait upon them; and the 
 
 15 
 
210 THE ETHICS OF SPECULATION 
 
 sum of all their winnings must always be less than the 
 amount of their losses. In the long run, they can make suc 
 cess only by fraud, or, as occasionally on the stock exchange, 
 by "tips," or bits of secret information, imparted by saga 
 cious friends who possess previous or exceptional knowledge 
 about the conditions of the market. Most of the gambling 
 of the world is, therefore, synonymous with ignorance, and 
 will give way only before the increase of enlightenment. 
 No stringent laws against it are enough by themselves to 
 prevent silly lambs from offering themselves to be shorn. 
 We have admitted that there is a necessary element of 
 speculation or venture in all enterprises. Is there such a 
 thing as honorable or useful speculation? It is at this point 
 that the chief difficulty of our subject lies. There are three 
 lines of justification of legitimate speculation. The orig 
 inal meaning of the word speculate suggests one use to which 
 society puts a certain class of its members. They are scouts 
 or outrunners, who, by their far sight or mobility, explore 
 new routes by which the marching caravan behind them 
 may proceed, or discover treasures and supplies for the 
 benefit of the rest. The inventors and promoters are thus 
 surely useful to the slower and cautious multitude. No one 
 grudges them generous return for their forethought, pa 
 tience, courage, and faith. The trouble with this class of 
 speculators is that they have frequently failed entirely to 
 see their relation to society. Their honorable business is to 
 serve all of us. They have heretofore been suffered to imag 
 ine that they could appropriate for their selfish use what 
 ever they might lay their eyes upon. Sent forward as scouts 
 from the main body, upon whose approach they always 
 reckon, and by whose continued support they are enabled 
 to exist, they have confidently written their own names 
 as proprietors upon the lands, the springs of water, the for 
 ests, the minerals, and all those natural resources which 
 
THE ETHICS OF SPECULATION 211 
 
 rightly belong to the body of society never to a few of its 
 members. 
 
 I There is, then, a kind of speculation which is itself right 
 eous, namely, the discovery and promotion of new means 
 of wealth. The injustice begins when men set an excessive 
 price of then* own on their work, as if they had performed 
 an act of original creation. We can applaud Mr. Carnegie s 
 and Mr. Rockefeller s enterprise, but we denounce their 
 system of tariff, their manipulation of railways, and their 
 appropriation of mineral lands, through which their specu 
 lation has passed over from useful social service into the 
 form of colossal extortion. We cannot even see the social 
 use of any sort which has attended the building of the Astor 
 and other similar fortunes. The scout in this case has merely 
 seized and fortified a height above the city and become a 
 robber-baron. We must say, however, by way of excuse, 
 that these men have turned to their own selfish use legal 
 enactments for which we are all responsible. 
 
 A second use of the speculator is as an appraiser of values. 
 Here is the social use of the stock and produce exchanges. 
 For the economists tell us that the maddening din of the 
 vast exchange is not for nothing. The men penned there 
 together like gladiators are helping to fix, and even to main 
 tain, the values of the great staples of the world, the 
 wheat and the cotton, or, again, the values of innumera 
 ble stocks and bonds. Grant this fact if you will. Ask next, 
 who these people are who are crying prices up or down. 
 .There are really two sets of speculators, present in person 
 or by proxy. One set are actual experts in valuation, whose 
 business it is, as dealers or as manufacturers, to study crops 
 and harvests and movements of traffic and labor. These 
 men are playing the game by the use of experience and in 
 telligence. They have a certain normal relation to the 
 values in which they are dealing. It is evidently these men 
 
212 THE ETHICS OF SPECULATION 
 
 alone, only a limited number, who at the best can 
 claim to confer a social service by their speculations. These 
 men also tacitly obey the law of which we have spoken 
 earlier. They tend always to minimize the element of ven 
 ture and to make their business as largely as they can a 
 matter of intelligence and science. In other words, the 
 good speculators endeavor, not to gamble, but to know. 
 So far as they break this law, they injure society and put 
 back the course of civilized business. ;Their valid use is to 
 establish values, and not to manipulate them; to maintain 
 the health of business, and not to provoke fever and excite 
 ment. Let any professional speculator then be ready to 
 answer this question: What effect, beneficent or otherwise, 
 have such transactions as mine upon the economical health 
 of the world? It is a shame to a man if he can give no hon 
 orable answer to this question. Moreover, society is going 
 to press this question till men who cannot answer it will feel 
 the shame. 
 
 Another group a very large one, by all accounts re 
 presented in the transactions of the speculative exchanges 
 a^*e people who are only ignorant guessers or bettors. No 
 doubt, they often act under advice of their brokers, but 
 they contribute no particle of intelligent study in the ap 
 praisement of values. This class surely are of no sound 
 economic use in crowding upon the market. So far from 
 helping to fix or maintain values, they probably add an 
 element of exaggeration, excitement, and peril to the con 
 duct of business. Their presence and the stakes which they 
 wager tempt the bonafide, or expert, class of speculators to 
 play upon their hopes and their fears, and to create artifi 
 cial "booms " or panics, and actually to unsettle values. In 
 short the people who "take flyers" are mostly gamblers 
 pure and simple. They pay their money to support a con 
 siderable and expensive group of bankers and brokers. To 
 
THE ETHICS OF SPECULATION 213 
 
 the honest question: What actual social service do you 
 render through your speculative transactions, such as might 
 justify you in pocketing your expected winnings, abstracted 
 doubtless from the common wealth? they can give no ra 
 tional answer. They are not merely trying to get something 
 for nothing, a harmless amusement, but they are try 
 ing to get what does not belong to them. 
 ( There is one other ground on which a class of somewhat 
 irregular speculators stand. They have a possibly legiti 
 mate function as traders. Some new stock, an invention, a 
 Japanese loan, comes into view. Our speculator believes in 
 the enterprise; he takes his risk with it, and puts up his 
 money on a more or less hazardous margin, and buys. He 
 does this on the trader s confidence that his more cautious 
 neighbors will in due time be glad to take the load off his 
 hands, and reward him for holding it through the period of 
 their uncertainty. He thus helps to market and distribute 
 investments among those who can afford later to hold them 
 permanently. All this is plausible. His gains (if he makes 
 them) do not appear to come out of the losses of others, but 
 to accrue from the normal rise in the values in which he had 
 trusted. In short, the speculator in this case is a kind of 
 promoter, a non-commissioned agent of his banker and 
 broker. 
 
 The ground of this form of speculation, however, is 
 rather slippery. Except as the man really becomes a regu 
 lar, banker, his field of quite honorable operation is both 
 perilous and limited. Suppose now that, from helping to 
 market promising ventures, he goes over to the other side, 
 as he will surely be tempted to do, and takes an amateur 
 hand in knocking values downward. Does he then help or 
 harm his fellows? Moreover, his only chance of success is 
 by virtue, not of the element of chance, but of prevision, 
 skill, intelligence all very rare qualities, for the lack of 
 
214 THE ETHICS OF SPECULATION 
 
 which ninety-nine per cent of the people who try to follow 
 his example will inevitably fail. 
 
 The pathos of speculation lies in this direction. It is not 
 wrong that the village schoolmaster, or the country minis 
 ter, or the dressmaker with her scanty earnings, wishes to 
 have a share in the fabulous wealth which modern society 
 is accumulating. They rightly think "it would be fine" if 
 their bit of investment in the wonderful mine described in 
 their denominational journal turns out as successfully as 
 they hope. What they do not see is that they have no busi 
 ness to hope for this success; they do not know enough. No 
 one has taught them that every useful or promising kind of 
 speculation depends upon effort, skill, experience, the play 
 of intelligence upon the conditions of each new problem. 
 Honorable speculation is a form of science. It is never mere 
 cheap guess-work. But these innocent people a great 
 host of them are daily matching their ignorance against 
 the loaded dice of those whom their credulity tempts to 
 make a business of floating all kinds of plausible and 
 worthless enterprises. 
 
 When will the world learn the supreme law of life? We 
 have no right to expect to receive when we give no equiv 
 alent return. We have no right to expect ordinary gains, 
 unless we give at least ordinary service. Much less have we 
 the right to extra gains from our investments, where we put 
 in no extra skill, foresight, or other form of service. We only 
 make fools of ourselves in expecting great dividends, where 
 we have not the least knowledge of the conditions of busi 
 ness. Indeed, we have no right to live, even upon our own 
 incomes, unless we are trying continually to make good to 
 society for all that we cost. We are always servants and 
 trustees for society, or else we are robbing our fellows. No 
 success, no secure or permanent happiness, lies away from 
 the line of this law. 
 
DOES AMERICANIZATION AMERICANIZE? 
 
 GINO SPERANZA 
 
 "I HAVE a solemn vow registered in heaven that I will 
 preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United 
 States." These words, spoken by President Lincoln at a 
 critical moment in the life of the Republic, are, in substance, 
 what the alien repeats when admitted to American citizen 
 ship. Imagine, however, what must have been their signifi 
 cance to Abraham Lincoln, and what, at best, they possibly 
 can mean to tens of thousands of "new Americans " when re 
 citing them in the oath of allegiance, which makes them our 
 fellow citizens ! And yet we wonder why things are not all 
 as they should be to-day, and why we should be obliged to 
 ask ourselves again, as we did half a century ago, how it 
 is that "an instructed and equal people, with freedom in 
 every form, with a government yielding to the touch of pop 
 ular will so readily, ever would come to the trial of force 
 against it." 
 
 Of the causes behind the existing unrest this paper will 
 attempt to deal with only one phase our attitude and 
 policy toward the immigrant as a potential citizen, premis 
 ing the statement that such attitude and policy have la 
 bored under one fundamental error: the failure to distin 
 guish clearly and consistently between the human rights of 
 immigrants and their political rights, between our human 
 duties toward them and our political duties toward our com 
 monwealth. To their human rights and to our human duties 
 toward them we shall refer here only incidentally, dwelling 
 instead upon the study of a policy which has tended, and 
 tends, to grant political rights to very large numbers of 
 
216 DOES AMERICANIZATION AMERICANIZE? 
 
 aliens wholly unprepared for American life, and utterly un 
 qualified for participation in the government. 
 
 As we look back, we see that three methods or processes 
 have found favor among us at various times, as means of 
 converting the alien into an American: naturalization, 
 assimilation, and Americanization. The first, which once 
 was supposed to possess a sort of special sanctifying grace 
 per se, has sunk back in public opinion to its purely legalistic 
 function; the second has been relegated with the melting- 
 pot to the top shelves of social laboratories; while the third 
 is now the object of a nation-wide "drive." 
 
 There is something both stirring and touching in the al 
 most religious belief that many Americans held regarding 
 naturalization in the early days of immigration to this 
 country: they honestly and sincerely relied upon it as an 
 almost instant solvent for changing a German or a Swede 
 into an American; they looked upon it, in their intense 
 patriotism, as a rite with well-nigh sacramental and mys 
 tically spiritual effects. 
 
 With the decline of the belief in naturalization as an in 
 fallible process of transformation, there came into favor, 
 as a spiritual aid to the former, the less legalistic process of 
 assimilation. The method sounded logical and was pic 
 turesque and attractive. We all fell under its sway more or 
 less, especially the social workers and the schools of philan 
 thropy. It was, on the whole, a useful movement, not only 
 because it showed the essential inadequacy of naturaliza 
 tion, but especially because it made us realize very vividly 
 the human rights of the alien in our midst, and our indiffer 
 ence to such rights. 
 
 The war, which passed like a steam-roller over numberless 
 favorite and popular theories, served also to show the 
 limitations of assimilation as we had attempted to develop 
 it, and the strength of alien nationalism, even and indeed 
 
DOES AMERICANIZATION AMERICANIZE? 217 
 
 especially in what we had hopefully considered safe and 
 "desirable * North-European stock. 
 
 The ancient problem being still with us, and looming 
 large on the background of present-day labor unrest, 
 American optimism promptly has come to the rescue with 
 a new and sure remedy Americanization. It is part of 
 our enthusiastic idealism, part of our "habit of practical 
 performance," to wish to correct every trouble and right 
 every wrong quickly; and, in order to do it quickly, we often 
 refuse to see any subtle and intimate complexity in the 
 problems which confront us, but cheerfully and rather 
 naively "simplify" them and reduce them to "essentials," 
 which can be, as it were, surgically treated with ease and 
 precision. 
 
 But there are problems and processes so obscure and 
 complex in their causes, so slow, intricate, and subtle in 
 their development and ramifications, as to be refractory to 
 any simplification and impossible of any accelerated or 
 swift solution. One of these is Americanization, which, like 
 every essential and effective change of nationality, involves 
 two distinct processes and two vital decisions in a man s 
 life: a divesting one s self of a deep-rooted patrimony of 
 ideas, sentiments, traditions, and interests, and an honest 
 and whole-hearted acceptance of, and participation in, 
 an entirely new set of ideas, sentiments, traditions, and 
 interests. 
 
 In order to grasp the difficulties in the way of real, and, 
 therefore, of the only worth-while Americanization, let us 
 consider the processes involved in the reversal of such con 
 version. Think how suspicious we are of any instance of 
 de-Americanization; how suspect, for instance, to the popu 
 lar mind is the Anglicization, not only of a Waldorf Astor, 
 but even of a Henry James, and, generally, how taboo is the 
 man who " turns." Or let us illustrate the process on a large 
 
218 DOES AMERICANIZATION AMERICANIZE? 
 
 scale as being nearer to our own problem: let us suppose 
 that the French government, or a large section of the 
 French people, had decided to attempt to Gallicize our boys 
 of the A.E.F. while they were in France, and had made a 
 nation-wide "drive" to accomplish it in five years, at the 
 end of which time any of our men who said they wished to 
 change would have been admitted to French citizenship. 
 Will any American claim that this would have worked at 
 all, or that the French citizens thus secured would have 
 been much of an asset or a help to the French nation? 
 
 I do not give this as a parallel example to the process of 
 Americanizing our immigrants; but I do contend that, on 
 the whole, the Gallicization of a million picked American 
 youths, at a time of tense and stirring life, would have been 
 infinitely easier and more possible than to convert a million 
 mixed Syrian, Russian, Greek, Slav, and Finnish peasants 
 
 or even French, British, and Italian subjects into 
 reliable American citizens, as we claim we can do in this 
 country. To feel that the powers of attraction and assimila 
 tion of America are tremendous is both true and patriotic; 
 but to practise the belief that such powers can work miracles 
 
 such as the rapid conversion of the mixed and unstable 
 immigrants of Europe into real American citizens is sheer 
 superstition and, as such, the child of ignorance. 
 
 The fact is that there is much loose thinking, inexact 
 ness, andsentimentalism on the subject of Americanization. 
 The very fact that the first professorship of Americaniza 
 tion in this country was fitted into a department of politi 
 cal economy indicates how even trained minds tend to look 
 at the process from too narrow a standpoint: for might it 
 not reasonably be urged, with equal force, that American 
 ization belongs rather to the department of history, or of 
 philosophy, or of psychology? 
 
 But consider some of the means in vogue to-day to secure 
 
DOES AMERICANIZATION AMERICANIZE? 219 
 
 Americanization: for instance, anything which betters a 
 man, such as being taught to read and write, is, of course, 
 in a roundabout way, Americanization; but why call it that, 
 as something new, instead of using the exact word such 
 betterment has meant for ages past schooling? Impart 
 ing a knowledge of civics, government, and history is like 
 wise, in a sense, Americanization; but why claim for it a 
 power that is no greater than, and no different from, what 
 it was when the identical thing was called education? So, 
 also, bringing the alien "into contact with what is best in 
 this country," which a recent publication glibly announces 
 as a "new method" in this process, is in one sense Amer 
 icanization; but is it not the same thing as what was more 
 correctly called social or public service, or, more anciently, 
 Christian duty? 
 
 Changing their names does not render inapplicable 
 methods applicable, but only lulls us into a dangerous con 
 tentment. That the insufficiency or inadequacy of such 
 methods is being grasped in certain quarters is evidenced 
 by the conditions and provisos proposed here and there as 
 necessary for the success of the "drive." Thus Secretary 
 Lane, in a popular magazine, cautions his readers that "be 
 fore we take up this work of the Americanization of others, 
 we must first be certain that we have Americanized our 
 selves." The implication, that even real Americans may be 
 in need of Americanization, shows the essential intricacy 
 and slowness of the process, even at its best. 
 
 To understand the real significance of Americanization 
 (and lack of clearness on this point is the root of the 
 trouble) we must consider it in relation to the larger ques 
 tion of nationality, of which it is only a part or instance. 
 One of the lessons of the Great War, of peculiar significance 
 to us in relation to our immigration problem, is the tremen 
 dous strength of national or ethnic sentiment: indifferent 
 
220 DOES AMERICANIZATION AMERICANIZE? 
 
 men, average men, comfort-loving and peace-loving men, 
 as we have dramatically witnessed, are, in the emergency of 
 a real test of its power, ready to die for it. It makes heroes 
 of phlegmatic Flemish burghers, and martyrs of ignorant 
 Slav peasants; it reacts in the blood of thousands of our 
 German- Americans, who, we had firmly believed, had been 
 rendered immune to the old call of the blood by the circum 
 stances of birth and education in the wholly new envi 
 ronment of American life. Right or wrong, happily or not, 
 the racial call persists, potent, assertive, even audacious. 
 Worthy or unworthy, we saw it destroy treaties and policies, 
 learned theories, and the most carefully constructed checks 
 and balances. In the face of a theory, we discovered a con 
 dition; in the presence of an idealization of our own patriot 
 ism, we found an equally strong and all-absorbing love of 
 nation and race in infinitely poorer, less advanced, and less 
 blessed lands. 
 
 Why then imagine especially, why do our colleges and 
 universities imagine that any large body of aliens can be 
 Americanized quickly, if at all; that they can undergo a sort 
 of miracle of trans-nationalization by any nation-wide 
 "drive" of kind words, by a smattering of education, or by 
 new legislation? I do not say that Americanization is not 
 possible, but I contend that history, science, human expe 
 rience, and good sense point to the conclusion that mass 
 Americanization or speedy Americanization (of the real 
 kind, which, I trust, is the only one the colleges and the 
 legislators want) is impossible by any of the methods sug 
 gested or applied. And this largely because, as it has been 
 said, "the central fact about nationality is not," as so many 
 Americans believe, "a political force at all, but a spiritual 
 force." Being largely a spiritual process, it may be swift 
 and almost sudden with certain types of unusual men, and 
 under certain very special circumstances; but for the great 
 
DOES AMERICANIZATION AMERICANIZE? 221 
 
 mass of aliens coming here, and even for many children 
 of alien parents, the change can be only slow and subtle 
 in its working, if it is to be real and enduring. 
 
 Many politicians and some students have lacked the 
 courage to say what one, like myself, of foreign descent 
 should frankly assert and defend that this is, and must 
 remain, an essentially and fundamentally American coun 
 try, to be governed solely by American-minded men in an 
 exclusively American way, and for wholly American ideals. 
 Any compromise on this seems to me spiritual treason to the 
 Republic. Shame to those of us, not of the old stock, who 
 fail in these days of trouble for our country to defend with 
 all our heart and mind what is first and foremost the heri 
 tage of freedom of the oldstock, and is ours only in so far as 
 we are individually worthy of it, and not because we can 
 vote under it. 
 
 There have been too many sentimental pleas, too many 
 spurious arguments about this being a land of immigrants 
 and all Americans the children of immigrants. What is 
 America, first and above all, if not the development, essen 
 tially, of Anglo-Saxon ways of thinking and doing, and, 
 more specifically, of New England ideas and ideals? Nor 
 must we overlook the fact that "in all history," as John 
 Fiske has pointed out, "there has been no other instance 
 of colonization so exclusively effected by picked and chosen 
 men as in New England." Let us ask ourselves in full hon 
 esty what claim of equality of performance or of American 
 qualities there can be between the great mass of immigrants 
 and their children and those colonists and their direct de 
 scendants, except the sheerest of legalistic equality. Who 
 will be so foolish, or so hypocritical, as to contend that the 
 vast majority, or even a substantial number, of the im 
 migrants who have come or are coming to this country 
 can be classed as "the picked and chosen men" of Europe? 
 
222 DOES AMERICANIZATION AMERICANIZE? 
 
 Political cowardice, squeamish conscientiousness, and cant 
 have avoided a frank, open, and frontal attack against 
 what is variously styled "the Irish vote," the "East Side 
 vote," and the like; as if the toleration of anything but 
 a thoroughly and wholly American vote were not a gross 
 failure in the practice of an elementary American duty. 
 
 What are all the schools and professorships of American 
 ization worthwhile we allow, in daily practice, such destruc 
 tive distinctions in the political life of the country? "For 
 the successful conduct of a nation s affairs," says President 
 Hadley in his book, The Relation between Freedom and Re 
 sponsibility, "we must have a certain degree of conformity 
 between its political institutions and the moral character 
 of its members." The duty, then, of every Irishman and 
 grandson of Irishmen, of every Italian and son of Italians, in 
 this land is to conform his moral character to American 
 political institutions; to conform, not his speech or even 
 merely his vote, but his every thought and hope and plan 
 for it must be an unreserved spiritual conformity to 
 this, his country. There cannot be two nationalisms even 
 if one is major and one minor, even if one claims to be 
 American first and German second. 
 
 It will justly be urged that criticism is not necessarily 
 helpful unless it is constructively suggestive as well as de 
 structively analytical. While I do not believe that the 
 current methods or plans for Americanization can bring 
 about what is claimed for them, yet, in themselves, they 
 are praiseworthy; in so far as they are new names for school 
 ing, education, hygiene, and the Golden Rule, they are the 
 minimum of what we should do and should have begun 
 doing decades ago for a somewhat helpless and often 
 ignorant and exploited class of our inhabitants, both alien 
 and native. These are all part of our human duty and of our 
 public duty to our fellow men. 
 
DOES AMERICANIZATION AMERICANIZE? 223 
 
 The objection to such methods which fail to Amer 
 icanize, even though they may humanly improve, those be 
 ings subjected to them is that, in effect, they accelerate 
 and widen the inclusion of new "foreign votes" in the 
 American electorate. In this respect they perpetuate the 
 basic error of all our immigration policy that of invit 
 ing and hastening that purely legalistic Americanization 
 known as naturalization. This, in a land swept by large 
 migratory currents of varied and even nondescript nation 
 alities, where manhood suffrage is the fundamental law, 
 constitutes a real and growing danger. 
 
 No country has so cheapened the electoral franchise as 
 the United States, by practically giving to everybody the 
 right to enjoy it, for the mere asking. The only controlling 
 and controllable test is a certain arbitrarily fixed length of 
 residence; for it will hardly be urged that the so-called "in 
 tention," supported by a declaration of forswearing alle 
 giance to foreign potentates, and so forth, enters seriously 
 into the transformation. Length of residence, that is, time 
 (in a process which, in the majority of cases, requires some 
 generations), if an element at all, should be a very long 
 period. Some students have urged fifteen years; but to the 
 writer twenty-five years would not seem too long for what 
 might be called a splendid political apprenticeship. Pro 
 vision, however, should be made for shortening such ap 
 prenticeship upon proof of special qualities of a high order, 
 or of public or quasi-public service rendered to this country. 
 
 Length of residence was chosen because it was easily 
 proved and easily ascertainable; but to-day no one could 
 claim it as either a safe or even a rational test. There are 
 services and sacrifices which an alien may undergo in this 
 country a month after landing, of such a character as to 
 entitle him to immediate or honorary citizenship; there are 
 acts and omissions by an alien resident here ten years, 
 
224 DOES AMERICANIZATION AMERICANIZE? 
 
 which should bar him everlastingly from citizenship, or 
 divest him of it if naturalized. The real test for citizenship 
 should be political fitness and personal worthiness; and if the 
 lawyers argue that these are too subtle and spiritual to be 
 defined by statute, then it would be better that we should 
 suspend naturalization for half a century, while we try to 
 live down our past errors in this field. 
 
 This nation has two functions in history and toward man 
 kind: first, to disseminate principles of democracy, freedom, 
 and humanity among all men throughout the world; and, 
 second, to be a nation characteristically American from top 
 to bottom. It is this latter function that we have sacrificed 
 if not seriously endangered by our policy and desire 
 of forcing quick or accelerated Americanization, be it polit 
 ical or spiritual. The present "drive" has already brought 
 forth a number of bills in Congress, which, in effect, would 
 compel aliens, after a certain length of residence, to become 
 "citizens" or leave the country. Yet the more "raw" citi 
 zens (if I may use the term) you take in, helping the process 
 by a veneer of Americanization, the more you threaten our 
 characteristically American form of democracy. " If we be 
 lieve," as I said several years ago before the American 
 Academy of Political Science, "in the great system of self- 
 government developed and stubbornly fought for by the 
 English people through centuries of training and struggle, 
 we may fairly claim that its continuance and stability will 
 depend on a citizenship attached to and understanding its 
 spirit and history, and in sympathy with its political ideals. 
 . . . We want and must have real spiritual allegiance; we 
 want and must have only such citizens as think in terms of 
 American life." 
 
 As the finest contemporary exponent of America said, in 
 his "American Ideals," there is "one quality that we must 
 bring to the solution of every problem : that is, an intense 
 
DOES AMERICANIZATION AMERICANIZE? 225 
 
 and fervid Americanism." Even in the great struggle now 
 going on between capital and labor, "the outcome," as 
 President Hadley has said, will depend "on the character 
 of the people," that is, on whether our business shall be 
 dominated by "the spirit of the adventurer or by the spirit 
 of the Puritan." 
 
 If such American spirit and such American citizenship 
 cannot be obtained by any rapid process working on our 
 alien masses, and I contend that it cannot, except in 
 special cases, then why encourage or permit the natural 
 ization of such masses, or, as at least one Congressional bill 
 provides, force American citizenship on alien residents? 
 Naturalization is not the right of an immigrant, but a 
 privilege, which the United States can grant, withhold, 
 or condition. 
 
 We are constantly concerned with the restriction of immi 
 gration, but it is a far more important matter for America 
 to bar the immigrant from its body-politic than to shut him 
 out from the country. Indeed, I believe we should encour 
 age a back-and-forth alien migration, rather than a stable 
 one which ends in becoming an alien colonization in our 
 midst. If we cared for America more and for our political 
 party or our labor-union less, we should concentrate our 
 efforts, not so much on excluding able-bodied alien work 
 men, who are needed to help develop the resources of our 
 country, but more on the urgent and vital need of barring 
 numberless "new-made" citizens from our electorate. 
 
 For over fifty years the tendency in this country has been 
 to make American citizenship easily achievable; to-day, 
 when we begin, though darkly, to see the evil consequences 
 of such largesse, we grasp at the slender raft of American 
 ization to escape the storm; and in the name of such an 
 empirical and simplicist remedy, some of our Congressmen, 
 with equal good faith and simplicism, propose legislation 
 
 16 
 
226 DOES AMERICANIZATION AMERICANIZE? 
 
 which, in effect, will add to our un-American or pseudo- 
 American vote. 
 
 We cannot remedy the past, or cover our mistakes, by a 
 resort to disfranchisement; but we can and should oppose 
 any attempt, made in however good faith, to increase the 
 number of such Americanized citizens within our body- 
 politic, as to-morrow may have the power, as well as the 
 desire, to change the character of our democracy. The for 
 eign vote is already making itself felt in some parts of our 
 country as a distinctly foreign vote. Let us, then, take to 
 heart the words written many years ago by the most bal 
 anced observer and student of our immigration problem, 
 Richmond Mayo-Smith; words which to-day sound like a 
 patriotic warning: 
 
 "The change in social ideals wrought by the infiltration 
 of peoples having different customs and habits of life can be 
 detected only as these elements and habits of life gradually 
 become dominant, and as we see the decay of habitudes 
 which we had valued. We then exclaim against the degen 
 eracy of the times, forgetting that we ourselves have ad 
 mitted the elements which have superseded the old." 
 
AMERICANIZATION: THE OTHER SIDE OF 
 THE CASE 
 
 JOHN KULAMER 
 
 BEFORE putting the patient under the anaesthetic and 
 operating on him, give him a chance to say a few words: 
 they may help the wise doctors in their diagnosis, and may 
 suggest the kind of operation to be performed. It is no con 
 solation to the patient or to his friends to say that the 
 operation was successful but the patient died. "American 
 ize the foreigners" is- the cry heard all over the country. 
 Several state legislatures have already passed laws, more 
 or less practical, to satisfy this hysterical cry; and the pres 
 ent session of Congress has similar legislation on its pro 
 gramme. I say hysterical advisedly, for the reason that it 
 looks so to the "foreigners" who have gone through the 
 mill, who are in better position to know the situation, and 
 can judge better the results of ill-advised attempts by legis 
 lators to make to order Americans out of "foreigners." It 
 is not a question of principle with us alien-born American 
 citizens; but the means by which "foreigners" are sought 
 to be Americanized give us cause to raise our voices in pro 
 test. By all means, let those who seek the bounty of this 
 liberal country to settle here permanently become in spirit 
 and in truth Americans; and let those who come here 
 temporarily, so long as it pleases America to admit them, 
 gratefully accept her munificence, and observe scrupu 
 lously all her laws; but the question is, can a "foreigner" 
 become a true American by force? Some of the legislation 
 already passed, and some of the methods contemplated, 
 savor strongly of force. Is that wise? Is it practical? Is it 
 American? 
 
228 AMERICANIZATION 
 
 I preface this, so as not to be misunderstood. Although 
 born in far-off Czecho-Slovakia, under the shadow of the 
 snow-capped Tatra, I can without boasting say that I yield 
 to no one in my loyalty to the Stars and Stripes; and if I 
 differ in my views as to the methods to be used in American 
 izing those who, like me, were born in other countries, I do 
 it out of love for my adopted country, and because I am 
 anxious to see these efforts crowned with success. We who 
 are Americans by our free choice (pardon the boast) deplore 
 sincerely the faults of our compatriots, and are most anx 
 ious to see them remedied; we are heartily in favor of any 
 practical movement on the part of American-born citizens 
 to help these people to become true Americans, in the full 
 meaning of the word; but we say that you will never suc 
 ceed by using the same methods that drove many of them 
 to seek the shelter of free American institutions. Do not 
 transplant Prussia or Hungary to the shores of liberal 
 America. Prussian and Magyar methods have proved to be 
 a failure; the Irish nation is a fairly lively corpse, in spite of 
 the fact that the prohibited Celtic language is almost reck 
 oned among the dead languages. Remember this: a parrot 
 does not become a man by learning to say, "Polly wants a 
 cracker, "or to swear like a sailor. Do not confuse the means 
 with the end : a man can commit treason in English as read 
 ily as in Hottentot. 
 
 First of all, why this hectic outcry just now? Why this 
 feverish activity to remedy by legislation the evils that 
 grew up through years of neglect, nay, almost brutal oppo 
 sition, on the part of the American-born; through years of 
 galling ridicule and heartless exploitation; through years of 
 contempt and prejudice? Let us face the facts squarely. 
 Is it because of the activities of the paid agents of foreign 
 governments during the war? Is it because of foreign and 
 native propaganda now? Why does not the government 
 
THE OTHER SIDE OF THE CASE 229 
 
 deal with individuals according to their just deserts? Why 
 does the government so scrupulously adhere to the con 
 stitutional safeguards of individuals in its proceedings 
 against those who openly renounce and ridicule them? 
 Could anything be more humiliating than the arrogance of 
 the departing Emma Goldman? Of all the "foreigners" 
 whom it is proposed now to Americanize, only a negligible 
 percentage is dangerous to American institutions, and the 
 government of such a powerful nation ought to have no 
 trouble in getting rid of these. 
 
 Some of them are crude in their manners, illiterate, and 
 ignorant of the fine points of our Constitution; but at heart 
 they are loyal to their new country; their greatest desire is 
 to become like Americans, whom they admire; their great 
 est boast is that they are citizens, and they almost worship 
 their "second papers," if they have been able to get them. 
 I need not cite proofs of this : it is inscribed in letters of blood 
 on the pages of American history. To-day many of them 
 are, besides, bound to this country by gratitude for the help 
 which it extended to their oppressed brethren in the land of 
 their nativity. During the war they looked upon the Stars 
 and Stripes, not only as the flag of their adopted country, 
 but also as a symbol of hope, a guaranty of freedom to their 
 mother countries : and so it is now. 
 
 They are living beings, and it is the essential principle of 
 life to respond to favorable environment. All efforts at 
 their Americanization should be founded upon this princi 
 ple. Remove difficulties out of their way, create a favorable 
 environment, and they will respond to it. Do not place new 
 difficulties in their way. 
 
 The greatest obstacles to the speedy Americanization of 
 foreigners are the ridicule of, contempt for, and prejudice 
 against them on the part of native Americans. In showing 
 this, I will confine myself to the experience of the Czecho- 
 
230 AMERICANIZATION 
 
 Slovaks, so that I may be able to make out a concrete case, 
 and because I am best acquainted with their spirit and sit 
 uation. The Bohemian or Czech portion of the Czecho 
 slovaks are old settlers in this country; most of them are 
 considered as Americanized. The Slovak immigration is 
 rather recent, and is included in that invidious term, 
 "foreigners." The first immigrants came here, or rather 
 were brought here, by American agents scouring Europe 
 for laborers; so that originally they were sought after. 
 They first settled in the hard-coal regions of Pennsylvania. 
 After them came thousands seeking larger opportunities, or 
 fleeing from Magyar political persecution. That they are 
 hard workers and economical, everyone concedes. But it is 
 said, in justification of the existing prejudice, if class- 
 prejudice can be justified, that they have so many bad 
 habits, their manners are so uncouth, their dress so ridicu 
 lous and crude, they live in such an unsanitary way, they 
 are such drunkards and fight so much in fact, they are 
 chronic trouble-makers. There are two other specifications, 
 of a different nature, charged against them : that they con 
 stitute the cheap labor of the country and compete unfairly 
 with the American laborer, and that they come here only to 
 save up money and take it home with them, thus taking 
 out of the country a large portion of its capital. Before 
 answering these accusations categorically, let me say this 
 in general: they are deeply religious, no matter what reli 
 gion they prof ess; there are hardly any professional hardened 
 criminals among them; and there are no anarchists. 
 
 It may be a little humiliating to proud Americans to 
 know that the manners of these foreigners deteriorate in the 
 United States. They have lost many good points by their 
 contact with Americans, principally on account of bad ex 
 ample. Trained in the hard school of centuries of servitude 
 under the most cruel masters, the Slovaks are naturally 
 
THE OTHER SIDE OF THE CASE 231 
 
 respectful to their superiors, not necessarily servile, 
 retiring, and law-abiding; they are trusting, kind-hearted, 
 and cheerful. To them the state and its authority are things 
 sacred. True, the laboring class does not possess the polish 
 of the salon, cannot wear a tuxedo with grace and elegance; 
 but are American laborers courtiers? They learned to chew 
 tobacco in America, but nothing is more repellent to them 
 than to see the cheek of a well-dressed man bulge with a 
 "quid," and they cannot understand how a man in an 
 exalted position, say a judge in the courtroom, can squirt 
 tobacco-juice under the bench. Their dress may appear 
 ridiculous; but when milady turns up her puissant nose at 
 the unshapely dress of her Slovak sister, let her remember 
 that she looks so ungainly because she is trying to imitate 
 Parisian fashions; in her native country she wore lace and 
 embroidery over which milady would rave, and that made 
 with her own hands; she wore the finest hand- made linen, 
 her own product, from the flax to the garment. She has not 
 tortured her shape all her life out of the proportions which 
 nature bestowed on her. 
 
 They will amuse themselves on Sundays in a boisterous 
 manner, have music and dancing. It should not be, even if 
 there is no real harm in it, if for no other reason than out of 
 deference to American customs. At home they did it mostly 
 in the open air, under some spreading tree; and they hardly 
 realize the difference when it is done in confined quarters. 
 
 Now about their housing conditions. Here the same 
 statement applies as to their manners : they live here, as a 
 rule, worse than they did at home. Who is to blame? The 
 first settlers lived exclusively in company houses, and thou 
 sands of them still use such quarters as their employers 
 supply them. Those living in cities mostly occupy houses 
 from which proud American families draw rents. And what 
 exorbitant rates they pay! At the rate which they pay for 
 
232 AMERICANIZATION 
 
 their two or three rooms they could rent palaces at home, 
 if counted by rooms. In the old country, no matter how 
 humble the cottage, it had a small plot of ground around it, 
 and the flower-garden in front of it was one of the house 
 keeper s greatest prides. A large coal company in Pennsyl 
 vania, in recent years, has made some effort to better the 
 housing conditions, and now in the blooming front gardens 
 you can see the reproduction of some old country village. 
 The Slovak women are the largest buyers of stove-polish, 
 and no other women spend so much time on their knees 
 scrubbing the floors. 
 
 So long as the American government drew large revenues 
 from the sale of liquors, who dares to accuse them of dis 
 loyalty because they drank a good deal? As to being trou 
 ble-makers : if the facts were thoroughly sifted, it would ap 
 pear that in the majority of cases the fights at celebrations 
 were caused by American hoodlums who wanted forcibly to 
 share their kegs of beer, which the "hunkies" naturally re 
 sented. I need not describe how much the first settlers in 
 the hard-coal regions of Pennsylvania suffered at the hands 
 of a certain organized gang of another nationality, dozens 
 of whom finally expiated their crimes on the gallows. We 
 heard of their terrorism four thousand miles away. 
 
 Now take the other side of the picture: what did the 
 "foreigner" have to endure? Ridicule, contempt, persecu 
 tion, exploitation, extortion, injustice, all of which was due 
 to the prejudice against him. He is very seldom called by 
 his name, is always referred to as "hunkie," or "dago," or 
 the like; he is made on all sides to feel that he is despised, 
 that he is a stranger and unwelcome. His children are dis 
 criminated against, no matter how hard he tries to bring 
 them up according to the American standard. To bring 
 this home: several times my little girl asked me, "Daddy, 
 why does Jennie call me a hunkie? " It hurts, and not 
 
THE OTHER SIDE OF THE CASE 233 
 
 everybody can take such matters philosophically, espe 
 cially when he knows that his child is just as good as, if not 
 better than, the other. 
 
 This ostracism by American-born children and young 
 folk is bearing very disastrous fruit. Fine clean-cut young 
 men of foreign parentage have gone wrong because com 
 pelled to associate with American scum. They are shunned 
 by their equals, made to feel uncomfortable among them, 
 and so they seek other society, often dangerous. And this 
 discrimination is not always crude and brutal, owing to ig 
 norance. Some years ago I had occasion to make an argu 
 ment before the court in bane, three judges sitting. Some 
 days later one of the judges was kind enough to compliment 
 
 me on my effort, and added that Judge had remarked 
 
 upon the fact that a foreign-born attorney could acquit him 
 self so well. And why not, pray? It would take volumes to 
 describe the abuse, ill-treatment, discrimination, and even 
 brutality which the "hunkies" have to suffer at their work 
 work which the native American would disdain to per 
 form, but which must be done. Let us spread a pall of 
 forgetfulness over it. Furthermore, only those connected 
 with the practice of law know the amount of injustice and 
 extortion that is practised on them. Prejudice often blinds 
 even the jurists sitting as judges. Details could be given ad 
 nauseam. At times it seems as if Americans thought that 
 the foreigners have no ordinary human feelings. 
 
 It is true that the first settlers competed with American 
 labor; but they soon learned their lesson. There are no 
 stauncher supporters of organized labor than foreigners, 
 and they form the backbone of some large unions. Just now 
 there is an outcry against them, and all the labor unrest is 
 laid at their doors. But go to their meetings, and you will 
 find that in some locals the only Americans are the officers 
 who are their leaders. In whose hands is the national lead- 
 
234 AMERICANIZATION 
 
 ership? How many foreigners are at the head of large labor- 
 organizations? The number of foreign agitators who are 
 dangerous to American institutions is small : why does not 
 the government eject them summarily? It is a principle of 
 American jurisprudence that a man can renounce his coun 
 try; why is not the reverse also true, that a country can re 
 nounce its citizen, after he has openly declared himself to 
 be opposed to all organized government? Easily misled; 
 blind followers; unfit for our institutions, it will be objected. 
 Which is a greater crime, to lead astray or to follow astray? 
 Besides, why is it almost impossible to abolish political 
 bossism throughout the whole country? That is politics, I 
 hear someone say. 
 
 It is true that many of them return to the old country 
 and take money along with them their hard-earned sav 
 ings. Can they be blamed for wishing to return to more 
 congenial personal surroundings and put up with political 
 oppression which is more distant? The fact is that the 
 United States should appreciate this propensity of the for 
 eigners; it has saved the country many a labor crisis, and 
 has automatically solved the question of unemployment, 
 with which other countries have had to wrestle. The vol 
 ume of travel by sea was a good barometer, and a very 
 sensitive one, of business conditions in this country. When 
 slack times came, the outgoing business of the steamship 
 companies was brisk, and when conditions improved, the 
 tide turned the other way. Thus unemployment was kept 
 at a minimum. America should not begrudge the price in 
 money that it had to pay for the solution of such a delicate 
 problem. 
 
 Now, what efforts are being made to make the foreigners 
 forget all this, and to make them cheerful, loyal, and willing 
 Americans? I am sure that no one wants to force them 
 to become Americans: that would be un-American. The 
 
THE OTHER SIDE OF THE CASE 235 
 
 method so volubly and voluminously discussed can be di 
 vided into two groups educational and legislative. Settle 
 ment-workers are as thick as flies among the foreigners. 
 But these latter, for some reason or other, are not respond 
 ing to kindness, it will be reported by some kind-hearted 
 but rather meddlesome lady. It would be far better for her 
 if she stayed at home and did her own knitting, put her own 
 house in order. It would be well if this work were more 
 sympathetic and less professional. The foreigners do not 
 want to be pampered, but neither do they want strangers to 
 come among them with a better-than-thou air, and try to 
 "uplift" them. The earnest foreigner, with a little self- 
 respect in him, hates to be made a public spectacle, to be 
 exhibited like some rare bird or a freak of nature, to boost 
 the standing of some professional Americanizer, so that his 
 salary may be increased. There is a suspicion among the 
 foreign-born that all this hullabaloo now raised is artificial, 
 that the professional Americanizers need it in their business. 
 The war has created so many new professions, organizers, 
 and charity workers, who need new outlets for their talents. 
 I was present at one "Americanization" meeting and was 
 disgusted with it. "See," the professional seemed to say, 
 "what I made of these savages; that is my work." I know 
 of a Federal judge who has made more Americans, tech 
 nically and spiritually, by his sympathetic talks when grant 
 ing papers, than whole shoals of professional Americanizers. 
 They fairly worship him, but the outside world knows little 
 about it. But when it is done to the accompaniment of 
 theatricals, the victim may remember what the boss called 
 him at his job the day before, and he will not have a very 
 high opinion of American sincerity. 
 
 Really all such work is unnecessary. The old generation, 
 the original immigrants, will soon die out, and the public 
 schools are doing all that can be done for the coming genera- 
 
236 AMERICANIZATION 
 
 tion. Only one thing need be added to their present system : 
 teach the American-born children to treat the others as 
 their equals. The problem will solve itself, if you will re 
 move the friction between native and alien-born, and keep 
 meddlers, who cannot take the foreigner s view, from inter 
 fering with the natural process. 
 
 In the vast mass of literature spread broadcast over the 
 country so far I have seen but one item which showed the 
 proper spirit. The Massachusetts Bureau of Immigration 
 gave out this motto: "Our foreign-speaking neighbors de 
 sire our friendship; we desire theirs. We should make these 
 strangers in a strange land feel at home ; that we want 
 them to share our house. You can help make America 
 united by special courtesy and patience in your daily con 
 tact with all who do not speak our language readily. Help 
 make America, its institutions, and Americans dear to 
 them, so that they, too, will become steadfast Americans." 
 
 Sincere thanks from all foreigners to the composer of this 
 beautiful motto. In other words, Americanize the American 
 first, and there will be no trouble with the foreigners; for 
 all these various methods are not truly American. These 
 foreigners have a very high conception of Americanism. 
 My teacher of English (and he was a Prussian), so far as I 
 can remember (it was twenty-eight years ago) , said to me : 
 "John, no higher compliment can be paid to a man than to 
 say that he is an American gentleman; the qualification 
 * American raises him above everybody." That was my 
 first lesson in Americanism; quite often I was disabused; 
 but when I meet with an American gentleman, I have no 
 trouble in recognizing him from this description. 
 
 All the legislative programmes contain in one form or 
 another a provision for forcing the foreigners to learn the 
 English language. That is a great mistake. By all means, 
 raise the bars against immigrants as high as public policy 
 
THE OTHER SIDE OF THE CASE 237 
 
 demands; be very stringent in granting the foreign-born 
 the supreme privilege of citizenship. It is right, nay, it is 
 the duty of the country, to protect itself against undesira 
 bles; but the language test is the poorest test that could be 
 thought of. It is just as futile as the literacy test in the 
 immigration legislation; it will produce results contrary to 
 those desired. It will admit into the country and to citizen 
 ship the crook, the agitator, the dangerous criminal, and 
 keep out the honest, hard-working man. The swindler, the 
 agitator, and his like are usually educated men, and can 
 easily comply with the provisions of such legislation; the 
 ignorant, unlettered man is politically harmless. 
 
 It is also proposed by some to abolish the foreign-lan 
 guage press. That would be taking away from aliens the 
 only means of acquiring information, and from the govern 
 ment the only means of reaching the foreigners. I am sur 
 prised that no government officials raise their voices in pro 
 test after their experience during the war; after the help 
 that they received from the foreign-language newspapers in 
 counteracting the poisons spread by agitators of hostile for 
 eign governments. They could also tell that they received 
 voluntary information concerning meetings at which dan 
 gerous principles were advocated. 
 
 History has proved that language will not necessarily 
 make a man a loyal citizen. What has England gained by 
 forcing the Irish to learn the English language? Prussia 
 tried to Prussianize the Poles by prohibiting the use of the 
 Polish tongue, and Hungary tried to Magyarize its various 
 nationalities by similar legislation; and what has happened? 
 The principle of the oppressed nations was that action 
 creates reaction; and the more the government tried to 
 force a strange tongue on them, the more strenuously they 
 opposed it. 
 
 Language is a very useful means to an end; also it is 
 
238 AMERICANIZATION 
 
 something to which a strong sentiment attaches; but it is a 
 mistake to make the language an end, the test of a man s 
 loyalty. So long as a man is free to learn another language, 
 he will do his best to learn it, if it is to his advantage; but 
 if you try to force him to learn it, his opposition to it will at 
 once be awakened. The psychology of this need not be 
 discussed; it is a fact. The foreigners in this country realize 
 the value of the English language, and are doing their best 
 to acquire it; but let them find out that it is obligatory, and 
 they will present a thousand and one excuses against learn 
 ing it. For one thing, they will argue: "You call this a 
 free country; we came here because we thought it was so; 
 we fled from our native land because they wanted us to 
 learn a strange tongue; and behold, America is doing the 
 same thing." They do not object to the English language 
 as a language, but they will more or less strenuously oppose 
 it, if required by law to learn it. Their objections are not 
 wholly for sentimental reasons; most of them are hard 
 working men, doing back-breaking labor in grime and amid 
 intense heat which completely exhausts them; to require 
 them, after a day put in at such work, to go to school and 
 to learn a new language, at an advanced age, is almost in 
 human. It is all very well for a professional Americanizer, 
 sitting at his desk, with plenty of leisure, to learn another 
 language; but it is a different matter for a hard-working 
 man. 
 
 Besides, it is unnecessary: the new generation knows 
 English; a great many young men and women are even 
 ashamed of their mother-tongue. Outside of small villages, 
 where the population is in some cases almost entirely for 
 eign, the children do not speak their mother-tongue even 
 among themselves. It is a common experience with some 
 parents to be answered in English by their children when 
 addressed in their mother-tongue. What advantage can be 
 
THE OTHER SIDE OF THE CASE 239 
 
 gained from arousing the secret opposition of these people 
 by such legislation? Because of the undue importance 
 given to language in European countries by their govern 
 ments, it received an equally undue importance in the esti 
 mation of the people; language was raised by these means 
 to the same sentimental heights as religion. It is not wise 
 for legislators to meddle with sentiments not directly harm 
 ful to the country. 
 
 This problem of language will also solve itself, if left to 
 its natural course. Liberal and generous treatment, in 
 accord with the principles of Americanism, on the part of 
 individuals in their daily contact with the foreigners, will 
 do more than volumes of laws. Let every American consti 
 tute himself a committee of one to behave with ordinary 
 courtesy toward the foreigner, and not to discriminate 
 against him, and he will respond wonderfully. He need not 
 show special courtesy as the Massachusetts Bureau asks: 
 ordinary courtesy will be sufficient. The American is not 
 asked to go out of his way to please the foreigner; he needs 
 only to meet him half-way. If the government will supple 
 ment this by energetic action against the real undesira 
 bles, the country will have nothing to fear from the others. 
 There is no one more disgusted with the dilatory, temporiz 
 ing tactics of our government in dealing with these pests 
 than the alien-born citizens. 
 
 It can be said with assurance that the solidarity of the 
 United States during the past war, in spite of its very much 
 mixed population, rested solely on its past liberality, these 
 unpleasant features nothwithstanding. The foreign-born 
 population overlooked all that, and their love for their 
 adopted country wiped out all past irritation, healed all 
 their wounds when the great crisis came. Do not repay 
 them with distrust and unnecessary burdens. Was not the 
 Kaiser disappointed in his "American party"? And the 
 evidence against the Germans seemed to be the strongest. 
 
240 AMERICANIZATION 
 
 The position of the foreigners here is analogous to that of 
 the Christians in the days of persecution by the Roman Em 
 pire. They are treated, not as individuals, according to their 
 deserts, but as a class, and the whole class is condemned. 
 There seems to be a certain perversity that is unexplain- 
 able; indulgence to the individual transgressor and severity 
 with the class. A man can openly renounce his allegiance, 
 declaim against organized forms of government, denounce 
 the right of the government to interfere with the individual, 
 laugh at constitutional guaranties, and at the same time 
 invoke them for his protection, and they will be granted to 
 him; but you condemn a whole class without a hearing. It 
 seems so un-American, for the American boasts of his fond 
 ness for fair play. 
 
 Let Congress stop playing politics, catering to the popu 
 lar clamor; let it pass stringent laws for the protection of 
 the country, and wise and constructive laws to promote its 
 future welfare; let the executive powers enforce those laws 
 fearlessly; let them hunt down the violators, high and low, 
 native or alien, and it will be found that those of Czecho 
 slovak origin, naturalized or unnaturalized (I speak now 
 for them alone), are, as a class, loyal, law-abiding, hard 
 working inhabitants of the United States, and that there 
 are no more criminals and traitors among them than among 
 native-born Americans. What more is wanted of them? 
 
NATIONAL INDEPENDENCE AND 
 INTERNATIONALISM * 
 
 BERTRAND RUSSELL 
 
 IN the relations between states, as in the relations of 
 groups within a single state, what is to be desired is inde 
 pendence for each as regards internal affairs, and law rather 
 than private force as regards external affairs. But as to 
 groups within a state, it is internal independence that must 
 be emphasized, since that is what is lacking; subjection to 
 law has been secured, on the whole, since the end of the 
 Middle Ages. In the relations between states, on the con 
 trary, it is law and a central government that are lacking, 
 since independence exists for external as for internal affairs. 
 The stage we have reached in the affairs of Europe corre 
 sponds to the stage reached in our internal affairs during 
 the Wars of the Roses, when turbulent barons frustrated 
 the attempt to make them keep the King s peace. Thus, al 
 though the goal is the same in the two cases, the steps to 
 be taken in order to achieve it are quite different. 
 
 There can be no good international system until the 
 boundaries of states coincide as nearly as possible with the 
 boundaries of nations. But it is not easy to say what we 
 mean by a nation. Are the Irish a nation? Home Rulers 
 say yes; Unionists say no. Are the Ulstermen a nation? 
 Unionists say yes; Home Rulers say no. In all such cases, 
 it is a party question whether we are to call a group a nation 
 or not. A German will tell you that the Russian Poles are a 
 nation; but as for the Prussian Poles, they, of course, are 
 
 1 Reprinted from Bertrand Russell s Political Ideals, by permission of 
 the author and of the publishers, The Century Company. 
 
 17 
 
242 NATIONAL INDEPENDENCE 
 
 part of Prussia. Professors can always be hired to prove, 
 by arguments of race or language or history, that a group 
 about which there is a dispute is, or is not, a nation, as may 
 be desired by those whom the professors serve. If we are to 
 avoid all these controversies, we must endeavor, first of all, 
 to find some definition of a nation. 
 
 A nation is not to be defined by affinities of language 
 or a common historical origin, though these things often 
 help to produce a nation. Switzerland is a nation, in spite 
 of diversities of race, religion, and language. England and 
 Scotland now form one nation, though they did not do so at 
 the time of our Civil War. This is shown by Cromwell s 
 saying, in the height of the conflict, that he would rather be 
 subject to the dominion of the royalists than to that of the 
 Scotch. Great Britain was one state before it was one na 
 tion; on the other hand, Germany was one nation before it 
 was one state. What constitutes a nation is a sentiment and 
 an instinct a sentiment of similarity and an instinct of 
 belonging to the same group or herd. The instinct is an 
 extension of the instinct that constitutes a flock of sheep, or 
 any other group of gregarious animals. The sentiment that 
 goes with this is like a milder and more extended form of 
 family feeling. When we return to England after being on 
 the Continent, we feel something friendly in the familiar 
 ways, and it is easy to believe that Englishmen on the 
 whole are virtuous, while many foreigners are full of design 
 ing wickedness. 
 
 Such feelings make it easy to organize a nation into a 
 state. It is not difficult, as a rule, to acquiesce in the orders 
 of a national government. We feel that it is our govern 
 ment, and that its decrees are more or less the same as those 
 which we should have given if we ourselves had been the 
 governors. There is an instinctive, and usually unconscious, 
 sense of a common purpose animating the members of a 
 
AND INTERNATIONALISM *4S 
 
 nation. This becomes especially vivid when there is war or 
 a danger of war. Anyone who, at such a time, stands out 
 against the orders of his government feels an inner conflict 
 quite different from any that he would feel in standing out 
 against the orders of a foreign government, in whose power 
 he might happen to find himself. If he stands out, he does 
 so with a more or less conscious hope that his government 
 may in time come to think as he does; whereas, in standing 
 out against a foreign government, no such hope is necessary. 
 This group instinct, however it may have arisen, is what 
 constitutes a nation, and what makes it important that the 
 boundaries of nations should also be the boundaries of states. 
 
 National sentiment is a fact and should be taken account 
 of by institutions. When it is ignored, it is intensified and 
 becomes a source of strife. It can be rendered harmless only 
 by being given free play so long as it is not predatory. But 
 it is not, in itself, a good or admirable feeling. There is 
 nothing rational and nothing desirable in a limitation of 
 sympathy which confines it to a fragment of the human race. 
 Diversities of manners and customs and tradition are on 
 the whole a good thing, since they enable different nations 
 to produce different types of excellence. But in national 
 feeling there is always latent or explicit an element of 
 hostility to foreigners. National feeling, as we know it, could 
 not exist in a nation which was wholly free from external 
 pressure of a hostile kind. 
 
 And group feeling produces a limited and often harmful 
 kind of morality. Men come to identify the good with what 
 serves the interests of their own group, and the bad with 
 what works against those interests, even if it should happen 
 to be in the interest of mankind as a whole. This group- 
 morality is very much in evidence during war, and is taken 
 for granted in men s ordinary thought. Although almost 
 all Englishmen consider the defeat of Germany desirable 
 
244 NATIONAL INDEPENDENCE 
 
 for the good of the world, yet, nevertheless, most of them 
 honor a German for fighting for his country, because it has 
 not occurred to them that his actions ought to be guided by 
 a morality higher than that of the group. A man does right, 
 as a rule, to have his thoughts more occupied with the 
 interests of his own nation than with those of others, be 
 cause his actions are more likely to affect his own nation. 
 But in time of war, and in all matters which are of equal 
 concern to other nations and to his own, a man ought to 
 take account of the universal welfare, and not allow his 
 survey to be limited by the interest, or supposed interest, 
 of his own group or nation. 
 
 So long as national feeling exists, it is very important that 
 each nation should be self-governing as regards its internal 
 affairs. Government can be carried on only by force and 
 tyranny if its subjects view it with hostile eyes; and they 
 will so view it if they feel that it belongs to an alien nation. 
 This principle meets with difficulties in cases where men of 
 different nations live side by side in the same area, as hap 
 pens in some parts of the Balkans. There are also difficul 
 ties in regard to places which, for some geographical reason, 
 are of great international importance, such as the Suez 
 Canal and the Panama Canal. In such cases the purely 
 local desires of the inhabitants may have to give way before 
 larger interests. But in general, at any rate as applied to 
 civilized communities, the principle that the boundaries of 
 nations ought to coincide with the boundaries of states has 
 very few exceptions. 
 
 This principle, however, does not decide how the rela 
 tions between states are to be regulated, or how a conflict of 
 interests between rival states is to be decided. At present, 
 every great state claims absolute sovereignty, not only in 
 regard to its internal affairs, but also in regard to its external 
 actions. This claim to absolute sovereignty leads it into 
 
AND INTERNATIONALISM 245 
 
 conflict with similar claims on the part of other great states. 
 Such conflicts at present can be decided only by war or by 
 diplomacy, and diplomacy is in essence nothing but the 
 threat of war. There is no more justification for the claim 
 to absolute sovereignty on the part of a state than there 
 would be for a similar claim on the part of an individual. 
 The claim to absolute sovereignty is, in effect, a claim that 
 all external affairs are to be regulated purely by force, and 
 that when two nations or groups of nations are interested in 
 a question, the decision shall depend solely upon which of 
 them is, or is believed to be, the stronger. This is nothing 
 but primitive anarchy, "the war of all against all," which 
 Hobbes asserted to be the original state of mankind. 
 
 There cannot be secure peace in the world, or any deci 
 sion of international questions according to international 
 law, until states are willing to part with their absolute sov 
 ereignty as regards their external relations, and to leave 
 the decision in such matters to some international instru 
 ment of government. An international government will 
 have to be legislative as well as judicial. It is not enough 
 that there should be a Hague Tribunal, deciding matters 
 according to some already existing system of international 
 law; it is necessary also that there should be a body capable 
 of enacting international law, and this body will have to 
 have the power of transferring territory from one state to 
 another, when it is persuaded that adequate grounds exist 
 for such a transference. Friends of peace will make a mis 
 take if they unduly glorify the status quo. Some nations 
 grow, while others dwindle; the population of an area may 
 change its character by emigration and immigration. There 
 is no good reason why states should resent changes in their 
 boundaries under such conditions, and if no international 
 authority has power to make changes of this kind, the 
 temptations to war will sometimes become irresistible. 
 
246 NATIONAL INDEPENDENCE 
 
 The international authority ought to possess an army 
 and navy, and these ought to be the only army and navy in 
 existence. The only legitimate use of force is to diminish 
 the total amount of force exercised in the world. So long as 
 men are free to indulge their predatory instincts, some men 
 or groups of men will take advantage of this freedom for 
 oppression and robbery. Just as the police are necessary to 
 prevent the use of force by private citizens, so an interna 
 tional police will be necessary to prevent the lawless use of 
 force by separate states. But I think it is reasonable to 
 hope that, if ever an international government, possessed 
 of the only army and navy in the world, came into existence, 
 the need of force to exact obedience to its decisions would 
 be very temporary. In a short time the benefits resulting 
 from the substitution of law for anarchy would become so 
 obvious that the international government would acquire 
 an unquestioned authority, and no state would dream of 
 rebelling against its decisions. As soon as this stage had 
 been reached, the international army and navy would be 
 come unnecessary. 
 
 We have still a very long road to travel before we arrive 
 at the establishment of an international authority, but it is 
 not very difficult to foresee the steps by which this result 
 will be gradually reached. There is likely to be a continual 
 increase in the practice of submitting disputes to arbitra 
 tion, and in the realization that the supposed conflicts of 
 interest between different states are mainly illusory. Even 
 where there is a real conflict of interest, it must in time be 
 come obvious that neither of the states concerned would 
 suffer as much by giving way as by fighting. With the 
 progress of inventions, war, when it does occur, is bound to 
 become increasingly destructive. The civilized races of the 
 world are faced by the alternative of cooperation or mutual 
 destruction. The present war is making this alternative 
 
AND INTERNATIONALISM 247 
 
 daily more evident. And it is difficult to believe that, when 
 the enmities which it has generated have had time to cool, 
 civilized men will deliberately choose to destroy civilization 
 rather than acquiesce in the abolition of war. 
 
 The matters in which the interests of nations are sup 
 posed to clash are mainly three: tariffs, which are a delusion, 
 the exploitation of inferior races, which is a crime; pride of 
 power and dominion, which is a schoolboy folly. The 
 economic argument against tariffs is familiar, and I shall 
 not repeat it. The only reason why it fails to carry convic 
 tion is the enmity between nations. Nobody proposes to 
 set up a tariff between England and Scotland, or between 
 Lancashire and Yorkshire. Yet the arguments by which 
 tariffs between nations are supported might be used just as 
 well to defend tariffs between counties. Universal free trade 
 would indubitably be of economic benefit to mankind and 
 would be adopted to-morrow if it were not for the hatred 
 and suspicion that nations feel one toward another. From 
 the point of view of preserving the peace of the world, free 
 trade between the different civilized states is not so im 
 portant as the open door in their dependencies. The desire 
 for exclusive markets is one of the most potent causes of 
 war. 
 
 Exploiting what are called "inferior races" has become 
 one of the main objects of European statecraft. It is not 
 only, or primarily, trade that is desired, but opportunities 
 for investment: finance is more concerned in the matter 
 than industry. Rival diplomatists are very often the ser 
 vants, conscious or unconscious, of rival groups of financiers. 
 The financiers, although themselves of no particular na 
 tion, understand the art of appealing to national prejudice, 
 and of inducing the taxpayers to incur expenditure of which 
 they reap the benefit. The evils that they produce at home, 
 and the devastation that they spread among the races whom 
 
248 NATIONAL INDEPENDENCE 
 
 they exploit, are part of the price that the world has to pay 
 for its acquiescence in the capitalist regime. 
 
 But neither tariffs nor financiers would be able to cause 
 serious trouble, if it were not for the sentiment of national 
 pride. National pride might be on the whole beneficent if it 
 took the direction of emulation in the things that are im 
 portant to civilization. If we prided ourselves upon our 
 poets, our men of science, the justice and humanity of our 
 social system, we might find in national pride a stimulus to 
 useful endeavors. But such matters play a very small part. 
 National pride, as it exists now, is almost exclusively con 
 cerned with power and dominion, with the extent of terri 
 tory that a nation owns, and with its capacity for enforcing 
 its will against the opposition of other nations. In this it is 
 reinforced by group morality. To nine citizens out of ten it 
 seems self-evident, whenever the will of their own nation 
 clashes with that of another, that their own nation must be 
 in the right. Even if it be not in the right on the particular 
 issue, yet it stands in general for ideals so much nobler 
 than those represented by the other party to the dispute, 
 that any increase in its power is bound to be for the good 
 of mankind. Since all nations equally believe this of them 
 selves, all are equally ready to insist upon the victory of 
 their own side in any dispute in which they believe that 
 they have a good hope of victory. While this temper per 
 sists, the hope of international cooperation must remain 
 dim. 
 
 If men could divest themselves of the sentiment of rivalry 
 and hostility between different nations, they would per 
 ceive that the matters in which the interests of different 
 nations coincide immeasurably outweigh those in which 
 they clash; they would perceive, to begin with, that trade 
 is not to be compared to warfare; that the man who sells 
 you goods is not doing you an injury. No one considers that 
 
AND INTERNATIONALISM 249 
 
 the butcher and the baker are his enemies because they 
 drain him of money. Yet, as soon as goods come from a 
 foreign country, we are asked to believe that we suffer a 
 terrible injury in purchasing them. No one remembers 
 that it is by means of goods exported that we purchase them. 
 But in the country to which we export, it is the goods we 
 send which are thought dangerous, and the goods we buy 
 are forgotten. 
 
 The whole conception of trade which has been forced 
 upon us by manufacturers, who dreaded foreign competi 
 tion, by trusts, which desired to secure monopolies, and by 
 economists poisoned by the virus of nationalism, is totally 
 and absolutely false. Trade results simply from division of 
 labor. A man cannot himself make all the goods of which 
 he has need, and therefore he must exchange his produce 
 with that of other people. What applies to the individual 
 applies in exactly the same way to the nation. 
 
 There is no reason to desire that a nation should itself 
 produce all the goods of which it has need; it is better that 
 it should specialize in those goods which it can produce to 
 most advantage, and should exchange its surplus with the 
 surplus of other goods produced by other countries. There 
 is no use in sending goods out of the country except in order 
 to get other goods in return. A butcher who is always will 
 ing to part with his meat but not willing to take bread from 
 the baker, or boots from the bootmaker, or clothes from the 
 tailor, would soon find himself in a sorry plight. Yet he 
 would be no more foolish than the protectionist who desires 
 that we should send goods abroad without receiving pay 
 ment in the shape of goods imported from abroad. 
 
 The wages system has made people believe that what a 
 man needs is work. This, of course, is absurd. What he 
 needs is the goods produced by work, and the less work 
 involved in making a given amount of goods, the better. 
 
250 NATIONAL INDEPENDENCE 
 
 But, owing to our economic system, every economy in 
 methods of production enables employers to dismiss some 
 of their employees, and to cause destitution, where a better 
 system would produce only an increase of wages or a dimi 
 nution in the hours of work, without any corresponding 
 diminution of wages. 
 
 Our economic system is topsy-turvy. It makes the inter 
 est of the individual conflict with the interest of the com 
 munity in a thousand ways in which no such conflict ought 
 to exist. Under a better system, the benefits of free trade 
 and the evils of tariffs would be obvious to all. Apart from 
 trade, the interests of nations coincide in all that makes 
 what we call civilization. Inventions and discoveries bring 
 benefit to all. The progress of science is a matter of equal 
 concern to the whole civilized world. Whether a man of 
 science is an Englishman, a Frenchman, or a German, is a 
 matter of no real importance. His discoveries are open to 
 all, and nothing but intelligence is required in order to 
 profit by them. The whole world of art and literature and 
 learning is international: what is done in one country is not 
 done for that country but for mankind. If we ask ourselves 
 what are the things that raise mankind above the brutes, 
 what are the things that make us think the human race 
 more valuable than any species of animals, we shall find 
 that none of them are things in which any one nation can 
 have exclusive property, but all are things in which the 
 whole world can share. Those who have any care for these 
 things, those who wish to see mankind fruitful in the work 
 which men alone can do, will take little account of national 
 boundaries, and have little care to what state a man hap 
 pens to own allegiance. 
 
 The importance of international cooperation outside the 
 sphere of politics has been brought home to me by my own 
 experience. I was until lately engaged in teaching a new 
 
AND INTERNATIONALISM 251 
 
 science, which few men in the world were able to teach. My 
 own work in this science was based chiefly upon the work of 
 a German and an Italian. My pupils came from all over the 
 civilized world: France, Germany, Austria, Russia, Greece, 
 Japan, China, India and America. None of us were con 
 scious of any sense of national divisions. We felt ourselves 
 an outpost of civilization, building a new road into the vir 
 gin forest of the unknown. All cooperated in the common 
 task and in the interest of such a work the political 
 enmities of nations seemed trivial, temporary, and futile. 
 But it is not only in the somewhat rarefied atmosphere of 
 abstruse science that international cooperation is vital to 
 the progress of civilization. All our economic problems, all 
 the questions of securing the rights of labor, all^the hopes 
 of freedom at home and humanity abroad rest upon the 
 creation of international good- will. 
 
 So long as hatred, suspicion, and fear dominate the feel 
 ings of men toward each other, so long we cannot hope to 
 escape from the tyranny of violence and brute force. Men 
 must learn to be conscious of the common interests of man 
 kind in which all are at one, rather than of those supposed 
 interests in which the nations are divided. It is not neces 
 sary, or even desirable, to obliterate the differences of man 
 ners and custom and tradition between different nations. 
 These differences enable each nation to make its own 
 distinctive contribution to the sum total of the world s 
 civilization. 
 
 What is to be desired is not cosmopolitanism, not the 
 absence of all national characteristics that one associates 
 with couriers, wagon-lit attendants, and others who have 
 had everything distinctive obliterated by multiple and 
 trivial contacts with men of every civilized country. Such 
 cosmopolitanism is the result of loss, not gain. The inter 
 national spirit which we should wish to see produced will be 
 
252 NATIONAL INDEPENDENCE 
 
 something added to love of country, not something taken 
 away. Just as patriotism does not prevent a man from feel 
 ing family affection, so the international spirit ought not to 
 prevent a man from feeling affection for his own country. 
 But it will somewhat alter the character of that affection. 
 The things which he will desire for his own country will no 
 longer be things which can be acquired only at the expense 
 of others, but rather those things in which the excellence of 
 any one country is to the advantage of all the world. He 
 will wish his own country to be great in the arts of peace, to 
 be eminent in thought and science, to be magnanimous and 
 just and generous. He will wish it to help mankind on the 
 way toward that better world of liberty and international 
 concord, which must be realized if any happiness is to be 
 left to man. He will not desire for his country the passing 
 triumphs of a narrow possessiveness, but rather the endur 
 ing triumph of having helped to embody in human affairs 
 something of that spirit of brotherhood which Christ 
 taught and which the Christian churches have forgotten. 
 He will see that this spirit embodies not only the highest 
 morality, but also the truest wisdom, and the only road by 
 which the nations, torn and bleeding with the wounds which 
 scientific madness has inflicted, can emerge into a life where 
 growth is possible and joy is not banished at the frenzied 
 call of unreal and fictitious duties. Deeds inspired by hate 
 are not duties, whatever pain and self-sacrifice they may 
 involve. Life and hope for the world are to be found only 
 in the deeds of love. 
 
ON THE FENCE 
 
 FRANCES PARKINSON KEYES 
 
 LAST spring, when it became apparent that New Hamp 
 shire might be the "pivotal state" on the suffrage question, 
 and that consequently my husband s vote on the Susan B. 
 Anthony amendment in the Senate might count a great deal 
 more than one vote usually does, I was naturally asked, 
 more than once, my opinion on the subject, especially as 
 the general impression seemed to prevail that my own 
 inclinations had been against equal suffrage rather than for 
 it and this was true, to a certain extent. But he voted, 
 with my entire approval, for the amendment, and I was 
 immediately the recipient of countless grateful letters from 
 women who imagined that I might, after all, have used such 
 influence as I possessed in urging him to do so. As a matter 
 of fact, I did not. We talked the question over, and agreed, 
 as usual, that the stand he afterwards did take was the 
 stand he ought to take; but I did not try to change his 
 opinion, nor have I changed my own. For frankly there 
 seems to be no reason, now that the question is settled, or 
 practically so, why I should not be frank my position is, 
 and has been for a long time, the extremely awkward one 
 of being "on the fence." I should be delighted if someone 
 would rescue me from it. 
 
 Most of the stock arguments in favor of suffrage seem to 
 me to be so irrefutably true as to be absolutely bromidic. 
 Women are certainly " people." They are certainly " equal " 
 to men. If they have property, they certainly ought to 
 have a part in the management of public affairs in the local 
 ity where it lies. It is eminently "fair," for all these reasons, 
 
254 ON THE FENCE 
 
 that women should vote if they wish to, and the majority 
 of them apparently do wish to the majority, that is, of 
 the whole country, not the majority in certain sections of 
 the country where it is still unpopular. And, though they 
 are still untrained in politics, there seems to be no reason 
 why they should not acquire experience, and develop tal 
 ents along these lines; for so far they have proved that they 
 can do anything that men can do, and do it well. Anyone 
 unconvinced of this before the late war must be certain 
 even if reluctantly certain of it now. 
 
 Nor can there be any question any intelligent ques 
 tion as to whether they "have time * to vote. It does 
 not take long to go to the polls. The poorest and most igno 
 rant woman for poor and ignorant women unfortunately 
 do exist can pile her dishes in the sink, and give the baby 
 a dose of paregoric, and run down the street for half an 
 hour. The richest and most frivolous woman for these, 
 quite as unfortunately, exist, too can step into her lim 
 ousine, and be back again at No. 930 Golden Avenue with 
 scarcely an interruption of a rubber of bridge or a luncheon 
 engagement. And all the women in between these two ex 
 tremes who, thank Heaven, exist, too can crowd one 
 more thing into their already crowded day if they wish or 
 need to. 
 
 As to one of the stock arguments against suffrage, that 
 some of its advocates have not behaved with dignity and 
 good sense, it is so silly that it ought to carry no weight 
 at all. It is, of course, true. Suffragists and anti-suffra 
 gists are human beings, with faults and virtues like other 
 human beings. There are bound to be some among them 
 who do not measure up to the highest standards of conduct 
 and intelligence, and who have done their cause immeasur 
 able harm by violence of speech and action, by rebellion 
 against law and order, by using suffrage as a means of self- 
 
ON THE FENCE 255 
 
 advertisement, or, worse still, by combining it with some 
 other doctrine, free love, for instance, or its direct oppo 
 site, when, in fairness to their sister workers in suffrage 
 who agreed with them not at all on these other points, if for 
 no other reason, they should have confined themselves to 
 the one common interest. But to condemn all suffragists, 
 ninety per cent of whom are sincere and high-minded and 
 "righteous altogether "; to say that they are not properly so 
 described, is like saying that all doctors are mercenary, that 
 all lawyers are tricky, that all actresses are immoral. It is 
 untrue. It is stupid. It is wicked. 
 
 There is, moreover, one very decided advantage which, 
 it seems to me, suffrage is sure to bring, and that is eco 
 nomic independence for women. Curiously enough, there is 
 much less said about this than about the probable "purify 
 ing" of politics, over which I am personally much more 
 skeptical. The states which already have suffrage, even 
 those which have had it for some time, are not noticeably 
 purer than those which have it not, and the reason is so 
 self-evident as to require very little comment. There are 
 all kinds of women in the world, just as there are all kinds 
 of men. We are not, as a sex, above every sort of reproach, 
 no matter how much idealists men and women both 
 would like us to believe that we are. We have faults which 
 are no more attractive than men s faults, though they are 
 not always the same ones. We hope, of course, that Amer 
 ican women and American men are going to grow 
 better as time goes on; but it will probably be some time 
 before we are perfect, and, meanwhile, we shall all vote, if 
 any of us do. The rain will continue to fall upon the just 
 and the unjust, as it has been doing for some ages already, 
 and as it is eminently desirable that it should continue 
 to do. 
 
 But all women, good, bad, and indifferent, want money, 
 
256 ON THE FENCE 
 
 need money, and ought to have money; and so far, many of 
 them in a good many cases those who need it and deserve 
 it most have not had their fair share of it. A man is re 
 sponsible for his wife s or his daughter s bills, but he cannot 
 be compelled to give them one cent in actual cash unless he 
 wishes to; and a lamentably large number of husbands and 
 fathers do not wish to. I believe that, even without suffrage, 
 women would have been better treated in this regard, as 
 time went on, than they have been in the past, or than they 
 are at present. A hundred years ago, if a woman with 
 property married, the property all became her husband s. 
 This unjust law, like many others, has been changed by 
 men. And the recent war has proved a great eye-opener to 
 many wilfully blind males. They have seen their wives and 
 sisters and sweethearts, and even their mothers, who 
 might perhaps be supposed to carry on old-fashioned tradi 
 tions better than the younger generation, who "could n t be 
 trusted to handle money"; who "had no business instinct," 
 fare forth without turning a hair, without more ado, in 
 fact, than they formerly made about getting breakfast or 
 putting the baby to bed (for which they were not paid), and 
 bring home very well-filled pay-envelopes once a week. 
 The uses of adversity have indeed proved sweet. These 
 same women, who have always worked hard, harder, in a 
 good many cases, than at their new jobs, are never going to 
 be satisfied again to ask for money for carfare and postage- 
 stamps, with the possible chance of being refused. And 
 their husbands and brothers and fathers are becoming aware 
 of the fact drowsily aware, perhaps, but still aware. 
 
 "My dear," Jane is saying to John all over the country, 
 "I love you and John, Junior, and I love to live at home 
 with you both. I d rather do it than anything else in the 
 world; much rather than run an elevator at Smithkins and 
 Smithkins. But is n*t my doing it worth anything, in hard 
 
ON THE FENCE 257 
 
 cash, to you, or the government, or or somebody? " (Jane 
 is still a little vague in places.) "It seems to me a much 
 more important job than running an elevator to you and 
 the government and and everybody; and I got paid for 
 that! Who is going to look after you and John, Junior, if I 
 don t? And if no one looks after you, and poor helpless men- 
 creatures like you all over the country, what s going to 
 become of the country? Of course, I shan t go back to the 
 elevator, even if we don t have a more satisfactory arrange 
 ment than we had before you went across that is, I don t 
 think I shall; but it is n t fair, just the same is it? " 
 
 So John begins to do a little thinking, drowsily at first, 
 but gradually, with that elevator running up and down in 
 the back of his mind, in a more and more wideawake man 
 ner, and decides that it is n t fair, and that, moreover, as 
 Jane hints, it s a very poor risk for him to take, to try it. 
 I do not believe for one minute that the wives of to-day are 
 less loving, as some persons try to make us believe, than 
 those of a generation ago; but they are more self-respecting. 
 I do not believe that they consider marriage less sacred, but 
 more so, because they refuse to endure the gross offenses 
 which, alas, sometimes defile it. The old-fashioned woman 
 put up with all kinds of faults sometimes with all kinds 
 of crimes; she suffered indignities and allowed her children 
 to suffer abuse, because she was afraid of losing her man, 
 that is, her means of support. But she hated and despised 
 and revolted against him while she did it. There is a good 
 deal of truth in a little verse I read somewhere not long ago 
 
 When the old-fashioned wife with her husband had strife. 
 "I ll go back to my mother," she d sob; 
 But the wife of to-day does n t argue that way; 
 She says, "I ll go back to my job." 
 
 John does not want Jane to go back to her job. He is 
 just as much afraid of losing her as his grandmother was 
 
 18 
 
258 ON THE FENCE 
 
 afraid of losing his grandfather, and usually with more and 
 with better reasons. It has a very wholesome effect upon 
 him. He behaves, as a rule, much better than his grand 
 father did to his wife. His morals and his manners are 
 both better. So I think, in time, he would probably find a 
 way to be "fair" to Jane, as I have said before, even if she 
 did not help him make the laws. But he will find it much 
 more quickly when she does. He will not allow himself to 
 be side-tracked by treaties and investigations and other 
 impediments. Jane will see to it that he does not. She will 
 get her fair share in a fair length of time. 
 
 "But," I can hear dozens of other women saying, "my 
 husband or father is not like that. You are very un 
 just to dwell on isolated cases. The average woman has not 
 had to earn her own living; she has been supported and 
 given all the money she could possibly use, and she has been 
 very comfortable just as she was. I m sure I don t want 
 to be economically independent. It s much easier just to 
 charge things, and to ask for twenty-five dollars or so when 
 ever I need it. I can t add up accounts to save my life. I 
 would much rather George did all that." 
 
 This is exactly where "comfortable" women have been 
 criminally blind and lazy. The "average woman" to whom 
 Ethel refers let us call her Ethel for convenience is 
 the average woman of her acquaintance, which is a very dif 
 ferent thing from the average woman of the whole country 
 of the whole world. The average woman is not, as Ethel 
 likes to think, a "nice," sheltered, well-educated, well-to-do 
 girl, with a pleasant home and indulgent father; whose life 
 is made easy for her at every step; who never worries about 
 anything or works at anything, and who marries, in her 
 early twenties, some nice, intelligent, well-to-do man, whose 
 indulgence simply supplements that of the still indulgent 
 father. 
 
ON THE FENCE 259 
 
 This kind of woman has, indeed, been very "comfort 
 able," and has received quite as much as she deserved in 
 many cases a good deal more than she deserved from the 
 men who have supported her. But she represents a very 
 small minority. She is not the average woman. Ethel has 
 only to consult statistics, if she will take that much 
 trouble, to find this out. Eighty per cent of the married 
 women in the United States do all their own housework, 
 and that represents an amount of labor which Ethel cannot 
 even comprehend. More than half the cases of insanity 
 among women are found in farmers wives, the women 
 whose "simple, healthful, wholesome life" Ethel likes to 
 contemplate from a safe distance, very often from the 
 back seat of her limousine as she rides through "the rural 
 districts," which gives her not the smallest inkling of 
 the long hours, and hard drudgery, and bleak isolation that 
 such a life often contains. Ethel, perhaps, has not read the 
 uncomfortable fact that something like twenty-five thou 
 sand women in this country die in child-birth every year 
 for lack of proper medical care; and the still more uncom 
 fortable one that seventy per cent of the operations per 
 formed on women are made necessary by the sins of others 
 for which they are in no way to blame. The average woman 
 is exactly the one who does need help, and to whom suffrage 
 will undoubtedly bring help. 
 
 "Well, then," says Ethel a little sulkily, and powdering 
 her nose as she speaks, "why do you call yourself on the 
 fence ? You are an out-and-out suffragist. I should think 
 you would have said so long ago." 
 
 No, I am not, and for the very reason though it may 
 sound contradictory that I agree with Jane and not 
 with Ethel. I fully believe, as I said before, that women 
 can do if they have to everything that men can do, 
 and do it well. But it seems to me an overwhelming pity 
 
260 ON THE FENCE 
 
 that, except in emergencies, like war, for instance, they 
 should either have to or want to. For men cannot do every 
 thing that women can do cannot do it at all, without 
 any question of doing it well. And the things that women 
 only can do seem to me the greatest and most important in 
 the whole world. We need economic independence very 
 much indeed, and the sooner the better; but we need 
 mothers much more. The place to begin to purify politics 
 is not at the polls, but in the nurseries. 
 "Give me a child until he is ten," the Jesuits used to 
 say; " anyone may have him after that he will be a good 
 Catholic all his life." "Give me a child until he is ten/ 
 any woman of to-day ought to be able to say; " anyone may 
 have him after that he will be a good man all his life." 
 The exceptions to this rule are so rare as to be negligible, 
 though of course they do exist. Of all the men I have known 
 I cannot recall one whose mother did her level best for him 
 when he was little who did not turn out well when he grew 
 up. I do not mean by this the mother who paid someone 
 else even if that person were thoroughly competent and 
 trustworthy to take care of her sons, but the mother who 
 worked and saved and sacrificed; who played with her 
 children and prayed with them, too; who taught them and 
 talked with them and nursed them when they were sick; 
 who gave them an example and an inspiration which were 
 to last them all their lives, not only through what she told 
 them, but through what she showed them. 
 
 Motherhood always has been, and always will be, the 
 greatest factor in civilization. It has never needed to be 
 recognized as such more than it does now. Henry Adams 
 is right when he says in his Education that it is time we 
 stopped regarding sex as a sentiment and recognized it as a 
 force. And the career of motherhood, to be successful, is 
 very nearly all-absorbing. It takes up, in many women s 
 
ON THE FENCE 261 
 
 lives, all their time for a few years, all their best time for a 
 good many years. We cannot, of course, all be mothers, 
 and those of us who cannot would be admirably employed 
 in helping directly or indirectly the more fortunate 
 ones who can. Perhaps suffrage will do this. I am not sure 
 that it will not, in the ways that I have mentioned before, 
 and in other ways upon which its conscientious supporters 
 rely. But I fear that there will be fewer mothers all the 
 time to help. The whole world, feminine as well as mascu 
 line, is seething with restlessness and discontent, with the 
 desire for liberty and pleasure and excitement; and this 
 seething will not, for a time at least, tend to make most 
 women content to live quietly in more or less seclusion, 
 while others are rushing headlong into the busy world, 
 especially if they know they are as well fitted to go as their 
 friends and sisters, or even better. They will be too con 
 scious of the sacrifices that they feel they are making, to 
 be entirely happy in them. I do not mean all women, of 
 course, possibly not even most, but enough to bring about 
 many empty nurseries. 
 
 "The spirit of the times " is not a mere catchword. It is a 
 vital force. All human beings are imitative, women espe 
 cially so. "Ethel has a new hat, and so I want one too." 
 "Jane is running an elevator, and so I think I had better 
 do something of the kind myself. " If Ethel had been going 
 bareheaded, if Jane had been making jam, the speaker 
 would have wanted to do those things instead. And so 
 mothers or potential mothers will want to have out 
 side careers, too, if their friends are having them, and their 
 friends will encourage them in this. 
 
 My own experience in this regard shows on a very small 
 scale what may easily happen what constantly does hap 
 pen on a large one. No sooner had my first little article 
 a mere paragraph in an unimportant magazine, which 
 
263 ON THE FENCE 
 
 has since failed! appeared in print, than countless sin 
 cere well-wishers began to urge me to give up all my time 
 to writing, and to ask me if I did not find my family a great 
 drawback in my " career." I cannot remember that anyone 
 has ever asked me if my career provided I could attain 
 one of that sort, which of course is doubtful at best might 
 not be a great drawback to my family! For it is perfectly 
 true that outside careers, conscientiously followed, are, or 
 should be, hardly less all-absorbing than that of mother 
 hood. It is utterly impossible to do justice to both at the 
 same time. No woman who has lived with a man who has 
 become what is popularly called a success in business or a 
 profession or politics needs to be told that that success has 
 to be earned, in nine cases out of ten, by letting everything 
 else go by the board. He may be fond of all sorts of amuse 
 ments, have a dozen other interests he will, practically, 
 have to abandon them, and keep his eyes glued straight 
 ahead on his single-track railway. He may love his wife 
 and children dearly, but they will perforce be a secondary 
 consideration with him. When he has achieved success, he 
 may, of course, relax a little; but by that time the best 
 years of his life are gone. For a man, this usually pays. 
 Success is the biggest thing in his life. 
 
 I see no reason why women should not achieve this same 
 kind of success, if they really want it. But will it pay? Is 
 it the best thing in our lives? Perhaps for some women it is. 
 But when it becomes the best thing for the majority, what 
 is to become of the next generation? 
 
 "Why don t you ask your father that question?" the 
 wife of an eminently "successful" man told me recently 
 she had said to her sixteen-year-old son, when he came to 
 her with a question that she felt a man could perhaps an 
 swer better than she could, in spite of the confidence that 
 had always existed between herself and^the boy. 
 
ON THE FENCE 263 
 
 "Oh, I couldn t," he exclaimed quickly; "of course, 
 father and I are friends, but we re not intimate friends!" 
 
 If he and his mother had not been intimate friends either, 
 to whom would he have gone with his question? And if it 
 had been unintelligently or untruthfully answered, or if 
 it had not been answered at all, it is easy to fancy what 
 effect this would have had on the boy. 
 
 "But a great many women," says Jane, "don t want 
 careers. They want to stay at home, just as they always 
 have, being mothers. Why, I wouldn t give up John, 
 Junior, for anything else in the world! You ought to know 
 that! Or or John, either. Of course, I want to have my 
 rights, economic and otherwise, but I guess I can 
 manage that all right whether I vote or not. I got that job 
 running the elevator once, and I can get it again, if I have 
 to. But I want to vote, so that I can be an influence for 
 good in the world." 
 
 Well, my dear Jane, are n t you? And, if you are n t, why 
 are n t you? If that is your only argument for suffrage, if 
 you don t care about a career, if you re not worrying about 
 economic independence, your theory falls to pieces like a 
 child s house of cards. Most women deal with individuals 
 far more successfully than they do with masses; their out 
 look is intensely personal, their perspective is apt to be a 
 little inaccurate. They have, for instance, if they possess 
 strong characters, tremendous power over the men they 
 know. They have very little, except indirectly, over the 
 men they do not know. (I am speaking, of course, now, of 
 the "average woman," not of the unusually brilliant or 
 highly trained or charming exception who proves the rule.) 
 We have already discussed what a woman can do for her 
 sons, and I believe it is here that her greatest work lies; but 
 she can do much, too, for other women s sons, supplement 
 ing what they have already accomplished, for her brothers, 
 
264 ON THE FENCE 
 
 for her friends, for her father, for her lover, for her husband. 
 What she makes of them is like a pebble thrown into a 
 placid pool it causes an almost endless number of ever- 
 widening circles to form. She does not need to vote with 
 them, to do this. She needs only to love them; I mean by 
 this, of course, to love them wisely, and to love them 
 enough. 
 
 I know a great many women who during the war were so 
 busy sewing for the Red Cross that they had no time left 
 to devote to the members of their own families who went 
 overseas. I cannot believe that they were the ones who did 
 the most good. We are so proudly conscious as we have 
 every reason to be, nowadays of what the women who 
 have gone out of their homes have done, that I think we 
 are apt to forget what the ones who have stayed there have 
 accomplished. I know a woman whose own household de 
 mands are very heavy, and who feels rightly, I believe, 
 in her case that these should always come first. But 
 when the war began, she grieved, very sincerely, because 
 she seemed to have so little time for the kind of work that 
 most of her friends were doing. She knitted a few sleeveless 
 sweaters after the children were in bed at night; she bought 
 a few small Liberty bonds; she ate no candy or white bread. 
 But that was very little, after all. She saw other women 
 she knew sailing for France as Red Cross nursesorY.M.C.A. 
 workers, and others efficiently conducting big "campaigns " 
 and "drives," with a discouraged sense of her own useless- 
 ness, of the futility of the small efforts she did make. And 
 still, when the necessary things at home were done, she had 
 no more time left. 
 
 Then, unexpectedly, a great source of comfort came to 
 her. A friend of hers, who lived in the same village, had a 
 letter from her brother at a training-camp, and brought it 
 to read to the woman who felt that she never accomplished 
 anything. 
 
ON THE FENCE 265 
 
 "We were sitting around last night talking," the embryo 
 soldier wrote, "about the places we came from. Our cap 
 tain, who was with us, started it. He is a Southerner, and 
 I remarked that I supposed he had never been in New 
 England. He at once looked as if he were recalling some 
 thing very pleasant, and said yes, indeed, he once took a 
 canoe trip with a friend down the X River, and camped 
 one night on some beautiful meadows near the village of 
 Y. You can believe I jumped when I heard him speak of 
 home like that. In the morning they found that they were 
 getting pretty short of some necessities, he said, and they 
 decided to go to the nearest house and see if they could buy 
 them. So they walked up over the fields until they came 
 to a big old-fashioned house. 
 
 " The door was opened/ the captain went on, by the 
 lady of the house herself. She quite evidently was n t a 
 rich woman, and she was very simply dressed; but she was 
 young and gracious and charming for all that. We intro 
 duced ourselves, the captain was some kind of a pro 
 fessor, nothing eminent, but a good sort, and then she 
 invited us to come in, and perhaps we looked rather 
 hungry to stay to lunch. She had an agreeable husband 
 a farmer and two or three attractive and unusually 
 well-brought-up children. There was no fuss and flurry 
 over "unexpected company," but the lunch was awfully 
 good, just the same. It was plain to see that she was not 
 only hospitable, but a good housekeeper. Afterwards she 
 gave us everything we could possibly need in the way of 
 provisions, and sent us on our way rejoicing/ 
 
 "Of course, before the captain had got anywhere near 
 
 that far, I realized that he was talking about Anne Z . 
 
 He had described her to a T. But he did a good deal more 
 than describe her. 
 
 " I ve thought of that woman so many times since, he 
 
266 ON THE FENCE 
 
 said, and hoped I d see her again someti me. She s the 
 kind that does you most good to remember in times like 
 these. It was n t only that she took time to be kind to the 
 stranger within her gates. But there was an atmosphere of 
 peacefulness, of serenity and contentment, about her, as 
 well as of usefulness. It made you feel better just to look 
 at her. And she was n t exactly pretty either but she 
 was lovely/ 
 
 "Bread cast upon the waters coming back again after 
 many days," Anne told me afterwards that she said to her 
 self when she read that letter. That simple act of courtesy 
 and kindliness meant more to some soldier than all the 
 sweaters she could ever knit, than all the bonds she could 
 ever buy. There was never any question for her again as to 
 what her best work was it was simply to keep her own 
 home fires burning so brightly that they would reflect as far 
 away as France. 
 
 Anne does not represent the majority of women. She is 
 not even an average woman she is far too sheltered, far 
 too happy for that. She has had too many privileges, to 
 worry about her rights. She is not silly and selfish like 
 Ethel, not self-reliant and sturdy like Jane. But the fact 
 remains that she is the sort of woman whom most men pre 
 fer, whom they love best, think of oftenest, respect most. 
 And however much we may state that it makes no differ 
 ence what they prefer, we have got to take their likes and 
 dislikes into consideration, if we are to work side by side 
 with them, for a time, at least. Without their cooperation 
 we shall not accomplish much. We are too untrained and 
 untried. 
 
 "I have met several women," a very able man said to 
 me once, "whose vote I thought would do a great deal of 
 good and I found they were all anti-suffragists! " " Why 
 is it," another a young merchant asked me, "that 
 
ON THE FENCE 267 
 
 when women take up public work, of course, I see it 
 most in drummers; there are lots of women drummers now 
 adays; but it applies to anything else just as well, some 
 of them grow so masculine, and some of them so cheap? 
 Either way one is as bad as the other the bloom 
 seems to get all rubbed off. I suppose it s inevitable. But 
 I like to think of a woman as something so apart, so clean!" 
 
 We may exclaim I know I did that this is an exag 
 gerated statement : that the bloom does n t always get 
 rubbed off; or, if it does, whose fault is it? the woman s, or 
 that of the men with whom she deals? That, anyway, 
 bloom isn t important it s only pleasant; that one 
 does n t need to live apart to be clean. We may shout to 
 the skies that men who are themselves marvels of efficiency 
 are unreasonable in preferring to sit in front of a fire talking 
 to a woman with a quiet face and a still more quiet voice, 
 who is not, according to their standards, efficient at all, 
 rather than seek out one who is; that others, who go about 
 sowing wild oats on every highway, expecting to be for 
 given whenever they see fit to repent and stop, are unjust 
 when they demand that a woman s high-walled garden 
 should be fragrant with roses. Perhaps they are unreason 
 able, perhaps they are unfair (perhaps we are, too, some 
 times), but the fact remains. They continue to bow down 
 to the kind of woman whom we call a lady. And lady, as 
 we all know, meant originally "giver of bread." Not the 
 beggar for anything, not even for that to which she is justly 
 entitled, but the giver of the staff of life; the symbol of the 
 power to give life itself. 
 
 It is, then, women like Anne to whom I think we must 
 turn first of all in the new responsibilities that we must 
 face, in the heavier burdens that we must carry until, 
 through readjustment, these burdens become lighter per 
 haps than they have ever been before, if only because it is 
 
268 ON THE FENCE 
 
 through women like her that men will be most ready to 
 work with us. If she refuses to work with us, we shall be 
 hardly placed indeed. But, whatever her opinions have 
 been in the past, whatever they are now, for that matter, 
 I do not believe she will refuse. Suffrage is coming, and 
 it is coming to stay. It has not been "forced "on any of us. 
 If the women who did not want it are as numerous as the 
 ones who did, or more so, as many of them claim, then they 
 did not work as hard to prevent its coming as the ones who 
 did want it worked to bring it about. They have only 
 themselves to blame that it is here; and the thing to do now 
 is to stop crying over spilled milk, to stop remembering 
 that there is any spilled milk, or while remembering, to 
 ask themselves who spilled it, and do the best they canto 
 make it a success. 
 
 I am perfectly willing to make a personal matter of this, 
 -to say "I" instead of "they," if anyone prefers to 
 have me. I have been an anti-suffragist all my life; I dread 
 the very thought of voting; and yet I have never done any 
 thing to prevent the coming of suffrage except once, long 
 ago, to lend my name to a small anti-suffrage society. I 
 know dozens of other women, who, if they would be fair, 
 would admit the same thing. I do not know a single suffra 
 gist who has not worked heart and soul for what she wanted 
 and believed she ought to have. Let us be fair. To the 
 victors belong the spoils. 
 
 But the glory of the conquered is sometimes a very great 
 glory indeed. Some men have voted for suffrage in a spirit 
 of spite, almost, because they are "sick of the whole thing," 
 because it is "better to let women have what they want 
 peacefully as long as they will get it anyway," exactly as 
 a certain type of man gives in before his wife s tears, but 
 neither respecting them because they want it, nor trusting 
 them to use it well after they have got it. It is for Anne to 
 prove to them that they are wrong. 
 
ON THE FENCE 269 
 
 Other men have voted for it in a spirit of fairness, al 
 most of reverence, not only believing that we are enti 
 tled to it, but believing much more than that that we can 
 be trusted to do well with this, in addition to the things 
 that we do well already. It is for Anne to prove to them 
 that they are right. 
 
 I am not clever enough, I am not far-sighted enough, to 
 know how she can do it. It seems to me, as I have said be 
 fore, that her arms are full to overflowing already. That is 
 why I am still on the fence. I love best to think of her, too, 
 beside her glowing fire or in her sunny garden, with her 
 children beside her. But I do not feel that it is fair to say 
 that the women who have let their own fires go out, who 
 have neglected their gardens until they were overgrown 
 with weeds, are dragging her out against her will. I am 
 optimistic enough to believe that there are not many such 
 women anyway. I think it is rather the ones who have 
 never been able to own a garden, who have had no wood 
 with which to build their fires, who are calling to her through 
 the few that can give voice to their cry, to come and help 
 them. The average woman, who despises the stupid selfish 
 ness of Ethel and quails before the stern efficiency of Jane, 
 turns instinctively to Anne to help her. She has never 
 failed anyone in her life. She will not fail anyone now. 
 
ENLARGE THE PLACE OF THY TENT 
 
 ANNE C. E. ALLINSON 
 
 WHEN the outward order disturbs or displeases, man has 
 always sought another of his own fashioning. 
 
 The wrong of unshapely things is a wrong too great to be told; 
 I hunger to build them anew. 
 
 If the disturbance has been on a large scale, great cities and 
 states have been reared by the imagination. When Athens 
 soiled her democracy by injustice toward Socrates, and 
 had lost her external glory under the victorious attacks of 
 Sparta, there arose Plato s ideal republic, a state conceived 
 in righteousness and dedicated to justice. When the Visi 
 goths were destroying the walls of Rome, burning and sack 
 ing the world s centre, Saint Augustine pointed to the 
 impregnable battlements of the City of God. When the 
 England of Henry VIII became unendurable to good men, 
 Sir Thomas More furnished a mental refuge in Utopia. 
 
 Genius is immortal, and to one or another of these states, 
 men in later epochs have often turned. But their successive 
 births prove also that each racked and suffering age will 
 find its own way to expression. The desire for citizenship 
 in a country other than the visible is naturally strongest 
 when the outward order most profoundly fails. Builders of 
 ideal republics are not much noticed in periods of content. 
 In 1912, in a book on the Greek genius, occurred these 
 sentences : 
 
 "Our own age would probably decide against [Plato]. 
 Things are well with it. It is making money fast; educa 
 tion and recreation are cheap; science has removed many 
 causes of misery; savagery and revolution are rare; so at 
 
ENLARGE THE PLACE OF THY TENT 271 
 
 present we are riding high on a wave of humanism, and are 
 optimistic about the nature of man and the rapidity of the 
 march on Paradise." 
 
 It seems incredible that this could have been said of our 
 civilization by an intelligent student only six years ago. 1 
 Plunged into the hell of war, we now seem forever to have 
 lost the road to Paradise. The most carefully educated 
 nation in the world has proved the most uncivilized. 
 Science has produced horrible instruments of torture and 
 destruction. Savagery stalks the land and sea and befouls 
 the very air. Instead of riding high on a wave of humanism, 
 we are swept into the maelstrom of barbarism. Perhaps this 
 cataclysmic disturbance of our own order may give form 
 and life to some new spiritual city, a mighty work of suffer 
 ing genius inspired by ruin and despair. Some watcher of 
 the skies above the bleeding fields of Belgium or Serbia or 
 Poland may bid us lift our weeping eyes to a new star 
 bright with liberty and love. 
 
 But genius* when it speaks, will but give art s wholeness 
 to our own broken, half-formed longings. Already each 
 suffering soul is seeking its own place of retreat. It may be 
 well to dwell for a little on the quest and the goal. 
 
 The imagination is a natural vagrant. Even when we 
 are not suffering, we are in the habit of turning away from 
 the actual to the ideal, of devising for ourselves a tent for 
 the fancy, a covert from life s unshapeliness. Such refuges 
 are often a quaint combination of the inward and outward. 
 Displeased with conditions in this place or that, we have 
 flown in memory to other places where, once upon a time, 
 for us, a fairer order prevailed. Although actually on 
 the world s map, these become almost dreamlands, so com 
 pletely do we free them from the dust of actuality and set 
 them stainless and bright before the inward eye. 
 1 Written in 1918. 
 
272 ENLARGE THE PLACE OF THY TENT 
 
 Moods of vagrancy differ. At times we seek a retreat 
 from the mere insignificance of our occupations. There is a 
 round of activity which seems never to set us further along 
 our road. Obligations which hold us in a vise seem artificial. 
 The transitory crowds in upon the essential. Intercourse 
 with other people lacks depth and completeness. We share 
 the sickening sense of futility described by Seneca: "Life 
 is not painful, but superfluous." 
 
 The occasion suggests no heroic philosophy. We only 
 turn, in memory or anticipation, to some dearer place, where 
 work has seemed worthwhile, play has been sweet, and peo 
 ple have been real. We take the Horatian road from Rome 
 to the Sabine farm. Some "smiling corner of the earth" 
 holds for us enthusiasms caught from the unplumbed, 
 the illimitable, the unquenchable. There, a fine sincerity 
 gives the lie to cynicism, and simplicity of heart removes 
 the sense of life s futility. 
 
 Quite another refuge opens in quite another and larger 
 mood. Intellectually we chafe against certain limitations 
 which are imposed upon us by our national civilization. 
 We understand why our artists and authors of ten expatriate 
 themselves. Even for us these external conditions seem to 
 hold no color, no charm, no romance drawn from a myste 
 rious past, no beauty of age-old manners and customs. We 
 are uninteresting, unsuggestive. The imagination sleeps. 
 Producing much that is ennobled by worth and power, we 
 produce little that is roseate with charm or vibrant with 
 feeling. Blood runs cold in us. Loveliness is a stranger to 
 us. 
 
 Then, surely, we spread our magic carpet and fly across 
 the unviolated sea to Italy. There, around any corner, is 
 something lovely, or passionate, or mysterious. Perhaps, 
 across an Umbrian valley, two hill-towns draw us back and 
 forth, one lowering with Cinquecento memories of the high 
 
ENLARGE THE PLACE OF THY TENT 273 
 
 and mighty Baglioni, who spilled the blood of their enemies 
 even on the steps of the Duomo; the other still sweet and 
 fragrant with the spirit of Saint Francis. In the valley we 
 listen for the tramp of Roman feet, or try to catch the 
 strange Etruscan tongue among the oblivious vineyards 
 and olive orchards, even while we are enchanted by the 
 voices of the living peasants, who greet us with the mingled 
 manners of child and prince. 
 
 In one little town there are white oxen to watch in the 
 cattle-market, their horns aflame with scarlet ribbons, or 
 brilliant majolica to buy in the ancient square, by the foun 
 tain. In the other there is Giotto s hand, picturing the heart 
 of Francis. Here the pure dawn seems ever breaking with a 
 flush of rose in a holy sky. There the sun goes down, red as 
 the wounds of the slain. Angel-faced and bloodstained 
 generations, purity and passion wrought by the centuries, 
 all can be ours, when we are irked by the monotones of our 
 own new day. 
 
 But discontent is not always impressionistic. Sometimes, 
 in nobler mood, we are baffled by the disharmony of all mod 
 ern life. Wealth without temperance, democracy without 
 standards of excellence, pleasures without taste, liberty 
 without reverence, mercy without reason, power without 
 restraint our best possessions are at variance with others 
 equally desirable. In isolated orbits men strive for sepa 
 rate ends. The artist despises the politician, and the poli 
 tician overlooks the poet. The capitalist pities the scholar, 
 and the scholar wonders at the merchant. Statecraft and 
 art do not recognize each other. Philanthropy and the 
 humanities pass as strangers. 
 
 From this confusion there is a refuge. It is a bright city 
 by the /Egean Sea, where once men created an harmonious 
 state, and where still the very ruins of the public buildings 
 of that state feed the soul with an impression of harmony. 
 
 19 
 
274 ENLARGE THE PLACE OF THY TENT 
 
 Here, on a height above the plain, one may sit and lean 
 against a Doric column, golden with age, fresh with death 
 less beauty. The landscape before the eyes is very noble. 
 The moving sea, the buoyant air, give life and vigor to the 
 statuesque austerity of the encircling mountains. On plain 
 and hill and shore perfect color glows upon perfect form. 
 
 Within this area there came into being a people who 
 created "the fairest halting-place in the secular march of 
 man." Their primal passion for freedom resolved itself 
 tripartitely into free institutions, art, and intellectual in 
 quiry. And these again coalesced into a brief unity, un 
 known among men before or since. Reason, beauty, and 
 liberty were welded together in their laws, their religion, 
 their society, their statues and buildings, their manners, 
 even their clothes and the utensils for their food and drink. 
 On their ageless Acropolis, laden with broken fragments of 
 the past, harmony still dwells, no pensive ghost, but a living 
 and ennobling presence. Here is a retreat from the un- 
 moulded, the unperfected. 
 
 We have been speaking of these refuges of the mind as if 
 they still existed for us. But the fact is that the war has 
 destroyed their imaginative value. Our Sabine farm must 
 produce food or fuel. In Perugia or Assisi we should now be 
 seeking only news from the Piave. In Athens none of us 
 could dream by a column of the Parthenon while Venizelos 
 was speaking in the Senate chamber below. To all these 
 places we might thankfully go in the flesh, to work, to help, 
 to share the fate of the living; but no longer do we seek 
 them in dreams as enchanted hiding-places from imaginary 
 troubles. 
 
 Imaginary? Yes, for the danger of the hour wakes us 
 from the unreality of minor disturbances. What time is 
 there for artificial or futile occupations in towns and cities 
 
ENLARGE THE PLACE OF THY TENT 275 
 
 that we must make ready for their share in a mighty strug 
 gle? What concern can we feel for magic charm, when our 
 country is grappling with the barbarian? Even delicate and 
 harmonious adjustments seem unimportant, while justice 
 and liberty and humaneness are in mortal peril. 
 
 Thus we are taken away from such annoyances in the 
 outward order as may be accidental in our own experience, 
 or philosophy, and placed in the universal attitude of the 
 times. All of us are experiencing danger when we want 
 security, sorrow when we want joy, death when we want 
 life. 
 
 In a desert, we are told, the primary needs of life are 
 nakedly revealed. Hunger and thirst and danger cannot 
 be concealed; "there is nothing to posture hi front of them." 
 So in the wilderness of our present life there are no screens 
 before our deepest needs. We see them and know them to 
 be unsatisfied. We have the clarified vision which comes to 
 an individual in personal sorrow, when many ambitions and 
 desires are found to have no reality in comparison with the 
 longing for the touch of a vanished hand. But now it is not 
 only our own little order that is disturbed and broken, but 
 the outward order, from horizon to horizon. We grieve, not 
 only for some lost happiness of our own, but for the sorrows 
 of millions of our fellows whom we have never seen, for the 
 shattered peace, the dishonored law, the mutilated justice 
 of the world. 
 
 Deep despair always demands a refuge which will not 
 prove illusory when we seek admittance. In the larger dis 
 appointments of experience men have sometimes turned to 
 the unchanging beauty of nature, as opposed to the ugly 
 acts of humanity, or to the beauty of art, which is an inter 
 preter of life. How well do these things serve us now? 
 
 It is, probably, safe to assert that only deliberate recluses 
 and there must be few of these find in even the loveli- 
 
276 ENLARGE THE PLACE OF THY TENT 
 
 est landscape more than a temporary anodyne for to-day s 
 sorrow. In flight from personal pain and passion, one may, 
 indeed, have found a lasting peace upon the breast of Na 
 ture. But her welcome is less satisfying when we ask for 
 release from the pain and passion of the world. It is a brute 
 fact that the war sobs between us and the myriad laughter 
 of the breeze-swept bay, when the waves sport gently upon 
 a rocky shore of the Atlantic. It roars between us and the 
 deep-toned music of the open ocean, as the Pacific falls in 
 white surf upon wide dunes of sand. It slips a veil between 
 us and the sunny pasture, where purple grasses and pink 
 laurel glow beneath the shining pines and sombre firs. It 
 hangs as a pall between us and the vast summits of eter 
 nal snow, monuments of tranquillity born of primordial 
 convulsions. 
 
 At the best, Nature only uplifts or refreshes us, in the 
 interludes. At the worst, she mocks our fears and our cour 
 age with her passionless serenity. The beauty-loving Greeks 
 never expected to find in the beautiful physical world a 
 final refuge for the mind of man. That they were right, our 
 romantic imagination must now concede. Man s life reaches 
 beyond nature, with needs and tragedies untouched by 
 her consolations. 
 
 In the case of art there is another element to be consid 
 ered. It ministers to man s spirit by interpretation, but it 
 has not yet had time to interpret this present unexampled 
 need. 
 
 When a sick child is well, or a dead child buried, the poet 
 may fling his joy or grief into immortal words. But he can 
 not do it at the moment when, by the child s bedside, he 
 is wrestling with the destroyer. After Athens had saved 
 herself from Persia, ^Eschylus laid the "calming hand of 
 great poetry" upon even the exultation of a righteous 
 victor. But while the struggle was on, he fought in the 
 
ENLARGE THE PLACE OF THY TENT 277 
 
 ranks at Marathon and Salamis. Perhaps some day this 
 cinematographic present of ours will become for others the 
 past of which Bertrand Russell once wrote with insight and 
 power : 
 
 "The beauty of its motionless and silent pictures is like 
 the enchanted purity of last autumn, when the leaves, 
 though one breath would make them fall, still show against 
 the sky in golden glory. The Past does not change or strive; 
 like Duncan, after life s fitful fever it sleeps well; what was 
 eager and grasping, what was petty and transitory, has 
 faded away; the things that were beautiful and eternal shine 
 out of it like stars in the night." 
 
 So out of our tragedies may yet emerge that Tragedy 
 which is "of all arts the proudest, the most triumphant." 
 In that day our tears and blood will lighten men s anguish, 
 even as we are soothed by the beauty of the tears and blood 
 which drenched the plain of Troy. 
 
 Soothed, we say, because this beauty of a Past inter 
 preted by poetry supplies refreshment, rather than a per 
 fect refuge from the present. While we read we are safe, 
 but with the closing of the book danger again engulfs us. 
 Nor can we read at will, even in rare hours of leisure. We 
 are like Jerome, who exclaimed, while the capital of the 
 world was falling, "In vain I try to draw myself away from 
 the sight by turning to my books. I am unable to heed 
 them." 
 
 The same limitation rests upon the power of pictures and 
 carven marble. In music, probably, a larger number find, 
 persistently, a remedial grace. But, even so, the divinest 
 melody furnishes a remedy rather than a cure, an inspira 
 tion rather than a salvation. The general statement is true 
 that, at the height of our anguish, art is no better able than 
 nature permanently to reestablish within, the peace that 
 has been destroyed without. 
 
278 ENLARGE THE PLACE OF THY TENT 
 
 The foregoing refuges, whether major or minor, have one 
 significant point in common. Their present efficacy is de 
 nied by men and women who have tried them. From the 
 coverts of happy dreams, of nature, and of art, we straggle 
 back into the desert, reporting that they are too small to 
 hold the suffering soul. Now this one thing cleaves them 
 utterly apart from another refuge from the one that we 
 call religion. In all ages, the power of religion to shelter the 
 spirit of man has been denied only by those who have not 
 put it to the test. The triumphant affirmation of those who 
 dwell within it resounds in the diapason of the centuries: 
 God is my refuge. He hath delivered my soul in peace from 
 the battle that was against me. 
 
 The word God means as many kinds of salvation as there 
 are needs of salvation. Definitions of religion run an ex 
 traordinary gamut, even when they are offered in the same 
 hour and expressed in the same speech. Very lately, in print 
 which is scarcely dry on the pages, this definition has issued 
 from a philosopher s study: "Religion is the experience con 
 stituted by those thoughts, feelings, and actions which 
 spring from man s sense of dependence upon the power or 
 powers controlling the universe, and which have as their 
 centre of interest the cosmic fortune of values." From the 
 trenches, on the other hand, have been flung these molten 
 words: "Religion is betting your life on the existence of 
 God." 
 
 We may take our choice of these and other definitions, 
 and yet agree that the fruit of to-day s travail may prove 
 to be a fresh and beautiful religious consciousness. Many 
 things do, indeed, seem laden with this prophecy. But a 
 day of revelation is always a day of Pentecost every man 
 hears the Spirit speak in his own tongue. Cloven tongues, 
 like as of fire, will herald the day of a spiritual renaissance. 
 
 But the Spirit s baptism will be one and universal. And 
 
ENLARGE THE PLACE OF THY TENT 279 
 
 something, at least, of its character may be predicated 
 from the threefold characteristics of the religion which to 
 day opens wide to the suffering soul. 
 
 Religion is a permanent refuge. This is because it is 
 reached by the only road which ends in permanence. We 
 discover it, not by a withdrawal of attention from the 
 actual, but by working our way through the seen to the 
 unseen, through the show to the reality. "I take my Bible 
 and sit down where I am" was said by a woman who had 
 known many sorrows to another who was planning the "dis 
 traction" of travel in unaccustomed grief. 
 
 Never was a more practical chart drawn for the discov 
 ery of a trustworthy haven. The vade mecum may be what 
 one chooses, but the point of departure must be the very 
 centre of sorrow. In our present enlarged experience of suf 
 fering, this has been profoundly true. If we had run away 
 from the world, we should now be tasting the husks of cyn 
 icism, despair, and cowardice. But, staying in full sight of 
 all that appalls us, determined, not to forget but to under 
 stand, not to escape but to enter, we find ourselves, in our 
 own despite, inspired to sacrifice, sustained by hope, fed 
 and satisfied with faith. Disregarding the personal price, 
 we have found the cosmic fortune of values. Staking our 
 lives, we have found God. Our covert never grows so 
 straitened that we must abandon it. The temporal becomes 
 eternal. Though our outward man perish, yet the inward 
 man is renewed day by day. 
 
 Religion is a democratic refuge. The democracy of faith 
 transcends all democracies of the imagination. Nature and 
 art can in no wise be compared to it, for from their consola 
 tions large groups of human beings are automatically ex 
 cluded by some condition of servitude. Philosophers have 
 had much to say of inner citadels, from which the outward 
 order could tranquilly be surveyed. Thought, says one of 
 
280 ENLARGE THE PLACE OF THY TENT 
 
 them, has set us free from "the tyranny of outside forces," 
 free even "from the petty planet on which our bodies im- 
 potently crawl." But the thought of the philosopher is no 
 more a refuge for the illiterate than song is for the deaf, or 
 nature for miners sunk in the bowels of the earth. In Rome 
 Lucretius frankly enjoyed the Epicurean s superiority. 
 Sweet it is for the cragsman, from some high retreat, to 
 watch the legions clashing in the battlefield below, but 
 
 Sweeter by far on Wisdom s rampired height 
 
 To pace serene the porches of the light, 
 
 And thence look down down on the purblind herd 
 
 Seeking and never finding in the night. 
 
 But now that we are suffering together around the world, 
 ruler and commoner, rich and poor, learned and unlearned, 
 who is so mean as to hide himself in a retreat to which 
 others may not find the way? Nor could any such retreat 
 be more than a half-way house on the road to that universal 
 Truth from which none is ever turned away. "You can t 
 buy God," my charwoman said to me as she scrubbed my 
 floor. No, not with money, or with education, or with 
 talent, or with opportunity. A refuge wide enough to re 
 ceive the poilu with the general, the child with the philos 
 opher, the dull with the gifted, is the only refuge wide 
 enough to satisfy my soul, to give me beauty for ashes, the 
 oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit 
 of heaviness. 
 
 Surely our consciousness of spiritual unity will, like a 
 great wind, sweep away the arrogance that has hung about 
 even our ideal turrets. A modern intellectualist, while ad 
 mitting that each one of us has some "other life" than that 
 of the visible order, issues this curious ultimatum: "The 
 advocates of this Other Life must not promise too much. 
 They must not speak to us of regions of light and truth 
 made perfect, nor of fields unshaken by snow and tempest, 
 
ENLARGE THE PLACE OF THY TENT 281 
 
 where joy grows like a tree. . . . Our refuge promises no 
 eternal bliss. It gives only a rally ing-point, a spell of peace 
 in which to breathe and to think, a sense, not exactly of 
 happiness, but of that patience and courage which form at 
 least a good working substitute for happiness. * 
 
 But what is this but attempted autocracy in the realm 
 where the spirit bloweth as it listeth? Because the Roman 
 Stoics found only courage and patience in their refuge, was 
 Paul not to publish abroad the hope and joy which he found 
 in his? Because followers of Epicurus, ancient or modern, 
 find in the Sum of Things no concern for themselves, are 
 the followers of Christ to deny the Spirit s whisper: I will 
 come in to him and will sup with him and he with me? And 
 a worse autocracy still shall those who hear this whis 
 per seek to confine it within words and phrases fashioned 
 by themselves? 
 
 We are struggling for the spread of democracy in the 
 outer world. Shall we not thereby bring into being a heav 
 enly democracy? In God s house are many mansions, but 
 one home. 
 
 Finally, religion is a fruitful refuge. It is pregnant with 
 blessings for the outward order. In God there is no escape 
 from the world, but the will to remake it in his image. Our 
 Refuge becomes our Strength. 
 
 A spiritual renaissance is as destructive to the mediaeval- 
 ist who looks for salvation only in Paradise as to the weak 
 ling who seeks it in temporary distraction. The great ideal 
 ists have not built cities in the skies, mere cloud-cuckoo 
 towns for a race that cannot walk upon the earth. Saint 
 Augustine interpreted God s City to be the Christian 
 Church. Sir Thomas More and Plato built cities to be 
 inhabited by Englishmen and by Greeks. 
 
 If some ideal republic is born of genius to-day, it will 
 but give artistic form to the practical desires actuating 
 
282 ENLARGE THE PLACE OF THY TENT 
 
 ourselves, our governments, our armies. We do not, and we 
 ought not to, admit that freedom, justice, and humaneness 
 belong only outside of this world s order. Those who return 
 from Belgium tell us that the people of that country have 
 planned the very route in the streets of the capital through 
 which Albert shall march back with and to his own. Our 
 purest idealism does not send us skulking to some hiding- 
 place where we cannot see the wrongs of Belgium, but 
 drives us forth to win our right to an ally s place in that 
 triumphal procession. 
 
 If all wrong cannot be righted by ourselves, then we must 
 pave the way for this accomplishment by our children s 
 children. If reason asserts that the end can never be 
 achieved in entirety, faith still bids each man stake his life 
 on the triumph of God. Because no mind can fail to see the 
 difficulty of catching the ideal, as it wings its infinite 
 flight, within the net of the actual, Plato admits that his 
 perfect state is confined to the region of speculation . But, 
 he adds, what difference does that make? "The question of 
 its present or future existence is quite unimportant, for the 
 man of understanding will adopt the practices of such a city 
 to the exclusion of every other." Citizenship in the spiritual 
 controls a man s acts in the visible commonwealth. 
 
 Metaphors vary, but the spirit remains the same in all 
 the greater idealists. Even the early Christian visionary, 
 whose horror of the abominations of Rome resulted in the 
 "revelation" to his imagination of a new and holy city al 
 most completely dissociated from reality, declared that 
 from its holiness must come salvation for the world of men. 
 Through his city ran a pure river of life, crystal-clear, and 
 on either side of the river grew the tree of life and the 
 leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. It is 
 true that the early Christians in general, an obscure and 
 helpless minority in a great Empire, forced by their very 
 
ENLARGE THE PLACE OF THY TENT 283 
 
 position to think in terms of inward rather than of outward 
 power, tended to become altogether too detached from the 
 world in which they lived. They believed, indeed, that the 
 visible order was soon to be destroyed and therefore need 
 not be improved. Impotent in the flesh, they turned their 
 thoughts heavenward. But in this they were almost as re 
 mote from the spirit of Christ as from the minds of their 
 pagan neighbors. 
 
 In the homeliest figures since those who listened un 
 derstood little of citizenship, but much of daily toil the 
 founder of Christianity indicated the true relation between 
 the inner and the outer life: candles are lighted for the use 
 of those in the house; branches draw sustenance from the 
 vine in order to turn it into grapes. Even in the last hours, 
 before He was slain, when the outward had completely 
 failed Him, and He had but one last opportunity to reveal 
 his inward visions, He said to his disciples, "I have chosen 
 and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit." 
 
 So fruitful was their particular idealism that, in spite of 
 all mistakes and limitations, these unworldly disciples and 
 their followers did, in time, completely change the aspect of 
 their world. It is a commonplace of history that a new 
 spiritual consciousness transformed the philosophy, the 
 art and literature, and the ethical standards of Western 
 civilization. 
 
 Herein we have a dramatic illustration of the supreme 
 potency of religion in comparison with other refuges of the 
 human spirit. It is religion that creates and changes those 
 minor retreats to which the fancy and the imagination take 
 their roving way. From a new heaven is let fall a new earth. 
 
 If the f ruitfulness of idealism seems often to suffer blight 
 and decay, we must remember that the wretchedness of the 
 soil can counteract the vigor of the seed. Enriched by such 
 suffering as the world has never known, quickened by a 
 
284 ENLARGE THE PLACE OF THY TENT 
 
 faith which survives the most crucial test of history, we 
 shall yet bear fruit and our fruit shall remain. 
 
 In that day all our longings will be fulfilled. Life will 
 be significant, magical, and harmonious. Nature s beauty 
 will be the matrix for beautiful human activities. Art will 
 perfectly interpret for us the unseen and the ineffable. 
 Justice and liberty will prevail. Love will be the law of free 
 peoples. 
 
 It is but a matter of enlarging the place of our tent, until 
 we rear one that shall not be removed, the stakes whereof 
 shall never be plucked, neither shall any of the cords thereof 
 be broken. 
 
REASONABLE HOPES OF AMERICAN RELIGION 
 
 GEORGE A. GORDON 
 
 IT has been said that "our dreams are the shadows of our 
 hopes," and sometimes it is doubtless the case that our 
 hopes are the shadows of our dreams. In the vicious circles 
 of mere subjectivity, idea, dream, and hope belong in the 
 category of the null and void. To gain and retain a sober 
 meaning, hope must be the prophet of a reasonable human 
 experience. Kant s three questions at once occur to one 
 here: What can I know? What ought I to do? For what 
 may I hope? Knowledge and moral action are the parents 
 of legitimate hope. Our ideas of knowledge and duty may 
 differ from those of Kant; there can be no difference among 
 sensible persons about the conclusion that authentic hopes 
 are the ideal completions of an imperfect but an essentially 
 rational experience. The reasonable hopes of men are, there 
 fore, like the morning fires in the East; they herald the com 
 ing of the perfect day. America is the land of hope; con 
 cerning the greatest force in its life, its religion, shall it be 
 without great hopes? 
 
 "Keep in the middle of the stream," is the refrain of an 
 old negro melody. The negro toiling on the banks of the 
 Mississippi had observed that in the mightiest of American 
 rivers there were shallows, eddies, counter-currents, and all 
 sorts of water pranks. Hence his warning to the navigator : 
 " Keep in the middle of the stream." The negro s observa 
 tion became a metaphor significant for the adventure of his 
 soul. In the religion of his country there are shallows, whirl 
 pools, all sorts of eddies and oddities. There is, however, a 
 vast central movement. Whoever would live religiously 
 
286 REASONABLE HOPES 
 
 must remain in that great current; whoever would under 
 stand American religion must watch the middle of the 
 stream. Otherwise, while the observer may write about the 
 religion of America with genial humor, obvious charm, kindly 
 sarcasm, telling epigram, and artistic ecclesiastical pur 
 pose, he must write without insight into the spiritual life of 
 Americans, and however much he may protest against it, 
 the picture drawn will be "a chimera, the monster" of the 
 writer s imagination. 
 
 The religion of Americans, like that of other peoples, ut 
 ters itself in no uniform manner. Its natural idiom is now 
 formal and again intangible, obtrusive and evasive, orderly 
 and vagrant, superconscious and subconscious, normal and 
 eccentric, manifesting itself here in creeds and elaborate 
 ritual and there as pure spirit. At last, in all significant in 
 stances, it comes to something like this : Religion is the ulti 
 mate strength of man s soul, gathered mediately or imme 
 diately from the Soul of the universe. Its worth lies in its 
 relation to life as men wend their way through the wild 
 mysteries of time; it is illumination, inspiration, sustaining 
 might, increasing peace. Thus understood, religion carries 
 in its heart the principle of the complete idealization of 
 existence. The religious soul aims with Plato at becoming 
 like God so far as that is possible for man. He directs his 
 life toward a supreme end; with Eudemus, he endeavors to 
 behold God and to serve Him. He expects, in the highest 
 sense of the words, to fare well; with St. Paul he believes 
 that all things work together for good to them that love 
 God, with Socrates that in life or in death no evil can hap 
 pen to a good man. His religion is his final satisfaction; he 
 sings with Augustine, "Thou hast made us for thyself, and 
 we are restless till we repose in thee." He looks to the In 
 finite as the source of life s ideal and goal; he answers the 
 sublime call of Jesus : " Ye shall be perfect as your Heavenly 
 
OF AMERICAN RELIGION 287 
 
 Father is perfect." Religion is thus the ideal life of a soul 
 conscious that it lives and moves and has its being in the In 
 finite soul, able to utter its experience and hope in the great 
 confession, "The Eternal God is thy dwelling-place, and un 
 derneath are the everlasting arms." 
 
 It is at once admitted that nothing is satisfactory in the 
 present conditions of the religion of America. As in every 
 other region of our life, here, too, discontent and confusion 
 reign. There is, however, one great note of prophecy ring 
 ing in the heart of religious America, audible above the 
 tumult of confused and contentious tongues. A group of 
 serious American students, engaged in the arraignment of 
 an unsatisfactory college preacher, were silenced by one of 
 their number, who said: "I plead for this preacher. He has 
 done me a world of good. As I have watched him striving 
 earnestly to find something and always failing to find it, I 
 have been stimulated to hunt for that something myself. 
 I am now engaged in the hunt, and I have already found in 
 religion a reality and greatness beyond my utmost dream." 
 American churches, Protestant, Catholic, and Greek Ortho 
 dox, all American religious bodies, are more or less in the 
 condition of that college preacher. They are unsatisfac 
 tory; they are seeking something that they have hitherto 
 failed to find. They are, however, in earnest, and they are 
 stimulating by their earnestness and failure a multitude of 
 the elect youth of the land to undertake the search for them 
 selves. The unattained is the glory of American religion. 
 
 The mood of content, whether with the religious insight 
 won, the volume and quality of experience secured, the 
 ideals formed, the fellowship established, the influence ex 
 erted, or the character achieved, is to the genuine religious 
 American the worst of all bad signs. Men are in an infinite 
 world; they are capable of growth indefinitely great; con 
 tent with present attainments, therefore, means the arrest 
 of progress, the blight of hope. 
 
288 REASONABLE HOPES 
 
 America has decreed freedom for religion in the sure fore 
 sight of the advent of the crank and the freak. These abound 
 inside organized religion and outside. The American method 
 of treating the normal and the abnormal in faith follows the 
 teaching of Jesus in his Parable of the Wheat and the Tares : 
 "Let both grow together until the harvest." Freedom is 
 costly, but it is worthwhile. It is the great test of faith. 
 
 Can we trust truth to win in a fair fight with error? The 
 man who says that he cannot must secretly despise the 
 truth. Such a man might well take a lesson from the tyrant 
 Tiberius, who refused to punish offenses against religion on 
 the ground that the gods can take care of themselves. Be 
 sides, religion can never know itself as real, save in the world 
 of freedom. No man can tell whether religion is an oasis in 
 the desert, or a mirage, who is not free to test it by every 
 power of the mind and spirit. Further, self-reliant, respon 
 sible manhood is gained only through the solemnity of 
 choice; as in Goethe s song: 
 
 But heard are the Voices, 
 
 Heard are the Sages, 
 
 The Worlds and the Ages; 
 
 Choose well; your choice is 
 
 Brief and yet endless. * 
 
 Once more, the repression of the crank by the law of uni 
 formity means the excommunication of the prophet. The 
 greatest words ever uttered in behalf of freedom in relig 
 ion are these: "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, which killest the 
 prophets and stonest them that are sent unto her! how often 
 would I have gathered thy children together even as a hen 
 gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not! 
 Behold your house is left unto you desolate." 
 
 On a level immeasurably lower, let it be said that, since 
 differences abound in the minds of men, it is in every way 
 safer to provide them with freedom. Wild beasts are wild 
 
OF AMERICAN RELIGION 289 
 
 beasts in cages no less than in jungles; putting them under 
 restraint sometimes tends to the disguise of this fact. The 
 utmost freedom serves to disclose the utmost in man; under 
 freedom we shall know man better and learn to act with 
 knowledge. One may put the skin of a deer over the body 
 of a lion; that act will not make the wearer of the new robe 
 any the less a beast of prey. Cover all religious views with 
 the same ecclesiastical skin, if you can, but know that not 
 in this way are doubt, protest, heterogeneousness, distem 
 per, ruthless passion abolished. We thus keep while we 
 conceal these evils; we add to them a whole brood of greater 
 evils: insincerity ;\ the double life, and sometimes the athe 
 ism that feeds on the sacramental bread and wine. 
 
 The great religion is the product of the great race; when 
 brought forth, the religion returns to exalt and perpetuate 
 the race from whose life it has come. Israel has given to the 
 world the sovereign religion, because, in moral sincerity and 
 depth, in the vision of God and of the spiritual world, Israel 
 has been the sovereign race. If the religion of America is to 
 be great, it must have as its source a great American people. 
 The mean races, and the mean individuals among great 
 races, degrade religion. Such has been the fate of Chris 
 tianity many times in the course of the centuries; the de 
 generate person reflects his degeneracy in his religious ideas. 
 
 But, Lord, remember me and mine 
 Wi mercies temporal and divine, 
 That I for grace and gear may shine 
 
 Excell d by nane; 
 And a the glory shall be thine 
 Amen, Amen. 
 
 What about the race of Americans? It is, without doubt, 
 heterogeneous; human beings are here, it might almost be 
 said, from every nation under heaven. Sometimes, in mo 
 ments of bewildered thought, America seems a Pentecostal 
 
 20 
 
290 REASONABLE HOPES 
 
 nation, minus the Holy Ghost. When one becomes clearer 
 and looks deeper into the life of Americans, one sees that 
 minus must be changed to plus. 
 
 Business stamina and athletic prowess show conclusively 
 that Americans are physically a great people. The evi 
 dences of their mental alertness, ingenuity, inventiveness, 
 resourcefulness, and mastery multiply on every hand. 
 Nothing else is to be expected when one considers that 
 hither have come, for many generations, the boldest, the 
 most energetic, and in many ways the most gifted and reso 
 lute, of the peoples of Europe. The physical and intellec 
 tual capacities of Americans are beyond dispute. 
 
 Can the same thing be said about the moral qualities and 
 the spiritual aptitudes of our people? I conceive that more 
 can be said to their advantage on this third and highest 
 level of life than on either of the other two. Immigration is 
 the surest key to the soul of Americans. We are a nation of 
 immigrants; some have come earlier, some later; but the 
 race as a whole is a stranger in a strange land. As of old 
 there came a voice to the earliest settlers and to their suc 
 cessors: "Get thee out from thy country, and from thy 
 kindred and from thy father s house." Leave was taken 
 with hope, and also with deep, inevitable regret. The deep 
 est psychic fact in our people is a structure of light and 
 shadow, "built of tears and sacred flames." Few, of all who 
 come to remain here, ever return or catch so much as a 
 glimpse of the land of their birth, which lies transfigured in 
 the morning memories of the heart. Recollection deepens 
 with the stream of the years, like the bed of the river under 
 its current. The volume of sentiment increases; our people 
 are deep-hearted; they are united by the ties of the soul 
 both to the old world and to the new. They have in then! 
 an impulse toward cosmopolitanism; there is among us a 
 vast unspoken humanity of high prophetic moment. Some 
 
OF AMERICAN RELIGION 291 
 
 day the voice of genius will unseal the depths, and we shall 
 see what the discipline of sorrow and hope, the warp and 
 woof of immigration, has wrought for this new race. 
 
 Here we meet a confident, and sometimes an insolent, 
 objection. Is not immigration mainly for economic pur 
 poses? Are not the Pilgrims absolutely without successors 
 in the motive of their settlement here? Should we not ex 
 cite against ourselves the mirth of the world, were we to 
 claim that any mortal now seeks these shores solely or 
 chiefly that he may have freedom to worship God? We 
 should, indeed; yet that admission is only the introduction 
 to the epic of the immigrant s life. Few gain the economic 
 Paradise they came hither to find; their hopes prove to be 
 more than half hallucinations. What the overwhelming ma 
 jority of immigrants discover is that harder work awaits 
 them here than in the old home, a swifter movement of 
 activity; severer conditions of toil; more pay, but not pay 
 enough to take them from the race-course; more pay, but 
 less play, less peace; an existence heightened in intensity 
 and therefore more exhausting; success gained through an 
 abnormal devotion to material ends a success that seems 
 poor in the light of the early economic ideal now seen to be 
 impossible. 
 
 We hear much of the few great economic successes among 
 our immigrants; we hear little of something infinitely deeper 
 and more important for the life of Americans, the eco 
 nomic disillusionment. In the experience of millions the 
 economic ideal is seen to be hopeless; by itself, as a satis 
 faction for the rational soul, it is at length seen to be unut 
 terably base. Then comes the great epoch and its great 
 event, the recoil of the disillusioned humanity upon itself. 
 This does not mean that all who pass through the experi 
 ence described turn up in the weekly prayer-meeting, that 
 they go to church, adopt a particular creed, or embrace any 
 
292 REASONABLE HOPES 
 
 form of conventional religion; it means the growing sense of 
 humanity as the great superlative, the vision of something 
 other, and immeasurably better, than economic triumph 
 and obedience, often enough halting and broken, but in 
 heart essentially true to this heavenly vision. America has 
 been cruelly misrepresented to the immigrant; it has been 
 made to appeal to the mere economic animal in his com 
 posite existence; experience brings reversal of hope and the 
 vision of the true America, the place where, as of old, men 
 earn their bread in the sweat of their brow, where the 
 ground is cursed for their sake. 
 
 Great is the life that often follows this early disenchant 
 ment. The sun is down, the dust is now laid that the wild 
 winds have blown through all the hot, noisy hours of the 
 day, and against the background of infinite night the stars 
 appear, symbols of the high and countless splendors that 
 exist in this amazing universe for the men who have re 
 covered their humanity. Standing upon this ground of the 
 essential moral greatness of our people, some of the nobler 
 hopes of American religion come into view. 
 
 Keeping in the middle of the stream, it may be said that 
 religion in America is setting toward its great objects with 
 a deeper and stronger tide. As the external supports of re 
 ligion have become the subjects of serious question, religion 
 has become clearer and surer of itself; it has made some 
 progress in disengaging essential from incidental, and is 
 likely to make greater progress along this line in the im 
 mediate future. Once the Bible was the book whose words 
 settled all religious debates. While for the seer the Bible 
 has become a greater book in passing through the fires of 
 modern criticism, its words are no longer substitutes for in 
 sight, but inspirations and guides toward the larger vision. 
 The letter fails in the greatest of books; because of the lit- 
 
OF AMERICAN RELIGION 293 
 
 eral failure, the spiritual opportunity and appeal have be 
 come more evident; spirit has been incited to find spirit 
 with increased sureness and depth. To be found of the In 
 finite Spirit one must more and more enter the realm of 
 spirit, and American religion may be said to be making that 
 entrance. 
 
 The Christian church, of whatever name, no longer ap 
 peals to religious Americans as a distinctively divine insti 
 tution. It is, indeed, a divine institution, in the sense in 
 which all essential human institutions are divine. The fam 
 ily, the state, the school, the university, and the organized 
 trade of the nation, are divine institutions; that is, they are 
 essential expressions of the life of our people. The forms of 
 these institutions may change; the institutions themselves 
 are permanent necessities of man s life in this world. They 
 have been wrought out by human beings, seeking, under 
 the guidance of the Eternal Spirit, the juster and mightier 
 organization of existence. The church and other essential 
 human institutions rest, therefore, on the same foundations. 
 These institutions are like the different peaks in some great 
 mountain range : higher and lower they are, more and less 
 massive; one, it may be, towers far above all the others and 
 fills a vaster area; but one and all rest upon the same earth, 
 one and all rise into the same heaven. A church organized 
 out of heaven and set apart from and above all other insti 
 tutions is a fiction that has vanished from the free mind of 
 America. It exists in certain places, doubtless, with other 
 survivals of an outgrown time; but among wise men it exists 
 as a myth, and is so regarded. The Founder of Christianity 
 was less of a churchman than any other religious teacher in 
 the annals of history. He used synagogue, temple, human 
 homes, mountain-tops, desert places, the fields, and the sea, 
 as the scenes of his prophetic activity and worship. It 
 would not be too much to say that his church was the 
 
294 REASONABLE HOPES 
 
 cosmos, the lights thereof, the sun, moon, and stars; the pic 
 tures on its walls, the fires of morning and evening and the 
 shadows of noon; its altar, the heart of man; its music, the 
 whispering winds; its organ, the universe supporting his 
 prophetic voice. 
 
 From this, the most unecclesiastical of teachers, arose, 
 justified by the necessities of the life of his disciples, fallen 
 upon different times in different lands, successive forms of 
 church-organization. These were integrated finally in the 
 church of the East and the great church of the West. Dis 
 integration at length set in; what was built by man in obedi 
 ence to the impulse of life was taken down in reverence for 
 the same impulse. The issue is the sense of the absolute 
 primacy of the life of the soul; the hope is that this builder 
 and destroyer of institutional forms will become surer of 
 itself, and continue to renew itself from the aboriginal 
 Foundation of life. 
 
 The Christian ministry has become one vocation among 
 many, equally sacred with other essential vocations, and no 
 more. The gain here is inexpressibly great; all mere offi 
 cialism is impotent and vain; the man is a prophet or priest 
 in virtue of his humanity exalted by the presence of the liv 
 ing God, or he is a chimera. No titles, no rank, no official 
 consecrations can serve as substitutes for a gifted, disci 
 plined, exalted human character; they may remain con 
 venient signs of it; they do not impart the grace of the spirit; 
 at best, they only call attention to that grace; they do not 
 create the prophet or priest; they do their utmost when they 
 serve him. This means the exaltation of all essential human 
 callings; it does not mean the degradation of the one sacred 
 calling. The command has gone forth to all vocations, Come 
 up higher. Again the outward fails us; the boat sinks, and 
 we trust ourselves to the deeps of the Eternal Spirit. 
 
 For more than a thousand years a definite system of 
 
OF AMERICAN RELIGION 295 
 
 thought ruled the minds of religious men throughout 
 Christendom. Protestant and Catholic confessed substan 
 tially the same theology; Europe and America stood here 
 upon essentially the same ground. It was universally held 
 that the truth about man s world was reflected in this sys 
 tem of belief. At length disintegration began here; great 
 abiding ideas were dug out of the debris and carefully con 
 served; the traditional creed as a whole, however, became 
 incredible; the eyes through which men for fifteen centuries 
 had read the meaning of the universe became dim. The 
 relief from this disintegration to the vexed religious soul 
 has been like escape from Hades; the world of God now 
 bids man welcome from the prison that he had built for 
 himself. According to their differing temperaments, fear 
 or audacity at first filled the minds of many persons in the 
 presence of this stupendous event; bewilderment has en 
 compassed a multitude of fine souls like a thick cloud; there 
 has been much uncertainty and searching of heart; what 
 seemed the foundations of the world have given way. What 
 can the religious soul do in this extremity? Betake itself 
 to God, with all its heart singing its great song, 
 
 Our little systems have their day; 
 They have their day and cease to be: 
 They are but broken lights of thee, 
 And thou, O Lord, art more than they. 
 
 So it has been in ten thousand instances; our reasonable 
 hope is that more and more it shall be thus. The call has 
 gone forth for a profounder retreat upon the aboriginal 
 Soul of the universe. From this great experience insight will 
 return, insight into the innermost heart of religion and con 
 fidence in its findings. This is the issue for the religious 
 spirit as against the man to whom life itself carries no gos 
 pel and whose home is in ruins amid floods and tempests. 
 The scientific intellect is at its task, dissolving all on its 
 
296 REASONABLE HOPES 
 
 way to the everlasting. To the dweller in the region of the 
 traditional this is appalling; to the soul whose one supreme 
 passion is to see God, here is another vast inspiration. Such 
 a soul longs for the things that cannot be dissolved, to hear 
 in the roar of this world of fateful change the song of the 
 Time-Spirit, 
 
 At the whirring loom of time, unawed, 
 I weave the living mantle of God. 
 
 Such in few words are some of the graver conditions of 
 religion to-day. Under these conditions religion would seem 
 bound to do one of these three things: to curse God and 
 die, the blasphemy of thought found on a tragic scale in 
 side Christian churches and beyond them; to hug the old 
 traditions in the new environment, hoping by desperate 
 loyalty to secure them against the fierce critical heat that 
 encompasses them a faith as vain as would be the ex 
 pectation of an iceberg to remain intact afloat on the 
 South Atlantic; the .cry of the mysterious Presence that 
 wrestled with the first Israelite: "Let me go, for the day 
 breaketh." 
 
 We are in the dawn of a new epoch. It would seem that 
 religious men are to be deterred by the decree of the living 
 God from continuing the practice of jumbling together in 
 one indistinguishable mass the precious and the worthless 
 in human experience, the rational and the mythical, the self- 
 attesting and the impossible, the self-sufficing reality and 
 the superstitions that always dim the radiant soul of re 
 ligion and try to replace its pure splendor with their wild 
 fantastic shows. The mood of the time sounds a more pro 
 found retreat upon God; it spreads its table in his presence; 
 it seeks for that table the living bread, the sustenance with 
 out which man cannot remain man. Temporal helps have 
 been taken away, that the Eternal helper may be found; 
 
OF AMERICAN RELIGION 297 
 
 religion has been compelled, like a ship caught in a tempest 
 in shallow water, to put out to sea. Our ship is good, but 
 there is safety for her and her precious burden only on the 
 deeps. 
 
 American religion is seeking, and it is likely to seek more 
 and more, a justification of its being out of the universe 
 now. Emerson s essay, once curiously referred to in an issue 
 of the "Atlantic" as "mournful," sounds the note of a vast 
 hope. "The foregoing generations beheld God and nature 
 face to face; we through their eyes. Why should we not also 
 enjoy an original relation to the universe? " In these words 
 Emerson is the prophet of all deep religion, of the Christian 
 religion in its inmost spirit. Protestant and Catholic are 
 here one. Communion of saints, fellowship with the spirits 
 of just men made perfect, access to the soul of Jesus, ad 
 mission to the immediate presence of God, are recognized 
 by all enlightened Christians to be at the heart of the 
 soul s life. This immediate contact with the Divine reality 
 is primal; books, churches, prophets, priests, creeds, are sec 
 ondary. We press toward the light ineffable; we are now 
 led, and again driven, toward this supernal centre by the 
 majesty of the past, by the mystery of the future, and by 
 the present necessities of the soul. We seek with all reli 
 gious human beings the immediate vision of the living God. 
 The apocalypse for this day we crave as our daily bread. 
 We discover that the greatest words of the past become 
 living only in the experience of the present hour; outside of 
 that experience, they are dead. 
 
 If the religious man s soul, the souls of his fellow men, 
 and the Soul of the universe are hidden, as may be the case, 
 he may borrow light from all religions to help him in his 
 search. The point is, that no religion can create the objects 
 of religion; the chief religion comes, not to create, but to 
 reveal. At last the universe itself must justify or discredit 
 
298 REASONABLE HOPES 
 
 our life in the spirit. Believers claim that it must be possi 
 ble to-day, as in other days, to be profoundly religious and 
 to justify from experience this attitude of face-to-face con 
 verse with the Eternal. 
 
 Here, indeed, we touch the inmost soul of the Christian 
 faith, that which it utters in its doctrine of the Holy Spirit. 
 Christians were never meant to rely solely upon the epic 
 history of the Master, to go back two thousand or ten thou 
 sand years, in order to find the warrant for their faith. 
 There is the present Guide unto all truth; there is the uni 
 verse to-day under the illumination of the Spirit. The 
 record of the Master s career is inexpressibly precious; it is 
 enriching, regulative, corrective, prophetic, dynamic; it is 
 the sovereign, historic form of the Infinite compassion; yet 
 its deepest promise is of the presence that pervades and 
 illumines the contemporary world of men: "Lo, I am with 
 you always, even to the end of the world." The ultimate 
 realities of the Christian religion are souls: the souls of men 
 and the soul of God; the New Testament has its highest 
 use as a guide to these ultimate realities. By the wonder of 
 the Spirit Jesus becomes the contemporary of his latest 
 disciples. 
 
 The great insight at work to-day in all truly religious 
 persons, that the Infinite Soul is with us, lends new signifi 
 cance to many forms of faith that must appear to thought 
 ful men crude. New Thought, Theosophy, Spiritualism, 
 Eddyism, the Healing Cult, and all kindred movements, 
 which seem trivial in the presence of the greater historic 
 churches of Christendom, which are, as it were, mushroom 
 growths compared with the religions of immemorial in 
 fluence, which often appear mere amusing products of 
 American extemporaneousness, become of serious import 
 ance when viewed either as man s face-to-face converse 
 with the universe, or as presenting to the Infinite in the 
 
OF AMERICAN RELIGION 299 
 
 unending process of apocalypse the open mind. The world 
 of science would stagnate, the growth of art would come to 
 an end, the hope of political and social betterment would 
 die, if the elect youth in each new generation should be 
 content with the insights and achievements of the past. 
 The crudeness and the eccentricity of youth do not blind 
 us to its noble dissatisfactions with the great past out of 
 which the greater future is to come. In the same way, we 
 should regard even the crude, the eccentric, the wildly ex 
 travagant in contemporary religion. It is at all events the 
 sign that men are living in the presence of the Infinite; that 
 their minds are in the mood of invocation; that they be 
 lieve God to be greater than man s best experience; and 
 that they look for his mightier manifestation. 
 
 From this new and eager contact with the Divine uni 
 verse, from this contemporary agitation over life s sovereign 
 problems, from this original, immediate fellowship with 
 the Eternal, it would be strange if there did not eventuate 
 vaster religious insight, a more steadfast religious character. 
 In the case of New England transcendentalism, which con 
 tinues to minister to the sense of humor of many genial 
 souls of alien discipline, these four lines from Emerson annul 
 the extravagance of the movement and indicate its deep 
 prophetic note: 
 
 Speaks not of self that mystic tone 
 But of the Overgods alone; 
 It trembles to the cosmic breath 
 As it heareth, so it saith. 
 
 All religion that is of substantial worth is man s response 
 to the whispers of the Eternal in his heart. The speaking 
 universe and the listening human soul are the great major 
 premise of valid religion. The contemporary soul, pure 
 through desperate need and lofty longing, responsive to 
 the voice of God that wanders through the world to-day 
 
300 REASONABLE HOPES 
 
 seeking the willing ear, whatever its immaturities and 
 eccentricities may be, is a fountain of life in the nation s 
 religion. 
 
 The unique Exemplar and Prophet of American religion, 
 in all its manifold varieties, is Jesus of Nazareth. His king 
 dom of man stands deeper in American insight and sym 
 pathy than the programme of all other religious teachers 
 and cults. His teaching and example have set aside Calvin 
 and Edwards; He and no other has his hand upon the 
 springs of religious desire; He, and not the crank or freak in 
 our caravan, is the inspirer of all that is worthiest in our 
 experience and surest in our hopes. We find that Jesus is 
 often acknowledged by the anarchist crazed by the woe of 
 the nations; He is not seldom close to the heart of the So 
 cialist in his madness over the contempt of the strong for 
 the weak; He is recognized as the supreme friend of man 
 by many among those who see in his disciples, as organized 
 in churches, a solidarity of selfishness hallowed under the 
 shadow of his glorious name; He is the pillar of fire by night 
 to many a servant of social betterment to whom the uni 
 verse is an impenetrable mystery; believers in the human 
 ity of man have seen the incomparable greatness of Jesus. 
 Inside all communions with present power and the hope 
 of to-morrow beating in their heart, the image of the 
 Prophet of Nazareth is sovereign. Hospitable to all promis 
 ing voices, ready to entertain strangers in the hope that 
 they prove angels in disguise, sadly disillusioned as it is 
 about many of its guests, American religion persists in the 
 open mind, the catholic heart, in the presence of the Infi 
 nite possibility of to-day; at the same time, the name that 
 was to St. Paul above every name is still our sheet-anchor 
 in the storm. Otherwise to read the signs of the times in the 
 religious life of America is to miss the chief sign. 
 
OF AMERICAN RELIGION SOI 
 
 American religion, while sympathetic toward the whole 
 higher intellectual achievement of mankind, is likely to be 
 less disposed to ask alien philosophies to account for it or 
 to accredit it to the world. This is the issue of the discipline 
 in historical analysis that a generation of great scholars 
 have imposed upon themselves. Everything that has be 
 come mixed with Christianity in the course of the centuries 
 is not therefore an essential part of its character; additions 
 to Christianity made since the close of the apostolic age are 
 not necessarily alien in spirit. Historical analysis exhibits 
 the original force and body of ideas in the Gospel of Christ; 
 it discriminates between what is original and what is a later 
 addition. It leaves the free mind of the world to decide the 
 further question, How far is the historic accretion compati 
 ble with the original genius of Christianity? Historical 
 analysis has made good the distinction between the orig 
 inal and the derived, the kindred and the alien, the devel 
 opment from within and the addition from without, the 
 product of the Holy Spirit and the product of the Time 
 Spirit. This distinction has been adopted by the free mind 
 of religious America; the adoption of this distinction marks 
 an epoch in the higher religious mind of the nation. 
 
 Christianity, the highest form of American religion and 
 incomparably the widest and deepest in influence, has been 
 obliged, as everyone knows, to run itself into the forms of 
 philosophies more or less alien to itself, in order to shape 
 the minds of men in certain ages of the world. Christianity 
 has at times spoken with the great voice of Plato; it has 
 filled with its transfiguring grace the vast impressive fog of 
 Neo-Platonism; it has taken as an ally the mighty intellect 
 of Aristotle; it has identified its belief with the opinions 
 of men like Origen and Athanasius, Augustine and Aquinas, 
 who were themselves in some degree products of many 
 
302 REASONABLE HOPES 
 
 alien contemporary influences. Christianity has become 
 Calvinistic, Arminian, Hegelian, Evolutionary, Pragmatic. 
 As adaptations of the genius of Christianity to the mind of 
 particular times, these forms of faith may be highly useful; 
 they may indeed be a temporary necessity. Christianity 
 must know the dialect and idiom of the successive ages, 
 and speak in them, if it is to be widely understood. The 
 wonder of Pentecost, at which were gathered the devout 
 from every nation under heaven, each group hearing in its 
 own tongue the mighty works of God, has been in a true 
 and great way the one continuous wonder in the onward 
 movement of Christianity. 
 
 Still, it must be said that Christianity does not espouse 
 the cause of the absolute truth of these contemporary serv 
 ants. They are not bone of its bone or flesh of its flesh. 
 Nothing is essential to Christianity as metaphysic, but 
 the reality of the souls of men and the soul of God; nothing 
 is permanently vital to the Gospel, but the fellowship of 
 these souls in an ever-deepening moral experience and the 
 resulting exaltation of our human world. Jesus is the per 
 manent centre of his religion, as mediating between human 
 souls and the Eternal soul; he is essential as the Supreme 
 prophet of a universe in which soul is the ultimate reality. 
 
 This deeper sense of its distinctive being and purpose on 
 the part of Christianity explains much in the Christian 
 mind to-day. The mood of American religion is that it is 
 unwise to identify its truth with the fortunes of even the 
 most important contemporary movements in the world of 
 thought; it is less unwise, but still questionable, to make 
 too close a covenant between the Gospel of Jesus, with its 
 austerely simple metaphysic and its sublime ethic, and the 
 vast enduring systems of thought. Greek philosophy is 
 great; on its human side it is in essence lasting as the mind 
 of man. Yet it is often immature, wanting in width of sym 
 pathy; it is the product of a small, although a profoundly 
 
OF AMERICAN RELIGION 303 
 
 significant, world. Religion is always the product of a vast 
 world; it is at its highest always in the sense of the Eternal, 
 and the Eternal is in the soul of the religious man and com 
 munity as creative spirit. This being its genius, religion 
 must give an independent account of itself. As experience, 
 it transcends in depth and character all other experiences; 
 as empirical reality, its momentousness is self-evident; 
 as reality, it must speak for itself, it must construe its own 
 universe, it must be its own ultimate prophet. 
 
 We come now to the highest aspect and hope of American 
 religion. Vision is indispensable to religion, but vision is 
 not the chief element; sentiment is essential, yet sentiment 
 is not the main thing. The soul of American religion is 
 action, issuing from creative will. Our religion adopts 
 Fichte s great insight, that the vocation of man is to be 
 come a doer of the will of the Highest; it cries out with 
 Emerson, 
 
 Unless to Thought is added Will 
 Apollo is an imbecile; 
 
 it accepts with reverence and confidence the assurance of 
 Jesus: "If any man willeth to do his will he shall know of 
 the teaching." Knowledge and being by the path of rational 
 action is our firmest possession. American religion is often 
 unconventional in its expressions; it can at times be profane 
 in its dialect; it cannot acquiesce in hopeless impotence. 
 To the pious cant of the fatalist on whose soul the wrongs 
 of suffering men sit lightly, " Well, God mend all," it an 
 swers, in the style of a man with red blood in his veins, 
 "Nay, by God, we must help him to mend it." The fighter 
 for righteousness believes that the stars in their courses are 
 on his side; he does his duty, in the sense that the universe 
 is the backer of the conscientious servant of man. His faith 
 comes up out of his experience as a creative force. He is con 
 fident that, in the long run, humanity cannot be defeated 
 
304 REASONABLE HOPES 
 
 by inhumanity; in the vivid idiom of the street, the final 
 triumph of evil over good is as likely as the success of a 
 celluloid dog chasing an asbestos cat through hell. Aggres 
 sive, confident, militant action is the great watchword of 
 American faith. 
 
 The actual world is apt to be the despair of the religions 
 of the nations. The theism of Mohammedanism is great, 
 and by no manner of means is it ineffective. It exalts the 
 lives of millions; it prohibits the use of alcohol, and it res 
 cues society from the retinue of miseries that follow the use 
 of that poison. It does indeed sanction polygamy, but it 
 exorcises the horror of prostitution. It secures among cer 
 tain races a creditable measure of honesty, a large degree of 
 kindness and loyalty. Mohammedanism has great merits, 
 and yet it is powerless in the presence of the deeper evils of 
 the world. The status of woman as inferior to man it has es 
 tablished and maintained, and this is the fountain of the 
 gravest disorders. It has been unable to sober the fanatic, 
 to elevate into sovereign influence the sentiment of human 
 ity. Above all, it is impotent in the presence of autocratic 
 and corrupt governments; it is without hope before the dis 
 tresses that arise from disease and uncleanness; it has no 
 inspiration for science and no appreciation of the mercies of 
 applied science; it stands dumb as it looks upon the eco 
 nomic misery of its devotees; it calls for submission to pres 
 ent evils as to the foreordained lot of human beings; it is ex 
 hilarated by no outlook toward a new heaven and a new 
 earth wherein dwelleth righteousness; it is in despair as it 
 surveys the actual world of men. 
 
 The same is true of Buddhism. The core of that mighty 
 faith is as noble as anything in the possession of mankind; 
 yet it is essentially the religion of despair. Resignation is 
 its highest word; the path to extinction of being by the way 
 of holiness is its supreme beatitude. The actual condition 
 
OF AMERICAN RELIGION 305 
 
 of man s world in time is beyond remedy except by spiritual 
 suicide. The universe has no light or help for those who 
 cherish the will to live. Our human world, with all its rela 
 tions, interests, experiences, aspirations, and ideal dreams 
 is a mistake. Nothing can cure this mistake but the will to 
 die, in the sense of absolute extinction. This religion is the 
 refuge for human beings in defeat, for the victims of de 
 spair, and for them alone. 
 
 Much of European Christianity is in a similar state of 
 mind. It has no word upon the economic distress of the 
 multitude; it does not lift its voice against government as 
 it grounds itself upon brute force; it has no vision of reme 
 dial energy equal to its vision of sin; it has no social gospel 
 for this world; it confines its work to the alleviation of evils 
 that it cannot hope to cure, to the discipline of men in limi 
 tation and sorrow toward blessedness in another state of 
 existence; it has no consciousness of a creative Christianity; 
 it throws no defiance in the face of the total evils that 
 afflict the world; it entertains no vision of the victory of 
 humanity over inhumanity in the course of time. 
 
 This social faith is the chief note in American religion. 
 It lives among evils as rank and offensive as exist in any 
 nation on the globe; it will acknowledge none of them as 
 inevitable and final. It has crudities enough of its own; it 
 can match at all points the weaknesses of other religions 
 with infirmities of its own, with this vast exception it is 
 determined to absorb the best in the vision, passion, and 
 character of the past and to wield this totality of ideal power 
 through believing souls upon the present condition of the 
 nation. AlTour efforts at the betterment of the people come 
 from essentially religious motives. Education, prison reform, 
 sanitation, the treatment of disease, the programme against 
 intemperance and vice, the movements against industrial 
 iniquity, social distress, the inhumanity of man to man, 
 21 
 
306 REASONABLE HOPES 
 
 come from the great basic faith that there exists no incura 
 ble evil, that the Soul of the universe is on our side while we 
 strive for the complete reflection in our existence of the 
 humanity of Jesus. 
 
 We Americans confess at once that in many respects we 
 are a crude race, that we are a people in the making. We 
 gratefully acknowledge the resources put at our disposal by 
 the older nations; we welcome the help of the art, the wis 
 dom, and the character of ancient races; we concede their 
 superiority at many points; we are eager to learn from them 
 where they seem to be wiser than we. We must, however, 
 add to this appreciation a criticism that we think inevitable. 
 We find in much of the Christianity of the older nations a 
 want of energy and hope that we refuse to make our own, a 
 timidity in the presence of immemorial wrongs that we con 
 sider cowardly, a spirit of acquiescence with inhuman con 
 ditions of existence that we regard as equal to the denial of 
 Christianity, a blindness to the physical and moral remedies 
 in the order of humanity that is astounding, an infatuation 
 with formal religion, a contentment with the pieties of a 
 purely personal faith, and a resignation before the woe of 
 the world that we must define as symptoms of practical 
 atheism. Above all, we miss in much of the Christianity of 
 the old world the consciousness of the Creative Spirit, the 
 Spirit that proclaims: "Behold, I make all things new"; 
 that goes against the total evil that afflicts mankind in a 
 campaign that will end only when evil is done to death. 
 
 This is the American religious war; it includes in its 
 grand army many dissimilar divisions, corps, battalions, and 
 companies; it is not the assemblage of American churches 
 merely; it is also, and in a great sense, the muster of the 
 moral forces of American humanity; it is a war against evil 
 to the knife and the knife to the hilt. Out beyond organ 
 ized religion in America is the shadow of a mighty dream : 
 
OF AMERICAN RELIGION 807 
 
 the dream is of the Republic of God in the Republic of man; 
 this dream lives and works in the souls of our greatest 
 prophets. The shadow is the projection of this dream; that 
 shadow claims for the complete life of our people the whole 
 circle of essential human interests upon which it rests. 
 
 We hear, as we expected, the unbelieving response: 
 "This is American optimism." To be sure it is. America, 
 with all her sins, believes in God, and in the ultimate omni 
 potence of duty read in the light of God s eyes. " This is the 
 faith of a young nation," is another exclamation from our 
 aged and somewhat infirm neighbors. True again; and this 
 faith of a young nation repeats itself in the successive gen 
 erations of elect American youth. In this way the religious 
 nation keeps itself young; it has in vision the spirit of the 
 Divine youth Jesus, before whom time appeared as the 
 field of the apocalypse of his Father: "Heaven and earth 
 shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away"; it re 
 calls the enthusiasm of the group of dauntless youth whom 
 Jesus commissioned to carry the news of his kingdom into 
 all the world. America is proud of her youth; she means to 
 renew her youth like the eagle; she is resolved to make it 
 everlasting in the creative might of the everlasting God, in 
 whom is her trust for herself and the world. 
 
BRIEF NOTES ON THE AUTHORS 
 
 Miss MARGARET SHERWOOD, a member of the Wellesley 
 College Literature Department, has been a frequent contributor 
 to the "Atlantic." 
 
 MRS. CORNELIA A. P. COMER, a resident of Seattle, is not only 
 an essayist of note but a writer of short stories of unusual charm 
 and power. She is represented in "Atlantic Narratives " by "The 
 Preliminaries, " critically analyzed by Professor Josiah Royce in 
 his " Sources of Religious Insight. " 
 
 RANDOLPH BOURNE, who died in 1918 at the age of thirty- 
 two, had already attained distinction as editorial writer for the 
 "Dial" and contributor to the "Atlantic." 
 
 ARTHUR E. MORGAN, now president of Antioch College, first 
 gained his reputation as a civil engineer connected with the flood 
 reclamation project at Dayton, Ohio. His essay, "Education: 
 The Mastery of the Arts of Life," was one of the early and pop 
 ular issues of "Atlantic Readings." 
 
 LE BARON RUSSELL BRIGGS, for years a professor at Harvard 
 University and President of Radcliffe College, is known also for 
 his many books on student life. 
 
 GEORGE BOAS is a member of the Department of Public 
 Speaking in the University of California. He is the author of 
 " What Do College Professors Know? " an article in the May, 
 1921, "Atlantic" that attracted wide attention. 
 
 Miss MARY LEAL HARKNESS is a member of the classical 
 department at Newcomb College, New Orleans. She is one of 
 the sturdiest opponents of the contemporary school of educa 
 tors which exalts household economics at the expense of the 
 humanities. 
 
 HENRY NOBLE MACCRACKEN, formerly a teacher of English 
 at Yale University, is now president of Vassar College. 
 
 WILLIAM PETERS REEVES, a graduate of Earlham College, 
 Richmond, Indiana, and later a student at Johns Hopkins, has 
 long been a teacher of English in Kenyon College, Gambois, Ohio. 
 
 EDWARD YEOMANS, a Chicago manufacturer by vocation and 
 a writer by avocation, has awakened wide interest among parents 
 and educators by his book, " Shackled Youth," published by the 
 
BRIEF NOTES ON THE AUTHORS 309 
 
 Atlantic Monthly Press in 1921. His messages are an emphatic 
 protest against formalism. 
 
 HENRY SEIDEL CANBY, for several years a professor of English 
 in the Sheffield Scientific School at Yale, is now the literary 
 editor of the "New York Evening Post." He is represented in 
 "Atlantic Narratives " by his virile story, " Business is Business." 
 
 J. N. LARNED, late a librarian in Buffalo, was deeply inter 
 ested in social and ethical questions. He is well known for his 
 school text on history. During his lifetime he was a frequent 
 contributor to the "Atlantic." 
 
 CHARLES NORMAN FAT, who has for many years been en 
 gaged in the manufacturing business, is now living in Cambridge, 
 Massachusetts. 
 
 JOHN MITCHELL, from boyhood a laborer and labor organ 
 izer, was for nearly ten years the president of the United Mine 
 Workers of America. His lectures and writings were devoted 
 almost entirely to the theme of unionized labor. 
 
 CHARLES F. DOLE was from 1876 to 1916 the minister of 
 the First Congregational (Unitarian) Church in Jamaica Plain, 
 Massachusetts. He has written many books on religious, social, 
 and ethical themes. 
 
 GINO SPERANZA is a practising lawyer in New York City, 
 who has accomplished much for the Italian immigrant and for 
 general welfare work. 
 
 JOHN KULAMER, of Czechoslovak origin, is a lawyer of Pitts 
 burgh, Pennsylvania. 
 
 BERTRAND RUSSELL is a British publicist who has traveled 
 widely and written interestingly sometimes in the support of 
 radical doctrines upon current world questions. 
 
 MRS. FRANCES PARKINSON KEYES is the wife of Henry Wilder 
 Keyes, U.S. Senator from New Hampshire. Mrs. Keyes has been 
 an active member of many civic organizations. Her home is in 
 North Haverhill, New Hampshire. 
 
 MRS. ANNE C. E. ALLINSON, a Greek scholar, is a member of 
 the faculty of Boston University. She has been a frequent 
 contributor to the "Atlantic." 
 
 DR. GEORGE A. GORDON, as pastor of the New Old South 
 Church in Boston and as a writer on religious themes, has been 
 prominently associated with the more advanced ethical thought 
 of the United States. 
 
QUESTIONS, COMMENTS, AND SUGGESTIONS 
 FOR WRITING 
 
 Youth and Age 
 
 WHAT are the specific faults that the old generation finds with 
 the new? Do you think that these faults really exist? Do they 
 exist in groups large enough to be called representative? In your 
 own environment, town, school, college, club, or fraternity, 
 do you find that morals and manners are lax? Upon what are 
 your standards of right and wrong based ? What instruction, what 
 examples, have you and your friends had? What improvements 
 could you suggest? Could your efforts and the efforts of your 
 friends really do any good? Perhaps there is nothing wrong at all 
 with the new generation. Have you ever found evidence in your 
 reading that the problem is a recurrent one? 
 
 There are usually two ways in which a subject may be treated. 
 It may be discussed ; it may be presented. So far, various methods 
 of discussion have been suggested. But there are methods of pres 
 entation, too. Describe a typical lady or gentleman of the old 
 school. Let the portrait speak for itself. Describe a dance, a house- 
 party, a skating-party, a picnic, a play. Make your descriptions 
 present your idea of the questions under discussion. Or perhaps 
 you can write a story or a narrative sketch, the theme of which 
 is the conflict of youth and age, or, better still, the harmony of 
 youth and age. Some parents get on famously with their children 
 can you tell of some? Do you know of any incidents that show 
 heroism, self-sacrifice, and devotion to duty, of young people of 
 your age? Can you get your father and mother to parallel these 
 stories? Can you parallel theirs? Your reading will help. Poets 
 and sages have fashioned their ideal of manhood and womanhood. 
 Read the description of "the virtuous woman" in Proverbs; read 
 Wordsworth s "Character of the Happy Warrior." Can you find 
 any others? 
 
SUGGESTIONS FOR WRITING 311 
 
 OTHER ATLANTIC ARTICLES 
 
 1. Youth: R. Bourne; vol. 109, p. 433. 
 
 2. The Younger Generation: an Apologia: A. Hard; vol. 107, 
 p. 538. 
 
 3. The Two Generations: R. Bourne; vol. 107, p. 591. 
 
 4. The Rising Generation : Letters to the Editor; vol. 107, 
 p. 718. 
 
 5. This Younger Generation : F. G. Peabody; vol. 116, p. 801. 
 
 6. Victorian Hypocrisy: A. W. Allen; vol. 114, p. 174. 
 
 7. "Polite Society": Mr. Grundy; vol. 125, p. 606. 
 
 8. Reflections of a Grundy Cousin: K. F. Gerould; vol. 126, 
 p. 157. 
 
 9. "These Wild Young People," by One of Them: J. F. Car 
 ter, Jr.; vol. 126, p. 301. 
 
 10. Good-bye, dear Mr. Grundy: A Last Year s Debutante; 
 vol. 126, p. 642. 
 
 11. The Revelation of the Middle Years: C. A. P. Comer; vol. 
 114, p. 460. 
 
 II 
 
 Education 
 
 What new ideas about education do you find in these essays? 
 What faults are pointed out? Are they real faults? Has your 
 education been especially good? or bad? dull? inspiring? What 
 made it interesting? Do you wish that you had studied Latin? 
 Or are you sorry that you did? Should you care to have your 
 brother or sister go through your experience in school? Should 
 you like to dream out an ideal school -system? Can you find out 
 whether anybody ever dreamed about one? Do you wish that 
 your work had been harder? your teachers stricter? What can you 
 find out about school in the old days? in other countries? Your 
 father and your mother ought to help you here. Are you glad that 
 you went (or did not go) to public school? Do you think that 
 everybody ought to go to public school? How is private school 
 different from public school? People seem rather doubtful, some 
 times, of the value of American education. Are they teachers or 
 students? Why do teachers get discouraged? What makes a good 
 teacher? What makes a good student? It has been said that 
 there are no uninteresting subjects there are only uninterested 
 students. 
 
312 QUESTIONS, COMMENTS, 
 
 Try the preservative way of handling some of the questions 
 raised by the essays. Describe your school. Make a portrait of a 
 good teacher, of an interesting class, of a particularly good student. 
 Imagine yourself a visitor from a far country. Tell what you see. 
 Describe the school which you would make if you could. Try 
 a dialogue between teacher and student, between two students, 
 between tax-payer and teacher. Dialogues about education are 
 difficult because one seldom hears intelligent conversation about 
 education. Have you ever heard any? Reproduce it. 
 
 OTHER ATLANTIC ARTICLES 
 
 1. Education as a Political Institution: B. Russell; vol. 117, 
 p. 750. 
 
 2. In the Dame School of Experience: an Interview with an 
 Educator: S. M. Crothers; vol. 124, p. 337. 
 
 3. Alice and Education: F. B. R. Hellems; vol. Ill, p. 256. 
 
 4. Aristocratic and Democratic Education: A. Flexner; vol. 
 108, p. 386. 
 
 5. Education as Mental Discipline: A. Flexner; vol. 119, 
 p. 452. 
 
 6. The Case against Compulsory Latin: C. W. Eliot; vol. 119, 
 p. 352. 
 
 7. High Schools and Classics: F. Irland; vol. 124, p. 47. 
 
 8. Some Fallacies in the Modern Educational Scheme: A. E. 
 Stearns; vol. 118, p. 641. 
 
 9. The Assault on Humanism: P. Shorey ; vol. 119, p. 793, and 
 vol. 120, p. 94. 
 
 10. The Extirpation of Culture: K. F. Gerould; vol. 116, 
 p. 445. 
 
 11. The Case for Humility: R. K. Hack; vol. 121, p. 222. 
 
 12. The College: an Undergraduate View: R. Bourne; vol. 108, 
 p. 667. 
 
 13. A Suit against Science: H. R. Sass; vol. 113, p. 702. 
 
 14. History Quick or Dead: W. R. Thayer;Vol. 122, p. 635. 
 
 15. A Teacher of History: E. Yeomans; vol. 125, p. 369. 
 
 16. Geography: E. Yeomans; vol. 125, p. 167. 
 
 17. The School Shop: E. Yeomans; vol. 125, p. 813. 
 
 18. What of Coeducation? Z. Gale; vol. 114, p. 95. 
 
 19. The Education of the Girl: M. L. Harkness; vol. 113, 
 p. 324. 
 
AND SUGGESTIONS FOR WRITING 313 
 
 20. One View of Domestic Science: M. L. Harkness; vol. 108, 
 p. 474. 
 
 21. A Boarding-School Inquiry: E. W. Parmelee; vol. 125, 
 p. 95. 
 
 22. A Democratic School: J. G. Cozzens; vol. 125, p. 383. 
 
 23. An Educational Emergency: E. O. Sisson; vol. 106, p. 54. 
 
 Ill 
 
 The Life of the Nation 
 
 What is the spirit of your fellow citizens? How do they look 
 at life? What things do they seem to hold most important? What 
 do they think about ? By what ideas and emotions are they moved ? 
 What concrete forms do their aspirations assume? Are there dis 
 tinct classes in your town? Is there any attempt to promote com 
 munity spirit? Can you make any suggestions? What is social 
 democracy? Do you know any men and women in your town who 
 seem to you good examples of Americanism? What do you think 
 are the fundamentals of American life, "when the tumult and the 
 shouting dies"? Your parents may be able to tell you about 
 changes which have come over your community. Have those 
 changes been for the better or the worse? Must they continue 
 blindly, or can you and your friends direct them? 
 
 Who governs America? What are some of the political institu 
 tions peculiar to America? What are some institutions which re 
 semble those of foreign countries? Can you define "democracy" 
 as it exists here? How does it differ from other democracies? 
 With what political institutions have you come in direct contact? 
 What institutions indirectly affect your life? What political 
 questions are being talked of now? 
 
 After you have learned about the American system of political 
 democracy, you will find plenty of people to find fault with it. 
 There are plenty of people ready to give you their views. And 
 there is an immense amount of material available outside of 
 books and magazines. The members of your city government, 
 local politicians, interested voters, uninterested voters, newspaper 
 men they will all talk to you. Visit the city council in some 
 session, and observe. If you can, go to the state house and see the 
 legislature. In every community there are political meetings of all 
 the parties, which will help you to take the measure of the men 
 
314 QUESTIONS, COMMENTS, 
 
 who want to wield power. What things do you think are wrong 
 with our political system? What things must be right that our 
 government should have so long endured? 
 
 There is no richer field of material than the economic life of the 
 community. 
 
 What industries are in your community? What do they make? 
 Where do they obtain their raw material? Where do they sell 
 their product? How are their plants organized? What effect have 
 they upon your community? What kind of people work for them? 
 Are their employees organized in unions? Have there ever been 
 strikes or lockouts in your town? Have industrial conditions 
 changed of late? How does a man "get a job"? If you had to "go 
 to work" in your town, what should you do? What commodities 
 are sold in your town? Why are some stores larger than others? 
 Why do your parents trade where they do? How does a man 
 "open a store"? Why do stores fail? How does your city get its 
 meat, its milk, its clothing, its gasoline, its coal? Are there any 
 interesting commercial enterprises, such as cooperative stores, in 
 your town? 
 
 When you think about the problems of your community, think 
 in concrete terms. Avoid generalizations that cannot be proved 
 by observation and experience don t rely wholly upon books 
 and magazines. Don t, for instance, worry about the vague and 
 general problems of "Americanization" in somebody else s town. 
 Study your own community. Are there unassimilated immigrants 
 in your town? Where did they come from? What kind of people 
 are they? What are their customs, their faults }> their virtues? Are 
 they in process of assimilation? How? What agencies are helping 
 them? Are the public schools doing anything? the churches? in 
 dustries? civic bodies? Describe some typical immigrants. Try 
 to see into their hearts with sympathy and understanding. Don t 
 take general statements about immigrants on trust: find out for 
 yourself. Their lives are full of interest and color. Help them to 
 assume the duties of citizens of a new country, and remember 
 that true help can be given only on a basis of understanding. 
 
 Above all, keep your eyes and ears open to the color and life, 
 the glamour and harshness, the variety and monotony of the 
 world outside your school and college. There is enough material 
 there to write about for a dozen lifetimes. 
 
AND SUGGESTIONS FOR WRITING 315 
 
 OTHER ATLANTIC ARTICLES 
 
 1. American Characteristics: G. Ferrero; vol. 106, p. 223. 
 
 2. Intellectual America: a European; vol. 125, p. 188. 
 
 3. Redwood Canyon: H. S. Canby; vol. 113, p. 832. 
 
 4. The Pace that Kills: F. M. Hueffer; vol. 107, p. 670. 
 
 5. Americanism: A. Repplier; vol. 117, p. 289. 
 
 6. Trans-national America: R. Bourne; vol. 118, p. 86. 
 
 7. "Scum o the Earth": R. H. Schauffler; vol. 108, p. 614. 
 
 8. To a Citizen of the Old School: S. M. Crothers; vol. 109, 
 p. 289. 
 
 9. The Social Order in an American Town: R. Bourne; vol. 
 Ill, p. 227. 
 
 10. The Ugly City: H. J. Smith; vol. 124, p. 27. 
 
 11. The Provincial American: M. Nicholson; vol. 107, p. 311. 
 
 12. The Passing of the Farmer: R. H. Holmes; vol. 110, p. 517. 
 
 13. The Matter with Us: W. S. Rossiter; vol. 106, p. 787. 
 
 14. The Direct-Primary Experiment: E. Woollen; vol. 110, 
 p. 41. 
 
 15. Do Our Representatives Represent? F. E. Leupp; vol. 114, 
 p. 433. 
 
 16. Our Irresponsible State Governments: W. D. Hines; vol. 
 115, p. 637. 
 
 17. The Second-Rate Man in Politics: M. Nicholson; vol. 118, 
 p. 175. 
 
 18. The Unlimited Franchise: M. Eastman; vol. 108, p. 46. 
 
 19. Prison Cruelty: F. Tannenbaum; vol. 125, p. 433. 
 
 20. Sing Sing: an Evolution: F. M. White; vol. 118, p. 341. 
 
 21. The Background of Prison Cruelty: Number 13; vol. 126, 
 p. 214. 
 
 22. The Basic Problem of Democracy : W. Lippmann. 
 I. What Modern Liberty Means; vol. 124, p. 616. 
 
 II. Liberty and the News; vol. 124, p. 779. 
 
 23. Press Tendencies and Dangers: O. G. Villard; vol. 121, 
 p. 62. 
 
 24. Immigration and the Labor Supply: D. D. Lescohier; vol. 
 123, p. 483. 
 
 25. Trade Unions and Public Policy. Democracy or Dyna 
 mite? H. R. Mussey; vol. 109, p. 441. 
 
 26. The Labor Policy of the American Trusts: C. H. Parker; 
 vol. 125, p. 225. 
 
316 QUESTIONS, COMMENTS, 
 
 27. The Technique of American Industry: C. H. Parker; vol. 
 125, p. 12. 
 
 28. The Human Factor: C. Wight; vol. 125, p. 23. 
 
 29. Coal and Reconstruction: G. H. Gushing; vol. 125, p. 119. 
 
 30. What Industries Are Worth Having? F. W. Taussig; vol. 
 Ill, p. 701. 
 
 31. My Chinese Fan: H. H. Powers; vol. 116, p. 779. 
 
 32. Imagination in Business: L. F. Deland; vol. 103, p. 433. 
 
 33. The Call of the Job; R. C. Cabot; vol. 112, p. 599. 
 
 34. The North Dakota Idea: A. Ruhl; vol. 123, p. 686. 
 
 35. Socialism and Human Achievement: J. O. Fagan; vol. 107, 
 p. 24. 
 
 36. Maxim Silencers for Old Wheezes: S. Deming; vol. 115, 
 p. 323. 
 
 37. Our Instinctive Idiocies: S. Deming; vol. 113, p. 585. 
 
 38. The Revolutionary Intellectual: J. S. Shapiro; vol. 125, 
 p. 820. 
 
 39. The Reaction of a Radical; vol. 124, p. 714. 
 
 40. Consolations of the Conservative: A. Repplier; vol. 124, 
 p. 760. 
 
 IV 
 
 International Relations 
 
 The student who is interested in writing about international 
 relations must first study the life of foreign countries. Let him 
 choose some country and ask himself such questions as these. 
 What is its government? What is its history? What is its present 
 economic and political status? What relation does it bear to the 
 United States? to other countries? How do people of the country 
 earn a living? How were they affected by the war? by recon 
 struction? Does it send immigrants to the United States? Do 
 they fairly represent it? What is its probable future? What has 
 civilization learned from it? What may we learn to-day? 
 
 From concrete details the student may well pass to general ideas. 
 What are we and other countries doing to avoid another war? 
 What are we doing to establish international good-feeling? How 
 are we profiting by the mistakes of the past? What do ordinary 
 folk know about international relations? What sources of infor 
 mation are open to them? How can they be stimulated to further 
 interest? 
 
AND SUGGESTIONS FOR WRITING 317 
 
 Finally, the student ought to watch the international trouble 
 spots: Russia, Ireland, the Balkans, South America. In these 
 places time will move swiftly in the next generation, and he who 
 is really prepared for life will keep abreast of time. 
 
 OTHER ATLANTIC ARTICLES 
 
 1. Manifest Destiny in America: H. M. Chittenden; vol. 117, 
 p. 48. 
 
 2. Destiny not Manifest: H. M. Chittenden; vol. 117, p. 643. 
 
 3. The Heart of the Trouble in Mexico: C. Johnston; vol. 124, 
 p. 554. 
 
 4. The Human Side of Mexico: C. B. Nordhoff; vol. 124, 
 p. 502. 
 
 5. Nicaragua and the United States: C. F. Wicker; vol. 119, 
 p. 682. 
 
 6. The Monroe Doctrine: an Obsolete Shibboleth; H. Bing- 
 ham; vol. Ill, p. 721. 
 
 7. The Monroe Doctrine and Latin America: F. G. Calderon; 
 vol. 113, p. 305. 
 
 8. The Future of Central Europe: E. D. Durand; vol. 125, 
 p. 830. 
 
 9. The United States and the League of Peace: H. N. 
 Brailsford; vol. 119, p. 433. 
 
 10. Democracy and Diplomacy : A. Bullard; vol. 119, p. 491. 
 
 11. Democratic Control of Foreign Policy: G. L. Dickinson; 
 vol. 118, p. 145. 
 
 12. Financial Imperialism: F. C. Howe; vol. 120, p. 477. 
 
 13. Shipping and World-Politics : R. G. Gettell; vol. 123, p. 255. 
 
 14. Is a Permanent Peace Possible? B. Russell; vol. 115, 
 p. 367. 
 
 V 
 
 The New Position of Women 
 
 The student who would write about the new position of women 
 must first seek knowledge. 
 
 He will try to find out precisely in what respects the position of 
 women has changed hi the last fifty years. How has women s 
 dependence on men changed? In what ways have women grown 
 self-reliant? What new fields of work are open to women? How 
 did women earn their living when they had to fifty years 
 ago? How are girls whom you know planning to earn their living 
 
318 QUESTIONS, COMMENTS, 
 
 now? What barriers still face women? How did women win the 
 privilege of suffrage? 
 
 He will try to understand what women are thinking about now. 
 He will talk with women who are busy with the world s work, and 
 women, too, who quietly keep their homes. What are their inter 
 ests, their occupations, their prejudices, their limitations, their 
 social activities, their problems, and their aims when they are 
 conscious of themselves as participants in programmes and social 
 movements? 
 
 He will analyze their relations to the civic, social, and economic 
 life of our own time. What is the effect of the competition of 
 women with men in industrial life? How have women and their 
 interests affected business : the retail trade, advertising, books, and 
 magazines? 
 
 He will find out about the status of women in other countries : 
 in England, France, Eastern Europe, the Orient. 
 
 And he will be especially interested in what women have writ 
 ten, and in what men have written about women. European lit 
 erature has been preoccupied with the relations between women 
 and men. W T hat women have figured in the literature that you 
 have read in school and college? In what respects do ideas that 
 you have gathered from your reading seem valuable, and perti 
 nent to modern conditions? in what respects do they seem out 
 worn and merely curious? 
 
 No subject is ridden by more prejudices than this; few offer 
 more opportunities for shaky generalizations. But, on the other 
 hand, few subjects are more closely bound up with the right direc 
 tion of our common life. 
 
 OTHER ATLANTIC ARTICLES 
 
 1. The Soulful Sex: W. Follett; vol. 125, p. 736. 
 
 2. The Mind of Woman: H. Ellis; vol. 118, p. 366. 
 
 3. Woman and Religion: B. I. Bell; vol. 117, p. 378. 
 
 4. Feminist Intentions: W. L. George; vol. 112, p. 721. 
 
 5. Notes on the Intelligence of Woman: W. L. George; vol. 
 116, p. 721. 
 
 6. Further Notes on the Intelligence of Woman : W. L. George; 
 vol. 117, p. 99. 
 
 7. The Unknown Quantity in the Woman Problem: E. Wood- 
 bridge; vol. 113, p. 510. 
 
AND SUGGESTIONS FOR WRITING 319 
 
 8. The Married Woman s Margin: E. Woodbridge; vol. 116, 
 p. 629. 
 
 9. Dress and the Woman: K. F. Gerould; vol. 108, p. 617. 
 
 10. Uniforms for Women: W. L. George; vol. 114, p. 589. 
 
 11. Uniforms for Women: Contributors Club; vol. 115, p. 
 139. 
 
 12. The Real Cost of Dressing: Contributors Club; vol. 115, 
 p. 138. 
 
 13. The Vanishing Lady: C. A. P. Comer; vol. 108, p. 721. 
 
 14. Honor among Women: E. Woodbridge; vol. 110, p. 588. 
 
 15. Women s Honor: Contributors Club; vol. 110, p. 855. 
 
 16. The Economic Independence of Women: E. Barnes; vol. 
 110, p. 260. 
 
 17. The Feminizing of Culture: E. Barnes; vol. 109, p. 770. 
 
 18. Women in Industry: E. Barnes; vol. 110, p. 116. 
 
 19. The Woman who Writes: W. Kirkland; vol. 118, p. 46. 
 
 20. Girls: R. S. V. P.; vol. 125, p. 490. 
 
 VI 
 
 Religion and Personal Life 
 
 One s personal life generally needs expression in character and 
 action rather than in writing. Not everybody wishes to write 
 about his religious opinions; most of us find such matters rather 
 too intimate for discussion. And yet the student who feels deeply 
 on this subject may well clarify his ideas by writing about them. 
 It is well, too, in an age which many people believe to be one of 
 declining faith, to face the social problems of religion clearly and 
 steadfastly. He who will write about them needs knowledge, 
 humility, tolerance for variations in method of observance and 
 forms of creed, and a firm and abiding faith in the truths that lie 
 at the heart of the matter. 
 
 OTHER ATLANTIC ARTICLES 
 
 1. The Useless Virtues: R. B. Perry; vol. 114, p. 411. 
 
 2. The Still Small Voice: J. Burroughs; vol. 117, p. 329. 
 
 3. The Cultivation of Nonchalance: E. P. Frost; vol. 113, 
 p. 644. 
 
 4. A Plea for Erasmians: C. H. A. Wager; vol. 114, p. 83. 
 
320 QUESTIONS, COMMENTS 
 
 5. The Cult of the Passing Hour: O. W. Firkins; vol. 113, 
 p. 661. 
 
 6. The Virtue of Intolerance: R. K. Root; vol. 125, p. 385. 
 
 7. The Cheerful Clan: A. Repplier; vol. 125, p. 748. 
 
 8. The Ignominy of Being Good: M. Eastman; vol. 107, 
 p. 131. 
 
 9. Our Loss of Nerve: A. Repplier; vol. 112, p. 298. 
 
 10. At Seventy-three and Beyond: N. V. Wilson; vol. 114 
 p. 123. 
 
 11. De Senectute: H. D. Sedgwick; vol. Ill, p. 163. 
 
STORY, ESSAY, AND VERSE 
 
 AN ATLANTIC ANTHOLOGY FOR 
 CLASSES IN LITERATURE 
 
 Edited by 
 CHARLES SWAIN THOMAS and HARRY GILBERT PAUL 
 
 This volume of literature selected from the Atlantic 
 Monthly was chosen especially to fit the needs of senior 
 high school and junior college classes. Those who are 
 preparing candidates for the College Entrance Exam 
 inations will find here, in compact form, material suffi 
 cient to cover the requirements in the short story and 
 the essay, and material that splendidly represents 
 the best in modern writing. It is with such books as 
 this that the teacher can best secure the spontaneous 
 and individual reactions that are necessary to the devel 
 opment of that selective and critical power which is 
 essential to the study of literature. 
 
 The stories in this volume are varied in interest and 
 in type: they range from the tragedy of Sir Gilbert 
 Parker s Three Commandments in the Vulgar Tongue to 
 the inimitable humor of Mark Twain s The Canvasser s 
 Tale; they include the conventional short story, the 
 sketch, and the informal narrative. Atlantic essays 
 have a charm and a fame of their own; those included in 
 Story, Essay, and Verse are true to the Atlantic tradition 
 of grace and excellence. The poetry in this volume 
 includes Browning s Prospice, and Chester Firkins On 
 the Subway Express. Its facets are many, and each is 
 perfectly cut. As a book to be put in the hands of 
 students and turned to throughout the year, Story, 
 Essay, and Verse will prove an ever-effective stimulus 
 to the enthusiasm and effort of the class. 
 
 12mo, bound in cloth. Price $1.50 
 
THE ATLANTIC BOOK OF 
 MODERN PLAYS 
 
 Edited by STERLING ANDRTJS LEONARD of the University 
 of Wisconsin 
 
 In high schools and colleges throughout the country 
 there is an urgent need for just such a collection as this 
 short modern plays chosen for their literary and 
 dramatic power, appropriate for class-study, carefully 
 edited, and assembled in an attractive and inexpensive 
 volume. 
 
 Community Theatres and Little Theatres all over the 
 country attest the people s growing appreciation of dra 
 matic art, and more and more high schools, as well as 
 colleges, are introducing the study of modern drama into 
 their curricula. Under these circumstances, the Atlantic 
 Book of Modern Plays comes as a peculiarly appropriate 
 offering for those who intend most adequately to satisfy 
 the demands of progressive education. 
 
 TABLE OF CONTENTS 
 
 THE PHILOSOPHER OF BUTTER- 
 
 BIGGENS Harold Chapin 
 
 SPREADING THE NEWS . . Lady Augusta Gregory 
 
 THE BEGGAR AND THE KING William Parkhurst 
 
 TIDES George Middleton 
 
 ILE Eugene O Neill 
 
 CAPTAIN OF THE GATE . . Beulah Marie Dix 
 
 CAMPBELL OF KILMHOR . . J. A. Ferguson 
 
 THE SUN John Galsworthy 
 
 THE KNAVE OF HEARTS . . Louise Saunders 
 
 FAME AND THE POET . . . Lord Dunsany 
 
 GETTYSBURG Percy MacKaye 
 
 LoNESOME-LiKE .... Harold Brighouse 
 
 RIDERS TO THE SEA . . . John M. Synge 
 
 THE LAND OF HEART S DESIRE William Butler Yeats 
 
 THE RIDING TO LITHEND . . Gordon Bottomley 
 
 12mo, bound in cloth. Price $1.50 
 
The Voice of Science in 
 Nineteenth-Century Literature 
 
 A Selection from the Works of Victorian Scientists, 
 
 Critics, and Poets, Edited by ROBERT E. ROGERS and 
 
 HENRY G. PEARSON of the Massachusetts Institute of 
 
 Technology. 
 
 The English Leaflet (the official publication of the 
 New England Association of Teachers of English) in its 
 May number said of this volume: 
 
 The reactions of men of letters to the challenge of science, in 
 an age significant both for literature and for science. The col 
 lection is worthy of study in all technical universities and in 
 liberal colleges where survey courses in English literature are 
 offered. 
 
 THE VOICE OF SCIENCE IN 
 NINETEENTH-CENTURY LITERATURE 
 
 includes selections from all the leading men of the cen 
 tury Arnold, Ruskin, Foster, Huxley, Tyndall, Ten 
 nyson, Browning, Meredith, Hardy, Emerson, Steven 
 son, and others. 
 
 Professor Henry G. Pearson, Head of the Department 
 of English and History at the Institute, hi his introduc 
 tion to this volume defines its purpose: 
 
 Broadly stated, the central theme of the book is man s place 
 in the universe, considered in the light of the new knowledge and 
 speculation as to his origin and destiny which the scientific study 
 of the nineteenth century has invoked. ... In some cases the 
 background is the group of ideas roughly classed under the word 
 evolution; in others it is some characteristic phase of religious 
 feeling or ethical or theological thought. ... 
 
 What should be emphasized on the side of history is not the 
 marshaling of fact, of things done; but the war of thought in one 
 field or another. 
 
 It ia the man of genius speaking with authority to those of 
 his own time who is here presented. In such a setting his voice 
 has still its ancient power. 
 
 Modern teaching demands that students shall be 
 aroused to earnest and original thinking. This collec 
 tion provides the necessary "initial impulse" of interest 
 and the synthesis of fact and speculation which stimu 
 late individual gropings toward the truth. The class 
 reaction to such a text is quick and creative. 
 
 Circulars, giving table of contents, sent on request. 
 
 12mo, bound in cloth. Price $2.00 
 
ATLANTIC READINGS 
 
 Interesting and Interpretative Literature in Inexpensive 
 Form for School and College Classes 
 
 1. The Lie By Mary Aniin 
 
 The story of a small Jewish immigrant s intense loyalty 
 to America. 
 
 2. Ruggs R.O.T.C. . . By William Addleman Ganoe 
 
 An instructive and humorous story of the military 
 training camp. 
 
 3. Jungle Night By William Beebe 
 
 A descriptive essay of unusual beauty. 
 
 4. An Englishwoman s 
 
 Message By Mrs. A. Burnett-Smith 
 
 From a loyal Englishwoman in war time. 
 
 5. A Father to His Freshman Son 
 A Father to His Graduate Girl 
 
 By Edward Sanford Martin 
 Intimate messages from a wise and sympathetic father. 
 
 6. A Port Said Miscellany . ... By William McFee 
 
 A personal record of interesting experiences at the Port. 
 
 7. Education : The Mastery of the Arts of Life 
 
 By Arthur E. Morgan 
 
 An essay by a gifted civil engineer, whose views of 
 education are unhampered by academic tradition. 
 
 8. Intensive Living . ... By Cornelia A. P. Comer 
 
 Homely philosophies discussed in dialogue form. 
 
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 The Pilgrim Tercentenary Oration by a trained 
 historian. 
 
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