  #1 in our series by Arthur Brisbane Copyright laws are changing all over the world, be sure to check the copyright laws for your country before posting these files! Please take a look at the important information in this header. We encourage you to keep this file on your own disk, keeping an electronic path open for the next readers. Do not remove this. **Etexts Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** *These Etexts Prepared By Hundreds of Volunteers and Donations* Editorials from the Hearst Newspapers December, 1996 [Etext #742] *Editorials from the Hearst Newspapers by Arthur Brisbane* This etext was scanned by Charles Keller with OmniPage Professional OCR software donated by Caere Corporation, 1-800-535-7226. Contact Mike Lough <Mikel@caere.com> We are now trying to release all our books one month in advance of the official release dates, for time for better editing. We produce about two million dollars for each hour we work. The fifty hours is one conservative estimate for how long it we take to get any etext selected, entered, proofread, edited, copyright searched and analyzed, the copyright letters written, etc. This projected audience is one hundred million readers. If our value per text is nominally estimated at one dollar then we produce $2 million dollars per hour this year as we release thirty-two text files per month: or 400 more Etexts in 1996 for a total of 800. If these reach just 10% of the computerized population, then the total should reach 80 billion Etexts. We need your donations more than ever! For these and other matters, please mail to: When all other email fails try our Executive Director: We would prefer to send you this information by email ftp uiarchive.cso.uiuc.edu login: anonymous password: your@login cd etext/etext90 through /etext96 or cd etext/articles [get suggest gut for more information] dir [to see files] get or mget [to get files. . .set bin for zip files] GET INDEX?00.GUT for a list of books and GET NEW GUT for general information and MGET GUT* for newsletters. ***START**THE SMALL PRINT!**FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS**START*** Why is this "Small Print!" statement here? You know: lawyers. They tell us you might sue us if there is something wrong with your copy of this etext, even if you got it for free from someone other than us, and even if what's wrong is not our fault. So, among other things, this "Small Print!" statement disclaims most of our liability to you. It also tells you how you can distribute copies of this etext if you want to. To create these etexts, the Project expends considerable efforts to identify, transcribe and proofread public domain works. Despite these efforts, the Project's etexts and any medium they may be on may contain "Defects". Among other things, Defects may take the form of incomplete, inaccurate or corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other etext medium, a computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by your equipment. If you discover a Defect in this etext within 90 days of receiving it, you can receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending an explanatory note within that time to the person you received it from. If you received it on a physical medium, you must return it with your note, and such person may choose to alternatively give you a replacement copy. If you received it electronically, such person may choose to alternatively give you a second opportunity to receive it electronically. THIS ETEXT IS OTHERWISE PROVIDED TO YOU "AS-IS". NO OTHER WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, ARE MADE TO YOU AS TO THE ETEXT OR ANY MEDIUM IT MAY BE ON, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.INDEMNITY You will indemnify and hold the Project, its directors, officers, members and agents harmless from all liability, cost and expense, including legal fees, that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following that you do or cause: [1] distribution of this etext, [2] alteration, modification, or addition to the etext, or [3] any Defect. [1] Only give exact copies of it. Among other things, this requires that you do not remove, alter or modify the etext or this "small print!" statement. You may however, if you wish, distribute this etext in machine readable binary, compressed, mark-up, or proprietary form, including any form resulting from conversion by word pro- cessing or hypertext software, but only so long as *EITHER*: [*] The etext, when displayed, is clearly readable, and does *not* contain characters other than those intended by the author of the work, although tilde (~), asterisk (*) and underline (_) characters may be used to convey punctuation intended by the author, and additional characters may be used to indicate hypertext links; OR [*] The etext may be readily converted by the reader at no expense into plain ASCII, EBCDIC or equivalent form by the program that displays the etext (as is the case, for instance, with most word processors); OR [*] You provide, or agree to also provide on request at no additional cost, fee or expense, a copy of the etext in its original plain ASCII form (or in EBCDIC or other equivalent proprietary form). [2] Honor the etext refund and replacement provisions of this "Small Print!" statement. *END*THE SMALL PRINT! FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.04.29.93*END* EDITORIALS from the HEARST NEWSPAPERS {Arthur Brisbane} CONTENTS The articles in this book were published originally in the editorial columns of the various Hearst newspapers throughout the country. These articles may have some interest for the student of modern happenings, because of the fact that the newspapers publishing them have an aggregate daily circulation of two millions of copies, and are read each day by no fewer than five millions of men and women. Such wide circulation of identical opinions on current events, in different parts of the country, is a new feature of our national life. The character of such writings, and their probable influence upon the public mind, whatever their lack of intrinsic merit, may be of sufficient importance to justify the publication of this collection of ephemeral writings. WHY ARE ALL MEN GAMBLERS?The annual report of the gambling house at Monte Carlo shows a profit of about $5,000,000. A large collection of human beings travel from all parts of the world to Monte Carlo for the sake of giving $5,000,000 to the gambling concern there. Wherever you look on earth to-day or in the past you find human beings gambling, and you will find the gambling instinct stronger than any other—stronger than the love of drink, infinitely stronger than the love of normal, honest gain. * * * Christopher Columbus's sailors gambled on the way over, and the Indians on this side were gambling while waiting to be discovered. In an office overlooking Trinity graveyard, in New York City, an old man, past eighty, with a fortune of at least $50,000,000, gambles every day with all the excitement of youth. The fluctuations in his game bring to his sallow cheeks the color that no other human emotion could bring there. On his way home this old man passes crowds of children in the streets and looks down, concerned and sorrowful, to find that they, too, are gambling. They are matching pennies or shaking dice. * * * Clergymen are startled and amazed to find that women are gambling heavily. They have gambled heavily ever since civilization has progressed far enough to give them large sums to gamble with. Marie Antoinette staked thousands of louis at a time at She was so wrapped up in gambling she could not see that her neck was in danger. When the lava came down from Vesuvius it buried Pompeiians who were gambling. The men who dig up the old monuments in Africa find gambling instruments crumbling away side by side with appliances for taking human life. * * * Nowhere in the lower forms of animal life, so far as we know, is there the slightest indication of the gambling instinct. The monkey, the elephant, love whiskey, and easily become drunkards. The passion for alcohol seems innate in animal life; even the wise ant can be readily induced to disgrace himself if alcohol is put near him. For all the human weaknesses and mainsprings—ambition, affection, vanity, drunkenness, ferocity, greediness, cunning—we can find beginnings among the lower animals. But man appears to have evolved from within himself the gambling instinct for his own especial damnation. Where did the instinct come from? Why was it planted in us? Like every other instinct with which intelligent nature endows us, it must have its good purpose, and it must not be judged merely in the corrupted form in which we study it at Monte Carlo or in Wall Street. Perhaps the spirit of gambling is really only an atrophied, perverted form of the spirit of adventure. Columbus staked his life and gambled, when he started across the water. The leaders of the American Revolution expressly staked their lives, their fortunes and their "sacred honor" in signing the Declaration of Independence. They were noble gamblers, working for the welfare of their fellows. Perhaps gambling is only a perverted form of intelligent ambition—we are all natural gamblers because we have within us the quality which makes us willing to risk our own comfort, security and present happiness for a result that seems better worth while. The universality of the gambling instinct in human beings is certainly worthy of our study. NO MAN UNDERSTANDS IRON HOW CAN WE HOPE TO UNDERSTAND GOD?Is there laughter in heaven—or can nothing move the eternal heavenly calm? If mirth exists among the perpetually blissful, how must the angels laugh when in idle moments they listen to our speculations concerning the Divinity? They peer down at us as we look at ants dragging home a fragment of dead caterpillar. They hear us say things like this: If God exists, why does He not reveal himself to ME? How could God exist before He created the world? Force cannot exist or demonstrate its existence without matter. How could a creator exist except with creation around him? Where did He live before He made heaven? If He is all-powerful, could He in five seconds make a six months' old calf? If He made it in five seconds it would not be six months old. Nonsense more subtle comes from the educated, from those who know enough to be preposterous in a pretentious way. Hear the wise man: God does not exist, because I cannot prove His existence: I can prove everything else. With my law of gravitation I point to a speck in space and say: "You'll find a new planet there," and you find it. If a God existed could I not also point to Him? If I can trace a comet in its flight, could I not trace the comet's maker? Huxley says: "The cosmic process has no sort of relation to moral ends." That's a philosopher's way of saying something foolish. Lalande, the astronomer, remarked that he had swept the entire heavens with his telescope and found no God there. That's funnier than any ant who should say: "I've searched this whole dead caterpillar and found no God, so THERE IS NO GOD." The corner of space which our telescopes can "sweep" is smaller, compared to the universe, than a dead caterpillar compared with this earth. Moleschott, an able physiologist, believed that phosphorus was essential to mental activity. Perhaps he did prove that. But he said: "No thought without phosphorus," and thought he had wiped the human soul out of existence. Philosophers do not laugh at Moleschott. But they would laugh at a savage who would say: "I have discovered that there is a catgut in a fiddle. No fiddle without catgut—no music without cats. Don't talk to me about soul or musical genius—it's all catgut." We peek out at this universe from our half-developed corner of it. We see faintly the millions of huge suns circling with their planet families billions of miles away. We see our own little sun rise and set; we ask ourselves a thousand foolish questions of cause and Ruler—and because we cannot answer, we decry faith. Wise doubter, look at a small piece of iron. It looks solid. You make it smaller. Then the particles did not touch. Do they touch now? No; relatively they are farther apart than this planet from its nearest neighbor. That piece of iron, apparently solid, consists of clusters of atoms wonderfully grouped, each cluster called a molecule. The molecular cluster is invisible, millions of clusters in the smallest visible fragment. The atom is accepted by science as the final particle of matter. Its name indicates that it is supposed to be indivisible. When science gets to the atom it calmly gives up and says: "That is so small that it can no longer be divided." A reasonable enough conclusion on the surface, considering that you might have millions of atoms of iron in one corner of your eye and not know it. But why should the atom be incapable of further division? If it is any size at all it can be thought of as split. Where does the divisibility of matter end, if anywhere? What is there SOLID about iron? Nothing in reality, except that it seems to us solid. Already, with the X-ray, we can look through it. Forces such as heat and electricity pass through it more readily than through free air. Science, which gradually finds things out, denying as it goes along everything one step beyond, tells you truly that the clusters of atoms in iron float in a sea of ether, just as do our planets going round the sun. Heat the iron intensely. What happens? You get what you call white heat. The white heat and the white light come from the increase of wave motion in this ether, and this ether, absolutely imponderable, of a tenuity inconceivable, possesses elasticity greater and more powerful than that of coiled steel. —— So much for one small piece of iron, such as you would kick to one side in a junk heap. If it interests you, read pages 159 to 162 of John Fiske's admirable little book, "Through Nature to God." You will finish the book the day you get it. If you are surprised to learn how much you did not know about iron—after living near bits of iron all your life—is it not just possible that your mind may be too feeble to conceive of God? For the fly buzzing about the edge of Niagara Falls, the falls do not exist. The fly's brain cannot grasp their grandeur. It can understand only the speck of spray that falls on its wing. You live with God around you, hopelessly incapable of perceiving His existence save through that faint spark of unconscious faith that was mercifully planted in you. Snuff that out with dull efforts at reason, and you have nothing. WE LONG FOR IMMORTAL IMPERFECTION— WE CAN'T HAVE IT.All our longings for immortality, all our plans for immortal life are based on the hope that Divine Providence will condescend to let us live in another world as we live here. Each of us wants to be himself in the future life, and to see his friends as he knew them. We want to preserve individuality forever and ever, when the stars shall have faded away and the days of matter ended. But what is individuality except imperfection? You are different from Smith, Smith is different from Jones. But it is simply a difference of imperfect construction. One is more foolish than another, one is more irresponsibly moved to laughter or anger—that constitutes his personality. Remove our imperfections and we should all be alike—smooth off all agglomerations of matter on all sides and everything would be spherical. What would be the use of keeping so many of us if we were all perfect, and therefore all alike? One talks through his nose, one has a deep voice. But shall kind Providence provide two sets of wings for nose talkers and chest talkers? Why not make the two into one good talker and save one pair of wings? Why not, in fact, keep just one perfect sample, and let all the rest placidly drift back to nothingness? Or, better, why not take all the goodness that there is in all the men and women that ever were and melt it all down into one cosmic human being? —— The rain drops, the mist and the sprays of Niagara all go back to the ocean in time. Possibly we all go back at the end to the sea of divine wisdom, whence we were sent forth to do, well or badly, our little work down here: Future punishment? We think not. One drop of water revives the wounded hero—another helps to give wet feet and consumption to a little child. It all depends on circumstances. Both drops go back to the ocean. There is no rule that sends the good drop to heaven and the other to boil forever and ever in a sulphur pit. —— Troubles beset us when we think of a future state and our reason quarrels always with our longings. We all want—in heaven—to meet Voltaire with his very thin legs. But we cannot believe that those skinny shanks are to be immortal. We shall miss the snuff and the grease on Sam Johnson's collar. If an angel comes up neat and smiling and says "Permit me to introduce myself —I am the great lexicographer," we shall say "Tell that to some other angel. The great Samuel was dirty and wheezy, and I liked him that way." And children. The idea of children in heaven flying about with their little fluffy wings is fascinating. But would eternal childhood be fair to them? If a babe dies while teething, shall it remain forever toothless? How shall its mother know it if it is allowed to grow up? Listen to Heine—that marvellous genius of the Jewish race: "Yes, yes! You talk of reunion in a transfigured shape. What would that be to me? I knew him in his old brown surtout, and so I would see him again. Thus he sat at table, the salt cellar and pepper caster on either hand. And if the pepper was on the right and the salt on the left hand he shifted them over. I knew him in a brown surtout, and so I would see him again." Thus he spoke of his dead father. Thus many of us think and speak of those that are gone. How foolish to hope for the preservation of what is imperfect! How important to have FAITH, and to feel that reality will surpass anticipation, and that whatever IS will be the best thing for us and satisfy us utterly. THREE WATER DROPS CONVERSEThree drops of water, stranded in a crevice on the side of an inland mountain, talked in this way: First Drop—"They say there is an ocean whence we came and to which we shall return." Second Drop—"They say we three drops are made in the image of that ocean; that as far as we go, which is not far, we are miniature oceans." Third Drop—"Bosh and nonsense. There is no ocean. It is all superstition. Before we were born here, from the mist, what were we? When we evaporate in a few minutes what becomes of us? You two drops make me feel sorry for you. I know that when I cease reflecting that white cloud up there, that ends ME. I have no delusions about oceans or going back to anything." —— You know what happened. The cloud formed into rain and our three drops were washed into a tiny trickling stream. The thin stream of rain ran into a brook, the brook into a river. Soon the three drops were back in the ocean—possibly without knowing it. Shall we some day go rolling back to the ocean of cosmic wisdom whence we came? Is it possible that man is indeed made in the image of God, as drops are made in the ocean's image—the individual men, like the individual drops, being sent forth to do necessary cosmic work through the universe, going back to the ocean after each errand is done, and so going back and forth, forever and ever? That would not be such a mean destiny, we should say. It would certainly be a very democratic form of cosmic government. —— Inferior men, inferior women, unworthy of comparison with perfect, cosmic wisdom? Not at all. Not inferior men and women, but inferior mediums, inferior brains, bodies and planets through which to work. Is one drop of water inferior to another? Is any inferior to the purest drop in the ocean? No. But one drop runs through the gutter of a stable, another rolls from a mountain spring, a third carries in solution the germ of typhus. But all three came pure from the ocean and all will go back to the ocean pure. DID WE ONCE LIVE ON THE MOON? AND SHALL WE MOVE ON TO THE SUN SOME FINE DAY?The most interesting questions are such as these: Whence did we come? Whither are we going? And, by the way, what are we? Are we of any true importance? Are we a permanent part of the universal scheme, privileged to move along through the ages and see the end as we have seen the beginning? Or are we, as advanced science says, merely like the weevil in the biscuit—no part of the Baker's plan? Are we indestructible specks of cosmic intelligence, lighting up and animating one material body after another—never destroyed—or do we play on this earth the passing part of the microbe in the Brie cheese, which gives that cheese its flavor? —— A great scientist, coldly analyzing the chemical processes essential to the creation of each new human being, scoffs at any possibility of immortality. With the microscope at his eye, he magnifies nature's mysteries; he sums up the investigations of the Hertwig brothers; he discourses learnedly of the nucleolus of the Cytula—or progeny cell. He declares that science is able to watch the creation of a human being, as it watches the progress of a chick in the egg. He asserts that each new creature is merely the result of a chemical process blending qualities of the mother and father. Having a "final beginning," man must have a final end. Man—a mixture of two sets of qualities—has no more chance of immortality than has beer, which is a mixture of malt and hops. Read and think over this cold summing-up of our mean, limited destiny as science farthest advanced now sees it: "It must appear utterly senseless now to speak of the immortality of the human person, when we know how this person, with all its individual qualities of body and mind, has arisen. How can this person possess an eternal life without end? The human person, like every other many-celled individual, IS BUT A PASSING PHENOMENON OF ORGANIC LIFE. With its death, the series of its vital activities ceases entirely, just as it began." That certainly is discouraging to a man who for fifty years has sung "I want to be an angel." Yet that is what Haeckel has to say about our chance of immortality. But the other side of the grave has the LAST say, and we think it will discredit Haeckel. We should even undertake to do that now and here in two columns of a yellow journal. But we are DETERMINED before the column ends to ask you what you think of our moon-earth-sun transmigration notion. The sun is now a blazing mass, inconceivably huge, inconceivably fierce in our eyes. Its flames leap hundreds of thousands of miles into space. If our earth fell to the sun, it would melt as a snow-flake falling upon a blazing forest. We certainly do not readily look upon the sun as our future home, if we accept its present condition as permanent. But once upon a time, hundreds of millions of years back, this earth used to look TO THE MOON, on a smaller scale, as the sun now looks to us. If there were on the moon at that time inferior human beings, in a low state of cosmic evolution, they undoubtedly had to thank the earth for their life, as we thank the sun. To them the earth, then incandescent, blazing with the heat that now reveals itself through volcanoes, was simply a whirling ball of fire, put in its place to warm them. They could no more think that men would ever come to live here than we can now think of moving on to the sun. —— In course of time this earth cooled off. It cooled so thoroughly that the moon died of cold. Life could no longer continue there. The dead satellite's destiny thenceforward was to show gratitude for past heat by moving our tides and cheering our poets. As life died out on the cold moon which had given us temporary hospitality, life sprang into being on this planet, now fitted to support it. Here, on a larger sphere, with greater opportunities, mankind is growing, and will far outstrip all that it could have done on the poor little moon. Meanwhile, as we struggle on, improving slowly, the sun, as science proves, is cooling off in its turn. The flames become less fierce as the thousands of centuries roll by. When we shall have developed as much as possible on this limited planet, our home will be cooled and ready on the sun, centre of our life in this corner of space. We shall move up a step—as boys do in the public schools. We shall have been moon men, earth men, and shall graduate into sun men. Think of a home so vast! On that grand star we shall lead lives worth while, and justify Huxley's belief that men exist somewhere compared to whom we should "be as black beetles compared to us." The excitement of meeting our brothers from other planets as they move up to the sun in batchcs will be great. WILLIAM HENRY CHANNING'S SYMPHONYTHE THOUGHT—To live content with small means; to seek elegance rather than luxury, and refinement rather than fashion; to be worthy, not respectable, and wealthy, not, rich; to listen to stars and birds, babes and sages, with open heart; to study hard; to think quietly, act frankly, talk gently, await occasions, hurry never; in a word, to let the spiritual, unbidden and unconscious, grow up through the common—this is my symphony. WILLIAM HENRY CHANNING.TO LIVE CONTENT WITH SMALL MEANS.This means to realize to the full the possibilities of life. Contentment means ABSENCE OF WORRY. It is only when free from worry that the brain can act normally, up to its highest standard. The man content with small means does his best work, devotes his energies to that which is worth while, and not to acquiring that which has no value. TO SEEK ELEGANCE RATHER THAN LUXURY.The difference between elegance and luxury is the difference between the thin, graceful deer, browsing on the scanty but sufficient forest pasture, and the fat swine revelling in plentiful garbage. REFINEMENT RATHER THAN FASHION.The difference between refinement and fashion is the difference between brains and clothing, the difference between an Emerson or a Huxley and a Beau Brummel or other worthless but elaborately decked carcass. TO BE WORTHY, NOT RESPECTABLE.In other words, to be like Henry George, and not like the owner of a trust. WEALTHY, NOT RICH.The man who has a good wife and good children, enough to take care of them, but not enough to spoil them, is WEALTHY. He is happier than the man who is RICH enough to be worried, rich enough to make it certain that his children will be ruined by extravagance, and perhaps live to be ashamed of him. TO LISTEN TO STARS AND BIRDS, BABES AND SAGES, WITH OPEN HEART.This means to enjoy the noblest gifts that God has given to man. He is happy who takes more pleasure in a beautiful sunset than in the sight of a flunky with powdered hair, artificial calves and lofty manners, handing him something indigestible on a plate of gold. TO STUDY HARD; TO THINK QUIETLY, ACT FRANKLY, TALK GENTLY.To exercise in this way the brain that is given to us is to lead the life of a MAN, a life of self-control, a life that is worth while, that leads to something and helps forward the improvement of the race. In the words which we have quoted at the top of this column WHO WAS CHANNING?He was a good man, and a wise man. He was one of the most eloquent clergymen ever born in this country, and as sincere a friend of individual man and of the race in general as ever lived. He was an enthusiast and an optimist—admirable combination. He was born in 1810, and died in 1884. His biography has been written by Octavius B. Frothingham. Channing saw the world through generous, charitable eyes. He was an ardent admirer of Charles Fourier, and appreciated the philosophy and social law-giving of that gigantic intellect. The quotation we print above is an index to his whole character, just as one flower tells the story of the beautiful garden in which it grew. Channing, unlike many sayers of fine things, was personally as fine as the things he said. He was worthy even of his own best thoughts, and that can be said for few fine thinkers. Admire him. Read some of his sermons and other writings if you have the chance. THE EXISTENCE OF GOD—PARABLE OF THE BLIND KITTENSThe notion that small things, the petty details of life, such as money getting, marriage questions, etc., are uppermost in the modern human brain is entirely false. If an editor asks: "Is marriage a failure?" he receives just so many answers, and then the interest dies out. If he asks: "Should a wife have pin money?" or "What is the easiest way for a woman to earn a living?" he ceases to receive answers after a short time. But to questions concerning the immortality of the soul, the existence of God, and man's destiny here and hereafter, the answers are endless. Letters on such matters have been received here by thousands. Every day the mail brings new and intelligent contributions to the questions that have kept men praying, thinking, fighting and hoping through the centuries: "IS THERE A GOD, AND WILL MY SOUL LIVE FOREVER?" ——Very interesting are the expressions of faith which fill a majority of the letters. Interesting also are the letters of doubters atheists, agnostics and the many intoxicated with a very little knowledge, who have decided to substitute their own wisdom and doubt for the belief of the ages—the belief in God and in personal immortality. Many think science has discovered that we could get on very well without a God. But science has done just the contrary. And here, if you please, we shall build up a sort of parable: —— A Man had a box full of motherless blind kittens. He was very kind to them. He put their box on wheels and moved it about to keep it in the sun. He gave them milk at regular intervals. With loving kindness he drove away the dog which growled and scared the little kittens into spitting and back raising. The kittens trusted the Man, loved him and felt that they needed him. That was the age of faith. One day a dog got a kitten and tore it to pieces. The kitten had disobeyed orders and laws. It had crawled away from the box. Another kitten, with one eye now partly open, got thoughtful and said: "There is no such thing as Man. Or, if there is such a thing, he is a monster to let little Willie get torn up. Don't talk to me about Kitten Wiliie being a sufferer through his own fault. I say there is no such thing as a Man. We kittens are bosses of the universe and must do our own fighting." That speaker was the Ingersoll kitten. A kitten of higher mental class opened both eyes just a little and actually made observations. Said he: "I am a scientist. I discover that we owe nothing to It rolls around in the sunlight of its own volition. True, I do not know who shoves it, but no Man could do it. Further, I discover that there is such a thing as the law of 'milk-passing.' Milk comes this way just so often. Its coming is nature's law. It has always come. It always will come. Good-night, I am going to sleep. But don't talk to me any more about a kind Man. It's all law, and I am certainly great, for I saw the laws first." That was the Newton kitten, but he lacked the Newton faith. We have no time to tell what the Darwin kitten said. He was very long-winded. But this happened. The kittens grew up—such as did not perish through their own fault. They got their eyes fully opened. They saw the Man, recognized him and asked only to be allowed to stay in his house. "Excuse us," they said, "for being such foolish kittens. But you know our eyes were not quite open." "Don't mention it," said the kind Man. "Go down cellar and help yourselves to mice." That's the end of the parable. We are all blind kittens, and our few attempts at explaining nature's wonders and kindness only get us into deeper and deeper mysteries. We discover that the earth goes round the sun. But the greatest scientist must admit his inability to tell or guess why it goes. "Give me the initial impulse," he says, "and all the rest is easy." The blind kittens in their wagon say: "Give our wagon just one shove and we'll explain the rest." The kitten gets hold of a law of "milk-passing" and substitutes that for man's individual kindness. The feeble-minded agnostic seizes the law of gravitation and thinks he can discard God with gravity's help. But the great mind that defined gravity's law was a religious mind—too profound to see anything final in its own feeble power. Newton was no atheist. None better than he knew the mysterious character of his law. That it has worked from all eternity "directly as the mass and inversely as the square of the distance" he knew and told his fellow-creatures. That is all he knew and all that any man knows about it. To-day Lord Kelvin, a worthy follower in Newton's steps, is asked to explain WHY gravity acts. He can only say: "I accept no theory of gravitation. Present science has no right to attempt to explain gravitation. We know nothing about it. We simply know NOTHING about it." Darwin asks, without answering his question: "Who can explain what is the essence of the attraction of gravitation?" —— To our doubting friends we say: Doubt if you must. But doubt intelligently and doubt first of all your own blind kitten wisdom. Remember that you at least know absolutely nothing. Study and think. Read. But don't let the half-developed wisdom of others choke up your brain and leave you a mere clogged-up doubting machine. Whatever you do, never interfere with the faith of others. Spread KNOWLEDGE, spread FACTS. Keep to yourself the doubts that would disturb others' happiness and do them no good. Tell what you KNOW. Keep quiet about what you GUESS. HAVE THE ANIMALS SOULS?"For that which befalleth the sons of men, befalleth beasts; even one thing befalleth them; as the one dieth, so dieth the other; YEA, THEY HAVE ALL ONE BREATH; SO THAT A MAN HATH NO PRE-EMINENCE ABOVE A BEAST: for all is vanity. "Who knoweth the spirit of man that goeth upward, and the The surface of the earth, the air as high as we can study it, the depths of the sea, swarm with animal life. The earth rolls around the sun bathed in its warm light. Millions of creatures die with every revolution of the little planet which is their home. And man "going to and fro in the earth, and walking up and down in it" rules the little animals and the big ones and calls himself sole heir of immortality. He says: "For ME this earth was made and balanced in its wonderful journey; for ME alone the marvels of future life are reserved." He digs up the strange creatures from the slimy depths of the ocean, studies and labels them. He dissects one animal to study his own diseases. He skins another to cover his feet with leather. He eats one ox and hitches its brother to the plough. He uses nature's explosive forces to bring down the bird on the wing. He sweeps the rivers with his nets. The stomach of the well-fed man is the graveyard of the animal kingdom. When his dinner is finished, the man well fed strokes his stomach contentedly and says to himself: All is well. For I have a soul and THEY have none. They have died to feed me. I am happy and they should be satisfied. —— What is the nature of the spirit that directs our humble animal brothers and sisters? They cover the earth as long as we let them, give place to us as the human race increases, and, without any thought of organized resistance, die that we may live. HAVE THESE ANIMALS SOULS?You have seen the bird grieving over the destruction of its nest. You have studied the pathetic eyes of the lost dog, and the sad submission of the tired, beaten horse. Is there not soul in those stricken creatures, and spiritual feeling deeper than that displayed by many men? First came all ANIMAL life, as we know it, and then came MAN. Science and religion agree on this point, at least. All owe their being to the same eternal FORCE. On this point again religion and science agree. Is the life in animals merely a passing dream, or does it express in its humble way the promise of life eternal? In Italy a scientific villain experimented on a dog to ascertain the power of maternal affection. The dog was most cruelly tortured. Its newborn puppy was beside Until it died there was nothing that could overcome maternal love in the heart of that poor dumb mother. Is there not soul in such love as that? JESUS' ATTITUDE TOWARD CHILDREN A SUNDAY SERMON"Suffer the little children to come unto me; and forbid them not; for of such is the Kingdom of God."—Mark X., 14. Jesus gave to the child its place in the world's society. With all the power of divine authority He built around the feeblest among us a wall that has protected them through the ages. Before His day the child existed only by sufferance. It had no rights. It was but a counter, an infinitesimal atom. It was considered simply the property of the parent. Its father had power of life and death over it. The homeless dog that roams the streets to-day is more effectively shielded from cruelty than was the friendless child before Jesus came to live and to die for the weak and poor. The law had said: "The parent is ruler of the child, and may dispose of it as he sees fit." But Jesus said—and these are the most beautiful and affecting words in all the moral law of the world: "Take heed that ye despise not one of these little ones; for I say unto you, that in heaven their angels do always behold the face of my Father which is in heaven."—Matthew xviii., 10. No threats so terrifying as those aimed at men who should harm little children: "It were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea."—Matthew xviii., 6. It is impossible now to conceive the horrid indifference to childhood's rights which preceded the birth of Christianity. Infanticide was not the exception, but a settled custom. So much so, that in Rome the "exposure" of children in desert places was almost a virtue, since it gave the child some slight chance of surviving. Not a few, but thousands and tens of thousands of children were thus "exposed." They fell a prey to wild beasts, or to the human beasts, still more ferocious, who took the children to make slaves or criminals of them. Jesus came, and a miracle was worked—a miracle that no man will deny. This was the miracle: Jesus said: "For I say unto you, their angels behold the face of my Father which is in heaven." Jesus spoke, and thousands of millions of men, through nineteen centuries, have believed, and obeyed the command. Every man was warned that the child dying goes straightway into the presence of God, and there, looking upon His face, bears witness to the treatment meted out to him here. Well might it be said of the man who mistreated such a child: "It were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea." Every man should study with awe and reverence the sad, lonely misunderstood life of Jesus, the friend of children. He had no home, and for companions only a few humble fishermen, to whom He spoke in simple parables, as to children. "The foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests but the Son of Man hath not where to lay his head."—Matthew viii., 20. It was this childless, homeless Man that ever used His marvellous power to protect children. It was He who gave to children their definite share in the kingdom of God. Before His coming the wisdom of the world was devoted to telling the child ITS duty. But Jesus explained to grown men THEIR duty toward children. The family life was His ideal. All men were His brothers, and, with Him, sons of God. The loving kindness shown by God toward helpless men and women Neither the rights nor the WISDOM of children must be despised: "I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes; even so, Father; for so it seemed good in thy sight."—Luke x., 21. Wherever Jesus went, children followed Him, and the tiniest little soul, in its mother's arms or tottering along in wide-eyed curiosity, could arrest His loving attention. How beautiful is the picture that the Bible story presents to the mind! Jesus is at Capernaum, on the sunny shore of the Sea of Galilee. The Disciples—simple, honest men, often excited as to precedence and filled with deep longing to stand first in the Master's esteem—ask Him: "Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?"—Matthew xviii., 1. Around them is gathered the typical Oriental group, and many olive-skinned women, with their children: "And Jesus called a little child unto Him, and set him in the midst of them and said: 'Verily I say unto you, except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven. "'Whosoever, therefore, shall humble himself as this little child, the same is greatest in the kingdom of heaven. "'And whoso shall receive one such little child in my name receiveth me.'" Teach your children to think of and to love the divine Soul that pleaded their cause. Teach them that in all the words He uttered there can be found only love for them. No threats, no warnings— only love. STUDY OF THE CHARACTER OF GOD"Then the Lord answered Job out of the whirlwind and said . . . . Since men have lived on earth their feeble intellects have struggled to realize the majesty of God. Succeeding nations and civilizations have expressed through laws or religions their puny conceptions of the power that controls the universe. As mental and moral standards have improved, there has been constant improvement in the conception of God. The Greeks and Romans imagined a variety of gods, and attributed to these the vices and weaknesses of men. The Fijians worshipped a god who devoured the souls of the dead, inflicting torture in the eating, but mercifully releasing souls from pain when the meal was ended. The ancient Mexicans went to war "because their gods demanded something to eat." Their armies fought "only endeavoring to take prisoners, that they might have men to feed those gods." —— Even with the birth of the one great idea—THE UNITY OF GOD—the personality of the universal Creator was but a reflection of His worshippers. He was a "jealous" God, a "man of war." "God Himself is with us for our captain."— Chron. xiii., 12. God dwelt in a city made of nothing cheaper than gold and precious stones. For His own glory, He maintained a court Oriental in form, with strange beasts to sing His praises, and He tortured forever and ever creatures that He had made. The present conception of an omnipotent God has changed greatly since the old days, when cruelty was the rule and was admired. There is to-day insistence on God's LOVE, on His JUSTICE, on His MERCY that "endureth forever"—there is practically no teaching of the old belief that a creature, born of circumstances, and good or bad as circumstances may determine, is to suffer endless torment under never-changing conditions of horror. —— The writing of this editorial is based upon frequent reading of the book of Job. In that ancient and wonderful book, as in no other writing, the Jewish forces of poetry and of prophecy are exhausted in the effort to portray God's majesty. All of the old prophet's knowledge of the world, all of his mystic notions of sidereal government, are used in the effort to glorify his Creator. "Hast thou commanded the morning since thy days? "Canst thou send lightnings, that they may go and say unto thee, Here we are? "Canst thou bind the unicorn with his band in the furrow? "Gavest thou the goodly wings unto the peacocks? "Canst thou draw out leviathan with an hook? "Will he make many supplications unto thee? Will he speak soft words unto thee? "Hast thou entered into the treasures of the snow? or hast thou seen the treasures of the hail?" Thus through chapters of greatest beauty the primitive mind seeks to portray for the benefit of other primitive minds the omnipotence of the world's Ruler. —— What hope has man of conceiving, even approximately, the great law-giving Force that rules the universe? Shall we ever do more than attribute to Him those qualities which our own pygmy minds admire? Shall we forever conceive Him as a glorified "individual"? We believe that in the Book of Job there is suggested the method of studying God that alone can aid us to a better, higher conception. The study of God must be prosecuted through the study of astronomy, and this the old prophet foreshadows clearly: "Canst thou bind the sweet influences of Pleiades, or loose the bands of Orion? "Canst thou bring forth Mazzaroth in his season? or canst thou guide Arcturus with his sons?" Long years ago children were taught to admire a god who created a leviathan, a unicorn, and "Behemoth." Children of the future will be told: You live on a globe twenty-five thousand miles round. It travels ceaselessly through space at a speed of eighteen miles a second. Compared to the huge sun that lights and gives us life, our earth is but a pinhead, and the sun itself is but one tiny dot in the ocean of space. Through that space the sun rushes on an errand unknown, carrying us with it. Everything moves, revolves, rushes ceaselessly, yet a balance registering the one-thousandth part of a grain is not adjusted as nicely as these huge behemoths of limitless space. Laplace shows positive proof that the earth, travelling eighteen miles per second, has not changed the period of its rotation by the hundredth part of a second in two thousand years. The mind of the future, imbued with respect for the Force that controls, conducts and makes the laws for the universe, will attain more nearly to a conception of God. But a study of God will remain man's chief and constant effort while he lives here. That study is never-ending. THE FASCINATING PROBLEM OF IMMORTALITY(If you read this you will probably feel that you have wasted time.) If you travel back far enough you can see in your mind's eye a primitive man with long, red hair, shivering in some icy pool. He has taken refuge there from a pursuing bear or other foe. He sees that he must die of cold or of the bear's teeth. His dark mind—product of a brain primitive and poor in convolutions—contemplates vaguely the prospect ahead of him. He hopes that after death he may through some mysterious kindness be permitted to meet again the red-haired women and the wolfish cave children left behind. There, in the cave man's mind, is the first craving for immortality. Born in that poor brain long centuries ago, it has steadily grown stronger with man's mental development. —— No man looks at death without looking beyond it. None but has a craving for a future life, with consciousness of his personality AND WITH RECOLLECTION OF FRIENDS, FACES AND DEEDS HERE. Say to a man, "You shall be immortal, but you shall not know that you are you." He will not give you thanks for such immortality. So strong is man's craving for personal, individual immortality that hell with its fires would be preferred by many to annihilation. The strongest argument against immortality—weak and ignorant at best—is but a frantic attempt of the mind to prove negatively the existence of what it covets. Fortunately for human happiness in general, FAITH, covers the requirements of millions. They live and die contented, the instinct within them fortified by the teachings of a faith not to be questioned. —— But what of the men and women who ask for evidence, or at least for plausible argument, proving the reasonableness of immortality? What can be said to please them? Not much, alas! Probably because we are still so undeveloped that it would be, for many reasons, unsafe to let us know how great a future is before us. Strongest in hope is the argument of Charles Fourier, based on what he declared to be a natural law. "Attractions are proportionate to destinies." By this Fourier meant that a universal longing among human beings was certain proof that their ultimate destiny involved the fulfilment of the longing. The little girl fondling a doll foretells maternity. The hectoring boy foretells the soldier's career. No universal attraction, save with a destiny proportionate. —— The human race since it began to think and believe has thought of and believed in immortality. The half wise declare that belief in immortality and a spirit world came to savage peoples through dreams, that it has been kept alive through superstition and the power of religion. Trivial, certainly, is such an explanation of a phenomenon as wide as mankind's existence. —— A very consoling fact for the doubter is this. The strongest minds born on the earth have almost invariably, at some stage of development, rejected belief in immortality—only to return to the belief, or at least to the HOPE, with fuller age and riper wisdom. That no great mind has seen any positive argument against the hope of immortality is certainly comforting to all of us. Intelligence can always refute improbability and falsehood. —— What about the nature of immortality? The Indian hopes for dogs and hunting, the Turk for a life of which the least said the better. The Christian, borrowing his ideas from the writings of the old Hebrews, looks forward to what may be called a solid gold existence—everything made of gold or of something more expensive. We do not think that religious docility demands implicit belief in any of the published details of our future existence. Gold is not comfortable; jasper would not well replace the green turf. Is it not more reasonable to assume, since immortality is to be ours, that it is ours now and always has been? We cannot imagine creation of the indestructible. Is it not sensible to take literally that most beautiful invocation: "Thy kingdom come ON EARTH as it is in heaven"? We know that heaven cannot be above us or hell below; because as we whirl round in each twenty-four hour period those abodes would have to whirl also—quite unreasonable. —— This earth would make a very good heaven—properly improved and managed. Wipe out human selfishness, and the Sahara and other deserts. Establish universal philanthropy, regulate the climate, confine human manual labor to the pushing of an electric button—all quite possible—and you have the sort of heaven that man would select if left to choose. Why should we not come back here again and again, taking varying human forms, doing our duty well or badly each time according to our start in life, and finally enjoying perfect terrestrial happiness here as a finished race of immortal beings—immortal in the sense of being indestructible and of possessing the gift of perpetual reincarnation? —— |
|