The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1856-1888, 1873-04-26

the constant presence Of the disagreeable object,
TO constantly hear the Litany sung by q man
whom you esteem to be q humbug, must be I
great proyocatiOn. There are those towards whom
you can maintain q tOlerably forgiying spirit only
by keeping them out Of your sight and hearing.
Among those members OF the little community
who remain fast friends, perils arise which must
be guarded against. One Il, that there comes the
tendency TO use the same freedom of speech
towards one another which exists in some out
spoken and harmonious families. Disagreeable
things are plainly said; faults pointed out with a
coniounded candOr. There Is even q disposition to
rake up unpleasant subjects without any call.
Now it has ever appeared 10 tie writer that an
excessive clOseness Of Intercourse Il not desirable,
unless among those very closely related by blood.
The atoms which make up physical nature are
kept a good way apart, even IN the substances
which 10 the unscientitc eye and touch appear the
most solid and homogeneous. This seems a
teaching by parable. Even 50, human beings
ought 10 be kept IN some measure apart by a GER
tain reserve aud q constant courtesy. Do not tell
YOUR friend that he has made i fool of himself
(however certain tie fact may BEL unless you
design that hencefOrth there shall be an underlined
something between YOU, a little rift, which may
spread till you are divided far. The recollection
viii be unpleasant of that over-!rank Judgment,
even in an unmOrbid mind. And | have remarked
that in a small community many minds are
mOrbidiy sensitive and touchy. One never goes
wrong in practicing towards all around 4 studied
courteousness of demeanor. And one has re-
marked how q man, little used to be treated so,
and known for a hasty temper and a rough tongue,
is gentled and humanlzed into a corresponding
courtesy and amiability towards another who
scrupulously and unatfectedly renders him his
social due.
The public-spirited man who desires in a small
community to carry out any public improvement
will find by experience what difficulties arise of
the situation. Ii Is not merely that the small
community is apt to be old-fashioned IN its likings,
and have no mind for Innovations; strongly holding
that what was good enough for the fathers must
be good enough for their children. Not merely
that such q community is apt to regard with
jealousy the proposals of a new conner from the
outer world, esteeming 1T as an answer to all his
arguments, that many of its members knew the
place before he was born; the difficulty isa further
one. 1t comes of the singular interlacing of
private interests, connections, likes and dislikes,
iealousies and enmities. {. will not 90 heartily into
any work, which he believes is instigated or sup
ported by his enemy D.. f. will not support any
reform which may affect the custom of the shop
of his cousin F.. G.. will solemnly declare that
black is white, if the recognition of the fact that
black is black would make things go hard with
the man whose son is to marry his niece. All
this is very irritating to q downright person,
eager that some good work be done, or at least
that the work be estimated on its proper merits.
1t shakes your faith in the honesty and right
heartedness of human nature. 1t painfully con-
vinces you what inferior motives practically
impel the doings of many men. And if you
manage your fellow-creatures into the doing of
what is good and right by driving them according
to their natures; by suggesting to the cantanker-
Gus man reasons fitted to sway the cantankerous,
and to the foolish man considerations which
might have weight only with a fool; you may
carry your point, and that a good point; but not
without some sense of self-degredation. 1t is by
imperceptible degrees that the tact and skill of an
Archbishop of Canterbury shaded into the Gun
ming trickery of the Artful DodIer. And near
the line which parts the permissible from the
mean, an honest man will begin to feel very
unhappy.
do not linger on that which in a little place is
sometimes felt as prOvocatiOn; the tendency on the
part Of some of your neigbbors to investigate all
your proceedings, and make them the subject of
much conversation and discussion. Gossip, if not
false or ill-natured, is a needful and iustifable
part Of real life; it merely means that human
beings are interested in the persons and events
which are nearest to them. Yet there come sea-
sons in which you are more sensitive to the little
ness of humanity than at other times; in which it
makes you angry, while it ought simply to amuse
you, TO find anxious enquiries made as to who
dined with you ON such a day, and even what YOU
had for dinner; likewise why you did not invite
\. and b. each of whom is as good as you. But
IL you have SO much good sense as to decline to
listen to such petty talk, you will not be ANNOYED
by it; and it comes to very little after all. Passing
from this, let me sum up by saying generally,
that if you live in a small community, it is expe-
dent that from time to time you should 90 for a
little while away from it; if possible, to a consid-
cradle distance from it. Thus only you will keen
your mind in a healthy state. Thus you will see
things in true perspective, and looking their true
size. Thus only will you keep it present to you,
how modest your own dimensions are, and how
small your weight. | have known a really clever
man, after living for some months together in the
unhealthy moral atmosphere of q small place,
burst out into exhibitions of arrogance and con-
ceit SO deplorable, as to be barely consistent with
sanity. 1t is needful that you go where you may
sit down and take in that the sphere wherein YOU
live is not all the world; and that its affairs are in
fact not much thought or talked of by the ma
iority of the human race. And discerning this,
you go home again quite resolved not to be drawn
into small s%trifes, ambitions, and d~iplomacies.
which are thoroughly bad for soul and mind. To
educated and sensitive men. dwelling in little
towns, London is Il great and wholesome altera-
tive. If L were a rich man, | would provide an
endowment which might send every country
parson in Britain to London for three weeks each
spring. just TO walk about the streets, and
behold ones unknown fellow-creatures, and see
how big the place is, is to many an over-driven
and oyer-sensItive mortal the most precious of
medicinal gum.
L have been setting forth moral rather than
material considerations But one cannot belp
thinking how in q little place one misses the ma
terlal advantages (not without their moral cOnse-
quencesl which come in a large community of the
clubbing together of the limited means of a great
number Of comparatively poor people. In a large
city, there is everywhere a s%olidity, the appear
ance of wealth. As in n club, q congeries of
men of very moderate resources are able to afford
a palace, with the arrangements, the books, and
the periodicals, which only a millionaire could
provide for himself, so is 1t in a great town. The
very pavement of the streets is different. The
water supply is better and more abundant. The
shops are incomparably handsomer and better
provided. You have the great luxury of a first
rate bookseller, on whose tables you can see all
the new books; buying a few, and seeing as much
as you desire of many more. In the little place
you may be thankful to have a railway at all; so
thankful that you do not grumble at the wretched
rickety wooden shed which serves for a station,
would make express speed destruction. You