Elizabeth daily monitor. [volume] (Elizabeth, N.J.) 1868-1880, 1873-08-16
REAL CULTURE
From "Love in the Nineteenth Gem
turY.,3

From "LoVe In the Nineteenth Gem
turY.S
By Harriet W. Preston
The necessary basis of culture is not
money, but content-content with out.
ward things just as they are-content, if
1t must be, with what you 50 plaintively
call a subordinate social position.n
Those lucky common-school children Of
Ir1mountain, whom you presume to pity.
need never feel any agonizing discord be-
tween their humble home SURROUNDINGS
and the culture which generous State
has given them, provided they simply
accept the surroundings, and do not ia
tgue and demcan themselves bya frantic
effort to make these grander. 1t seems
exceedingly trite to say that a
perception of great thoughts and
great harmonies cnnobles simple
no less than a snowy life, but one
would think you did not believe it. If
the souls of Mozart and Mendelssohn
are still alive and happy in blessing, and
II they minister in person to poor inortals
sometimes through the strains, that
abundantly live-as what music-lover
does not love to .dream2 do you suppose
they are particular about the locality of
the street, or the furniture of the room,
IN which they perform their angelic
service? Oh! let us learn the grace to
stand still, and receive what is given us.
instead of crowding and struggling after
the truly boorish fashion of the day! 1t
IS this selfish and unlovely strife to get
up, up, up, which leaves us no time for
thought, no room for beauty, and
no breath for song. l have
sometimes wondered, by the way
whether the reason why life in so many
OF our country towns is so incidentally
stiff, barren, and unsocial, were not that
everybody is vainly trying to show to the
satisfaction of himself and others that he
is first. But why frst2 one thinks. Why
not second or fifth, or fifteenth? What is
the possible value Of pre-emincnce in
such an order2 You 90 about among
such people, being connected with differ
ent ones by different ties, and you are
surprised that folks who are individually
so excellent, occupy SO nearly the same
plane, and have SO much in common,
should not mingle freely and pleasantly
with one another. BY and by, it appears
that they are afraid, if they do, they will
compromise some imaginary dignity,
vi bSllO sOillC ClGIlSllca GA-
clusiveness, and so they grow
more queer and narrow every day, until
they wither quite away in their absurd
isolation. know two old ladies in Min
den, whose gardens adjoin, and whose
hens are mutually lawlcss and intrusive,
The consequence is that they-the old
ladies mean, not the hens-cxist in a
state of chronic grievance, which their
very high-tlown selfJrespeet does not of
ten allow them tC express. But now and
then OF course human nature prevails, and
one of these good lwomen-it may be
either--says. a spiteful thing. Where
upon the other makes haste to spread the
remark abroad, invariably adding, with
an air of mildest triumph, . You know,
my dear, no lady would have
said that" I always know what
is coming, and l always want to
laugh. 'ris so funny travesty of the
glorious n0dlssse obIigo principle, that /
declare l am never sure whether the spirit
shown is more respectable or ridiculous.
You see don't pretend to extol country
life Unfortunately. But to that phase
of it which we see here in Minden there
are two saving clauses which render it
tolerably invulnerable by your cockncy
raillery. In the first place, the natural
and confessed leaders of society here (no
smiling), the men and women who, by
right Of their accomplishments deserve
and hold the highest places, are tolera-
bly, numerous class. There are eight or
ten families which are obviously on ex-
actly the same footing, and, what is bet
ter, they are all poor. In a place
where the average income of the intlu-
entail men is eighteen hundred dollars
year there can't be any sinful luxury, and
those who aim at distinction must de-
pend upon intrinsic merits. And they
do. Nor is it much matter that the
struggle ismade, as you intimate, hard
one, or that the rule Of our oligaFchy is
little arbitrary and ,austere, and encum-
bered by q certain quaint parade. 1t isa
wise rule, on the whole And here, in
the pine woods, there has actually been
fulfilled, after the fashion, the ideal of
that dear old aristocrat Count Joseph de
Maistrc: 1.-THE chief use Of an aristocra-
cy is to secure the presence, in Il State, of
something more precious than gold"