Lancaster daily intelligencer. [volume] (Lancaster, Pa.) 1864-1928, 1888-10-20
THE SHEATH OF CUSTOM.
HAVE WE REACHED THE VERY BEST
METHODS OF LIVING!

Our rroncncss to Honor Customs and
Practices simply Because Everybody Else
Docs-IIow Much Il Reasonable and
How Mach Is Merely Arbitrary
Every human being grows up inside
sheath Of custom which enfolds IL as tho
swathng clothes enfold the infant. The
sacred customs of ones own early home
how fixed and immutablo they appear to
the child II surely thinks that all the
world IN all times has proceeded on tho
same lines which bound its tiny life. 1t
regards n breach Of these rules (some Of
thom, at least) as a wild step in the dark,
leading TO unknown dangers. The elders
have always said land, indeed, ii seems
only reasonably that by this time Of day
everything has been 30 thoroughly worked
over that the best methods Of ordering
our life--food, dress, domestic practices,
social habits-have long ago been deter
mined. II so, why these divcrgcnccs In
the simplest and most obvious matters
And then one thing after another gives
way. The sacred world wide customs in
which we nre bred turn out to be only
the practices Of q small or narrow caste or
class, or they prove TO be confined TO a
very limited locality, and must be left be-
hind when we SGT out on our travels; or
they belong to tho tenets Of feeble sect;
or they are Just the products Of one age
In history and no other.
Are there really no natural boundariesf
Has not our life anywhere been founded
on reason and necessity, but only on arbi-
trary customsH What Is more important
than food, yet in what human matter arc
there more arbitrary divergences of prac-
tipay Tho SCOT oh Ifrb1anlnr np,triuhrp
on oatmeal, which the English Sheffield
iron worker would rather starve than eat,
the fat snail which the Roman country
gentleman once so priced now crawls un-
molested In English or American gardens;
rabbits aro tabooed in Germany; frogs arc
unspeakable In England; saucrkraut is
dctested in France; many races and
gangs of people are quite certain they
would die If deprived Of meat, others
think spirits Of some kind necessity,
while to others again both these things
nre an abomnation.
AND YET, why NOT2
Every district has its local practices in
food, and the peasants look with the
greatest suspicion on any new dish, and
can rarely be induced 20 adopt It, Though
It has been abundantly proved that many
Of the fungi are excellent eating, such Is
the force Of custom that the mushroom
alone is ever publicly recognized, while
curiously enough IL is said that in somo
other countries where the claims of other
agarics are allowed tho mushroom itself
is not used Finally, feel myself land
tho gentle reader probably feels the same)
that | would rather die than subSist on
Insects, such is tho deep seated disgust
we experience toward this class of food.
Yet 1t ia notorious that many races Of
respectable people adopt n diet Of this
sort, and only lately book h.. been pub.
lished giving a detail Of excelI>nt proven.
der of the kind we habitually overlook
nasty morsels of caterpillars and beetles,
and so forth.
And, indeed when one comes to think
of it, what can it be but prejudice which
causes ono TO cat the pcriwinkle and re
ject the land snail, or TO prize tho Lively
prawn and prescribe the cheerful grass
hopper Why do we sit on chairs instead
of on the floor, rs the Japanese do, or on
cushions like tho Turks2 It is custom,
and perhaps it suits with our other Gus.
toms The moro we look into our life and
consider the immense variety of habit in
every department Of it-ovcn under con.
ditions to all appearances exactly similar
the more are we impressed by the alb
Sonre OF any serious necessity in tho
forms we ourselves are accustomed TO.
Each race, each class. each section of tho
population, each unit even, vaunts its
own habits Of life as superior to the rest
ns the only truc and legitimate forms
and peoples and classes will 60 to war
with each other In their assertion of their
own special belief and practices. but the
question that rather presses upon the in
genuous and inquiring mind is whether
any of us have got hold of much true life
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