The Wilmington daily Republican. (Wilmington, Del.) 1890-1902, 1893-07-12
SEEKING HAPPINESS.
zoLHs ccREAr sPEEcH TO THE
STUDENTS ASSOCIATION.

Acknowledgment OF His Mistakes-He
Points Out tho Direction In which Flu
turs Writers Must Continue.
At the annual banquet of the Paris Stu
dents association Emile lola presided and
spoke as follows:
/, alasi am at the age when regret at be-
ing no longer young makes itself felt, when
one Ia occupied especially with those who
will soon push him aside. 1t is they who
will condemn or continue his work. With
them begins the future, and sometimes
wonder, not without anxiety, what of that
which we have brought to pass they will
keep and what they will cast aside. 1t is
for them to decide, for the future is theirs.
That Is why closely study the mental
tendencies of the young men OF today and
read with attention their journals and re-
views, trying thus 10 understand the new
spirit that snimates our schools and to see
where you are going you who are to be the
intelligence and the will Of tomorrow.
In this no doubt there is something Of
egotism. am like q man who has built g
house to shelter his old age, and who Is
anxious to know what the weather will bt
and whether he has made his house strong
enough TO Withstand the coming tempests
do not indeed believe that any man,
work is eternal or decisive. The greatest
must resign themselves to the idea of being
only a moment in humanity's ceaseles,
growth. But is it small thing to hav,
been even for an hour the bearer of gen
eration's countersignf And since no on,
can stop literary progress any more thar
other forms of evolution each of us mus
see with resignation the birth and growth
of those who will replace him, who will Ell
face perhaps even his memory.
l do not deny that my old spirit of com
bativeness impefs me, now and then, wher
my work is attacked, to angry resistance
yet as face the new century feel more o
curiosity than of antagonism, more of ar
dent sympathy than of personal Dispute
tude. II and my generation are really o
no other use than to fill with our dry bone
break in the road over which others will
march TO the light, we, having done ever
that, will not have persisted quite uselessly
/ hear frequently enough that positivisn
is at the point of death, that naturalism i
dead already, that science confesses its pow
erlessness to give the moral peace and tn
| happiness 1t promised. OF course shall
not attempt to solve the grave problem
thus suggested. Learning is not mine, ant
1 hoNC III W hptdh lOi btlCuCC u
for philosophy. / am, as you know, only
writer of stories, one who has OWNED
little now and then, and whose only compe
tency is that which comes from having oh
served much and worked much.
| The writers Of my generation-who onl,
continued the work of illustrious prede
cessors-endeavored to open wide window
upon nature, to see everything and to tel
4 it all. We swore by science alone, wer
developed in it, lived in it, breathing tn
air of the epoch, confess that by tryin,
to bring into the domain of letters the sci
entist's rigidity of method proved mysel
a narrow sectary, but who does not. Will
the battle is on, go further than is useful
and who, when victorious, does not com
promise his victory by undue insistence
After all, regret nothing. l still belev
in the passion that wills and acts. An,
what enthusiasts and what hopes wer
oursl To have all knowledge, all power
all conquests, and through truth to rebuilt,
humanity, higher and happierl
Now it is you, the youth Of today, VIII
come upon the scene. But youth" is
vague word, profound as the sea. Who
it, and who has. the right to speak in it
name2 / am forced to ascribe to you tn
ideas given you by common report. If tn
ideas are not those entertained by all o
even the most of you, must ask pardon ii
, advance and lay the blame for my mistake
: upon informants who have told me no
the truth about you, but what they desir
: should be true.
1t is said, then, that your generation ha
4 broken away from ours, that you no longe
lput your hope in science. Instead. and I
avoid the great moral and social danger
/ which in your opinion are the result Of s
doing, you have resolved to throw YOU
selves back into the past and from the d,
/ bris of dead beliefs to make a living one.
There is, am aware, no question of
complete divorce from science. You accel
5 the recent eonquests over nature and eve
purpose to enlarge them. Proved veritie
lyou would reconcile with the ancient dog
mas. Science however, Is to be a thin
quite apart FROM faith and Is to be felegste
, to its old position, that of a simple exercil
for the intelligence, an inquiry permissibl
only while it refralns from touching tn
!, supernatural, the beyond. For science,
ilhear, has done its work and cannot repet
, pie the sky it has made empty nor give haI
tpincss to the souls from whom it has take
, their naive peace. So let science be modes
since it cannot acquire all knowledge by
single effort, cannot make everybody ric
nor heal all maladies. No one has yet quit
r dared to bid youth throw away its book
and desert its masters, but already theI
are saints and prophets who 60 about e.
lalting the virtue Of ignorance and the s.
renity OF the simple minded, preaching hi
manity's need, 30 old and overwise is it, I
3 be born again in the prehistoric village, I
d start once more from the position occupie
by our ancestors when they had hardl
struggled up out Of the dirt and befol
t there was any society or any knowledge.
:. These are the things hear.
do not deny that we are traversing
= crisis; that there is n revolt from the feve
s ish toll whose ambition was to know Il
;. and tell all. 1t was expected that scienc
h after running the old world, would make
new one modelled upon our conceptions
q Justice and happiness. 1t has done nothin
d of the kind, and there are impatient d
y nials that content follows knowledge \
{ action escapes reaction. We are feelir
the fatigues of a long journey, and not
few are sitting by the roadside in despair
:. cause the interminable plain still stretch,
4. on in front. They even regret that instea
D of coming so far they did not lie down in
field and sleep beneath the stars. Why n
vance toward an ever distant goal-wt
y learn at all If everything cannot be Learned
o The child's pure simplicity and his ign
'e rant Joys are better And so science, ha
ing promised happiness, ends before OF
E eyes In failure.
Z Did science ever promise happinessf Ii
e not think so. Science promised the trut
. and it is questionable if happiness can
= made out of facts.
[ There is perhaps no country that has 81
n Tered more from the alternate floods AZ
u thoughts arising from stripping off u
'. natural covering Of the hillsides than Il
X..t tc.t