The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1898-10-30
THE HIGHER SOLITUDE.
Never less alone than when alone"

Lonesomeness Is a confession or INTEL
lectual and spiritual poverty. The person
who has no ability to enjoy solitude, but
must always have society. or books. or pic
tures-something to look at or TO hear-loses
the best part Of life. Any culture is super
fetal which has not reached that point
where you can enjoy long stretches of soli-
tude: where you can feed yourself with
your own thoughts and emotions, and where
you can open the windows of your soul and
let In portions of that shoreless and fence
less woald of beauty and spirituality which
surrounds does the air, but which
never has been written or painted or put
into expression. Granted that there cannot
be wordless thoughts. This is not true of
music or art poetry or worship, the es-
sential element of which is emotional. The
secret of genuine picture is not it's Won
drous color or form, but its power to arouse
you to something back of the canvas-the
Beyond-and leave you there to ponder over
the unexplored depths of your being and
surroundings He or she has not approached
the borders Of the power of music that must
use libretto. All Of the higher music is
wordless. And so with worship. Our wor-
ship is that high, ecstatic mood where
heaven comes down our souls to meet" the
6dlcS u WHICH are Hymn ana prayer, anu
which is too subtle for language to profane
with its touch. And so with our deepest ex-
periences. What words were ever used that
did not fail to express the joys of young
love or the rapturous chances of dewy eyes
or tender touch Of hands instinct with the
great passion? Compared with such mo-
ments, how poor and thin is the cackle Of
society with it's endless words. words
words and dress dracS dreesi
Never less alone than when alone" The
chief use of books is stimulation. That is
the only real poetry which arouses the
poetic in US. If this capacity FOR poetry is
lacking in US; if we cannot lay the book
down and let the tide which it sets in mo-
ton flow and surge through our souls it is
time wasted And so with all reading. If
you cannot read between the lines study be-
comes form of busy idleness. In Thack-
eray's "Newcomes" is a minor character,
little Miss Cam, who operates upon a rent
ed piano much the worse for wear. Her
sole auditor is a young artist student. Here
is a skeleton abridgment of the words of
the great novelist:
Don Juan and Zerelda come tripping over
the meadows, and Marsello after with
sweetest of all music. Piano. Pianissamo!
The city is hushed. The towers of the
great cathedral rise in the distance, its
spires lighted by big, broad moon; the
streets are full of lovely ladies and brave
cavaliers, flashing with colors trum-
pets pets tromb0nes :, ophiceides, swords,
glories, all these thrills of sympathy and
visions OF grandeur and beauty, young lad
of eighteen enjoys in a stuffy dark room
upon back street in fourth story. with
bed disguised as wardrobe and little
dried up woman playing under a single gas
Jet upon the jingling keys Of an old piano"
IN he
paper in full and to insert here a picture
OF that scene drawn by Thackeray himself
and and found TO nd upon Page g. Harpers Edition.
any reader to hunt up the picture in one Of
our public libraries.
But for a person of high culture I repeat
1t is not necessary to have books or music
to people their solitude with heavenly vi
sOns or visitors. Never less alone than
opens her treasures and bids us take and be
satisfied. All our holy dead come to us
when alone, and SO do allathe great expert
ences of life. In all of our deepest moments
we are alone. No one can bear anothers
pain or meet another's God. All the grand
possibilities of life come to us in their glory
worship and its profound Gains and its
visions "of brighter scenes in heaven"
Faith thriyes best upon solitude and medi-
tation. Only those who have reached that
stage in the life of the spirit when they are
good company for God know what the high
est culture means.
Never less alone than when alone" To
possess the open vision-to be able to see the
King in His beauty and "the land that is
afar off,, and at call to entertain the high
est is the last attainment of the human
spirit. Blessed are those who have accom-
plished this power, nor need they become
mystics or recluses SO to do.
Mr. Emerson is easily our greatest Amer
lean thinker and seer. If you do not grasp
the purport of these feeble lines. turn to
his poem Goodbye Proud World, 1 Am
Going Home and study it. Happy the per-
son who can truthfuly say:
"Oh! When I am safe in my sylvan home
I tread on the pride of Greece and Rome
l laugh at the lore and the pride of man,
At the Sophist school and the learned clam
For what are they all in their high conceit,
When man in a bush with God may
meet?"
And yet-and yet it will never do in this
cheerful, busy world, humming with the
sweet music of industry, to turn ourselves
into hermits recluses or mystics. That is
are sisters. The crown and sum of all crea-
ton is humanity; men with their superb
activities and grand enthusiasms; women
with their unfathomable purities, as beauti-
full in body as in spirit; and children,
breathing the heaven that lies about us
in our infancy Unhappy the man who
does not see the divine in his fellow-man
Unhappy he or she who has not the in
sight to comprehend that evil is only ne
cation; that this world, with all its short
cOmingS, rests upon an impregnable basis
of truth; that all progress is optimism;
that all relapse is pessimism, and who
does not find untold joys in the society of
men, women and children.
Society and solitude. The ability to be
alone and never less alone than when alone,
and at the same time to be a man among
two sides or facets of that wondrous dia-
mOnd, q cultured human soul Neither
should exclude, but suggest and supple
niTl nea .re orner Ind OCT % BALDWIN.