New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1900-10-07
TIE BALM OF CUSTOM.

There are some thousands of excellent Dem
ocrats who will vote for Mr.. Bryan this fall
because they have got used to him." They
will not vote for him because they have made
a logical analysis-so far such a thing is
possible-of his curiOusly complicated ethics;
they will not vote for him because they believe
that Organism, a reiuyenating abstraction,
is the one thing that will save this Western
world from damnaticn and eclipse. But they
will vote for him, and they will do it because
he is no longer an object of unqualified terror
to them. They will take him as a matter of
course. They will take him somewhat as an
accomplishing farmer would take a blight or
a long drouth-as a part of the Great Plan.
1t is much easier to vote than it is to think,
and it is far more restful to yield to the subtitle
magnetism of a good old word like Democrat
than it is TO dedicate few sessions of sweet,
silent thought" to finding out what that word
means as il is used to-day in the United States
of America No honest man would encourage
any illusions in regard to the simplicity of such
an undertaking but one might venture to wish
that some of his pacific fellow countrymen
would at least put to themselves the question
of the immortal Congressman who did not
know where he was Eat" They are not silver
men, they are mot exactly anti-imperialists";
they are just Democrats. They do not show
specific symptoms of even the most remote
forms of Bryanistic unrest; they do not seem
to be more than casually restless over any
thing. Marjorie Fleming would say that they
are more than usually calm. They did not
vote for Mr.. Bryan in 1896 for he was
novelty then and they were afraid of him; but
they will vote for him in 1900, for he is no
longer a novelty and they are no longer afraid
of him. Custom has so stalled his infinite
of ba T. 70 ba
half so dangerous as he used to be-
They are willing enough to confess that Mr..
Bryan has few peculiar attributes that are
not wholly admirable and some of them will
say that they have occasional suggestions of
something like doubt as to the alleged infalli-
bility of his prophetic genius They have heard
that he can read the future as well as an ordi-
nary man can read newspaper and few of
them may have heard that his persistent as
ISOLATION with things that are to be- has been
bad for his sense of proportion. and positively
shocking to his realization of the prophetic
significance of things that are. But all this
need not dishearten them. 1t Is said that
NIichelangelo, after completing his work on the
ceiling of the Sistine Chapel could not read
a book with any comfort without holding it
above his head and If his be true of Michel
angelo, what may not be true of Mr.. Bryan?
II so SnSnt a TASK as mat or painting Biblical
allegories on a ceiling may produce such strange
results what may not be the results of trying
to decorate the zenith with all sorts of pictorial
fables that will not stick? And who is to
wonder that Mr.. Bryan should be impatient
and somewhat irrational? Not these reclaimed
and passive supporters of his, assuredly 1t is
not their duty to wonder 1t is their duty TO
be consistent Democrats 1t is just as easy
to be consistent as 1t is to be incredulous.
And therefore they will vote. They will not
know precisely what they are voting for but
they will not he annoyed by little discrepancy
like that. They have relaxed themselves into
state of intellectual captivity that has developed
degrees into condition that borders on political
Nirvana. and Nirvana is nothing If not painless.
Four solid years have been given to them for
the attainment of this individual negation, and
they appear to have improved every hour of It;
they have got used to Mr. Bryan and they are
going TO do their duty; and they seem to be
contented. There is a great deal in getting
used to things. The illustrious Lord Byron
wrote famous poem about a man who got so
used to being captive that he regained his
freedom with sigh.