Middlebury register. (Middlebury, Vt.) 1886-1937, 1904-12-02
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having II no longer. For my part, l
think no pains too great to take to
acquire and guard good sense, to
maintain ones eyes ole%arseeing and
ene's judgment right. One takes great
bent or rusted. How much more
should he take care of his thought.
But let us understand this we'll. An
appeal to good sense is not to such
thought as g~rovels to the earth, to
q narrow positivism which denies ev-
erything it cannot see or touch. For
that is also a lack of good sense, to
wish that man should be absorbed in
his material sensation. and to forget
the high realities of the inner life.
Here we touch a painful subject,
around which the greatest problems
of humanity are being agitated. In
fact we are striving to attain to n
conception of life. We are seeking 1t
amid a thousand obscurities and pains,
and all that which touches upon the
spiritual realities becomes daily more
agonizing. In the midst of the grave
p~erplexities and the momentary dis
orders which accompany great crises
of thought, it seems more than ever
difficult for man to free himself from
the affair with a few simple principles.
Yet necessity ome to our aid as 1t
has lone for the men of all times.
The programme of life is terribly sim
pie, after all, and in the fact that ex-
istence is so pressing and that 1t is
imposed IN one. it gives us notice that
1t precedes the idea that we can form
for ourselves, and that no one can
wait to live until he has first under
stood. We are everywhere confronted
by our philosophers, our explanations,
our beliefs, and it is this actual ac-
complished fact, prodigious and ire
futable, which recalls us to order
when we would deduct the life of our
~reasonings and wait to act until we
shall have finished philosophizing. 1t
is this fortunate necessity which him
ders the world from stopping While
man is in doubt as to his road. Travel
lers of a day, we are carried along in
a vast movement to which we are
called to contribute. but which we
nave HOI WI 5CSh, AOl III oNCN 80 w.
entirety, nor sounded to it's deepest
depths. Our part consists in filling
faithfully the position of private sol
der which has fallen to us, and our
thought should adapt itself to the sit
uation. Do not say that we live in
more trying times than did our ances-
tors, for that seen from afar is often
badly seen and besides it is bad grace
to complain of not having been born
in ones grandfather's time. What one
may think the least contestable on
this subject is this: since the world
began it is troublesome to see it clear.
Everywhere and always to think just
ly has been difficult. The ancients
have no privilege in that above the
moderns. And we may add that there
is no difference between men when M
reaches a point where they can be
considered from that point of view.
Whether a man obeys or commands,
teaches or learns, holds a pen or a
hammer, it costs him the same to
fully discern the truth. The few lights
that humanity acquires in its advance
ment are doubtless OF great utility,
but they also ~aggrandize the number
and extent of the problems. The diff
Guilty is never removed, the intelli-
gence always meets with the obstacle.
The unknown dominates us and draws
us to every side. But as one does not
need to exhaust all the water of the
springs to stanch ones thirst, one
does not iced to know everything to
live. Humanity lives and has always
lived on some elementary provisions.
We will try to indicate them. First
of all, humanity lives by confidence.
In doing that it but reflects, com
mensurate with its conscious thought,
that which is the hidden foundation
of all beings. An imperturable faith
in the stability of the universe, and
its intelligent ordering, sleeps in ev-
erything that exists. The flowers,
the trees, the animals all live in calm
strength and an entire security. There
is confidence in the rain hat falls,
in the morning, in the brook running
to the sea. All that which is seems
to say: Il am, therefore l should be.
There are good reasons for that, let
us be assured"
So, too, mankind lives by conf
dence. For the reason that it is 1t
bears in itself the eason sufficient
for his being, a pledge of assurance.
He rests in the power that has willed
that he should be. 1t is to guard this
confidence and not allow it to be
shaken by anything, and on the on
trary to cultivate it and render it
more evident and personal that the
first effort of our thought should tend.
All which adds to our confidence Is
good. Because from that is born
tranquil energy, r%eposeful action,
love of life and fruitful labor Deeply
seated confidence is the mysterious
spring which sets in motion the ener-
gy within us. 1t nourishes us. 1t Is
by that that man lives, much more
than by the bread he eats. Thus,