Gloucester County Democrat. (Woodbury, N.J.) 1878-1932, 1905-01-12
CHAPTER TX.

y tiSement. 10 emerge from
~ obscurity. to be in the public
eye. to make oneself talked of-some
people are so consumed with this desire
that we are justified in declaring them
attacked with an itch for publicity. In
their eyes obscurity is the height of ig-
nominy, so they do their best to keep
their names in every mouth In their
obscure position they look upon them
selves as lost. like shipwrecked sailors
whom night of tempest has cast OH
some lonely rock and who have re-
course to cries, volleys, fire. all the sig
nails imaginable to let it be known that
they are there. Not content with set
ting off crackers and innocent rockets,
many to make themselves heard at
any cost, have gone to the length of
perfidy and even crime. The incendi-
airy Erostratus has made numerous dis
ciples How many men of today have
become notorious for having destroyed
something Of mark, pulled down-or
tried to pull down-some mans high
reputation; signaled their passage, in
short by a scandal, a meanness or an
atrocity!
This rage for notorety does not surge
through cracked brains alone or only
III the world of Adventures, charla-
tans and pretenders generally. 1t has
spread abroad in all the domains of
life. spiritual and material. Politics,
literature, even science, and, most obi
Gus of ALL philanthropy and religion
are infected Trumpets announce q
good deed done, and souls must be
saved with din and clamor Pursuing
its way of destruction, the rage for
noise has entered places ordinarily 81
lent. troubled spirits naturally serene
and Initiated in large measure all activ-
ity for good. The abuse of showing
everything. or, rather, putting every
thing on exhibition, the growing inca
pacity to appreciate that which chooses
to remain hidden and the habit of esti-
mating the value of things by the rack
eft they make have come to corrupt the
judgment Of the most earnest men, and
one sometimes wonders If society will
not end by transforming itself into a
great fair. with each one beating his
drum in front of his tent
Gladly do we quit the dust and din
of like exhibitions to go and breathe
peacefully in some faroff nook of the
woods. all surprise that the brook is so
limpid, the forest so still the solitude
so enchanting. Thank God there are
yet these uninvaded corners, How
ever formidable the uproar, however
deafening the babel of merry andrews,
it cannot carry beyond a certain limit
1t grows faint and dies away. The
realm of silence is vaster than the
realm of noise Herein is our consola-
ton
Rest moment on the threshold of
this infinite world of inglorious good,
of quiet activities. Instantly we are
under the charm we feel in stretches
of untrodden snow. in hiding wood
flowers, in disappearing pathways that
seem to lead to horizons without bourn.
The world is so made that the engines
of labor. the most active agencies. are
everywhere concealed. Nature affects
q sort of coquetry in masking her OPP
erations. 1t costs you pains to spy her
out, ingenuity to surprise her. if You
would see anything but results and
penetrate the secrets of her laborato-
ries. Likewise in human society the
forces which move for good remain in
visible. and even in our individual
lives; what is best in us is incom-
municable, buried in the depths of us.
And the more vital are these sensible
tiles and intuitions. confounding them
selves with the very source of our be-
ing. the less ostentatious they are.
They think themselves pr0faned by ex-
posture to the light of day
There is n secret and ineXpressihle
joy in possessing at the heart of ones
being. an interior world known only
to God. whence. ne artheless. come i'm
pulses. enthusiasts, the daily renewal
OF courage and the most powerful mo-
dyes for activity among our fellow
men, When this intimate life loses in
intensity, when man neglects it for
what is superficial, he forfeits in worth
all lHdl Ht gums III dppedLdHtc. by q
sad fatality K happens that in this
way we often become less admirable
in proportion as we are more admired.
And we remain convinced that what is
best in the world is unknown there,
for only those know it who possess it,
and if they speak of it in 50 doing they
destroy its charm.
There are passionate lovers of nature
whom she fascinates most in byplaces,
in the cool of forests, in the clefts of
canyons, everywhere that the careless
lover is not admitted to her contempla-
ton. Forgetting time and the life of
the world they pass days in these in
violate stillnesses, watching a bird
build it's nest or brood over its young
or some little grounding at its gra-
cious play. So to seek the good within
himself one must go where he no lon
ger finds constraint or pose or gallery"
of any SORT hiIt tha cimnln fact of q