The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1909-12-08

| Wnen ne does eat ne does II me-
chemically, hardly knowing what he is
| eating, and takes no pleasure at all
| in it.
His admirers think that this indif-
ference to his physical needs shows
great spirituality and is something to
| be much lauded.
| I don't.
4 To be completely absorbed by the
demands and sensations of the body
] is wrong, of course. but to completely
ignore them and the pleasure we
| might get out of them is also wrong.
Why were we given the sense of
| taste unless we were meant to get
pleasure as well as nutriment from
| our food.
Do you get all the pleasure you
might from your walk to the train in
the morning? Do you teach yourself
how to get the most happiness possible
out of beautiful display in a florists
window. your favorite tune played by
a good hurdy-gurdy, the sight Of a
| thoroughly pretty girl, the unexpected
meeting with an old friend. the read
| ing of an unusually good story. or
any one of hundred little things that.
4 if you let them, will help fill up the
chinks of your life?
| : Perhaps you are young now and can
| dare to despise these things.
! There are such vast possibilities in
most young lives that young people
seldom appreciate the value of little
things.
| But some day, when you are older
and life is less crowded, I think you
! will realize the value of knowing how
to get some of your happiness from
! the little everyday things. ami will
wish you had made it habit in your
| youth instead of waiting till an age
when habits are hard to acquire.
| If you are bit inclined to think
this is childish philosophy, please wait
before you Judge and read what a far
| far wiser philosopher than I said in
| much the same vein.
IT once gave lady two and twenty
recipes against melancholy: one was
a bright fire; another to- remember
all the pleasant things said to and Of
her; another to keep a box of sugar
| kettle simmering on the hob. I
thought this mere trffling at the mo-
ment. but have, in after life, discov-
| cred how true it is that these little
pleasures often Danish melancholy
better than higher or me- exalted OBJ
| jects; that no means ought to be
thought too trifling that opposes it
either in ourselves or others."-Sidney
Smith.
X "
! 1 wish that in every home in the
land could be hung large-sized copy
| of that famous French motto:
"Honi soft qui NAL pense.'
EVIL to him who evil thinks
| For I think that to thoroughly abb
sorb its spirit would do a good many
people as much good as almost any
preeept they could learn.
! A few days ago Miss Isadore Dun
can, the great dancer, appeared in st.
! Louis
Miss Duncan is trying to bring back
the art of dancing to the dignity she
| thinks it deserves; to the same dig
nifty as sculpture or music for in
| stance.
She puts it this way
1.-THE danger of the future will be
one whose body and soul have grown
! so tremendously together that the nat
| ural language of the soul will have be-
| come the movement of the body
ITO express what is the most moral.
\ healthful and beautiful in art-this is
the mission of the dancer. and to this
! I dedicate my life.''
| Do those sound like the words of an
| immoral woman?
I Does the fact that many of the most
| cultured people in the land attend ana
| applaud her performances. sound as If
she were an immoral woman?
And yet few people in st. Louis
got together and tried to Stigmatize
| her as such They adopted resolu-
ance was the grossest violation of the
proprieties of life and they hoped it
| would never be repeated in their fair
city.
|
take strength of mind for some people
to see thing of that sort and entirely
| ignore the sex side of it.
| But don't think it takes so much
| but that almost anyone could cultivate
| it if he really tries.
| Perhaps Miss Duncan's detractors
would tell me that the average person
will not be up to that point of view
for some time yet, but, personally
should hate to think that.
/ In a little village in Long Island not
! long ago some women got together
and tried to have the photographs of
certain famous pieces of sculpture,
such as the Discus Thrower and the
Apollo Belvidere removed from the
faint the minds of the boys and girls.
And-all honor to him-a Presby-
pterian clergyman protested.
| His protest, quoted by a New York
paper, expresses my views SO well that
1 also am going to quote it.
Let boy and girl go into that
library together and see the Discus
Thrower or the Apollo Belvidere,'
said the clergyman, land they see
something that is beautiful and inspir-
ing They see nothing to make the
lsweetest. most innocent girl in the
world blush, nothing to arouse in the
mind of the boy a thought of evil
4 shrieking nastiness and calling II
purity She points to the fig leaf
which is to her the principal thing in
the picture, and she whispers to the
boy and girl.
1.-The boy and the girl are tainted
then, not by the picture but by the
busvbody, and they do blush.
Dirt has been put in the place OF
lculture, and the attack on the true