The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1913-01-06
SAYS UNCLE CAV

the one who sits down to wall because
the world will not live up to his IDEAS
The saddest failure, by the same tok-
en-, is he that can't make facts ana
ideals fit Moreover and most espe-
! cially, you have no right TO claiiu
credit for ideals if you haven't taken
at least one step toward their reaiiza-
ton.
The man who howls most about the
refusal of society to make good ac-
cording to his altruistic notions is the
one who is doing least to live up TO
them. If he had tried to ADJUST MS
standards to his own life, he'd be pos
sessed of a little understanding that
would bring him a wide sympathy for
a world full of well meaning Ioik
who somehow or other will go wrong
at times The ideal is the one thing
in the universe of thought that we
most theorize about, and it is ABOUT
the last thing that we should decloe
without the test of practical appilca-
tiCn.
| An ideal is an exceedingly dynamic
thing. 1t has within it the force of
the dreams of ages, the pentup hopes
and fears and hates and loves of mil
lions of dead men. This force Is eter-
nal, and once it takes form and is
launched from restless m1nd' II hves
forever and forever grows. Truth
herself lives only as she is an ideal,
and an ideaIized error is quite as tena-
cious of life. Have care then now
/ you espouse this ideal or that; have
/ care, too, how you insist that your
neighbors share it. word may
fasten an error upon untold genera
tions.
But if ideals grow forever, they
come to realization with exceeding
slowness. The fact and the dream
meet, but they meet only in infin-
| ity. If you have conceived of per-
feet society today, get out and agitate
the cosmic waves; your progeny In
the thousandth generation may wit
ness perfection, but you won't. 1t is
your greater privilege to plant the seed
of mustard that is to split the noun
tain.
| Unless you have planted that seed
you have no right to complain that
| the world is all wrong. If you have
planted it you'll have the vision of
/ the sympathetic and realize that this
| is a pretty good earth and that
fairly decent sort of society encum-
bers it. Having that vision, you will
see how that the facts of today give
promise of the ideal of many millen-
NUNS hence, how imperfection puts
! on, by slow and age-long process, per-
lection, and all works together for
/ good. sla t
| If you spend much time fretting
and Tuning at good folk who hav-
| ing eyes, can not see things in ac-
cordance with your more or less in
Spired vision, it is probable that you
| nave not reIloCIeQ upon the DleSS-
! ings of moral inertia. 1t is only our
disposition to stick to our idols that
has kept the race from rushing hell
bent for bedlam. If there was not
that tendency to stick to the old until
we get a good look at the new and
few cosmic punches by way of an
accelerator, plausible men of great en-
ergy but little judgment would have
turned this world topsyturvy every
| twenty-four hours. 1t is quite pos
sible that you would have been one
of them, although the wall you are
making seems to indicate that you
really have more faith in noise than
in argument.
Not everything that is new-not
| even your Ideals an unalloyed
blessing. Most new things are good
only when they have been ground in
the mills of the gods for ten thousand
| years and come out old and service
able And the mills of the gods are
your opinions and mine grinding
against the neither stone of moral in
ertia. In this mill must be your ideal
and my ideal ground exceeding fine,
before they are to bless our children's
children to the thousandth generation.
Shut up, you idealistic yowler, and
| get busy. It's getting late.
|