The Washington herald., 1915-11-16
Mind. That Harden.


By JOHN d. BARRY.
You must often have noticed those fields that
in dry season. harden and crack. They are suffer.
ing for. moisture. Without II they cannot produce
When il comes they drink il up eagerly. At once
they look more healthy. Soon they are breaking
into grass perhaps into flowers. showing that they
are alive and able to do their part in expressing
the wholesomeness and the beauty of the world.
There are many minds like those fields. They
grow dry and they harden. They, too, are suffer
ing for lack of the moisture that comes through
springs of interest through human sympathy
through caring. Fortunate beyond most Of their
kind arc they If just spring bubbles there. As
rule instead of being fertilized, they grow har-
der. The time may come when they will seem to
be like ivory.
This disaster overtakes many a woman and
many man. 1t is one of the greatest tragedies
of living. all the more deplorable because as il
goes it may not give the slightest warning. 1t
is like those painless diseases that stealthy creep
through the system. And like those diseases it
may soothe even while it destroys.
We see it working all about US among the
people who refuse to keep abreast of the times.
Their minds are drying and hardening and crack
ing. Their plight is more distressing than the
the fields never refuse to absorb. But around those
hardening minds inuumerable springs are bubbling.
The minds look on and refuse to take in the re-
freshment. They are satisfied as they are.
There are people who, at varying periods in
life, come to a stop. They are like those trouble
some children who hang mothers skirts, ere
ating obstacles and disturbance, interfering with
progress.
In the business world we can see them joining
the melancholy ranks of failure Sometimes they
know they have been left behind and they Hope
lessly long to catch up. Among such there is
hope. Through their very longing and under
standing, they may yet start of these springs
working.
But for those who tagging behind, cherish
the illusion that they are really ahead there is
little hope. They are in the ivory stage.
l know a man who years ago became enamored
of kind of derby hat, for brief time in fashion,
with high, square crown. When he had worn
out the first one he had another hat made exactly
like it and he has gone on duplicating it ever
since By some curiously psychological process
he could not get away from that hat. He wears
it still. If l were to see it in China / should
know that he was near by. In his attitude to-
WdrQ mats ne lives IN pcIlOu Oh ldsnlOn
He provides physical illustration of a kind of
mind very common in the world, perhaps, in a
sense, universal For nearly all of US, in some
way, are reactionary.
One of the most radical men l have ever
known, revolutionist often condemned for his
views, though less condemned now than he used
to be, is, in some ways, absurdly conventional. A
argument might be made to show that
some of his qualities could not possibly go with
others of his qualities. His character is made up
of contradictions. Ahead of the times he is,
he is also behind the times.
For all the springs of sympathy that bubble
in his mind, there are parts of his mind that
to have ossihed, that are beyond the reach Of
fertilization. Moreover, his advanced ideas work
against him by making him think that all his ideas
are advanced and by deepening his satisfaction
with himself.
With case of this kind in mind, easily paral-
leled in every ones acquaintance, it might, now
and then be we'll for us all to make impersonal
examination of ourselves for the purpose of dis
covering whether there any spots in the field Of
that betray symptoms of harden
ing.