The Bridgeport evening farmer. [volume] (Bridgeport, Conn.) 1866-1917, 1916-11-24
Gulf YAWNS between CIVILIAN
Who HAS SERVED IN TRENCHES
& And HIM WHO STAYED AT HOME

" TN &D na RkVh1hM
sions and to already formed mental
habits.
The contrast between the life which
men have left and the unfamiliar du-
ties imposed upon them creates a fer
ment, none the less powerful because
often half-unconscious, in all but the
least reflective minds.
Background Is the Same.
In particular, when, as has happen
ed in the present par, men have ia
ken up arms. not as profession or
because forced to do so by law, but
under the influence of some emotion
or principle, they tend to be ruled by
the idea which compelled them to en-
list long after it has yielded, among
civilians, to some more fashionable
novelty.
Less exposed than the civilian to
new intellectual influences, the so1-
der is apt to retain firmly, or even
to deepen, the Impressions which
made him, often reluctantly. SOL
dier in the first instance.
He is like a piece of stone which
the form originally struck out in the
fires of a volcanic upheaval-
How often, fatigued beyond endu-
rance, or Mortified by one's actions,
does not one recur to those ideas for
support and consolation! 1T is worth
it, because 1T is awful, but need
not 1oathe myself, BECAUSE
We see things which you can only
imagine. We are strengthened by re-
Elections which you at home have
abandoned. Our minds differ from
yours, both because they are more
exposed to change and because they
are less changeable.
While you seem-forgive me If am
rude-to have been surrendering your
creeds with the nervous facility Of
Tudor official, our foreground may be
different, but our background is the
same It is that Of August to No
vember, 1914. We are your ghosts.
s'Sman Things and Great.''
The contrast reveals itself not less in
small things than in great It APP
pears as much in the manner in which
you visualize the events of war and
interpret to yourselves the duties and
moods Of your soldiers as in your con-
ception Of the principles for which
we are fighting, and Of the kind of
harmony, National and supernatural,
in which the world may recover sta
bility.
But I am wrong in speaking of
1ssman things and great. y C1earness
of vision and sensitiveness Of judg-
ment are not qualities which can be
improyised- The ability Of men to
command them when they need them
most Is apportionate to the sincerity
with which they have habftuated
themselves to regard matters more ac-
cessible and familiar.
Therefore I cannot dismiss as triv-
ia1 the picture which you make to
yourselves of war and the mood in
which you contemplate that work Of
art They are an index Of the tenn
per In which you will approach the
problems Of peace
The war is always beneath your
eyes. You read and talk about it, I
should say, more constantly than
about any other matter You are
anxious to have a truthful account.
not of strategy or of other things
which are rightfully concealed, but
Of its daily routine and color, the du-
ties and perp1exities, rangers and ex-
posl1res to toll and occasional repose
which make up the life of a soldier at
the front.
You would wish to enter, as far as
human beings can enter, into his in
ternal life, to know how he regards
the task imposed upon him, how he
conceives his relations to the enemy
and to yourselves, from what sources
he derives encouragement and com
fort.
Falsehood, Not Ignorance.
You wish to know these things; we
should wish you to gnow them. Yet
between you and us there hangs a.
veil. It is mainly of your own UNI
conscious creation.
1t is not a negative, but a positive
thing. 1t is not intellectual, it is
moral. It is not ignorance Cor I
should not mention it). It is false
hood.
read your papers and listen to
your conversation, and T see clearly
that you have chosen to make to
yourselves an image of war, not as it
is, but of a kind which, being pic
tuFesque, fatters your appetite for
novelty, for excitement, for easy ad-
miraton. without troubling you with
masterful emotions.
You have chosen, say, to make an
image, because you do not like, or
cannot bear, the truth; because you
are afraid Of what may happen to
your souls if you expose them to the
Inconsistencies and contradictions, the
doubts and bewi1derment, which lie
beneath the surface of things.
You are not deceived as to the facts:
for facts of this order are not worth
official lying. You are deceived as to
the fact. AS to that, you may. ap-
parently be trusted to lie to your
selves.
No Hatred of the Enemy.
Perhaps this Judgment is harsh. Yet
when I read the pictures of war given
every day in your Press I do not
| think it is. There are in some of them
traits which I recognize as not UNI
true to life. But the general inn
preston given is tragically false.
I can forgive you for representing
war as a spectacle instead of state
| of existence. for I suppose that to the
| correspondent who is shepherded in
| to an observation post on a show day
| it does seem spectacular.
But the representation of the hui