The Caldwell tribune. [volume] (Caldwell, Idaho Territory [Idaho]) 1883-1928, 1916-03-24
The Man Who Meditates.
(Boston Transcdipt)

4
The other day. in Congress, a Re-
publican leader began a speech with
these words: "As l was meditating in
my garden last summer Never mind
what else he said. or what he meditat-
ed; his thought may not have inspired
him to wisdom; we note merely that
the congressman was in his garden,
thinking about public affairs, and that
months later his reflections there in
| spired his public utterance. And al
most upon the very day when Mr..
| Mann made this speech. Colonel Win
ston Churchill, returning to the House
If Commons from the front to ex-
press his views there upon the con-
duct of the war, remarked that "his
mind had become clearer since he
lad been in the trenches" Watching,
waiting there, with long intervals be-
tween the alarms, and the cold sky
hung emptily above the trenches and
the silent rows of motionless armed
men, the English statesman found the
opportunity for reflection which had
come to the happier American in his
garden. In each case, the moment
of reflection was so highly valued that
the speaker made public ackr owledg-
ment of it in his address. as boon to
which he owed the thought which he
expressed.
To think, in ones garden; is it not
rare privilege. and one which few
American men of action either seek
or appreciate? Generally speaking,
meditation is out of our character, and
gardens are to be gazed at, quite OBJ
lectively. or shown off to visitor,
Or merely stocked with rare flowers
and succulent vegetables. Who thinks
of. sitting down on bench in the gar
den at the close of day, the dog at
one's feet and a pipe between ones
lips, in full subjective sympathy with
the spot, to ponder and dream and let
ones thoughts ripcn and glow with the
reddening berries? The measure and
type of our wisdom is far from this
It is to think in rush and decide in
hurry; to keep in the hurlyburly,
say in the West In other words, we
insist upon having the tumult always
with us, priding ourselves upon being
able to think in the midst of it-even
by the aid of 1t. If we seek relief
from it. it is in more tumult; from
the legislative melee, the stock ex-
change, the keyed-up and noisy Office,
we fly to the babble of clubs. the mob
on the beach, or the swift clatter OF
the musical comedy. AS an escape
from all this, the philosopher Nigh.
even be glad of the hour of nothing
ness in the trenches. awaiting the next
shower of schrapnel.
For there is not merely content
ment, but strength. order, reason and
mature judgment in the hour of medi-
tation at the days end in the garden
Washington shaped his great purposes
tor his country as he rode his horse
alone through the jungle paths of the
Dismal Swamp or over the slopes of
the Alleghenies. or brooded over the
trimming meadows of the Potomac
from his lawn. Burns followed the
plough over the fields of Are, and
Emerson pondered the great thoughts
which inspire men of action today
while he sat watching the ripples chas-
ing one another over the surface of
Goose Pond. The logic of the pro-
cess is plain. Effective thought and
cogent reasoning require concentra-
ton and calm analysis, and neither one
nor the other is possible amidst up
roar and distraction. Shut out the |
world. or that part of it which crowds |
and confuses the brain; replace the
uproar with healing silence; put Ma.
lures orderly suggestion where there
was chaos, and we may have thought |
worth proclaiming. Any people, which |
leases to mediate ceases to be great
With hustle and clatter we are laying
waste our inheritance of wisdom from
the fathers. We need nothing as much |
as to learn how to mediate.