The Washington times., 1918-08-31
The Earth Is Only a Front Yard
The Real Man of the Future Will Have His Greatest
Interests Far Outside of Our Little
Rolling Sphere.

editors socioogists and all other woudbe deep think
of this earth are really engaged In pretty small
business.
We are like a swarm of human beings cast away on
some desert island This earth is island little island
in space and it is desert island and badly arranged
island in ways than one. Many Of US lack good
dwellings some of lack food all of US worried
about the future The island is infested with mosquitoes
and with disease that have not learned to conquer,
There are MANY criminals it that prey upon the honest
people-cmnals at the top and criminals at the bottom
of society
And all of those who think and sympathize with their
fellowcreatures busy with the problem of putting
things right this little desert island that carries us
along in the wake OF the sun.
Most of us imagine that the most important work for
men is the organization of life this little planet There
is a very small and mean idea of mans real destiny.
When starts to build house, of course the plan
ming of sanitary arrangements must first be attended TO-
After that begin the real life and the real interests That
real life and those real interests not confined to the
front yard the back yard of the that owns the
house.
So it will be some day with who are now engaged
in the detailed organization of the little home which we
call the earth. We fixing up our moral plumbing
fighting poverty injustice, and above ALL ignorance. We
are fighting the meanness that of competition and
the greater that based upon the dread of pow
ery in the future Some of are ping up millions that
use while others suffer for lack of that which
could be abundanty supplied.
ALI these little earthly questions that so big will
be settled in time.
But few years in the sight of Tme-a few hundred
centuries perhaps as we count time-and earthly
SsbtatiOn viii have been made fit to live in We shall
have eliminated the unt-not by killing them off, but by
educating them We shall have solved the question of
ery by solving the question Of production and especially
of distribution We shall have developed ctzensip ca
pabe of work. of sobey, and of moral decency
without the spur of want imprisonment or the scafold as
necessary adJuncts.
In time the human race will have solved its little prob
lens here-the problems that vast today.
When that time comes we shall be like the man who
has put his house in order and thoughts will not be
confined to this little piece of ground Then shall ap
Tho Sd0r Uh
into darkness and ighthe light for the enjoyment OF the
material beauties of earthly home, THE NIGHT FOB
MYSTERIOUS UNIVERSE SPREAD OUT AROUND US.
Everybody knows that the aged require less sleep than
the young In the future this will make old age what it
ought to be- blessing because it will give to the old more
hours of the night for contemplation OF the Infinite and
all its wonders.
Those of us who now think themselves very abstract
when they speculate the North Pole when they dis
the possibility of recaiming the Desert of Sahara
will have their minds many millions of miles away from
this earth great deal of the time
We shall communicate perhaps with sister planet
Venus-the planet most like in physical arrange
ment. We shall be intensely interested in that world
where it is always night side of the planet and al
ways day the other.
We shall realize with deepest envy the fact that the
constant terrific currents of air whrlng around Venus
in consequence of the extreme heat and the extreme cold
opposite sides of the planet having developed race
far superior to the trout in the swifthowing
brook superior to the heaVye catfish In the bottom OF
the pond.
we snail humbly beg Tor ln1ormatlon from tne su-
peor inhabitants of other worlds and perhaps wait with
mpatence for release from duty here which shall take
to higher planetary existence. If look backward
at all we shall consider present selves simply re-
fined cannbas who lived upon the labor and the suffer
ing Of fellows instead of feeding upon their bodies
It may ridiculous to predict that the time will
when the intelligent mans interests will be nearly
all outside of the earth on which he lives
But to the savage the Congo, squatted beside a
decayng hppopoamus gorgng himself with the meat with
not thought beyond that beyond the edge Of
that river it would preposterous to speak of men
whose interests range out over the entire world.
We look upon a very small today unless all
knowledge interests him. unless his mind roams daily all
the civilized globe sharing in the interests Of all
ons in the literature the discoveries and the activities Of
all nations