New-York tribune., 1918-04-07
IN ature Passes Us and
Our Sorrows Bv''
Man Is Of Little Account to the Race
Of Birds or the Race of Trees or the
Race Of Flowers or the Race of Stars
From "7'he Ne1U Statesman

crowd than would gather to see a dog
that had been run over in the street.
One was never before so conscious
OF the indifference Of nature to human
tragedy as one has been since the out
break of the war. Here, one would
think, was tragedy that all but threat
ened to crack the globe. One would
imagine that the sides of nature must
be in pain with it and the earth in peril
of being hurled out of her accustomed
path around the sun. Yet the sparrows
in the Surrey valleys have not heard Of
it, and the sea birds know nothing of it,
save that occasionally they are be-
wildered to find a submarine rising from
the waters instead of the porpoise for
whose presence they had hoped. We
hear that the phcasants in Sussex
wood awoke and screamed on Sunday
night during the barragc fire around
London. But this was mere egotism on
the Part of the pheasants. The pheasants
of Wiltshire did not have their sleep
broken, and SO were not troubled about
the sufferings of Londoners.
THE whole of nature, indeed, is curl
ously secretive. She does not tell
much about herself save to the i'm
Fortunate. Not many of US can speak
her language or have learned the pass
word to her cave of hidden treasure.
She thrusts upon our notice few
birds, a few insects, few animals, a
few flowers. But for the most part
there is no finding her population with
out seeking for it, Hundreds of her
flowers arc hidden to the lazy eye, and
we may pass lifetime without seeing
so common bird as a tree-creeper or
so common an animal as shrew-mouse.
How seldom it is one sees even rat!
There are human beings who will
never discover an early flower however
many miles they cover in their country
walks. They take no pleasure in finding
wild strawberry flower in January or
campion blossom in the first week in
February. They are as Indifferent to
nature as nature is to them
The honeysuckle that breaks out with
leaves as with green hames the thrust
of the leaves of the wild hyacinth un-
der the trees, like the return of youth:
the Towering of the elm, the young
moon like a white bird with spread
wings in the afternoon sky, the golden
journey of Orion and his dog across the
heavens by night-these things, they
feel, are not interviewer with mans fate
They were before him, and they will be
after him. Therefore, he cares more
Tor his little brick house in the suburbs,
which will at least be changed when
he goes.
We do not suggest that any one con-
sciously adopts a philosophy of this kind
But most of us are undoubtedly a little
offended at some time in our lives when
we realize that nature has so little re-
gard Tor our passions and our teers
She is a consoler, but it is on her own
terms
Matthew Arnold found the secret of
life IN becoming as resigned to obedience
as the stars and the tide. Who knows
but, If we do this, nature may be found
to care after all? But she does not
care in the way in which most of us
want her to care. The religious found
that out long ago. They found that
nature was guilty of neutrality in human
affairs, if they did not go further and
suspect her of enmity
1t is only when philosophy has been
added to religion that men have been
able to reconcile without gloom the in
difference of nature with the idea of
the love of God. And even the religious
and the philosophers are puzzled by
the spectacle of the worm that writhes
on the garden path while the robin pecks
at 1t, triumphant in his fatness and
praising the fine weather.