The Washington herald., 1920-11-21
Incivility is the extreme of pride;
il is built on the contempt of man
End.-Zimmerman.
Giving Thanks for Duties.

N
W latest and also bis last Thanksgiv-
ing proclamation message as COVER
nor of Massachusetts, calls on his fellow
citizens to "give thanks for our duties"
He reminds them that the year has brought
great obligations" as well as great re-
sources" In short, like President Wilson,
in his Thanksgiving Day proclamation, he
urges the nation to Service"
, There are so many nations and 50 many
groups within the nations now fighting for
what they call their rights that it is not at
all surprising that the individual man
throughout the world today is more egotis-
tic and seif-assertive than ever before in
history. Neither in the State, the family,
the school or the factory is there anything
4 like the cohesion and loyalty to a concep-
ion of institutional duty that existed, let
Us say, when the twentieth century began.
En the nation, whether it be monarchy or
a republic, there is breaking down of
party discipline and of acceptance of the
ideals and governmental forms of the past
In ihe family, the contract conception
breakable at wifLgains at the expense of
the sacramental and permanent standard
of marriage and divorce and separations
increase rather than decrease in number.
In education the trend is toward abolition
of standard, humanistic, cultural educa-
ton for all, and toward earlier choice OF
vocational preparation obedient to the pu-
pifs desire or proclivities. In industry, the
employing few and the employed many,
stress rights rather than common duties,
Il c--l L. L. 4 ,f
The consequence of this widely diffused
attitude which is confined to no one con-
tinent, or race, or nation, is registered in
= the present chaotic condition of the world,
in the baneful diplomatic record of the
postwar period, and in the break down of
race morale, leading to all manner of forms
of luxury, carnality, and hippancy, and to
exaltation of the creed, ."Come, let US eat,
drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die"
One way out of the morass has been in
dicated by Gov. Coolidge and by the Presi-
dent Men so generally have substituted
license for liberty, that there now must be
a reaction from emphasis on rights TO en-
phasis on duties. And these duties must
be thankfully met and lived up to and not
grimly faced as if they were plaques. Men
in general must.come to think of Duty after
the fashion of one of the knightliest of
men, Thomas Wentworth Higginson, who
said of her:
Tonic for fears; check to the overbold;
Nurse whose calm hand its strong re-
striction lays,
Kind, but resistless, on our wayward
days;
Mart, where high wisdom at vast price
is sold;
Gardener, whose touch bids the rose
petals fall,
The thorns endure; surgeon, who
human hearts
Searchest with probes, though the
death-touch be given;
Spell that knits friends, but yearning
lovers parts;
Tyrant relentless, DER our blisses ALL
Oh, can it be, thine other name is
Heaven.
For all truly noble men or nations the
verdict of history is that
path of duty is the way to glory"
And the truth is as applicable to the hum
bfest as to the highest citizen. more and
more, gentlemen, as / grow older, / come
to feel that it is not the sphere in which
we perform the duty; it is the doing the
duty that counts" said Theodore Roosevelt
in the prime of his power.
Of course obedience to duty is easier
when hearts desire and DUTY strike twelve
together"-to- quote an Expressive phrase
that Cable, the novelist, puts in the mouth
of one of this characters. And fortunate is
the man to whom "the rule of joy and the
rule of duty seem to be all in. one" as
Oliver Wendell Holmes, the judge, has
pointed ont in one of his orations. But
whether this be so in your case or in mine.
the fact is that Ought is a greater word
than delight
For when this truth is denied then con-
science Is put lower than instinct, the part
is made greater than the whole, the indi-
viduzI is deheds andssociety debased- Socra-
ties explained to Critic why this was so in
an immortal passage defining the primacy
of social solidarity; and one has only to
look out On the contemporary world to see