Norwich bulletin., 1922-08-26
TIE MAN WHO TALKS

overesfimate the mere question of au- l thership? It is perfectly natural of l course, that we should have our favor l ties among writers As there are such 1 widely different tastes and such incress- 1 ing fields to be covered, the supply is ac- cemmodating itself to the demand. This | explains the vast amount of printed mat ter available at the present time But l are we quite just to the profession in conaning our reading to only favorite authors? What chance does it givs to new writers of ability to get a hear ing? They may be superior to some of our favorites. How absurd it would be to hear only Galiicuroi sing. or only Charlie Chaplin act. No baseball fan would be satisfied in seeing only Babe Ruth play ball But when 1t comes to reading many people confne themselves to only this or that writer. If enc is satisfied that writer is delivering the real stuff" what difference Is it who he is or where he lives? We are not sure who wrote the Psalms, but somebody has given us something that will live.
 One of the most important things in this world Is habit, and it is fully as serious as 1t is important. It is i'm
 Portant because it is repeated action along certain lines; it is serious because 1t may be repeated bad action along certain definite lines. A single act ney- CT makes character, but a single act may blast it. Habit Is the series of steps we take in the formation of char acter. The steps we take may lead us up into the tower where everything is bathed in sunshine, or down into the dungeon where it is total dofkness. The direction we take is determined by our own will power. And the process of going up or down, step by &ep, is what
 we call habit. At first we proceed in either direction tiHidly. We take the first rung of a tall ladder shringingiy, but gain courage as we go up; we feel our way going down cellar at first but
 soon get used to the darkness The I young lad hesitates in the first steps of sin, but the gutter drunkard doesn't
 Habit is not only repeated but acceler- l ated action.
 Language is the vehicle of thought, and words the expression of ideas. The least discriminating will recognize the 1 difference between a parrot and a 1 prophet. With the former, words are nothing but prattle, with the latter they l are revelation. The parrot learns tSe sound of words and attempts to initiate l them, the prophet feels the power of | ideas and seeks to transform them in I to living speech. The parrot has not the l least idea of what he is talking about,
 but the prophet is so obsessed with his 1 utterance that to him it is a matter of ] life and death. We are either disgusted l with a parrot or we laugh at him we l seldom admire him. But unfortunately some parrots are not clothed with feath- ! CTS or kept in a cage, who go up and down the land using language they lit tie understand and expressing ideas of 1 which Nhey know less. It would be
 only light comedy were it not for ihe
 fact that some people take them seri- eusiy, which of course makes it trage- dy. When shall we distinguish the Far- tl rot from the prophet?
 l Recently a book has been published s entitled The Conquest of Fear, and < it is worth reading. Few people real
 ize what deadly effect fear has upon hu. manity in general. Its sway is not SC extensive as it was in the so-ealle6 ' Dark Ages, but the dark age in whicf , fear is not manifest has not yet wholly passed away. No single element Is st ri responsible for the enthronement of feal I as ignorance, and naturally the mort : widespread ignorance. is the more dead al ly is fear. Fear Is the greatest diseas
 of the immature. The child is afrai,
 of the dark, so was the childhood of tn
 race. In both cases darkness was no ? understood. When the child learns wha e darkness is he ceases to fear, so ha d the race to a certain extent. Intelli l. gence Is fears greatest Waterloo It Think of what fear has done in tn a name Of religion. The history of pagan oI ism shows the place that fear ooeu ' pies. And even in Our Christianity . man has had the audacity to say, "Be = heve in my ism. or you will be eternal 7 ly damned" We are still humiIiated b fear
 ls II Wendell Phillips were now Twin and featuring he would have anethe y item to add to the wonderful thing lel he said in the lecture, The Lost Art leI He would perhaps refer to meditatio
 as a lost art We have some thinkin; sell more writing and speaking, and vas ,el ly more talking, in the present age. Bl ,A real quiet meditation seems to be large ,,. ly a matter of the past. The individl = al is not wholly to blame for this sitl ~ alton. This nervous. high strung, rusi In ing age is mostly to blame. We don lgt have time to look calmly into the deel ae CT recesses of the soul that was CT re- of the great privileges of the past. Ar O. we are losing out in the sum total ani perscNSlity. In our great haste we al lsf spreading. ourselves over a larger art tv of human knowledge than formerly, bl ,, in so doing we have grown terribly tn
 in spots. We are so magnifying eff
 ciency that we are negleetins that qui p- background out of which efftc.ent
 springs.
 One of our problems, as yet by
 means mastered, is to accommodate ou i'll selves to sudden climatic changes. wh ey we consider what marvellous thin
 have been done by science in the Ia
 fifty years, it may not be unreasonah Ter to believe that the hand of man m; av have much more to do in modifyil
 these changes than at present and st
 M this latitude sudden changes wi probably always take place, but we u likely science will show us the way SC better adaptation to them. Take for
 stance the matter of frests. In t
 period of vegetable growth, a slig Ttn drop in temperature will ruin some V set rieties entailing great financial los he There Is reason for belief that dang
 from this source will be greatly Jesse
 ed through the application of scienti sn principles. Scientists have already z ,n+ serted that refraining from false art 'e cial stimuli better enables the hum TO- body to resist these sudden char
 es. Science plus right living are yet do wonders.
 nee .o-,o~,,,,a,,+ 1,,,z Iorvio.I infa-a,,-,o 4 les o1,r t.++,+,,da 4or,. r,f ,a1i,.;or,g o
 democracy was the outgrowth of the P
 itan conception of life in general I ere early Puritans in England conceived ose idea that they had the inalienahle ris the to worship God according to the dicta
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