The Lambertville record. [volume] (Lambertville, N.J.) 1872-1968, 1924-07-24
SMILIN' THRU
BY GEE SEE

from Little Journeys by Ebert
Hubbard:
Life in this world is a collecting,
and all the men and women in it
are collectors.
The question is, What viii you col
lect? Most men are intent ON col
lecting dollars. Their waking hours
are taken up with inventing plans
methods, schemes, whereby they may
secure dollars from other men FL
gather as many dollars rs possible,
and to give out as few, is the de-
sideratum. But when YOU collect
one thing you always incidentally
collect others. The fisherman who
casts his net for shad usually Sc
cures few other fish, and once in
a while a turtle, which enlarges the
mesh to suit, and gives sweet liberty
to the shad. To focus exclusively
on dollars is to secure Jealousy,
fear, vanity, and a vaulting ambition
that may claw its way through the
mesh and let your dollars slip into
the yeasty deep.
Ragged Haggard and his col
league, Cave-of- the Winds, collect
bacteria; while the fashionable
young men of the day, with few
exceptions, are collecting headaches,
regrets, weak nerves, tremens, par
esis-death. OF course we shall all
diet | will admit that, and fur
ther, we may be long time dead
q will admit that and moreover,
we may be going through the world
for the last time-as to that ] do
not know; but while we are here it
seems the part of reason to devote
our energies to collecting that which
brings as much quiet joy to oursel-
YES, and as little annoyance to
others, as pcssa'e.
My heart goes out to the collector
In the soul of the collector of old
books, swords, pistols, brocades,
prints, clocks and bookplates, there
is only truth. If he gives you his
friendship, it is because you love
the things that he loves; he has
no selfish wish to use your good
name to further his own petty plans
he only asks that you shall behold,
and beholding, your eye shall glow,
and your heart warm within you.
Inasmuch as we live in the age
of the specialist, one man often col
lects books on only one subject,
Dante for instance; another, nothing
but volumes printed at Venice; an
other, works concerning the stage;
and still another devotes all his
spare time to securing tobacco
pipes. And | am well aware that the
man who for a quarter of century
industriously collects snuffboxes has
a supreme contempt for the man who
collects both snuffboxes and clocks.
And in this does the specialist re-
veal that his normal propensity TO
collect has degenerated. That is to
say, it has refined itself into an alb
normality, and from the innocent de- +,
sire to collect, has shifted off into
selfish wish to outriyal.
The man who collects many things,
with easy, natural leanings toward.
say, spoons, is pure in heart and
free from guile; but when his soul
centers on spoons exclusively, he has
fallen from his high estate and is
simply possessed of lust for own
ership-he wants to own more Pc
euliar spoons than any other man
on earth. Such one stirs up wrath
and rivalry, and is the butt and by
word of all others who collect
spoons.
Prosperous, practical, busy people
sometimes wonder why other folks
build cabinets with glass fronts and
strong locks and therein store post
age-stamps, butts of old silks, auto
graphs and books that are very
fANN'NNS OiAS WHtu inttT leaves are
uncut; and so | will here endeayor to
explain. At the same time | despair
Of making my words Ineligible to
any but those who are collectors,
or mayhap to those others who are
in the varioloid stage.
Then possibly you say | had bet
ter not waste good paper and ink
by recording the information, since
collectors know already, and those
who are without the pale have
neither eyes to see nor hearts to
incline. But the simple fact is, the
proposition that you comprehend on
first hearing was yours already;
for how can you recognize thing
as soon as it comes into view if
you have never before seen it?
You have thought my thought your
self, or else your heart would not
beat fast and your lips say, Eyes,
yesf' when | voice it. Truth is in
the air, and when your head gets