Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1931-10-05

after . certain number of years spent
IN living the everyday life, that most
human beings have very little in COM
mon, after ell. Surely 1t is too bad
put It 10 true, with thousands Of people
AS members Of the race they share
alike certain wants. certain ambitious
approach to each and a different way
Of looking at things.
What offends one will be regarded a.
highly natural with another. The
standard ization Of human beings, to
which all Americans have been SUBJ
Jected during the past so years, has
made millions more or less look alike,
but they do not think alike.
Their very similarity Of appearance
Is based upon q million different stand
aros, at bottom, which result from
vast differences of breeding, training
and blood, SO that no man can put q
positive finger on any trait and say,
i know just where this came from"
NO one can know. Not even the
man himself can be sure. At one mo-
ment he may be inclined to blame his
ancestors, at the next himself, but he
IS never sure, nor can he be sure, that
he Is even on the right track.
X X X \
Life Is mixture of so many things
some Of them lost to sight, like the
rudimentary tall which vanishes, that
1t Is not in US to know anything surely
In q fieeting life which some believe to
be nothing but the interesting escape
OF electricity, after all.
The very way man wears his hat
may offend US. II his hair Is not cut
according to our preconceived pattern
and standard usually based upon the
right proper way in which we wear our
own, we are inclined to call him q
peculiar fellow and hope that he strikes
better barber next time.
The art of happy living, then, one
may feel inclined to think, consists
largely In meeting people with whom
one agrees and whose doings strike one
as proper and In avoiding those bar
barians who rub one the wrong way,
whether the fault be ones own or
theirs.
In this agreeable pursuit life flows
along, now one way, now another, with
no man at any time getting any nearer
the ultimate perfection Of which all
men have dreamed and which some few
have made manifest in writings about
a new heaven and new earth, the So
called perfect state of the philosophers
4 y 4 Il
Let no one feel ashamed of himself
that he must subscribe to the plainly
written statement of one of the great
est, If not the greatest, of American
philosophers, 81 like man, not men,"
The race is still, after thousands
some say millions, of years Of so-called
civilization, in thral to its animal
ancestry. The brute Is in all of US
more or less successfully held in check
but cropping out here and there.
1t Is these outcroppings which cause
a man to shrink back in the face OF
the jungle, peering out between the
leaves, the horned bead, the sharp
pointed ears of Pan, the switching tail
of the forest.
Strange that the automobile, one of
mans farthest reaches from his jungle
ancestors, should bring to the surface
something Of that old slumbering brute
It Is q truisn. however, that polite men
become impolite when behind the
wheel
Let us like man in the abstract and
do our best to get along with the indi-
vidual specimens we meet every day.
1t Is a poor day indeed which does not
bring us at least one human being
whose kindness, decency and square,
ness IN the face of all our common
weaknesses make life very much
worth while.