Evening star., 1932-04-02
THIS AND THAT
BY CHARLES E. TRACEWELL.

| men, as a whole, think better today
than they did a thousand years ago
This gain has gone hand in hand
with a refinement of the feelings, or OF
the emotions. Often the two are in
extricable. When some sight or deed
appeals to the heart it is impossible
| to say that it does not appeal to the
mind in the same way. although when
We so mix mind and heart we are talk
ing in riddles, indeed.
All the centuries that minds and
hearts have been improving, they have
been waging the greatest fight in his
tory, that of life against life, the life
which would rise against the life which
would pull down. There is in every
human being-and this distinguishes
him from the sheer animals-this great
contest going ON. waRing necessarily.
never ending. The idea of the powers
of good and evil came out of it. the
imagery of heaven and hell came out
of it.
Much of what mankind has achieved
comes to us out of this grand battle.
If one believes the very cells of the
body to be intelligent-and it is diff
cult to think otherwise, even in such a
simple matter as the CLOTHING of the
blood-it is easy enough to believe also
that our very emotions are kinds of
telligence-thinking taking another
| form, manifesting itself in body states.
We think all over, as we live all
over; these intellectual processes we
prefer to call instinct, intuition, shrink
ing, fear, and the like. These are the
mysterious, unconscious "thinkings" of
the body, which come to mankind out
of the early jungies of life.
Of cnltyoc 9
the first great job of the cells. and
their work today is largely built upon
this basis. Therefore, the fancy think
ing which a man does with his brain,
per Sc. must be looked upon by the
cells of the blood stream as only so
much foolishness.
4
Even when the cells Of the brain
function to help the cells of the blood
stream. by directing experiments which
will aid mankind to build up the hemo-
globin OF the red corpuscles in the blood
stream, the cells which will be aided
are ignorant of the help. and stand
pulling the wrong way in the darkness:
Yes, they stand in the darkness, and
they pull the wrong way. With all their
little intelligences, they resent the work
of the human mind. and If they had
voices a sensitive human being could
hear them cry, stop thinking Stop
thinking You are pulling me down
The days when thinking comes hard,
then. may be laid at the doors of mil
lions upon millions of tiny little bits OF
life, created God alone knows how, out
of God alone knows what stuff, for
God alone knows what purpose. These
difficult days, in the high art of apply
ing the human brain, are the gravity Of
life. For there is a gravity of life, as
we'll as in physics. It's downpull may
come to US al the least welcome mo-
ments. and we may accuse ourselves of
being dull, dispirited, pessimistic, igno-
rant.
Il am a Ounce" said the wise man,
but he wasn't. The great clutch OF the
primitive living tissue. whose main job
was and is to stay alive, was upon him.
For all of his great natural wisdom, he
did not have the scientific attitude
which would have enabled him to look
upon his trouble with a viewpoint
nearer the truth. The veriest school,
boy of today. bred up on cosmic ravS
and the like, hes a clearer approach to
the truth.
The man who listens to the silent
voices of the ages. as they well up with
In him, may be called moody" by others
and accused OF gross laZiness. perhaps,
but he will be nearer to the eternal
springs and Surer of such rewards as
life has to offer. Let him not mind the
criticisms of the ignorant but go his
way in peace, sure of the fact that II
his intelligence is at low tide today 1t
will be at high tomorrow, and that these
waters are older than Pharaoh and come
from a source farther away than Egypt.