Evening star., 1932-10-12

into the past and runs into the future,
when all the time 1t stands still and
has no existence except in the single
spot called now.
One Of the thoughts which comes to
the booklover on ending some old
book and finding 1t quite new and
modern, after all, is that human nature
is just the same now as it always has
been, with the one vast exception Of a
growth Of loving kindness.
Gentleness, loving kindness, call 1t
what one will. is the single great diff
ference between this age Of today and
those ages We call past.
A certain callousness to human mis-
cry Is spread like film over much Of
the literature of the past. Only few
hundred years ago a public execution
was gala event in the lives of millions.
Cruelty was unthinking in certain
eras of the past. In the prosperous
days Of Rome cook who spoiled a
meal was killed with no more thought
than he previously had given to the
killing of the meat courses.
There was always loving kindness.
even in those ages, but it was reserved
for the minorities. The spread of this
feeling to larger and larger groups is
the outstanding gain in human nature.
The level has been raised.
No one should congratulate himself,
however, on being up to the level un-
less he knows that he Is, through a
searching of his heart and mind. Espe-
cially of his emotions. The slant of the
day is to sneer at the emotions and to
place sheer intelligence on throne Of
its own.
If the books Of the past show any
! thing however, it Is that pure intellec-
tuality, divorced from an understanding
heart, is nothing much. human be-
ing is both emotion and thought, one
as much as the other.
Proper Internationally should one
be afraid Of it?
More Indignation indeed. is needed.
Indignation at wrongs too long en-
dured-this is the way of emotion bal
anced by thought, but not checked py
undue thought.
The extremes Of emotion or thought
are inimical to the best humanity. That
way madness lies. A balance must be
come, but by us who are here, now and
forever, without time and in time.
| The reading of old books, taken at
random from the nations and the ages,
helps bring about state of content
| in the mind of the reader, for he sees
plainly that life is very limited, after
all; that 1t has not changed much over
the ages, and does not seem likely to
change much in future centuries.
| Big rooms or little rooms, such dis
| tinctions. after all, make very little
difference, nor have made much differ
ence, except in the mind.
| II one sits in a chair, one sits in it
quite as comfortably in small room
as in a very large one. The ancients
knew it. and we of today know it, ex-
cept when We try to do what is popu-
! larly called keeping up with the JoneseS
| One can't do more than sit in the
chair, wherever it is, and since the chair
may be taken as the symbol of human
comfort. it IS readily seen that the chair
is what counts, not the room the chair
/ is in.
| This is literature's lesson Of content.
preached endlessly by the happiest sort
Of preaching which is no preach
ing at all, but a mere telling, with the
lesson" left to the reader to receive at
his own sweet will.
The dark hand Of pressure Is re-
moved in the delightful pursuit of
reading. For few years, true, some
! little compulsion is felt from the hands
of well meaning but often mistaken
educators.
| Shortly however, and their hands are
removed and the books of the ages and
Of the world lie open to the happy
reader. intent now only on pleasing
himself
Sham and hypocrisy pursue him here,
as elsewhere, blatting from all sides for
attention, but he makes his own judg-
ments and puts aside the mere tricks
with words, the ballyhoo Of the obnoxi-
Gus along with the sugary lure of the
insipid.
Real worth, as he is given to see it,
he makes his own in the divine pleasure
Of reading good books, old yet strangely
familiar. new yet as old as the hills OF
| the human heart and mind.