Evening star., 1939-02-12
By Alice Eversman

The financial demands of the
present-day mode of living call for
retrenchments in spending from the
most of us, besides leaving con-
stant fear as to what the future will
bring. 1t is still, more or less, the
unfortunate custom to sacrifice mu-
sic in the desire for economy, with
out thought as to what Is being
taken out of each individuals per-
sonal life. If ever there was need
for the benefit that music can bring,
1t is at the present time, for grad
ually all the finer things Of life, 1t
would seem, are being surrendered
to material claims which have set
the world to thinking only in terms
of money and financial security.
This is all very understandable,
but where will it end? Once begun,
there is no limit to the fear that
will assail people, and the circle
will close in so tightly that the
broader vision which has made our
civilization what it is win be COM
pletely lost. One of the things
that will help to keep the vision
bright and shining and nourish the
spiritual elements in our natures Is
the cultivation of music. BY this
is not meant alone the study of
music, but the hearing of 1t in the
right way. so that 1t can be abb
sorbed in the inner life to strengthen
1t and keep it alive.
Cost of Progress.
But why should music cost so
much, you will ask. Some day, per-
haps, we will arrive at that ideal
state when art will be divorced from
money, but the chances are small
that this will be accomplished for
many generations. Those great men
who have enriched the world with
their musical compositions knew
dire poverty, yet their faith in the
power for good of music was un-
shakable, and no suffering could
shut off the voice of their inspira-
ton. But these men were intellec-
tual giants as we'll as geniuses, and
they wrote for posterity, and so
great was their talent that musl-
clans of their time and that follow
ing could only skim the surface of
their ideas in both technical and
emotional Interpretation.
This means that constant progress
must be made by those who would
interpret music, and that costs
money. The large fees which noted
artists receive may seem exorbitant,
as does the price of good seats for
hearing them. But when the money
spent in education is considered and
how the ordinary indulgences of the
average person have been sacrificed
during an entire lifetime in order
that these artists may become priests
of their calling. then the price paid
for their services is small in COM
parison.
With art, however, there should be
no balancing of money against 1t,
for art Is designed for greater
things than money can buy. Except
for religion, there is no more potent
aid in facing the trials and tribula-
tions of life than music, and is there
any one who has not need of help at
some time or other? Today, when
the serious-minded are fearing for
the stability of civilization itself
is it wise to sacrifice the spiritual
things that will keep us sane and
believing in the ultimate good be-
cause it is a question of money?
Civilization Defined.
Sometime ago that very clever
and far-seeing writer, Dorothy
Thompson, had an article in one OF
the magazines entitled How to De-
stroy Civilization" Quoting here
and there from it: Il hear a great
deal about the imminent destruction
of civilization" she says. THE most
common prophecy is that war will
destroy it, but I think it would be
truer to say that war is a symptom
of a destructive process and not Its
cause. We talk about civilization as
though it were something external;
as though 1t were outside us and not
Inside us; as though Fifth avenue
and the Champs Elysees and West
minister and Cologne Cathedral and
roads, boulevards comely towns,
,ororoupicat tiop SvStomS were ciVilf-