The Chronicle-star combined with the Moss Point advertiser., 1947-04-25

we were down on the beach
near Bayou Chicot with q
party of visitors, among them
a man in late middle-life. 1t
was a balmy spring day. The
sun was warm. The day was
clear, and the air had that
quality of lightness and cool
ness, without being sharp,
which one feels only for a few
rare days in the spring time.
The sky was deep clear blue,
with a few fleecy motionless
white clouds far out over the
islands. We could hear the wind
sitting and sigting through the
pine trees, and the waves wash
ing through the shells on the
beach. The whole day was
bathed in sunlight, and the
blue gulf cleaned and sparkl-
ed far out as the eye could
see.
After we had grabbed for a
while, our party sat down on
the ledge of grass above the
dry sandy beach Our friend
lay back, and under the lull-
ing influence of the soundof
the waves, and the hum of
conversation, very soon feel
asleep. After a while he woke
up, and as he opened his eyes,
he was startled for a moment
to be peering into the blue
infinity of the sky. The fami-
liar ceilings of home, of office,
of stories, of churches-all
we're removed from the scene.
And so were all downward
looking vistas that the eye of
civilized man falls on during
the day-streets and steps,
floors and thresh-holds, rugs
and paths, curb-stones and the
shoes of other hurrying passers-
by. Even the grass in which
he lay was invisible to his eye.
There are few things al
pleasant as lying down on old
Mother Earth and looking up
into the cky," he said. 1T is
one of the simplest things a
fellow can do. 1t doesn't cost a
cent. There is no tax on it. AS
a matter of fact, it is easier to
do than to stand up and look
down, because when standing
the body constantly has to OPP
pose the forces of gravitation
and equilibrium. Furthermore,
no artist could ever paint a
picture as beautiful as the deep
blue sky. 1t lifts up the spirit
in a way beyond anything that
one sees when looking dow"
And yet" he continued, 1T
must be thirty years since the
last time l did this simple
thing"
And with that simple obser-
walton, he put his finger right
at the core of one of the chief
failures of modern life. 1t has
cut off modern man from a
sense of relationship with
earth. sea and sky, and has
walled him in with towns and
houses, paved streets, walls
and corridores, and thousands
of other products, customs and
gadgets which tend to sever
his connection with the pri-
mary forces of the earth.
And besides these material
objects of separation, the
modern way of life has put in
creasing emphasis with every
passing generation on customs,
values and daily routines
which increase the sense of
separation. The farmer and the
fisherman and others who till
in the ways have not yet been
so thoroughly Gu. off. But in
city life the sense of separa-
ton is becoming ever more
complete.
From the years of Adde'S
cence onward, as a man be-
comes involved with the SER
ious business of education or
wage-earning, of learning a
trade, or starting a business,
or building up a practice in law
or medicine, he becomes more
and more tied down to a rig
id routine of life in the forum
and the market-place and upon
the hard-surfaced streets of
the city. His relationship be-
comes less and less a relation
ship with soil and seasons and
natural objects, and more and
more a relationship with other
men and the affairs of other
men-their records, and pro-
ducts, their plans and quar-
rels. The brain work is done
in cities and the leaders of the
nation dwell therein. And per
haps one reason why there has
been SO little of peace
and rightneSs in the affairs of
nations for so many years
stems large from this simple
fact-that our leaders are too
eity-bound, and too bound up
with man-made circumstances
and with one another, and this
has led to a distorted sense of
proportion. Man now thinks he
is bigger than he is; and he
takes his contentious affairs,
boasts. claims, rights, and pri-
vileges too seriously. He has
put too much emphasis on the
ego and the individual and the
rights thereof. In his think
ing he no longer is capable of
relating himself to the earth,
in all his transitory littleness,
and of looking into the vast
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