Jackson advocate. [volume] (Jackson, Miss.) 1939-current, 1949-06-11
FOR MEMPHIS
my father
J. A. HIBBLER

Last week / SAID Inar 1t was the
reading of Richard Wright's MA
TIVE SON, polar counerpointedly
localed in Nazi-conquered Europe.
(The points of it being in Chic
ago) that was the beginning of
the thing, for me, upon which I
am trying to write.
Now, the term, POLAR COUN.
TERPOINT is @an art term. not
in the dictionary nor in use at
all. My conclusion is that it is
the real art secret of the ancient
aestheticians who taught POINT
and COUNTERPOINT as the pro-
cess to bet set up and followed in
art. hey taught, however, that
POINTS did not exist, as students
today are taught in geometry. Of
course, plurality of points
could not exist because Nothing
Exists Alone.
(This is philosophy; Pythagor-
can philosophy So that left
counterpoints as the thing to start
or end with. Now, COUNTER,
POINTS as thing could not exist
alone, if Nothing Exists Alone.
Everything, then, must have an
opposition, as students of cleo
tricity know. Therefore COUN-
TERPOINTS exist along with
their opposition, which L called
POLAR COUNTERPOINTs, as 1
2, 3, 4, exists as the opposite of
0 or Il, 2, 3, A, or minus every
thing. The larger the unit of op-
position, the greater the value set
up.
Now that is very simple, as sim
pie and plain as the noses on
our faces. But with out a mirror no
one can see his nose. (THE study
of John Dryden's satire, taking
me over four or five thousand
years of satire, in modern transla-
lions, formed the morror for me.)
But the process by which | came
upon it was a long hard one. 1t
was made up of much hard study
in liberal arts and science, and it
was made possible only by much
suffering, high hopes and despair,
many, wanderings and wonder
lngs. If one is successful and
happy he or she - land most
modern Discoveries have been
made by women) - is not in a
position to have this percept or
insight. That is why university
professors with all their degrees
and work have not come upon it.
That is why it is hardly to be
found by white student as Amer
lean economy is geared to the
success and happiness of white
families out of which white uni
versity students come 1t is
thing that must be found by some
one of the great suffering masses
of the people so long deprived of
learning, deprived in every land
on earth. But one must have learn
ing to come upon it, and one must
know despair. $50 it is written
about in the books, by Havelock
Ellis and by American educators
and scientists, and by Edmund
Husserl)
For my learning 1 owe John
Wesley, founder of Methodist
Evangelism: "Take the knowledge
and the power to the people. Let
none be deprived of mans herit-
age. If they will not come to us
(the CHURCH, let us go to
! them,' Wesley said.
And l hated him, his discip-
line to which my father and moth
er held us. Spend every spare mo-
, ment you have", John Wesley
taught, with book, and sing
ing my hymns" Pphew). But
the man, John Wesley, was a
great scholar and knew what he
was talking about. And my fa-
Their believed in John Wesley.
Leave the results to God" Wesley
said. q hated cd too: it was all
SO hard. 1 blot my paper now with
my tears. Put then | cried at the
BEAUTY, the sheer beauty of the
thing, when I had found it. the
interaction Of polar counterpoints.
as the secret of LIFE, DEATH.
and all Beauty, is.
Copyright, 1949, J. A. Hibbler