Part 3

There are all kinds of love. The simple man loves simply--himself, his woman, his children and his animals. The love of the cosmic consciousness breaks forth in a deluge upon the race, because it comprehends and includes all beneath. This great outpouring is formed of earth, air, water, fire, sunlight and all winds, all facts, all experiences, all arts, light of the moon and stars and all glowing things under the sun, all sounds and scents and pictures, all ardours, and sympathies and tolerances. Its outpouring is action, and is of itself creative. This is the _OM_. Such a love leavens and impregnates all things, because it understands and includes all things. It unifies all separateness; it enfolds all intelligence with intuition; it unites all parts.

This brings us to that ancient and unassailable premise of all religions--that God includes every part of the universe in being the spirit of it; that His idea of creativeness is expressed in one great single, all-mastering and including emotion,--which is love. We hear the little children saying it, "God is love."

* * * * *

... We awaken the Ideal in ourselves first by imitating the virtues of others. In the earlier days when to me courage meant physical action, men passed in different fields, leaving an imperishable remembrance. I have often seen the expressions of those I loved and idealised as a boy, live again in the faces of my own children. John T. McCutcheon in Luzon, filling a reel of films, under a volley of fire at Binan, on his knees, working the camera with a whole brigade sprawled behind--gave me one of the finest early building blocks for the courage among men. He also gave me an ideal of cleanliness: One evening, after a vicious day's march, and we were all ravenous, John T. left camp to find a river. There he bathed with government bouquet,--made himself right with himself, even to shaving, before meat and drink. His constraint looked like mastery to me then. Grant Wallace was a big star of that service--ideal in performance of friendship.... Young men at hand now are different. Not one of them lack in grip and grit. They reveal the new thing in courage, the courage that begins where the courage of the soldier ends. These have gone far into the mystery of their own kingdoms--rapidly becoming kings of themselves.

The world doesn't understand them. The Abbot[3] is a sensation in literary matters at Columbia, but unplaced. The Dakotan[3] was said to be unfit for a soldier because he was twenty pounds under weight for his height. He can leap five feet six, run or hike indefinitely, exhaust a cement-mixer, say "stick" in all tongues and "quit" in none. He has the will and wisdom to make himself a new man over night--and yet his Government wants him served up just so, in pounds. There isn't any one loves America more than the Dakotan, whom we now call Steve. Even the young military surgeons will know before long that endurance is a matter of spiritual culture, that courage is spirit--that a man is well because of cleanliness of body and thought and organised will; that he doesn't fail in a pinch because he is evolved; that all the higher forms of life call for speed rather than strength, the levitating force of spirit rather than the gravitating force of flesh, for brain rather than brute.... Comrade stuff is the stuff of souls.... I've studied them long and devotedly. I build my days upon the things these boys show me. Less and less are we different from those who call to our hearts.

[3] These appear in _Child and Country_.

These young men do not think themselves out; they are not troubled by misses or personal discrepancies. They simply are themselves. I have perceived that men of dreams and genius and action are in the larger sense free from themselves. The main part of their day's performance is a lifting out of the tangle of emotion and desire, into a large, unrestricted area full of calm daylight, where events and movements are seen in their relation to one another, not in separateness and one at a time, an area also where inspiration is momentarily expected to strike. They do not analyse themselves. They do not hear their own voices. They are not dismayed if they falter or drop from the key. The things that most men do with care, and that occupy so much of the days these young men perform automatically.

My own path was upward through an intense self-consciousness--the American, not the oriental way. I lived with myself all the route. I observed outward conditions and events, domestic, civic and cosmic; but at the same time observed their effects upon myself. I did not know until I was adult that there is a big receptivity of consciousness above this--where intuitions play and weave causes and effects together--where the mind is more like a child's than a man's, or more like a giant's, perhaps--where the big faith comes, and the warm laugh comes, and man surpasses himself, but does not know until afterward, if at all.

Warmth flooded into me as I touched this larger consciousness. It became clear as daylight--that a man is at his best only when out of himself. I saw much of my misery and depression was the result of self-analysis. I was a better man when I let myself go utterly. And this was exactly the thing that happened in moments of danger, moments of romance and friendship, moments of the self hurling itself outward. Capacity for these moments makes the Comrade, and indicates that love which is not a sentiment, but a cosmic force.

Again, you cannot describe a spiritual thing with these little tools and materials in black and white--just intimations.... If we are sweet enough inside, something of the song will come to us.... Two words suggest it best. The first is _Comrade_, which has become a silliness in a military sense, yet has a high and holy meaning to all reconstructionists.... I remember when the word first came to me with a thrill, as a young lad going off to Cuban wars. It was burned out of me a few days afterward in a Sibley tent full of regular army soldiers.... I remember the scorn with which I used the word all the years--or avoided using it--until slowly, smilingly, its new dimension opened, hard as a diamond, and as clear--its meaning in work and world and women, its new meaning to Russia and India and China and America.

It seems to say _Equality_. It's a kind of deep drink of spirit together, a word spoken at the last moment between men--an inner-shrine word, spoken with a smile, and a glimpse into the eternal indestructibility of the human heart. It expresses the love of the world, not as it is felt in the brain, but in the breast of the soul. The New Race has already washed it clean. It goes with a Cause fit to die for. It belongs to men and women who can look at each other with a kind of prayer in their eyes and face death alone and laugh at it.

There's a fury, too, in the word--fury against the world, against things as they are. It stands against the world-darkness now, and for the day that is to be. It means love for the poor, a love for the peasants, a passion to serve and be tender to them, not to drive them into the pits of death--a readiness to die for them without _cant_, a readiness also to dare to live for them.

_Comrade_--there's vision in it to strip off the masks of decadent nations, to open wide the sepulchres where the priests are still plotting to crucify the King; its strong magic will uncover the monotonous crimes of commerce.... It signifies the spirit of the young men and women who have already begun with gladness and fire to clear the débris for the building of the New Age.

They will begin with the soil; they will know and love their own hard part. They will begin with the grass, with the rice, with the millet and the wheat, the clean things, the simple and holy things that the peasants love, with the songs that the peasants sing, the songs of the soil and the rivers and snows--to build upon them the new heaven and the new earth.... Above all, there's a laugh in the word--the laugh of youth and power.

The other word is _Democracy_.

* * * * *

5

JOHN'S THINGS

Here are some of John's things, mainly letters to the Old Man. California called hard for the recent winter, and I went out a few weeks ahead of the Stonestudy outfit. John intended to follow within three weeks, but overturned a kettle of boiling water in his lap, and was unable to leave his quarters for three times that period. We all learned better the hard lesson--to wait. The quoted word "Play" in his first letter refers to a little slip of paper which I had pasted upon my typewriter. There has been a big tendency in recent months, in my case, to let down all tension in relation to literary production--the idea being that when one has learned all the laws he is capable of, the time is at hand when it is well to forget them. I have written several times throughout this book of an ideal emergence of Workman into Player. We learn many laws, to learn at last that there are none. We come up through many slaveries to freedom.... I have not corrected all the spelling in John's documents. The point most interesting is how the real voice breaks through the mind of a child of nine from time to time.

DEAR YOUNERVERS[4] PAL:

We got your letter but it was not like you for it was not type-written. Your old machine here is going grand. I am using it now. It seems that I am with you all the time. _Comrad_ has meant a lot the last four days to me. Comrad is everything in the New Race. Masters will be comrads with every one.

That "Play" has it all, on your machine. "Play" is in all somewhere. It is all like a big page and everything is woven on it. There is a time when Comrads hafto go apart for a little while, but not long. Their thoughts never go apart. They are always pulling together, always weaving in thoughts and things that are the same. It is wounderful--a parting. No sadness over it. It is the best that could come, or it would not. We are held together. The pull of the world is nothing to us.

It is hard to keep high, but we will. Fred[5] and I take a swim every day. I go a hundred and fifty feet. Then we come up and rub each other.

True Comrads have it all. Love from Comrad to Comrad.

[4] Universe.

[5] The Abbot.

PAL:

I woke up this morning kind of blurred, and got Irving and Steve to come out and clean up the barn. They came and we worked there all morning, and then went in for a swim. It was wounderful, the feel I had when I got some clean clothes on and had the old dog[6] feeling good. He is meditating over what a wounderful world it is now. The stall smells sweet as a hay-stack.

Fred just got here and is working at your desk.

How was your morning? I never had a better one, and its the weary old Sabbath, too.

Send for me soon now. It seems that it was a year since we have been together. We can not do without each other. Send for me _Soon_. I hold my hand high to you.

[6] The saddle horse.

DEAR OLD MAGIC FATH:

I am at Steve's desk in the guest room. It is the first time that I have touched the keys of a type writer since the night I was berned. It sure does feel good.

It has been much more wonderful to hafto have Patience for the Meeting. It will be twice as great for both. I have needed you so since I have been in bed. In pane and sicknes there is nothing that you need so much as your Comrad.

I felt palms up to everything. It is all good. We love it all. It all was something for us to get. It puts us higher after something comes to us like that.

I have all the pores poring out love to you. We are always together.

YOUR SIDE KIKER.

DEAR OLD PAL:

Fred and I slept again in the Study. It looked like a storm last night, but it did not come. Fred is a real Comrad. I got to his heart last night. I do not know how. The roses have been wounderful the last few days.

How is wounderful Mary? We are all sending Thoughts to you. We have had wounderful full days lately, all heat. The town is howling for rain now; they are never satisfied. We are always ready for anything. It is the best. Our wounderful old mailtrain just crossed the magic lane. I love trains more and more. They have a pull to my heart. We love everything.

I do not feel on erth. I feel in space. Out of the draw of the erth--_Free_.

Love always in my heart for you. I hold hard for the time that Comrads pull together again for the road, us two. Jane is at my hump all the time--so I will quit.

DEAR OLD COMRAD:

We are close this morning. I can feel your warm wounderful hand in mine this morning. We are one. There is the holy breath--such a great pull of thoughts and work to California. It seems as if all the Comrads were calling me there. Then I hafto think of the one thing--_Patience_. When you have mastered Patience, you are free. All well here. My sores are getting better fast. I have wanted to work lots lately, since I was in bed, but I could not. I lost so many ideas in bed. Beds are a curse. I love you, Comrad. We need to be together.

YOUR OLD PAL.

SUNLIGHT PAL:

A wounderful sun. A little late in getting up. The sun was out full--a wounderful breakfast and a wounderful bowl of roses.

Every morning gets greater. The coming together again gets closer. Separation is a great thing! You find that when it comes. It will be so big and wounderful to come together on the shores of the sea. The trains on the Pere Marquette line have a draw to my heart; the whistle is so wounderful.... To have a bath in the salt water and not in old Lake Erie.... It was another wounderful night with Fred. He has done so much for me this time that we have been away from each other.

He is so wounderful if you can get to him. I think I have got right to him to the heart. I am awful lonesome for you and the sea.

I walked to the train track with Fred this morning. It was like the day you were going away. I felt it was nearing the last walk up the old Lane. Fred has the same feel. It swept over us--a free feel; it was almost too much.

How is your Sisity-list coming? Mine is great. It is hard to get along without you here. Old Abe was drafted, and we don't know when we will see him. The sea and sunlight sweeping in the open door of your work room! We will sure have some grand times. We will get horses and have some more of them Moonlight rides. It will be great to hit the old _Tie path_ Itself--with the[7] Welcome Mulligan and the[8] Onerbel Chas. Lipton under our arms. The smell of the burning bark and a caben in the Rockies! Oh, the open road. Life is Life on the old Road.

That canyon must be a wounder, and the sea and the misty mountains and the brown hills. You have it all. Oh man, that is the country for everything.

I keep high for our meeting, Comrad of the Road.

[7] Frying Pan.

[8] Teapot.

PROSE SETTINGS

I

THE RED SUNSET.

The red sunset Died away like the close of a forest fire.

The Dusk ran through the mountains like a scarf of blue.

The Moon and old Jupiter took the Open Road together.

The others came out of the everlasting Blue Deeps.

II

THE DESERT NIGHT.

The man at the camel corral was fixing the camels for the desert. Other men were waiting at the front of the Temple. Another came forward with four camels, a pack-beast and two riders. Then all were off over the Sun Betin Sand.

Nothing but Sand and Harizen. Only the Arab who was ahead on the Old Camel knew the way.

They went on and on over the Everlasting Sand, the Sun Betin Sand.

III

PINES.

The great wood is the Pines. The very whiff of them gives you the breath of Nature, the great Mother of the planet, the mother of Love. Her breath is the breath of life and love, and the Mouziek of the world.

TREAS (_California_)

Treas are grate. They are so wild and wounderful. There is so many kinds here. The trea I love best of them all, is the U.K. Liptes. It is fragran; it has the sun and the erth all flowers and the swaying beauty of its great youth. I loved it from the first. It is beauty that stays.

I went up to a grove the other day and along a little lone path--the mist and odor of them lingering in deep shadows. My feet broke the deep silences and a Voice came and spoke soft to me: "If you listen long enough you can hear----" I think it was my Master speaking, for a glow came around me, after He had spoke.

THE SONG OF THE SPERIT

Life is not any good until you forget your boddy; then you get all the power of living, but you can't do anything that you feel like doing.

LETHER:

All lether has a mystery in it. It is the animal's mystery. The misteks of the other world know it, and try to tell us. I have been told but my mind has not received it. I will hafto wait until it does. I think I will know it all in a fue years. I will tell the rest of the world, if I hear it first. I would like to be the first to hear it.

STONES:

The whole erth was of stone.

God thought that he would make it something good. He sent the Old Mother Nature down and she spent years and years, but she did not know what to put on it. She went up to God and He took her to a room, and showed her the things that He had to put on the Erth.

They were sperits, so she got them one at a time and brought them down.

In the mean time she was making other things. They were seeds and she planted these and they came up. It was wheat and barley and other things like that. The sperits became people and took them for food, and the old Mother is still putting things and bringing her sperits on the Erth. This world is just about filled.

THE SPERIT

At night the Sperit goes to see God. It gets fresh to make the boddy fresh every morning. This is what keeps you clean. If you were all clean, you would not die. You go thru a hard life and what is not clean is burned off, and then you are pure to go to heaven. You rest then until you are ready to come and be a saint.

ALONE

The sun beat hard upon the rocks.

I was alone in the Power of the rocks. Nothing was moving.

I was Alone. My Sperit was alone.

It was the loneliest place in the world.

No animal of any kind, not a bird or a snake--alone.

Nature did not even have cells of thought.

The power of the rocks was holden me there.

A thought came over me that I had never known Home.

All of a sudden Nature spoke, and I was free from everything.

I came back to the Father.

EQUALS

There is a greatness in a man that treats his horse like his brother. A man is a beast when he beats his horse. He is of a lower Brivahen[9] than the horse. The man who says to his horse that he is his equal, is a great man, a master of animals.

[9] Vibration.

BEAUTY

When the New Race comes, there will be beauty--real beauty. Down thru the ages people have talked of beauty, but they have not seen it really, yet. It will come with the New Race--beauty in everything--in the body, in writing, in talk, in love. Not love one, but all. The younerverse Lovers will not only love each other, but they will love all. This war is the great clean up of the world. After it is all over, and the troops come all home together, there will be the great New Race waiting for them with open arms--then all will be real beauty.

THE HOLD UP AND THE GET AWAY

... It was the first time Denver Bill had come in without a cigarette in his mouth. They wanted to know why he wasn't smoking, but they didn't ask.

He ordered the same drink and took it fast.... He chucked the chair over, grabbed the tellfon off the table and gave "Hlo."

He said, "Horse up here in five minutes."

It was there.

He was out of town in a minute more.

Denver Bill stopped at a cabin where he had made ponmets[10] to rob a train at 7:45, and it was now 6:10. His friend was there. They jumped on their horses and rode a quarter of a mile. The train whistled around the curve.

[10] Appointment.

There was a shout. Denver called: "Stop that engine!"

It stopped slow.... Bill murdered the engineer, and then flew thru the train of cars. He grabbed the fifty pound gold box and jumped thru the window. A shot rang out.

Bill was pincked.

The man that he had come with played dirt on him because he went off with the gold. Bill crawled across the field and laid in the hay stack.

He rolled the first cigarette of the day.

* * * * *

LETTER TO THE ABBOT (from California)

DEAR OLD WIFE:

How are you coming? I was just up over the hill behind us, getting two wounderful qwortz of golden honey. How is your type mill pumping these days? I got a new story in my bean:--Have an old fisherman that takes those forks and goes after crabs--have him find a pot of pearls instead of crabs.--Think if it is done right it would make a wounder.

When will you be out here? We will lead a pack trane over the mountains! Oh, that is the old open road! Pack mules, they mean it to me--a line of mules in the mountains and a couple of saddel horses! That's the life.

I hope you have changed your mind about them airaplanes. I do not like the Idea. But, old man, it is for the best, and nothing is a mistake. Take it as it comes. Write soon, and make the pages fly like dust to me. I need all that I can get.

Last night was our first bit of rain. Slept in an open window where my face was sprayed all night with the wounderful cold drops of spring. When I got up, I was feeling better than I ever did before. I was all relaxed. I lay a long time just in the wounder of the wounderful free air and rain. I got up and went down and washed in more of the soft rain, and ate and went outside to come down to my work shop. I stood in the wind. Everything around me was so wounderful. All the trees and flowers were brighter. The hills were a little damp. The birds were playing and drinking in the rain. The ray of sun was just coming over the hill. I could almost hear the breathing of the grass and erth. It was like a song, the great song of spring and breathing of the world.

That is the way that the new generation will come in after the world is washed and all countries are _one_. A Boy, young and clean, will come in, whistling and breathing a Song of the New Race.

YOUR COMRAD.

* * * * *

ANOTHER

WELL, WIFE:

Here I am pumping a little more of my vocabulary at you. I think that I will go into the ocean and have a swim. It's dulce on my wounds. What I want to tell you is about an old sea loafer here--a big, black dog. He isn't any kind of a dog--nothing but a world-man-dog, he is. He is a lover of the sea and sand. He goes down with us every day. He is a pal for the road. He can't follow the saddel like Jack, but he can shore be a frend. I have lerned him and he has lerned me. We stick close.

Well, pal of the sea and saddel, I am getting awful lonesome, but I am with you all the time. I need your old paw. I shore keep high for the Spring Coming. We will have a shack back in the hills all alone, and drink tea and talk. Don't it sound good? I won't forget it either, not until we have it. We have planned it for many ages, and we will hafto have it--old pal of the moonlight rides.

I am close and always your Comrad.

6

VALUES OF LETTER WRITING

Stonestudy particularly is a shop for writers. A man is at his best in writing to the one who pulls the most from him. The thing is to pour out. The pursuit of happiness is a learning how to radiate. Happiness itself is radiation--incandescence.