Part 9
Indeed, it is the interest of our millionaires in art, science, and religion which has created a puzzling ethical problem. They are not content to be mere money-getters. They aspire to be benefactors on a large scale. But what if the wealth so freely offered has not been honestly come by? What if the best institutions should hesitate to receive it? The poor rich man cannot contemplate such a refusal with equanimity. It would interfere with the fulfillment of his most cherished plans. To have unlimited opportunities to make money, and to be hindered in giving it away, seems to him like building a trunk line of railroad and then being denied terminal facilities. Of course he could change his plans and keep it all himself, but to a man who had been accustomed to “doing things” that would be a humiliating anti-climax.
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The fact that the American is greatly absorbed in his work with material things is no sufficient basis of the charge of materialism that is lightly brought against him. The crucial question is, “What do the things stand for in his mind? Are they finalities, or are they means to an end?” The most appalling picture of a purely materialistic civilization is that given in the book of the Revelation. It is an inventory of the wealth of the Babylon which was Imperial Rome. The inventory is an indictment. “The merchandise of gold, and silver, and precious stones, and of pearls, and fine linen, and purple, and silk, and scarlet, and all thyine wood, and all manner vessels of ivory, and all manner vessels of most precious wood, and of brass, and iron, and marble, and cinnamon, and odours, and ointments, and frankincense, and wine, and oil, and fine flour, and wheat, and beasts, and sheep, and horses, and chariots, and slaves, and souls of men.”
The heart grows sick when the list of commodities ends with the “souls of men.” What were they worth, measured against all that goes before?
A very different impression comes as we read Joaquin Miller’s exultant cry over the West:--
O heart of the world’s heart, West! my West! Look up! Look out! There are fields of kine, There are clover fields that are red as wine,
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There are emerald seas of corn and cane,
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There are isles of oak and a harvest plain Where brown men bend to the bending grain, There are temples of God and towns new born.
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And the hearts of oak and the hands of horn Have fashioned them all, and a world beside.
This frank delight in the riches of the earth is not materialistic. The souls of men are not in the market. They form the supreme standard of value. Materialism is not a disease to which nations are subject in their lusty youth. It comes with senile decay.
Sometimes when we are wearied with the intense activity of modern life we quote the saying, “Things are in the saddle.” Perhaps our sympathy is misplaced. If the poor Things could speak, they would tell us that, so far from being in the saddle, they are under the lash of furious young idealists who give them no rest. It is the nature of a Thing to “stay put,” but these headstrong youths despise this conservative bias. They are no respecters of Things, being wholly absorbed in Purposes.
To see Things in undisputed possession, go into “the best room” of a respectable old farmhouse. Here the Thing has the place of honor, and the Person is a base intruder, having no rights of his own. The priestess hovers occasionally around her sacred Things, waving her feather duster as a mystic wand, and then leaves them in respectful gloom. Nothing short of a death in the family would induce her to disturb them. Go into a busy workshop, and you may see how the Thing may be taught to know its place. It is always at the mercy of the innovating Intelligence. When a new Idea comes, the old Thing which had heretofore had a useful function is thrown aside. It is still as good as it ever was, but it is not good enough. It must go to the scrap pile.
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The man of the West is likely to offend against the standards of propriety in speech. When he begins to explain the character of his country, he is accused of inaccuracy. His prospectus is not always confirmed by the Table of Contents. He has acquired the habit of “talking large.” This prejudices many people against him. They accuse him of willful exaggeration, and if he be the promoter of some commercial enterprise, they impute to him a mercenary motive.
But he is in reality quite sincere. If he talks large, it is only because he feels large. His is a language natural to those who are engaged in creative work, and who foresee great things. It is like “the large utterance of the early gods.” He does not feel called upon to limit his statements to the facts that are already apparent; he expects the facts to grow up to his statements. He is not shooting at a fixed target, but at a flying mark; if he is to hit it, he must aim a little ahead.
Another reason for this large utterance is that in a new country the ordinary man identifies himself with his community in a way impossible to any but very great magnates in an old civilization. He feels very much as did the kings and earls he has read about. How proudly on the Shakespearean stage a great noble will speak of himself as Norfolk or Northumberland! It is as if his personality had been multiplied by so many square miles. He is no longer a mere individual,--he is a whole county.
An American may have much the same sense of territorial aggrandizement by identifying himself with a promising community in its first stage of growth. He is not a unit lost in a multitude. His town has a fine name and a glorious future. Some day these glories may be divided among thousands, now they are his own. He is proud of the town, and the pride is more satisfying because he is it.
I once camped for a whole month in the city of Naples on the shores of the Pacific. I knew it was a city, for a huge sign announced the fact to every one who passed by the beautiful, secluded spot. Unlike some of the boom towns of that period, Naples had an inhabitant, whom I had occasion frequently to meet. When I addressed him, it was hard for me to use his surname, as I would with a common man. For to me he was Naples. It would have seemed appropriate for him to speak in blank verse.
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There are those who look upon the Western delight in the idea of bigness as an evidence of vulgarity of sentiment and of the lack of idealism. They have a scorn of those who habitually think of quantity rather than of quality. But the man of fastidious taste should not be allowed to have it all his own way. One poet may be inspired by “the murmur of a hidden brook in the leafy month of June.” But another may prefer to stand on the shore of the ocean and feel its immensity. He is tremendously impressed by its size. It is a big thing. But the ocean is as poetical as the brook, though in its own huge way.
There are some things wherein quality is the first consideration. They are the luxuries of life. But when we come to the prime necessities, the first question is in regard to the adequacy of the supply. When a sentimental young lady was seated at dinner next to a great poet, she waited, awestruck, for him to give utterance to a fine thought. The only gem he vouchsafed was, “How do you like your mutton? I like mine in hunks.” The poet was a man of sound sense. There is one law for poetry and another for mutton. Poetry is precious, and a little goes a long way; we can get on without any but the best. But mutton should be served more generously.
It is the glory of the West that it treats what elsewhere are the luxuries of the few as the necessities of the many. It dispenses even “the higher education” not in dainty morsels, but in hunks.
Old Mrs. Means, in “The Hoosier Schoolmaster,” formulated the wisdom of the pioneer. “You see, this ’ere bottom land was all Congress land in them there days and sold for a dollar and a quarter, and I says to my old man, ‘Jack,’ says I, ‘do you git a plenty while you’re gittin’. Git a plenty while you’re gittin’,’ says I, ‘for ’twont be no cheaper than ’tis now;’ and it haint, and I knowed ’twouldn’t.”
Translate Mrs. Means’s shrewd maxim into the terms of idealism, and you have the characteristic contribution of the West. The old prudential maxims, which were true enough in a finished civilization, may well be disregarded by those who face a great new opportunity. They can well afford to preëmpt more territory than they can at present cultivate. When one’s aims are selfish, the desire to get a plenty is mere greed, but in the altruist it rises into “the enthusiasm for humanity.” It is the ambition to supply the wants of men no longer in niggardly fashion, but in full measure.
In two directions the expectation of moral amplitude in things American is fulfilled,--in Education and in Charity. Here we feel that the people have been aroused to the need of making plentiful provision, not only for immediate necessities, but for future growth. Along these lines we think and plan nationally.
But there are some questions which give pause to the most boastful patriot. Where is the distinctive American Art which interprets in a broad, fresh way the genius of the land, and where is the public that would recognize it and delight in it if it should appear? Where is the great American Church able splendidly to organize the forces of spiritual freedom as Rome organized the principles of ecclesiastical authority? How is the vision of her prophets fulfilled?
And thou, America, For the scheme’s culmination, its thought and its reality, For these (not for thyself) thou hast arrived. Thou, too, surroundest all, Embracing, carrying, welcoming all, thou too by pathways broad and new, To the ideal tendest. The measured faiths of other lands, the grandeurs of the past Are not for thee, but grandeurs of thine own, Deific faiths and amplitudes, absorbing, comprehending all.
Where are these “deific faiths and amplitudes” that are worthy of the land embodied?
America presents new problems for statesmanship; where are the large-hearted, clear-eyed men who give themselves to the task? Here and there we see them. In the crisis of the nation’s life nature came to the rescue.
For him her Old-World moulds aside she threw, And, choosing sweet clay from the breast Of the unexhausted West, With stuff untainted shaped a hero new, Wise, steadfast in the strength of God, and true.
That is the kind of manhood America needs. Is the supply equal to the demand? The growth of wealth in the Republic has been marvelous. Has there been evolved a wisdom equal to the task of justly distributing what enterprise has created? We hear of American “Captains of Industry.” How far have they realized Carlyle’s idea when he gave the title to those whose success lies not in personal gain but in ability to be real leaders of men? How far has America produced great captains, able to bring into commerce and manufacture the soldierly virtues of courage, loyalty, and willing obedience?
When he considers these things the just critic must say to the Republic, “Thou art weighed in the balances and found wanting.” But let him not hastily assume that he is reading the mystic handwriting on the wall, the _Mene, mene, tekel, upharsin_, that foretells the fall of nations. Let him rather talk as to a young athlete who has not come up to the mark, “You have done much, but you have not yet done your best! You are yet wanting in some essential elements. You must try again.”
The American idealist recognizes the present failures, but it does not quench his high spirits. They come to him as challenges. He takes his falls as Adam and Eve took theirs. After the first shock was over there was a healthy reaction.
Some natural tears they dropped, but wiped them soon; The world was all before them where to choose Their place of rest, and Providence their guide.
The most hopeful sign of the times is the number of young Americans who have become conscious of the grave evils that beset their country, but who neither whine nor scold nor prophesy ill. The pioneer spirit is strong within them. They attack the abuses of democracy with a cheery iconoclasm. They are impelled to their work not merely by a sense of duty; they find their fun in it. It is with a sense of exhilaration that we watch these pioneers. Their world is all before them. We are anxious to see what they will make of it.
A COMMUNITY OF HUMORISTS
Humor is not usually looked upon as a civic virtue. It is for the most part confined to a modest sphere of usefulness, and is accepted as an alleviation to the lot of the private man. He learns to find pleasure in his small misadventures and to smile amiably at his discomfitures. The most ancient pleasantries have almost always an element of domesticity. They form the silver lining to the clouds that sometimes gather over the most peaceful homes. What comfort an ancient Hebrew must have taken in the text from Ecclesiasticus: “As climbing up a sandy way is to the feet of the aged, so is a wife full of words to a quiet man.” The quiet man would murmur to himself, “How true!” He would seize the simile as a dog snatches a bone, and would carry it off to enjoy it by himself.
But it would never occur to him to treat the large affairs of the community in this fashion. Here everything seems too dignified to allow of pleasant conceits. The quiet man could not treat the prolixity of his social superiors as he could the too long drawn out wisdom of his wife. He must take it, as he would take the invariable laws of nature, with unsmiling acquiescence. Lord Bacon in his list of works that ought to be undertaken declared the need of one to be entitled “Sober Satire; or the Insides of Things.” Such sober satire might express the moods of a philosophical statesman, who could contrast the inside of great affairs with the outside. It implies a certain familiarity with the institutions of society which the common man does not possess.
Now and then, however, there is a reversal of the usual relation. The community is of such a nature that each member can see through it and all around it. The ordinary citizen becomes a philosopher indulging habitually in sober satire. He knows that things are not as they seem, and is pleased at the discovery. In such a case humor envelops everything and becomes the last word of sociological wisdom.
So it was in a community which I fondly remember. It was not much to look at, this brand-new Nevada mining town. The main street swaggered up the gulch in a devil-may-care fashion, as if saying to the teamsters, “You may take me or leave me.” To the north it pointed to an alkali flat, and to the south to a dusty old mountain, which was immensely richer than it seemed. On the mountain side were hoisting works and hundreds of prospect holes which menaced the lives of the unwary. In the gulch were smelters which belched forth divers kinds of fumes. To the stranger they seemed to threaten wholesale asphyxiation, but to the citizen they gave the place the character of a health resort. An analysis of the air showed that it contained more chemicals than were to be found in the most famous mineral springs. Certain it was that there were enough to kill off all germs of contagious diseases. The community felt the need of no further hygienic precautions, and put its trust in its daily fumigations. No green thing was in sight, not so much as a grass blade, for the fumes were not only germicides, but also herbicides. On the main street were saloons and gambling houses, in close proximity to two or three struggling churches. There were two daily newspapers, each of which kept us informed of the other’s manifold iniquities. A narrow-gauge railroad had its terminus at the foot of the gulch. Once a day a mixed train would depart for the world that lay beyond the alkali flat. Some of the passengers would be “going below,” which meant nothing worse than a trip to California; others were promoters going East on missions of mercy to benighted capitalists. The promoter was our nearest approach to a professional philanthropist. As for the rest, the chief impression was of dust. It would roll in great billows down the gulch; it seemed as if the mountains had been pulverized. Then the wind would change and the dust billows would roll back. No matter how long it blew, there was always more where it came from.
I cannot explain to an unsympathetic reader why it was that we found life in our dusty little metropolis so charming, and why it was that we felt such pity for those who had never experienced the delights of our environment. Nor can I justify to such a reader the impulse which led a woman whose husband had died far away in New England to bring his body back to be laid to rest in the bare little cemetery amid the sage brush.
“It’s not such a homelike country as the other,” I ventured.
“No,” she answered, “it isn’t, but he liked it.”
And so did we all; and the liking was not the less real because it was an acquired taste. There was nothing in it akin to serious public spirit. It was a whimsical liking, like that of Touchstone for Audrey,--“An ill-favoured thing, sir, but mine own; a poor humour of mine, sir, to take that that no man else will.”
When several thousand people, set down in the midst of a howling wilderness, tacitly agree to consider it as the garden of the Lord, they can do much. It pleases the ephemeral community to make believe that it is permanent. The camp organizes itself into a city, with all the offices and dignities appertaining thereto. Civilization is extemporized like a game of dumb crambo. It amuses the citizens to see their beloved city going about in institutions several sizes too large for it. Nothing is taken literally. Humor is accepted not as a private possession, but as a public trust, and cultivated in a spirit of generous coöperation.
In the town were men whose education and experience had been in the great world. There were mine superintendents who a little while ago might have been in Germany or Cornwall; there were assayers and engineers fresh from the great technical schools, and “experts” full of geological lore. The mines were as rich in litigation as in silver, and there were lawyers great and small.
But all were dominated by one typical character who was accepted as the oracle of the land,--“The Honest Miner.” To him saloons were dedicated with alluring titles, such as “The Honest Miner’s Delight” and “The Honest Miner’s Rest.” At the end of the gulch was “The Honest Miner’s Last Chance,”--one which he seldom missed. The newspapers and political orators appealed to his untutored judgments as the last word of political wisdom. He occupied the position which elsewhere is held by the “Sturdy Yeoman” or the “Solid Business Man.”
The Honest Miner of the Far West is one of those typical Americans who are builders of commonwealths. His impress is upon the western half of our continent. He is a nomad, the last of a long line of adventurers to whom the delight of the new world is in its newness. Sometimes his work is permanent, but he never is quite sure. His habitual mood is one of sober satire.
I know nothing more pleasant than to sit with an old-timer who has spent years in prospecting for silver and gold, and listen to his reminiscences. Here is a philosopher indeed, one with an historic perspective. He has the experience of the Wandering Jew, without his world-weariness. He has seen the rise and fall of cities and the successive dynasties of mining kings. His life has been a mingling of society and solitude. With his pack upon his back he has wandered into desert places where no man had been since the making of the world,--at least, no man with an eye to the main chance. A few weeks later the lonely cañon has become populated with eager fortune-seekers. The camp becomes a city which to the eyes of the Honest Miner is one of the wonders of the world. A year later he revisits the scene, and it is as Tadmor in the Wilderness. He pauses to refresh his mind with ancient history, and then passes on to join in a new “excitement.” He measures time by these excitements as the Greeks measured it by Olympiads.
He loves to tell of the ups and downs of his own fortune. There is no bitterness in his memory of his failures. They relieve the record from the monotony that belongs to assured success. His successes are not less gratifying because, like all things earthly, they have had a speedy ending. A dozen times he has “struck it rich.” He has thrown away his pick and shovel and gone below to bask in the smiles of fortune. He has indulged in vague dreams of going to Europe, of looking up his family tree, and of cultivating grammar and other fine arts. Fortune continued to smile, but after a while her smile became sardonic, and with a wink she said, “Time’s up!” Then the Honest Miner would take up his pick and shovel and return to his work, neither a sadder nor a wiser man,--in fact, exactly the same kind of man he was before. That Experience is a teacher is a pedantic theory which he rejects with scorn. Experience is not a schoolmaster, Experience is a chum who likes to play practical jokes upon him. Just now he has given him a tumble and got the laugh on him. But just wait awhile! And he chuckles to himself as he thinks how he will outwit Experience.
All the traditions of the mining country confirm him in his point of view: Listen to what Experience says, and then do just the opposite. It is the unexpected that happens. The richest diggings bear the most lugubrious names. The Montanian delights to tell of the riches taken out of Last Chance Gulch. The Arizonian for years boasted of the gayety of Tombstone and the amazing prosperity of the Total Wreck Mine.
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Certain physiologists are now telling us that the poetic praise of wine is based upon a mistake. Alcohol, they say, is not a stimulant, but a depressant. It does not stimulate the imagination so much as it depresses the critical faculty so that dullness may easily pass for wit. An idea will occur to a sober man as being rather bright, but before he has time to express it he sees that it is not so. Under the inhibition of good sense he holds his tongue and saves his reputation. But in a convivial company the inhibition is removed. Everybody says whatever is uppermost in his mind. The mice play, not because they are more lively than before, but only because the cat is away.
On first hearing this theory, it seemed to me that it was the most powerful temperance argument which could be formulated. But I am not sure but that it leaves the matter very much where it found it. After all, the man who is oppressed by the dullness of his ordinary condition would enjoy feeling brilliant, even if he were not really so.
In trying to recall any specific instances of wit and humor in my Nevada town, I am compelled to fall back on the theory of the removal of inhibition. Life was not more amusing there than elsewhere,--it only seemed so. There were no “best people” whose critical judgments inhibited the self-expression of less favored classes. Every one feeling at liberty to be himself and to express his own opinion, unfailing variety was assured. Society, being composed of all sorts and conditions of men, was in a state of perpetual effervescence. A very ordinary man, who elsewhere might have passed unnoticed in a life of drudgery, became a notable character.