Part 9

First as to the motive. Generally speaking this is dissatisfaction with the _status quo_ and a desire to alter it. Altering may evidently be about anything one pleases. Hence the motive for kicking may be anything from crude envy to lofty altruism; it may be a simple reaction, scarcely more noble than the electrically stimulated kick of the frog’s leg in the classical experiment, or it may be quite rational and untemperamental. It is obvious that the artist, the _Stossenskunstmeister_, should avail himself of the high motive; and no matter how much he may personally pine, should at least assume the altruistic virtue. Skilful mammas customarily observe this principle when they spank their children, saying, with greater reference to an ideal than an actual world, “This hurts me more than it hurts you,” or “I do this for your own good,” or other equally convincing remarks. In contrast with this amiable and ambi-flagellatory or bipenal practice, may be placed the character and instance of the unjust judge who frankly admitted boredom as his motive for action.

It would seem as if the present generation, in America, at least, besides losing the old fashioned virtues of tact and reticence, had also to some degree lost the artistic sense of the selection of the proper motive, and in so far have become unskilful kickers. Perhaps the growth of democracy has engendered obtuseness to the more delicate arts, but what could be cruder, for example, than the motives of many suffragettes, of many trade unions, of many socialists. It is crude raw envy: “You have something that I haven’t got; I want it or something just as good.” Intellectually and morally this position is about as far advanced as that of a group of infants, whose conception of play seems to be the snatching of those toys that are for the moment most desired by their companions. “What is the city doing for women to make up for the money that has been stolen from the treasury to found a man’s college?” cries one, and another exclaims: “What is it all worth so long as we haven’t the vote?”

“What are all these kissings worth If thou kiss not me?”

says Shelley, and the child in proportion to his infancy will not be happy until he gets the star, the watch, the rattle, or the cake of soap.

One may believe in Votes for Women, rejoice over the improvement of the position of workingmen, and hope to see many of the ideals of socialism prevail,--and yet lament clumsiness and maladroitness in the use of motive. For all causes need the aid of the judiciously selected method, the appeal to high expediency, whereas they have to some degree fallen into the hands of extremely clumsy operators, the Pankhursts, the Carons, the Tannenbaums, who recall Newman’s words: “Others are so intemperate and intractable that there is no greater calamity for a good cause than that they should get hold of it.” They also recall Shakespeare’s version of the words of Antony, which may be regarded as the epitome of good form in kicking, so far as motive is concerned:

“This was the noblest Roman of them all: All the conspirators, save only he, Did that they did in envy of great Caesar; He only, in a general honest thought And common good of all, made one of them.”

Even more various, important and interesting than the motive of kicking is the object of the kick, _l’objet d’appui, das Stossensstoff_. Judging from some specimens and examples still to be found among us, we may imagine that the primitive man always objected to specific and tangible things; if an acquaintance impinged too violently upon the person of the primitive, the latter replied by “handing out,” or footing out, a good “swift” blow. So too, now-a-days, the wise and simple person is not likely to go too far afield to kick, there being plenty of objects in the immediate neighborhood on which he can break his toes, such as little eccentricities in his neighbor’s or his own _ménage_. If he is wise, really wise, he takes exception to these things from the high impersonal motives that we have been examining, and only where he is pretty sure of success. But if he have a disinterested mind, a philanthropic temperament, a broad philosophical outlook on life, he will see a very large assortment of objects that are by no means those of his special field of activity. These are the generalized _objets d’appui_, and it may be said to the credit of our civilization that we have accumulated them in larger numbers than any of our predecessors. The fact is, indeed, that the primitive had none of them, or, if in his later aeons he recognized some of them, his attitude was religious, terrorful, abject. They apparently grow in number quite as rapidly as other inventions of the human mind; and as each of these latter has been devised and recognized, so its accompanying kick has been engendered, thereafter never quite to leave it; just as the louse of the dead Filipino accompanies him to the nether world. Thus the general recognition of something called Life, brings a kick at Life by those who are hard hit by it. This is on the whole the most idle of the manifestations of the _Stossenslust_. The most evident thing about life, for the individual, is that it apparently begins somewhere, through no fault whatever of the individual’s own, and ends for the individual in some way that he cannot specifically forecast. Evidently to object to the most hard and fast fact of the world, the time-honored premise that all men are mortal, is a most futile proceeding; and yet it has been made not only the subject of the most varied and legitimate inquiries, but also of wailings and gnashings of teeth, of religious terror, fervor and abnegation. So far as the subject of this paper is concerned, the reasonable kick at life is the kick at conditions that lie along the way; and it is a healthy sign of the times that our energies are being directed rather to improvement of affairs in this world than to a too active calculation about the compensations that the next one affords.

Another almost equally futile aim of the _Stossenskunst_ lies in a kind of objection to alleged tendencies. With the advance of civilization, to use Macaulay’s phrase, new tendencies and movements are thought to appear; and these naturally develop their own special crop of kickings. The decay of modern manners, the growing corruption of the English tongue, the growing impudence of modern youth, the encroachments of scepticism upon the domain of religion, the antagonism of classes, the sentimentality of democratic life, the general increase of foolishness,--these and a thousand other alleged tendencies, are really futile matter for fretting about. Here, indeed, the operation is something like this: the kicker goes forth to kick. He mistakes a balloon for a football and with an inflator proceeds to blow the balloon up, puffing it into enormous size with air (at 99F) from his own lungs. Then he paints on it the sign, “Degeneracy of modern times,” and kicks it a mile or two into the air in about any direction, except toward a goal. Meanwhile really skilful kickers are trying to score by accurate judicious kicks over a cross-bar.

The recognition of real tendencies, of movements, of purposes, of motives, on the other hand, is of course indispensable if the art of objecting is to be successfully practiced. If I were oblivious to the tendency of my neighbor to absorb small portions of my estate, of harum-scarum pictures and statues to oust a more sober art, of armaments to go on increasing, I should find myself bunkoed in a minute; I should be as inept as Piggy Moore in the story, who did not know one goal from another. If one looks up only when his toes are trod on, he will see little. Tendencies must be recognized; without them we could have no such thing as the anticipatory, the preparative, the restraining, the stimulating kick. But it is evident that little except by way of suggestion can come through treating these matters in general; the effective kick has a specific objective. And unless one’s criticism of tendency be based on facts, one does as the protagonists of the last paragraph, booting the self-blown air of vituperation or aspiration.

It is a pastime to kick at institutions as well as at tendencies. I once knew a man who for a whole long year never ceased to complain of the Subway; it was noisy, ill-ventilated, ill-mannered. The kick was very inapposite: I was not the president of the Metropolitan, and moreover I liked the Subway, in spite of some drawbacks. But the correct attitude is quite simple: one is under no undeniable compulsion to ride in the Subway; but even if one cannot escape, to destroy it is inconvenient and impossible; and therefore the only sensible course is to attack the abuses, by writing about them to the management, or to some benignant newspaper. In like manner many of us find a peculiar joy in attacking modern journalism, flats, pianolas, victrolas, automobiles, the modern drama, the study of rhetoric, the management of asylums, city life and many institutions of many descriptions. Whereas the judicious kicker usually aims only at the abuses that such institutions bring with them,--unless the evils are inherent and colossal, as possibly in Tammany Hall and war and the corner saloon. But even here kicking must be piecemeal.

If for a moment a practical application of the foregoing principles and kinds of kicking be made to contemporary American life, it is evident that we do not, on the whole, frown sufficiently at the varied assortment of specific objects at our feet. That is the charge often brought against us by observant foreigners. Whether in our eager individual pursuit of the main chance we neglect the details that lie along the way, or whether we do not like to interfere with what is not our own particular business, it is certain that we put up with abuses and impositions that would not be tolerated in other lands. Every country, to be sure, has its special crop of abuses, which are more apparent to the foreigner than to the native, and there can be no harm in the visitor’s indulging in the very common pastime of plucking them out if the act helps him to consider the beam in his own eye. Yet our attitude is seldom so correct as that of the old deacon who said, “When you see a fault in me, mend it in yourselves, brethren.” It is really much easier,--and quite as futile,--to rail at what we don’t like in other lands--the lack of hot bread and ice-water in England, of swift and slaughterous railways in Germany and France, of public control of beggars in Italy and Spain--than to set our own house in order. But kicking, like charity, should begin at home. It ought to be the duty of everybody at home to object, persistently and effectively, to the specific overcrowded street-car, the badly paved road, the encroaching door-step, the neglected yard, the malodorous cesspool, the irresponsible automobile, and the reckless railroad--especially if he have any personal part in the maintenance of similar abuses. If the tendency of these evils were rightly apprehended, if a part only of the effort that is expended, presumably, in objecting to generalized, foreign and futile subjects, were bestowed on specific and tangible details, if we would forego the emotional pleasure of the impersonal “muck-rake,” to assail the evil at our very feet,--especially if each one of us were careful to avoid offence in matters of the same kind--our country would surely be a much fairer one.

* * * * *

If we are to distinguish good kicking from bad the matter remains to be looked at from a somewhat different point of view, that of method and technic. The matter is important enough to run some risk of repetition. I am far from following a school of thinkers who seem to imply that when the method of a subject,--as of teaching, brick-laying, railroading, etc.,--is properly apprehended, the learner may ride gaily away on a successful career without reference to the facts of his business. Nor is method easy to define; all that I know is that it is very important. In addition to the inspiration and animus of a good, or at least a plausible, motive and to a judicious choice of object, good kicking should also be in the right direction. Let us see what is actually in vogue.

A common kind of kick might be called conservative. Under the loose figure of the “gridiron” we may imagine certain more spirited and adventurous souls who wish to propel the game toward a more or less distant and obscure goal; they have some idea of tendency. In their efforts they are constantly hampered, checked, and tripped by an equally numerous body of players, who desire to keep the game where it is, alleging that there is no fairer prospect than the fields that have already been played over, that every advance is sure to lead to the bog and the morass. Life has nothing better to offer than what it has already offered; their efforts are to keep the ball in the middle of the field; no score games are best. Now this conservative kick certainly has manifest advantages; it may be used, for example, with great effect against the common cry that we are better than anybody else, or against rash and hasty innovation. But in its extreme form it is peculiarly irritating. This extreme form may be called the reactionary kick, a favorite pastime in all the ages. Let me take an example that I happened to come across a day or two ago. In _The School of Abuse_, Stephen Gosson said among many other things of like reasonable tenor and sense of fact,--

“Consider with thy selfe (gentle reader) the olde discipline of Englande, mark what we were before, and what we are now: Leave _Rome_ a while and cast thine eye backe to thy Predecessors, and tell mee howe wonderfully wee have been chaunged, since wee were schooled in these abuses. _Dion_ saith, that english men could suffer watching and labor, hunger and thirst, and beare of al stormes with hed and shoulders, they used slender weapons, went naked, and were good soldiours, they fed uppon rootes and barkes of trees, they would stand up to the chin many dayes in marishes without victualles: and they had a kind of sustenaunce in time of neede, of which if they had taken but the quantitie of a beane, or the weight of a pease, they did neyther gape after meate, nor long for the cuppe, a great while after. The men in valure not yeelding to _Scithia_, the women in courage passing the _Amazons_. The exercise of both was shootyng and darting, running and wrestling, and trying such maisteries, as eyther consisted in swiftnesse of feete, agilitie of body, strength of armes, or Martiall discipline. But the exercise that is now among us, is banqueting, playing, pipyng, and dauncing, and all such delightes as may win us to pleasure, or rocke us a sleepe.”

This is amusing; we are so far from Gosson’s time that we are not afraid to laugh at it; we recognize its absurdity, as we recognize the humor of the quack medicine vendor in _Punch_ (Dec. 24, 1913): “Here you are, gents, sixpence a bottle. Founded on the researches of modern science. Where should we be without science? Look at the ancient Britons. They hadn’t no science, and where are they? Dead and buried, every one of ’em.” But, _mutatis mutandis_, Gosson’s words are a reactionary formula of all the ages: we find it, more persuasively and more subtly, in the _Past and Present_ of Carlyle, in some of the criticism of Arnold, in many of the denunciations of Ruskin, and it is even betting that one will not find an example of it any day in the pages of our more staid journals. It objects to most modern enterprises, to imperialism, to the increase of foreign trade, to modern science, to psychical research, to the Ph.D. degree, to children’s courts, to scientific philanthropy, to eugenics, to the Panama Canal, to a thousand other things, not because there may be a reasonable and conservative scepticism regarding the outcome of these matters and the facts on which they are alleged to rest, but because they were not recognized by the pre-Baconian philosophers, and fail to be specifically commented on by Aristotle or Marcus Aurelius or St. Paul.

Whereas it must, of course, be evident to common sense that the enterprises of an age may be properly criticised, for the most part, only in terms of the age. One’s own age is usually regarded as a particularly enterprising one, and an enterprising age is one full of experiment. All that experience has to teach us about new enterprises in the main is that they have never been tried before, and that we were best not to be over sanguine of their success. But that is merely reasonable caution,--such as doubtless mingled with the loftier spirit of a Themistocles, a Pericles, a Michael Angelo, a Raleigh, a Bismarck, a Wilbur Wright, a Scott, in the ages that we are accustomed to think of as great. The enterprising age has always tried to find better houses, better ships, better laws,--to find its north pole,--and it is good much in proportion as it tries to find these things. Many of the attempts are failures, and the way to success is strewn with bones of men, but they are failures because they do not attain the goal for which they are striving, because they do not win the satisfactions of their own times; not because they do not conform to the achieved success or to the reactionary formula of a past age.

The reactionary kick is not without virtue; it is usually a gentleman’s instrument. It may even be charming, as with those dear ladies in _Cranford_ who never used any word “not sanctioned by Johnson.” The charm may arise from the fact that the reactionary kick really requires no thought at all; a fair acquaintance with the literature of past ages, of one past age in particular,--the Periclean, the Medicean, the Spenserian, the Johnsonian,--is all that is necessary. Therefore one can put one’s effort on manner and style, and may produce the effect of great suavity and wisdom. The reactionary kick is really terribly easy, possibly the easiest of all intellectual exercises,--indeed, it barely merits the name of intellectual; for it really consists in putting some standard on ice, and taking it off from time to time whenever a warm modern idea is thought to be in need of cooling. Whereas, on the other hand, the man in the thick of an active enterprise must work and think with all his might, and etiquette and style are of minor moment.

Yes, on the whole, the reactionary kick must in turn react on the intellectual and moral quality of its operator and cause his fibre to degenerate through easefulness. But this we seldom notice. The poet says:

“The crown of olive let another wear; It is my crown to mock the runner’s feet With gentle wonder and with laughter sweet.”

and we scorn him, calling him hedonist, epicurean, indifferentist, “quitter;” but he is really less bad than the reactionary kicker who, when he has energy enough to get into the game, still hugs the side lines or keeps trotting back to the bleachers to shout needless warnings to players who know quite as much as he. Or again, we usually reckon it doubtful ethics to quarrel with another man’s job, and can see the absurdity in lack of harmony between the pot and the kettle; for we are fundamentally of the opinion that live and let live is ordinarily a good public and private motto. And yet, the strife that sometimes arises between the representatives of various activities is no more absurd than the attempt to pry down from its various pedestals the enterprise of modern times, with the levers and pulleys of past generations. The reactionary kick is, on the whole, as useful as plowing with wooden plowshares, battling with the pilum, crushing flies with a steam-hammer, repudiating the typewriter and the locomotive, or giving one’s days and nights to the volumes of Thomas Aquinas.

* * * * *

A word as to technic, which is in a comparatively crude state and leaves much to be desired. That is perhaps inevitable, since really skilful kicking, no matter in what direction, does not really proclaim itself as such, and is consequently not likely to be thought of at all as anything more than advice or persuasion, whereas the unskilful technician is too likely to call names to be really effective. Some of the phrases in vogue will show the crudeness of the technic: the white man’s burden, the strenuous life, a tendency toward socialism, this is an age of transition, simplified spelling is an entering wedge, let us sweep anarchy into the sea, we are up against it in life, home is the girl’s prison and the woman’s workhouse, I fear that I am too old-fashioned, we must uplift the masses, what are home and children and country if we have not the vote, America for the Americans, destroy the very foundations of our faith, threaten to overwhelm our fairest institutions beneath a wave of ignorance and despotism, to crucify mankind on a cross of gold,

“Why be this juice the growth of God, who dare Blaspheme the twisted tendril as a snare? A blessing, we should use it, should we not? And if a curse, why then, who set it there?”

etc., etc., etc., etc.

Nor is the pantomime of kicking more advanced: the melancholy air of grave concern at the state of scholarship in America; the tears in the voice lamenting the decay of our dear mother tongue; the placid large-eyed sorrow at the spectacle of corruption, of reckless automobiles, or of unkempt pavements; the firm and elevated chin and stretching neck of her who presses into the service of the Cause; the slow and silent tread, albeit in public places, of him who goes about in meditation on the misery of mankind (_eheu miser!_);--all these methods were the object for the satire of a Swift or the sweet rationality of a Montaigne; but they must be content with this sketchy cataloguing from a humbler pen.

One school of kickers only, so far as I am aware, has paid much attention to the technic of the great art. Their names will presently appear (for should they not be named with honor?), but the essence of their method is this, that they side-step every move in the game and, as the play goes rushing by, plant a skilful kick where they think it will be effective. In this game they do somewhat imitate the methods of the reactionary kicker, who as we have seen, retreats to the rear of the field, bidding the play come to him on the ground where it was played by St. Thomas, Samuel and Noah. That is to say, the method consists in assuming a point of view different from the current one. There the resemblance ceases, for these modern masters of technic rarely retreat to the rear, but keep alongside the game or even ahead of it, and even mingle in it with jest and laughter. And thus Mr. Shaw, from his coign of vantage just ahead of the player, is constantly thrusting things between his legs to trip him up if he run awkwardly; and Mr. Wells is making diagrams of how badly the game has been played in the past, and showing how it is bound to improve when we divest it of old and ragged toggery, which somehow holds together; and Mr. Chesterton is engaged in proving that nobody but himself knows anything about sport anyway; while Mr. Galsworthy, Mr. Belloc, and a host of others are kicking away brilliantly, imagining that they also have discovered something quite new in the annals of the sport. Meanwhile hosts of good quiet people are lending a helping hand or are, like skilful guards or backs, actively but unostentatiously pushing the good cause through the opponents’ line and towards the goal.