Part 19

“History,” says Henry Ford, “is bunk.” I inscribe myself among those who dissent from this doctrine; nevertheless, I am often hauled up, in reading history, by a feeling that I am among unrealities. In particular, that feeling comes over me when I read about the religious wars of the past—wars in which thousands of men, women and children were butchered on account of puerile and unintelligible disputes over transubstantiation, the atonement, and other such metaphysical banshees. It does not surprise me that the majority murdered the minority; the majority, even to-day, does it whenever it is possible. What I can’t understand is that the minority went voluntarily to the slaughter. Even in the worst persecutions known to history—say, for example, those of the Jews of Spain—it was always possible for a given member of the minority to save his hide by giving public assent to the religious notions of the majority. A Jew who was willing to be baptized, in the reign of Ferdinand and Isabella, was practically unmolested; his descendants to-day are 100% Spaniards. Well, then, why did so many Jews refuse? Why did so many prefer to be robbed, exiled, and sometimes murdered?

The answer given by philosophical historians is that they were a noble people, and preferred death to heresy. But this merely begs the question. Is it actually noble to cling to a religious idea so tenaciously? Certainly it doesn’t seem so to me. After all, no human being really _knows_ anything about the exalted matters with which all religions deal. The most he can do is to match his private guess against the guesses of his fellow-men. For any man to say absolutely, in such a field, that this or that is wholly and irrefragably true and this or that is utterly false is simply to talk nonsense. Personally, I have never encountered a religious idea—and I do not except even the idea of the existence of God—that was instantly and unchallengeably convincing, as, say, the Copernican astronomy is instantly and unchallengeably convincing. But neither have I ever encountered a religious idea that could be dismissed offhand as palpably and indubitably false. In even the worst nonsense of such theological mountebanks as the Rev. Dr. Billy Sunday, Brigham Young and Mrs. Eddy there is always enough lingering plausibility, or, at all events, possibility, to give the judicious pause. Whatever the weight of the probabilities against it, it nevertheless _may_ be true that man, on his decease, turns into a gaseous vertebrate, and that this vertebrate, if its human larva has engaged in embezzlement, bootlegging, profanity or adultery on this earth, will be boiled for a million years in a cauldron of pitch. My private inclination, due to my defective upbringing, is to doubt it, and to set down any one who believes it as an ass, but it must be plain that I have no means of disproving it.

In view of this uncertainty it seems to me sheer vanity for any man to hold his religious views too firmly, or to submit to any inconvenience on account of them. It is far better, if they happen to offend, to conceal them discreetly, or to change them amiably as the delusions of the majority change. My own views in this department, being wholly skeptical and tolerant, are obnoxious to the subscribers to practically all other views; even atheists sometimes denounce me. At the moment, by an accident of American political history, these dissenters from my theology are forbidden to punish me for not agreeing with them. But at any succeeding moment some group or other among them may seize such power and proceed against me in the immemorial manner. If it ever happens, I give notice here and now that I shall get converted to their nonsense instantly, and so retire to safety with my right thumb laid against my nose and my fingers waving like wheat in the wind. I’d do it even to-day, if there were any practical advantage in it. Offer me a case of Rauenthaler 1903, and I engage to submit to baptism by any rite ever heard of, provided it does not expose my gothic nakedness. Make it ten cases, and I’ll agree to be both baptized and confirmed. In such matters I am broad-minded. What, after all, is one more lie?

5

_The Disabled Veteran_

The science of psychological pathology is still in its infancy. In all its literature in three languages, I can’t find a line about the permanent ill effects of acute emotional diseases—say, for example, love affairs. The common assumption of the world is that when a love affair is over it is over—that nothing remains behind. This is probably grossly untrue. It is my belief that every such experience leaves scars upon my psyche, and that they are quite as plain and quite as dangerous as the scars left on the neck by a carbuncle. A man who has passed through a love affair, even though he may eventually forget the lady’s very name, is never quite the same thereafter. His scars may be small, but they are permanent. The sentimentalist, exposed incessantly, ends as a psychic cripple; he is as badly off as the man who has come home from the wars with shell-shock. The precise nature of the scars remains to be determined. My own notion is that they take the form of large yellow patches upon the self-esteem. Whenever a man thinks of one of his dead love affairs, and in particular whenever he allows his memory to dredge up an image of the woman he loved, he shivers like one taken in some unmanly and discreditable act. Such shivers, repeated often enough, must inevitably shake his inner integrity off its base. No man can love, and yet remain truly proud. It is a disarming and humiliating experience.

6

_Patriotism_

Patriotism is conceivable to a civilized man in times of stress and storm, when his country is wobbling and sore beset. His country then appeals to him as any victim of misfortune appeals to him—say, a street-walker pursued by the police. But when it is safe, happy and prosperous it can only excite his loathing. The things that make countries safe, happy and prosperous—a secure peace, an active trade, political serenity at home—are all intrinsically corrupting and disgusting. It is as impossible for a civilized man to love his country in good times as it would be for him to respect a politician.

XIX. SUITE AMÉRICANE

1

_Aspiration_

Police sergeants praying humbly to God that Jews will start poker-rooms on their posts, and so enable them to educate their eldest sons for holy orders.... Newspaper reporters resolving firmly to work hard, keep sober and be polite to the city editor, and so be rewarded with jobs as copy-readers.... College professors in one-building universities on the prairie, still hoping, at the age of sixty, to get their whimsical essays into the _Atlantic Monthly._ ... Car conductors on lonely suburban lines, trying desperately to save up $500 and start a Ford garage.... Pastors of one-horse little churches in decadent villages, who, whenever they drink two cups of coffee at supper, dream all night that they have been elected bishops.... Movie actors who hope against hope that the next fan letter will be from Bar Harbor.... Delicatessen dealers who spend their whole lives searching for a cheap substitute for the embalmed veal used in chicken-salad.... Italians who wish that they were Irish.... Mulatto girls in Georgia and Alabama who send away greasy dollar bills for bottles of Mme. Celestine’s Infallible Hair-Straightener.... Ash-men who pull wires to be appointed superintendents of city dumps. Mothers who dream that the babies in their cradles will reach, in the mysterious after years, the highest chairs in the Red Men and the Maccabees.... Farmers who figure that, with good luck, they will be able to pay off their mortgages by 1943.... Contestants for the standing broad-jump championship of the Altoona, Pa., Y. M. C. A.... Editorial writers who essay to prove mathematically that a war between England and the United States is unthinkable....

2

_Virtue_

Pale druggists in remote towns of the Epworth League and flannel nightgown belts, endlessly wrapping up bottles of Peruna.... Women hidden away in the damp kitchens of unpainted houses along the railroad tracks, frying tough beefsteaks.... Lime and cement dealers being initiated into the Knights of Pythias, the Red Men or the Woodmen of the World.... Watchmen at lonely railroad crossings in Iowa, hoping that they’ll be able to get off to hear the United Brethren evangelist preach.... Ticket-choppers in the subway, breathing sweat in its gaseous form.... Family doctors in poor neighborhoods, faithfully relying upon the therapeutics taught in their Eclectic Medical College in 1884.... Farmers plowing sterile fields behind sad meditative horses, both suffering from the bites of insects.... Greeks tending all-night coffee-joints in the suburban wildernesses where the trolley-cars stop.... Grocery-clerks stealing prunes and ginger-snaps, and trying to make assignations with soapy servant-girls.... Women confined for the ninth or tenth time, wondering helplessly what it is all about.... Methodist preachers retired after forty years of service in the trenches of God, upon pensions of $600 a year.... Wives and daughters of Middle Western country bankers, marooned in Los Angeles, going tremblingly to swami séances in dark, smelly rooms.... Chauffeurs in huge fur coats waiting outside theaters filled with folks applauding Robert Edeson and Jane Cowl.... Decayed and hopeless men writing editorials at midnight for leading papers in Mississippi, Arkansas and Alabama.... Owners of the principal candy-stores in Green River, Neb., and Tyrone, Pa.... Presidents of one-building universities in the rural fastnesses of Kentucky and Tennessee.... Women with babies in their arms weeping over moving-pictures in the Elks’ Hall at Schmidtsville, Mo.... Babies just born to the wives of milk-wagon drivers.... Judges on the benches of petty county courts in Virginia, Vermont and Idaho.... Conductors of accommodation trains running between Kokomo, Ind., and Logansport....

3

_Eminence_

The leading Methodist layman of Pottawattamie county, Iowa.... The man who won the limerick contest conducted by the Toomsboro, Ga., _Banner._ ... The secretary of the Little Rock, Ark., Kiwanis Club.... The president of the Johann Sebastian Bach _Bauverein_ of Highlandtown, Md.... The girl who sold the most Liberty Bonds in Duquesne, Pa.... The captain of the champion basket-ball team at the Gary, Ind., Y. M. C. A.... The man who owns the best bull in Coosa county, Ala.... The tallest man in Covington, Ky.... The oldest subscriber to the Raleigh, N. C, _News and Observer._ ... The most fashionable milliner in Bucyrus, O.... The business agent of the Plasterers’ Union of Somerville, Mass.... The author of the ode read at the unveiling of the monument to General Robert E. Lee at Valdosta, Ga.... The original Henry Cabot Lodge man.... The owner of the champion Airedale of Buffalo, N. Y.... The first child named after the Hon. Warren Gamaliel Harding.... The old lady in Wahoo, Neb., who has read the Bible 38 times.... The boss who controls the Italian, Czecho-Slovak and Polish votes in Youngstown, O.... The professor of chemistry, Greek, rhetoric and piano at the Texas Christian University, Fort Worth, Tex.... The boy who sells 225 copies of the _Saturday Evening Post_ every week in Cheyenne, Wyo.... The youngest murderer awaiting hanging in Chicago.... The leading dramatic critic of Pittsburgh.... The night watchman in Penn Yan, N. Y., who once shook hands with Chester A. Arthur.... The Lithuanian woman in Bluefield, W. Va., who has had five sets of triplets.... The actor who has played in “Lightning” 1,600 times.... The best horse doctor in Oklahoma.... The highest-paid church-choir soprano in Knoxville, Tenn.... The most eligible bachelor in Cheyenne, Wyo.... The engineer of the locomotive which pulled the train which carried the Hon. A. Mitchell Palmer to the San Francisco Convention.... The girl who got the most votes in the popularity contest at Egg Harbor, N. J....

INDEX

Adam, Villiers de l’Isle Adams, Henry Addams, Jane Addison, Joseph American Legion American Protective League _Annabel Lee_ Anti-Saloon League Arnold, Matthew Asch, Sholom Asquith, Mrs. Astor, Lady _Atlantic Monthly_ Augier, Emile

Bach, J. S. Baker, Newton D. Balfour, A. J. Baltimore _Sun_ Balzac, H. Barton, William E. Beerbohm, Max Beethoven, Ludwig van Belasco, David Bennett, Arnold Benson, Admiral Bentham, Jeremy _Berliner Tageblatt_ Berlioz, Hector Bible Bierbaum, Otto Julius Birkenhead, Lord Bismarck, Otto von Blunt, Wilfrid Scawen Böhlau, Helene Bolshevism Boston _Transcript_ Bottomley, Horace Boyd, Ernest A. Brady, Diamond Jim Brahms, Johannes Brandes, Georg Brieux, Eugene Browning, Robert Bryan, William Jennings Bryce, James Burleson, A. S. Butler, Nicholas Murray

Cabell, James Branch Capitalism Carlyle, Thomas Cather, Willa Catt, Carrie Chapman Cawein, Madison Cézanne, Paul Chamberlain, Joseph Chopin, F. Churchill, Winston Cicero Civil War Clemenceau, Georges Clemens, Samuel L. Clutton-Brock, A. Congress _Congressional Record_ Conrad, Joseph Constitution, U. S. Coolidge, Calvin Cooper, J. Fenimore Cox, James M. Crane, Frank Creel, George Criticism Curtis, Cyrus K.

D’Annunzio, Gabrielle Darwin, Charles Dawes, Rufus Debs, Eugene Declaration of Independence Dempsey, Jack Dillon, Dr. Disarmament Treaty _Dixie_, Dreiser, Theodore Dryden, John Dumas, Alexandre _fils_, Dunsany, Lord Duse, Eleanora Dvorak, Antonin

Edwards, Jonathan Ehrlich, Paul Ellis, Havelock Emerson, R. W.

_Faust_, Finck, Henry T. Flower, B. O. Foch, Ferdinand Ford, Henry France, Anatole Franklin, Fabian Freud, Sigmund

Gale, Zona Galileo Garland, Hamlin Garrett, Garet George, W. L. Gilman, Daniel, C. Goethe, J. W. Goldmarck, Karl Gorky, Maxim Gounod, Charles Gourmont, Remy de Grant, U. S. Greenwich Village

Hamilton, Alexander _Hamlet_, Hamsun, Knut Harding, W. G. Harris, Frank Hartleben, O. E. Harvey, George B. Hauptmann, Gerhart Hazlitt, William _Heart of Darkness_ Hergesheimer, Joseph Hillis, Newell Dwight Hofmannsthal, Hugo von Howells, William Dean Huch, Ricarda _Huckleberry Finn_ Hughes, Charles E. Huneker, James G. Huxley, T. H. Huysmans, J. K.

Ibsen, Henrik Iconoclasts Intellectuals, Young Irving, Washington

Jackson, Andrew James, Henry Jefferson, Thomas Jespersen, Otto Jordan, David Starr _Josef’s Legend_

Kerr, Alfred Kipling, Rudyard Klebs, Edwin Knights of Pythias Know Nothings Krehbiel, Henry Ku Klux Klan Kürnberger, Ferdinand

Lagerlöf, Selma Lanier, Sidney Lee, Robert E. Lewes, George Henry Lewisohn, Ludwig Lincoln, Abraham Lindsey, Ben B. Liszt, Franz Lloyd-George, David Lodge, Henry Cabot Lodge, Oliver London _Times_ Lowell, James Russell Lowes, J. L. Ludwig, Karl Luther, Martin Lyly, John

Mabies, Hamilton Wright Macaulay, T. B. Mann, Thomas March, General Marden, Orison Swett Marlowe, Christopher Martial Masefield, John Mendelssohn, Felix Meredith, George Methodists Mill, J. S. Miller, Joaquin Milton, John _Mlle. New York_ Mobile _Register_ Moody, John Moore, George More, Paul Elmer Morgan, J. Pierpont Müller, Johannes Murray, Gilbert Murry, Middleton _Musical Courier_

Nathan, George Jean National Institute of Arts and Letters National Security League Nearing, Scott _New Republic_ New York _Evening Journal_ New York _Sun_ New York _Times_ New York _Tribune_ Nicoll, Robertson Nietzsche, F. W. Northcliffe, Lord

Ochs, Adolph S. Odd Fellows _Old Fogy_ _Othello_

_Painted Veils_ Palmer, A. Mitchell _Parsifal_, Pershing, John J. Philadelphia _Ledger_ Pinchot, Gifford Pirquet, Clemens von Plato Poe, Edgar Allan Poetry Pound, Ezra Prescott, F. C. _Puck_,

Reading, Lord Red Cross, American Reed, James A. Reese, Lizette Woodworth Reventlow, Count zu Ricardo, David Roosevelt, Theodore Roosevelt, Theodore, Jr. Root, Elihu Rops, Félicien Rosetti, Christina Rotary Club Rothert, Otto A. Russell, Bertrand Russell, Lillian

St. Augustine Sainte-Beuve, C. A. St. John Santayana, George _Saturday Evening Post_ Schmidt, Annalise Schubert, Franz Schumann, Robert Schwab, Charles M. Scott, Evelyn Scribner’s, Charles, Sons Seidl, Anton Senate, U. S. Serao, Mathilda Shakespeare, William Shaw, George, Bernard _Sheik, The_ Sherman, S. P. Sienkiewicz, Henryk Sims, Admiral Sinclair, May Sinclair Upton Smith, Adam Sousa, J. P. Spencer, Herbert Staël, Mme. de Stearns, Harold Steed, Wickham _Steeplejack_ Strauss, Richard Strindberg, August Sumner, William G. Sunday, William A. Supreme Court of the United States Swedenborg, Emanuel Swinburne, A. C.

Taft, William H. Thoma, Ludwig Thompson, Francis Thoreau, H. D. _Town Topics_ Tumulty, J. P.

Underwood, Oscar U’Ren, W. S.

Van Dyke, Henry Verlaine, Paul Viebig, Clara Vigilantes Volstead, Andrew

Wagner, Cosima Wagner, Richard Washington, George Wassermann, Jacob Weber, Gottfried Wedekind, Frank Wells, H. G. Wesley, John Whitman, Walt Wilson, Woodrow Wolsogen, Ernst von Wood, James N. Wood, Leonard A. Woodberry, George E.

Yeats, W. B.