Common Sense, How To Exercise It | Page 4

reasoning.
"He who ventures in the darkness and walks haphazard, finds himself
suddenly confronted by obstacles which he was unable to foresee.
"He finds himself frightened by forms whose nature he cannot define,
and is often tempted to attribute silhouettes of assassins to branches of
trees, instead of recognizing the real culprit who is watching him from
the corner of the wild forest.
"Life, as well as the wildest wilderness, is strewn with pitfalls. To think
of examining it rapidly, without the aid of that torch called reason,

would be imitating the man of whom we have just spoken.
"Many are the mirages, which lead us to mistake dim shadows for
disquieting realities, unless we examine them critically, for otherwise
we can never ascribe to them their true value.
"Certain incidents, which seem at first sight to be of small importance,
assume a primordial value when we have explained them by means of
reasoning.
"To reason about a thing is to dissect it, to examine it from every point
of view before adopting it, before deferring to it or before rejecting it;
in one word, to reason about a thing is to act with conscious volition,
which is one of the phases essential to the conquest of common sense.
"This principle conceded, it then becomes a question of seriously
studying the method of reasoning, which we propose to do in the
following manner but first it is necessary to be convinced of this truth."
Without reason there is no common sense.
Yoritomo teaches us that, altho moderation is only of secondary
importance, it is still indispensable to the attainment of common sense.
It is moderation which incites us to restrain our impatience, to silence
our inexplicable antipathies and to put a break on our tempestuous
enthusiasms.
Can one judge of the aspect of a garden while the tempest is twisting
the branches of the trees, tearing off the tendrils of the climbing vines,
scattering the petals of the flowers and spoiling the corollas already in
full bloom?
And now, Yoritomo, who loves to illustrate his teachings by expressive
figures of speech, tells us the following story.
"A Japanese prince, on awakening, one day, demanded lazily of his
servants what kind of weather it was, but he forbade them to raise the
awnings which kept a cool, dim light in his room and shielded his eyes
from the strong light from without. The two servants left him reclining
upon his divan and went into the adjoining room, where the
stained-glass windows were not hung with curtains.
"One of them, putting his face close to a yellow-tinted pane of glass,
exclaimed in admiration of the beautiful garden, bathed in the early
morning sunlight.
"The second one, directing his gaze to a dark blue pane and, looking
through the center, remarked to his companion, I see no sunshine, the

day is dreary and the clouds cast gloomy shadows upon the horizon.
"Each one returned to relate their impressions of the weather, and the
prince wondered at the different visions, unable to understand the
reason."
There, concluded the Shogun, that is what happens to people who do
not practise moderation.
Those, who see things through the medium of enthusiasm refuse to
recognize that they could be deprived of brilliancy and beauty.
The others, those who look upon things from a pessimistic standpoint,
never find anything in them save pretexts for pouring out to their
hearers tales of woe and misery.
All find themselves deceptively allured; some rush toward illusion,
others do not wish to admit the positive chances for success, and both
lacking moderation, they start from a basis of false premises from
which they draw deplorable conclusions, thus defeating future success.
The spirit of penetration, according to the old Nippon philosopher, is
not always a natural gift. "It is," said he, "a quality which certain people
possess in a very high degree but which in spite this fact should be
strengthened by will and discipline.
"One can easily acquire this faculty by endeavoring to foresee the
solution of contemporary events; or at least try to explain the hidden
reasons which have produced them.
"Great effects are produced, many times, from seemingly unimportant
causes, and it is, above all, to the significant details that the spirit of
penetration should give unceasing and undivided attention.
"Everything around us can serve as a subject for careful study; political
events, incidents which interest family or friends, all may serve as just
so many themes for earnest reflection.
"It is always preferable to confine this analysis to subjects in which we
have no personal interest; thus we shall accustom ourselves to judge of
people and things dispassionately and impersonally. This is the quality
of mind necessary to the perfect development of penetration.
"If, for any reason, passion should create confusion