Humanly Speaking | Page 2

with his views of national affairs.
Jeremiah's reputation is that of a pessimist. Still, when the country was
in the hands of Nebuchadnezzar and he was in prison for predicting it,
he bought a piece of real estate which was in the hands of the enemy.
He considered it a good investment. "I subscribed the deed and sealed it,
and called witnesses and weighed him the money in the balances."
Then he put the deeds in an earthen vessel, "that they may continue
many days." For in spite of the panic that his own words had caused, he
believed that the market would come up again. "Houses and vineyards
shall yet be bought in this land." If I were an archæologist with a free
hand, I should like to dig in that field in Anathoth in the hope of finding
the earthen jar with the deed which Hanameel gave to his cousin
Jeremiah, for a plot of ground that nobody else would buy.
It is the moralists and the reformers who have after all the most
cheerful message for us. They are all the time threatening us, yet for
our own good. They see us plunging heedlessly to destruction. They

cry, "Look out!" They often do not themselves see the way out, but
they have a well-founded hope that we will discover a way when our
attention is called to an imminent danger. The fact that the race has
survived thus far is an evidence that its instinct for self-preservation is a
strong one. It has a wonderful gift for recovering after the doctors have
given it up.
The saving clause is a great help to those idealists who are inclined to
look unwelcome facts in the face. It enables them to retain faith in their
ideals, and at the same time to hold on to their intellectual self-respect.
There are idealists of another sort who know nothing of their struggles
and self-contradictions. Having formed their ideal of what ought to be,
they identify it with what is. For them belief in the existence of good is
equivalent to the obliteration of evil. Their world is equally good in all
its parts, and is to be viewed in all its aspects with serene complacency.
Now this is very pleasant for a time, especially if one is tired and needs
a complete rest. But after a while it becomes irksome, and one longs for
a change, even if it should be for the worse. We are floating on a sea of
beneficence, in which it is impossible for us to sink. But though one
could not easily drown in the Dead Sea, one might starve. And when
goodness is of too great specific gravity it is impossible to get on in it
or out of it. This is disconcerting to one of an active disposition. It is
comforting to be told that everything is completely good, till you reflect
that that is only another way of saying that nothing can be made any
better, and that there is no use for you to try.
Now the idealist of the sterner sort insists on criticizing the existing
world. He refuses to call good evil or evil good. The two things are, in
his judgment, quite different. He recognizes the existence of good, but
he also recognizes the fact that there is not enough of it. This he looks
upon as a great evil which ought to be remedied. And he is glad that he
is alive at this particular juncture, in a world in which there is yet room
for improvement.

Besides the ordinary Christian virtues I would recommend to any one,
who would fit himself to live happily as well as efficiently, the
cultivation of that auxiliary virtue or grace which Horace Walpole
called "Serendipity." Walpole defined it in a letter to Sir Horace Mann:
"It is a very expressive word, which, as I have nothing better to tell you,
I shall endeavor to explain to you; you will understand it better by the
derivation than by the definition. I once read a silly fairy tale called
'The Three Princes of Serendip.' As their Highnesses traveled, they
were always making discoveries, by accidents and sagacity, of things
which they were not in quest of.... Now do you understand
Serendipity?" In case the reader does not understand, Walpole goes on
to define "Serendipity" as "accidental sagacity (for you must know that
no discovery you are looking for comes under this description)."
I am inclined to think that in such a world as this, where our hold on all
good is precarious, a man should be on the lookout for dangers. Eternal
vigilance is the price we pay for all that is worth having. But when,
prepared for the worst, he goes forward, his journey