The Simple Life | Page 5

of simplicity, of labor, of sobriety, and dreams only of
idleness and pleasure. For among the least simple and straightforward
of men must be reckoned professional beggars, knights of the road,
parasites, and the whole tribe of the obsequious and envious, whose
aspirations are summed up in this: to arrive at seizing a morsel--the
biggest possible--of that prey which the fortunate of earth consume.
And to this same category, little matter what their station in life, belong
the profligate, the arrogant, the miserly, the weak, the crafty. Livery
counts for nothing: we must see the heart. No class has the prerogative
of simplicity; no dress, however humble in appearance, is its unfailing
badge. Its dwelling need not be a garret, a hut, the cell of the ascetic nor
the lowliest fisherman's bark. Under all the forms in which life vests
itself, in all social positions, at the top as at the bottom of the ladder,
there are people who live simply, and others who do not. We do not
mean by this that simplicity betrays itself in no visible signs, has not its
own habits, its distinguishing tastes and ways; but this outward show,
which may now and then be counterfeited, must not be confounded
with its essence and its deep and wholly inward source. Simplicity is a
state of mind. It dwells in the main intention of our lives. A man is
simple when his chief care is the wish to be what he ought to be, that is,
honestly and naturally human. And this is neither so easy nor so
impossible as one might think. At bottom, it consists in putting our acts
and aspirations in accordance with the law of our being, and
consequently with the Eternal Intention which willed that we should be
at all. Let a flower be a flower, a swallow a swallow, a rock a rock, and
let a man be a man, and not a fox, a hare, a hog, or a bird of prey: this is
the sum of the whole matter.
Here we are led to formulate the practical ideal of man. Everywhere in
life we see certain quantities of matter and energy associated for certain
ends. Substances more or less crude are thus transformed and carried to
a higher degree of organization. It is not otherwise with the life of man.
The human ideal is to transform life into something more excellent than
itself. We may compare existence to raw material. What it is, matters
less than what is made of it, as the value of a work of art lies in the
flowering of the workman's skill. We bring into the world with us

different gifts: one has received gold, another granite, a third marble,
most of us wood or clay. Our task is to fashion these substances.
Everyone knows that the most precious material may be spoiled, and he
knows, too, that out of the least costly an immortal work may be
shaped. Art is the realization of a permanent idea in an ephemeral form.
True life is the realization of the higher virtues,--justice, love, truth,
liberty, moral power,--in our daily activities, whatever they may be.
And this life is possible in social conditions the most diverse, and with
natural gifts the most unequal. It is not fortune or personal advantage,
but our turning them to account, that constitutes the value of life. Fame
adds no more than does length of days: quality is the thing.
Need we say that one does not rise to this point of view without a
struggle? The spirit of simplicity is not an inherited gift, but the result
of a laborious conquest. Plain living, like high thinking, is
simplification. We know that science is the handful of ultimate
principles gathered out of the tufted mass of facts; but what gropings to
discover them! Centuries of research are often condensed into a
principle that a line may state. Here the moral life presents strong
analogy with the scientific. It, too, begins in a certain confusion, makes
trial of itself, seeks to understand itself, and often mistakes. But by dint
of action, and exacting from himself strict account of his deeds, man
arrives at a better knowledge of life. Its law appears to him, and the law
is this: Work out your mission. He who applies himself to aught else
than the realization of this end, loses in living the raison d'être of life.
The egoist does so, the pleasure-seeker, the ambitious: he consumes
existence as one eating the full corn in the blade,--he prevents it from
bearing its fruit; his life is lost. Whoever, on the contrary, makes his
life serve a good higher than itself, saves it in giving it. Moral precepts,
which to a superficial view appear arbitrary, and seem made