ENGLAND
with its baby rivers and little towns, each with its abbey or its cathedral;with voices—one voice perhaps, echoing through the transept—thecriterion of suitability and convenience; and Italy with its equalshores—contriving an epicureanism from which the grossness has beenextracted; and Greece with its goats and its gourds, the nest of modified illusions:and France, the “chrysalis of the nocturnal butterfly” inwhose products, mystery of construction diverts one from what was originallyone’sobject—substance at the core: and the East with its snails, its emotionalshorthand and jade cockroaches, its rock crystal and its imperturbability,all of museum quality: and America where thereis the little old ramshackle victoria in the south, where cigars are smoked on thestreet in the north; where there are no proof readers, no silkworms,no digressions;the wild man’s land; grass-less, links-less, language-less country—in whichletters are writtennot in Spanish, not in Greek, not in Latin, not in shorthandbut in plain American which cats and dogs can read! The letter “a” in psalmand calm whenpronounced with the sound of “a” in candle, is very noticeable butwhy should continents of misapprehension have to be accounted for by thefact? Does it follow that because there are poisonous toadstoolswhich resemble mushrooms, both are dangerous? In the case of mettlesomenesswhich may bemistaken for appetite, of heat which may appear to be haste, no con-clusions may be drawn. To have misapprehended the matter, is to have confessedthat one has not looked far enough. The sublimated wisdomof China, Egyptian discernment, the cataclysmic torrent of emotion compressedin the verbs of the Hebrew language, the books of the man who is ableto say, “I envy nobody but him and him only, who catches more fish thanI do,”—the flower and fruit of all that noted superi-ority—should one not have stumbled upon it in America, must one imaginethat it is not there? It has never been confined to one locality.
with its baby rivers and little towns, each with its abbey or its cathedral;with voices—one voice perhaps, echoing through the transept—thecriterion of suitability and convenience; and Italy with its equalshores—contriving an epicureanism from which the grossness has beenextracted; and Greece with its goats and its gourds, the nest of modified illusions:and France, the “chrysalis of the nocturnal butterfly” inwhose products, mystery of construction diverts one from what was originallyone’sobject—substance at the core: and the East with its snails, its emotionalshorthand and jade cockroaches, its rock crystal and its imperturbability,all of museum quality: and America where thereis the little old ramshackle victoria in the south, where cigars are smoked on thestreet in the north; where there are no proof readers, no silkworms,no digressions;the wild man’s land; grass-less, links-less, language-less country—in whichletters are writtennot in Spanish, not in Greek, not in Latin, not in shorthandbut in plain American which cats and dogs can read! The letter “a” in psalmand calm whenpronounced with the sound of “a” in candle, is very noticeable butwhy should continents of misapprehension have to be accounted for by thefact? Does it follow that because there are poisonous toadstoolswhich resemble mushrooms, both are dangerous? In the case of mettlesomenesswhich may bemistaken for appetite, of heat which may appear to be haste, no con-clusions may be drawn. To have misapprehended the matter, is to have confessedthat one has not looked far enough. The sublimated wisdomof China, Egyptian discernment, the cataclysmic torrent of emotion compressedin the verbs of the Hebrew language, the books of the man who is ableto say, “I envy nobody but him and him only, who catches more fish thanI do,”—the flower and fruit of all that noted superi-ority—should one not have stumbled upon it in America, must one imaginethat it is not there? It has never been confined to one locality.
with its baby rivers and little towns, each with its abbey or its cathedral;with voices—one voice perhaps, echoing through the transept—thecriterion of suitability and convenience; and Italy with its equalshores—contriving an epicureanism from which the grossness has been
extracted; and Greece with its goats and its gourds, the nest of modified illusions:and France, the “chrysalis of the nocturnal butterfly” inwhose products, mystery of construction diverts one from what was originallyone’sobject—substance at the core: and the East with its snails, its emotional
shorthand and jade cockroaches, its rock crystal and its imperturbability,all of museum quality: and America where thereis the little old ramshackle victoria in the south, where cigars are smoked on thestreet in the north; where there are no proof readers, no silkworms,no digressions;
the wild man’s land; grass-less, links-less, language-less country—in whichletters are writtennot in Spanish, not in Greek, not in Latin, not in shorthandbut in plain American which cats and dogs can read! The letter “a” in psalmand calm whenpronounced with the sound of “a” in candle, is very noticeable but
why should continents of misapprehension have to be accounted for by thefact? Does it follow that because there are poisonous toadstoolswhich resemble mushrooms, both are dangerous? In the case of mettlesomenesswhich may bemistaken for appetite, of heat which may appear to be haste, no con-
clusions may be drawn. To have misapprehended the matter, is to have confessedthat one has not looked far enough. The sublimated wisdomof China, Egyptian discernment, the cataclysmic torrent of emotion compressedin the verbs of the Hebrew language, the books of the man who is able
to say, “I envy nobody but him and him only, who catches more fish thanI do,”—the flower and fruit of all that noted superi-ority—should one not have stumbled upon it in America, must one imaginethat it is not there? It has never been confined to one locality.