Philip said, smiling: “My father now reads Marcus Aurelius.”
This tickled the General immensely. He shouted: “The accountants ought to examine his ledgers then, by God! Marcus Aurelius! Haven’t come to that yet myself.” But he eyed Philip curiously. “He’s got no objection to all this friendliness, eh?”
Jerome frowned, but Philip seemed amused. “My father respects my judgment.”
“First time I ever heard of Alfred Lindsey respecting anybody’s judgment but his own. Think I’ll mention this to the State examiners.”
Philip indicated the papers. “I’m willing to put up twenty thousand dollars of my own—not from my father’s bank, either. Jerome will do the same, or more. We thought you might wish to contribute, for the good of the community. The Widow Kingsley is willing to advance ten thousand, and there are others. When you consider it over a long range, the scheme will pay its own dividends. The workers, as Jerome has shown you, are really invested capital. I’m surprised that employers haven’t realized that before. When a man is clean, interested and happy, and has something to look forward to besides his daily monotonous work, he produces more. It is boredom and hopelessness that make a worker restless and discontented, and that lead directly to large labor turnovers, indifference, wastefulness and resentment.”
“Visionary! Anarchistic! What’s a damned worker for? He’s expected to work, and that’s all, and the hell with him.”
Philip said coolly: “We are making an experiment, an experiment in humanity. An experiment in human cooperation.”
“Ho! Damn humanity! I’ve said it all my life, and I say it again. It’s come to a pretty pass when you pay a man more than he’s worth, then must worry about his soul! His soul, by God! This cattle hasn’t any soul. Isn’t it enough that Jerome’s been kicking the employers of labor in the backsides so hard that he’s got hours reduced to nine a day, instead of the usual ten or twelve? What more do they want?”
“They want to live, too, General. Yes, I know there will always be drawers of water and hewers of wood who won’t ever want anything besides their pay and their sleep and their women. But there is also an element among them who want more, and must have it, not only for their sakes, but for ours, too.”
The General looked from Philip to Jerome suspiciously, his eyes narrowed so tightly that they almost disappeared. He seemed highly edified. “It’s a cute thing, this, Jerome going in for philanthropy. Can’t reconcile it with what I know of him.”
Jerome said, with a smile: “I’m thinking of myself. I don’t like the gray men who are now beginning to control American industry. I never liked the gray men who think only of profits and of money. I’ve studied them down through the centuries, from the time when they were great landowners, and now when they are industrialists and financiers. I hate them. Having no life or joy of their own, they try to destroy these things in everyone unfortunate enough to be in their power. But I see you don’t understand, General.”
The General was silent, his eyes still screwed up, a long, slitlike grin on his mouth. He puffed at his cigar. Finally he said: “I remember a talk we had long ago, Jerome. When my girls and I came for tea at Hilltop. It was about a dream that the young men had, in America. Do you recall my saying that I had had that dream, too, but couldn’t remember what it was? It was a nice dream, and it was like living in a perpetual state of drunkenness. But I don’t remember what it was.”
He scratched his ear. “Funny, I remember how I felt about it, but I still don’t remember what it was!” He paused. “You seem to have it still, and that’s a very funny thing! Very, very funny. Come on, now. What is it? I’d like to remember it.”
It was Philip, rather than Jerome, who answered: “I think, if you will pardon my sentimentality, that the dream is the universal welfare of men. It’s very sad that men as they grow older lose that personal sense of responsibility towards the world. No one need forget that dream. It has been written down for many centuries, in the two Testaments. How long has it been since you’ve read the Bible, General?”
The General slapped his hand loudly on the table and burst out laughing. “A pair of parsons, by Jesus! I never thought to see the day!” He turned to Jerome, and jeered: “You wouldn’t have a Bible handy, would you?”
But Jerome only smiled. The General studied him sharply and with concentration. “Come on,” he said. “What’s behind this? It isn’t love for humanity. I know you too well.”
Jerome said: “You are right. It isn’t. Rather, you could call it hatred for the kind of men I’ve always hated. The killers of joy and gaiety. The gospel-shouters of ‘Work.’”
He stood up and began to walk up and down the room. “I meet these men regularly. I wonder, when I meet them, at their barrenness of heart, their drabness of imagination, their emptiness of soul. If they can find nothing better to do with their lives than work, then they had best be dead. One wouldn’t mind, but they impose their dusty laws on others, too. These dreadful creatures, out of their sterility of mind, see only ashes and blank walls, and must work to shut their awareness of their own futility out of their consciousness. Worse, they try to imprison all other men in their jails.”
He stood by the window, and continued, more softly: “We all have to work, but no one should work more than a few hours a day for his living. Soon we’ll need no more than that. When the American frontier is entirely conquered, when all the cities are built and great highways have been riven through rock and mountain, America will have come of age, so far as material wealth is concerned. But if something revolutionary doesn’t happen, the myth of work for its own sake will persist, to the ruin of the American mind and spirit.
“What will happen? As the machine age advances and becomes more powerful, such masses of things will be produced that the market will be glutted, and panics will follow. There will have to be some limit imposed on the amount of things which can be produced. Or the working week will have to be cut very short. Otherwise, America will be smothered under mountains of things—daily growing more trivial and worthless. Men will waste their lives making foolish trinkets and unnecessary and silly luxuries. And that will be a crime committed bloodily against the human spirit and its dignity.”
The General scratched his ear more vigorously, but his eyes, fixed upon Jerome, were intent and curious.
Then Philip spoke: “I think what Jerome means is that a mechanical civilization does mortal violence to the subjective nature of man. Man cannot live by machines alone, nor by the things which they produce. He must have something else. Jerome, in our proposed Riversend Community, hopes to give the local workers that ‘something else.’ We can’t do away with machines, and we don’t want to. But we can do something for men, so that the machine doesn’t make them serfs of mechanisms. Work is good only when it produces just sufficient bread for survival. When it produces more than that it is evil, and those who demand devotion to work are the enemies of man.”
The General chuckled. “You’ll get the parsons, as well as Wall Street, down on you for that! Doesn’t the Good Book say that mankind was banished from the Garden and sent out to earn its bread by the sweat of its brow in the fields?”
“That’s exactly what we mean,” said Philip, with his usual charm. “Thank you, General. You’ve expressed it perfectly. We propose to give the workers in this community a chance to ‘earn their bread by the sweat of their brows in the fields.’ As an escape from the factories. That is just one of our plans. Jerome will buy two hundred acres of land to the west of Riversend, and allow every worker to buy an acre, on easy payments financed by this bank. The worker and his family will then raise whatever they wish on that land, flowers, vegetables, chickens. They will not be divorced from the land. We think it a very dangerous thing for men to be divorced from the land. If men must work in factories, they must have earth to stand on afterwards, their own earth. A constantly expanding urban society is cannibalistic. It’s a threat to the peace of the world.”
Jerome
turned from the window. He and Philip looked at each other with strong affection and understanding. The General saw that look, and he chuckled again, inwardly, but with more kindness. He tapped the papers again.
“Well, I agree with you about the land, damn it. But what about this ‘education’ for the factory fellaheen? Teaching them to ‘enjoy’ books, by Christ! Teaching them what American citizenship means! Getting the parsons and the priests to help! They won’t!”
“They will,” said Philip positively. “There are one or two rock-bottom preachers who are horrified. But we’ve talked to several ministers, and to the two Catholic priests of this community. We had less trouble with the priests: the Roman Catholic Church understands that man cannot live by bread alone but must have something nourishing for his stronger subjective nature. So these good men are going to help us. They will conduct classes in one of our buildings, not religious classes exactly, but moral ones, full of interest. They will explain man’s place in nature, his duty to others, his responsibility towards the rest of the world.”
The General was silent. But he shook his head slightly, over and over.
Philip was becoming somewhat excited, though his voice remained quiet and firm:
“We’ve talked to local teachers and to others outside. We’ll have classes in the skilled trades. We’ll have music recitals, made up of workers who can learn to play various instruments. Silver-work will be taught. We’ll have tinsmith shops, carpenter shops. Handicraft. Woodwork. Carving. We’ll have a store where these things can be sold, at a profit to the workers. Or they will make the things for their own homes. We’ll offer prizes every year for the best work, the best gardens.
“We’ll have discussion groups, on politics. We’ll make the workers see how necessary it is to have an intelligent electorate.
“All these things will be done after working-hours, on holidays, week-ends.”
“My God!” muttered the General, as if dazed. “What rot! What nihilism!”
“Playgrounds for children, laid out and made by their fathers. And for the women, instruction in household matters, prenatal care, child care, cooking, sewing, participation in the County Fairs,” said Philip.
“Visionary!” cried the General. “You’ll have the whole country down on your necks! I never heard such nonsense! Who cares about these cattle? You’ll be laughed out of existence.”
Philip winked surreptitiously at Jerome. “What do you say, General? Will you donate a few thousand dollars for this? Think of your name in the newspapers as a benefactor of man! We’re going to give the matter a lot of publicity.”
The General said, waving his hand as if to brush away all this: “Who is going to build all these infernal buildings for your classes and your shops?”
“The workers themselves. There are good bricklayers and masons and carpenters among them. We’ve talked to them about it. You never saw such excitement.”
“And the money? You’ll need scads of money.”
“I’ve told you: Jerome and I will put up twenty thousand apiece, or more, if necessary. And we hope that others like yourself will help.”
The General stood up to shake out his coat-tails. “You’re mad,” he said. He scowled. “How much? I won’t put up a cent more than five thousand dollars.”
Philip and Jerome stumbled over each other in their haste to shake the General’s hand. The General glared at them, shook his head, pulled away his hand abruptly. “I’m going demented in my old age,” he said. “You can pray that I won’t change my mind.”
Then he laughed. “What do the boys who own the factories think of all this, eh?”
Jerome laughed in answer. “They went into a panic, until it was explained to them that this is a private project and will cost them nothing. Worse, however, was their fear that the workers would get ‘uppity.’ Forget that they were born to work for their masters. Yes, the boys are in a state. We’ll prove to them that they are wrong.”
“But what about industrialists in other cities and sections? They’ll cut your hearts out, Jerome.”
“That’s something we’ll fight when the time comes. Some rumor of all this has gotten about. That is why I went down to see Jay Regan last week, and Mr. Livingston, and others of my backers. They didn’t approve. They said, as you have said, that this is ‘revolutionary,’ a ‘dangerous experiment.’ You see, they, too, think only of their profits. They have an idea that I am insane. I persuaded them to wait a year or two, and see for themselves. We’ve got to make it a success.” He spread out his hands, with a rueful smile. “We’ll need the help of all this community. For, if we go down, you’ll all go down with us, General.”
The General was immediately alarmed. “I thought sol Who the hell thought of this foul scheme, anyway?”
“I did,” said Philip quietly. “Jerome knew something was wrong. I thought it all up myself. We finally worked out this plan together.”
The General looked at him with an irate eye. “What could you expect of a damned scholar! A bookman!”
Philip smiled. “I went to Harvard, too, General.”
“You never learned such things at Harvard!” cried the General. “I went there, myself, and never heard of it!”
“You’d be surprised what you can hear there now.” Philip still smiled. “You’d be more surprised to hear that many thousands of men in America are seriously concerned with the growth of the machine in America, and what it will mean to the people. They know what unrelieved materialism can do to a nation. They have the evidence of history.”
He looked at Jerome consideringly, as if to seek permission for what he would next say. Jerome nodded.
“As Jerome has explained, we’ll have to make this a success. We’re going ahead with it. No one can stop us. And we’ll need the help of all of you who have money. You can’t withdraw, General. You’re too heavily invested with Jerome.
“But then, we called you here today because you are a perspicacious man, of understanding. We are relying on you to influence others, also.”
“Blackmail, for a lot of visionary nonsense!” shouted the General.
“Have another brandy,” suggested Philip, filling the General’s glass again. “Very good brandy. And another cigar.” He opened Jerome’s silver box and pushed it invitingly towards the old soldier.
He said: “We are going to summon newspaper reporters from all over the country. With their artists. I think you can do the honors, General. You will be our spokesman. I understand a quite famous author is going to write a book about this, too. You’ll be mentioned prominently.”
“‘Riversend Community’!” snorted the General. His face was very red and congested.
“With you as one of the directors,” said Philip.
The General drank his brandy furiously, let Philip light his cigar. Then he paused, scrutinized Philip. The poor devil was deformed, but he had good blood in him, and the deformity was not hereditary. He would also have a fortune some day—Alfred’s bank. The Lindseys were the best.
He said, with his usual disarming frankness: “Time you got married, you scheming devil. What about my Josephine? She wraps me in cotton. Hate it. I’m not dying yet. Ho! How old are you? Twenty-five, eh? She’s not much older. Is it a match?”
CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE
Amalie had been enjoying a novel highly recommended for its “sensibility, perception and deep insight into human nature.” The critics had loved it. It was very popular. Amalie herself found it interesting and amusing until she read the artless phrase: “Lucille asked so little of life. She wanted only to be happy. A small, small thing.”
At this monstrous absurdity, at this quintessence of all that was ludicrous and naïve, Amalie uttered a profane exclamation and flung the book far from her across the brick terrace, so that it landed with a satisfying smash against the trunk of a tree. “A small, small thing,” the lady novelist had wistfully called “happiness.” A free peach on a tree in a boundless orchard; a little shell on a beach; a butt
ercup beside a garden path! How could any human being be so precious, so ridiculous, so appallingly unaware of one single day in the agony of a world?
Happiness. Not even the founders of America had declared that happiness was an inalienable right of man. Only the “pursuit of it.” There was wisdom, there was understanding, there was sad cynicism. One only pursued it. It was rarely, if ever, attained, and then only briefly, like the sun shining for a moment through a rack of dark clouds.
The fool, in his misery, believed that some malign fate kept him from dancing in a perpetual ecstasy. The malcontent believed some alignment of baleful men plotted to shut him out of the garden. The suffering, in their blind selfishness, believed all other men possessed of contentment, of money, of health, of joy. Only a few knew that there was no happiness, no peace, no real and enduring rapture, anywhere in the world. There was no happiness even in love. Men clutched at each other in a despairing darkness, and begged for reassurance. It was the pursuit of the impossible—the shadow of it—that constituted the hope. “A small, small thing,” indeed! Oh, damn fools!
She herself was a “damn fool.” But a wiser one now. And a much sadder one.
She stared at the mangled book she had thrown from her. A warm summer breeze fluttered its crushed pages pathetically. She felt a kind of compassion for the book and its ingenuous writer, and for all the others who believed in the easy attainment of the unattainable.
She knew now that the one most active and terrible force in the world was fear. It was fear that compelled men to seek happiness, as an agonized body seeks a narcotic. It was fear that developed civilizations, built monuments and started wars. It was behind all the irrationality and chaotic emotions that dogged mankind. It was the fountainhead of religion. It had conceived God, or become aware of Him. It was the mother of hatred.
The old prophets had known the power of fear. All the holy books recognized it for the power it was. Against it Moses had thrown up the fortress of the Ten Commandments, instinctively recognizing that law can be a great wall against wild uncertainty, that obedience to the demands of order, and stern regulation, can give men a sense of security. Law helped a man not to think. It substituted conduct for meditation, and so saved men from madness. The repetition of prayers, an established code from which it is dangerous to deviate, hypnotize men and dull the terror of their instinctive perceptions.
This Side of Innocence Page 53