Evening Republican, Volume 15, Number 151, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 June 1911 — THE GLORY OF THE COMMON PEOPLE [ARTICLE]

THE GLORY OF THE COMMON PEOPLE

BY DR. FRANK CRANE.

WALKING along the street the other day 1 saw a crowd gathering about something at the curbstone. Of course I approached and elbowed my way In toward the center and craned my neck and raised my ears to find out what was the object of Interest. One always does so. _We are cragy to see what the crowd sees, and when we see it, It Is usually something like what I saw—a faker selling soap.

That is It. In the center,' at the goal toward which all eyes and attention are bent. Is a fool or a fool thing of sepne sort. On the outside, toward which our backs are turned, are the sky and the glorious city and life and wonder and beauty. The older I get the more I am coding to think that people are, as Carlyle said, mostly fools. We are madly going in one direction, while what we really want is in just the opposite direction. For what Is it we all seek? Is It not exclusiveness, in one form or another? We long to be rich or learned w in the smart set, or distinguished or extraordinary by hook or crook. Whereas, as a matter of fact, the best things in life lie not all in the uncommon but in the common lot. trembling I once made Up my mind to ride - third class in a railway in Germany. The guide book had warned me against It and a lot of nice people had said It was dangerous, but I tried it. I went from Munich to Ulm and Nuremberg and then on to Paris, in the lowest and cheapest coaches. For when once I got started I was delighted. It beat the elegant first class and the bourgeois second class utterly.

“Third Class” All Human.

I met a lot of interesting people, commercial travelers, soldiers, market women, priests, boys and girls, and we were not at all afraid of each other. Any one 1 saw I could spunk up and converse with and everybody was human and approachable, and, in the language of the Podunk News, "a nice time was had.” And if I had ridden first class I would have been In the midst of half frozen mummies, each afraid of the other, all fearful that some one would encroach upon their precious exclusiveness. Now, for short distances, 1 always ride with hoi poliol. There's a limit to my democracy. I draw the line on bad smells and dirt. When it comes to horsy smelling eiothes and possibilities of vermin, I am an aristocrat. But you don't have to be high and mighty to be clean. And 1 have an idea that the average United States school ma'am is more fastidious in her personal antisepticism and intimate linen than the average grand duchess. I have gotten a vast deal more out of life since 1 renounced all notion of becoming rich or famous, or in anywise one of the elite, and have sought out the Common People for my amusement and company. Just plain folks are more interesting than the people who occupy niches. I have met one or two kings, a number of hereditary nobles and many presidents of things, but today I feel surer of real entertainment to drop into a seat on the street car beside a Jew peddler or a plumber's apprentice than to call on the Marchese de Kalibazam and sip tea and swap "Select Societv'' All Aliks.

In the first place, it is plain, common folks who have characteristics. They are individual. In cultured, select society all are alike, poured into the same mold. In a wealthy club all the men’s clothes are new, hence they all look alike; while among people that have hut one week day suit the garment becomes creased and modeled to the body. Common people have customs. The \rlstocraey, as Chesterton says, have no customs; they have only habits. I'ke animals. The table d'hote eet is precisely the same whether you dine with them at Rome or Berlin, Copenhagen or Palermo. And there are poor eillies who go abroad and never meet anybody but these boresome, same uncolored table d'hote* from the time they land at Liverpool till they embark at Naples tor home. Even in the language of the so-called lower classes you find distinctions and originality. A Bostonian graduate from the Latin High talks so horribly proper that you are consumed with ennui. Whatever he does you know he will not surprise you. When he begins a sentence you are certain he will finish It Just as It he had learned It by heart from a Melsterschaft system. He belongs to the Internationa] Conversational association. On the contrary a Coney Island tout Is Interesting. He takes his langeols, has always been the home of the great moral dynamite of the race, ▼lee and crime are the product of the dregs and the scum of humanity. Society la' whiskey and dirt at the bottom, champagne and divorce at the top. In the middle Is the pure water and healthy people. It Is the common people who support the churches, send their children to Bnndsy school, have business to do had do it. go to bed at night and stir about by day, sat breed and moat and drink milk, toll the troth as a habit, live with their own wives when they son old

“ when they were young, hay# goo« xised families, pray when they an wail and not when they are sick an< scared, and sing when they are sobei and not when they arc drunk. All religions have sprung from ant have grown among the common folk Anarchy Infidelity, God-hating ant belly worshiping belong to the top ant bottom layers of the social mass.. Origin of Orest Men. Almost all the great men of history have been bourgeois. Few heroet oome from slums or castles. To cal a, man common, la to clasi him in the same social level as Rich ard Wagner, Napoleon Bonaparte Raffael 8 anti, .Socrates, Abraham Lin coin, and Jesus Christ. To want ti get up into the select circles wit! kings, counts, dukes, and millionaire* is to pine for the atmosphere that hat grown the Borgiae and Neros, Oencia Marquis de Sades, the four Englisl Georges. Catherine of Russia, and Harry i Thaw. Just the other day I was reading la a French review the usual drive! about the danger which the dead level of democracy has in store for art and letters. It is taken for granted that only an aristocracy can encouragt genius. The truth is that the greatest patron of art and letters is th« public. All great creative work li done for the human race. And th« greatest permanent encouragement tc the painter, sculptor, musician, and writer will come in the spread of th« cult of humanity. The great art of the renaissance was created for the most part foi churches, and in the past In Europe the Roman Catholic church has been the nearest thing to a public affaii that existed. States and cities were usually the property of private families. The church was, in its way, a persistent democracy. All the great popes have been bourgeoise.

What Liberal Arts Need.

If the American people ever gel sense enough to put some of the millions which they now waste In battleships into civic theaters, public galleries, the artistic adornment of state and national buildings, and the maintenance, of orchestral and choral music (in this Item after the manner of Germany), it will be infinitely better for the liberal arts than all the millionaire collectors of Christendom. And finally, the common lot is the best, because there people in plain, everyday English have the most fun. Life Is fuller, fresher, more sparkling. As the people do not have to spend so much time and energy playing at precedence, they have more force left with which to enjoy life. The higher one climbs in the social ladder the more he is bound with customs, rules, prohibitions, and responsibilities. Uneasy lien the head that wears any kind of a crown. A day's work and a day’s reward, labor by sunshine and sleep by night, the dear cares of family and Namely duties, these are best. And living the common lot we can possess our own bouls, hawe our own individualities. We are napidly unloosing the remaining chains of Ignorance and superstition ami narrow provincialism that have tattered the common people so long. We are working out in America our reifl freedom, which Is least of all po lit toad freedom, and most of all freedom from place worship, success worship, money, admiration, and the corse of. ecccloslvenees.