The Young Man and the World

by Albert J. Beveridge

It is absurd, too, that a farmer living on one side of an imaginary state line which separates his farm and the state in which it is located from that of his neighbor living on the other side of the imaginary line in another state, should have to deal with his neighbor as if he were a foreigner in a foreign land and under foreign laws.

Again, the multiplication of decisions on all subjects has reached a point where practise by precedent, to be exhaustive and thorough, has become practically impossible; and so the problem that confronted the Roman emperors, and terminated in the Pandects of Justinian, is now demanding immediate solution at the hands of American legislators, lawyers, and jurists.

So, you see, my ambitious young friend, that by no means all has been done in the law, and that what has been done is so bulky, unorganized, and confused, that even to reduce, rationalize, and systematize it is the greatest task of all. The trouble will therefore be with yourself, and not with conditions, if you remain an underling in this great profession.

Take literature—take imaginative literature. More can be said on its possibilities than on those of the law—and I enlarged upon the unexplored fields of the law merely to outline the immensity of the great things yet to be done in the law's domain. Is it not plain that the great novel of modern society is yet to be written? The contest between human nature and the complex machinery of our industrial system, and the mastery of human nature over the latter, present a theme such as Homer, or Vergil, or Dante never had.

The world awaits this genius! If you are not he, but talented in that direction, there are a thousand phases of American life that are of permanent historic value, which are rapidly passing away forever, and need to be perpetuated by literature and art.

In poetry, the master singer of modern days has not yet appeared. There have been faint signs of him, a suggestion of him, an indistinct prophecy of him, in nearly all of the world's singers for a hundred years. Some day he will come. It may be soon, and then he will sound that note which shall again thrill the hearts and again turn heavenward the eyes of men all round the world.

The point I am making is that the great things in poetry have not all been done. On the contrary, it is the same old cry the world has heard since Homer. Until Shakespeare wrote, it appeared, to those who had no vision, that the immortal things in literature had all been done. But these immortal things and things not immortal, things permanent and things temporary, were only food and material for Shakespeare.

Literature, then, has only been furnishing the materials—the timber—for the structure that is yet to be built. But the timber is noble in dimension, and they must be giants who use it. If you are a giant, your task awaits you.

"It is nonsense to talk of any great war in which this country will ever be engaged," said a wise and experienced public man to me one day, in discussing our future. "There is no place in the world for distinguished service by an American soldier. He can wear his uniform; he can study his tactics; he can be a warrior of the ball-room; but, after all, he is only a kind of policeman."

This conversation occurred some years ago. The fallacy of this conservative (shall we not say short-sighted, for sometimes they are mistaken for one another) man's conclusion has been revealed by recent events. And these events are only an index of similar possibilities. Not that we want war; not that it is desirable; not that it should not be avoided, if possible; but that the movement of the pawns by Events on the great chess-board of the world and history may force us to war, no matter how unwillingly.