They sadly shake their heads, whisper “Vanity, vanity, all is vanity!” and mutter disagreeable things about the cussedness of the human race which goes everlastingly to school, yet always refuses to learn.
Until, in sheer despair, they join the rapidly increasing ranks of our spiritual defeatists, attach themselves to this or that or the other religious institution (that they may transfer their own burden to the back of some one else), and in the most doleful tones acknowledge themselves beaten and retire from all further participation in the affairs of their community.
I don’t like such people.
They are not merely cowards.
They are traitors to the future of the human race.
So far so good, but what is the solution, if a solution there be?
Let us be honest with ourselves.
There is not any.
At least not in the eyes of a world which asks for quick results and expects to settle all difficulties of this earth comfortably and speedily with the help of a mathematical or medical formula or by an act of Congress. But those of us who have accustomed ourselves to consider history in the light of eternity and who know that civilization does not begin and end with the twentieth century, feel a little more hopeful.