The Spirit of America

by Henry Van Dyke

Here, it seems to me, is the supreme test which the Spirit of America has to meet. In a certain sense the problem appears insoluble because it involves an insoluble race. But precisely here, in the necessity of keeping the negro race distinct, and in the duty of giving it full opportunity for self-development, fair play may find the occasion for a most notable and noble triumph.

I have left but a moment in which to speak of the influence of the kind of democracy which exists in America upon social conditions. In a word: it has produced a society of natural divisions without closed partitions, a temper of independence which shows itself either as self-assertion or self-respect according to the quality of the man, and an atmosphere of large opportunity which promotes general good humour.

In America, as elsewhere, people who have tastes and capacities in common consort together. An uneducated man will not find himself at ease in the habitual society of learned men who talk principally about books. A poor man will not feel comfortable if he attempts to keep company with those whose wealth has led them to immerse themselves in costly amusements. This makes classes, if you like, ranks, if you choose to call them so.

Moreover you will find that certain occupations and achievements which men have generally regarded with respect confer a kind of social distinction in America. Men who have become eminent in the learned professions, or in the army or navy, or in the higher sort of politics; men who have won success in literature or the other fine arts; men who have done notable things of various kinds,—such persons are likely to know each other better and to be better known to the world than if they had done nothing. Furthermore there are families in which this kind of thing has gone on from generation to generation; and others in which inherited wealth, moderate or great, has opened the way to culture and refinement; and others in which newly acquired wealth has been used with generosity and dignity; and others in which the mere mass of money has created a noteworthy establishment. These various people, divided among themselves by their tastes, their opinions, and perhaps as much as anything else by their favourite recreations, find their way into the red book of Who’s Who, into the blue book of the Social Register. Here, if you have an imaginative turn of mind, you may discover (and denounce, or applaud, or ridicule) the beginnings of an aristocracy.

But if you use that word, remember that it is an aristocracy without legal privilege or prerogative, without definite boundaries, and without any rule of primogeniture. Therefore it seems to exist in the midst of democracy without serious friction or hostility. The typical American does not feel injured by the fact that another man is richer, better known, more influential than himself, unless he believes that the eminence has been unfairly reached. He respects those who respect themselves and him. He is ready to meet the men who are above him without servility, and the men who are beneath him without patronage.

True, he is sometimes a little hazy about the precise definition of “above” and “beneath.” His feeling that all the doors are open may lead him to act as if he had already passed through a good many of them. There is at times an “I-could-if-I-would” air about him which is rather disconcerting.

There are great differences among Americans, of course, in regard to manners, ranging all the way from the most banal formality to the most exquisite informality. But in general you may say that manners are taken rather lightly, too lightly, perhaps, because they are not regarded as very real things. Their value as a means of discipline is often forgotten. The average American will not blush very deeply over a social blunder; he will laugh at it as a mistake in a game. But to really hurt you, or to lower his own independence, would make him feel badly indeed.

The free-and-easy atmosphere of the streets, the shops, the hotels, all public places, always strikes the foreigner, and sometimes very uncomfortably. The conductor on the railway car will not touch his hat to you; but, on the other hand, he does not expect a fee from you. The workman on the street of whom you ask a question will answer you as an equal, but he will tell you what you want to know. In the country the tone of familiarity is even more marked. If you board for the summer with a Yankee farmer, you can see that he not only thinks himself as good as you are, but that he cultivates a slightly artificial pity for you as “city folks.”

In American family life there is often an absence of restraint and deference, in school and college life a lack of discipline and subordination, which looks ugly, and probably is rather unwholesome. One sometimes regrets in America the want of those tokens of respect which are the outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace.

But, on the other hand, there is probably more good feeling, friendliness, plain human kindness, running around loose in America than anywhere else in the world. The sense of the essential equality of manhood takes away much of the sting of the inequalities of fortune. The knowledge of the open door reduces the offence of the stairway. It is pleasant and wholesome to live with men who have a feeling of the dignity and worth of their own occupations.