Reconstruction
And just so far as modern Socialism possesses this "mystical power" just so far will it go—inevitably. But, personally, I always think that Socialism (so-called) is far too busy attacking the elderly and decaying, both in men and traditions. It should attack youth; or, rather, it should fight for youth, and for youth principally and almost alone. You cannot found the New World in a day, but if the youthful citizen is taken in hand, educated, inspired, and given all possible advantages both for intellectual improvement and bodily health, this New World will come without resistance, inevitably, and of its own accord and free will. To a certain extent the ideals of the British Empire succeed only for the socialistic "vision" which inspires it. But the chief fault of this "vision" is that it is so busy making black men clean and "Christian" that it has no vigour left to clean up and "Christianise" the dirt and heathenism at home. It would rather, metaphorically speaking (I had vowed never to use that expression again in the New Year, but—well, there it is!), bring the ideals of Western civilisation into the jungles of Darkest Africa than tackle the problems of the slums of Manchester. And this, not so much because a "civilised" Darkest Africa will have money in it, as because in tackling the problem of the slums it will have to fight drastically the rich and poor heathens at home—with all the tradition and prejudice, ignorance, and selfishness with which they are bolstered up and deluded with the cry of "Freedom" and "Liberty," and that still greater illusion—Legal "Justice."
Education
Education of the mind, education of the body—to stop at the very beginning that tragic waste of human material, both physical, mental, and spiritual, which forces youth into blind-alley occupations or into occupations unworthy of physically fit men and women—that is the first stone in the foundation of the New World—a step far more important than the confiscation of capital, which seems to be the loudest cry of those who, in their ignorance, claim to be Socialists. Socialism is constructive not destructive—but the construction must have the vision of the future always before its eyes, and that future must be prepared for—drastically, if need be.
The Inane and Unimaginative
In every mixed crowd there always seems such a large percentage of the unimaginative and the inane that I am never surprised that the silliest superstitions still flourish, "the Thing" is rampant, and that, in every progress towards real civilisation, the very longest way round is taken with the very feeblest results. It is not that this percentage is wicked, nor is it strikingly good, neither is it necessarily feeble-minded, but it shows itself so entirely unimaginative and inane that it is no wonder that the charlatan in religion, politics, and education rampages over the world through a perfect maelstrom of bouquets. Nothing impersonal ever seems to stir the sluggishness of their "souls." They feel nothing that does not hit them straight between the eyes. They never perceive the tragedy behind the smile, the wrong behind the justice of the law, the piteousness and helplessness of men and women. The price of currants stirs them to revolt far more rapidly than that disgrace to civilisation which are the slums. Air raids were the greatest injustice of the war—air raids, when they never knew from one moonlight night to another if they might not join unwillingly the army of the heroic dead in heaven. That is why so many of them secretly believe that they endured far more at home than the ordinary common soldier did in the front-line trenches. They cannot realise his tragedy; they can, however, fully realise their own. That is why they talk of it with so much greater eloquence; that is why, when they listen to his recitals of dirt and hunger and indescribable pain, they do so with a suppressed yawn and a secret conviction that they have heard quite enough about the war. As for tragedy—their apotheosis of the tragic is reached in a street accident at which they can stand gaping, nursing the details for the moment when they can retail them with gusto at home; but I verily believe that, if the dying man cut rather a ridiculous figure, some of them would have to laugh. But then, this inane and unimaginative percentage among the crowd is always ready to laugh. Their special genius is that they will always guffaw in the wrong place. Or, if they do not laugh, they will let fall some utterly stupid remark—so stupid that one wonders occasionally if nature by mistake has given them a bird's brain without giving them at the same time a bird's beautiful plumage. And the worst of it is one is up against this inane percentage in every walk of life—this unimaginative army of men and women who can perceive nothing which does not absolutely concern themselves and their own soul's comfort.
Life's Great Adventure
I hope when I am old that Fate will give me a garden and a view of the sea. I should hate to decay in a suburban row and be carried away at the end of all my mostly fruitless longings in a hearse; the seven minutes' wonder of the small children of the street, who will cry, "Oo-er" when my coffin is borne out by poor men whose names I can't ever know! Not that it really matters, I suppose; and yet, we all of us hope to satisfy our artistic sense, especially when we're helpless to help ourselves. Yes, I should like to pass the twilight of my life in a garden from which there would be a view of the sea. A garden is nearly always beautiful, and the sea always, always promises adventure, even when we have reached that time of life when to "pass over" is the only chance of adventure left to us. It seems to beckon us to leave the monotonous in habits, people and things in general, and seek renewed youthfulness, the thrill of novelty, the promise of romance amid lands and people far, far away. And we all of us hope that we may not die before we have had one real adventure. Adventure, I suppose, always comes to the really adventurous, but so many people are only half-adventurous; they have all the yearning and the longing, but Nature has bereft them of the power to act. So they wait for adventure to come to them, the while they grow older and staler all the time. And sometimes it never does come to them; or, perhaps, it only comes to them too late. There are some, of course, who never feel this wild longing to escape. They are the human turnips; and, so long as they have a plot of ground on which to expand and grow, they look for nothing else other than to be "mashed" from time to time by someone of the opposite sex. These people are quite content to live and die in a row, and to have an impressive funeral is to them a sufficient argument for having lived at all. But their propinquity is one of the reasons why I should not like to grow old in a crowd. I know there are turnips—human turnips, I mean—living amid the Alps. But these don't depress you, for the simple reason that, besides them, you have the Alps anyway. And the Alps have something of that spirit of eternity which the sea possesses.
Travel
Do you know those men and women who, to paraphrase Omar Khayyám, "come like treacle and like gall they go"? Well, it seems to me that life is rather like such as they. You may live for something, you may live for someone, but some time, sooner or later, you will be thrown back upon your own garden, the "inner plot" of land which you have cultivated in your own heart, to find what flowers thereon you may. Live for others, yes! but don't live entirely for them. No. For if you live altogether for someone, it stands to reason that they cannot well live for you—or, if they can, then they don't trouble, since you are such a certain asset in their lives. So they will begin to live for someone else. For this living for people is part of the nature of all hearts which are not the hearts of "turnips." And then, what becomes of you? No, the wise man and woman keep a little for themselves, and that "little" is barred to permanent visitors. You may allow certain people to live therein for a while, but, as you value your own joy and happiness, your own independence and peace, do not deliver up to them the key. Keep that for yourself, so that, when the loneliness of life comes to you, as come it will—that is part of the tragedy of human life—you may not be utterly desolate, but possess some little ray of hope and delight and joy to illumine the shadows of loneliness when they fall across your path. And, for what they are worth to me for consolation, I thank Heaven now for the long years which I spent practically alone in the world, so far as congenial companionship went. Solitude drove me back upon myself, and since all of us must have some joy, natural or merely manufactured, in order to go on living, it forced me to cultivate other interests, which, perhaps, had I been happy, I should have neglected for brighter but more ephemeral joys. So I am not frightened of my own society, and that, though a rather dreary achievement, is by no means to be despised. It enables me to wander about alone and yet be happy; it permits me to travel with no one but my own company and the chance acquaintances I pick up en route, and yet not be entirely depressed. It helped me to achieve that philosophy which says: "If I may not have the ideal companion, then let me walk with no one but myself"—and that is the philosophy of a man who can never really feel lonely for a long time, even though he may be quite alone.