{"collection":"philosophy-ethics","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_5068/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_5068","id":"gutenberg_5068","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/5068","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Essays, Letters & Speeches","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Conduct of life"],"text":"[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nOn Being Human\n\nby Woodrow Wilson\n\n\nPh.D., Litt.D., LL.D.\nPresident of the United States\n\n1897\nFrom the _Atlantic Monthly_\n\n\nContents\n\n I\n II\n III\n IV\n V\n VI\n\n\n\n\nI\n\n\n\u201cThe rarest sort of a book,\u201d says Mr. Bagehot, slyly, is \u201ca book to\nread\u201d; and \u201cthe knack in style is to write like a human being.\u201d It is\npainfully evident, upon experiment, that not many of the books which\ncome teeming from our presses every year are meant to be read. They are\nmeant, it may be, to be pondered; it is hoped, no doubt, they may\ninstruct, or inform, or startle, or arouse, or reform, or provoke, or\namuse us; but we read, if we have the true reader\u2019s zest and plate, not\nto grow more knowing, but to be less pent up and bound within a little\ncircle,\u2014as those who take their pleasure, and not as those who\nlaboriously seek instruction,\u2014as a means of seeing and enjoying the\nworld of men and affairs. We wish companionship and renewal of spirit,\nenrichment of thought and the full adventure of the mind; and we desire\nfair company, and a larger world in which to find them.\n\nNo one who loves the masters who may be communed with and read but must\nsee, therefore, and resent the error of making the text of any one of\nthem a source to draw grammar from, forcing the parts of speech to\nstand out stark and cold from the warm text; or a store of samples\nwhence to draw rhetorical instances, setting up figures of speech\nsingly and without support of any neighbor phrase, to be stared at\ncuriously and with intent to copy or dissect! Here is grammar done\nwithout deliberation: the phrases carry their meaning simply and by a\nsort of limpid reflection; the thought is a living thing, not an image\ningeniously contrived and wrought. Pray leave the text whole: it has no\nmeaning piecemeal; at any rate, not that best, wholesome meaning, as of\na frank and genial friend who talks, not for himself or for his phrase,\nbut for you. It is questionable morals to dismember a living frame to\nseek for its obscure fountains of life!\n\nWhen you say that a book was meant to be read, you mean, for one thing,\nof course, that it was not meant to be studied. You do not study a good\nstory, or a haunting poem, or a battle song, or a love ballad, or any\nmoving narrative, whether it be out of history or out of fiction\u2014nor\nany argument, even, that moves vital in the field of action. You do not\nhave to study these things; they reveal themselves, you do not stay to\nsee how. They remain with you, and will not be forgotten or laid by.\nThey cling like a personal experience, and become the mind\u2019s intimates.\nYou devour a book meant to be read, not because you would fill yourself\nor have an anxious care to be nourished, but because it contains such\nstuff as it makes the mind hungry to look upon. Neither do you read it\nto kill time, but to lengthen time, rather, adding to its natural usury\nby living the more abundantly while it lasts, joining another\u2019s life\nand thought to your own.\n\nThere are a few children in every generation, as Mr. Bagehot reminds\nus, who think the natural thing to do with any book is to read it.\n\u201cThere is an argument from design in the subject,\u201d as he says; \u201cif the\nbook was not meant to be read for that purpose, for what purpose was it\nmeant?\u201d These are the young eyes to which books yield up great\ntreasure, almost in spite of themselves, as if they had been penetrated\nby some swift, enlarging power of vision which only the young know. It\nis these youngsters to whom books give up the long ages of history,\n\u201cthe wonderful series going back to the times of old patriarchs with\ntheir flocks and herds\u201d\u2014I am quoting Mr. Bagehot again\u2014\u201cthe keen-eyed\nGreek, the stately Roman, the watching Jew, the uncouth Goth, the\nhorrid Hun, the settled picture of the unchanging East, the restless\nshifting of the rapid West, the rise of the cold and classical\ncivilization, its fall, the rough impetuous Middle Ages, the vague warm\npicture of ourselves and home. When did we learn these? Not yesterday\nnor today, but long ago, in the first dawn of reason, in the original\nflow of fancy.\u201d Books will not yield to us so richly when we are older.\nThe argument from design fails. We return to the staid authors we read\nlong ago, and do not find in them the vital, speaking images that used\nto lie there upon the page. Our own fancy is gone, and the author never\nhad any. We are driven in upon the books meant to be read.\n\nThese are books written by human beings, indeed, but with no general\nquality belonging to the kind\u2014with a special tone and temper, rather, a\nspirit out of the common, touched with a light that shines clear out of\nsome great source of light which not every man can uncover. We call\nthis spirit human because it moves us, quickens a like life in\nourselves, makes us glow with a sort of ardor of self-discovery. It\ntouches the springs of fancy or of action within us, and makes our own\nlife seem more quick and vital. We do not call every book that moves us\nhuman. Some seem written with knowledge of the black art, set our base\npassions aflame, disclose motives at which we shudder\u2014the more because\nwe feel their reality and power; and we know that this is of the devil,\nand not the fruitage of any quality that distinguishes us as men. We\nare distinguished as men by the qualities that mark us different from\nthe beasts. When we call a thing human we have a spiritual ideal in\nmind. It may not be an ideal of that which is perfect, but it moves at\nleast upon an upland level where the air is sweet; it holds an image of\nman erect and constant, going abroad with undaunted steps, looking with\nfrank and open gaze upon all the fortunes of his day, feeling even and\nagain\u2014\n\n\u201c. . . the joy 1\nOf elevated thoughts; a sense sublime\nOf something far more deeply interfused.\nWhose dwelling is the light of setting suns.\nAnd the round ocean and the living air,\nAnd the blue sky, and in the mind of man:\nA motion and a spirit, that impels\nAll thinking things.\u201d\n\n\nSay what we may of the errors and the degrading sins of our kind, we do\nnot willingly make what is worst in us the distinguishing trait of what\nis human. When we declare, with Bagehot, that the author whom we love\nwrites like a human being, we are not sneering at him; we do not say it\nwith a leer. It is in token of admiration, rather. He makes us like our\nhumankind. There is a noble passion in what he says, a wholesome humor\nthat echoes genial comradeships; a certain reasonableness and\nmoderation in what is thought and said; an air of the open day, in\nwhich things are seen whole and in their right colors, rather than of\nthe close study or the academic class-room. We do not want our poetry\nfrom grammarians, nor our tales from philologists, nor our history from\ntheorists. Their human nature is subtly transmuted into something less\nbroad and catholic and of the general world. Neither do we want our\npolitical economy from tradesmen nor our statesmanship from mere\npoliticians, but from those who see more and care for more than these\nmen see or care for.\n\n\n\n\nII\n\n\nOnce\u2014it is a thought which troubles us\u2014once it was a simple enough\nmatter to be a human being, but now it is deeply difficult; because\nlife was once simple, but is now complex, confused, multifarious.\nHaste, anxiety, preoccupation, the need to specialize and make machines\nof ourselves, have transformed the once simple world, and we are\napprised that it will not be without effort that we shall keep the\nbroad human traits which have so far made the earth habitable. We have\nseen our modern life accumulate, hot and restless, in great cities\u2014and\nwe cannot say that the change is not natural: we see in it, on the\ncontrary, the fulfillment of an inevitable law of change, which is no\ndoubt a law of growth, and not of decay. And yet we look upon the\nportentous thing with a great distaste, and doubt with what altered\npassions we shall come out of it. The huge, rushing, aggregate life of\na great city\u2014the crushing crowds in the streets, where friends seldom\nmeet and there are few greetings; the thunderous noise of trade and\nindustry that speaks of nothing but gain and competition, and a\nconsuming fever that checks the natural courses of the kindly blood; no\nleisure anywhere, no quiet, no restful ease, no wise repose\u2014all this\nshocks us. It is inhumane. It does not seem human. How much more likely\ndoes it appear that we shall find men sane and human about a country\nfireside, upon the streets of quiet villages, where all are neighbors,\nwhere groups of friends gather easily, and a constant sympathy makes\nthe very air seem native! Why should not the city seem infinitely more\nhuman than the hamlet? Why should not human traits the more abound\nwhere human beings teem millions strong?\n\nBecause the city curtails man of his wholeness, specializes him,\nquickens some powers, stunts others, gives him a sharp edge, and a\ntemper like that of steel, makes him unfit for nothing so much as to\nsit still. Men have indeed written like human beings in the midst of\ngreat cities, but not often when they have shared the city\u2019s\ncharacteristic life, its struggle for place and for gain. There are not\nmany places that belong to a city\u2019s life to which you can \u201cinvite your\nsoul.\u201d Its haste, its preoccupations, its anxieties, its rushing noise\nas of men driven, its ringing cries, distract you. It offers no quiet\nfor reflection; it permits no retirement to any who share its life. It\nis a place of little tasks, of narrowed functions, of aggregate and not\nof individual strength. The great machine dominates its little parts,\nand its Society is as much of a machine as its business.\n\n\u201cThis tract which the river of Time 2\nNow flows through with us, is the plain.\nGone is the calm of its earlier shore.\nBorder\u2019d by cities, and hoarse\nWith a thousand cries is its stream.\nAnd we on its breast, our minds\nAre confused as the cries which we hear,\nChanging and shot as the sights which we see.\n\n\u201cAnd we say that repose has fled\nForever the course of the river of Time\nThat cities will crowd to its edge\nIn a blacker, incessanter line;\nThat the din will be more on its banks,\nDenser the trade on its stream,\nFlatter the plain where it flows,\nFiercer the sun overhead,\nThat never will those on its breast\nSee an enobling sight,\nDrink of the feeling of quiet again.\n\n\u201cBut what was before us we know not,\nAnd we know not what shall succeed.\n\n\u201cHaply, the river of Time\u2014\nAs it grows, as the towns on its marge\nFling their wavering lights\nOn a wider, statelier stream\u2014\nMay acquire, if not the calm\nOf its early mountainous shore,\nYet a solemn peace of its own.\n\n\u201cAnd the width of the waters, the hush\nOf the gray expanse where he floats,\nFreshening its current and spotted with foam\nAs it draws to the Ocean, may strike\nPeace to the soul of the man on its breast\u2014\nAs the pale waste widens around him,\nAs the banks fade dimmer away,\nAs the stars come out, and the night-wind\nBrings up the stream\nMurmurs and scents of the infinite sea.\u201d\n\n\nWe cannot easily see the large measure and abiding purpose of the novel\nage in which we stand young and confused. The view that shall clear our\nminds and quicken us to act as those who know their task and its\ndistant consummation will come with better knowledge and completer\nself-possession. It shall not be a night-wind, but an air that shall\nblow out of the widening east and with the coming of the light, and\nshall bring us, with the morning, \u201cmurmurs and scents of the infinite\nsea.\u201d Who can doubt that man has grown more and more human with each\nstep of that slow process which has brought him knowledge,\nself-restraint, the arts of intercourse, and the revelations of real\njoy? Man has more and more lived with his fellow-men, and it is society\nthat has humanized him\u2014the development of society into an infinitely\nvarious school of discipline and ordered skill. He has been made more\nhuman by schooling, by growing more self-possessed\u2014less violent, less\ntumultuous; holding himself in hand, and moving always with a certain\npoise of spirit; not forever clapping his hand to the hilt of his\nsword, but preferring, rather, to play with a subtler skill upon the\nsprings of action. This is our conception of the truly human man: a man\nin whom there is a just balance of faculties, a catholic sympathy\u2014no\nbrawler, no fanatic, no pharisee; not too credulous in hope, not too\ndesperate in purpose; warm, but not hasty; ardent, and full of definite\npower, but not running about to be pleased and deceived by every new\nthing.\n\nIt is a genial image of men we love\u2014an image of men warm and true of\nheart, direct and unhesitating in courage, generous, magnanimous,\nfaithful, steadfast, capable of a deep devotion and self-forgetfulness.\nBut the age changes, and with it must change our ideals of human\nquality. Not that we would give up what we have loved: we would add\nwhat a new life demands. In a new age men must acquire a new capacity,\nmust be men upon a new scale, and with added qualities. We shall need a\nnew Renaissance, ushered in by a new \u201chumanistic\u201d movement, in which we\nshall add our present minute, introspective study of ourselves, our\njails, our slums, our nerve centers, our shifts to live, almost as\nmorbid as medieval religion, a rediscovery of the round world, and of\nman\u2019s place in it, now that its face has changed. We study the world,\nbut not yet with intent to school our hearts and tastes, broaden our\nnatures, and know our fellow-men as comrades rather than as phenomena;\nwith purpose, rather, to build up bodies of critical doctrine and\nprovide ourselves with theses. That, surely, is not the truly\nhumanizing way in which to take the air of the world. Man is much more\nthan a \u201crational being,\u201d and lives more by sympathies and impressions\nthan by conclusions. It darkens his eyes and dries up the wells of his\nhumanity to be forever in search of doctrine. We need wholesome,\nexperiencing natures, I dare affirm, much more than we need sound\nreasoning.\n\n\n\n\nIII\n\n\nTake life in the large view, and we are most reasonable when we seek\nthat which is most wholesome and tonic for our natures as a whole; and\nwe know, when we put aside pedantry, that the great middle object in\nlife\u2014the object that lies between religion on one hand, and food and\nclothing on the other, establishing our average levels of\nachievement\u2014the excellent golden mean, is, not to be learned, but to be\nhuman beings in all the wide and genial meaning of the term. Does the\nage hinder? Do its many interests distract us when we would plan our\ndiscipline, determine our duty, clarify our ideals? It is the more\nnecessary that we should ask ourselves what it is that is demanded of\nus, if we would fit our qualities to meet the new tests. Let us remind\nourselves that to be human is, for one thing, to speak and act with a\ncertain note of genuineness, a quality mixed of spontaneity and\nintelligence. This is necessary for wholesome life in any age, but\nparticularly amidst confused affairs and shifting standards.\nGenuineness is not mere simplicity, for that may lack vitality, and\ngenuineness does not. We expect what we call genuine to have pith and\nstrength of fiber. Genuineness is a quality which we sometimes mean to\ninclude when we speak of individuality. Individuality is lost the\nmoment you submit to passing modes or fashions, the creations of an\nartificial society; and so is genuineness. No man is genuine who is\nforever trying to pattern his life after the lives of other\npeople\u2014unless, indeed, he be a genuine dolt. But individuality is by no\nmeans the same as genuineness; for individuality may be associated with\nthe most extreme and even ridiculous eccentricity, while genuineness we\nconceive to be always wholesome, balanced, and touched with dignity. It\nis a quality that goes with good sense and self-respect. It is a sort\nof robust moral sanity, mixed of elements both moral and intellectual.\nIt is found in natures too strong to be mere trimmers and conformers,\ntoo well poised and thoughtful to fling off into intemperate protest\nand revolt. Laughter is genuine which has in it neither the shrill,\nhysterical note of mere excitement nor the hard, metallic twang of the\ncynic\u2019s sneer\u2014which rings in the honest voice of gracious good humor,\nwhich is innocent and unsatirical. Speech is genuine which is without\nsilliness, affectation, or pretense. That character is genuine which\nseems built by nature rather than by convention, which is stuff of\nindependence and of good courage. Nothing spurious, bastard, begotten\nout of true wedlock of the mind; nothing adulterated and seeming to be\nwhat it is not; nothing unreal, can ever get place among the nobility\nof things genuine, natural, of pure stock and unmistakable lineage. It\nis a prerogative of every truly human being to come out from the low\nestate of those who are merely gregarious and of the herd, and show his\ninnate powers cultivated and yet unspoiled\u2014sound, unmixed, free from\nimitation; showing that individualization without extravagance which is\ngenuineness.\n\nBut how? By what means is this self-liberation to be effected\u2014this\nemancipation from affectation and the bondage of being like other\npeople? Is it open to us to choose to be genuine? I see nothing\ninsuperable in the way, except for those who are hopelessly lacking in\na sense of humor. It depends upon the range and scale of your\nobservation whether you can strike the balance of genuineness or not.\nIf you live in a small and petty world, you will be subject to its\nstandards; but if you live in a large world, you will see that\nstandards are innumerable\u2014some old, some new, some made by the\nnoble-minded and made to last, some made by the weak-minded and\ndestined to perish, some lasting from age to age, some only from day to\nday\u2014and that a choice must be made among them. It is then that your\nsense of humor will assist you. You are, you will perceive, upon a long\njourney, and it will seem to you ridiculous to change your life and\ndiscipline your instincts to conform with the usages of a single inn by\nthe way. You will distinguish the essentials from the accidents, and\ndeem the accidents something meant for your amusement. The strongest\nnatures do not need to wait for these slow lessons of observation, to\nbe got by conning life: their sheer vigor makes it impossible for them\nto conform to fashion or care for times and seasons. But the rest of us\nmust cultivate knowledge of the world in the large, get our offing,\nreaching a comparative point of view, before we can become with steady\nconfidence our own masters and pilots. The art of being human begins\nwith the practice of being genuine, and following standards of conduct\nwhich the world has tested. If your life is not various and you cannot\nknow the best people, who set the standards of sincerity, your reading\nat least can be various, and you may look at your little circle through\nthe best books, under the guidance of writers who have known life and\nloved the truth.\n\n\n\n\nIV\n\n\nAnd then genuineness will bring serenity\u2014which I take to be another\nmark of the right development of the true human being, certainly in an\nage passionate and confused as this in which we live. Of course\nserenity does not always go with genuineness. We must say of Dr.\nJohnson that he was genuine, and yet we know that the stormy tyrant of\nthe Turk\u2019s Head Tavern was not serene. Carlyle was genuine (though that\nis not quite the first adjective we should choose to describe him), but\nof serenity he allowed cooks and cocks and every modern and every\nancient sham to deprive him. Serenity is a product, no doubt, of two\nvery different things, namely, vision and digestion. Not the eye only,\nbut the courses of the blood must be clear, if we would find serenity.\nOur word \u201cserene\u201d contains a picture. Its image is of the calm evening\nwhen the stars are out and the still night comes on; when the dew is on\nthe grass and the wind does not stir; when the day\u2019s work is over, and\nthe evening meal, and thought falls clear in the quiet hour. It is the\nhour of reflection\u2014and it is human to reflect. Who shall contrive to be\nhuman without this evening hour, which drives turmoil out, and gives\nthe soul its seasons of self-recollection? Serenity is not a thing to\nbeget inaction. It only checks excitement and uncalculating haste. It\ndoes not exclude ardor or the heat of battle: it keeps ardor from\nextravagance, prevents the battle from becoming a mere aimless m\u00eal\u00e9e.\nThe great captains of the world have been men who were calm in the\nmoment of crisis; who were calm, too, in the long planning which\npreceded crisis; who went into battle with a serenity infinitely\nominous for those whom they attack. We instinctively associate serenity\nwith the highest types of power among men, seeing in it the poise of\nknowledge and calm vision, the supreme heat and mastery which is\nwithout splutter or noise of any kind. The art of power in this sort is\nno doubt learned in hours of reflection, by those who are not born with\nit. What rebuke of aimless excitement there is to be got out of a\nlittle reflection, when we have been inveighing against the corruption\nand decadence of our own days, if only we have provided ourselves with\na little knowledge of the past wherewith to balance our thought! As bad\ntimes as these, or any we shall see, have been reformed, but not by\nprotests. They have been made glorious instead of shameful by the men\nwho kept their heads and struck with sure self-possession in the fight.\nThe world is very human, not a bit given to adopting virtues for the\nsakes of those who merely bemoan its vices, and we are most effective\nwhen we are most calmly in possession of our senses.\n\nSo far is serenity from being a thing of slackness or inaction that it\nseems bred, rather, by an equable energy, a satisfying activity. It may\nbe found in the midst of that alert interest in affairs which is, it\nmay be, the distinguishing trait of developed manhood. You distinguish\nman from the brute by his intelligent curiosity, his play of mind\nbeyond the narrow field of instinct, his perception of cause and effect\nin matters to him indifferent, his appreciation of motive and\ncalculation of results. He is interested in the world about him, and\neven in the great universe of which it forms a part, not merely as a\nthing he would use, satisfy his wants and grow great by, but as a field\nto stretch his mind in, for love of journeyings and excursions in the\nlarge realm of thought. Your full-bred human being loves a run afield\nwith his understanding. With what images does he not surround himself\nand store his mind! With what fondness does he con travelers\u2019 tales and\ncredit poets\u2019 fancies! With what patience does he follow science and\npore upon old records, and with what eagerness does he ask the news of\nthe day! No great part of what he learns immediately touches his own\nlife or the course of his own affairs: he is not pursuing a business,\nbut satisfying as he can an insatiable mind. No doubt the highest form\nof this noble curiosity is that which leads us, without self-interest,\nto look abroad upon all the field of man\u2019s life at home and in society,\nseeking more excellent forms of government, more righteous ways of\nlabor, more elevating forms of art, and which makes the greater among\nus statesmen, reformers, philanthropists, artists, critics, men of\nletters. It is certainly human to mind your neighbor\u2019s business as well\nas your own. Gossips are only sociologists upon a mean and petty scale.\nThe art of being human lifts to be a better level than that of gossip;\nit leaves mere chatter behind, as too reminiscent of a lower stage of\nexistence, and is compassed by those whose outlook is wide enough to\nserve for guidance and a choosing of ways.\n\n\n\n\nV\n\n\nLuckily we are not the first human beings. We have come into a great\nheritage of interesting things, collected and piled all about us by the\ncuriosity of past generations. And so our interest is selective. Our\neducation consists in learning intelligent choice. Our energies do not\nclash or compete: each is free to take his own path to knowledge. Each\nhas that choice, which is man\u2019s alone, of the life he shall live, and\nfinds out first or last that the art in living is not only to be\ngenuine and one\u2019s own master, but also to learn mastery in perception\nand preference. Your true woodsman needs not to follow the dusty\nhighway through the forest nor search for any path, but goes straight\nfrom glade to glade as if upon an open way, having some privy\nunderstanding with the taller trees, some compass in his senses. So\nthere is the subtle craft in finding ways for the mind, too. Keep but\nyour eyes alert and your ears quick, as you move among men and among\nbooks, and you shall find yourself possessed at last of a new sense,\nthe sense of the pathfinder. Have you never marked the eyes of a man\nwho has seen the world he has lived in: the eyes of the sea-captain,\nwho has watched his life through the changes of the heavens; the eyes\nof the huntsman, nature\u2019s gossip and familiar; the eyes of the man of\naffairs, accustomed to command in moments of exigency? You are at once\naware that they are eyes which can see. There is something in them that\nyou do not find in other eyes, and you have read the life of the man\nwhen you have divined what it is. Let the thing serve as a figure. So\nought alert interest in the world of men and thought to serve each one\nof us that we shall have the quick perceiving vision, taking meanings\nat a glance, reading suggestions as if they were expositions. You shall\nnot otherwise get full value of your humanity. What good shall it do\nyou else that the long generations of men which have gone before have\nfilled the world with great store of everything that may make you wise\nand your life various? Will you not take the usury of the past, if it\nmay be had for the taking? Here is the world humanity has made: will\nyou take full citizenship in it, or will you live in it as dull, as\nslow to receive, as unenfranchised, as the idlers for whom civilization\nhas no uses, or the deadened toilers, men or beasts, whose labor shuts\nthe door on choice?\n\nThat man seems to me a little less than human who lives as if our life\nin the world were but just begun, thinking only of the things of sense,\nreckoning nothing of the infinite thronging and assemblage of affairs\nthe great stage over, or of the old wisdom that has ruled the world.\nThat is, if he have the choice. Great masses of our fellow-men are shut\nout from choosing, by reason of absorbing toil, and it is part of the\nenlightenment of our age that our understandings are being opened to\nthe workingman\u2019s need of a little leisure wherein to look about him and\nclear his vision of the dust of the workshop. We know that there is a\ndrudgery which is inhuman, let it but encompass the whole life, with\nonly heavy sleep between task and task. We know that those who are so\nbound can have no freedom to be men, that their very spirits are in\nbondage. It is part of our philanthropy\u2014it should be part of our\nstatesmanship\u2014to ease the burden as we can, and enfranchise those who\nspend and are spent for the sustenance of the race. But what shall we\nsay of those who are free and yet choose littleness and bondage, or of\nthose who, though they might see the whole face of society,\nnevertheless choose to spend all a life\u2019s space poring upon some single\nvice or blemish? I would not for the world discredit any sort of\nphilanthropy except the small and churlish sort which seeks to reform\nby nagging\u2014the sort which exaggerates petty vices into great ones, and\nruns atilt against windmills, while everywhere colossal shams and\nabuses go unexposed, unrebuked. Is it because we are better at being\ncommon scolds than at being wise advisers that we prefer little reforms\nto big ones? Are we to allow the poor personal habits of other people\nto absorb and quite use up all our fine indignation? It will be a bad\nday for society when sentimentalists are encouraged to suggest all the\nmeasures that shall be taken for the betterment of the race. I, for\none, sometimes sigh for the generation of \u201cleading people\u201d and of good\npeople who shall see things steadily and see them whole; who shall show\na handsome justness and a large sanity of view, an opportune tolerance\nfor details, that happen to be awry, in order that they may spend their\nenergy, not without self-possession, in some generous mission which\nshall make right principles shine upon the people\u2019s life. They would\nbring with them an age of large moralities, a spacious time, a day of\nvision.\n\nKnowledge has come into the world in vain if it is not to emancipate\nthose who may have it from narrowness, censoriousness, fussiness, an\nintemperate zeal for petty things. It would be a most pleasant, a truly\nhumane world, would we but open our ears with a more generous welcome\nto the clear voices that ring in those writings upon life and affairs\nwhich mankind has chosen to keep. Not many splenetic books, not many\nintemperate, not many bigoted, have kept men\u2019s confidence; and the mind\nthat is impatient, or intolerant, or hoodwinked, or shut in to a petty\nview shall have no part in carrying men forward to a true humanity,\nshall never stand as examples of the true humankind. What is truly\nhuman has always upon it the broad light of what is genial, fit to\nsupport life, cordial, and of a catholic spirit of helpfulness. Your\ntrue human being has eyes and keeps his balance in the world; deems\nnothing uninteresting that comes from life; clarifies his vision and\ngives health to his eyes by using them upon things near and things far.\nThe brute beast has but a single neighborhood, a single, narrow round\nof existence; the gain of being human accrues in the choice of change\nand variety and of experience far and wide, with all the world for\nstage\u2014a stage set and appointed by this very art of choice\u2014all future\ngenerations for witnesses and audience. When you talk with a man who\nhas in his nature and acquirements that freedom from constraint which\ngoes with the full franchise of humanity, he turns easily with topic to\ntopic; does not fall silent or dull when you leave some single field of\nthought such as unwise men make a prison of. The men who will not be\nbroken from a little set of subjects, who talk earnestly, hotly, with a\nsort of fierceness, of certain special schemes of conduct, and look\ncoldly upon everything else, render you infinitely uneasy, as if there\nwere in them a force abnormal and which rocked toward an upset of the\nmind; but from the man whose interest swings from thought to thought\nwith the zest and poise and pleasure of the old traveler, eager for\nwhat is new, glad to look again upon what is old, you come away with\nfaculties warmed and heartened\u2014with the feeling of having been comrade\nfor a little with a genuine human being. It is a large world and a\nround world, and men grow human by seeing all its play of force and\nfolly.\n\n\n\n\nVI\n\n\nLet no one suppose that efficiency is lost by such breadth and\ncatholicity of view. We deceive ourselves with instances, look at sharp\ncrises in the world\u2019s affairs, and imagine that intense and narrow men\nhave made history for us. Poise, balance, a nice and equable exercise\nof force, are not, it is true, the things the world ordinarily seeks\nfor or most applauds in its heroes. It is apt to esteem that man most\nhuman who has his qualities in a certain exaggeration, whose courage is\npassionate, whose generosity is without deliberation, whose just action\nis without premeditation, whose spirit runs toward its favorite objects\nwith an infectious and reckless ardor, whose wisdom is no child of slow\nprudence. We love Achilles more than Diomedes, and Ulysses not at all.\nBut these are standards left over from a ruder state of society: we\nshould have passed by this time the Homeric stage of mind\u2014should have\nheroes suited to our age. Nay, we have erected different standards, and\ndo make a different choice, when we see in any man fulfillment of our\nreal ideals. Let a modern instance serve as test. Could any man\nhesitate to say that Abraham Lincoln was more human than William Lloyd\nGarrison? Does not every one know that it was the practical\nFree-Soilers who made emancipation possible, and not the hot,\nimpracticable Abolitionists; that the country was infinitely more moved\nby Lincoln\u2019s temperate sagacity than by any man\u2019s enthusiasm,\ninstinctively trusted the man who saw the whole situation and kept his\nbalance, instinctively held off from those who refused to see more than\none thing? We know how serviceable the intense and headlong agitator\nwas in bringing to their feet men fit for action; but we feel uneasy\nwhile he lives, and vouchsafe him our full sympathy only when he is\ndead. We know that the genial forces of nature which work daily,\nequably, and without violence are infinitely more serviceable,\ninfinitely more admirable, than the rude violence of the storm, however\nnecessary or excellent the purification it may have wrought. Should we\nseek to name the most human man among those who led the nation to its\nstruggle with slavery, and yet was no statesmen, we should, of course,\nname Lowell. We know that his humor went further than any man\u2019s passion\ntoward setting tolerant men atingle with the new impulses of the day.\nWe naturally hold back from those who are intemperate and can never\nstop to smile, and are deeply reassured to see a twinkle in a\nreformer\u2019s eye. We are glad to see earnest men laugh. It breaks the\nstrain. If it be wholesome laughter, it dispels all suspicion of spite,\nand is like the gleam of light upon running water, lifting sullen\nshadows, suggesting clear depths.\n\nSurely it is this soundness of nature, this broad and genial quality,\nthis full-blooded, full-orbed sanity of spirit, which gives the men we\nlove that wide-eyed sympathy which gives hope and power to humanity,\nwhich gives range to every good quality and is so excellent a\ncredential of genuine manhood. Let your life and your thought be\nnarrow, and your sympathy will shrink to a like scale. It is a quality\nwhich follows the seeing mind afield, which waits on experience. It is\nnot a mere sentiment. It goes not with pity so much as with a\npenetrative understanding of other men\u2019s lives and hopes and\ntemptations. Ignorance of these things makes it worthless. Its best\ntutors are observations and experience, and these serve only those who\nkeep clear eyes and a wide field of vision. It is exercise and\ndiscipline upon such a scale, too, which strengthen, which for ordinary\nmen come near to creating, that capacity to reason upon affairs and to\nplan for action which we always reckon upon finding in every man who\nhas studied to perfect his native force. This new day in which we live\ncries a challenge to us. Steam and electricity have reduced nations to\nneighborhoods; have made travel pastime, and news a thing for\neverybody. Cheap printing has made knowledge a vulgar commodity. Our\neyes look, almost without choice, upon the very world itself, and the\nword \u201chuman\u201d is filled with new meaning. Our ideals broaden to suit the\nwide day in which we live. We crave, not cloistered virtue\u2014it is\nimpossible any longer to keep the cloister\u2014but a robust spirit that\nshall take the air in the great world, know men in all their kinds,\nchoose its way amid the bustle with all self-possession, with wise\ngenuineness, in calmness, and yet with the quick eye of interest and\nthe quick pulse of power. It is again a day for Shakespeare\u2019s spirit\u2014a\nday more various, more ardent, more provoking to valor and every large\ndesign, even than \u201cthe spacious times of great Elizabeth,\u201d when all the\nworld seemed new; and if we cannot find another bard, come out of a new\nWarwickshire, to hold once more the mirror up to nature, it will not be\nbecause the stage is not set for him. The time is such an one as he\nmight rejoice to look upon; and if we would serve it as it should be\nserved, we should seek to be human after his wide-eyed sort. The\nserenity of power; the naturalness that is nature\u2019s poise and mark of\ngenuineness; the unsleeping interest in all affairs, all fancies, all\nthings believed or done; the catholic understanding, tolerance,\nenjoyment, of all classes and conditions of men; the conceiving\nimagination, the planning purpose, the creating thought, the wholesome,\nlaughing humor, the quiet insight, the universal coinage of the\nbrain\u2014are not these the marvelous gifts and qualities we mark in\nShakespeare when we call him the greatest among men? And shall not\nthese rounded and perfect powers serve us as our ideal of what it is to\nbe a finished human being?\n\nWe live for our own age\u2014an age like Shakespeare\u2019s, when an old world is\npassing away, a new world coming in\u2014an age of new speculation and every\nnew adventure of the mind; a full stage, an intricate plot, a universal\nplay of passion, an outcome no man can foresee. It is to this world,\nthis sweep of action, that our understandings must be stretched and\nfitted; it is in this age we must show our human quality. We must\nmeasure ourselves by the task, accept the pace set for us, make shift\nto know what we are about. How free and liberal should be the scale of\nour sympathy, how catholic our understanding of the world in which we\nlive, how poised and masterful our action in the midst of so great\naffairs! We should school our ears to know the voices that are genuine,\nour thought to take the truth when it is spoken, our spirits to feel\nthe zest of the day. It is within our choice to be with mean company or\nwith great, to consort with the wise or with the foolish, now that the\ngreat world has spoken to us in the literature of all tongues and\nvoices. The best selected human nature will tell in the making of the\nfuture, and the art of being human is the art of freedom and of force.\n\n\n1 From \u201cLines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey,\u201d by William\nWordsworth.\u2014J.M.\n2 From \u201cThe Future,\u201d by Matthew Arnold.\u2014J.M.\n\n\nTHE END","title":"On Being Human","tradition":"philosophy-ethics","translated_text":null,"word_count":6833}