David Starr Jordan

“ That poetry was a means of grace was known to the first man who wrote a verse or who sang a ballad. It was discovered back in the darkness before men invented words or devised letters. The only poetry you will ever know is that you learned by heart when you were young. Happy is he who has learned much, and much of that which is good. Bad poetry is not poetry at all except to the man who makes it. For its creator, even the feeblest verse speaks something of inspiration and of aspiration. ”

“ All these represent a point of human contact and the reaction which makes for youth, for virtue and for enthusiasm.
To travel is merely to increase the variety of contact by giving our time to it, and by extending the number of points at which contact is possible. It may be that "he who wanders widest, lifts no more of beauty's jealous veils than he who from his doorway sees the miracle of flowers and trees." It is true, however, that the experiences of the traveler cover a wider range and fill his mind with a larger and more varied store of remembered delights. ”

“ Each leader of science and of intellectual life is in some degree the disciple of one who has planned and led before him. There is a heredity of intellect, a heredity of action, as subtle and as real as the heredity of the continuous germ-plasm. Ask the teacher who has helped mould your life, who in turn was his own master. In a very few generations you trace back your lineage to one of the great teachers the world knows and loves. Who was your teacher in Natural History in America? Was he a pupil of Agassiz, or was he a student of one of Agassiz's pupils? ”

“ The spirit of ragtime determines the six best sellers, the most popular policeman, the favorite congressman, the wealthiest corporation, the church which soonest rents its pews.
But it does not, control the man who thinks for himself. It has no lien on the movements of history, its decrees avail nothing in the fixing of truth. The movements of the stars pay it no tribute, neither do the movements of humanity. The power of graft is a transient deception. ”

“ Wherever snow falls or water flows or birds fly, wherever day and night meet in twilight, wherever the blue heaven is hung by clouds or sown with stars, wherever are forms with transparent boundaries, wherever are outlets into celestial spaces, wherever is danger and awe and love—there's Beauty, plenteous as rain shed for thee and though thou shouldst walk the world over thou shalt not be able to find a condition inopportune or ignoble. ”

“ Let us then fill our souls with noble ideals of knowledge, of art, of action. "Let us lay up a stock of enthusiasms in our youth, lest we reach the end of our journey with an empty heart, for we lose many of them by the way." ”

“ Old as the world is, let it be always new to us as we are new to it. Let it be every morning made afresh by Him who "instantly and constantly reneweth the work of creation." Let "the bit of green sod under your feet be the sweetest to you in this world, in any world." ”

“ The last paragraphs of this little essay were written within a huge hotel of steel and stone in the heart of a bustling city, in the most gracious of lands and under the bluest of skies. A great commercial city it was, a wondrous city, full of all manner of men—eager, impulsive, loving, enthusiastic men; men cunning and grasping, given over to all "high, hard lust and wilful deed;" carefree, joyous men living in the present and taking their chances for the future; men who have whistled all the airs that fluttering birds and frolicking children have learned to sing ”

“ Religion should be known by its tolerance, its broadmindedness, its faith in God and humanity, its recognition of the duty of action.
And action should be understood in a large way, the taking of one's part in affairs worth doing, not mere activity, nor fussiness, nor movement for movement's sake, like that of "ants on whom pepper is sprinkled." As the lesser enthusiasms fade and fail, one should take a stronger hold on the higher ones. ”

“ Joyous, free limbed, white toothed swimmers in Samoan surf, a Hawaiian eel-catcher, a Mexican peon with his "sombrero trailing in the dust," a deferential Japanese farm boy anticipating your every want, a sturdy Chinaman without grace and without sensitiveness, but with the saving quality of loyalty to his own word, herdsmen of the Pennine Alps, Aleuts, Indians and Negroes, each race has its noblemen and through these humanity is ennobled. ”

“ Without the saving grace of humor our Puritan conscience which we all possess would lead us again into all extravagance, witch-burnings, Quaker-stoning, heresy trials, and intolerance of politics and religion. From all these we are saved by our feeling for the incongruous. A touch of humor recalls us to our senses. It "makes the whole world kin." ”

“ When Agassiz died, the Harvard students "laid a wreath of laurel on his bier and their manly voices sang a requiem, for he had been a student all his life long, and when he died he was younger than any of them." Jefferson was in the seventies when he turned back to his early ambition, the foundation of the University of Virginia. The mother of Stanford University was older than Jefferson before she laid down the great work of her life as completed. When the heart is full, it shows itself in action as well as in speech. When the heart is empty, then life is no longer worth while. ”

“ In the arts of music and painting and sculpture, one may find not only professional satisfaction, but the strength that comes from higher living and more lofty feeling. In the study of history as biography, the acquaintance with the men and women of other times, those who have felt and thought and acted and suffered to make a freer world for you and me, like inspiration may be found. History is more than its incidents. It is the movement of man. ”

“ To learn good poetry by heart is to acquire help toward doing this instinctively, automatically, as other habits are acquired. In the affairs of life there is no form of good manners, no habit of usage more valuable than the habit of good English. And to this end the masters of English, from Chaucer to Tennyson, and in spite of perversities, we may add Emerson, Browning, and Kipling, have written English verse. It is not in verse alone that poetry is written. Sweetness and light and truth can be crystallized into prose, and prose well worthy to be borne in memory. ”

“ Half the joy of life is in little things taken on the run. Let us run if we must —even the sands do that—but let us keep our hearts young and our eyes open that nothing worth our while shall escape us. ”

“ There is a kind of music popular with uncritical audiences and with people who know no better, which answers to the name of "ragtime." It is the music of those who do not know good music or who have not the moral force to demand it. The spirit of ragtime is not confined to music: graft is the ragtime of business, the spoils system the ragtime of politics, adulteration the ragtime of manufacture. There is ragtime science, ragtime literature, ragtime religion. ”

“ The very humanity of men at large is in itself a source of inspiration. Study men on the trains, at the ferry, on the road, in the jungles of the forest or in the jungles of great cities,—"through the ages, every human heart is human." ”

“ He fancies himself poor, orphaned, insignificant. The mad crowd drives hither and thither, now furiously commanding this thing to be done, now that. What is he that he should resist their will and think and act for himself? Every moment new changes and new showers of deceptions to baffle and distract him. ”

“ Grand old men are those who have been grand young men, and carry still a young heart beneath old shoulders. There are plenty of such in our country to-day, though the average man begins to give up the struggle for the higher life at forty. President White, President Eliot, President Angell,—few men have left so deep an impression on the Twentieth Century. Edward Everett Hale, the teacher who has shown us what it is to have a country. Senator Hoar, Professor Agassiz, Professor Le Conte, Professor Shaler,—all these, whatever the weight of years, remained young men to the last. ”

“ In the love of nature is another source of saving grace. Science is power. In the stores of human experience lies the key to action, and modern civilization is built on Science. The love of nature is akin to Science but different. ”

“ And with this you may take many other bits of verse which were hammered out on the anvil of the terrible Civil War.
Perhaps these bits of verse chosen almost at random will not appeal to your taste. Then find some other verse that does. The range of literature is as wide as humanity. It touches every feeling, every hope, every craving of the human heart. Select what you can understand—best, what you can rise on tiptoe to understand. "It was my duty to have loved the highest." It is your duty toward poetry to take the highest you can reach. Then learn it by heart. Learn it when you are young. ”

“ Every god is there sitting in his sphere. The young mortal enters the hall of the firmament; there he is alone with them alone, they pronouncing on him benedictions and gifts, and beckoning him up to their thrones. On the instant and incessantly fall snow storms of illusions. ”

“ To make all this more direct we may look to the various sources from which enthusiasm may be derived. What does the school give us in this direction? Intellectual drill, broadening of mental horizon, professional training, all this we expect from school, college, and university and in every phase of this there is room for a thousand enthusiasms. Moreover, the school gives us comradeship, the outlook on the hopes and aspirations of our fellows. It opens to us the resources of young life, the luminous visions of the boys that are to be men. ”

“ The picturesque individual, the man who could not be counted with the mass, the David, the Christ, the Brutus, the Caesar, the Plato, the Alfred, the Charlemagne, the Cromwell, the Mirabeau, the Luther, the Darwin, the Helmholtz, the Goethe, the Franklin, the Hampden, the Lincoln, all these give inspiration to history. It is well that we should know them, should know them all, should know them well—an education is incomplete that is not built about a Pantheon, dedicated to the worship of great men. ”

“ The older students of Stanford will always show the traces of the master teacher Thoburn. "In terms of life," thus he construed all problems of Science, of Philosophy, of Religion. In terms of life, Thoburn's students will interpret all their own various problems, for in terms of life all things we do must finally be formulated. Every observation we make, every thought of our minds, every act of our hands has in some degree an ethical basis. ”

“ Gentle hearts and pure souls exist among our own unfortunates, those to whom our society has shown only its destroying side. All misery and failure as well as all virtue has its degrees, and our social scheme is still far from the demands of perfect justice. ”

“ His dream may be our inspiration as it passes, as its realization may be the inspiration of future generations. In the school is life in the making, and with the rest we are making our own lives with the richest materials ever at our hand. Life is contagious, and in the fact lies the meaning of Comradeship. ”

“ It is a wonderful thing to build a great city. Men can do this in a quarter century, working together each at his own part. More wonderful still is it to be a city, for a city is composed of men, and now, ever and forever the man must rise above his own creations. That which is in the man is greater than all that he can do. ”

“ It involves something of right or wrong, and without adhesion to right, all thought, all action must end in folly. And there is no road to righteousness so sure as that which has right living as a traveling companion. ”

“ And everything is worth our while, if we only grasp it and its significance. As we grow older it becomes harder to do this. A grown man sees nothing he was not ready to see in his youth. So long as enthusiasm lasts, so long is youth still with us. ”

“ They never heard of Spaulding, and do not know that he is their neighbor, notwithstanding I heard him whistle as he drove his team through their house. Nothing can equal the serenity of their lives. Their coat of arms is simply a lichen. ”

“ Never before has the common man shown himself so hopeful, so courageous, so sure of himself and his future. For it is the man, after all, that survives and it is the will of man that shapes the fates. ”

“ To see the funny side of one's own accomplishments is the highest achievement of the American philosopher and there is hope for the land in which the greatest wits have been the most earnest of moral teachers. ”

“ We hear much in these days of the wickedness of power, of the evil behavior of men in high places, of men in low places, and men whom the people have been perforce obliged to trust. This is no new thing, though the struggle against it, the combination of the forces of reform and blackmail, of dreamers and highwaymen, is offering some new phases. ”

“ One who has traveled among simple-living people, men and women we call savages, because they live in the woods and not in cleared land or cities, will bear witness that a savage may be a perfect gentleman. ”

“ But even the main herd of fools may teach its lesson to the student of human nature. It gives at least a point of departure in the study of wisdom. To study men or to kill time. What is your motive? The poorest use of time is to kill it. ”