An absence from one's own country for almost eleven years makes one timid about forming conclusions—for one's old premises have disappeared. All my visits to the United States had been under definite instructions; I had had no time to cx amine conditions leisurely and little opportunity to meet again those groups of gentlemen on whose impressions I relied. Returning, I had everything to learn. The war had had a marked effect on arts, letters and the theatre and the point of view of the American people towards the social problems much discussed in 1906 had become entirely different.
During my conges at home, I had formed the opinion that the whisky habit was growing in the United States. I was in Washington and in New York during one Christmas week and it seemed to me from the appearance of the streets that my people were as drunken as most of the inhabitants of Belfast.
It was only reasonable to expect that something would be done to abolish the saloon and to make the drinking of whisky less common. But it never occurred to me that our people would consent to such an unscientific remedy as that of prohibition. It was plain that something must be done to save the youth of the country and to stop the habit of drinking which was making thousands of families miserable. After all, I had learned in Europe one lesson—that laws were not passed thoughtlessly, carelessly, for merely partisan and fanatical motives, and without the advice of scientific experts.
It became plain to me that the non.conformist clement which rules our country was stronger than ever. It was made up of well-meaning but semi-educated persons, whose principles and prejudices were mcitricably mixed; who had not learned that a straight line in the practical affairs of life is not always the most effective means of reaching good ends. Puritans are always devoted to geometry, and they seem to have no knowledge of the cultural arts or of those many complications that make up humanity. This question of drink was to the mind of a man, who was a newcomer in his own country, the main problem after the successful conclusion of the war, that we had to meet. Coupled with this was the decay of a belief in and knowledge of those liberal principles of democracy which the fathers of our country had taught and practised. In fact, partisanship and fanaticism seemed to have taken the place of those principles which made American ideas both sympathetic and workable.
I discovered that the United States was, from the European point of view, regarded as the least free nation in the sphere of western civilization. It was very hard to meet the arguments of my European friends, who had at least not lost the habit of thinking for themselves, against the practical disfranchisement of the colored people in the South. I might say what I chose as to the expediency of this disfranchisement; but it was ineffectual, and later our favorite word, "self-determination," was constantly thrown into my teeth. I soon dropped the use of the phrase, "making the world safe for democracy." Some talks with Dr. Booker Washington, who was inclined to be optimistic and uncritical, had led me to feel that on certain questions silrnce was much better than speech.
The quality of our legislators seemed to have deteriorated greatly. One had only to go into the Senate or the House and to compare the speeches of senators and representatives with what one had heard in the 'seventies and 'eighties, to feel strongly that there was something radically wrong with the American people if these men were their voluntarily chosen delegates. A recent visit to Milwaukee and an examination of the mental attitude of Wisconsin legislators, as expressed in their speeches, has corroborated this impression. If you want to believe that democracy is safe in the hands of Wisconsin legislators, just drop into Madison and look them over!
Fortunately, during the war, our books of fiction had not been permeated by qualities which made some of the representative fiction writers of English obnoxious to every clean-minded person. The Japanese amateur of English literature who once said, speaking of the kind of books printed before the war in England, that "a people represented by such novels ought to be conquered and reformed" was almost right. It would be unfair to the mass of English people to believe that The Pretty Lady of Arnold Bennett and even The Devil's Garden by that most skilled of all English novelists, Maxwell, really represented the ethics of the English nation.
Unhappily, since the war, American novels have became wbat thc pro-war English novel was. It is the fashion to blame the indecency of the novelists, their perversions and their tendency to be Zolacsque without thc talent of Zola, on the war. The war, in fact, is blamed for almost everything that is obnoxious to good morals or good taste. In truth, war does not make a grcat change in the morality of people; it probably makes the bad worse and the good better.
It had seemed as if nothing under heaven could awaken the American people from their insularity. The war did not do it, but thc attempts at reconstruction have begun to do it. Europe and America are slowly discovering each other.
It was a delightful surprise for me, then, to discover that in the United States we had the best character actors in the world. I have not as yet seen any great American actor; but for stage management in the best of our theatres, for the selection of types, for the fine art of acting what are ailed character parts, there are no better players in the world today, nor excepting even those of the Comedie Francaise or of the Moscow Art Theatre, than the American.
The English, of course, will always object to our accent, but they accept with great case a French or Hungarian accent, and Modjeska never suffered in their eyes, or did Ristori for her touch of farcigriess. It may be saId that these were truly great actors and that they were a law unto thcmsclvcs. But after all the foreign opinion of our stage is not really important to us. It is sufficient for us to know that we have brought the art of acting to a high point of perfection. It may be said that thc theatre, undcr present management which is largely commercial, is not really friendly to thc highest art. But I am not speaking of the highest art; but only of a very finc art cxertcd in what may be called minor parts. For example, whatever may be said about the merits of the play itself, an experienced theatre-goer can conceive of no better acting than that in Rain; and what can be said except in praise of the production of The Rivals, with Francis Wilson in the part of Bob Acres?
It was borne in upon mc that I should end this volume of recollections on a very personal note. I argued against it, because I think that the book itself has been so very personal; and its effect on mc is to give me the impression—borrowed from an oftrepeated nightmarc—that I am standing in the middle of a drawing-room in my shirt sleeves. At my age, however, I may be forgivcn, not for moralizing, but for expressing skccrely the results of the experience of a man rapidly nearing his seventy-second year.
In thc first place, looking back—if I had my lifc to go over again, I should never worry about anything that might happen—during my long life the things that I worried about never happened, and the things to which I gave no unhappy thought always happened. I should like to say, too, for the benefit of the young, that when one is old, one regrets not the sins one has committed so much as the good deeds one might have performed. As a Christian, I trust that I can leave my sins to Christ, who is more merciful than man; but I can never forgive myself for not having been keener to discover means of helping others.
It may be considered sentimental to say or to repeat what is often said—that the only treasure for the old is the love of one's family and one's friends. I have been sevemi times on the verge of death, but under the providence of God I could not die because of the knowledge that my death would bring unhappiness to others.
And even since the one whose love and understanding were most constant has, after forty years of happiness in my life passed away, I still feel that it is love which gives rue the will to live and the will to live really means living. The sort of an exile, an exile who became thoroughly American, whose love for his native country always reminded mc of Gilder's exquisite line:
A pearly shell
Which murmurs of the far-off murmuring sea.
War, I am told by high authorities, like scandals, will be always with us. From my experience and observation, I think that.,war ought to be—in a world that pretends to be Christian—impossible. As waged today it has no rcdceming quality, and its results can be only evil. But whether (here shall be ncw wars or not depends on the civilizing of the human race. It ought to be remembered that the angels, announcing the coming of Christ, promised peace, not to all mankind, but to men of good will. Whether the unspeakable horrors of war shall be renewed or not, depends entirely on the instruction and education of mankind, in which the least of us can take part.
(From the last chapter of Recollections of a Happy Life, soon to be published by the George H. Doran Company.)
