Page:Education and Life; (IA educationlife00bakerich).pdf/179

 makes of his vocation, his romance, exults and sings.

The world is as we regard it. Many look at the world as Doctor Holmes' squint-brained member of the tea-table views the plant kingdom. He makes the underground, downward-probing life of the tree the real life. The spreading roots are a great octopus, searching beneath instinctively for food, while the branches and leaves are mere terminal appendages swaying in the air. It is a horrible conception, and we are pained at standing on our heads. The tree roots itself to the earth and draws its nourishment therefrom that it may spring heavenward, and bear rich fruit and be a thing of beauty, a lesson and a promise. Man is rooted to the earth, but his real life springs into the free air and bathes in the glad sunlight.

The purpose of our labor determines its qualities of truth and healthfulness. Satisfaction must be sought by employing our faculties in the useful arts and in the search for truth. Perfection of self is the ultimate good for each individual, but this is attained, not in isolation, but in social life with its mutual obligations. The lesson of civil and religious liberty, taught by the great reformers, has been only partly learned. Individualism, rightly understood, is the true political doctrine, but the selfishness of individual freedom is the first quality to develop. Concerning great public questions often the attitude is as expressed in Balzac's words: "What is that to me? Each for himself! Let each man mind his own business!" Democracy is the way of social and political progress, but we have not yet