Page:Hermione and her little group of serious thinkers (1923, c1916).djvu/126

 ON BEING OTHER-WORLDLY

T is not enough to be merely unworldly. One must be Other-Worldly as well, if you get what I mean.

For what does all our Modern Thought amount to if it does not minister to the Beautiful and the Spiritual?

Isn't Materialism simply frightful?

For the undisciplined mind, I mean. Of course, the right sort of mind will get good even out of Materialism, and the wrong sort will get harm out of it.

Every time before I take up anything new I ask myself, "Is it Other-Worldly? Or is it not Other-Worldly?"

We were going to take up Malthusianism and Mendelism—our Little Group of Serious Thinkers, you know—and give a whole evening to them, but one of the girls said, "Oh, let's not take them up. They sound frightfully chemical, somehow!"

I said, "The question, my dear, is not whether they are chemical or un-chemical. The question is, Are they worldly? Or are they Other-Worldly?" [112]