Page:The Genius of America (1923).pdf/111



If Puritanism is, as I have been contending that it is, an essentially non-conforming spirit, then its most formidable adversary should be an essentially conforming spirit. And contrary to the general impression of the facts, the spirit in ouf present younger generation which is most deeply at variance with traditional Puritanism is not its sporadic rebelliousness but its prevailing readiness to conform. Current criticism, confining itself chiefly to manners and "minor morals" scents a revolt and a flying-off where a deeper consideration discovers rather a slavish conformity.

The social censors have been reporting lately, in high excitement, that our young people exhibit signs of moral deterioration, that they are already crowned with vine leaves and dancing like bacchants down the primrose way. When one corners a censor and demands point-blank what is wrong, one is not quite adequately answered. What one ordinarily receives is an