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lover of rose-gardens doubtless is master of a blameless
joy. He is a leisurist first of all, delighting in the
quiet life and silently acquiescing in the great law
of the unimportance of the individual. He has his pleasure
of life behind his garden walls, in sunshine and seclusion,
while the pageant of the world goes by with all its
drums and pennons. With shouts and cheers and martial
strains the concourse is parading down the road; but
your rose lover only sees the dust, only feels the confusion,
and turns to his flower-beds with a happy heart. Let
others do what they will, his soul prefers peace and
the quietude of his own small plot of earth. [Page
60]
Yet he is no idler. With diligence
he tends his beloved companions — trims and waters,
shelters and weeds, with untiring zest. And all his
reward is beauty, the generous responsive beauty of
the earth — the soul of the ground made visible
in roses. At nightfall, I doubt not, he had dreams of
his own. In the silent silver moonlight, sifting through
the tall elms, he broods among his sumptuous beauties
slumbering on their stalks. He devises new varieties
to be evolved in time; he lays out new domains for crimson
favourites, and brings wild corners under cultivation
for his lovely friends. His mind is not idle, you may
be sure, as he paces to and fro in the warm air under
the stars. He is an artist and a labourer in one; to
the labourer’s rewards of careless health and
freedom of mind, he adds the artist’s joy.
The
elements are kind to the lover of flowers; sun and rain
and air conspire to second the toil of his hand; and
while he sleeps his [Page 61] designs
are being accomplished. Of what other craft can so much
be said?
It
was not really the compensations of gardening, however,
that I had in mind when I began these notes this morning,
but the pleasures and rewards of a different sort of
culture, which gardening only symbolizes. I mean, of
course, the culture of ourselves. For every one of us
is a garden. I may be full of nettles and pigweed; you
may be full of lilies and lavender. You may have a rich,
deep soil; mine may be sandy and dry. You may bask toward
the south in the sun of circumstance, while I have to
front the north of dreary adversity. Still, here we
are awaiting the gardener’s care. Let us go in
and cultivate ourselves. For, if you think we can lie
here in the weather waiting for some fabulous divine
gardener to come along and do all the weeding, and digging,
and sowing, and scuffling for us, while we have only
to bloom and absorb moisture, you are sadly in error.
There is no gardener but oneself. And you may [Page
62] construct a fine esoteric poem on the subject,
concluding with the line:
“Myself
the weeder and the weed.”
This
is a mystery, but it is sober truth, too. And the garden
in which we are placed may be divided, for convenience,
into two or three parts. There is the garden of the
mind, for instance, which we are sent to college to
cultivate. And there is the garden of the body, which
we too often shamefully neglect. Indeed, some misguided
folk would have you believe that one is a rose-garden,
while the other is only a despised vegetable patch.
But this is not true, as every man who has tried faithfully
to cultivate his body knows. If you have never made
the attempt, why not take up the care of your body for
one year. Find where it needs attention. Lavish upon
it all the thoughtful consideration you would give to
the culture of your mind. Tend it with patience, enrich
it with understanding. Work with all the science and
enthusiasm [Page 63] of a true horticulturist.
And watch for the flowers of grace and strength to grow
and prosper under your care.
Very
likely your body is sadly neglected. You must overlook
the whole ground, first of all, to see where there is
the greatest need of attention. You will probably have
to have some advice at first, for an instinct for perfection
is apt to be blunted from long disuse. But, once aroused,
it will soon revive to its normal function; you will
begin to know intuitively what food are good, for instance,
and what exercises most helpful.
If
your wrist is stiff and your arm unlimber, take some
exercise that will correct the fault. Then diligently
practice that gymnastic, and watch the results. You
will begin to see perfection of arm movement and wrist
motion gradually spring into life like fair, unfolding
blossoms. You will be capable of beauties of graceful
exertion which you have never dreamed you could possess.
If
your voice is weak and unmusical, learn [Page
64] to breathe; then learn to produce tones;
then learn the right conformity of the mouth for the
production of the legitimate sounds of speech; then
learn to add expression. You will find you have acquired
a beautiful torso and a fine carriage, better possessions
than we often buy.
And
so on through all the muscles and members; let none
be neglected, for none are despicable or useless, and
all are needed for the final perfection. Your great
reward will come, when (long after you have cast off
all harmful and absurd restrictions of fashion) your
cultures begins to show itself in perfect mobility and
poise, and when, as a last test of normal being, you
begin to be aware of the rhythms of your own body. Most
of us pass our lives without ever being once awake to
this sense of divine joy, this rapture of musical motion.
And yet rhythmic mobility is a source of happiness,
a means of health and a magical creator of beauty.
It
cannot surely be very long before we [Page 65]
amend our standards of education, so as to
place the body on an equal footing with the mind. We
are suffering for our neglect. If we make body culture
as important as mental and spiritual culture, we should
be much happier, for we should be much better balanced
and much more normal. All the attention we have come
to give to sports and out-of-door pastimes is itself
evident of our instinctive tendency to better things,
to a completer culture; and still we are only beginning
to learn the possibilities of bodily culture, and its
imperative necessity as a factor in human perfection.
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66]
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