The Story of Mankind [171]
took years and years of hard
work before the doctors could convince the people of this fact.
Few of us now fear the dentist chair. A study of the microbes
that live in our mouth has made it possible to keep our
teeth from decay. Must perchance a tooth be pulled, then we
take a sniff of gas, and go our way rejoicing. When the newspapers
of the year 1846 brought the story of the ``painless
operation'' which had been performed in America with the help
of ether, the good people of Europe shook their heads. To
them it seemed against the will of God that man should escape
the pain which was the share of all mortals, and it took a long
time before the practice of taking ether and chloroform for
operations became general.
But the battle of progress had been won. The breach in the
old walls of prejudice was growing larger and larger, and as
time went by, the ancient stones of ignorance came crumbling
down. The eager crusaders of a new and happier social order
rushed forward. Suddenly they found themselves facing a new
obstacle. Out of the ruins of a long-gone past, another citadel
of reaction had been erected, and millions of men had to give
their lives before this last bulwark was destroyed.
ART
A CHAPTER OF ART
WHEN a baby is perfectly healthy and has had enough to eat
and has slept all it wants, then it hums a little tune to show how
happy it is. To grown-ups this humming means nothing. It
sounds like ``goo-zum, goo-zum, goo-o-o-o-o,'' but to the baby
it is perfect music. It is his first contribution to art.
As soon as he (or she) gets a little older and is able to sit
up, the period of mud-pie making begins. These mud-pies do
not interest the outside world. There are too many million
babies, making too many million mud-pies at the same time.
But to the small infant they represent another expedition into
the pleasant realm of art. The baby is now a sculptor.
At the age of three or four, when the hands begin to obey
the brain, the child becomes a painter. His fond mother gives
him a box of coloured chalks and every loose bit of paper is
rapidly covered with strange pothooks and scrawls which represent
houses and horses and terrible naval battles.
Soon however this happiness of just ``making things''
comes to an end. School begins and the greater part of the
day is filled up with work. The business of living, or rather
the business of ``making a living,'' becomes the most important
event in the life of every boy and girl. There is little time left
for ``art'' between learning the tables of multiplication and the
past participles of the irregular French verbs. And unless
the desire for making certain things for the mere pleasure of
creating them without any hope of a practical return be very
strong, the child grows into manhood and forgets that the
first five years of his life were mainly devoted to art.
Nations are not different from children. As soon as the
cave-man had escaped the threatening dangers of the long and
shivering ice-period, and had put his house in order, he began
to make certain things which he thought beautiful, although
they were of no earthly use to him in his fight with the wild
animals of the jungle. He covered the walls of his grotto with
pictures of the elephants and the deer which he hunted, and
out of a piece of stone, he hacked the rough figures of those
women he thought most attractive.
As soon as the Egyptians and the Babylonians and the
Persians and all the other people of the east had founded
their little countries along the Nile and the Euphrates, they
began to build magnificent palaces for their kings, invented
bright pieces of jewellery for their women and planted gardens
which sang happy songs of colour with their many bright flowers.
Our own ancestors, the wandering nomads from the distant
Asiatic prairies, enjoying a free and easy existence as
work before the doctors could convince the people of this fact.
Few of us now fear the dentist chair. A study of the microbes
that live in our mouth has made it possible to keep our
teeth from decay. Must perchance a tooth be pulled, then we
take a sniff of gas, and go our way rejoicing. When the newspapers
of the year 1846 brought the story of the ``painless
operation'' which had been performed in America with the help
of ether, the good people of Europe shook their heads. To
them it seemed against the will of God that man should escape
the pain which was the share of all mortals, and it took a long
time before the practice of taking ether and chloroform for
operations became general.
But the battle of progress had been won. The breach in the
old walls of prejudice was growing larger and larger, and as
time went by, the ancient stones of ignorance came crumbling
down. The eager crusaders of a new and happier social order
rushed forward. Suddenly they found themselves facing a new
obstacle. Out of the ruins of a long-gone past, another citadel
of reaction had been erected, and millions of men had to give
their lives before this last bulwark was destroyed.
ART
A CHAPTER OF ART
WHEN a baby is perfectly healthy and has had enough to eat
and has slept all it wants, then it hums a little tune to show how
happy it is. To grown-ups this humming means nothing. It
sounds like ``goo-zum, goo-zum, goo-o-o-o-o,'' but to the baby
it is perfect music. It is his first contribution to art.
As soon as he (or she) gets a little older and is able to sit
up, the period of mud-pie making begins. These mud-pies do
not interest the outside world. There are too many million
babies, making too many million mud-pies at the same time.
But to the small infant they represent another expedition into
the pleasant realm of art. The baby is now a sculptor.
At the age of three or four, when the hands begin to obey
the brain, the child becomes a painter. His fond mother gives
him a box of coloured chalks and every loose bit of paper is
rapidly covered with strange pothooks and scrawls which represent
houses and horses and terrible naval battles.
Soon however this happiness of just ``making things''
comes to an end. School begins and the greater part of the
day is filled up with work. The business of living, or rather
the business of ``making a living,'' becomes the most important
event in the life of every boy and girl. There is little time left
for ``art'' between learning the tables of multiplication and the
past participles of the irregular French verbs. And unless
the desire for making certain things for the mere pleasure of
creating them without any hope of a practical return be very
strong, the child grows into manhood and forgets that the
first five years of his life were mainly devoted to art.
Nations are not different from children. As soon as the
cave-man had escaped the threatening dangers of the long and
shivering ice-period, and had put his house in order, he began
to make certain things which he thought beautiful, although
they were of no earthly use to him in his fight with the wild
animals of the jungle. He covered the walls of his grotto with
pictures of the elephants and the deer which he hunted, and
out of a piece of stone, he hacked the rough figures of those
women he thought most attractive.
As soon as the Egyptians and the Babylonians and the
Persians and all the other people of the east had founded
their little countries along the Nile and the Euphrates, they
began to build magnificent palaces for their kings, invented
bright pieces of jewellery for their women and planted gardens
which sang happy songs of colour with their many bright flowers.
Our own ancestors, the wandering nomads from the distant
Asiatic prairies, enjoying a free and easy existence as