Prev | Current Page 231 | Next

Brisbane, Arthur, 1864-1936

"Editorials from the Hearst Newspapers"



THE EARTH IS ONLY A FRONT YARD
The philosophers, political economists, lawmakers, editors,
sociologists, and all the other would-be deep thinkers of this
earth, are really engaged in a pretty small business.
We are like a swarm of human beings cast away on some desert
island. This earth is our island, a little island in space, and
it is a desert island and a badly arranged island in more ways
than one. Many of us lack good dwellings, some of us lack food,
all of us are worried about the future. The island is infested
with mosquitoes and with diseases that we have not learned to
conquer. There are many criminals on it that prey upon the
honest people--criminals at the top and criminals at the bottom
of society.
And all of those who think and sympathize with their fellow
creatures are busy with the problem of putting things right on
this little desert island that carries us along in the wake of
the sun.
Most of us imagine that the most important work for men is the
organization of life on this little planet. That is a very small
and mean idea of man's real destiny.
When a man builds a house, the planning of sanitary arrangements
must first be attended to. After that begin the real life
and the real interests. That real life and those real interests
are not confined to the front yard or the back yard of the man
that owns the house.


Pages:
219 220 221 222 223 224 225 226 227 228 229 230 231 232 233 234 235 236 237 238 239 240 241 242 243