The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, March 4, 1906, Page 27

THE SAN FRANCISCO CALL, SUNDAY, MARCH 4%, o R R | }_.,« — MIND the r- THE E does alf in doesn’t loro- would not have | on the brains of the | foliow the great wheel | receptive, piastic | travel with the | of the world, the | a 40 laining away of hich Osler is popula i in regard to the use- ho are over 40 and chloroforming them ached 60, there is still statements to show in favor of the nd a belfever that | dispense with over 4. To the hich the publication sed he has repijed: ticism has shaken my & work of the 1 is done by men sent book of es to old age st from the t of the day the ed terms of e connected with | the eminently spirits n charac! Egyptian > “You Hel- € but children; t mong you you are all young { the success of the French Louis, he attributes it to t seven years, con- g the whole of his time and tal- rigorous, impartial observation, these years were taken from what s the flower of his bodily and owers—estimated from 33 fo 40. Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes,, who be 85, he says, “the freshness y of his mind had never falled,” had, “to use the expression of Franklin, intruded himself y years into the company of if the author had not men- last phrase as being from one would have thought it a ginal expression of Osler upon In some remarks upon the ad- of making periodical changes in teaching staffs, he says: “It persimmon to tell how some i n -even lovable and righteous men ther respects—have the hardihood to | years | parish which | the old doctor, because he and the young 7 (M 0. WILZLLA. ERY LRSI T ALe FOR D@PTORA Y : & : TR - Eppie’s firm and beautiful faith in Occi- dental beliefs fails to convert him from his Oriental apathy. - His is the philoso- phy that to seek for the happiness of the individua) life is illusion and futile folly, and to gain reabsorption in the universal spirit is the only, hope for surcease of mental pain. 7 Many beautiful passages tell of Eppie's opposition to this view, but it might, be briefed into Tennyson's words that such A “faith is vague as all unsweet.” Cer- tainly in this case it wrecked the sweet- ness of two fates and made the love pas- B, 1906. ; QALD. P AT boys! Forty-nine-four!” and the salute would invariably be answered with ‘Six further on, boys! Six further on!” The significance of this was that, in the *Sacred Songs and Solos,’ a number of copifes of the small edition of which had been sent to the front, No. 494 was, ‘God be with you till we meet again’; and six further on than 494, or No. 500. was ‘Blessed Assurance.’ Another anecdote which Illustrates the ywer of hymns even in very distant and very different places from churches is an interesting one concerning the beautiful sion of Gavan and Evple so vague and | sacred song written by the poetess Phoebe futile a thing that it threw a shadow over the life of both. Out of the vague stuff of this mystic Oriental philosophy— coming in to complicate the love-life of a man, and woman, is the plot of the story built up. I will give you two extracts— one in which the author graphieally de- seribes Eppie, and the other in which that young woman, who sacrificed her life through hard work done for the un- fortunates of London's East End, beau- tifully expresses her faith in the Western philosophy of life while trying to re- conyert her lover back to the joys of mortal life and belier in individual im- mortality: He had heard many analogles for the haunt- ing anq fugltive charm of Miss‘Gifford’s face— a charm that could only, apparently, be caught with the subtleties of antithesis. " One appre- clator had said that she was like an angelic jockey: another, that with a statesman’s g: she had a baby's smile; another that she a Flying Vietory done by Velasquez. And with bis own dominant impression of strength, sweetness and daring there crowded other similes. Her eyes had the steeplechaser’s hard; smiling scrutiny of the next jump; the halloo of the hunt under a morning sky. in them, the jeyous shouts of Spartan boys at play: vyet, though eyes of heroism and laughter, they werk eyes sad and almost tragically benignant. . : . . . > “You see life as what? he asked her, Epple, unconscious, was finding wor As something mysterious, beautiful. Cary, called “Nearer Home.” The story is that a gentleman traveling in China went into ome of the back rooms of a hotel at Macao where was gathered a company of gamblers. There he saw an Ametican about twenty years old, play- ing with a gray-haired old mapn. As the old gambler was shuffiing the cards the young man began, to sing in a careless way that celebrated hymn concerning the ever nearer approach of death which Phoebé Cary poetically thought of as *“Nearer Home.” “Where did you learn that song?”’ ask- ed the otd man. The youth pretended he ‘was not aware that he had been singing. “Well; no matter,” said his listener, “I have played my last game, and that's the end of it. The cards may lie there till doomsday, and I'll never pick them up.” He had won a hundred dollars from the young man, but he immediately gave it back and told him to “do good with it,” he intended henceforth to do with his. A letter received long afterward showed that the old man's reformation from gambling to useful work was a permanent one. To those who do not remember Phoebe '‘=7y's hymn, the casual humming of which at a gambling table made so great Some- ! @ change in an old man’s life, the men- stay in the same position for twenty-five To & man of active mind too long attachme ollege is apt to breed self-sath >w his outlook, to d to promote senil- iclans who do not keep up with the advancing science of the profession by reading books and and going out to hear lectures, is a waste of time, nd he feels better at home aps that is the best place for a has reached this stage of in- tellectual stagnation.” In showing the mutual advantages to be got by the as- sociation of youth with age, he “Not vy the older man, if he has soft in his gray cortex, pick up many from the young fellow, but there h clinical wisdom afloat in each s now wasted or dies with only ma points m men havi er been on friendly Callin ttention to the some men to gain wisdom by experi- ce, Osler says: “Growth in the a quisition of facts is not necessarily as- sociated with development. Many grow through life as the erystal, imple aceretion, and at 50 possess vary the figure, the unicellular mental blas- toderm with which they, started.” 1In evidence of the long toil that lies be- fore the young physician we get this The physician develops more slowly | than the surgeo: and success comes ater. There are surgeons at 4 and in full practice and at the top of the wave, a time at which the physician is only preparing to reap the harvest of patient toil.” Quoting Bassett on the Incessant activity of the French physicians, he says: “Old men daily may be seen mixing their white locks with b and pursuing their profes- sion with the ardoer of youth.” Singling out the two most sweeping views we ge: of life, he says: “From two points alone have we a wide and satisfactory view of life—one, as amid the glorious tint of the early morn, ere the dew of youth has been brushed off. we stand at the foot of the hill, eagér for the journey; the Other wider, perhaps less satisfactory, as we gaze from the sum- mit at the lengthening shadows of the setting sun.” The foregoing extracts, which have been selected with purpose of showing Csler's general attitude in regard to old age, are not to be taken as indi- cating that the book is to any consid- erable extent a treatise on that sub- ject of senility with which his name has become a synonym: it is a book of counsels and ideals on a wide variety of subjects. It tells of the humanities in medicine, and of catholicity, hon- esty, truth, accuracy and thorough- ness; of encouragement and influence; of patient devotion to duty and high ideals; of charity and fraternity in medicine; of work and of religion, death and immortality. Perhaps the extract that will best illustrate the enthusiastic idea the author has of the exaltation of his profession is the fol- Jowing, taken from the section on “Duty end High Ideals.” It is to be noted that Osler regards the practice of medicine as “an art, not a trade.” and he-gets stimulus for fine work in that art by contemplating what must be the imspiration of the great artists of the world's history: 3% Sitting in Lincoln Cathedral and gazing one of the loveliest of human works °* * there arose within me * a strong sense of reverence for the minds which had con- ceived and_the hands which had executed such things of beauty. * * * What was the se- cret of their art? By what spirit were they moved? Absorbed In thought, I did not heag the beginning of the musie, and then, as a responee to my revery and arousing me {rom it, rang out the clear voice of the boy leading the antiphon, ““That Thy power, Thy glory, and the mightiness of Thy kingdom might be known unto men.” Here was the answer, (Houghton, Miffiin & Co., Boston and New York. $1.25 net) ANNE SEDGWICK’S SHADOW OF LIFE Somber us its title is the new novel at by Anpe Douglas Sedgwick, called “The Shadow of Life.” The shadow of life in this case was the shadow which a man and a woman cast upon each other’s lives. Not even the con- ventional happy ending lightens up the gloom of the story. Even the dark- ness of the ending is a blessed relief after having too much of a fonotony of happy ending stories—until you be- come impressed with the thought that fictigh is untrue to life. It is a peculiar | book -and in it the author describes un- usual people, as is her wont. It is a | story of a man and a weman who love | each other, both characters fine in a | way, but who never marry, and the only {bar to their union is the man’s will Strangely ungallant and unmanly that sounds when bluntly stated; but Anne Sedgwick takes up a large part of a book to explain the development of the character of this odd mystic who be- lieved the girl he loved and who loved him could not find her life’s happiness in marriage with him. “I'd kill you with the greatest pleas- ure—if it would do her any good.” These angry words were addressed to the non-marrying man’ by one of his | rivals. “Yes—I quite understand that. So would 1,” Gavan acquiesced, “kill my- gelf, T mean—if it would do her any good.” u Jove her.” “Not as she must be loved. I only want her when I am selfish. When I think for her I have no want at all,” “I consider you a madman.” “Perhaps I am one. You don’t think it for Eppie's happiness to marry a madman?” In that brief conversation between the man the woman loved but who would not marry her, and the man !w}m wished to marry the woman but whose suit was refused because of her love for the other, you have a situa- tion which it takes the whole of a fair- ly writen and sincerely thoughtful book to work up to as the natural finality { between three lives ‘which had been ?oul;ld together by ties of friendly af- ection ever since the haj days of childhood. PO WERaLY The scene of the story opens in Scot- land., where the children are friends to- gether at the house of Epple's uncle. Here some of the best work of the book is done. Eppie, the brave and bright- minded little girl, who becomes the hero- ine of the tale, is made to live before us quite vividly, as her girlish admiration and affection is given to the boy, Gavan, who in maturity becomes her lover, but an unhappy mystic, and by a devotion to a false philosophy puts a shadow upon his own and upon Epple's life. This de- scription of childhood life, which takes up Part I of the novel, can much more safely be commended as sure and whole- some art than can the relation of the history of the characters after they have grown to manhood and womanhood. Eppie, however, is interesting and lov- able all the way through, and a book is lnlwnys readable if it has a flne woman n it. 4 } Gavan's life is embittered even from boyhood because of the ill treatment that was dealt out to his beloved mother by his brutal father, who was an army offi- cer in Indla. This is-intensified by the enforced separation of the mother and son and the hindrances put in his way of his eager ambition to save her and make her life happy. He is quite religlous as a boy, but later in life becomes skeptical as to the religion of his own race, and adopts that of the Indian mystics with ‘whose explanation of the mystery of life and the of escape from its evils he becomes so deeply Imvpressed that e i ond 99 | Aeve. 7ricd 7 i 7 o Y YOU 22 \ 1§ propase 1 fell you e seeret of lif«g§ as | have sean fhe - -Moweli could only et 7he Aclp of Holi and Aiesons Oy sending fhem 7he masterword - -This | propose 1o give Thoush @ litfle onc the mas N fer-vord Iaoms lorée in megning. - -+ The mirgcles of lie qre with it - - - Not only Aes it been e touchstone of progress but it is M. measure of succerr in evenydey life. Noto men before you but 1 beholden. 7o it for Ais position Acte.while He who addresses you fias the Aonour directly in consequence of Aaving, hed it graven on Aig heart when Ae v@s a8 you are o-day. And fhe mas- terword is WORK) : WillemOsler : " (FromCounsels and Ideals) = me plgved, fo play it myself. —_— L - PORTRAIT OF DR.| WILLIAM OSLER, AT OXFORD, A IN MEDICINE." 3o :GIUS PROFESSOR ]g A PASSAGE FROM HIS ESSAY ON “THE MASTER-WORD — OF MEDICINE thing strange, yet near, like the thought of a tion of a few of its lines may call it back: mother about her unborn child, but, still, like the thought of an unborn child about its ‘unknown -mother. We are such unborn children. And this something mysterious and beautiful says: ‘‘Come; through thorns, over chasms, vast terrors and in darkness. So, one goes."” Those quotations, I think, show Anne Douglas Sedgwick at her best. And I think most of her readers will admire this bit—Iit comes just after Gavan has told Eppie that he must go out of her life, because, as he said, “I am its shadow—its fatal shadow.” .The trope of the cathedral and the Venusberg is especially good: She made no gesture, no appeal. Her face was like a rock. It was only that deep em- durance and, under it. that decp threat. Never, never would she allure; never draw him to her; never build In her cathedraf a Ven: for him. He must come to her. He must | kneel with her before her dltar. ~He must worship with her, her god Of suffering and triumph, 7 (The Century Company, New York, $1.50.) SANKEY’S STORY OF GOSPEL HYMNS “Sankey's Story of the Gospel Hymns,” by Ira D.'Sankey, who so ably performed the songster side of the work done by that s team of re- vivalists, Moody ‘and Sankey, is a his- tory of hymns and incidents connected with their composition and use. The little volume will be of interest to those who love music, to these who love religion, and some of it will be quite entertaining to even those ":o neither like religion nor care much for ‘“con- cord of sweet sounds,” but who will listen willingly to the telling of good anecdotes. One of the anecdotal pas- sages which will make its appeal to all those who. love the joys of comrade- ship and delight in the use of s leths of friendly protherhood following incident 6f the Afr! “During the recent war in the Trans. yaal, when the' soldiers g to th front were passing another | ~of sol- diers whom they recognized, their greetings used to ‘Forty-nine-four, | Ore sweetly solemn thought Comes to me o'er and o'er— I'm nearer home today Than I ever have been before. &Sk e e e e Nearer the bound of life, . Where we lay qur burdéns down. Closer and closer my steps Come to the dread abysm; Closer Death to my lips Presses the awful chrism. | / . Let me feel as T would, when I stand On the shore of the river of Death. (The Sunday School Times Company, Philadelphia. 75 cents.) ORIENTAL STUDIES BY L. D. BURDICK Four interesting essays by Lewis Day- ton Burdick, author of “Magic and Hus- bandry,” are bound into a little book un- der the title of “Oriental Studies.”” They concern ancient writings which have been modernly revealed to us. The four papers are ‘‘Antiquity of Our Ethical Ideals,” “Some Variants of the Tale of the 4 tes on Faiths and Folklore of the Moon,” “Epics Before the Flood.”” In the paper on the antiquity of our ethical ideals we are given some curious facts in regard to how exceedingly an- clent is that ethical code known as the Mosaic law, or ten commandments, and which are often asserted to be the ground- work of the civil and moral low of all enlightened nations. Centuries before | AND SOME OTHER POOKS et l thou shalt not bear false witness against I solely because we have abused our pow- thy neighbor; thou shalt-not take the|ersof auto-suggestion.”—Jean Finotin La name of the Lord thy God in vain.” Those words are in the chapter which deseribes the Hall of Osiris. In the essay of “Variants of the Tale of the Kings' occurs the following account of the deification of Aesculapius: “It is said that Aesculaplus was human in Homer's time, and just the ‘blamegless physician,” but later was given the at- tributes of a god, restored the dead to life, and was finally killed by Juplter with a flash of lightning at the request of Pluto, king of the dead, who asked it for fear there would be none to people his realms while Aesculapius lived. “Aesculapius, too, was cared for by shepherds when an infant, having been exposed in the Mount of Myrtles. His sire was a god, and the virgin mother who bore him, when she looked upon the babe, according to Ovid, foretold his fu- ture greatness: Hall! great physician of the world! all hail! Hail, mighty infant. who in _years to come Shall heal the nations and defraud the tomb! (The Irving Company, Oxford, N. Y. $1 net) NOTES OF BOOKS AND THE AUTHORS EXTRACTS FROM “COUNSELS AND IDEALS.” BY DR. WILLIAM OSLER. “The practice of medicine is an art, not a trade; a calling. not a business; & call- ing in which your heart will be exercised equally with your head. Often the best part of your work will have nothing to do with potions and powders, but with the exercise of the Influence of the strong upon the weak, of the righteous upon the wicked, of the wise upon the foolish. To vou, as the trusted family couneelor, the father will come with his anxieties, the mother with her hidden grief, the daugh- ter with her trials, and the son with his follles. Fully one-third of the work you do will be entered in other books than yours. Courage and cheerfulness will not only carry you over the rough places of life, but will enable you to bring com- fort and help to the wegk-hearted and will console you in the sad hours when, like Uncle Toby, you have to whistle that you may not weep.” “After all, concentration is the price the modern student pays for success. TRhor oughness {5 the most difficult habit to acquire, but it is'the pearl of great price, worth all the trouble and worry of the search.” “In no way has biological science so widened the thoughts of men as in its application to soctal problems.” “Biology touches the problem of life at every point, and may claim, as no other scienéde, completeness of view and a com- prehensiveness which pertains to it alone.” “Start at once a bedside library and spend the last half hour of the day in communion with the saints of humanity. There are great lessons to be learned from Job and from David, from Isaiah and St. Paul. Taught by Shakespeare you may take your intellectual and mor- al measure with singular precision.” “When to the sessions of sweet, silent thought you summon uUp your own imper- fections, the faults of your brothers will seem less grievous.” * “The artistic sense of perfection in work is another much to be desired quality to cultivate.” ““The problems of disease are the most difficult with which the trained mind has to grapple.” “Surrounded by people who demand cer- tainty, and not philosopher enough to agree with Locke, that ‘probability sup- plies the defect of our knowledge and guides us when that fails, and is always conversant about things of which we have no knowledge,’ the practitioner often gets into a habit of mind which ‘resents the thought that opinion, not full knowl- edge, must be his stay and pron.” “In the group of literary physicians Sir Thomas Browne stands pre-eminent. His “Religio Medici,’ one of the great English classics, should be in the hands—in the heart, too—of évery medical student.” “Learn to play the game fair, no self- deception, no shrinking from the truth; merey and consideration for the other man, but none for yourself, upon:whom you have to keep an ihcessant wateh.” “By far the mest dangerous foe we have to fight is ‘apathy—fully 25 per centwof the deaths in the community are due to this aceuw thy.” “Had I time and wi this the proper occasion T would lke to rouse the profes- sion to a sense of -its responsibility to- ward - the soclal evil—the black plague which devastates the land.” “Ask any active business man or a leader in a profession the seeret which enables him to accomplish so much work. and he will reply In one word, system: or, as I shall term it, the VIRTUE OF METHOD.” . The First Thought. By Clinton Dangerfield- Foreshadowed in a thousand wondrous types, Forecast to finish what God's self began, Shaped to encounter Doubt, Despair and Dread, There rose upon the grassy plains—a man; Upright and goodly, but through instinct stili Subservient td) Nature's mighty wil Too newly born for resson now he moved, Seized all he needed with impulsive grasp; But those far Watchers saw, iike nebulae, The consciogs thought siow forming (while the clasp Of Instinct loosened) till, one glorious morn, They, in the Child-Mar's eves. beheld it dawn. From this shall Love—courageous generate, And Love's high sister, Infinite Desire. these two he shall so grow, so el That to the uttermost star he shall aspire. ©Oh, little, first-born Thought, thy fleeting span Is sire of all! Thou art indeed the Man. The Century (March). . There are not a dozen men within the sound of my voice who know that Ari- zona has the greatest forest within this nation. The greatest forest of white pine timber which the continental United States affords exists in Arizona; it runs from its northwest corner down to its southeast corner. The second greatest forest in- this nation is in New Mexico. The greatest coal fleld in this nation is in New Mexico. The greatest iron deposit in this mation is in New Mexico, Our Territory has enough iron to gridiron China with steel rails and coal enough to smelt it; and yet we are told by gentlemen that we can never support a great population, and that un- less we have vast agricultural resources we can never have a people.—From speech ‘of Hon. B. 8. Rodey in House of Repre- sentatives, National Geographic Magazine (February). 3 Revue (Paris). Digest.) (Translated for Literary . The curious acoustics of the Taj are observable to a visitor going often to Arjamand’s shrine. A harsh voice is echoed harshly back and ceases quick- 1y; but a woman's tomes, raised gently in song, are echoed many timeS, diver- sified and amplified in strange combi- nations of melody. Such a voice rever- berates from every side, seemingly as- cends, and its force finally dies away to silence like the notes of a fying wood dove in a forest—F. C. Pentleld, writingsef the Taj Mahal in Appleton’s Booklovers' Magazine (Mareh). . . . In discussing the question of chivalry and the relation toward the fair sex, Baron Suyematsu, in “A Fantasy of Far Japan,” contrasts the Japanese Iidea with that of the West. x In the days of your chivalry faith- fulness in love affairs was looked upon in general as gallantry, no matter whether the affair was honorable or otherwise, but with the Japanese Bush- ido it was very different. It was not because a Bushi was heartless toward the weaker sex, but effeminacy was a thing which he despised most. In the days gone by in Japan, if a Bushi had been found paying too much attention to a lady, and making himself a slave to her, to the neglect of his duty, he would have been hooted out of soclety. ‘With European chivalry, therefore, the tendency of desire was to be noticed by others for his actions performed in homage to a lady, while with our chiv- alrfy one would try to do his utmost to conceal his emotion and even to look cold.—Daily News, London. .. . “Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch” and “Lovey Mary” by the same auther are about to be printed in serial form in the pages of the Bibliotheque Uni- verselle of Switzerland. . . . Dr. William Osler is a great lover of literature and lives and works sur- rounded by a collection of the best books. He is an ardent admirer of the famous author-physician, Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes. Osler tells us that Holmes experienced more pleasare for having been the author of the little poem called “The Chambered Nautilus™ than from any work in either medicine or authorship he ever did in his life. He seems to have felt that in express- ing just that thought In just those words he was inspired. Holmes thus explains his joy in the composition of the beautiful and inspiring littie pearl of thought which was mystically heard from pearly lips: “In writing the poem I was filled with a better feeling—the highest of mental exaltation and the most crystalline clairvoyance, as it seemed to me, that had ever been granted to me * . After that very enthus tic confession it will be interesting to recall a few lines of the poem about the seashell and its mes- sage—just as a start off to set the old musie of it again ringing In your ears: This Is the ship of pearl. which, poets feign, Safls the unshadowed main B . - . . . Thanks for the heavenly message brought by thee, Child of the wandering sea, * $ T & . . While on mine ear it cings, Through the deep caves of thought I hear & voice that sings “Build thee more stately mansions, soul, As the swjft seasons roll”” BOOKS RECEIVED FROM PUBLISHERS FORTY YEARS AN ADVERTISING AGENT—By George Presbury Rowell Printers’ Ink Publishing Company. TWENTIETH CENTURY GOSLINGS —By Francis Meade Scager. Broadway Publishing Company, New York. JOHN BURTON'S STAGE YARNS—By Annie Cooper. 83 Broadway. Manhattan. THE TRUE DOCTRINE OF PRAYER —~By Leander Chamberlain. Baker & Taylor Company, New York. VROUW GROBELAAR, and Her Lead- ing Cases—By Percival Gibbon. MeClure, Phillips & Co., New York. THE BIBLE AND SCRIPTURAL CRITICISM—By Arthur T. Plerson. Baker & Taylor Company, New York. §L HISTORY OF THE LUMBER IN- DUSTRY OF AMERICA—By James El- liott Defebaugh. The American Lumber- man. Chicago. THE ORIGIN OF MASONRY—By J. 6. Swinnerton. Whitaker & Ray Company, San Franeisco. 76 cents. BASKETRY, CLAY AND PAPER WEAVING, for the elementary grades— By Arthur Henry Chamberiain, Ella V. Dobbs, Jane Langley, Harry D. Gaylord. ‘Whitaker & Ray Company, San Fran- cisco. 30 cents. BRIDGE ABRIDGED — By Annie Blanche Shelby. Whitaker & Ray Com- pany, San Francisco. $1. TWO YOUNG CRUSOES-By W. S. Phillips. Star Publishing Company, Chicago. ’ WHO'S WHO IN AMERICA—Edited by John W. Leonard, (for 1906-1%7). A. N. Marquis & Co., Chicago. $3.50. SANKEY'S STORY OF THE GOSPEL HYMNS—-By Ira D. BSankey. Sunday School Times Company, Philadelphta. 7 cents. THE TRUTH ABOUT TOLNA—By Ber- tha Runkle, The Century Company, New York. $L30. THE SHADOW OF LIFE—By Amne Douglas Sedgwick. The Century Compa- ny, New York. $1.30. —_———— Balfour Must Give Up Goif. INDON, March 3.—Friends of Mr. jour, the former Prime Minister, are very anxious regarding the state of his health, as he has been far from well for some time past, and is, in faet, thoroughly tired out and overworked. The strain of the ten years' leader- ship, followed by the arduous and un- successful electoral compaign and by the period of unusual political stress and difffieulty, has overtaxed his nat- urally delicate conmstitution. oh, my He has been ordered to give up golf for the present. e Czar to Exhibit Toys. 3T. PETERSBURG, March 3—Czar will seek a prize at the Mar-