21～25

21.It is when Parliament is not sitting that the papers are most interesting to read. I have found an item of news today which would never have been given publicity in the busy times, and it has moved me strangely. Here it is, backed by the authority of Dr. C. Mitchell. “The caterpillar of the puss-moth, not satisfied with Nature's provisions for its safety, makes faces at young birds, and is said to alarm them considerably." I like that “is said to." Probably the young bird would deny indignantly that he was alarmed, and would explain that he was only going away because he suddenly remembered that he had an engagement on the croquet lawn, or that he had forgotten an umbrella. But whether he alarms them or not, the fact remains that the caterpillar of the puss moth does make faces at young birds.

 
22.I once made a speech over the radio and, when I entered the studio, I was surprised to see about fifteen people of assorted ages and dresses sitting very grimly over against the wall. I thought at first that they constituted some choir or team of bell ringers who were going to follow me on the program, but the announcer told me that they were my audience and that, whenever he gave the signal, they would burst into laughter and applause so that my larger audience in radioland would think that they were listening in on a wow. All that this did was to make me nervous. Furthermore, I could feel that my professional laughers had taken an immediate and instinctive dislike to me.

 
23.I never move without a plentiful supply of optical glass. A pair of spectacles for reading, a pair for long range, with a couple of monocles in reserve—these go with me everywhere. To break all these, it would need an earthquake or a railway accident. And absence of mind would have to be carried to idiocy before they could all be lost. Moreover, there is a further safety in a numerous supply: for matter, who can doubt it? is not neutral, as the men of science falsely teach, but slightly malignant, on the side of the devils against us. This being so, one pair of spectacles must inevitably break or lose itself, just when you can least afford to do without and are least able to replace it. But inanimate matter, so called, is no fool; and when a pair of spectacles realizes that you carry two or three other pairs in your pockets and suit-cases, it will understand that the game is hopeless and, so far from deliberately smashing or losing itself, will take pains to remain intact.

 
24.Of the fact that it takes all sorts to make a world I have been aware ever since I could read. But proverbs are always commonplaces until you have personally experienced the truth of them. To realize that it takes all sorts to make a world one must have seen a certain number of the sorts with one's own eyes. Having seen them and having in this way acquired an intimate realization of the truth of the proverb, one finds it hard to go on believing that one's own opinions, one's own way of life are alone rational and right. This conviction of man's diversity must find its moral expression in the practice of the completest possible tolerance.

 
25.A male servant long in my house seemed to me the happiest of mortals. He laughed invariably when spoken to, looked always delighted at work, appeared to know nothing of the small troubles of life. But one day I peeped at him when he thought himself quite alone, and his relaxed face startled me. It was not the face I had known. Hard lines of pain and anger appeared in it, making it seem twenty years older. I coughed gently to announce my presence. At once the face smoothed, softened, lighted up as by a miracle of rejuvenation. Miracle, indeed, of perpetual unselfish self-control.