Open That Door!Ingersoll, R. Sturgis (Robert Sturgis)
Philosophy
Open That Door!
Ingersoll, R. Sturgis (Robert Sturgis)
Books and reading
Why are the young so superior to their elders? Why, indeed, do we have
to cast off our years to enter the Kingdom of Heaven? Ponce de Leon, in
search of the Fountain of Youth, journeyed from Spain to the New World,
and, weary of the quest, left his body to rot in the American
wilderness. He need not have gone so far upon his travels, as in the
point of view of the last boy whom he met before embarking from the
shores of Spain there was this very Fountain which he sought. To break
down all the barriers which hedge us in, to open a thousand doors
entering upon undiscovered countries of ambition and delight, to forget
time, to forget everything but the joy of living, to experience the
thrill of carrying heavy burdens and the overcoming of obstacles, all we
have to do is to see the world through the eyes of the boy of ten. It
is the youth’s relation to the world as he finds it that makes him
superior to, and a more worthy inheritor of the Kingdom than is his
father. The former’s outlook is that of perpetual wonderment, of
endless romance, of intensive interest, and wide horizons; the latter’s
too often is that of a blind man in a picture gallery. A lad lives
acutely, never lets an hour "slip by," is ever willing for an assault
against any battlement, and in that lies the secret of life.
Most things, to be sure, are "easier said than done," but after having
found that the proper door to open is that which leads to the world of
fervid expectancies, experienced by the boy, we may at least _attempt_
to find the key that fits the lock. Perhaps you have already found it!
This is a good personal test—do you feel that your mind is a-tingle with
the music that is played by the world in which you live?
It has been said that you can tell a man by the company he keeps—but
there are far better methods! Find out his experiences when he walks
along a city street, rubbing elbows with the crowd, dodging motors at
the crossings, with every step he takes passing faces, human faces,
passing windows behind which are woven the webs of human happiness and
grief. What are his innermost sensations? Does he feel the throbbing
pulse of men and women, or is his heart and soul dead and forbidding?
Or else go with him upon a walk into the country—Spring or Fall—Winter
or Summer—his talk and expression will show the stuff that is in him.
Is he alive to the multifarious beauties of color, life, and movement
that are about him, or is he the same gnarled, twisted parody of man
who, when in the office, always thinks himself imposed upon, or in his
home appears a misfit, uncomfortable piece of furniture?
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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