But if you merely settle down, unthinkingly and uncourageously, in the mould provided for you by your neighbors, if you accept as standards and values merely those of the majority, you will not be an individual or even the useful citizen you may think yourself though you attend every meeting of your association in the year. America can count such men, as she can her motor cars, by the tens of millions. What she needs as useful citizens today are men and women who dare to be themselves, who know with Emerson that “life only avails, not the having lived,” who can conceive how rich and varied life can be, and who, with the spirit of the artist and at least an amateur’s knowledge of tools and technique, will defy the crowd and show what an art of living may be. Americans have never lacked courage on the fields of battle. It is time they showed some on the golf links. We are more afraid of what our best customer may think or what Mrs. Umpty Bullmarket-Jones may say than our ancestors ever were of what the redskins might do. If I thought mottoes and slogans did any good, I would replace the “God bless our happy home” of a generation or two ago, and the “say it quick” of our offices today, with old Emerson’s “Be yourself.” That is what every artist, every civilized man and woman has got to be, as the very foundation of an[Pg 306] art of living. It is, indeed, only the foundation but it is essential. Every art is social. It is the result of a relation between the artist and his time. Music could not have developed as a result of a succession of individual musicians composing for a society of the deaf, and before we can develop an art of living in America and adjust our machinery of life to its practice as it is adjusted in many ways in Europe, we must develop a taste for individual living in thousands of Americans who will refuse to bow the knee to the crowd, whether city, suburban or village, and insist upon being themselves. The road of conformity is merely the road back to savagery. BONIBOOKS Here is a list of books of solid and enduring literary value. With the addition, from time to time, of new titles, the publishers pride themselves that they have achieved their aim of making the Bonibooks’ imprint synonymous with literary and intrinsic excellence. The books are attractive in appearance, with a sturdy full-cloth binding, stamped in silver, printed on paper of good quality. $1.00 each. 1. AMERICAN OXFORD DICTIONARY F. G. and H. W. Fowler 2. EDUCATION AND THE GOOD LIFE Bertrand Russell 3. GREAT SHORT STORIES OF THE WORLD Clark and Lieber 4. OXFORD BOOK OF AMERICAN VERSE Bliss Carman 5. ISRAEL Ludwig Lewisohn 6. THIS EARTH OF OURS Jean-Henri Fabre 7. AGAINST THE GRAIN J. K. Huysmans 8. OUR BUSINESS CIVILIZATION James Truslow Adams 9. THE HIGH PLACE James Branch Cabell 10. WHAT IS WRONG WITH MARRIAGE Hamilton and MacGowan 11. SOUTH WIND Norman Douglas 12. MICHELANGELO Romain Rolland