Do you know I am beginning to admire myself. Now many have thought that that was my favorite sport. But I can assure you that no one ever felt more humble than I have, any appearance to the contrary being a bluff for success--effect. But now that I have been wisely and scrupulously and unscrupulously examined by the most exalted rulers of the Inner Temple, and they pronounce me all that man should be, why shouldn't I strut some? But, damn it, strutting brings that Devil's clutch--and a man cannot be anything more strutty than a dish-rag then. In William James you will find a questionnaire, "Why do I believe in immortality? 'Because I think I'm just about ready to begin to live.'" There speaks self- justifying age--I'm there, too. I'd love to look on Bethel this morning, and see what your poet- partner calls the hills in their wine bath. Good luck. LANE To Lathrop Brown Los Angeles, [January] 15, [1921] MY DEAR LATHROP,--I have yours of the eleventh. First question, as to men and women for the Executive Committee, Answer: Get men who can make a program, something that the party can push, outside Congress, if too cowardly in. People who don't want anything, if possible. Think of these! (I don't say they will do, but they stand for something.) Charles W. Eliot. Benjamin Ide Wheeler. (Ex-President of the University of California. Ex-Chairman, Democratic Committee, Elmira, New York.) E. M. House. Frank L Cobb. John W. Davis. Robert Lansing. R. Walton Moore. (Congressman from Virginia, big fellow.) Gavin McNab. Governor Parker, of Louisiana. James D. Phelan. Van-Lear Black. For solid thought I'd choose out of that bunch--Eliot and Moore. For cleverness--Black and McNab. For diplomacy--House and Davis. For progressiveness--House and Parker. For Conservative Democracy --Wheeler and Lansing. For writing ability--Cobb and Eliot. I know no women who think, particularly. ... The kind of publicity we need is the advocacy by the National Committee, and by Democrats in Congress of first class measures, known to be Democratic measures, part of a program. I'll tell you how to get all the publicity you want when I see you--or White--a new kind, cheap, but requiring brains. ... F. K L. To Lathrop Brown Los Angeles, January, [1921] DEAR LATHROP,--(1) You are right as to standardization. The Devil devised it as a highway to socialism. It is the Bible of the great Tribe of Flatfoot, not for artists like you and myself. And speaking of programs, please read what Wells says in his first volume of Outline of History, on David, Solomon, Moses. It will delight your anti-semitic soul. ... Yes, standardization is like all else, good--for a distance. The whole bally outfit of life is a matter of balance, maintained by war among the unintelligent bacilli and other primitives, and by will among men (goat feed for men, eh?) But do you get my point? Something to it!