Produced by Chris Curnow, Sarah Jensen, Matt Mello and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net THE SIMPLE LIFE By CHARLES WAGNER _Author of The Better Way_ _Translated from the French by Mary Louise Hendee_ GROSSET & DUNLAP Publishers, New York Copyright, 1901, by McCLURE, PHILLIPS & CO. CONTENTS Page I. OUR COMPLEX LIFE 1 II. THE ESSENCE OF SIMPLICITY 15 III. SIMPLICITY OF THOUGHT 22 IV. SIMPLICITY OF SPEECH 39 V. SIMPLE DUTY 52 VI. SIMPLE NEEDS 68 VII. SIMPLE PLEASURES 80 VIII. THE MERCENARY SPIRIT AND SIMPLICITY 96 IX. NOTORIETY AND THE INGLORIOUS GOOD 111 X. THE WORLD AND THE LIFE OF THE HOME 128 XI. SIMPLE BEAUTY 139 XII. PRIDE AND SIMPLICITY IN THE INTERCOURSE OF MEN 151 XIII. THE EDUCATION FOR SIMPLICITY 167 XIV. CONCLUSION 188 THE SIMPLE LIFE I OUR COMPLEX LIFE At the home of the Blanchards, everything is topsy-turvy, and with reason. Think of it! Mlle. Yvonne is to be married Tuesday, and to-day is Friday! Callers loaded with gifts, and tradesmen bending under packages, come and go in endless procession. The servants are at the end of their endurance. As for the family and the betrothed, they no longer have a life or a fixed abode. Their mornings are spent with dressmakers, milliners, upholsterers, jewelers, decorators, and caterers. After that, comes a rush through offices, where one waits in line, gazing vaguely at busy clerks engulfed in papers. A fortunate thing, if there be time when this is over, to run home and dress for the series of ceremonial dinners--betrothal dinners, dinners of presentation, the settlement dinner, receptions, balls. About midnight, home again, harassed and weary, to find the latest accumulation of parcels, and a deluge of letters--congratulations, felicitations, acceptances and regrets from bridesmaids and ushers, excuses of tardy tradesmen. And the _contretemps_ of the last minute--a sudden death that disarranges the bridal party; a wretched cold that prevents a favorite cantatrice from singing, and so forth, and so forth. Those poor Blanchards! They will never be ready, and they thought they had foreseen everything! Such has been their existence for a month. No longer possible to breathe, to rest a half-hour, to tranquillize one's thoughts. _No, this is not living!_