Week by Week
October 13, 1926 THE COMMONWEAL ...
...Ziegfeld and his ilk are about Washingtonians might justly be proud, recently conthe only ones upon which a human being is permitted tributed the following to the statistics regarding nato be merry...
...A tribute to effectiveness owing to the conditions under which they the Celtic past (and present, for that matter) is paid are forced to travel...
...There read a notice: `In broad daylight a man smiled on is other evidence of the care for popular well-being of the street...
...Nevertheless, it is avoids argument about 1914 as carefully as possible...
...The pre- THE eminent Fellowship Forum, a journal of which cincts occupied by Mr...
...Their repertory is rich with lives of its people that a certain amount of human old melodies and folk-lore songs...
...The case is made all the achievement...
...Robertson has literally combed the in health, temper, fitness for work and consequent in- musical brushwood of his native land...
...salutary to remember that Senior Francisco Bulnes put The world is less likely than it once was to stake its his finger on a real source of infection when he spoke faith on a bogey...
...tokens of the utmost loftiness of man's mind and heart...
...There is the irrational joy, hard render their lot more endurable, and more especially to explain but harder to resist, of "sitting in" day to supplying some means of getting across town from after day and night after night, at the very sources west to east...
...Human beings seldom remem- ments on behalf of good government now identified ber the great maxim, "children, love one another," with official Methodism-a series to which Mr...
...Speakers who appended to vague attacks on "fanaticism" unmistakable threats of death and exile, shook hands MICHAEL WILLIAMS, Editor across the centuries with strutting young pamphleteers Assistant Editors fresh from a Paris conclave...
...The money thus levied men to newspaper work, but a consideration of mone- would not repay citizens for the light and air of which tary reward is not often among them...
...Hail a taxi and ride along- been bettered even by South Kensington...
...Methodist Building," he quotes from a printed circular, "occupies a site which cannot be duplicated in READERS who take their knowledge of the middle- Washington...
...not be defeated by men who have not in them the desire to be just, to be merciful, and even self-sacrificTHOSE who use the world war as a handy explana- ing...
...For the evil has worked in two ways...
...One remedy that does not seem ever to have ment of a regiment after war...
...The to practise it...
...Even older or a Christian-to see that the root of the evil is where more local matters might be dug up and exhibited as...
...Small wonder that musical comedies are popular...
...Duval saw the followers of the poor man of Assisi that we have New York, the best that America has been able to not space to quote, though one Franciscan specific for do...
...Strategic spots haps it is because martyrdom is so commonplace an suitable for artillery exist throughout the city and on affair along the "rapid transit" route...
...the gazers-in of mediaeval popular life with the monographs of M. at shop-windows never whistle ; and even the leading Boissonade and Vicomte d'Avenel, and many another clubs are less distinguished for ornate facades than scholarly study, of which our "Outliners," luckily for for the line-up of dour faces which one can glimpse this own cocky self-complacency, never read a line...
...Meantime, the course, as everybody knows perfectly well, huge quan- ethical conditions of world government have not tities of both of these are still stored in all Catholic changed...
...John Dewey's the Versailles Treaty...
...There is a dents in the streets of New York between January glow of fine old-world culture in its purpose and i and September 1, 1926...
...At present, facilities for cross-town of history, the excitement of a tense atmosphere into travel in New York, owing to the constant hold-ups which a "big story" may break at any moment...
...the police intervened.' " Mr...
...Should the French succeed in carrying the whole problem of international finance to Geneva, they_ will CONGRATULATIONS from the press all over likewise concentrate the attention of all Europe upon America and even from across the Atlantic which are what is really the basic social illness of the time...
...I think the in- acter of the state government is to be decided, the sane unheaval of the war shattered the framework of name of the next United States senator is to be spelled convention which already was getting dislocated: and out, and in all likelihood the chances of one candidate both men and women found that they had been act- for the presidency are to be determined...
...October 13, 1926 THE COMMONWEAL 54 Washington is pessimistic about the fate of the reserTHE COMMONWEAL vations...
...Apart from all considera- dawn...
...It is much easier to join fervently in the clouds now hang over the European political commemoration of American independence when one scene...
...This startling fact village, were it not for a suspicion that the unprece- is definitely established by a recent survey of the Disdented effort might permanently distort countenances...
...He has ad- record of two Franciscan brothers who lived in the mitted that no amount of skyscrapers, taxis, subways, thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, through the and theatres can turn a thriving city into a place for scholarship and industry of Dr...
...That the board is now competent to body should want to...
...But what reason of the indubitable poetic value of every lyric no figures will ever be able to show is the price paid rendered...
...publicans, on the field of Gotham, are staging a conIt is strange to find this staunch Catholic priest and test at which the nation gazes watchfully...
...ous to render comment superfluous...
...These conditions, the City Club through the medium of songs which belong definitely survey bluntly asserts, have been imposed on them by to the Irish tradition...
...It have brought credit upon their school and order, and increases our respect immeasurably for a man whose earned the thanks of all to whom culture is still a business career, we now perceive, gave little outward living issue and the great masterpieces of the past still sign of the ideals that must have animated it...
...The invitation from the Philadelphia authoriSTATISTICS when skilfully marshaled can be more ties to repeat the performance of Hecuba in their effective in presenting the inwardness of an evil than stadium was an act in accord with the demonstrated many columns of comment...
...All sorts of things draw height, say, of six stories...
...It may seem rather strange to the greed of ground landlords and the license per- anyone who has been accustomed to identify Scotland mitted them to rear their mastodonic piles of office with the sourest sermons of John Knox, to find on buildings in the air up to eighteen and even twenty this choir's program a tribute to the music of "Merrie October 13, 1926 THE COMMONWEAL 5 43 England" as well as gentle lyrics by Katherine Tynan by monkish obscurantism-a sort of trance of uncleanand Joseph Campbell...
...clear thinker, reaching, from the spiritual approach, But there is really only one issue-Al Smith...
...excellently, appear minus the brawny Highlander garb and an overanxious desire to indulge in antics and THE figures, it is to be feared, would be far worse hard a's...
...But it is hard to see where of a system of peaceful penetration which has choked else one, who denies the supernatural order or any and throttled American legislation as efficiently as Von moral law transcending that of the state, is to look Moltke choked and throttled the French at Sedan...
...it had lieve the war created any condition which was not hewed to the line in so far as state policies were conlatent already...
...Nor is this the sole redoubt controlled by the Metho- At the very time it has reduced one anonymous unit, dist forces...
...Hugh S. Robertson, exemplituresquely informed, owed their deaths to traffic acci- fies a musical tradition of unusual charm...
...Wells's shallow improvisations of cerin a graceful little speech at the New York premiere, tainty, that occasional sidelights upon it, drawn from "the purpose is to interpret Scotland as a place where contemporary material, are worth preserving...
...One hesitates to ask what his fancies might have good health-"work, sound sleep and a jest"-has not been in other places...
...It should take its place as a study are tracing sombre geometrical lines...
...sequent congestion of the streets at their foot-which, unhappily, have not the same power of expansion...
...The street is a place where a lot of people American edition...
...The same universality and ness and ferocity, waiting till science and the "stinks" affection for the spiritually beautiful distinguishes the department of South Kensington University should character of the rendition...
...THE antics of the Mexican Congress which dismissed the petition of the Catholic hierarchy, revived pleasant memories of antiquated liberalism...
...WEEK BY WEEK We wish the new organization success in its thorny AFTER a season of sunny international weather, enterprise...
...and it is within the range of possibility that a an end must be made of the "status quo" imposed by mind otherwise so unmalleable as Mr...
...Relations affecting the United of "a Catholic landed aristocracy, with servile souls States (and, of course, other peoples) far more directly and nerveless hands, ready to sell its pride of race, its are the status of the World Court and the French debt...
...John P. Marshall from the problem that is being presented to them through the recently discovered tablets and fragments of the music unchecked upward growth of buildings and the con- of the classical Greeks...
...it was first eight months of the present year, should arouse music that has been unheard for some two thousand the urban authorities of America to the size of the years, recovered by Dr...
...A minority of taxpayers might legitimately complain that government which is genuONE need not be a Catholic-one need hardly be inely popular costs a lot of money...
...544 THE COMMONWEAL October 13, 1926 T is from this centre," continues the circular, "that Father Martindale squarely locates it-in the steady we are directing and promoting the cause of temper- depression of individual responsibility which is the ance, prohibition, and public morals on a national and evil heritage of a century and a half of invasions by international scale...
...Bernard things may be used to disguise this fact...
...The figures just made culture and amplitude of their spirit...
...Simple robes which seem nearer to academia were it not for the fact that, like all bad conditions than to the bloody glens of yore, symbolize very well which develop little by little, the appalling congestion the devotion with which this self-supporting organizaof New York streets has become so far a part of the tion carries on its work...
...Thus the Reing within conventions and not from living principles...
...religious zeal and its right of conquerors in exchange If we are to believe that the address delivered by for the protection of the mailed fist which would save Deputy Dariac, at Alencon, was intended as an ad- it from having to risk its head and its fortune in the vance notice of what the government intends to do defense of its legitimate rights and ancient privileges...
...stand...
...Here are the heart and ganglia the all-obliterating state...
...Obviously, Stresemann's debate with Poincare realizes that the Rio Grande is not merely a boundary concerning war responsibility, ill-timed though it may line, but also a watershed between something like a seem from the point of view of pending agreements decent social environment and chaos...
...out of which flowers the apt phrase and the colorful story...
...Wells and his various mouthpieces, the Capitol that is sustained by the Senate Office Buildlatest of whom happens to call himself "William ing...
...It may be Shaw, who, in days when the statement had all the averred that the coming state reorganization will proring of paradox, found himself unable to pay any re- vide Tammany, if the slate it favors is elected, with spect whatever to "popular religion, popular mor- an unprecedented opportunity to reap spoils and reality, or popular science...
...Salter's interesting book ington Irving's statue (which at least changed its is timely, and it is to be hoped that we shall see an position...
...William T. Dewart, on his succession Europe organized might actually give the United to the late Frank Munsey as proprietor of the New States a choice between compromise and complete iso- York Sun properties, show how strongly the scheme lation...
...The scholars of Holy Cross College, alleviates the unnerving element of insecurity that has who have collaborated in the important production, descended upon it in recent years, as the result of first in Worcester last May, and again recently in shifts and combines carried through in the business the stadium of the Sesquicentennial in Philadelphia, office, is to the advantage of journalism generally...
...thought and poetry are at home...
...through their open windows on a warm day...
...and, little hone that the terms of the Mellon agreement will unless the signs are wholly untrustworthy, it is arising...
...By comparison, Both are irresponsible, one by reason of his lowliness, the Catholic choice of sites must have been made by the other by reason of his uplifting...
...Subway caverns have all the seriousness tional defense : "Great forts of stone, cement and of the Catacombs, without anything of their precious brick surround the national capital and command the inner radiance-or even their martyrs' tombs...
...One feels that the French may admit that a healthy Mexico can never be guarPremier will establish a reputation for wisdom if he anteed by a doctor like Calles...
...Seldom can the League of Nations have listion for all the ills that afflict the world at peace, will tened to an appeal more remorseless in its exposition not find much support for their thesis in the annual of the roots of failure, more hopeful in its indication "Assembly Sermon" preached by Father C. C. Mar- of the way back to success than this, the first assembly tindale of the Society of Jesus, before statesmen and sermon to be preached by an Englishman who happens League of Nations officials at the Geneva headquar- to be also a Catholic and a Jesuit...
...reaching _Mr...
...Per- principal approaches to Washington...
...If this route is to be abandoned, then New York City, N. Y. obviously the time has come to look for another...
...Yet so general is ignorance of the epoch, even tions of mere technique, the work of this choir is among instructed readers who have no difficulty in radiant and illuminating...
...Were there nothing of importance excepting balance sheets, national isolation would be still a calamity...
...about its obligations to the United States, there is The time has come for honest Mexico to awake...
...Both elude consome shy and erratic genius who could think only in trol, the one by his obliteration in the mass, the other terms of gunpowder and long-range cannon...
...for a remedy...
...For practically the first time within worse by the additional detail that not far from half memory, Scotch artists who can sing border ballads of them were children under the age of fifteen...
...There is dis- they are robbed that private fortunes may be swelled...
...What he does believe it did, was to cerned...
...At present, official a living human organization through long fellowship 542 THE COMMONWEAL October 13, 1926 and association is something as sad as the disband- stories...
...It is the last in a long series of achieveseat on the way home...
...We which a man would risk his bottom dollar and his get the illuminating foot-note that "some English last drop of blood...
...Flanking the Capitol on another side is not buttressed by some ruling status, to an automaton, the Bliss Building, home of the Anti-Saloon League, or Robot, whose sole function, in the hateful words which is "specifically the authorized interdenomina- used recently by Mussolini, is to be "a cell of the tional agency of numerous church bodies...
...ters a few weeks ago, and of which the only adequate notice we have seen reaches us from the special cor- THE BATTLE IN GOTHAM respondent of the London Universe...
...Sooner or later, between France and Germany, has grown out of the this will be apparent to even the most erudite in our fierce insistence by conservatives in the Reichstag that midst...
...As the conductor remarked, piercing Mr...
...trict of Columbia by the research department of the One can understand why people have to live in such Methodist Board of Temperance, Prohibition and places...
...Briefly, he refuses to be- not compromised on the wet and dry issue...
...From the point of view of effective barrage Clissold," are not likely to be shaken in their views fire, the site is probably not so admirable as some by evidence which keeps cropping up to allay his pic- that might be named, but there are compensating adture of the "terrible epoch" as a huddle and muddle of vantages and, one might add, there is even somedirt, darkness and discomfort, intensified, of course, thing like a good bet, strategically speaking...
...Upon that fate does depend, however, the Published weekly and copyrighted 1925, in the United States by whole of further progress in a political direction we the Calvert Publishing Corporation, 25 Vanderbilt Avenue, took in 1918...
...Each morning I opened my news- towns have till quite recently depended for their water paper, as heavy as a telephone directory, fearing to supply on the conduits of the Friars `Minor...
...In New York City, integration, which clearly must issue in a social one, through its mammoth political organizations, the charis merely the result of the war...
...Whatever it be, there is no doubt that the THE human appeal of the Hecuba of Euripides newspaper breeds a type of service quite apart...
...An abrupt hope that membership in the League, as Wilson had change in ownership of a newspaper that has become conceived of it, was a step nearer...
...The arguments are JOHN F. MCCORMICK, Business Manager such as would astonish a northern scholar by reason Editorial Council of their staleness and inappropriate violence...
...Amid all the special pleading, nebulous idealism, and general soft THE righteous protest of the delegates from Hersoap to which the League has been treated from the kimer County notwithstanding, the New York Repulpit at recurrent intervals, Father Martindale's vital publican Convention dissolved enthusiastically...
...The offen- organism," it has provided a formula by which another, sive carried on from this stronghold is sufficiently obvi- invested with power escapes criticism or discipline...
...Washwhen they are given a world of opportunity in which ington Pezet refers in the current Forum...
...There at the avenues, are considerably worse than they were is the fellowship that men once found in the tavern, in the horse-car days of the Mauve Decade...
...One does not feel that the World Court will of mutual ownership, left as his bequest by the dead change matters greatly, either in the direction of in- owner and editor, is appealing to the imagination of ternational amity or otherwise...
...A remarkable public by the City Club of New York of the deaths feature of the Holy Cross rendering of Hecuba was by motor accident in Manhattan streets during the the musical setting of the odes and hymns...
...like of the modern commercial office, its general prim- But it might be applied to means of relief that would ness and sleekness...
...There is no scheme," says Father Marchurches ! We cannot understand the shrewdness of tindale, "no program, no equilibrium of weights, no the Methodist research department in getting at the sheaf of forces, however perfectly arranged, that cansecrets of ecclesiastical architecture...
...The service given by been mooted, would seem to us to be the imposition reporters and editors to "the sheet" is not measured of full ground rent upon floor space over a reasonable by money or money's worth...
...ward its henchmen...
...If this be Glasgow, let us have more of it ONE, that we take the liberty to quote, occurs in a work entitled The Coming of the Friars Minor to JACQUES DUVAL, writer for the Parisian jour- England and Germany, translated from the Latin nal, is a man of considerable courage...
...I cannot think," declared sake-the all-important sake-of making an excellent the Jesuit speaker and writer, "that this personal dis- impression on the metropolis...
...it is treasurable by adaptability has been developed to meet it...
...It sustains the same relation to the ages from Mr...
...What is utterly incomprehensible is that any- Public Morals...
...Any- keeps it well adapted to modern sympathies and drathing that gives it a static character, anything that matic rendering...
...Other conclusions not very different to those of Mr...
...It had address shines by contrast...
...E. Gurney Salter...
...Europe was interested men who know the problems and occasional hardships in the Senate debate chieflv because it held out the of press work from personal experience...
...And of by his transfusion in the Empyrean...
...We should eminences commanding all public buildings-all owned hurry to advocate a "smile day" for every populous by the Roman Catholic hierarchy...
...Well T. LAWRASON RIGGS JAMES J. WALSH may a new association of intellectuals "for the defense CARLTON J. H. HAYES R. DANA SKINNER of liberty" declare that the hour has come "to proBERTRAM C. A. WINDLE mote, within the most strict legality, the necessary Subscription Rates Yearly: $10.00 Single Copies: $0.20 measures in which to lead the authorities, individuals, and organizations existing in this country to respect the liberties that every civilized man should enjoy...
...It seems queer that THOMAS WALSH HELEN WALKER Latin society should be so readily susceptible to such HENRY LONGAN STUART GEORGE N. SHUSTER spasms of destructive nonsense...
...THE Glasgow Orpheus Choir, coming to the United Five hundred and fifty-five persons, or "more than States under the personal management of its widely lost their lives in the Florida hurricane," we are pic- known conductor, Mr...
...Everybody was free to conclude that for the test a fabric whose armature had, little by little, been nonce Republicanism was content to risk a certain allowed to shake loose, with the result that all the amount of provincial bickering and resentment for the world is watching today...
...Perhaps the real reason is the discuss ordnance and strategy will come as a surprise thrill that comes from triumphantly wriggling into a to many...
...In this year the man in front of you is more impassive than Wash- of Franciscan celebration, Dr...
Vol. 4 • October 1926 • No. 23
