Fools

“THE longer I live,” said my friend the Professor thoughtfully, “the more I hate a fool.”

Now in most things the Professor and I are pleasantly in accord; but, as he spoke that damning sentence, I knew that the subject, further pursued, would breed alienation between us, and I turned the discourse into other channels. I smiled to myself as I felt the resemblance of my instinctive state of mind to the attitude of a mother hen, hustling all her chickens behind her out of the way of the prowling cat, anxious, perturbed, defensive. For it is my excellent fortune to rank not a few of the class obnoxious to the Professor among my cherished friends. They are the salt of the earth to me. I could not relinquish one of them, nor has one of them reformed.

It may be a somewhat delicate matter to determine in just what high folly consists. There are fools and fools, and from the latter I avert my eyes as sadly and speedily as the Professor. But the standards shift so enormously that it is perhaps not going too far to say that every man is a fool to someone and a wise man to someone else. Which lets us all in to the happy band, if we view the matter broadly.

However, for the sake of convenience, that a definition may be approximated, it is always possible to appeal to a shadowy sort of public tribunal which fluctuates like the waves of the sea, but which, again like the sea, remains pretty well limited. With this tribunal I should probably agree in stating that the chief mark of a fool is indifference to results. That is so disconcerting and childish in him! It is a severely logical world — cause and result, cause and result; we should reason our actions well. But the fool cares only about the cause. Glorious, beautiful, soul-filling thing! he rushes at it with arms held wide, seizes it, launches it — whither away ? Perhaps it is fortunate for our peace that, for the most part, a fool throws far, having a mighty impulse in him; so that his cause goes clean over the edge of the decorous world and apparently comes to nothing. But who shall say what alarming results take place among the stars ?

I once knew a joyous, refreshing creature — like the sun was the sudden entrance of him — who spent himself in translating books which no one wanted to read, in devising schemes to assist a race which declined to be assisted, in pouring his life in the sand.

“Never mind,” he would assure me brightly, when I weakly fell so far from the grace of our true understanding as to remonstrate with him. “I can’t do anything else, you know, for these things seem important to me. If people don’t care for them now, they will; I can always wait.”

Another impetuous soul was fain of extravagant hero-worship. I watched his career with an interest which was partly impersonal, but which owed something also to my own ends. For I found that he furnished me a sure test of the measure of greatness. Some of his heroes — the most, alas! — fled from his praises precipitately. They did not understand him; they thought him about to swallow them up; they beat him off with both hands. Now a hero who cannot apprehend love and accept it simply and frankly lacks the true magnanimity; so it appears. In the end, as a matter of fact, the laugh was always on the heroes; for their impulsive admirer had no intention of swallowing up; he would have choked with shame at the thought. It was simply natural for him to love, and, loving, to mention the fact. His love was thrown back in his face twenty times to my certain knowledge, to my burning indignation too; but his heart remained sweet and warm through it all, and he went on loving. Who was the hero here ? Who the fool ? One may well pause and consider.

Another certain trait of a fool is his zest in living. This is so marked that the wonder is, considering how keen we all are in the quest for happiness, that we do not at once adopt the motley as a universal garb. I suppose our dignity stands in the way. It would doubtless be going too far to say that all optimists are fools; but there is certainly hardly a fool who is not an optimist. They see the world couleur de rose, these children. If evil exists, it is only a chance to prove the hearts and the hands of men; they have at it courageously. Given a problem before which wise men have pondered and waited long, to determine the safest line of approach: up comes the fool along any line which he happens to occupy at the moment, suddenly running, his head well down, and — pouf! whack! presto! finish! the problem has disappeared. The amazed discomfiture of the wise men at the unwarranted consummation is not the least engaging part of the whole pleasant spectacle.

One of the fool’s most lovable qualities is his entire willingness to appear ridiculous. That takes greatness of nature. To do absurd things in the calm understanding that they are absurd (though probably glimpsing divinity, too, on their cloudy side, which is larger), and then to abide the consequences of laughter and derision — excellent fool! he puts to shame the solemn pride of wisdom. The most beloved fool I know turns on himself and laughs at himself wdth such an abandon of cheerful mirth that one might think his quixotic achievements were undertaken quite for the joke — if one had not first seen deeper.

They are all eternally young and glad ; of that we may be certain. There was never an “old fool” in the world, though the phrase is common enough. I met a typical member once of the delightful order. His folly I recognized at once, and rejoiced in it and warmed myself at it through the whole of a happy evening. But when I was questioned about his age, I was suddenly at a loss. I had talked with him as with one of my years; perhaps now, however, thinking about it, he had seemed a little older. “ Forty ?” I hazarded doubtfully. My hostess clapped her hands and laughed in a merry triumph. “ Sixty-nine! ” she informed me. It is a wonderful thing to hold the secret of freshness thus. Strange! strange! that we are not all fools, when the profit is so great.