Company and Solitude 99 



should I leave my occupation, be it loafing 

 even, and give my attention to some man or 

 woman who is thoughtless enough to " call" ? 

 The actuating motive never appears. Much 

 is spoken and nothing said. I receive no 

 worthy thought to profit by or increase the 

 probability of a beatific eternity. The famil- 

 iar well-gnawed bones of doctrine fall from 

 the devil's table. Usually I am forced to 

 breathe, at such a time, a gossip-poisoned 

 atmosphere. This " call" is another's idea 

 of civility, and I am compelled, it appears, 

 to be a vi&im of his or her whim. If I 

 refuse, as I have done point-blank, to present 

 myself, I am called a boor and all manner of 

 ugly names. Well, is it not better to be 

 called black as night, and know that you have 

 the whiteness of mid-day in your heart, than 

 to be called civil, while you are cursing the 

 thoughtlessness of the company that has 

 called ? That is my view of the matter. 



The world professes to hold in righteous 

 indignation a hypocrite ; but how are we to 

 escape hypocrisy if we become the slaves 

 of company ? It has often been said that the 

 set phrases of formal social customs are un- 

 derstood by everybody and no harm is done. 



