st harmonious faithfulness
prevailed. Truly, as Burns says:

'We had nae wish, save to be glad,
Nor want but when we thirsted;
We hated naught but to be sad.'

"I rejoice to say that I never got over this first blessed lesson in
communism; even though it was on a small scale, the family contained the
unity of a Greek tragedy. The heart that throbs with little things may
finally throb for the world. And I learned nothing in these days except
the lessons of the heart. The only necessary thing of which we had
almost enough was bread. The struggle for existence, began on one
continent, has continued on the other, with the surviving members of the
family standing shoulder to shoulder for lack of room.

"Armed with a throbbing faith in everything but myself, I boldly and
voluntarily entered the arena of commercial activity at the pliable age
of eight. My first job away from home was in a mattress factory. Ah,
that first job! I was a triumphant Archimedes who had found his fulcrum.
I helped move the world, for twelve hours a day and for two dollars a
week.

"Then and later, I, like all people who possess nothing, found that my
best visions have come to me while at work on something in which I had
wistful faith; and when I lost faith I blindly followed the economists
and philosophers who can never know the mystic power of work over the
worker. And it may be that herein lies the secret of the philosopher's
ignorance and the worker's slavery. A man stands to his job because of
the visions that come to him only when at work.

"Though I helped move the world, I was not an Atlas, and at last, I grew
tired, for I found the world moved me out of all proportion to my
capacity. Even at an early age, I found that I had not the heart for the
fray. Stamped on my narrow forehead, on my whole being, perhaps, so
clearly that every unsympathetic boss could understand at once, was the
mark of the visionary. My pitiable willingness to work was truly tragic.

"We were an eccentric family, especially in our peculiar aloofness from
others. We clung desperately to one another long after the necessity was
past. Neither eviction nor commerce could disband us. Only marriage or
death could separate us. Though we were Catholics on the surface, we
were pagans at bottom. I had fed my fill on the fairy tales of Ireland.
Fortunately, these fairy tales were told to me, not read, and told in
such a way that they led me to seek no individua