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es the two-fold blessing. Notes, Letters and Stray Leaves A "free lance" is less free than the organs of a party. In one case it means at least the opinions of a group; in the other, the dogmatism of the one who wields the lance. Nothing is less free than the self-styled freedom of the individual. Enthusiasm implies a certain narrowness of vision. When people can take a broad view they can see the elements of goodness or beauty everywhere, and they cease to be enthusiastic in regard to one. The great popular preachers are not university men, or those who are quiet and literary in style, but strong, dogmatic men. Perhaps the most noticeable difference between the so-called new woman and the new man is this, that she is seizing every opportunity that opens up new avenues of individual employment, while he is discovering and storing energy to save himself from doing any work at all. The old man made other men, and women too, work for him, the new man is making the hitherto uncontrolled forces his servants, locking them up in such small compass that a twist of the wrist will start the crash of worlds. The notes of the great god Pan, so "piercingly sweet by the river"--a far cry and a weary way from Pan to Handel and Beethoven; yet during all that time music has been the joy and the consolation of peoples,--all except the Quakers. If Poetry is the prophet of the future, music expresses all emotions,--love, joy, fear, above all, aspiration. Music is essentially religious, and has inspired the most perfect forms of emotional composition we know. I take off my hat to the new man--that is, I would if I wore one, but I wear a bonnet, and pin it on with long, sharp-pointed things which if they were not used voluntarily would be considered instruments of torture. Think of the man who is testing the force of dynamite--who is holding lightning bolts in his hand and forcing them to do the work which he has planned for them, who is taking the altitude of the mountains in Mars in his observatory in the air at midnight,--think of these men stopping to swear while they ran the murderous little weapon through six thicknesses of buckram, lining, velvet, lace, feathers, ribbon and hair--to fasten on their bonnets! Letter to the New York Woman's Press Club October, 1900. My dear Friends and Fellow-Members: It was really a grief to me not to be able to meet you individually and collectively before le
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