Yeshiva University - Masmid Yearbook (New York, NY)

Page 15 text:

M A S M I D 13 Pot-Pourri By EEGEE Meanderings of a miscreant mentality. 1. Idiosyncrasy is the privilege of the genius and of the successful but when pos- sessed by the average citizen makes him the subject for an alienist. 2. Reading maketb a full man sayeth Bacon. Even a prohibitionist may indulge in that form of dissipation. 3. Idealism is the saving grace of human- kind. It is the line of demarcation between the material and the mind. Without it life would be entirely a struggle for existence, an insenate desire for self-preservation — and devil take the hindmost. Idealism is the only e xcuse man has for continuing to live. 4. A cynic is usually a person who, dis- appointed in a petty personal affair, uses it as a criterion by which to judge the rest of the world. 5. Sarcasm is often a substitute for rea- son. 6. The dogmatist tells us that Vice is Vice and Virtue is Virtue — and never the twain shall meet, nevertheless there are sev- eral things that may be both: Pride is just as much a vice as it is a virtue. Conceit is a vice, self-confidence a virtue — yet both have the same origin. Vanity. 7. Stretching the truth is hyperbole for the poet, but plain perjury for the lay- man. 8. Of those who keep within the law, fifty percent do so because they fear retalia- tion; fifty percent because they haven ' t had an opportunity to violate a law — the re- mainder because they really have a moral sense of right. 9. I fear that the problems arising from a discussion of eugenics have addled my poor brain sadly. If a m.an is but a composition of good or bad characteristics inherited from his ancestors why should he be commended for talent or punished for wrongdoing — be- ing personally irresponsible for the traits that cause his actions? However, were Society not to reward abil- ity or punish crime, those born with talent would have no incentive for exercising that ability, and those born with criminalistic tendencies, and who are kept from crime by the fear of punishment under the present seemingly unjust system, would make the rest of the social organization suffer for their own unfortunate condition. The existing system of justice may be fundamentally unjust, but it is necessary. 10. The pessimist is the fellow who con- stantly tells the world that it is stuck in a rut, instead of helping to extricate it. 11. It takes two to make a quarrel, says the pacifist derogatorily, forgetting that the holy state of matrimony itself has this principle for its raison d ' etre. 12. Nothing is right unless its conse- quences are more beneficial than harmful: and nothing is wrong unless its consequences arc more harmful than beneficial. There are no exceptions to this rule. 13. Isn ' t it peculiar that those who least expect to go to Hell are most interested in it? 14. Variety is the spice of life — but our modern brand is too seasoned for healthy consumption. 15. Age that would be youth can never be more than a synthetic imitation, nor can it be more than a pathetic paradox, out of its sphere, alien both to its kind and to that which it seems to emulate. Lif e ' s inevitable flow and ebb cannot be arrested, and he who would stay the ebb-tide finds loneliness and isolation at a time when he needs most compassion and sympathy.

Page 14 text:

12 M A S M I D bliss, for the stirrings of their poignant souls were far removed from earthly things and purposes. It was a world of contentment complete within itself. It was a gossamer world of dream-stuff where naught existed but the abstract tenderness of the present and the honeyed promises of the future. Not a word did the lovers say: but their silence was of mystic clairvoyance, while their spirits glided from their eyes and lips. Then when Rachel slumbered Jacob wan- dered off into the desert alone with a feeling of sadness and with a presentiment of evil. His happiness made him feel aged as if he had lived through an eternity. All other things were petty now for a new spirit had merged with the two lovers from their own warmth and felicity. A prayer burst out of Jacob for strength and guidance to keep this ardent soul thrust upon his care forever youthful and happy. For Rachel was with child. . . . There came thoughts of a graying domesti- cated Rachel, weaning children and mo- ther of a household, her fervor hidden like sidereal fires. It was depressing to think of her ageing slowly, and the fire within her cooling. She was an arrested flame and there could be no embers of passion. Would there be only an aching emptiness where the flames had once licked, or would there be two graying heads nodding asleep together? On the road to Hebron Rachel died. Jacob stood by the dry sand that covered her body with wrinkled, new-born Benjamin in his arms. Ben-oni — child of my pain — Rachel had called him with her last breath. A deep void within him bowed Jacob; too deep for tears to reach or fill. A salty mist veiled his eyes, and slowly he felt a youthful spirit within him wither and fade away. And he knew that when Rachel had gone two souls were lost in an eternity of quiet. Ben-oni was crying in Jacob ' s arms, and an old, old man was waiting for a tarrying son. And it was shearing time in Canaan. DEFEAT? Stir me not To troubled aspirations That torture me On the rack of discontent. Let me dream Untroubled Of things that must not be. With the perfect happiness Of dreams. With the nebulous perfection Of dreams. Let me grasp The unattainable. Enter Paradise. And, awaking, forget. Oh, Domesticity, Powerful mother, Let me sleep in your arms. Charles Hirshfeld

Page 16 text:

14 M A S M I D 16. There is no complacence like that of the radical in ridiculing the smugness of the conservative. There is nothing so conventional as his so-called freedom from conventionalism. 17. Beauty covers a multitude of sins. 18. Lying isn ' t wrong — it ' s foolish. It is not the original cost of lying that is the greatest burden, but its upkeep. 19. Cat-like, Life plays with us, amused at our puny attempts to escape the bounds of its paws. Then, its enjoyment waning, it idly destroys us. 20. Having obtained dominion over this world by a series of fortuituous events Man, in his colossal conceit, declares because he is master of the Earth the entire Universe was made for his benefit by a God whose main concern is Man ' s welfare. How bombastic is his fantastic faith to believe that he, an infinitesimal speck on an infinitesimal needle lost in an infinite hay- stack, is the reason for the existence of both the needle and the haystack! 21. There is nothing so good but that there is a limit to its value and efficacy. Re- ligion, overdone, becomes bigotry — logic, so- phistry — civilization, decadence — patriotism, junkerism — contentment, stagnancy. So it is with charity, with ambition, with love, with culture, with prosperity, with truth and with everything else we consider desirable. 22. In many cases sympathy is a com- bination of fear that you may become in- volved in like circumstances, and relief that you have not. 23. In choosing words to express our thoughts adequacy is more important than simplicity, but when simplicity is adequate complex language is affectation. 24. Courage is either the repression or the lack of imagination. 25. Many of us admire our friends be- cause we endorse their admiration of us. Much of our antagonism for others is prompt- ed by their dislike for us. 26. There are many people who spend their lifetimes trying to find out the purpose of existence and then realize that their cogi- tations occupied the time within which they ought to have lived. They were unable to comprehend that actual living is the purpose of life. 27. Being in hot-water makes us hard- boiled. AMANS AMARE My humble heart was gashed with ragged rents Ere you came. Another had already hacked with strands of hair And veiled eyes and skin of velvet Ere you came. All I could offer was a bruised pulp And in your charity you took me in — And the healing wounds again began to bleed. Now you ' re gone — Yet I feel the mightiness of my heart Exulting in its shattered bits. Trebreh