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opposite kind into their dull minds. For ages, any expression of
so-called irreverence from their lips has been sin and crime. The sham
and swindle of all this is apparent the moment one reflects that he is
himself the only legitimately qualified judge of what is entitled to
reverence and what is not. Come, I hadn't thought of that before, but
it is true, absolutely true. What right has Goethe, what right has
Arnold, what right has any dictionary, to define the word Irreverence
for me? What their ideals are is nothing to me. So long as I reverence
my own ideals my whole duty is done, and I commit no profanation if I
laugh at theirs. I may scoff at other people's ideals as much as I want
to. It is my right and my privilege. No man has any right to deny it."
Tracy was expecting to hear the essay debated, but this did not happen.
The chairman said, by way of explanation:
"I would say, for the information of the strangers present here, that in
accordance with our custom the subject of this meeting will be debated at
the next meeting of the club. This is in order to enable our members to
prepare what they may wish to say upon the subject with pen and paper,
for we are mainly mechanics and unaccustomed to speaking. We are
obliged to write down what we desire to say."
Many brief papers were now read, and several offhand speeches made in
discussion of the essay read at the last meeting of the club, which had
been a laudation, by some visiting professor, of college culture, and the
grand results flowing from it to the nation. One of the papers was read
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