MARGINAL COMMENTS
By ROSE MACAULAY
OW many Societies for the improvement of the world do you, or do I, support ? And can you, or can I, always remember which is for the protection, preservation, defence or abolition, of what ? I find that one grows confused. All these admirable, all those other detestable, things, which must be either protected or abolished--it is earnestly to be hoped that we never apply the wrong treatment, like those absent-minded professors who, it is said, will boil their watches in a saucepan while gazing on an egg. Ancient Buildings, Intellectual Liberty. Litter. International Cult iire, Commons, Footpaths, Civil Liberties, Noise. Pure English, Sanctions, War. Peace, the League of Nations, Abyssinia, Tithes, Cruel Sports . . . one signs resolutions and letters about these. one attends (perhaps) meetings, even contributes (possibly) money. And sometimes one pauses to ask oneself with sonic mistrust, what have I today abolished, what preserved ? Which did I do to Abyssinia ? Which to Cruel Sports, Ancient Buildings, the League of Nations, Litter ? Cati I. in some absent moment, have abolished Abyssinia and protected Cruel Sports? Both, somehow, wear that air. . . . Ancient Buildings, too : they are being razed to the ground all about me ; while, on the other hand, Litter seems to have been by someone (was it by me ?) well preserved. As to Culture, Civil Liberties, the League of Nations, Road Safety, Pure English and Footpaths, can it. be that the weapons which I thought I aimed at Noise hit and shattered these instead ? From their somewhat disintegrated appearance, one might almost suspect. so.
Never mind. Do not let any impulse to protect, to protest, to abolish, ever perish on the vacant air. Join a Society forthwith ; or, in the unlikely contingency of no Society for your particular purpose existing, forli one ; that is to say, have sonic note-paper stamped with your -purpose. This will relieve you. 1 sec that the B.B.C. has started a series of talks called " I Protest;']. in which speakers arc allowed to inveigh against this and that. After giving such talks, the speakers will feel much better. Others write to the newspapers, and feel better too. For my part, when I have time to spare from abolishing great world nuisances, such as Litter, Civil Liberties, Abyssinia and Footpaths, 1 turn to my own private list and consider having note-paper stamped about each of them. The abolition, for example, of those members of the London Library who do not return over-due books immediately on demand. If this is not the worst of those sins classified in heaven (against that Great Day) as Library Offences, I shall he, on that Day, surprised. It is worse than writing in the books, or even licking them. If, before long, Sanctions should be sacked from their international job and be wanting another, here is a crime that calls for them. The Application of Sanctions to Non-Returners of Books ; such a cause would fill the Albert Hall with its supporters.
On another piece of note-paper I should wish to stamp, Abolition of journalese terms Highbrow, Middlebrow, and Lowbrow ; on another, Restriction of Word Sex, to Literal Meaning ; on another, Abolish Tyranny of Fashion in Clothes. But, alas, this last Society would really be for the Abolition of Human Nature. Indeed, when you come to think of it, all abolition and all pro- tection Societies are this : which must, I suppose, be why they do not meet with more success. To abolish Human Nature : it is a great, if a somewhat far and faint, goal. Let us strive towards it ; but we must not be too greatly surprised if, like the professor with his egg and his watch, we find we have preserved it by mistake after all, and flung something else into the pot.
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