FALLING OUT OF IT. •
TT is, we suppose, some far-off derivative of the herd instinaf which makes it so painful to fall out of things." We hate to feel that our particular group can do without us, that we no longer count among the initiated ; we hate to take our place with the strangers who require explanations and are no longer consulted, however kindly the explanations may be given. We had rather suffer within than be comfortable with- out. It is the sense of loneliness, as a rule, which first tells no that we are getting old. It is the dread of this isolation whieli makes us determine to die in harness. It is the certainty that, we must fall out of things which casts men into despair when they are faced by loss of money or by any radical and permanent, change in their way of life.
A man whose income is halved at one financial blow is a strong man indeed if he is not knocked down by his misfortune, if he suffers no more than a physical or nervous upset. Unimaginative people, if they have never had more than a tenth of his income, often reflect ratherpleasantly upon the worldlinesit and love of luxury which have rendered him downcast. They are perfectly happy, they say to themselves, and so might Is, be if he were a little less proud and earthy. Standing close to what we may call the central hearth of their own group, they laugh at a man who has fallen out of another. It seems very wrong that a loss of money should cut a man off from Ids friends ; and, indeed, in the true sense of friendship it does not do so. The luckiest of us, however, have few friends in the strictest sense of the word. Three outside of one's own family is a common computation, and it would surely be difficult to find a man or a woman who has half a dozen. One may not actually lose one's friends and yet feel very sadly out of it. It is not that a man's former associates cold-shoulder him because he is poor ; it is simply that Ile no longer lives the same life, fellows the same pursuits, or thinks, so far as money is concerned, upon the same scale that they do. In a sense Inc is an accidental exile. He no longer lives, metaphorically speaking, in the same place, and in the nature of things he is forgotten, or, to be more correct, he becomes a pleasant recollection occasionally revived by the sight of his corporeal presence at a distance.
An Englishman who through loss of money falls out of things may be said never to get back. In America one hears that this is not the case. Americans, especially American women, often appear to be very worldly, but it is certain that they take loss of fortune in better part than we du and are far less dis- couraged by it. It is no doubt largely a ease of "light come, light go," but there is something very admirable about the sight of a middle-aged American getting up after he has fallen out of it," and determining to be "in it" again.
Loss of money, however, is not the only thing which leads people away from the warm centre of their former environment. Any very unpopular opinion which a man cannot keep to himself will lead to his falling out, or perhaps even ti Ids being thrown out of his group. If he can stand ridicule he may possibly preserve his place ; if not, he must leave it. There is nothing much sadder than to sec a man drifting 'further and further away from his companions in company with some adored theory or fancy or conviction which Inc not only will not let go, but will force upon the notice of every one whom he meets. Ile becomes the subject of a kind of unconscious persecution ; and whethtt it is his conscience or his vanity which has thrown him outsids of his world, the result is the same. As a rule he becomes in fanatic, and is spoken of by his former friends either contemp. tuously or affectionately as "Poor so-and-so." Excessive industry is another peculiarity which leads straight to exile. If a man has no leisure to bestow upon anyone, and none, as it were, to throw away, the tacit trade union of his acquaintance will turn hint out. His constant occupation with his avocations is a sort of reproach. There is something didactic in the rare companionship of a man who almost never relaxes. Those who live for their work and for nothing else are almost always proud of the fact, and it is one of the most disagreeable forms of pride. Too hard work, too long hours, too great a devotion to output, is a penal offence in almost every society. The offender will feel his punishment if ever he comes to retire. He will suddenly realize that he has fallen out of things, that with his work his social life has ended. Many strenuous people realize this, and dare no more stop than they dare commit suicide. They had rather watch the deterioration of their own powers, rather spoil the prospects of a younger man, rather see their own job for which they have lived badly done, than accept what might cynically be called the punishment of their good deeds, and " settle down" in the place they have made for themselves, that wretched place known as " out of it."
Extremes meet, and there is an innate laziness which is quite as likely to float us into a backwater as feverish industry. A great many men and women are endowed with a moral force which enables them to make almost any exertion which duty demands of them and nd more. They will not take the slightest unnecessary trouble. They are as a rule excellent people, and they are not unnaturally inclined to think that the world treats them badly. They will go out of their way to do a good turn to anyone who is in need, but they will not move a finger to amuse him or give him pleasure ; neither will they exert them- selves to get amusement or pleasure for themselves. They suffer from a form of mental inertia. They cannot realize that those who would not drift outside the charmed circle must exert themselves to keep within it. Often they become very bitter, these lazy folks. All the interest of life, they say, falls to the lot of pushing, bustling persons, who get everything for themselves. If you do not push and shoulder your way you are left behind, they complain ; and that though you have never turned your back on a friend in trouble. They forget how often they have turned it on a friend in luck. They have condoled with their world ; they have not congratulated it. They have been too lazy to attend the feasts of life, and the feasters have forgotten them. People who will do nothing but rest in their leisure will be left picnic's a, and all the fun of the fair will go on too far off for them to see it. They are such good aorta, these mentally inert people, that it is a pity they should not all come together and form a world of their own ; a dull world it would be, but better than loneliness.
What about those whose great desire is to get out of their own world and to soar into another, who are not only content but eager to become outsiders ? Their object, of course, is to get into a larger circle than their own. How far they are happy at first only those who have climbed successfully can know. All social aims are humanized and made more or less innocent by the fact that they are seldom altogether selfish. People abandon their old friends, and even their old acquaintances, most often for the sake of their children. It cannot be denied that happiness is more easily to be obtained by the young near the top of the social scale. Ambition is the result of cumulative experience. Those who soar out, however, if they do not take so big a risk as those who allow themselves to fall out of their own world, do take one, and may find themselves in outer darkness after all.
Perhaps the complaint, "We have somehow fallen out of it," was never so general as it is to-day. In some sense we have all been away and come back strangers. During the war almost every social circle was broken up. Great causes and small causes have left almost all the groups, all the mental and spiritual townships, as it were, more or less in ruins. The fires of society, in the lighter sense of the word, are out. If we are not in the great movement, in the world where reputations are made and everybody is conspicuous, we are apt to feel as if we were in no world at all. It is a state of things which cannot last. We are not only social, we are parochial animals ; we sigh in the midst of a general sense of disintegration and dream of some new and delightful feudal system which, without tyranny and with- out such great diversity of fortunes as the term usually implies, should assign to us all a place somewhere in some system so that the average man and woman can once more be part of a whole, a cog in a well-defined little wheel within a wheel. The machinery of social life is all clattering and out of gear, and most people would rather it were set going again anyhow than nohow.
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