Upton Sinclair - The Book of Life

To
Kate Crane Gartz
in acknowledgment of her unceasing efforts for a
better world, and her fidelity to those
who struggle to achieve it.

The writer of this book has been in this world some forty-two years.That may not seem long to some, but it is long enough to have made manypainful mistakes, and to have learned much from them. Looking about him,he sees others making these same mistakes, suffering for lack of thatsame knowledge which he has so painfully acquired. This being the case,it seems a friendly act to offer his knowledge, minus the blunders andthe pain.

There come to the writer literally thousands of letters every year,asking him questions, some of them of the strangest. A man is dying ofcancer, and do I think it can be cured by a fast? A man is unable tomake his wife happy, and can I tell him what is the matter with women? Aman has invested his savings in mining stock, and can I tell him what todo about it? A man works in a sweatshop, and has only a little time forself-improvement, and will I tell him what books he ought to read? Manysuch questions every day make one aware of a vast mass of people,earnest, hungry for happiness, and groping as if in a fog. The thingsthey most need to know they are not taught in the schools, nor in thenewspapers they read, nor in the church they attend. Of these agencies,the first is not entirely competent, the second is not entirely honest,and the third is not entirely up to date. Nor is there anywhere a bookin which the effort has been made to give to everyday human beings theeveryday information they need for the successful living of their lives.

For the present book the following claims may be made. First, it is amodern book; its writer watches hour by hour the new achievements of thehuman mind, he reaches out for information about them, he seeks toadjust his own thoughts to them and to test them in his own living.Second, it is, or tries hard to be, a wise book; its writer is not amongthose too-ardent young radicals who leap to the conclusion that becausemany old things are stupid and tiresome, therefore everything that isold is to be spurned with contempt, and everything that proclaims itselfnew is to be taken at its own valuation. Third, it is an honest book;its writer will not pretend to know what he only guesses, and where itis necessary to guess, he will say so frankly. Finally, it is a kindbook; it is not written for its author's glory, nor for his enrichment,but to tell you things that may be useful to you in the brief span ofyour life. It will attempt to tell you how to live, how to find healthand happiness and success, how to work and how to play, how to eat andhow to sleep, how to love and to marry and to care for your children,how to deal with your fellow men in business and politics and sociallife, how to act and how to think, what religion to believe, what art toenjoy, what books to read. A large order, as the boys phrase it!

There are several ways for such a book to begin. It might begin with thechild, because we all begin that way; it might begin with love, becausethat precedes the child; it might begin with the care of the body,explaining that sound physical health is the basis of all right living,and even of right thinking; it might begin as most philosophies do, bydefining life, discussing its origin and fundamental nature.

The trouble with this last plan is that there are a lot of people whohave their ideas on life made up in tabloid form; they have creeds andcatechisms which they know by heart, and if you suggest to them anythingdifferent, they give you a startled look and get out of your way. Andthen there is another, and in our modern world a still larger class, whosay, "Oh, shucks! I don't go in for religion and that kind of thing."You offer them something that looks like a sermon, and they turn to thebaseball page.

Who will read this Book of Life? There will be, among others, the greatAmerican tired business man. He wrestles with problems and cares allday, and when he sits down to read in the evening, he says: "Make itshort and snappy." There is the wife of the tired business man, theAmerican perfect lady. She does most of the reading for the family; butshe has never got down to anything fundamental in her life, and mostlyshe likes to read about exciting love affairs, which she distinguishesfrom the unexciting kind she knows by the word "romance." Then there isthe still more tired American workingman, who has been "speeded up" allday under the bonus system or the piece-work system, and is apt to fallasleep in his chair before he finishes supper. Then there is theworkingman's wife, who has slaved all day in the kitchen, and has achance for a few minutes' intimacy with her husband before he fallsasleep. She would like to have somebody tell her what to do for croup,but she is not sure that she has time to discuss the question whetherlife is worth living.

Yet, I wonder; is there a single one among all these tired people, oreven among the cynical people, who has not had some moment of awe whenthe thought came stabbing into his mind like a knife: "What a strangething this life is! What am I anyhow? Where do I come from, and what isgoing to become of me? What do I mean, what am I here for?" I have satchatting with three hoboes by a railroad track, cooking themselves amulligan in an old can, and heard one of them say: "By God, it's a queerthing, ain't it, mate?" I have sat on the deck of a ship, looking outover the midnight ocean and talking with a sailor, and heard him usealmost the identical words. It is not only in the class-room and theschools that the minds of men are grappling with the fundamentalproblems; in fact, it was not from the schools that the new religionsand the great moral impulses of humanity took their origin. It was fromlonely shepherds sitting on the hillsides, and from fishermen castingtheir nets, and from carpenters and tailors and shoemakers at theirbenches.

Stop and think a bit, and you will realize it does make a differencewhat you believe about life, how it comes to be, where it is going, andwhat is your place in it. Is there a heaven with a God, who watches youday and night, and knows every thought you think, and will some day takeyou to eternal bliss if you obey his laws? If you really believe that,you will try to find out about his laws, and you will be comparativelylittle concerned about the success or failure of your business. Perhaps,on the other hand, you have knocked about in the world and lost your"faith"; you have been cheated and exploited, and have set out to "getyours," as the phrase is; to "feather your own nest." But some gust ofpassion seizes you, and you waste your substance, you wreck your life;then you wonder, "Who set that trap and baited it? Am I a creature ofblind instincts, jealousies and greeds and hates beyond my own controlentirely? Am I a poor, feeble insect, blown about in a storm andsmashed? Or do I make the storm, and can I in any part control it?"