The Joyful Heart

The Joyful Heart, by Robert
Haven Schauffler

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Title: The Joyful Heart
Author: Robert Haven Schauffler
Release Date: November 2, 2006 [EBook #19696]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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THE JOYFUL HEART

BY
ROBERT HAVEN SCHAUFFLER
AUTHOR OF THE MUSICAL AMATEUR, SCUM O' THE EARTH
AND OTHER POEMS, ROMANTIC AMERICA, ETC.

"People who are nobly happy constitute the power, the beauty and the
foundation of the state."
JEAN FINOT: The Science of Happiness.

BOSTON AND NEW YORK HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY
The Riverside Press Cambridge 1914

COPYRIGHT, 1914 BY ROBERT HAVEN SCHAUFFLER
* * * * *

TO
MY WIFE
* * * * *

FOREWORD
This is a guide-book to joy. It is for the use of the sad, the bored, the
tired, anxious, disheartened and disappointed. It is for the use of all
those whose cup of vitality is not brimming over.
The world has not yet seen enough of joy. It bears the reputation of an

elusive sprite with finger always at lip bidding farewell. In certain dark
periods, especially in times of international warfare, it threatens to
vanish altogether from the earth. It is then the first duty of all peaceful
folk to find and hold fast to joy, keeping it in trust for their embattled
brothers.
Even if this were not their duty as citizens of the world, it would be
their duty as patriots. For Jean Finot is right in declaring that "people
who are nobly happy constitute the power, the beauty and the
foundation of the state."
This book is a manual of enthusiasm--the power which drives the
world--and of those kinds of exuberance (physical, mental and spiritual)
which can make every moment of every life worth living. It aims to
show how to get the most joy not only from traveling hopefully toward
one's goal, but also from the goal itself on arrival there. It urges sound
business methods in conducting that supreme business, the investment
of one's vitality.
It would show how one may find happiness all alone with his better self,
his 'Auto-Comrade'--an accomplishment well-nigh lost in this crowded
age. It would show how the gospel of exuberance, by offering the joys
of hitherto unsuspected power to the artist and his audience, bids fair to
lift the arts again to the lofty level of the Periclean age. It would show
the so-called "common" man or woman how to develop that creative
sympathy which may make him a 'master by proxy,' and thus let him
know the conscious happiness of playing an essential part in the
creation of works of genius. In short, the book tries to show how the
cup of joy may not only be kept full for one's personal use, but may
also be made hospitably to brim over for others.
To the Atlantic Monthly thanks are due for permission to reprint
chapters I, III and IV; to the North American Review, for chapter VIII;
and to the Century, for chapters V, VI, IX and X.
R. H. S.
GEEENBUSH, MASS.

August, 1914.
* * * * *

CONTENTS
I. A DEFENSE OF JOY
II. THE BRIMMING CUP
III. ENTHUSIASM
IV. A CHAPTER OF ENTHUSIASMS
V. THE AUTO-COMRADE
VI. VIM AND VISION
VII. PRINTED JOY
VIII. THE JOYFUL HEART FOR POETS
IX. THE JOYOUS MISSION OF MECHANICAL MUSIC
X. MASTERS BY PROXY
* * * * *

THE JOYFUL HEART
I
A DEFENSE OF JOY
Joy is such stuff as the hinges of Heaven's doors are made of. So our
fathers believed. So we supposed in childhood. Since then it has

become the literary fashion to oppose this idea. The writers would have
us think of joy not as a supernal hinge, but as a pottle of hay, hung by a
crafty creator before humanity's asinine nose. The donkey is thus
constantly incited to unrewarded efforts. And when he arrives at the
journey's end he is either defrauded of the hay outright, or he dislikes it,
or it disagrees with him.
Robert Louis Stevenson warns us that "to travel hopefully is a better
thing than to arrive," beautifully portraying the emptiness and illusory
character of achievement. And, of those who have attained, Mr. E. F.
Benson exclaims, "God help them!" These sayings are typical of a
widespread literary fashion. Now to slander Mistress