age, that the possession of things is the final achievement of society,
and that in multiplication of conveniences civilization will reach its
point of culmination.

We are so engrossed in getting rich that we forget that by and by, when
we have become rich, we shall have to learn how to live; for work can
never be an end in itself; it is a "means of grace" when it is not
drudgery; and it must, in the long run, be a preparation for play. For
play is not organized idleness, frivolity set in a fanciful order; it is
the normal, spontaneous exercise of physical activity, the wholesome
gayety of the mind, the natural expression of the spirit, without
self-consciousness, constraint, or the tyranny of hours and tasks. It is
the highest form of energy, because it is free and creative; a joy in
itself, and therefore a joy in the world. This is the explanation of the
sense of freedom and elation which come from a great work of art; it is
the instinctive perception of the fact that while immense toil lies
behind the artist's skill, the soul of the creation came from beyond the
world of work and the making of it was a bit of play. The man of
creative spirit is often a tireless worker, but in his happiest hours he
is at play; for all work, when it rises into freedom and power, is play.
"We work," wrote a Greek thinker of the most creative people who have
yet appeared, "in order that we may have leisure." The note of that life
was freedom; its activity was not "evoked by external needs, but was
free, spontaneous and delightful; an ordered energy which stimulates all
the vital and mental powers."

Robert Louis Stevenson, who knew well how to touch work with the spirit
and charm of play, reports of certain evenings spent at a clubhouse near
Brussels, that the men who gathered there "were employed over the
frivolous mercantile concerns of Belgium during the day; but in the