SUBLIME CHAOS


=Acquisitiveness.=--In fancy, at least, we may attain a position over
and far above the city of London and from this vantage-place, with the
aid of strong glasses, watch a panorama that is both entrancing and
bewildering. The scene bewilders not alone by its scope, but still more
by its complexity. The scene is a shifting one, too, never the same in
two successive minutes. Here is Trafalgar Square, with its noble
monument and the guardian lions, reminding us of Nelson in what is
accounted one of the most heroic naval engagements recorded in history.
As we look, we reconstitute the scene, far away, in which he was
conspicuous, and reread in our books his stirring appeal to his men.
Thence we glance up Regent Street and see it thronged with equipages
that betoken wealth and luxury. Richly dressed people in great numbers
are moving to and fro and giving color to the picture. A shabby garb
cannot be made to fit into this picture. When it appears, there is
discord in the general harmony. All this motion must have motives behind
it somewhere; but we can only conjecture the motives. We have only
surface indications to guide us in our quest for these. But we are
reasonably certain that these people are animated by the instinct of
acquisition. They seem to want to get things, and so come where things
are to be had.

=Desires for things intangible.=--There are miles of vehicles of many
kinds wending their tortuous, sinuous ways in and out along streets that
radiate hither and thither. They stay their progress for a moment and
people emerge at Robinson's, at Selfridge's, at Liberty's. Each of these
is the Mecca of a thousand desires, and faces beam with pleasure when