much. But consider where Chaucer would be but for the work of the Chaucer
clubs, and what an effect upon the universal progress of things is
produced by the associate concentration upon the poet of so many minds.

A cynic says that clubs and circles are for the accumulation of
superficial information and unloading it on others, without much
individual absorption in anybody. This, like all cynicism, contains only
a half-truth, and simply means that the general diffusion of
half-digested information does not raise the general level of
intelligence, which can only be raised to any purpose by thorough
self-culture, by assimilation, digestion, meditation. The busy bee is a
favorite simile with us, and we are apt to overlook the fact that the
least important part of his example is buzzing around. If the hive simply
got together and buzzed, or even brought unrefined treacle from some
cyclopaedia, let us say, of treacle, there would be no honey added to the
general store.

It occurred to some one in this talk at last to deny that there was this
tiresome monotony in American life. And this put a new face on the
discussion. Why should there be, with every race under the heavens
represented here, and each one struggling to assert itself, and no
homogeneity as yet established even between the people of the oldest
States? The theory is that democracy levels, and that the anxious pursuit
of a common object, money, tends to uniformity, and that facility of
communication spreads all over the land the same fashion in dress; and
repeats everywhere the same style of house, and that the public schools
give all the children in the United States the same superficial
smartness. And there is a more serious notion, that in a society without
classes there is a sort of tyranny of public opinion which crushes out
the play of individual peculiarities, without which human intercourse is