TO-DAY AND TO-MORROW.

Auckland Star, Volume XLI, Issue 203, 27 August 1910, Page 13

TO-DAY AND TO-MORROW.

I am a to-dayer; a nerved note in this modern world where so many things go wrong: listen to my little solo of ideas about civilisation. Why is the world upside-down? Because the wrong people get together, and we do not sufficiently realise that happiness comes from persons, not things. We begin our undertakings at the wrong end; this age is like a lion with a forward tail and a ; backward head. Federation means progress; progress ■ implies originality; how can New Zea--1 land give that to the world? Considering these things, I should approve a Society of To-Dayers, a live company of . bright-siders, __b would breathe elation i through this perplexed creation, because the world is ours to-day. No ideal brotherhood business, mind; but a society that would begin at the right end of I things, and stir up humanity that tho ; right people might come together. Of course, it is difficult to say how i this could be done. Gould we start a i new religion? Good sackcloth and ashes! ! The idea is impossible; for the creeds of the past have defied everything, and ; left few things undamned. How about , a new philosophy? By the smile of , Psyche, let us pray ourselves away from . the thought; philosophy has doubted ; everything and asserted everything, till we wonder whether man is a postulated -, orphan or an automatic pirate. As to , politics, that reforming machine which always wants repairing, there is little '. hope" of novelty there; the idea of -one . babe, one vote," by proxy of tbe parents, . ! has already been mooted. A new style of . education for children presents possibili- , ties; but to begin at the beginning we must go further back, and educate the , ___.y____.r_. Homoeulture —that is, the scientific , I breeding of men and women, is one oi f I the ideals before society. Sooner or - I later, the world will cross-breed human . I beings in a due and ennobling manner; but. as it is, lust or face-love is mostly the motive towards marriage. For unr told ages. Nature has been hybridising ~ till she lias arrived at the human beling; and, nowadays, humanity eross- | breeds everything except man and truffles. It is time man turned natural selector. I We improve microscopes for human eye 1 and brain to study the mystery of things, • i but we do noD scientifically engender - ! better brains to invent finer microscopes. 1 The idea of "homoeulture is not new, and s ' is absurd or glorious according to the i ' point of view. Several theories are in .'lthe air: for instance, to encourage mar-j t riage by State-endowment among people ; noble in mind and beautiful in body, and to have a board of specialists to note j * * _-■

hereditary qualities- This may seem __» acme of absurdity to the mother of the middle _as_, who rules tbe proprieties; but once start a National Nuptial Department and a Minister for Matrimony, and the woman of the latere will sooa bike through all difficulties. Many obstacles are in the way: State control of the marriage market would interfere with- the supreme liberty cf man to love woman; it might result ia peopling the world with a hideous monotony of beauty. Beauty is sometimes inane, and fine souls are often found ia ugly bodies. Nevertheless, something might be done to discourage the marriage madness which afflicts society. What a tantalisation ia life! Here ia homoculture we can see a way to enrich the earth with a life-lifting race of mortals: yet there is, at present, no fine feasibility in the idea. There are beaittsfnl women and noble men in the world who could engender the coming race; but how to bring the right people together? The world is a heaven of hybridisation. Australasia is a leviathan iamb of the South! Will she ever bring forth happy hybrids, men and women of the future, divine Southern Cross-breds who will glorify the world? Shall wp ever hail the new Bride, mother of the sublime To-morrow-man. In -the name of wild wedlock I wonder.—J. H.