All of us have read thrilling stories in which the hero had only alimited and specified time to live. Sometimes it was as long as a year;sometimes as short as twenty-four hours, but always we were interestedin discovering just how the doomed man chose to spend his last days orhis last hours. I speak, of course, of free men who have a choice, notcondemned criminals whose sphere of activities is strictly delimited.
Such stories set up thinking, wondering what we should do undersimilar circumstances.What associations should we crowd into those lasthours as mortal beings? What happiness shouldwe find in reviewing thepast, what regrets?
Sometimes I have thought it would be an excellent rule to liveeach day as if we should dietomorrow. Such an attitude would emphasizesharply the values of life. We should live each daywith a gentleness, avigor, and a keenness of appreciation which are often lost when timestretchesbefore us in the constant panorama of more days and months andyears to come. There are those,of course, who would adopt the epicureanmotto of “Eat, drink, and be merry,” most people wouldbe chastened bythe certainty of impending death.
Most of us take life for granted. We know that one day we mustdie, but usually we picture that day as far in the future, when we arein buoyant health, death is all but unimaginable. We seldom think ofit. The days stretch out in an endless vista. So we go about our pettytask, hardly aware of our listless attitude towards life.
The same lethargy, I am afraid, characterizes the use of ourfaculties and senses. Only the deaf appreciate hearing, only the blindrealize the manifold blessings that lie in sight. Particularly doesthis observation apply to those who have lost sight and hearing inadult life. But those who have never suffered impairment of sight orhearing seldom make the fullest use of these blessed faculties. Theireyes and ears take in all sights and sound hazily, withoutconcentration, and with little appreciation. It is the same old storyof not being grateful for what we conscious of health until we are ill.
I have often thought it would be a blessing if each human beingwere stricken blind and deaf for a few days at some time during hisearly adult life. Darkness would make him more appreciative of sight;silence would teach him the joys of sound.
Now and then I have tested my seeing friends to discover what theysee. Recently I was visited by a very good friend who had just returnedfrom a long walk in the woods, and I asked her what she had observed.“Nothing in particular,” she replied. I might have been incredulous hadI not been accustomed to such responses, for long ago I becameconvinced that the seeing see little.
How was it possible, I asked myself, to walk for an hour throughthe woods and see nothing worthy of note? I who cannot see findhundreds of things to interest me through mere touch. I feel thedelicate symmetry of a leaf. I pass my hands lovingly about the smoothskin of a silver birch,or the rough shaggy bark of a pine. In spring Itouch the branches of trees hopefully in search of a bud, the firstsign of awakening Nature after her winter’s sleep I feel thedelightful, velvety texture of a flower, and discover its remarkableconvolutions; and something of the miracle of Nature is revealed to me.Occasionally, if I am very fortunate, I place my hand gently in a smalltree and feel the happy quiver of a bird in full song. I am delightedto have cool waters of a brook rush
through my open fingers. To me a lush carpet of pine needles or spongygrass is more welcome than the most luxurious Persian rug. To me thepageant of seasons is a thrilling and unending drama, the action ofwhich streams through my finger tips. At times my heart cries out withlonging to see all these things. If I can get so much pleasure frommere touch, how much more beauty must be revealed by sight. Yet, thosewho have eyes apparently see little. The panorama of color and actionfill the world is taken for granted. It is human, perhaps, toappreciate little that which we have and to long for that which we havenot, but it is a great pity that in the world of light and the gift ofsight is used only as mere convenience rather that as a means of addingfullness to life.
Oh, the things that I should see if I had the power of sight for three days!
