DBBearman

Friends War Veterans Relief.Cttee

13TH Dec 1919                                                                                                                               53 Rue de Rivoli

Paris

Dear Pere,

It has come to Saturday again & is therefore time to take up again my tale.

Thanks for your letter of 10th which I received Friday. Apropos don’t forget to get me some cheese:- have you tried “Petite Suisse”? it is the best we get here.

Last Sunday afternoon I went down to the Britannique to call for Gertrude Simms & we went to hear a Socratique discourse by Raymond Duncan, at his shop & work room 21, Rue Bonaparte. We took our seats on a bench at the back of the shop. Curtains were drawn across the many windows, but nevertheless crowds of people gathered to peer in at the assembly. There were three or four bath-towelled figures standing near us.  Duncan, himself came in, -long hair, Grecian face, long white robe & sandals complete – soon after 3.30 & addressing us in quite understandable French – for he was born American. His great contention is that action is the one great reality: that intelligence does not produce action but action intelligence: that sentiment, emotion, faith, & reason are nothing in themselves unless it be reflections of our activities. We act primarily by necessity & impulse, & if I understood him insight, mind or intelligence is the mere superficial modifying influence resulting from former activities. His aim in life seems to be to realize an existence which shall be complete in all its activities. He aims at simplicity in all that is material & bodily, just in order to free life for the most perfect complexity of action & understanding.

He has enunciated seven commandments (as I have since learnt) which translate somewhat as follows:-

•Thou must act.

•Thou shalt develop thy capacities for action.

•Thou shalt allow thy actions to be directed by thy instincts & emotion.

•Thou shalt deliminate habit & custom from thyself by direct contact with Nature.

•Thou shalt search for Beauty, justice & wisdom in Nature in order to come into contact with her.

•Thou must become beautiful, just,& wise, thyself, in order to find Beauty, justice & Wisdom in Nature.

•In order to become beautiful, thou must exercise thy body & thy mind in all the works render you independent of the service/or servitude) of others. That will give you justice: & of the union of Beauty with justice is born Wisdom.

Then follow seven means, such as:-

•Thou shalt give.

•Thou shalt give altogether.

•Thou shalt give of thy personality (or of thyself).

•Give: & Beauty, justice & wisdom shall guide you.

•Give: & Beauty, justice & wisdom will make you their instrument.

(The numbering seems a bit astray- there are only 5 means listed)

Then follow seven purges:-

3. Purge thyself from the past.

4.Purge thyself from all relations& friends.

5.Purge thyself of all interest & thought about thy morrow (thy way).

7. Purge thyself of all ideal: & be the thing thyself.

Afterwards I got Mr. Jacques Demarquette (the Secretary of the Veg? Society) to introduce me to him personally & thereupon introduced Gertrude Simms. I told him that Miss Simms wished to come & see his wonderfully designed & coloured curtains, so he asked us to come to tea one day. Gertrude, who is  a great sport though a little person, at once suggested Wednesday.

Thus Wednesday afternoon punctually at 4 pm she & I met in the Sortie from St. Germain des Pres metro, & inserted ourselves again into the Philosophers den. We inspected a number of designed stuffs & curtains, & I paid 15f for one. (which Gertrude has since fallen in love with & bought from me- but I intend to get another). Then we mounted onto the first floor & tea was served. We sat on boxes but R & his disciples are in the habit of laying on rugs on the floor. There were two women present & a child of three, the rosiest faced of even temporary dwellers in Paris. She & Miss Simms got on well & were the best of chums She only wore her sort of bath towel & a little woollen vest: for towards the end of our stay she removed the outer garment & proceeded to give us an exhibition of Greek dancing, which was very amusing. Mr. Duncan & I explored whole regions of Philosophy & practical art. He has reworded the whole of the ten commandments also, & one of them reads:-

“Thou shalt not lust after a woman except in the desire to create a child.”

This, he says is the real moral test. Marriage or otherwise is no moral issue with him, but rather the active need & creativeness, or otherwise of the spirit of the thing.

One would take him to be the philosopher offspring of the minds of Tolstoy & Bergson. But he scarsely reads anything, & had not heard of Bertrand Russell, whose ideals he so nearly embodies.

Tuesday, when Emily Fletcher & i were to have gone to see his dancing, an address was given at the Britannique by Mme(?) Hilda Clarke on Central Europe where she had just come, so I proposed we left the dancing for another week. So we trouped down from Sevres to the Brit.

It seems that the root of the whole trouble & disorganization of industry in Austria is lack of fuel. Given fuel (coal, above all) & industry could revive, transport become active, foods & necessities be imported in exchange for the growing productions of industry. Our chaps are engaged in scouring eastern Europe for saleable produce & in arranging & expediting transport. Our ladies are mostly engaged in direction of medical & child feeding work in Vienna – that great unfed town of two & a half millions.

On the way down Emily Fletcher has arranged a thing which took away the breath of half our fellows & set the other half laughing. It was nothing less than an arrangement to take her to the Follies (Follies Bergeres – the greatest Vaudeville or Vanity Theatre in the world perhaps). I already had tickets for Charlie Teague, Benny Cooper & myself, & she expressed her concern to see it once at any cost. Miss Simms refused to come so she undertook to come by herself with me. We both knew what was to be expected there: but stood our ground on the truism that people who know Paris had nothing to fear in the way of being shocked at this entertainment. Wednesday morning she rang me up & asked me to get tickets for a Miss McGee as well. Thursday –the day-she was unwell & had to stay in bed all day, so our mentors breathed again, & I had to sell the extra tickets.  The real reason I undertook it was because of her challenge that I was harbouring a smug distinction between the sexes. Besides I know her for what we call a “tomboy”. Everyone who knew, agreed that there was no moral issue. But I am inclined to agree that the bad reputation of the Follies made it rather indiscrete. So keep the matter from orthodox ears.

But we others went. Of course tights & short skirts are the order of the day: but the costumes, colour schemes, dances & acrobatics are wonderful. One or two short scenes were more vulgar than artistic, though always the latter: but one is prepared for tastes of that everywhere in Paris. Behind the seats is a huge Salle de Promenade, where, if fellows are alone, it is nothing to be “deared” or “charmed” etc., & where a real American nigger jazz band is pouring forth rhythmical discords,-which I could contend is the most immoral thing there.

The night before, Thursday, we had an address at the Rue de Sevres to a crowded room by Mlle. Rolland – the sister of Romain Rolland the great French pacivist & novelist. Madame Deychisne(?)(I hope that is spelt right) was also there to support Mlle. Rolland. The latter is apparently the organizer & inspiration of the “feminist” movement, as well as of the Pacivist movement in France. The address was on the Pacivist movement in France. It seems, though, that their society has never exceeded a membership of two hundred, mostly women (if not all.)

Friday night I read part of the Nation & went to my little Professor.

Today I have had my hot bath, & now I am going to have my dinner.

Sunday afternoon Charlie Teague & I met Germaine & Suzanne at the Gare del’Est  (Lucienne was unfortunately working even on the Sunday). We took them to the Porte Dauphine & went for a walk in the Bois de Boulogne until nearly six, & then returned to the Rue de Sevres to dinner.

Well it is now Monday morning & the office & I must post this.

Love to all.

Don.

Ask Tom what he thought of the definition of art in the Nation last Friday week:-

“ the realization, through a creative effort of the universal sense of harmony in life”. It is an attempt to reconcile Tolstoy & the Aesthetic idea,& I think it most penetrating. Don.