Life, 1917-08-02 · page 13 of 40
Life — August 2, 1917 — page 13: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
The main illustration depicts a whimsical fairy hospital treating wounded forest creatures—tortoises, butterflies, snakes, rabbits—with gentle elf care. This is Arthur Guiterman's poetic vision of compassionate medical treatment. Below, "How Blind We Are!" satirizes American society's standardization and efficiency obsession. The author criticizes how "society" has become systematized like business operations, with even love subjected to psychological analysis and "permanent chemical basis." The piece mocks contemporary social trends, particularly the era's fascination with scientific management and rationalization of human experience. The small cartoon below shows a Sunday-school teacher telling children to "cast our bread upon the waters"—a biblical reference—suggesting ironic contrast between spiritual wisdom and modern materialistic efficiency culture.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
RED CROSS WORK How Blind We Are! S it not a sad lack that, as yet, no at- tempt has been made to place the thing we term “ socicty” on a basis of efficiency? Apparently, everything else has been standardized and systematized. The working units of railroads are duly tabulated, All business is run by time- nd card index: Even the po- accuracy of love has been in- ated by psychologists with a view cing it on a permanent chemical When will this stop? When will so- ciety, spending more money than any- one else, except war, be reduced to a basis of the highest efficiency? When SOME ROMANTIC LADIES will scandal and its commercial import- ance—its effect, for instance, upon the feather trade—be the subject of learned pamphlets by the Chairman of the Ways and Means Committee? When. will the thé dansant and the monkey supper be hotly debated in Congress by the distinguished gentleman from Oklahoma and the learned President of the Dumdoodle University at his annual address to the senior class? “VY/HY in the name of Sam Hill do you want to die before old Simp- son does?” “Because if he dies first he'll corner all the desirable sites in heaven and hold them for fancy prices.” 173 A Field Hospital P ST the oldest woodchuck’s bur- Tow Where the forest meets the furrow, Close beside a tumbled wall Lies the fairies’ hospital. Thither from their rocky cellars Come the little cavern-dwellers ; Thither, wounded, bruised and broke Flock the wood and meadow folk. Tortoises with cleft cuirasses, Limpy-leggéd hoppergrasses, Minks with damaged paws in slings, Bobolinks with tattered wings, Draggled butterflies and millers, Crippled snakes and caterpillars, Ailing rabbits, dented snails, Hirpling down converging trails Toward that place of healing wend them. Gentle elfin hands shall tend them There, with all the herbs and worts. That are remedies for hurts, Binding up the sores that grieve them With soft bands that spiders weave them, Heartening them with fennel brew, Bathing them in blesséd dew; Till the rabbits and the crickets Leap once more among the thickets, Till the butterfly and wren Take the trails of air again. arthur Guiterman. “PA, THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER TELLS US TO CAST OUR BREAD UPON THE Waters.” “THAT'S ALL RIGHT, MY SON; BUT WHEN YOU GET HOLD OF A BONE—BURY at! comicbooks.com