violated the law and the will of the majority I have little or no sympathy, for a democracy cannot exist without obedience to law, and, it has the power, in the case of bad laws, to peaceably change them at the ballot box. But there were those who violated no law; they simply were "cranks”—to the majority— who disbelieved in war and wished to help each other in their trust that God, in His wisdom, might lead the nations to some other settlement than the dread arbitrament of the battle-field. Certain overofficious and zealous officers of the law, in one case with which I am familiar, aided and abetted by impatient citizens, violated the law by disturbing the peaceful meeting of these cranks and haling them before a judge. Three of these cranks were sentenced to prison, where they remained, suffering the indignity of confinement among actual law-breakers, pestered by the vermin that were allowed to breed, crowded in filthy places with drunkards, tuberculosis victims and unclean-minded and mouthed men, who fouled the air with vile smoke and viler words. The food provided, while possibly healthful, was neither varied nor tastefully prepared and served, and they were dependent upon outside friends for what they ate. Milk was sent each morning, but one of the petty tyrants of the place, on the occasion of my own visit to these cranks, refused to let the prisoners-who were afterwards shown to be guiltless of any violation of law have it, and it remained out in the sun and

spoiled. Another official, coming on duty later, when appealed to for the milk, though he and every worker and prisoner in the jail knew to whom it belonged, refused to deliver it, because his immediate predecessor had not told him to do so. Petty tyranny like this, to innocent citizens, whose only offense was crankiness and a fuller belief in the love and power of God than that possessed by most men, made my own blood rise to boiling point. Yet with equanimity and calmness these three endured all that was visited upon them in the name of the law-though on the appeal of their case the Supreme Court affirmed they had done no wrong and the case should never have gone to trial.

There are many things about many cranks that I like. For instance, I admire the courage of men who dare to defy public opinion when they are assured that opinion is wrong. They are not concerned with the judgment of men-their own conscience and God is their standard of right and wrong. Now, where such "cranks" are violating no law they have as much right to their opinion as have those who differ from them, and I confess to a feeling of admiration for their indifference alike to men's praise or blame. Such men possess a freedom of thought, feeling and action not possible to ordinary men, and freedom-within the law-is a perfect passion with me. No one but those who are free know the perfection of joy that comes with the sense of freedom.

I have friends who, when they get into the parks, or the open road of the country, love to go barefoot. Why shouldn't they? They offend neither law nor decency and they enjoy the foot-freedom. I know what it is, for I have often emulated them. Yet there are those who laugh, sneer and scoff, and others who would prevent such "cranks" from enjoying their God and law-given right to do as they please.

My friends the Duncans like to wear the Greek costume and sandals. They are more healthful, convenient and enjoyable to them. Yet meddlesome people have interfered and had them arrested, claiming that a Greek costume, in America, is out of place, though it shocks no sense of decency or propriety. My friend Ernest Darling, sick and given up to death, decided that if he could go about with as much of his body exposed as possible, and bareheaded, he could regain his health. His costume was far more "decent" than that worn by hundreds of thousands of "respectable" women on the sea-beach and in the ball and drawing room. Yet in several "progressive" communities, in free and liberty-acclaiming America, he was arrested, and even foolish judges tried to compel him to conform to their ideas-totally irrespective of the law-of proper clothing.

When I was a boy and young man Dr. Mary Walker made a great sensation by seeking to introduce a more sensible and free costume for women. She was condemned unknown, unseen and unheard

by thousands of people who dubbed her "Crank." Yet she persisted in her ideas and today much of the freedom of women's costume is owing to her brave courage and that of Mrs. Bloomer, who invented the trousers of that name.

All honor to all these cranks who have dared to sing their own individual song, regardless of the tyrannical will of the majority, and the narrowminded conceptions of those who would never allow any change from old-established and popularly endorsed customs.

Time was when a woman was marked who did not wear a corset, a crinoline, a bustle like a camel's hump, bangs, montagues, a switch, a hideous chignon, or powder her hair, and men were as consummate asses as the women, in their yielding to the frivolities and sheer idiocies of fashion. No one regrets the absence of these things now, but at the time it required courage for one to join the ranks of the cranks and oppose them.

I have always admired and revered the spirit of the iconoclasts-the cranks-the image-breakers, the smashers of popularly fashionable idols, of fetiches, who refused to accept as binding the temporary conventions of the race, conventions that they deemed restriction of body, mind, spirit, and a limitation of their freedom to choose as they preferred.

Today I am crank enough not to shave off my beard or moustache; not to allow a barber to dictate

whether my neck shall be shaved or clipped; not to eat the usual heavy breakfast of ham and eggs, hot biscuits, coffee, buckwheat cakes and syrup generally served; not to sit up until all hours of the morning, in an over-heated room, dancing bunny-hugs and other fool-appearing contortions (to me), preferring to retire early and get up to enjoy my work and the sunrise. I am crank enough to purchase books and pictures instead of making a "splurge" with the limited amount of money I earn; to prefer a good lecture, concert or symphony to the movies; to chop my own wood, when possible, do as much of my garden work as I can, and be my own porter. Furthermore, I am crank enough to believe that God has health enough of body, mind and soul for me; that He has abundance so that "I shall not want" any good thing; that He desires and wills that I should succeed in all the legitimate, right and proper things I undertake. I am crank enough to reject many things accepted by others who, maybe, are far wiser than I, and one of my growing crankinesses is the beautiful assurance that "no good thing will God withhold from them that walketh uprightly."

If I “live and move and have my being" in God— the Great Whole-and He is all these beneficent things, am I asking any more than my right, my due inheritance, His own will concerning me, when I ask for my full share of health, strength, ability, success, riches, character? None of these demands are