Camera Work: A Photographic Quarterly (1905 (Heft 11))

The philanthropist came first, although I had to look again before I could
believe that it was he. Was this, then, the mind of the great altruist? I
shuddered and laid it aside. I took up another. It was my friend! I looked
at another. “God!” I cried, “Can such things be?” For it was like turn-
ing over mossy logs in a summer wood and looking at the things beneath.
Believe me, it was not what they thought of me, these men. For once
I forgot myself. It was Humanity! Humanity, trapped in its secret
chambers; surprised without its mask, seen—heaven help me!—without
even the decent covering of its own self-deception.
I crossed fourteen names from the list of my acquaintances, reloaded my
magazine, and tried again. I developed the new lot in trembling hope,
finished them with a sinking heart, and looked at them with loathing. I
became as one distraught, possessed by a mad access of iconoclastic rage.
I determined to put my entire fortune into psycho-kodaks and distribute
them gratis to the men whose souls I had laid bare. But some inkling of
the dreadful truth restrained me. I began to realize the result. I saw that
within a month business would cease. The Stock Exchange would be closed.
The banks would be drained of deposits. The insurance companies would
be insolvent. The doctors would be mobbed, the clergy hooted from their
pulpits, the physicians tarred and feathered. Diplomacy unmasked, nation
warring against nation, the veil of polite convention rent asunder, and the
illusion of civilization dispelled, the beneficent dynasty of Pretense would be
overthrown, and Truth—fell, unspeakable, naked Truth — reign supreme in
her own hell!
It was too much. I abandoned the idea of publication, gave over my
investigations, and bore in contemptuous silence the jibes of Sneidecker and
his fellows. From passive neglect the attitude of my friends changed to
open contempt. For twenty years I have lived misrepresented and despised,
and more and more retired from the world.
It is true that for a time I made occasional experiments with my dis-
covery. Again and again, hoping against hope, I put my doubts to the test
of the psycho-kodak. But only to be disappointed, disillusioned, and dis-
gusted. I gave it up at last and retired from active intercourse with
my kind.
I am an old man, old before my day. My hand can hardly hold the
pen that writes these words. For twenty years, another Sampson, I have
leaned against the foundations of Philistia, my arms twined about the pillars
of society. Yet I have never put forth my strength, and I know now that
I never will. Last night I burned my camera and destroyed my notes. I
hardly know myself whether it is because I love the world so well or
despise it so thoroughly that I make it a present of its peace of mind.
J. B. Kerfoot.

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