The rooster is a dependent; he depends upon the farmer and the
weather. Midas is a dependent; he depends upon the farmer and the
weather. The rooster thinks only of the moment; Midas provides for
to-morrow. What does he provide for to-morrow? Nothing that the
rooster will not have without providing.
The rooster and the prosperous worker: they are born, they grub,
they love; they grub and love grubbing; they grub and they die.
Neither knows beauty; neither knows knowledge. And after all, when
Midas dies and the rooster dies, there is one thing Midas has had
and rooster has not. Midas has had the excitement of accumulating
what he has grubbed, and that has been his life and his love and
his god. He cannot take that god with him when he dies. I wonder
if the worthy gods are those we can take with us.
Midas must teach all to be as Midas; the young must be raised in
his religion--
The manuscript ended there, and Sheridan was not anxious for more.
He crumpled the sheets into a ball, depositing it (with vigor) in
a waste-basket beside him; then, rising, he consulted a Cyclopedia
of Names, which a book-agent had somehow sold to him years before;
a volume now first put to use for the location of "Midas.
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