Telegrams of the Soul

On the Street

Baudry de Saunier’s The Art of Driving

Why do all the splendid things conceived, dreamed up by the godlike human brain so soon degenerate into grotesque chicaneries?!? For the very reason that everywhere you look in this earthly existence there’s heaven and hell, the deceptive devil and guardian angel side by side!

Nobody who loves the fresh air of nature, the forest and field, the evening and morning, the lazy, easygoing afternoon and the forceful vibrant magnificence before noon, nobody eager to catch a glimpse of a deer in the early evening on the edge of the woods, of hungry crows in a snowy field, of the blossoming and wilting bushes bordering endless streets, the stormy symphonies of mountain streams and the noble, discreet silence of homogeneous groves of trees, nobody so inclined would speed through the world in his holy private luxury automobile and, thereby, endanger his fellow man, animals and himself!

Could you imagine Beethoven, Goethe, Kant speeding along, you men of means?

To let life slowly flow into you, that’s all there is to life! Everything else is the pitiful attempt to elude at a speedy clip God’s indictment of your failure to grasp the beauties of this world, for lack of eye, ear, time! The noble horse and buggy in the Prater that can tear along at a speedy clip, still leaves us the pleasure of the morning dew on the meadow, the lonely woods, the old head waters of the Danube, of pebble banks in modern faded tones of gray-brown-blue, of old pastures and cawing crow rookeries. But the speeding automobile wants to whisk away what’s left of your already overly burdened soul! It wants to abduct your own sense of peace with a meanspirited spurt of speed! Roll on, destiny’s children, at the tempo of a rubber-tired hack on the Praterhauptallee, cherish the riches of nature more than the pace of your passage, and above all read: Baudry de Saunier’s The Art of Driving!