The Spectator at war: Driven to distraction

‘Distraction’, from The Spectator, 5 September 1914:

EVER since the world began great trouble has been surrounded by ceremonial. From age to age the ceremonial changes. It tends to become a bondage or a hypocrisy, and bold social reformers step in, as they think, to destroy it, but immediately it appears again in a new form. Modern mourning is the sackcloth and ashes of the past. The grave tone in which we address the afflicted, though their trouble touch us but little, is as much a ceremonial as was the wailing of the ancient Jewish sympathizer. The Psalmist was greatly aggrieved because, when his false friends were in distress, he “humbled himself,” and his politeness was disregarded. His vexation was natural; he had done the seemly thing with a good intention, and the levity of his acquaintances had caused them to misunderstand him.