Chapter M: B. Banks writes a missionary lesson after the style of “Mother (8)

“Of course,” said the bear, “it is the rind of some kind of
fruit off a tree--the fruit of the cork, I should say. This is
cork, it is plain to see,” and he showed the sole of the boot.

“Oh, just hear him! just hear him!” cried all the beasts and
birds.

“It is not that at all,” said the wolf, with a glance of scorn
at the bear. “Of course it is some kind of nest. Look; here is
the hole for the bird to go in at, and here is the deep part for
the eggs and young ones to be safe. No doubt at all, of course
not!”

“Oh, oh!” cried the bear and the goat and all the birds and
beasts, “just hear what he says! It is not that at all.”

“I should think not,” said the goat. “It is quite a plain case.
Look at this long root,” and he showed the string at the side of
the boot. “It is the root of a plant, of course.”

“Not a bit of it,” cried the wolf and the bear; “not a bit of
it. A root? How can you say so? It is not that, we can all see.”

“If I might speak,” said an old owl, who sat in a tree near, “I
think I can tell you what it is. I have been in a land where
there are more of such things than you could count. It is a
man’s boot.”

“A what?” cried all the beasts and birds. “What is a man? and
what is a boot?”

“A man,” said the owl, “is a thing with two legs that can walk
and eat and talk, like us; but he can do much more than we can.”

“Pooh, pooh!” cried they all.

“That can’t be true,” said the beasts. “How can a thing with two
legs do more than we can, who have four? It is false, of course.”

“Of course it is if they have no wings,” said the birds.

“Well,” went on the owl, “they have no wings, and yet it is
true. And they can make things like this, and they call them
boots and put them on their feet.”

“Oh, oh!” cried all the beasts and birds at once. “How can you?
For shame. Fie on you! That is not true, of course. It can not
be.”

“A likely story!” said the bear.

“Can do more than we can?” said the wolf.

“Wear things on their feet?” cried they all. “On the face of it
your story is not true. We know that such things are not worn on
the feet. How could they be?”

“Of course they could not,” said the bear; “it is false.”

“It must be false,” cried all the birds and beasts. “You must
leave the wood,” they said to the owl. “What you say can not be
true. You are not fit to live with us. You have said what you
know is false. It must be, of course.”

And they chased the poor old owl out of the wood, and would not
let him come back.

“It is true for all that,” said the owl.

And so it was.--_The Nursery._

(1668)

INTRODUCTIONS

Some introductions to sermons, speeches, articles, etc., would gain if they were made as brief as the speech of this mayor:

“Long introductions when a man has a speech to make are a
bore,” said former Senator John C. Spooner, according to _The
Saturday Evening Post_. “I have had all kinds, but the most
satisfactory one in my career was that of a German mayor of a
small town in my State, Wisconsin.

“I was to make a political address, and the opera-house was
crowded. When it came time to begin, the mayor got up.

“‘Mine friends,’ he said, ‘I have been asked to introduce
Senator Spooner, who is to make a speech, yes. Vell, I haf dit
so, und he vill now do so.’”

(1669)

=Intruders=--See INGRATITUDE.

=Intrusion=--See TRIVIAL CAUSES.

INTUITION

What is true in music, according to R. H. Haweis, is equally true of all intuitive processes:

To accompany well you must not only be a good musician, but you
must be mesmeric, sympathetic, intuitive. You must know what I
want before I tell you; you must feel which way my spirit sets,
for the motions of the soul are swift as an angel’s flight. I
can not pause in those quick and subtle transitions of emotion,
fancy, passion, to tell you a secret; if it is not yours
already, you are unworthy of it. Your finishing lessons in music
can do nothing for you. Your case is hopeless. You have not
enough music in you to know that you are a failure.

(1670)

INTUITIVE JUDGMENT

Mill cites the following case, which is worth noting as an
instance of the extreme delicacy and accuracy to which may be
developed this power of sizing up the significant factors of a
situation. A Scotch manufacturer procured from England, at a
high rate of wages, a working dyer famous for producing very
fine colors, with the view of teaching to his other workmen the
same skill. The workman came; but his method of proportioning
the ingredients, in which lay the secret of the effects he
produced, was by taking them up in handfuls, while the common
method was to weigh them. The manufacturer sought to make him
turn his handling system into an equivalent weighing system,
that the general principles of his peculiar mode of proceeding
might be ascertained. This, however, the man found himself
quite unable to do, and could therefore impart his own skill to
nobody. He had, from individual cases of his own experience,
established a connection in his mind between fine effects of
color and tactual perceptions in handling his dyeing materials;
and from these perceptions he could, in any particular case,
infer the means to be employed and the effects which would be
produced.--JOHN DEWEY, “How We Think.”

(1671)

=Invention=--See AMBITION.

=Invention and Employment=--See VALUE OF ONE MAN.

=Inventions=--See LABOR-SAVING DEVICES.

=Inventions, Worthless=--See DISAPPOINTMENT.

=Inventive Possibilities=--See FUTURE POSSIBILITIES.

INVESTMENT RETURN

The Rev. John F. Goucher established many vernacular Christian schools in the villages of India.

An American traveler in northern India, strolling on the
platform when the train had come to a standstill, saw a native
who drew near, eyed him closely, then fell before him, clasped
him about the ankles, and beating his feet with his head, cried,
“I am your servant, and you are my savior!”

The traveler bade the man get up and say what he had to say.
The native at length exprest himself: “You are Dr. Goucher,
of America, are you not? All that I am and have I owe to you.
Hearing that you were traveling through on this train, I walked
more than twenty miles just to see your train pass. Now God has
let me look into your face.”

Thousands of young Indians in the north-west provinces of
India call themselves “Goucher Boys,” and look upon a man in
distant America, whom they have never seen, as their friend and
emancipator.--WILLIAM T. ELLIS, “Men and Missions.”

(1672)

INVESTMENT, SAFE

One of the Copes had but just written his check for $50 for some
local charity, when a messenger announced the wreck of an East
Indiaman belonging to the firm, and that the ship and cargo were
a total loss. Another check for $500 was substituted at once,
and given to the agent of the hospital with the remark: “What
I have God gave me, and before it all goes, I had better put
some of it where it can never be lost.” (Text.)--NOAH HUNT
SCHENCK.

(1673)

=Invisible, Answers from the=--See UNSEEN, RESPONSE FROM THE.

INVISIBLE, POTENCY OF THE

Material forces called battleships bulk larger, but the
invisible spiritual forces go farther, last longer and make
cannon seem contemptible and paltry. In cold countries men
sometimes build palaces of ice for some public function. In the
hour when beautiful women and brilliant military bands assemble
for a winter festival, the water, manifest in blocks of ice,
seems very imposing. But would you know the real power of water,
wait until it becomes invisible. Then lift your eyes to the
western sunset, where colors of gold and rose are revealed by
this invisible vapor; watch the rain-drop redden in the purple
flow of grape and the crimson drops of pomegranate, or see it
tossed by a harvester in sheaves of grain. Then, in what water
does through its invisible workings, do we know its place in
nature and its contributions to man’s happiness. (Text.)--N.
D. HILLIS.

(1674)

INVISIBLE, THE, MADE VISIBLE

On the brightest and sunniest day, millions of tons of black
charcoal in an invisible condition are floating in the air.
Millions of plants are at the same time restoring it to visible
form by the chemical processes going on in the tiny laboratory
of every leaf that expands in the sunshine. In the course of
time the leaf or the wood it elaborates by its delicate alchemy,
may be burned; and this cycle of change may go on indefinitely,
the matter becoming visible and invisible again and again.
(Text.)--_Popular Science News._

(1675)

* * * * *

In chemical operations, whether natural or artificial, matter
is often “lost to sight”; but the veriest tyro has learned, as
one of the fundamental axioms of science, that it can never be
actually lost or destroyed. In its manifold mutations it often
disappears from our vision; but it reappears, or can be made to
reappear, as palpable to our senses as before. If a piece of
silver be put into nitric acid, a clear and colorless liquid,
it is rapidly dissolved, and we “see it no more.” The solution
may be mixed with water, and apparently no effect is produced.
Thus, in a pail of water we may dissolve fifty dollars’ worth
of silver, not a particle of which can be seen. Not even the
chemist, unless he should apply certain tests to detect its
presence, would, by merely looking at the liquid, guess what
hidden wealth it contained. Other metals, as we know, can be
treated in similar ways with the same result. When charcoal and
many other substances are burned, they disappear as completely,
no visible ashes even being left from the combustion. In fact,
every material, which is visible can, by certain treatment, be
rendered invisible. Matter which in one state or condition is
perfectly opaque, and will not permit a ray of light to pass
through it, will in another form become perfectly transparent.
The cause of this wonderful change in matter is utterly
inexplicable.--_Popular Science News._

(1676)

* * * * *

The progress of science is fast bringing the hitherto invisible universe into man’s view.

Unofficial announcement has been made at Boston that Prof.
H. C. Ernst, of the Harvard medical school, has discovered a
new method of photographing bacteria, which makes it possible
to watch the life of disease germs, to watch the effect of
medicine upon them and to see new facts as to the form which has
heretofore been clouded in mystery. The Ernst method consists in
the use of ultra-violet rays of the spectrum which are invisible
to the eye. Under the present method no picture of germs is made
until they are colored by chemicals.

(1677)

=Invitation=--See HELP FOR THE HELPLESS.

=Inward Rectification=--See TRANSFORMATION BY RENEWING.

IRONY OFTEN MISUNDERSTOOD

The fact is that the Carlyles habitually addrest one another
with irony. It is no uncommon thing between intimates: it is
rather a sign of the security of the affection which unites
them. But if, by some unhappy accident, a third person who has
no sense of humor hears this gay clash of keen words, and puts
them down in dull print, and goes on to point out in his dull
fashion that they do not sound affectionate, and are phrases
by no means in common use among excellent married persons of
average intellects, it is easy to see that the worst sort of
mischief may readily be wrought.--W. J. DAWSON, “The
Makers of English Prose.”

(1678)

IRRATIONAL LAWS

The law of imprisonment for debt, which existed so long in
England, the land of freedom, whereby a creditor enforced
payment of debt by imprisoning his debtor for unlimited
periods, is perhaps the most irrational that ever existed. The
purposeless cruelty of imprisonment for debt was demonstrated in
1792, when a woman died in Devon jail, after forty-five years’
imprisonment, for a debt of £19. And when the Thatched House
Society set to work to ransom honest debtors by paying their
debts, they, in twenty years, released 12,590 at a cost of 45
shillings per head. (Text.)--CROAKE JAMES, “Curiosities
of Law and Lawyers.”

(1679)

=Irresolution=--See HUMAN NATURE, INSECURITY OF.

IRRESPONSIBILITY

The spectacle of a $100,000,000 “trust” unable to get hay
for its horses on credit was seen recently in Sault Ste.
Marie, where the Consolidated Lake Superior Company went into
liquidation. The liquidation resulted from the failure of the
directors of this big concern to raise $5,000,000 to pay a loan
from the Speyer syndicate.

Here is a corporation which was paying seven per cent dividends,
and which began two or three years ago with a capital of
$102,000,000, so destitute of liquid assets or working capital
that it can not pay a loan of $5,000,000, for which its very
existence was pawned. Nothing appears to be left.

Lake Superior Consolidated, like all the other trusts, was
organized under the Connecticut corporation act, which, like
that of West Virginia, New Jersey, Delaware, and other States,
was expressly drawn to relieve all concerned of responsibility.
No one was responsible for anything in the prospectus. No
one could be held, in the promotion or direction, for any
statements, promises, or representations. The sidewalk vender is
more responsible for the razors and remedies that he sells in
the flare of his gasoline lamp than the promoters or directors
of an American trust to which millions of dollars flow.--New
York _American_.

(1680)

IRRETRIEVABLE, THE

The people of Florence sent their great poet, Dante, into exile.
He went into Ravenna, there died, and there was buried. After
his death, Florence recognized how great this exiled son of hers
had been, and begged his body from Ravenna, and could not get
it. Ravenna would not part with it. Florence might have had it
had she asked Dante to come back.

(1681)

=Irreverent Laughter=--See LAUGHTER, PERILS OF.

IRRIGATION

Long have I waited their coming, the men of the far-lying mist-hills
Gathered about their fires and under the kindly rains.
Not to the blazing sweep of Thy desert, O Lord, have they turned them;
Evermore back to the mist-hills, back to the rain-kissed plains.

Long through the ages I waited the children of men, but they came not;
Only God’s silent centuries holding their watch sublime.
Gaunt and wrinkled and gray was the withering face of Thy desert:
All in Thine own good time; O Lord, in Thine own good time.

Lo! Thou hast spoken the word, and Thy children come bringing the
waters
Loosed from their mountain keep in the thrall of each sentinel hill.
Lord, Thou hast made me young and fair at Thine own waters’ healing,
Pleasing and fair to mankind in the flood of Thy bountiful will.

Wherefore in joy now Thy children come, flying exultant and eager;
Now is thine ancient earth remade by Thy powerful word.
Lord, unto Thee be the glory! Thine is the bloom of the desert.
Hasten, O men of the mist-hills! Welcome, ye sons of the Lord!
(Text.)

--MCCREADY SYKES, _The Atlantic Monthly_.

(1682)

=Isolation, Fatal=--See RESOURCES, EXHAUSTED.

=Issue, A Consequential=--See CONSEQUENCES.

J

JARS, DAILY

It is not often the great strokes of misfortune that break men down, but the daily wear and tear of small troubles. An editor writes thus:

A huge cart-wheel lies in the gutter near our office. The cart
itself has been pulled with difficulty out of the way of the
trolley cars. An axle has broken. And that axle! It is fully
four inches in diameter and was originally forged of soundest
steel. But as you look at the fragments of it wedged in the
overturned hub you discover a peculiar condition. “The steel
has been crystallized,” the mechanic would explain. No sudden
strain broke it, no tremendous wrench twisted the spindle from
the beam. The ruin was wrought by the constant small jars of
daily traffic. Rumbling over stones, bumping over crossings,
scraping against curbs threw the atoms of steel in the axle out
of cohesive harmony. Then came the one jar, no heavier than the
others, that sent the load of coal into the street.

(1683)

=Jester, The=--See HUMOR OVERDONE.

JESTING COMMENDED

It is wise to laugh, and Joe Miller is right when he says
that the gravest beast is an ass, and the gravest man is a
fool. This opinion of the famous jester is in accord with
Plato, who is reported to have remarked to his friends, when
their social enjoyment was occasionally intruded upon by the
approach of some sedate wiseacre, “Silence, my friends, let us
be wise now, for a fool is coming.” Other notable characters,
if not themselves witty, have sought relief from the strain of
serious employment by a laugh and innocent merriment. Philip
of Macedon, Sylla, the Roman dictator, Queen Elizabeth, and
our own Abraham Lincoln, keenly enjoyed a good joke, while
Julius Cæsar, Tacitus, Erasmus, and Lord Bacon compiled
jest-books. So there is high authority for jesting, and a jest
is merely petrified laughter--a laugh congealed into words,
so as to be passed from mouth to mouth and handed down to
further generations.--EDMUND KIRKE, _North American
Review_.

(1684)

JESTS, OLD

To Hierocles, who lived in the sixth century, is attributed a
book called “Asteia,” which contains twenty-one jests, the most
of which are now alive, and passing themselves off as “real,
original Jacobs.” Among them is the man who would not venture
into the water until he had learned to swim; the man whose horse
died just as he had taught it to live without eating; the other
who stood before the mirror with his eyes shut, to see how he
looked when asleep; the other who apologized for a negligence by
saying, “I never received the letter you wrote me”; the other
who kept a crow expressly to satisfy himself if the creature did
live to the age of two hundred years; and the old philosopher
who carried a brick about as a specimen of the house he desired
to sell. But, older than Hierocles--old as Horace--is the stupid
fellow who, wanting to cross a stream, sat down upon the bank
to wait for all the water to run by. The French king who said,
“After me, the deluge,” was thought to be original, but the
phrase is found in the Greek of two thousand years ago; as is
also the proverb, “There is many a slip between the cup and the
lip,” which was the appropriate inscription upon the drinking
cup of a rich Greek. Every one knows the lady who insists that
her age is but thirty, and whose friend asserts that he believes
her, because he has heard her say so “any time these ten years.”
Bacon, in his “Apothegms,” asserts that the same anecdote is
told of Cicero.--EDMUND KIRKE, _North American
Review_.

(1685)

=Jesus All Right=--See CHRIST APPROVED.

=Jesus as a Character-builder=--See CHARACTER-BUILDING.

JESUS AS COMPANION

A missionary riding on horseback through one of the cotton
States of the South came upon an old tumble-down cabin in
the doorway of which stood a poor crippled negress. Her back
was bent nearly double with years of hard work and her face
was deeply wrinkled and her hair was white, but her two eyes
were as bright as two stars. The man called out cheerily,
“Good-morning, Auntie--living here all alone?” “Jes me n’
Jesus, Massa,” she replied with a bright smile. The missionary
dismounted and went in for a little visit with her--and he said
as he was riding away, and looked back for a last glimpse of the
happy old saint, “It seemed as if he could see the form of one
like unto the Son of God” standing by her side in the doorway of
the poor little cabin.

(1686)

=Jesus as Guide=--See GUIDE, THE PERFECT.

=Jesus, Canceler of Sin=--See CHRIST DESTROYER OF SIN.

=Jesus Crowned with Thorns=--See CHRIST’S FACE.

JESUS, GREATNESS OF

Recently a flower was exhibited that was grown in a cellar by acetylene gas. But let no man be anxious. The summer’s sun is not seriously threatened by acetylene! The scientist knows that there is a large amount of condensed sunshine stored away in the acetylene that was released. There are a few soldiers of supreme genius that divide honors. There are a few poets of the first order of greatness. There are a few statesmen of equal rank. But Jesus is alone, one star, shining down upon the little hills.--N. D. HILLIS.

(1687)

* * * * *

Dinocrates, a Macedonian architect, once proposed to carve
Mount Athos into a statue of Alexander--the left hand to hold a
city of 10,000 population, and the right hand to be a basin to
receive the perpetual flow of the mountain and give it to the
sea below. Jesus, a mightier architect, is carving all humanity
into a kingdom that, like a stone cut out of the mountain
without hands, shall fill the whole earth.

(1688)

JESUS, SECOND COMING OF

In Venice stands a very beautiful monument, a pyramid of marble,
in which lie the mortal remains of a little child. By the door
stands a sculptured angel resting one hand on the door-latch,
and holding in the other hand a trumpet, and himself peering
intently into the distant heaven; while carved upon the door is
the inscription: “Till He Comes.”

Such a monument is the institution of the Lord’s Supper. Such an expectancy is appropriate to the soul. Such a lesson of patient waiting is not amiss. Such a readiness to respond to the last call were becoming even to the busy. (Text.)

(1689)

JESUS, SUPREMACY OF

On Chinese Gordon’s monument in St. Paul’s Cathedral, proud
England has inscribed this epitaph, “Who at all times and
everywhere gave his strength to the weak, his substance to the
poor, his sympathy to the suffering, and his heart to God.”
Well may old England gather young England about the monument
of her dead hero who gave Jesus Christ supremacy over both
life and relations. Henry George and Cardinal Manning were
talking together. “I love men because Jesus loved them,” said
the Cardinal. “And I love Jesus because he loved men,” was Mr.
George’s quick reply. It does not matter which way you go to
it, only that you do actually go to the real love of men. This
kind of Christianity is not outgrown; this kind has not yet been
tried.--WM. F. MCDOWELL, “Student Volunteer Movement,”
1906.

(1690)

“=Jesus, Thy Blood and Righteousness=”--See CHRIST’S FACE.

=Jesus Would Have Done, Just as=--See GENEROSITY, CHRISTIAN.

=Jewel, The Sympathetic=--See SYMPATHY.

=Journalism=--See CLASSICS, STUDY OF.

=Journey of Life=--See SOUL QUERIES.

JOURNEY TO HEAVEN

Our highest aspiration must wait. We are here to get through the
world. Life is a road where we camp for a night on a journey
to the golden gate and the setting sun; a traveler who sets up
his tent at dark does not plant corn or put out a grapevine,
if when the morning comes he expects to pull his tent down and
march on. Men are born upon the shore of one ocean; by traveling
lightly and never losing a moment, and marching bravely on,
through forest, over desert, mountain and river, the traveler
can reach the other ocean in time to catch the little boat that
slips out into the dark, and sails out of sight with God alone.
But the traveler must not expect to plant harvests and grow
vineyards while out upon his march. Yonder lie the happy hills
of God. There no winter falls, there the summer sheds its warmth
always upon the violet beds. There youth is perfect and beauty
is eternal. There every ambition will be perfected, every dream
realized; every hope turned to fruition, and the soul is a tree
waving its fruit and casting down its purple vintage at the feet
of the God of the summer. (Text.)--N. D. HILLIS.

(1691)

JOY

John Kendrick Bangs, in the _Atlantic Monthly_, writes an ideal note:

To-day, whatever may annoy
The word for me is joy, just simple joy;
The joy of life;
The joy of children and of wife;
The joy of bright blue skies;
The joy of rain; the glad surprize
Of twinkling stars that shine at night;
The joy of wingéd things upon their flight;
The joy of noon-day, and the tried
True joyousness of eventide;
The joy of labor, and of mirth;
The joy of air, and sea, and earth--
The countless joys that ever flow from Him
Whose vast beneficence doth dim
The lustrous light of day,
And lavish gifts divine upon our way.
Whate’er there be of sorrow
I’ll put off till to-morrow,
And when to-morrow comes, why then
’Twill be to-day and joy again! (Text.)

(1692)

* * * * *

So take joy home,
And make a place in thy great heart for her,
And give her time to grow, and cherish her;
Then will she come, and oft will sing to thee,
When thou art working in the furrows; aye,
Or weeding in the sacred hours of dawn.
It is a comely fashion to be glad--
Joy is the grace we say to God. (Text.)

--JEAN INGELOW.

(1693)

JOY AFTER GRIEF

I had a sorrow, and I wept salt tears
One winter night, and heavy beat the rain;
At dawn came frost, and on my window-pane
Each drop like fairy lacework now appears.

So shall my grief perchance become a pleasure;
Yes, tears maybe are jewels hearts would keep,
For in another life we’ll wake from sleep,
And light shall sparkle from our new-found treasure.

--BEATRIX L. TOLLEMACHE.

(1694)

JOY AND SORROW

“Joy and sorrow are contemporaneous experiences in the same Christian consciousness,” says Dr. Cruddylan Jones. In the Straits of Gibraltar is a double current, the stream flowing back again from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic. This phenomenon is analogous to the double current in the life of every believer. (Text.)

(1695)

=Judge, a Considerate=--See PROBATION.

=Judged by the Sun=--See TESTS.

=Judging=--See CYNIC REBUKED.

JUDGING, CARE IN

A traveler in North Carolina saw an old colored man sitting in a
chair in his garden, hoeing. The traveler laughed. He thought it
was a case of monumental laziness. But he happened to look back
as he laughed, and he saw a pair of crutches lying on the ground
by the old man’s chair. At once what made him seem ridiculous
before made him seem heroic now.

When disposed to criticize, remember human infirmities. (Text.)

(1696)

JUDGING FROM FACTS

We must not judge any act without knowing the facts of the
case. “See that man! He has sat on the bank all the morning
throwing pebble after pebble into the water. How lazy he must
be!” “Is this a fair judgment?” I inquire. And at the end of a
warm discussion, I tell my pupils how Turner, the artist, did
that to watch the surface of the water in motion and learn how
to paint its sheen and color. “A child is walking quietly along
the sidewalk. Suddenly a rough looking man seizes her and pushes
her into the gutter. Is he cruel?” Of course every one answers
yes, at first. But no--a mass of ice is about to fall from the
roof above the child’s head. Her assaulter turns out to be her
protector.

In teaching, of course, every good teacher passes from examples
to principles. Through such examples as these we elicit the fact
that we can judge no act on sight, for every act is open to a
good or a bad interpretation. The eager energy members of my
class show in pointing out possible good motives for acts that
at first sight look selfish makes me feel sure that they will
not in later life condemn unheard. “The special part of this
ethics course which stands out in my mind as important,” writes
one of my pupils, “is that on right and wrong judgments. It
makes me realize how little right we have to judge people from
appearances. There are so many sides of people’s characters
that we don’t half consider or appreciate.”--ELLA LYMAN
CABOT, “Proceedings of the National Education Association,”
1909.

(1697)

JUDGMENT DAY

A traveler in Tennessee came across an aged negro seated in
front of his cabin door basking in the sunshine.

“He could have walked right on the stage for an Uncle Tom part
without a line of make-up” says the traveler. “He must have been
eighty years of age.”

“Good-morning, uncle,” said the traveler.

“Mornin’, sah! Mornin’,” said the aged one. Then he added, “Be
you the gentleman over yonder from New York?”

Being told that such was the case, the old darky said, “Do you
mind telling me something that has been botherin’ my old haid? I
have got a grandson--he runs on the Pullman cyars--and he done
tells me that up thar in New York you-all burn up youah folks
when they die. He is a powerful liar, and I don’t believe him.”

“Yes,” replied the other, “that is the truth in some cases. We
call it cremation.”

“Well, you suttenly surprize me,” said the negro, and then he
paused as if in deep reflection. Finally he said, “You-all know
I am a Baptist. I believe in the resurrection and the life
everlastin’ and the comin’ of the Angel Gabriel and the blowin’
of that great horn, and Lawdy me, how am they evah goin’ to find
them folks on that great mawnin’?”

It was too great a task for an off-hand answer, and the
suggestion was made that the aged one consult his minister.
Again the negro fell into a brown study, and then he raised his
head and his eyes twinkled merrily, and he said in a soft voice:

“Meanin’ no offense, sah, but from what Ah have heard
about New York, I kinder calculate they is a lot of
them New York people that doan’ wanter be found on that
mornin’.”--_Cosmopolitan._

(1698)

JUDGMENT DELAYED

A certain farmer, who was an infidel, sent to the editor of a
weekly newspaper the following letter:

“Sir--I have been trying an experiment. I have a field of Indian
corn, which I plowed on Sunday. I planted it on Sunday. I did
all the cultivating which it received on Sunday. I gathered the
crop on Sunday, and on Sunday hauled it to my barn; and I find
that I have more corn per acre than has been gathered by any of
my neighbors during this October.”

What a triumphant sneer lay behind these words of the skeptic!
But one thinks the light faded from his eyes as he read the
sentence which the editor appended to his letter: “N. B.--God
does not always settle His accounts in October!”

(1699)

=Judgment Dependent on Position=--See _Point of View_.

JUDGMENT, FAULTY

When President Roosevelt was in Idaho, shortly after the
publication of his book, “The Winning of the West,” he entered
a book-store one day and saw a copy of his book lying on
the counter. “Who is this author, Roosevelt?” he asked the
proprietor. “Oh, he is a ranch-driver up in the cattle country,”
was the answer. “Indeed,” said Mr. Roosevelt, “and what do you
think of his book?” “Waal,” said the dealer, thoughtfully, “I’ve
always had the idea that I’d like to meet that author and tell
him that if he’d stuck to running ranches, and not tried to
write books, he’d cut a heap bigger figure at his trade, and
been a bigger man.”

The ranchman’s judgment was doubtless defective, but it is often well to see ourselves as others see us.

(1700)

JUDGMENT, GRADUAL

Gibbon wrote and we speak of the “Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,” and Maspero has written a magnificent volume on “The Passing of the Ancient Empires.” Gradual degeneracy is the cause and precursor of final collapse.

After a violent gale one night a great tree was found lying
across the pathway in the park where through long years it
had been developing a noble growth. Nothing but a splintered
stump remained standing. Examination showed there had been
another development besides that of its stately beauty. For it
was rotten to the core, because of the secret workings of a
multitude of little insects which for generations had lived and
multiplied. Judgment was not passed on that tree by the sudden
gale, but went forth from the very moment that the first insect
nested within its bark.

(1701)

JUDGMENT, LACK OF

“I will never forget my first experience in the hospital work,”
said Chief Surgeon Millar, of the Central Emergency Hospital,
San Francisco. “There was a green nurse in the detention ward
and we had a very violent case in there--a man in the worst
stage of delirium tremens. I was awakened in the middle of the
night by the head nurse, who requested me to come at once to the
patient. When I got there I found him raving and very violent,
with the new nurse scared out of her wits. I said:

“‘Why did you let him go so far? I left you some medicine to
give him as soon as he got delirious.’

“‘Yes, doctor,’ she replied; ‘but you told me to give that to
him if he saw any more snakes, and this time he was seeing blue
dogs with pink tails.’”--San Francisco _Call_.

(1702)

JUDGMENTS, INDISCRIMINATE

It is to be feared that many verdicts against our fellow men are as indiscriminate as that of the juryman in the following extract:

A lawyer once asked a man who had at various times sat on
several juries, “Who influenced you most--the lawyers, the
witnesses, or the judge?” He expected to get some useful and
interesting information from so experienced a juryman.

This was the man’s reply: “I tell yer, sir, ’ow I makes up
my mind. I’m a plain man, and a reasonin’ man, and I ain’t
influenced by anything the lawyers say, nor by what the
witnesses say--no, nor by what the judge says. I just looks at
the man in the dock, and I says, ‘If he ain’t done nothing,
why’s he there?’ And I brings ’em all in guilty.”

(1703)

JUNK

The Rev. William Barnes Lower writes this telling illustration:

The dredging-machines at work deepening the channel of the
Delaware River are bringing to the surface all kinds of junk and
implements lost or thrown overboard from ships. All kinds of
tools, brass and copper are being found and sold as junk.

Every life carries with it, some more, some less, a lot of
worthless junk--old superstitions from which it is hard to
break away, old prejudices that have hindered the progress
of the soul and should have been thrown overboard long ago.
Superstition is the greatest burden in the world. The imaginary,
scarecrow superstitions of many homes is the worthless junk,
that is a dead weight to its spiritual and intellectual
progress. Superstition is the disturber of many homes. Very
often superstition parades itself under the guise of religion.
Superstition is the one swing of the pendulum, skepticism
believes nothing. Prejudice always arises through inexperience
of the world and ignorance of mankind. In any life it is as
worthless as old junk.

(1704)

=Just Punishment=--See _Boys Adjusting Their Troubles_.

JUSTICE

Over on the further side, in the shallow eddy, the pool was
troubled a second, then there rose from it a wee sunfish, not
more than three inches long, rose from it tail first and began
balancing across the pool surface toward me, on his head. His
tail quivered in the air, and I could see his freckles growing
in the yellow transparency of his skin; yet, tho I watched
with wide eyes, he was two-thirds the way across the pool
toward me before I noticed beneath him the tip of the nose
and the wicked little dark eye of a water-snake. At sight of
him the demoiselles should have shrieked and flown away, but
they made no move. I, however, indignant, arose, and seizing
broken fragments of rock was about to lacerate him, and lose
his prey, when I quite suddenly thought better of it. Had not I
a few days before come down stream to the deep pool above and
carried off a string of perch, sunfish, pouts, and an eel? Had
not the water-snake also a right to his dinner?--WINTHROP
PACKARD, “Wild Pastures.”

(1705)

* * * * *

Some of the early settlers of this country bargained with the
Indians that for each fish-hook given, they were to give as much
land as a bullock’s hide would cover. But the settlers cut the
hide into thin strips, and made it cover a large area. William
Penn, when he first came to Pennsylvania, bargained with the
Indians that he would give a certain number of articles for as
much land as a man could walk around in a certain time. The man
covered so much more ground than the Indians believed he would,
that they became dissatisfied and threatening. But Penn said
to them, “You agreed to this way of measuring.” His companions
wished to force the carrying out of this agreement, but Penn
replied that that would be wrong toward these simple children of
the prairie; he asked them what they thought would be right, and
they simply demanded a few more rolls of cloth, to which Penn
agreed. Not only was war averted, but the Indians were pleased
with the fair and just spirit shown by the strangers, and became
their friends.--JAMES T. WHITE, “Character Lessons.”

(1706)

* * * * *

The story is told of a boy whose mother gave him some food
to feed the chickens and little ducks. While feeding them he
noticed that the ducks were scooping in nearly all the food. He
saw that their large bills gave them a decided advantage and
this he did not like. It did not exactly square with his notion
of justice, so he got hold of a knife with a good edge to it,
and just as fast as he could catch the ducklings he cut down
their bills to match the size of that of the chicks.

(1707)

JUSTICE BY MAJORITY

Mr. Justice Perrot was a servile political judge, whose power
of discrimination was well measured by the celebrated way
in which he summed up to the jury in a case of a disputed
watercourse, at Exeter Assizes. He concluded thus: “Gentlemen,
there are fifteen witnesses who swear that the watercourse used
to flow in a ditch on the north side of the hedge. On the other
hand, gentlemen, there are nine witnesses who swear that the
watercourse used to flow on the south side of the hedge. Now,
gentlemen, if you subtract nine from fifteen, there remain six
witnesses wholly uncontradicted, and I recommend you to give
your verdict accordingly, for the party who called those six
witnesses.”--CROAKE JAMES, “Curiosities of Law and
Lawyers.”

(1708)

JUSTICE DELAYED

A case that has been on Chicago court dockets for almost twenty
years was brought to light, and an effort made to hasten the
progress of the wheels of justice in its disposal. The case is
a damage suit of the survivors of victims of the _Tioga_
steamer explosion July 11, 1890. Since it was started the
original lawyers on both sides have died. The _Tioga_ was
moored in the Chicago River, between Washington and Randolph
streets, when the explosion occurred, resulting in an estimate
of thirty deaths.

The suit was filed in the Circuit Court, but was transferred to
the United States District Court. Technical pleas and hearing of
evidence before a master in chancery have consumed the years of
litigation.

(1709)

* * * * *

As I passed down through India I saw two little rice-fields side
by side. One was green and growing; the other was dead and dry.
I looked for the cause. The great lake was full of water. There
was no lack there. Into the one the living water was flowing,
for the channel was open. The other was choked. Brother, is your
life green and growing, fruitful and joyful, or barren and dry
because the channel is choked?--G. S. EDDY, “Student
Volunteer Movement for Foreign Missions,” 1910.

(1710)

JUSTICE, ETERNAL

Nations change their names, their boundaries, their creeds and
their languages. The altars of yesterday are but the curios of
to-day. The temples that have been raised to the worships that
have now disappeared from the face of the earth but move our
wonder that beliefs so simple and so transparent should have
nerved the minds of men to raise such marvels of architecture.
But tho creeds and dynasties and languages are ephemeral, the
principles of justice are eternal; and this Government, founded
and built upon them, will, I believe, last to the end of
time.--WILLIAM BOURKE COCKRAN.

(1711)

JUVENILE COURT EXPERIENCE

Judge Ben Lindsey, who has been made famous by his remarkable work in the Juvenile Court of Denver, tells the following in _The Survey_:

A heart-broken mother whose child was becoming dependent can
tell her own story: “My husband, judge, is a good man; he
was steady at his employment as structural ironworker until
recently. Now he is neglecting his home and his work. As soon
as he quits work he goes down to the gambling-house and there
he is being ruined. He used to go to mass with me on Sunday,
and he was so good and loving to us all. Now he is indifferent,
gloomy and melancholy. I am without clothes and the children
have no shoes. He has gambled away two hundred dollars of the
money that belongs to his union, for he was highly respected
and elected its treasurer. I gave him fifty dollars to pay the
chattel mortgage on our furniture, and I did not know that he
had gambled it away until the chattel-mortgage man came and
threatened to take the stove and furniture out of the house. I
went to police headquarters and they were rude and insulting
to me. But one of the officers came up to me and whispered
confidentially to me that if I would go to the Juvenile Court
they might help me out of my troubles.”

Of course the “big business” men who commercialize political
parties had little concern about their part in the ruin of that
home and in the dependency and delinquency of that child. I sent
for their political partner, the gambler who conducted the hell
that was burning up that home. He admitted it all. I told him
I would make a noise if he did not pay back that money to the
poor mother. He paid it back. It would have been useless to talk
about arrest and prosecution, for the public officials of that
period would do neither.

(1712)

K

KEENNESS

The poets have celebrated the perfection of the Oriental steel;
and it is recognized as the finest by Moore, Byron, Scott,
Southey and many others. I have even heard a young advocate of
the lost arts find an argument in Byron’s “Sennacherib,” from
the fact that the mail of the warriors in that one short night
had rusted before the trembling Jews stole out in the morning
to behold the terrible work of the Lord. Scott, in his “Tales
of the Crusaders,”--for Sir Walter was curious in his love of
the lost arts--describes a meeting between Richard Coeur de Lion
and Saladin. Saladin asks Richard to show him the wonderful
strength for which he is famous, and the Norman monarch responds
by severing a bar of iron which lies on the floor of his tent.
Saladin says, “I can not do that”; but he takes an eider-down
pillow from the sofa, and, drawing his keen blade across it, it
falls in two pieces. Richard says, “This is the black art; it
is magic; it is the devil; you can not cut that which has no
resistance”; and Saladin, to show him that such is not the case,
takes a scarf from his shoulders, which is so light that it
almost floats in the air, and, tossing it up, severs it before
it can descend. George Thompson told me he saw a man in Calcutta
throw a handful of floss-silk into the air, and a Hindu sever it
into pieces with his saber.--WENDELL PHILLIPS.

(1713)

=Keenness from Use=--See PRACTISE.

KEY-NOTE OF LIFE

In tuning a piano the artist strikes his tuning-fork on a hard
surface and holds it to his ear while at the same time he
strikes the A key on the keyboard. Then he tightens or loosens
the string until the key and the fork correspond. From this he
proceeds to harmonize all the other keys.

For the harmony of human life we have One who furnishes the keynote. When we tune our life up to His all its chords become consonant.

(1714)

KEYS, FALSE

The notion that alcohol may do good because, for a moment, it
seems to do good, was well answered by a physician’s response to
a man who was somewhat too much given to the pleasures of the
table. This man had said to the doctor:

“What do you think of the influence of alcohol on the digestion,
doctor?”

“I think that its influence is bad,” said the physician.

“But a little whisky taken just before a meal is the only key
that will open my appetite, doctor.”

“I don’t believe in opening things with false keys, sir!”
answered the other.

Nor is alcohol the only false key in common use. Pretension, misrepresentation, any means not adapted to the desired end--all are false keys and must fail.

(1715)

=Kind Looks=--See _Face, An Inviting_.

KIND WORDS, VALUE OF

The influence exercised by kind words from certain people
can not be measured. I have in mind a retiring, modest man,
singular in aspect and manner, who every Sunday visited the
house of a friend where the head of the family, a superior man
of great position, always bade him “Good-evening,” and kindly
asked after his health. His simple words were so valued by this
lonely man that when his friend died and he could no longer
receive his kindly greeting, he left his employment and the
city, dying in his turn of sorrow, in some obscure and unknown
place where he had sought refuge.--DORA MELEGARI,
“Makers of Sorrow and Makers of Joy.”

(1716)

KINDLINESS, SENSE OF

Few people possess the kindly sense of the French abbe mentioned
in the memoirs of Madame Vig’ee de Brun, the celebrated
portrait-painter of the last century. This gentleman was,
unfortunately, extremely deformed, and, playing at cards with
him, Madame de Brun was so struck by his strange figure that
she inadvertently hummed a few bars of a tune called “The
Hunchback.” Immediately recollecting herself, she stopt in
confusion, whereupon the abbe turned to her with a kindly
smile, “My dear madame, continue your tune. I assure you it
does not offend me in the least; the association is so natural
a one, that I believe it would have occurred to me in your
place.”--London _Evening Standard_.

(1717)

KINDNESS

Several passengers on a hot day in June entered the train on
the Columbia and Augusta Railroad. Among them were several
young college boys who were on the way home from their summer
vacation. They were stylish, well-drest lads, and were gay and
happy, as boys usually are who have put books aside.

A party of merry girls already occupied the car, and in a little
time the train seemed flooded with youth and sunshine. A very
lean woman, with an ample lunch-basket, divided her time between
eating chicken and boiled eggs and fanning vigorously with a
turkey-tail fan, while a stout man in the corner mopped his face
with a red bandanna, and remarked, by way of emphasis, “Hot,
very hot!”

The girls and boys took in every incident, laughing and
tittering all the while. Just across the aisle, opposite the
boy, sat a woman holding a baby. A pale, tired, despairing look
was on her face, and her eyes were full of suffering. The little
one was fretful and cried piteously, but the young mother was
too exhausted to try to quiet the baby.

“Oh, just listen to that young one. I think crying babies ought
to be put out of the cars,” one of the girls said pertly.

“Yes, my head begins to ache,” said another, while the boys
laughed; and the louder the child cried, the more merriment it
caused among the young people; while the lean woman and the fat
man scowled and complained.

“I do not see any cause for ridicule,” said Fred Weston, as he
arose; and to the amazement of all the passengers, he crossed
to where the woman sat, and with a courteous bow, extended his
arms. “Please let me hold your baby a while,” he said; “I have a
little sister just her age and she loves me dearly. You look so
tired, ma’am.”

The child opened wide her big brown eyes and gazed into the
handsome, bright face of the boy, as without hesitation she
sprang forward into the outstretched arms. She ceased crying,
and her lips puckered into a plaintive sob.

(1718)

* * * * *

A poor boy was taken from the poorhouse into the home of a
farmer, a just man, who dealt justly by the boy; but, somehow,
he never gave him any help, and the boy moped along hopelessly.
One day a visitor came to that farmer, and as the orphan boy
brought around his horse the visitor said a kind word that made
the boy open his heart a little. “I see,” said the stranger, as
he was mounting to go, “you have a pretty hard time; but keep
a good heart and you will come out all right. I have noticed
that a boy that has a great shock of red hair and a large nose
and a freckled face, if he keeps a good heart, always comes
out right.” It was the first kind word, but it made the boy
and the man he grew to be, who told the story. The law can not
put a man in the right way when he finds himself wrong, but
sometimes a kind word can.--FRANKLIN NOBLE, “Sermons in
Illustration.”

(1719)

* * * * *

Henry Clay was at one time considerably distrest by a large debt
due to the bank. Some of his friends heard of it, and quietly
raised the money and paid off the entire indebtedness, without
notifying Mr. Clay. In utter ignorance of what had been going
on, he went to the bank one day, and addressing the cashier,
said, “I have called to see you in reference to that debt of
mine to the bank.”

“You don’t owe us anything,” was the reply.

Mr. Clay looked inquiringly, and said: “You don’t understand me.
I came to see you about that debt which I am owing the bank.”

“You don’t owe us anything.”

“Why! how am I to understand you?”

“A number of your friends have contributed and paid off that
debt, and you do not owe this bank one dollar.”

Tears rushed to Mr. Clay’s eyes, and, unable to speak, he turned
and walked out of the bank.

(1720)

* * * * *

In my journal of Friday evening, July 3, 1863, I made the
following note, “At eight o’clock this morning hundreds of
rebels were seen standing on their fortifications. Both armies
laid down their arms. About noon I went with part of my company
(H. 33d Wis.) near the enemy’s fort, which was hardly more than
200 yards from our line, and there the blue and the gray chatted
pleasantly for a full hour. The meeting was so unrestrained
and amicable as to make the scene exceedingly interesting and
touching as well. My boys gave the contents of their haversacks
to the rebels whom they had been fighting for nearly forty days
and nights, and the defenders of the city deeply appreciated the
kindness.”--NICHOLAS SMITH, “Grant, the Man of Mystery.”

(1721)

See FRIEND, A TRUE; PRESERVATION; TRAINING CHILDREN.

KINDNESS OF THE POOR

A touching story of how the poor help one another comes from one
of the Claremont Crusaders. A man, destitute and homeless, had
been found by him shivering on the Thames embankment. He gave
him a ticket which would provide a night’s shelter at Medland
Hall. An hour or two later the man ran up to the Crusader. “I
have just done a job,” he said, “for which I earned sixpence.
Take this ticket back. It will help some other chap.”

(1722)

=Kindness, Oil of=--See LUBRICATION, EFFECTIVE; SUNSHINE.

=Kindness Rewarded=--See RECOMPENSE FOR KINDNESS.

KINDNESS STIMULATING DEVOTION

In Mrs. Pickett’s memoirs of her husband, General George E. Pickett, of the Confederate Army, she relates this incident: