Newspaper Page Text
- , tu r
__ \ 1 B j^ Ry )
VOLUJII TWO.
NUNFBER ELE VEN.
WHAT WE THINK OF WHAT WE SEE
Little did Mr. Carnegie think, when he gave a
diplodocus to King Edward, that he was thus mak
ing himself into a Friend of All the World. But
that is what he did. He recently received a let
ter from a fond parent, as follows: i ' Dear Mr.
Carnegie—-Please send ns a diplodocus. The baby
has lost his Teddy bear.” You know he will make
that baby happy. It is his disp siT n to do such
things.
A delightful true story is being told of Mrs.
Ella AV. Peattie, author of “The Shape of Fear”
and other things. It seems that on an occasion
when she was absent from home, she was seized
with a nameless fear that the children, left at home
with their father, were in some terrible trouble.
She could not shake off the presentiment, so final
ly she wired her husband, “Are the children well?”
The telegram was delivered to Mr. Peattie at two
A. M. Relieved to know nothing was wrong with
his absent better half, but a little annoyed, he
sent a reply: “Yes, Why?” At half past three
the second message came. After paying the extra
delivery charges, he read it. It was brief, but
satisfying: “Because.”
I? *
An announcement has been made by Dr. C. B.
Schildecker, of Pittsburg, that for a time struck
terror to the souls of every citizen of that city,
notwithstanding that there are twenty-eight right
eous men abiding there. The Doctor said that
every man, woman and child in the city had
“Pneumonokoniosis. ” When asked to explain,
to send it along in sections so that it could be ex
amined piece by piece and then rebuilt, he said that
it was nothing serious—that it was merely a “pseu
domelanotic formation induced by carbonaceous ac
cumulations.” This seemed to be getting still
more dangerous, but when explained, the Pitts
burgers breathed more calmly. The trouble is that
the smoke from the mills gets into the lungs and
makes them look like a blue blotter with a bottle
of Carter’s writing fluid spilled over it. The la
dies hurriedly inquired if they could wear low
neck dresses, and the Doctor assured them that it
would never show’ on the outside; so all is serene.
There has been much discussion at home and
abroad of recent weeks, on the rights of man in the
matter of whiskers. During a recent strike of
waiters in Paris, one of the matters of importance
involved was whether or not waiters should be al
lowed to wear a mustache. In some sections of this
country, particularly in the North, in the remote
regions surrounding the Back Bay District in Bos
ton, it is almost a family disgrace to wear whis
kers. Coming South, however, one finally crosses
an invisible line, as real in existence, though not in
fact, as the Mason and Dixon Line, immediately
. south of which the whisker belt sets in. In Ken
tucky, for instance, there is the style of whisker
peculiar to the natives. In Arkansas there is a
ATLANTA, GA., MAY 2, 1907.
Sy A. E. RAEISAUR, Managing Editor.
kind ’of whisker which travels dejectedly around
the esophagus, keeping well under the chin, some
thing in human adornment like the wainscot in ar
chitecture. In Georgia there are many kinds; but
most popular is the style which came in vogue sev
eral years ago with the populistic movement. This
is, perhaps, the most luxurious and satisfying whis
ker in the world. It is the result of absolute free
dom from restraint. It groweth where it listeth;
all over the face and under the chin, in free and
unlimited fashion. When its owner talks or chews
it wags benevolently and approvingly, and there is
generally a delicate amber stain down the middle
front elevation of it. There are more than fifty
seven different varieties of whiskers and heretofore
the citizens of our various commonwealths have
been free to cultivate them in just such fashion as
met with the individual approval; but now there
is a determined movement on foot to secure legis
lation providing for the taxation of the whisker.
A Mr. Inglis, writing in a popular periodical, sug
gests a graduated scale of taxes according to a
certain schedule, the amount assessable being gov
erned by the style of whisker worn. He proposes,
for instance, that the taxes should be as follows:
Ministerial sideboards, $lO. Geometrical retrousse
dusters, SSO. Gubernatorial involuted breeze-inviters,
SI,OOO, and so on. We see in his long list no men
tion of the whisker most popular in this section,
described above. We believe that the tax to be as
sessed on that should not be lightly fixed. In this
matter wo favor the initiative and referendum.
•5 *
The Rev. Dr. Hammil, of Nashville, Tenn., on
last Monday morning at the Atlanta Methodist
Ministers’ Conference made some remarks in the
course of which he stated that the “Sissy” ser
mon is going out of style, and that the pulpit menu
of these days must consist of a good meat diet in
stead of milk. We approve the use of the word he
has chosen to describe the kind of sermon which is
now become impossible. People who go to church now
are farther, perhaps, than ever before, from being
willing to accept flowers and declamation and
poetry from their minister. Time was when a red
hot and perhaps senseless denunciation of a cer
tain classified list of things, provided it was full
of sound and fury, was considered great doings in
the way of preaching. On the other hand, a lot
of beautiful sunset scenes mixed with a little
poetry, delivered in the tremolo, was listed as the
pretty sermon. Now, men and women are think
ing about the great questions involved in the mat
ter of right living, and in the tenets of the church
to which they belong, and they want sermons that
will enable them to think more; to travel farther
along the road to knowledge in these matters, and
they won’t stand for what was known to our fath
ers as “saft sawder” and evasions of the great
and eternal verities surrounding human existence.
This is a time of fearless thinking and of intoler
ance of shams. The minister who wants to do good
will give his congregation straight from the shoul
der what he conceives to be the truth. The time
has passed when people believe they can meet to
gether some pleasant afternoon and abolish Hell.
They may get some consolation in settling the fact
that there won’t be any real brimstone used in the
lake that is not quenched; but they know that a
punishment awaits the transgressor suited to his
transgressions; and if the transgressions merit the
burning fire, they can be reasonably sure to find
it provided for them. On the other hand, the soul
triumphantly conscious of its righteousness can just
so surely expect a reward in keeping with the prom
ises of the Book. Suppose there are no really
truly golden harps; there is a music of the soul that
transcends all this, and the blessing and the happi
ness will be provided Somewhere. Men call it
Heaven. There are some things we know and some
which we try to perceive as through a glass, darkly.
The minister who does good, and the kind who is
demanded today, is one who helps us to clear our
vision in the things that really matter, that are
truly worth while.
•8 *
it is now become the fashion for Federal grand
juries to bring indictments against the Standard
Oil Company. A trial jury in the District Court
in Chicago, before Judge Landis has brought in a
verdict of guilty on 1,463 counts. But what real
good is accomplished in the way of punishing a
corporation which, as some one has said, “has no
body to kick and no soul to damn”? The minimum
fine possible in these cases is $1,463,000, and the
maximum is twenty-nine million dollars. Suppose
the maximum penalty were inflicted —a raise of one
cent per gallon of the Company’s products would
square it pretty soon and leave enough over to
found a University or build a church.
H It
The spelling reform is spreading and a colored
minister of “ole Virginny” has inaugurated a
system of his own. Like Humpty Dumpty, he
uses the words that sound right to him, and when
lie uses it, the word means just what he wants it
to; it goes right to the spot, regardless of foolish
rules in dictionaries and such like. The Reverend
recently wrote the following letter to a real es
tate dealer in Vienna, Virginia:
“Exhonerated and Resteemed Sir:—
“I take my pen in han to indicate yo a few
lines. I seen by the papahs that yo alls got a
farm for sale for cullud persons. I desires a edi
fy in situation whah I kan hab all the pleasyurs of
rusty life widout all de corrugatin inflooinces of
siverlization. When mus I cum to respec de
propty. Yors with solisitud,
“rev samuel jackson.”
This gentleman has solved the problem of an
other reverend author. The latter thought it the
“simple life” for which he yearned. The “rusty
life” is the one. We have more confidence in it
than anything available in the way of simplicity.
TWO DOLLARS A YEAR.
FIVE CENTS A COPY.