Atlanta Georgian. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1912-1939, April 18, 1913, Image 20

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■M 4 I, EDITORIAL RAGE! THE ATLANTA GEORGIAN I’ubliHhtvi Hv*r The Atlanta Georgian THE HOM . n ?' 15y THK GEORGIAN COMPANY Aftc-rnoon Except Hun«lay N Emit Alabama Ht., Atlanta, titter at pottofflce at Atlanta, undor art of Mareh 3.1173 red by rarrlet, 10 rents a week. By mall, $5.00 a year. Payable In Advance. Two Clerks Had a Boss--They Decided That They Could Go Into Bush ness for Themselves=«What Happened Two young men worked for an employer who did not quite suit them. They did not like their hours, they were not satisfied with their pay, they were discouraged especially by the fact THAT THERE SEEMED TO BE NO CHANCE FOR IMPROVE MENT AHEAD. These two young men decided that they would enter busi ness for THEMSELVES. They said: “We are young, ener getic. What others have done, WE can do. Let us use our brains and energy to make our conditions better.” One of the young men started out as follows: The day that he dropped his regular salary he felt like crying. Next Saturday loomed up very dreary ahead of him. He tried to do one thing, and found it was much harder than he thought. He tried to do another thing, and he found it was much harder than the first. Bills began to come in, AND NO SALARY WAS COMING IN. There were complaints from his friends that they didn't see him, there were complaints in his home. The head that was held so high when he started out began to get lower. The eye that was bright had a worried, anxious look. Finally this young man said: “I guess I was MADE to be a clerk. Clerks are pretty happy after all, even if THEY DO have to take orders and get bossed around, and have long hours. An employer to pay me every Saurday night is a pretty good thing, even if he doesn’t pay me much.” So this young man went back to clerking, and considering his character, it was the very wisest thing he could have done. The other young man went out and he had more trouble than the first one. But when he dropped his salary he said to him self, “I have quit clerking AND I MEAN IT,” and he DID mean it. He found that life was harder than it had been, but he was willing to stand it. He found that it took some time to realize the dreams that had seemed so easy when he had been dreaming them, BUT HE KEPT AT IT. He said to himself, “I can do what others have done, but I have got to go through the troubles and worries and hard times that THEY went through.” He didn’t fool himself, he didn’t fool those with whom he talked, he was willing to take things as they came. For more than a year the other clerk who went back used to smile and laugh at the clerk who didn’t get back. And it was pretty hard for the man that stuck to his resolution. But eventually, the man that stuck to his idea, the man WHOSE FAITH IN HIMSELF WAS BASED ON ENERGY AND CAPACITY, found that he could succeed, as he had hoped. At present he is running his own business, clerks are work- ir,g for him. The fact that he had IN HIM to do what he said he would do has made him successful. The other clerk who gave up and went back is now a confidential, fairly well paid man in the employ of the man that COULD stick and DID STICK. Young men may'adapt this story to suit themselves. We are not advising men who hold good jobs to give them up INDISCRIMINATELY—far from it. The man who gives up a good thing erratically for an uncer tainty is pretty sure to regret it. But at least once in every man s life there conies the prompting toward freedom. Every man has his day of strong resolution, his day of de termination. And for one man that STICKS a thousand turn out like the feeble clerk that went back. This, of course, is inevitable. In this world, where competi tion and struggle settle everything, the strongest are bound to GIVE orders and the weaker men to TAKE orders. Not all men can be THE STRONGEST. Not all can succeed in making themselves independent of others. But this we do say to young men: If you make up your mind that YOU INDIVIDUALLY will not give up, YOU INDIVID UALLY will succeed. tut Senator Bacon Is Entitled to His Nomination United States Senator A. 0. Bacon, of Georgia, was duly and regularly nominated in a Democratic primary last Au gust to succeed himself in Con gress. He was opposed vigorously and aggressively inside the party by a strong Democrat, who lost to the Senator after a gal lant and exhaustive contest. This nomination was for the Senatorial term in succession to Mr. Bacon’s, which began on March 4 last, although an awk ward provision in the laws of Georgia made it impossible for the legislature to ratify that nomination until July of this year. Governor Brown, however, wisely proclaimed and admitted the validity of the nomination by appointing the Senator to fill the vacancy occasioned by the termination of his regular period of accredited service in the Senate. Whatever may be the method whereby Senator Bacon’s successor shall be elected, however—and the ratification of the seventeenth amendment to the Federal Constitution would seem ro make his election direct by the people imperative—The Geor gia:; takes it as settled that Mr. Bacon will be, without question, the Democratic standard bearer in that election. The suggestion * 1 that he may have opposition, or that his :<■' r to the nomination may be in any wise forfeited, is certain ly" ; mistaken suggestion. Again to require him to seek the -..c. n ation would oe unfair, unnecessary, and un Democratic. It would subject both the Senator and the people of Georgia to useless expense and annoyance. The incoming legislature should provide promptly for a Senatorial election, and that election should be held in time to get the returns back to the legislature for canvassing before summer adjournment. Nothing less than this will work justice to Senator Bacon and the Democracy which nominated him to succeed himself. His continuity of service and his committee standing should Vie preserved even more for Georgia's sake than his own. And inly by acting promptly, and along the lines set up, can the leg- jature perform this service to the people. He Hooked Her—She Hooked Him “The Blood of Twenty Heathen Centuries Still Speaks in Modern Brutalities” Dr. John E. White Writes on “Whipping Women.” “If It Rain:: While Sun Is Shining, It Means the Devil Is Whipping His Wife.’ Mysteries of Memory, a Faculty Not To Be Abused, Scientifically Explained Many of the World’s Most Noted Geniuses Cultivated This Re markable Gift and Utilized It in Furthering the Ambitions of Their Lives A N English writer has just men recalling the remark able history uf the Rev. Thomas Threkheld, a Presbyter ian minister, of Rlchdale, who, it Is averred, carried the entire Bi ble in his head, so that i.t the number of a chapter tn any of tile books was given to him he could immediately recite the en tire chapter from memory, tie was a living encyclopedia of dates and farts of all kinds, and could speak ten languages. Similar instances of extraordi nary memory frequently arise, and they possess a certain Im portance for the light they throw upon a faculty of immense value, which most of us entirely neglect to train and develop. The popular belief that a power ful memory is not an accom paniment of great intellectual ability does not appear to be well founded. Napoleon could go among his guard and call by name any member of it who hap pened to attract his attention. Macaulay’s memory was the basis of his enormous productivity as a writer. Many other men of tirst rate ability have had extra ordinary powers of memory. Still, it Is true that the many instances of remarkable memory relate to persons who were either eccentric; or defective, in men tality. Possessed Musical Memory. The famous dwarf, Tom Thumb, hail as perfect a mem ory of musical sounds, although he possessed no scientific knowl edge of music, that upon hearing a new piece he could sit down ami play it at once The “Learned Blacksmith,” El- ihu Burritt, who continued to practice his trade nearly all his life. learned FIFTY LAN GUAGES. He learned Latin and Greek, and read the Aeneld and the Iliad, while he was still ari apprentice at the forge. Antonio Magliabecchi. a poor Florentine, never forgot unythlng. that he read. On one occasion he hastily read over a manu script that a writer had lent him as a test, and immediately took away. Long afterward, when the By GARRETT P. SERVISS. writer came to him in distress, saying that his manuscript had been burned, .Magliabecchi re peated every word of it. The Duke Cosmo Ill. made him his librarian, and learned men of all GARRETT P. SERVISS. kinds used to come to him for facts and dates rather than take the time and trouble neoessary to consult the books. He was never at a loss, whether the sub ject was history, theology or lit erature. He was allowed to travel in order to carry away in his head the treasures of other libraries. Once the Grand Duke asked him where he could find a certain book. "There is but one copy in the world," said Magliabecchi, "and that is in the Grand Signiors library in Constantinople, it is the seventh book, on the sec • ond shelf, on the right hand as you enter." Divided Into Two Classes. This calls attention to a pecu liarity of memory which many persons possess. They can recall places as if they saw them before their e>e> J have often been aided in searching for a particu lar passage by an instinctive recollection that it. is on the right or the left hand page, and near the top, the middle or the bot tom, even though I may not have seen the book for years. Some psychologists divide memory into two classes—mem ory of form, or visual memory, and memory of sound, or audi ble memory. Many persons never forget what they hear, but quick ly lose what they read. In gen eral, we remember better what we have seen. How often do we meet a face that we recall per fectly, without the slightest re collection of the name of the per son that it belongs to? This Is another proof of the educational value of pictures, whether "mov ing" or “still.” On account of the almost uni versal existence of visual mem ory, systems of memory train ing are frequently based upon the association of the things to be recalled with a serios of vis ible or tangible objects. A speak er will sometimes utilize his fin gers, his rings, his watch chain, or objects in his pockets to as sist him in recalling the divi sions of his subject, or the state ments that he intends to make. Sometimes he will, as it were, plant the divisions of his dis course in the various corners of a room, or upon striking objects that it contains, confident that a glance will find them when he wants them. Must Not Be Burdened. Memory is a faculty that must not, according to my experience, be too much burdened or wor ried. It likes to be trusted. Run lightly over the facts and state- •ments that you wish to put into speech, and do not strain the mind overmuch in trying to memorize them by frequent rep etition. Let them rest in the background, and give rein to the imagination. Then they will flock to you as if they were glad to come, and often they wiil bring associated things that you had not thought of in advance. Mem ory is a chain whose links may be broken by too much pulling, but when it is allowed to run lightly upon visible wheels it often amazes its possessor by its riches. Written for The Georgian by L ord Wellington invited his German ally at Water loo, General Blucher, to visit him in London. He took him to the top of St. Paul's and showed him the wonderful city. "What do you think of it?” he asked. "The blood of twenty heathen centuries rose in his cheeks,” and he repiied: "What a city for pillage!” The blood of twenty heathen centuries rose in his cheeks! That is a gripping sentence, and it un covers the peculiar persistence of all our barbaric survivals. "Scratch an Englishman and you will find a Tartar.” It came to mind when I read that the wardens of the Georgia prison system were agitating for a restoration of the custom of whipping refractory female pris oners. When the scientists in the universities hear of it it will go down in their notebooks for classes in Genetics as phenomena. Of course the Legislature of Georgia will have scant respeci for the proposition and it wiil come to nothing, but it reminds us that "the blood of twenty heathen centuries” has not all run out of our veins, but that it is running out every day. The civilization of Georgia has gone a long ways forward since the treatment of prisoners was a subject of public indifference. When the traffic in convicts was ended the State entered a new era of penology. Henceforth, what is done to a prisoner it is you and me and all of us who do it. Why Not Whip the Women? Is It because they are too good, too gentle and inoffensive to be whipped? Nay, verily. There Is nothing worse in the possibilities of human nature than the worst woman. It is because of our selves that we will not whip women any more in Georgia. We all remember the case of the DeCris woman, the Savan nah Diamond Queen. She was an ugly character and the trouble she gave the authorities was no torious. She exasperated them to the limit, and then beyond the limit. She tempted them and they fell—into bestiality. Her meanness provoked the represen tatives of the State of Georgia to a meanness as bad as hers. Having the power and being enraged, they tied her hands to the ring in the- wall above her head and whipped her until she REV. DR. JOHN E. WHITE, Pastor Second Baptist Church. The sign of succumbed. When she succumbed, you and 1 and all of us fell down.” It was a contretemps in Christian civilzation. A drop of "the blood of 20 heathen centu ries” splashed on the white page REV. JOHN E. WHITE. and the whole book was ashamed of itself. Have you seen it raining while the sun is shining? “The devil is whipping his wife,” we say. What does the old saying mean? It means that nature is disgracing itself, that sunsiiine and rain are incongruous and that the devil is at his worst when he is whip ping his wife. In the emergence from bar barism, humanity has discovered certain leading lines which guide upward, and which, if it turns about and follows in tile contrary direction leads downward. One of these great leading lines, which measures progress, is our thought toward and our treatment of womanhood. The savage did not understand that when he struck his wife, he inflicted a blow upon his posterity. sign of our escape from savagery is our better under- standing and our keener appro- elation and our greater sensitive ness. The fact that a woman was a prisoner in some castle dungeon did not exclude her from the sym. pathy of King Arthur's knights, it intensified their chivalry. What Shall the Wardens Do? .That we are governed by sen timental considerations is not to be denied. Sentimental consider- ations govern civilization at its highest. What shall the wardens do, then? Must they not enforce dis cipline? Yes, and a thousand times, No. There are methods 0 f discipline which do not degrade the State of Georgia. Let them be applied sternly enough and with perseverance. But there are methods of discipline which would degrade the Stale of Georgia, and they are effective. They reduce the most stubborn to submission because there is an extremity of unconsciousness at their end, just beyond which grins the ghost of death. Human nature can not support the easy possibilities of their ex quisite torture. Shall they not be employed when necessary to break the spirit of the devil that possesses the prisoner? A thou sand _ times "No,” because the State of Georgia is a civilized State. It were better that prison dis cipline suffer, better that the war. dens endure something than that a Christian State should lose its soul, which is very much more important than the wardens. By however low an estimate you put on the women in the scale of human values, because they are negro women, you only indicate the stoop of the State to their level when brutality of power matches itself aghinst the brutal ity of ignorance and weakness in the convict camps. The appeal to the Legislature for the ring in the wail and the cat-o-nine tails is ill advised. The people of Georgia are not moving backward In humanity toward prisoners. Besides, as a practical matter, in a few years more the difficulty of securing white men who are willing to hire themselves out to whip women—even negro wom en—ought to become a serious difficulty. "The blood of twenty- heathen centuries” is playing out in this world. Why Don’t You Stop Pushing on the Lines! Don’t Worry and Fret and Nag Yourself or Anybody Else. It Only Gets on Your Own Nerves and It Doesn’t Get You .Anywhere At All. J UST a year ago it was that I saw her last until yesterday. A little, thin, nervous, wor ried-looking woman—with eyes too bright, mouth too Set, firm little hands too tight ly clasped, going up hill in an old-fashioned wagon pushing on the lines. There was a good driver in the front seat and a good steady horse in the shafts, a good smooth road under the wheels, a fine green landscape all around to see, hut my friend didn't see it; she was too busy pushing on the lines. Let Him Do the Pulling. Up, up. up the long hill climbed the Btraining wheels. "Gid-dap,” said the driver an he spat content edly into the splendid gulf of green below the bluff; “gid-dap,” and the patient, steady oid horse "gid-daped” quietly, calmly, stead ily to the top of the long hill. At tljje top my friend leaned back on the cushions. “There,” she said, and sighed in great re lief. The driver turned in his seat and spoke with all the free dom of the Western spirit. “Tired, ain’t you?” he said. “Tired?” echoed my friend, “why, yes, I guess I am.” "Well now," said the driver, soothingly, “you hadn't ought to be. The old horse, he did all the pulling. I wouldn't push so hard on the linos when we come to the next hill." The woman's face relaxed, her bright eyes softened a little. “That s so. silo said, "1 believe that's good advide,” and she By WINIFRED BLACK. waved us a good-humored good bye as she and the driver and the old horse and the old-fashioned mountain wagon started down the hill. Yesterday I met my friend for the first time since then. Her back was toward me and I didn't know her till she turned. Such a young back it was. and so was her face, young and rested and pleasant and full of a kind of calm joy that had been miss ing when last I saw her. "What in the world has hap pened to you?" said I. “You look like a girl again.” , My friend smiled. "I am," she said, "and yet it is all so simple. "I learned it from the driver on the mountain road. I've stopped pushing on the lines, that’s ail, and you can’t think how much easier the road is to climb.” - Stopped pushing on the lines, that was it. Always Pushing on the Lines. My friend has a good husband, kind, devoted, successful in a quiet sort of way. Not so clever as my friend, not so ambitious, not so full of energy, but the man of the family without a doubt. I have often wondered if her con stant pushing and prodding and reminding and spurring didn't get on nis nerves. My friend told me about it. "You know Joe as well as I do,” she said. "Poor fellow, he's had a time of it with me. I was always pushing on the lines and thinking I was helping, and ail the time it -dn't do a thing but make me tired before we get to the top of the hill. "Joe never hurries; he never goes into things with his heart and soul; he just does the best he can and lets it go at that. ’’It used to fairly kill me to get him off to the office. I wanted him to hurry, I wanted him to get to work, I wanted him to do thing* and ‘hustle,’ and he never would, he couldn't. He had just so much strength, Just so much energy, and just such a hill to climb, and all the pushing I'did didn't make a particle of difference to him or to me or to the load. ‘I’m Ten Years Younger.” “I worried, and fretted, and nagged, and was irritated, ‘push ing on the lines' all the way, and we didn’t get to the top a bit quicker for all my pushing. “Suddenly, last year, when the driver told me that about the lines, it all was clear to me and I’ve never done it since; not once. "When I feel like hurrying Joe, when I wish fie’d do something quicker than he does, or put more life into the doing of it, I just lean back and untie my face and say to myself, 'don't push on '-he lines,’ and it's all right. “I'm ten years younger, and 50 is Joe. I take time to enjoy things. I don’t worry over what I can’t help, and in the long run T guess we get over the road about as well as we did before, if not a good deal better.” Don't push on the lines. I wish every woman who nags would learn that lesson She needs it and so does her husband. ^