Alexandria gazette. [volume] (Alexandria, D.C.) 1834-1974, 1859-04-14

| we have been warned that each man must
cross this river alone, as best he can, We
nod on cozily and comfortably, trusting that
some way will be provided somehow or 9TH
or for terrying us over, or that the pastor
that is. the engine driver will see to it, and
mt any rate there is no use in bothering
| about it until we get somewhere near the
station.
| Then we are charitable-yery. We give
money to every lazy or drunken rascal. or
! woman with lot of hired children, that
stops US in the street, and dismiss them with
great deal Of good advice about going to
work. &c-only we don't show them where
or how to go-because our hearts are so east
! " touched by the appearance OF misery that
/ we can't we really can't resist: that is ii is II
great deal easier to hel p people to homilies
and three cent pieces, than follow them to
their homes and see into the truth of their
story, and put them in II way to help them
selves. We show the most laudable alacrity
in assisting all benevolent enterprises, and
get ourselves to preside at meetings held TO
organize them, with the greatest enthusiasm.
/ We rise with overlooking hearts to make a
few unprecedented remarks, got by rote
the dav before: head subscriptions with lib
eral sums, which are not to be called for, in
order 10 induce somebody else to subscribe Il
similar sum, which is to be called for; and fur
nsh the reporters of morning papers with q
copy of our speech, together with the pro-
ceediugs of the meeting and the names Of the
officers.
We turn up our eyes with edifying con-
sceutiousness mt the idea of shaving ten per
cent. from promissory note, and turn them
down again cOmplacently and prick up our
ears at the offer of ground rent or mortgage
at the same discount; because, you see, that
is different thing: it is a-it is-that is, YOU
know-there is difference---when you take
real estate security, you-a-a-a-it $50, you
see-a-a-" to be sure not doubt Of it; moth
ing could be clearer.
Then we write elaborate art criticisms.
profusely Illustrated tby the aid Of Glossa-
ry) with learned technicalties -such Is
breadth, tone, warmth, chiaro-scuro. per-
spcctive lights, touch, foreground, middle
distance atmospheric effects, intersected with
great deal Of cant about handling, style,
execution, composition, idealism, lovely bits
of distance &C.. Of the meaning of which we
have as accurate perception as school boys,
with imperiectly developed mathematical or
cans, have of what the dreaded Pons Asino-
rum is all about when they have got through
saying it "off the book"
We get up reputation rs MieratcnrS, I'VE
hate using foreign words in English wri-
ting, but no other word expresses the idea SO
well. based, with regard to books, upon the
advice OF Dean Swift--wasn't ito a friend,
with regard TO the members Of the English
Peerage-"learn their names and then bray
of their acquaintance" and we descant upon
their merits, and discourse dreary patitudes
upon their want of plot, their lack Of origi-
nality, their inartistic denouement, or, on
the other hand, of their independent noble
tome" their free, untrammeled expression of
thought, their "entrancing pictures of the
beautiful" the truthful delineation of the
writer's style" I'VE copy this last, verbatim,
from newspaper criticism; what rs truth
full delineation" Il style?) with gravity and
profundity that almost deludes ourselves into
the idea that we are talking sense.
We have great many other shams among
us: grave. thoughtful men, who never say
anything because they never have anything
to say; their gravity and thoughttuness be-
ing of the owist kind. requiring no brains.
but only discreet silence, backed by sol
emn countenanee to give them etfect;-dig-
nihed men, whose dignity consists in looking
pompous and pronouncing long-taled words
with sonorous wobble of voice, calculated
to produce feeling of respectful awe in their
Undergraduates writers, whose names
nobody ever saw or heard, until they were
placarded in big letters on all the blank
walls, and announced with q flourish in the
fash newspapers, (which themselves should
take high rank in the list of shams, only
we can't stop TO deal with them now for
which they get up blood and thunder stories
by the yard, mixing sixteenth century
grandiosity, and our own dear nineteenth
ccntury's .Iakcyism in the same speakers
mouth, in the funniest manner conceivable.
There is host, besides, which we have
neither time nor space even to ennmerate-
Altogether. when we think how little of any
thing genuine we see or hear--of how few
things we can say this is itself and isn't
something clse"-of how we are constantly
trying to throw dust into our neighbours eyes
conscious all the while that they are trying
the same thing with US, the wonder is that
we can ever look each other i'll the face with
out laughing.
Likeness of the New Born and the Dead.
Larater, in his "Physiognomy." makes