Weekly standard. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1858-1865, 1864-10-19
GREAT EVENTS FROM SLENDER
j. CAUSES. .t

GREAT EVENTS f1lOM OLENOE1S
CAUSES.
DR.. Paris observes, that the history ct
great effects from small causes wonld
form al interesting work
"uow momentous," says Campbell,
care the results OF apparently trivial cir
cumstances! When Moham:ced was fly
ing from his enemies, he took refuge in
cave; which his pursuers would have
entered, if they had not seen spiders
web at the entrance. Not knowing that
it was freshly woven, they passed by the
cave and thus spiders web changed the
history of the world" ... -.
When Louis VII, to obey the injnnc-
tons of his bishops, cropped his hair and
shaved his beard, Eleanor his consort,
found him, with this unusual appearance,
very ridiculous, and soon very Contempt
bic. She revenged herself as she thought
proper, and the poor shaved king received
divorce. She then married the Count
of Anjou, afterward Henry II OF Eng
land She had for her marriage dover
the rich provinces of Poictou and Guienne;
and this was the origin of those wars,
which for three hundred years ravaged
France, and cost the French three mil
lions ofmen. All this probably had never
occurred, had Louis not been so rash as to
crop his head and shave his beard, by
which he became so disgustful i'll the eyes
of Queen Eleanor.
Warton mentions, in his Notes on Pope,
that the treaty OF Utrecht was occasioned
by quarrel between the Duchess OF
Marlborough and Queen Anne about
pair Of gloves.
The coquetry of the daughter of Count
Julian introduced the Saracens into Spain.
"What can be imagined more trivial"
remarks Hume, in one ofhis essays, than
the difference between one color OF livery
and another in horse races?' Yet tins
difference begat two most inveterate fac
tions in the Greek empire, the Prasini and
Veneti; who never suspended their ami
mosities till they ruined that unhappy gov
eminent.
The murder of Caesar in the capitol was
chiefly owing to his not rising from his seat
when the Senate rendered him some par
ticular honors..
The negotiations with the Pope for dis
solving Henry Fights marriage (which
brought OH reformation) are said to have
been interrupted by the Earl of Whitshire's
dog biting his holiness's toe. when he put
it out to be kissed by the ambassador; and
the Duchess of Marlborougli's spilling a
basin of water on Airs. Masham's gown, in
Queen Anne's reign brought in the Tory
ministry, and gave new !rrn to the affairs
Of Europe.
eff the nose of Cleopatra had been shor-
ter" said Paschal, in his epigrammatic
manner, "the condition of the world would
have been different"
Luther might have been lawyer, had
his friend and companion escaped the thun-
der storm Scotland had wanted her stern
re:ormer, iftlle appeal Of the preacher, had
not startled him in the Chapel of St. An
drew's Castle ;and if Mr.. Greenville had not
carried, in 1904, his memorable resolutions
as to the expediency of charging certain
stamp duties on plantations in America, the
Western world might still have bowed to
the British sceptre.
Giotte, one Of the early Florentine pain
tiers might have continued rude shepherd
boy, ifa sheep drawn by him upon stone
had not, by the merest accident, attracted
the notice of Cimabue.