The Portland daily press., 1867-01-26

PORTLAND
Saturday Morning, January 26, 1867.
Familiar Quo,n,io,.s.

e"'uiu"y morning., January 70, 1901.
Familiar Quotations.
ut is pleasant" says Horace. "to be
silly in the right company" and If is
certainly relief the wisest and grayest to
unbend in the presence of the select few. ~
loaf," says Walt Whitman, "and invite nv
SOUL" an emphatic assertion OF determined
repose which Emerson declares is unequalled
in human speech. Yet the most resolute
idler seeks some gentle occupation as an ex-
cuse for his idleness, if it be nothing more
than inhaling and expiring tobacco smoke.
Fishing owes its charm largely to the incidence
which it allows and excuses. Verifcation Of
familiar quotations is an indoor pursuit of the
same nature. The compilers of the little die
tionaries ofquotations really do an injury to
the community, since they deprive us of the
| opportunity of leisurely turning over our IA
vorite authors under pretence OF finding some
rare expression which has got adrift and which
we make virtue of restoring to its owner
What a fund OF enjoyment have we not de-
rived here in Portland this winter from the
hunt after that hacknied adjuration, 80 Con-
sistency! thou art jewelp The dictionary
makers are silent about it. Mr.. Proctor thought
at first it was Shakespeare's, but changed his
mind afterwards. Some of us reread "Much
Ado about Nothing" and other plays to no
| purpose. Mrs. Clarke's concordance finally
assured us that the word consistency is not
used by Shakespeare at all and so we are all
delightfully."- at sea, and if some impertinent
person doesn't tells us wEo first used the ex-
preston, which nobody now desires to use, we
shall so on talking about it till spring. -.
We had hoped that another was about to be
added to the stock ofwild quotations, which
is really getting rather small, SO many of them
are annually run down. We quoted the 9TH
er day without suspicion, the declaration that
negroes in this country have mo rights which
white man is bound to respect" attributing
these remarkable words to the Supreme
Court of the United States. We had suppos-
| ed they were used by Chief Justice Taney, in
delivering the opinion OF the court in the ia
NOUS Dled Scott case. That impression we
believe, is very general. Thereupon however,
greatly to our delight, up starts writer who
processes to know all about it, who like Hor-
ace thinks it pheasant to be silly in suitable
company" and finds in the Argus good enough
opportunity; this gentlemen sets us right in
the austere manner which is always proper in
correcting misquotation. Critical ignor
ance and injustice" are among the inputa-
tions which he heaps upon us. Finally he
declares, in so many words, that fit is known
to every person of ordinary intelligence in the
country that the court never made the decla-
ration above attributed to it, and that that
| shocking declaration never stood as law for
| time, OF for an hour or.s as
We had not supposed that every person of
ordinary intelligence in the country was SO IA
miliar with the text OF the Dred Scott decis-
ion as this would indicate. If we had been
told however that Cicero never said aam,d
| the din of arms the laws are SILENT" that By
ron never wrote "a change came DER the
spirit OF my dream" that Burns is not the ar-
thor OF "A mans man for a. that" we could
Lot have been more delighted. For now come
the questions, who did say that negroes have
under the constitution ''no rights that the
white man is bound to respect? and how
came that saying to be attributed to Judge
fancy and his Associates Interested in
these questions, which seemed to promise
food for gossip for the rest of the inelement
season, we turned at our first leisure to the |
report OF the Died Scott case, in Howards
10th volume. Judge fancy we found, in per-
feet accordance with our recollection of the |
case, took the ground that the change in pub
lie opinion and feeling in relation to the Afri-
can race, (which has taken place since the adop- |
ton OF the Constitution, cannot change its |
construction or meaning. To determine its |
construction and meaning at that time, insist
ing also that the same meaning and intent are
| still valid and active in the instrument the
| Chief Justice goes into an elaborate investi-
| cation OF the state of public opinion respect
ing the negro race in the latter part of the
eighteenth century. Here is what he saws:
In the opinion of the court, the legislation
| and histories OF the time and the language used
| in the Declaration of Indie ependence show that
| neither the class oil persons who had been inn
| ported as slaves, nor their descendants wheth-
er they had become free or not, Were then ae-
knowledged as part OF the people, nor intend
ed to be included IN the general words used in
| that memorable Instrument. 1t is diffieult nt
this day to realize the state OF public opinion
IN relation to that unfortunate race, which pre-
vailed IN the civilized and enlightened horizons
OF the world at the time of the Declaration of
Independence and when the Constitution Of
the United States was framed and adopted =
But the public history of every European na-
| tion displays it i'll q manner too plain to he mis-
| taken. They had for more than a Century he
| lore been regarded as beings of an interior Or
| der and altogether unfit to associate with the
white race, either i'll social or political
| and so far fJeffOr that THEY HAD NO RIGHTS
WHICH THE WHITE MAN WAS BOUND To RE
SPECIFY Holodrd, 4O7. s s.- ~ -
Why, these appear to be thu very words in
dispute! Judge fancy insisting that this an
cient prejudice Was still alive and noxious in
the constitution, proceeded to declare that
Dred Scott, as descendant of this unfortu-
nate race, could not be recognized as citi-
zen OF the United States and could not be al
lowed to sue for redress in United States
courts. The plaintiff in that celebrated case
had no rights which the white judge felt bound
to recognize. Our lively friend OF the Argus
is mistaken. 1t is he who blunders about the
quotation, rashly declaring that it is net to
be found in document widely known and of
easy access, while there it is, notoriously, dis
gracefully public. OF course we should be eu-
tirely justified in dealing very severely with
this would-be critic; no epithet milder than
malignant maniac" is at all adequate to his
offence; it is bad enough to misquote without
provocation, as many OF US unfortunately do,
but to set ones self up as censor, to sternly
rebuke your neighbors error, and then to find
your neighbor right and yourself wrong
here is wretchedness without alloy, stupidity
without palliation. The Argus published
that communication as a leading article. -l.t
tt -f .a+i-'f4 t'il ~ f34rlilileyI -iiit1A i' p
/ SO .as-f.9 Economy i'm Time.
"Time is money! said Franklin. 1t is more
than money, say we. Though riches take to
themselves wings and fly away, they may
also mount the same wings and fly back
again. But time lost can never be regained.
| A MN who annrOachne vot, and ohatroo+ei q