, 1873-11-16
GREAT EFFECTS FROM LITTLE CAUSES.


OF CHICAGO.
: OF tho various forms Of exaggeration to which
sensational writer's and Speakers aro addicted,
there is mono moro common than that OF nttril-
uting great eventH to petty aud insignificant
causes. Accident, tho sudden intorposition Of
some triyial event, has boen supposed in thou
sanda of casoH to- hayo determined not only tho
destinicB OF individuals, but those Of States.
Matters Of the highest moment aro assumed to
hayo boon tho product Of others the most
trivial, incidental, capricious,, and foreign; and
but for these minor. events; it is assorted. the
greater would hayo mover happened. Not,only
epgrammatists, who must hayo their an-
tithosis ut whatever cost but gravo moraEists anl
philosophers, aro fond of" showing "what great
evonts from little causes spring." and, in their
anxiety to point o moral, mak ko deductions Of
which moments reelection would ahow tho at-
surdity. As tue fall Of an apple led to tho sub
limest discoveries in science, 60, NO arc told tho
slightest moral act may load to events which no
scalo, aayo ono that can graduate eternity, can
estimate. The first Of q sorics Of crimes haa
often boen;" little thing"-a slight deviation,
by IN almost impereeptibfo anglo, from the path
Of rectitudo; but though doomed Of tri1lng
moment, It hau lod tho mistaken wandoror eter
ually astray. "a happy marriage, which might
have boon prevented BY any QUO of numberloss
accidonts," says a writer in IN English journal,
"wilt lend nun to take cloorfu1 yiow Of life.
Some secret stab in the affections, Of which only
two or three people: arc aware, may convert Il
mau, who would otherwise hayo been satisfied
and amiable, into a4stoic, a sour fanatic, or q
robol against. society, US tho caso may DO. If
Danto had beer! personally lappy, or Shakespeare
personally wrotchcl, if Byron had married Miss
Chaworth, if Yoltairo had mot with no personal
ill-usage, their literary influence would hayo
boon worry diiferont."
History, rs veil as Biography, is pointed to
as confirming tho an1ne Wow. Was not Rome
saFed by goose, and captured by a. haro7 Docs
not Pascal toll us, in his brilliant, opigram-
natio way, that if tho noge of Cleopatra had
been shorter, Antony might hayo kept tho
world2 What can be imagined, aslss Hume in
ono of his essays, moro triyinl than tho difor-
ence between ono color Of livery than another in
horso-races Yet this difference, he alda,
"bogat two most important factions In tho
Greek Empire-tho Prasini and the Vencti--
who noyor suspended their animoaitios till they
ruined that unhappy Government" Does not
Ducloa tell us that the vormin that for long
timo infested the Roman conclavo. by oxpclt-
ing tho votes Of the Cardinals, often defeated
tho grossoBt bribery and corruption, and placed
on the Papal throne MON who otherwise never
would have ant thoro2 Was not the Treaty OF
Utrecht, which, put an end to tho bloody war OF
tho Spanish Succession, occnsiono1 by q quarrel
batween tho Duchess Of Marlborough and Queen
Anne about pair Of g}oves2 Havo we not becn
assured by historians, that, had not Louis
VII, in obedience to tho injunctions Of his
DalQpa, crQprcd lia head Aul Shaved