Smyrna times., 1874-09-23
Superior People.

One word moro to the teachers waiting for
scholars before they and their multtudinouS
swarms disappear from view for another SIX
mOnthS-dOn't inhict too many great men on
the next generation. There is not Bob or
Joe who shoulders his school bag this week
who has not been adured from his cradle to
become a President, Missionary, or million
aire, "a great and good man OF some sort or
other. AS soon as he could walk, mother and
father were on the watch to discover peculiar
talent in him. From the day he enters school
until he leaves it, the prizes and honors are the
objects at which they aim for him. That he
should jog on with the hard-wOrklng rank and
lille OF boys, who master just enough knOwl
edge to enable them to Jog on aitcrward with
the rank and file outside honest mechanics,
tradesmen, professional men, agreeable trl
lows and good workers who earn their bread
and butter and make no mark in the world
what father or mother imarines such fate
possible for their prodigy? Yet in nine hund-
red and ninety nine eases out Of the thousand
he does so jog on, in school aud in the world,
and bears the gall and bitterness OF diSapPont,
ment that he could not reach the unattainabe
mark they set before him.
1t is not only the school boy who shares in
this graSping race for greatness; the Americ IN
of any age scOrns medi0crity, the level middle
place to whi,h he rightfIlly belongs. 1t he is
in trade he must be Fisk if he is in politics
Butler (fOr these are our gods, oh Israel y
He is in reality o ward politician or dry goods
clerk; bat why shall hG not have immortal
longings in him and be Overworked and neu
ralgic and disagreeabe in consequence, as the
rest of the aspiring Smiths aad JOneses who
are his neighbOrs? His wife and children
strain and work breathlesSly for the GORDON
blue of whatever sort it may be which bewild
ers their fancy; they dress and talk and ac
tually live after the fashion of some village
aristOcrat who is their demigod, but whose
habits fit them as badly as their old clothes
would do. But worse woe befalls them il great
ness has really Overtaken them Whether it
be money or position or the possession of lit
tie moro culture than their neighbors, how ex-
aggerated is the glory in their own eyes How
the sprig OF broom in their caps turns into a
royal crown Or if they cannot claim preemi
nence on their own account with any hope of
success they manage to know somebody else
in whose reflected light they may shine. Dut
tons grandmother was friend of Mrs. Dolly
Madison aud aided that lady in her stately
receptions, and little Van Mott was taken into
| Dickens set in London, aud has dined and
wined with Thackeray. Shall they not look
down aHably on all iSnoble humanity there
| after?
Another phase of this morbid hankering for
superiority shows itself noticeably among lonely
unmarried women in inland villages and country
places, of finer tastes and instincts than their
kinslOlk; women who invariably read the
Tribune and best magazines, and usually essay
to write for them once a year. The class IL
larger in this than in any other country; they
drag through their routine OF sewing, house
work, etc., with lifeless eyactltude, and spend
their strength aud energy in studying and
! forming themselves. Missionary circles they