The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1880-05-07
Hard.Headed PEOPLE.

Hard.Headed People.
THE hard-headed man is almost in.
variably successful. "Luckr' he says.
"There's no such thing as luck.
built my own fortune brick by brick. I
simply took no steps backward" But
the truth is that Fate gave him in his
cradle sharper sight and a cooler brain
than the rest of us, and he has been
cooling and sharpening them ever
since. No nurse could frighten him
with bugaboos or the dark; and no
clergyman's talk of remorse or the
judgment-day affects him now. He
has never done wrong; why should he
be afraid? Nobody ever mistook his
character. He was known as "long-
headed fellow when he played num-
ble-the-peg and wore petticoats. His
father never romped with him; and his
mother, telling the dear old Bible
stories, stammered when she caught
his keen, incredulous eye. Angels, she
remembered, did seem so very unlikely
after all, when one looked at things in
a common-sense way! and as for the
old heroes and martyrs she was
ashamed to let him see the glow of soul
with which she thought of them. Could
they have really found no more practi
cal method of introducing the Gospel
than by going through the rack and
fire?
He was a cynical little doubter as a
boy, but now, as man, he is well
known as a Christian to all his custom
ers and as a tradesman to all Chris
tians. Not that he is hyp0crite. But
he prefers church-going people as
patrons; they pay their bills promptly.
And he thinks that the Christian reli-
gion teaches sound business principles.
1t is honesty that wins in the long run
in the market; and it is the fair dealer
whose profits are the biggest. He is so
successful a man that the public always
give him credit either for genius or
luck; but he has neither the one nor
the other. He simply knows the mar
ket, and has no higher aim than to
please it. If he is tradesman, he
catches the farthest glimpse of the
coming whim of fashion and fills his
shop with it. If he is an author, his are
the .smade" books, which nobody can
do without: his pictures, if he has
given himself to art, are those pop
ular studies of babies and young
mothers at prayer which are first
marked "sold' in exhibition rooms.
If he has devoted his life to science, he
seizes the crude invention of some WIS.,
ionary fellow, gives it practical use,
patents it, and makes his fortune. If
he is physician, he is always at hand
as an expert on trials; you will seldom
miss his name out of the papers. If he
is clergyman, he is always master of
the sensation of the hour, ready to
preach upon any subject upon which
the public has temporarily gone mad.
1t really does not matter to him where
the horse goes, so that he sits astride
it. Other men, in short, tumble some
times upon good fortune hiding in the
field; he lies in wait for it, catches it
when it is latest. He knows how to
bide his time; he is le chat qa1i dort.
If he happens not to be man, but
woman, you usually find this shrewd
hard-headed citizen a thin-lipped. pale
eyed leader of the "best society,""
whether fast and fashionable or sternly
pious depends altogether on the acct
dent of her position. She is usually,
however, so immaculate as to her own
morals as to have no mercy for any
shortcomings IN others. The New Test
ament system of charity, in her opin-
ion, is crude and lax. If she hao been
there she would have given the man
beset by thieves ticket for work to
ward committee, instead of oil and
wine; and she would have handed the
Magdalene over to a policeman, to
make sure that she sinned no more.
This lady is always known as capital
manager of servants, seamstresses,
church suppers or her sons wives. She
can get an incredible amount of work
for small wages out of the people in her
kitchen. Her neighbors (easy, thrift
less creatures, to her minO look on
with envy. Neither she nor hermascu-
line congener has at heart the slightest
faith in any man or woman but them
selves. 1t is they who can lay an 'un-
erring finger on the one black spot of
character which your friend keeps hid
den, be it freckle or bloodstain. They
know human nature. You shall not
humbug them!
The possessions of wealth, of public
esteem and of ideas of this hard-head-
ed citizen are all so substantial that he
is the man whom the world always en-
vies most. 1t does MOI love him prob
ably half so much as some luckless,
lovable, sinful Lazarus starving at his
gate. who had not the crumbs from
the rich mans table here, and is net at
all sure of Abraham's bosom hereafter.
But what of thatp He has been shrewd,
rational, practical. He has sought solid
goods in the world; money, influence,