The San Saba news. [volume] (San Saba, Tex.) 1873-1966, 1889-08-16
The Worlds Acceptance Of Us.

Goethe says .'the world accepts every
person for what he gives himself out ia
be-
vi first dash we are inclined to challenge
this statement. But the fact is we give
ourselves out in a great many ways we
neither intend nor suspect. Ones ear
riage, movements, expression of face, atti-
tndes, voice, the choice and fit of onr
clothes and our habitations. our friends
and eoinpanions-all are but network of
'looped and windowed raggednessT
through which he that runs may get a
glimpse ofour real character and know
more in certain ways about us than we
know about ourselves.
A dog always knows when you are
iaraid of him. You march past him with
p air. of bravado. What stink of your
Sc, or untoward wriulling of your
dothes,or unconscious quickening of your
motion, gave ont to the dog that your
: laart was being dissolved within you,
fhers was something that told 1t: and tie
dog knew it. A horse knows instantly
when the hand of a master holds the reins;
ahd little children know whom to trust
ahd whom to suspect, whom to obey and
whom to defy.
You enter street car and the man OPP
pOsite who gives You a casual glance set
ties very definitely some things you never
suspected in yodrself There is fine line
ofsupereiliousness in your face, especially
when the ear goes past low quarter,
there is slight toss your head when you
gather back your skirts from the washer
woman with the dirty baby; there was
hardly ahair-breadth of motion, but it
told direction as plainly as lift had been
two miles. You pose before yourself and
your world us a benevolent person. You
assist at the Cash girls Fair and the Chill |
dren's Fresh Air Fund and dress Christ
mas dolls, and you love yourself in many
ways which you could mention, but you
''give yourself out to be- some
thing quite different from your ideal self
by turn of the lip or tone of the voice
a word spoken or word omitted.
You have heard people use French
phrases to convey the idea that they were
conyersant with thatlanguage; but instead
they gave out very definitely that they
knew nothing whatever about it. Some
slight difference of sound-very slight, but
absolutely impossible to one who under
stood himself-betrays alike theignoranee
and pretense of the wOuld-be Frenchman.
Have you never seen young girls sign
themselves in autograph books 'yotre
annie" or ''vOtre amil" Well, they simply
give themselves OUT
Have you never seen lady keep the
conversation in her hands and at her own
level, from herself as the center, she reels
off platitudes, or hurls iavelins of remarks
among her guests, who gasp mOnOsyllabic
replies. This lady prides herself upon be-
ing an entertainer, a conversationalist, the
queen of the occasion; but in truth she
''lagse,;. l74rseif out as fearful bore-a /
person TO be run from thousand miles.
"It might have been worse,' said an
old Englishman when his wife died: lit
might have been me-" He thought he was
'justifying the ways food to manr-but
he was only giving himself out as a self
ish man as he was, for every body else was
of opinion that it had better have teen
him that died
a keep my keyhole stuffed with paper"
said discreet duenna in a whispe; and
this gave ont that she herself vas inthe
habit of keyhnles.
a lady makes herself slave to an ele-
CANT wardrobe-and she looks like what
she subjects herself to; she conveys some
lefnite impression of the supremacy of
clothes and the subordinacy of herself.
She eau never have the subtle air that dis
tinction which woman has who does not
link OF clothes, who can look right with
mt spending great and constant thought
upon her garments.
So in thousand ways the impression
we really make is opposite to the impress
sion we designed to make.
Probably the great German was not far
rom the truth when he said, 'The world
accepts every person for whot he gives
himself out to be."-Margaret Emma Dit
20, in August Wide Awake.