The Manitowoc pilot. [volume] (Manitowoc, Wis.) 1859-1932, 1892-06-30
ABOUT PECULIAR PEOPLE,.
The Old Quaker's Maxim Is Mcec OF Lesd
True to Everyone.

All the world is queer but thee and
me, Rachel. and thee is Z little pecu-
liar said an old Quaker to his wife.
The good friend with the shrewdness
OF his sect. and in its quaint simplicity
of diction, formulated truth as uni
versal as it is practically unacknowl-
edged.
We all know peculiar people and
wonder ut them. and in our own little
private courts of Judgment pronounce
Il verdict against them. There Is the
woman who. never having seen you
before, @ivcs YOU in five minutes after
introduction Il rapid and comprehen-
sive sketch of her ca,'eer, past and
present. with future expectations ana
plans added thereto; and the man who
airs his pet theories, rides his religious
or political hobby, and dogmatically
prescribes adhesion to his views as the
one thing requisite to make all man
kind perfect. Then there are those
who are color blind mentally rs well
as physically. and whose inharmonious
ideas are as discordant as the glaring
incongruities of their attire.
But it is not those whom many join
in condemning, not the truly eccen-
tric the grotesquely odd of whom we
are now speaking, but rather of those
who differ from our preconcelved no.
tions Of their characters on from our
own standards of propriety and con-
duct. Intimate friends and admired
acQuaintances often Startle or wound
us bv a revelation of traits which we
never dreamed that they possessed;
and we cry out, How peculiar,' for
getting that in our turn we probably
give Just such surprising glimpses of
our own inconsistent natures and cause
others to wonder at our peculiaritics.'
We eXclaim. and believe that we hon
estly desire it:
Q wad some power the 2iftie gle us.
To see oursel 5 as others see u.s.
But were our wish granted. We're
some unwise and overfrank being to
give us our portrait with Photographic
fidelity. we would shrink as we do
from some of those unfiattering mega
tives which might take the vanity out
of Narcissus himself.
We must take Il different point of
view from the Quaker, says Il writer in
Harper'S Bazar. Not until we 90 lit
tie deeper into the well where Truth
hides herself can we learn the right
lesson and make allowances FOR "hu-
man various" Everyone is peculiar"
to someone else, and the wisest plan is
to arrive at the conclusion reached by
two intimate friends who. in the seclu-
sion OF their sewing-room, were dis
cussing their neighbors. Neither was
gossip; nevertheless mild species
OF dissection was in operation. when
one of them merrily exclaimed: we
find so many oddities in people whom
everyone else accepts as commonplace
that it must be zee who are peculiar"
The old proverb will not fit the ease.
1t is precisely because we do not live
in glass houses, and our motives and
springs of action are so obscure, even
TO ourselves, because we are not and
cannot be transparent. that we must
refrain from casting the'tirst stone. We
must cease to think and speak of pecu-
liar people and take our friends as we
do our flowers -discreetly avoiding the
sharp points and enjoying their beauty
and SweetnesS-for
with all its thorns. the rose
Is more than any Hover that blows.