Aberdeen herald. [volume] (Aberdeen, Chehalis County, W.T.) 1886-1917, 1893-06-29
IN ARIZONA.

IN ARIZONA.
a lonely spot there is amid the sand,
With hot cliffs hemmlng blank on either hand,
Where through the canyon gashes a far range
Spreads its slow sweep OF panoramic change;
Where, on the utmost landscapes serrate rim,
Energies, swells. now radiant, now dim,
A mighty peak whose living gaze intent
Dwells on the wonder of the armament;
Where, struggling up mid blistering crags that
blind.
The narrow labyrinthine pathways wind,
Above the wind-ribbed sand whose hopeless
gold
One time meath palm encircled pillows rolled,
But now where desolate Memory only brings
The pale mirage-the dream of bygone things.
-Maude E. Caldwell, in The Inlander.
No two words are more commonly mis-
used than "criticise" and appreciate. +"
Criticism is no more necessarily fault
finding than appreciation is necessarily
admiration: each is but process OF
weighing, and the result depends upon
the matter weighed and the scales Of the
weigher. The great chemist is not the
man who can detect the greatest number
Of mal-odorous elements in given COM
pound; but he who can anaIyze it into all
its component parts, naming the true
proportions of each. The criticism that
finds fault is much simpler, in majori-
ty of cases, than that which finds good !;
and both are elementary compared with
the criticism that shows the root of good
and evil. Pope says in the "Dunciad" =
"Cavil you may, but never criticise."
Fortunately, the reviewer who dropped
upon his victim with the full weight of
his panoply Of hammered phrases is as
obsolete as an arnored knight upon q
modern battle field. In spite of this adj
vance, there are still reviewers who look
upon their critical work rather as an
occasion for the display of caustic wit
than for the exercise Of that. higher func-
ton of sympathetic insight, which can
alone make a man helpful or stimu-
lating critic. Anything that has been
written in an earnest and sincere spirit
deserves, at the hands of a critic, earnest
and sincere treatment; but these two
Qualities are as uncommon in the minds
of men as in the manners of women. A
great proportion of what is written is but
the confused echo of aforementioned
sounds, there is in it no personal convic-
ton. 1t is this parrot-wisdom, this
phonograph-wit, with not cadence Of
the round human voice in the dreary
mechanical drone, that is the critics
despair and tempts to the bitter gibes of
a past age: but he should learn to look
upon any such outbreak as bit Of
humiliating atavism. In avoiding the
error of hyper-criticism the alternative
evil of "a. insipid amiability, which adds
the sin Of dullnes to the fault OF other
methods. 6onfronts the reviewer How
IS be both kindly and discriminating,
how = allow for the warp Of personal
prejudice, are among the problems of
every conscientious reviewer.
To the reader of reviews, who wishes
to find if new story is really worth read
ing, no method Of criticism, SO called, is
so annoying as the kind that tells the
plot without giving the reader any clue
as to the quality Of the book. 1t is very
doubtful if any review should deal with
the incidents of story unless it is abso-
lutely necessary in order to illustrate a
fault or beauty in the authors treatment.
A critique should read intelligibly as
an independent piece Of work without
presupposing an acquaintance with plot
or characters. What we want, in a
review Of a new book especially. is an
analysis that will give US clue to the
inner significance, not memoranda of
the outer members that have no inherent
meaning ard would only be noticeable If
absent. We are not content to know by
vague phrases that the reviewer thinks
we'll of the book, since his liking may
spring from some idiosyncracy which we
do not share with him, we desire him tc
furnish concisely material from which VIC
may form general impression of whal
we shall find when we pass by the roat
of which he tells. He is an explorer in
new fields Of literature, and we ask o.
him just and intelligent account OF his
adventures; not the proper names of the
natives of strange lands,
In an interesting and timely article up
on the problems of Presumptive Proof,
in the July Atlantic, the writer, jane
w. Clark, says, in writing of those curl
GUS cases in which men have confessed
crimes that they have never committed
"Many such astonishing cases of falls
confessions, made from motives neve
satisfactorily ascertained, are embalme'
in the chronicles of crime they belong t
the mysteries Of human experience the.
are puzzles in psychological phenomena
which defy solution and mock all GU
reasoning"
Is the mystery SO profound? May no
these false self-accusations that evidentl
spring from an hallucination on the par
Of the self-accused, be the direct result c
hypnotic suggestion? These confession
have usually come from men upon tria
for their life, worked into morbid men
tai state by months of suspicion and con
tinement. Previous to and during tn
trial hundreds and thousands of mind