Marshall County independent. (Plymouth, Marshall County, Ind.) 1894-1895, 1895-01-25
HUMBUGGERY.
The Necessity of Being Defrauded
Before Being Convinced.

There are a few things more dlscOur-
aging To the friend of humanity and it,
progress, than the apparent desire of s.
many people to be humbugged.
There is hardly any person with sense
enough to go in when itrains. but knows
that in the commercial world. something
cannot be secured for nothing. or. IL
other words, anything of financial value
must be paid for Yet. there is nothing
SO catching to most of rs as the promise
to give something for nothing. No mat
ter IN what form the offer is made.
thousands rush up pell neil at the offer
of the promiSer. and even after they
have been swindled over and over again
are always as ready for the last new
fake that may be presented as they were
at the first
If such persons were found only
among the ignorant, or those who never
read the newspapers. there would per
haps, be nothing surprising about It.
But they are not. \ wheel of fortune
at horse race perhaps takes in nothing
but the foolish. But the patent right
swindlers. the illusory Insurance com
panies, the set up horse or foot races.
the patent medicine peddler, the foreign
grocery seller, reach classes that are Ger
tainly intelligent and are ordinarily
looked upon as shrewd and sharp.
Perhaps the greatest credulity Of the
people is shown in their aptitude TO fall
in with the biggest swindlers and quacks
of them all, the travelling doctor and the
spectacle man. We do not pretend to
say that all those who follow this line of
work are quacks and swindlers, but we
do believe the majority that 60 from
town to town, are not responsible.
Persons who are not willing to place
anytrust in physician they have known
for many years, and whose whole inter
est lies in advising them fairly and for
the best, will run after some loud.
mOuthed swell quack who comes along
periodically and claims to be able to cure
all the ills flesh is heir to. They will pay
an enormous price for his advice or for
some villianOus compound, they have no
evidence other than his mere word, that
it will cure anything from tapewOrm
to an ingrowing toenail, or SPAWN or
bolts in horse.
Another gross humbug of the same
class, is just now a sort of fad with many,
and that is the slick individual who puts
on the garb of piety, and gulls the faith
full with his faith cure.
Still another gross humbug is the
spectacle doctor, who by some unknown
sorcery, hypnotizes the people into the
belief that he is the only person in the
known world who has spectacles which
will make the blind see, and palms off
glasses which can be purchased of any
reputable optician for from one to five
dollars, for ten, twenty and sometimes
twenty-five dollars. Why this is true is
mystery.
Sometimes, undoubtedly, people place
faith in promises from the quack, which
no known responsibility, which an edu-
Gated and responsible physician, who
has his reputation and honor at stake,
would not assure.
In the great majority of cases, this
success of humbuggery can only be laid
to the inherent passion of the people to
be gulled and swindled. So long as peo-
pie insist on being humbugged we do
not see how 1t can be helped.
If people insist upon being swindled
there are always plenty of swindlers to
occupy the field. The liberty of indi-
viduals is one of the sacred institutions
of this land even though it is the liberty
to swindle. So mote ii be. But how
true is thisfact, that THE Sucker
harvest never ends"