The daily morning journal and courier., 1895-02-21

| subjects for biographies; but i've don't always care most for those hat-pattern flowers that press best in the herbar- | ium." Nathaniel Hawthorne describes | the host of his Select Party" as not being one of those eynics who con- | slider human patterns of excellence, | without one fatal flaw, as utter rarities in the world; and when he Invited cer- | tain such to his table, 1t was largely out of humble deference to the judg- ment of society, which pronounces them | almost impossible to meet with. But, as a matter of natural course, the re- suit of this invita- tion was that these | specimens of perfection proved to be not half such agreeable companions as people without any allowances of faults. Originality. is generally agreeable" :" was the remark of Hartley Coleridge | The only disagreeable original he knew was an original bad heart anything not positively vicious that belongs. to the individual is good. "Even ugliness is sometimes lovely. have known very plain women whom I should have been sorry to see handsomer." With Charles Lamb in his mind he wrote that
 Nobody who is acquainted with a stammering humorist or lisping lady Off her lisping be origlnaD would wish to. have him or her cured"
 Of Lamb it is notable that, if a man had but what is called "charaeter"- no matter whether it were built upon prejudices the most evtravagant, or ig- norance the most profound, provided it were only sincere, and not mere lawless audacity, but were self-consistent and had unity as respected self-in that ex- tent Lamb manifested liking and res pect for the man. Like Charlotte Bronte's head of the Yorke family, him self thoroughly original, he had no taste for the merely ordinary; a racy character found instant acceptance with him; a refined, insipid person was his abomination The elder Coleridge largely shared this feeling Writing to Wedgwood, he says: Poole is very, very good man. like even his lncor- rigibiEty in little faults and deficiencies. It looks like a wise determination of Nature to let well alone" In quoting Dr. Johnson's fervent tribute to Bonnet Langton that "The earth, sir, does not bear q worthier man." Forster remarks that the tribute was not less sincere be- cause one of Johnson's favorite topics of talk to Boswell was the weakness of their worthy mutual friend, and the same remark and reflection would ap- ply with at least equal force to John son himself. It was maxim of the elder Humboldt that if man be con scious of freedom from that cold, cavll- 1i,,nr adicnpcit4ny1 x1-binb Jafnra either love or reverence, must weigh CT measure with punctilious eye every lit tie fault--if he be but sure that his friendship is warm and sincere-nr need never hesitate to consider and analyze the character of his friends. To de- lineate with an impartial hand those of whom we owe love, reverence, and gratitude, throws no slur, he held, up- on the life of those feelings in our breasts. The matter is put in quaintly familiar form by the poet, who says; T am no- sure that I love Ralph the
 less
 For that gruff voice, for that forbidding
 scowl
 Which means so little though it threats
 so much.
 I am not sure but I the better like Luke for his limp, and Humphrey for
 his hump,
 Seth for his stammer, Lesbia for her
 lisp.
 And Dolly for the saucy upward curve Of her diminutive nose"
 The most nonzexacting and most in- dulgent cannot perhaps fail to find some faults in the nearest and best friends but in not a few cases foibles are even the strengtheners of regard.