The Paducah sun. [volume] (Paducah, Ky.) 1898-1906, 1901-12-12
LowLY ORIGIN OF
NOBLE QUOTATIONS.

the finest and most beautiful aphor-
isms and sayings spring from mean
and obscure literary parentage Some
are the result Of ridiculous perversion
Of the intended Specification, and a
flsrger number arc due to deliberate or
unconscious misrepresentation. To
accident, chance remarks of inferior
writers or orators, we owe not a few
Of our grandest proverbial expressions
This general fact Is emphasized and
abundantly illustrated by Prof J.
Charlton Collins, the well known. Eng
lish critic and severe censor Of contem-
porary book reviewers, in an article on
Popular Quotations" in the New
Liberal Review. He begins with some
instances Of perversion;
1--WE all know the famous line in
Shakespeare,
One touch Of nature makes the
whole world kim,
and q most beautiful truth il seems,
worthy to stand beside Terrenees
equally beautiful expression Of cath.
Ollie sentiment, Homo sum; humani
nihil a me alienuw puto'--'I am a
man, and think nothing that concerns
man Indifferent to me-" But miscon-
oeption and the suppression Of the
context have given Its beauty to it, for
nothing could have been further from
shskespeare's intention than the
meaning which has been attached TO
it, The line occurs in 'Troilus and
Cressids, and simply means that all
mankind have this in common,
that they delight in novelty.
One touch of nature makes the
whole world kin,
That all with one consent praise
newborn gawds
"Agnin, we all know the proverb,
AS the tree falls, there shall it lie,
supposing il to mean that q mans
fate after death will be determined
by his state when he dies, thus at
taching TO IL . most solemn moral
But a reference to the source Of It,
that is, the eleventh chapter Of &c
elesiastes, shows that nothing can be
more remote from its true meaning.
All that is mean, is that the discharge
of rain from the clouds and the in
clinstion Of = falling tree, in other
words, the times and seasons. are in
the hands Of God, and DOT q the nus
bandman's control, and all that con-
Germs him is to be diligent about the
work which he has in hand. Another
curious psrversion, but . perversion
made as early as Seneca, rs the often
quoted Art Is long and rme 10 short
This is the FIRST OF the sphorisms of
the Greek physician Hippocrstes. and
what he means is that the crrsical
moment when medical assistance can
be OF avail is soon passed, but that
medical science is slow and laborious,
and so not up to. time. The erroneous
substitution Of . futNre tense for o.
present has givsn us the celebrated
Magma est .veritAs OF prssvalebif-l
Great IL truth and IL will prevail
The quotation 10 from the vulgAss
version of the fcrty-hrst verse Of tho
fourth chapter Of Esdras, third
book, where, 10 has no snch mean.
ing As We, by farming . nsesent
tense into . future, attach. 10 il, bet
simply means, gDeat 10 truth' and
mighty above all things. Bat psp-
hAps the most sI,raordiaary Instances
Of perversisn 10 the we'll knsvs
English proverb. First s~tch year
mare and then cook. IL. Il has al
ways been sssume4that thisreospt 10
to be fousd in Mrs, Glasse'h eeleb-at-
ed book on cookery. wosb we'll known
to orr great grsndmothers. Bot what
nrs. Glssse says is something very
different. She il giving direotionsfor
what ia called chasing ths hare, that
Is. for wrapping it in paper and
bastine 1t with gravy, and in describ-
ing this process IN cookery she says,
first ease your hare, and sat of
this misconeeptisn has sprunz the
proverb."
The proverb, Curses. like young
chickens, come home to roost, - 10 sup
posed to come from soma Greek writ
err; it was uttered by a cracked,
half-witted folADw named Tyler, .
relative OF sonthey. "A poet IA
born, not made co1es from
Roman historian of no nots or cen
sequence. who was incapable Of so
immortal a saying, but who simSly
said that not every year is a king
or noet horn -