Evening times-Republican. [volume] (Marshalltown, Iowa) 1890-1923, 1902-01-22
FROM ALL OVER IOWA
The Doings of Your Friends in Iowa Towns
Your Old Home.

| endeayor to I'LL pupiIS mental StoIe
house with material that will be usetui
| to him in the ordinary affairs OF HE,
and the most of this material should
be of kind that is most frequently
needed The trouble with the average
man u.s. not that he does not Know
enough, but that he knows too much
that is of no value to him. The aim
of our public school system should
be to impart useful, practical inform
ation-valuable every day and many
times day in the ordinary vocations
| of life. After having acquired this in
the public schools there are innumer-
able ways in which a person can sat
Iisfy his desires for other or special
lines of knowledge, but the public
schools should be first practical and
thorough, and last thorough and prac-
Itical-and only that.
THE NEW BABY.
lIH. A. Burrell in Washington Qowa)
Press.]
Is there anything else so comical ana
droll as a new infant? Puckered,
lwrinkled, ungainly, cylindrical. slimp-
sy form that looks like red jelly. Yet
lp.tiful, it is so helpless. Its very weak
ness appeals to the powers to protect
| and nurture it. Just two strengths 1t
has-two only-in its tiny hands in its
lamorphous mouth. 1t grasps a finger so
is.urdlly when only five minutes old that
the Darwinians say Its remote hairy
simian ancestors were arboreal in their
habits and their young seized the bough
lof tree just as our little red Indian
squads grab your finger. And the funny
little mouth goes mooing around for
certain human ripe strawberry and
when it gets hold it sucks like your els
tern pump. Outside Of these two ener-
igies and instincts it is blank--a hui
man soul in posse. in state of coma
Just a potentiality, an undeveloped wad
| CT putty that excites the sheer Of old
bachelors and disillusions young hus-
bands who wear the halo of fatherhood
for the first time.
Cry?-we should say so. 1t has ar
| rived over a fearful road, not a fairy
one, and Jordan is a hard road to travel
Ard that first lungful of terrestrial air
lis like vital stab. We have all yelled
I IL that same Comance way. When We
are cast like bantlings on the rocks" on
| this shoal and bank of time, washed
ashore by the tide of souls, we all cry
and we go out of nature. later, with
moan and gasp. Human fate is pitt
full, fearful thing, If you think OF it.
pain at both ends-yet comedy at the
| beginning and a tragedy at the close of
the fifth act.
Yes, indeed, the new baby is com
ical little cuss." as the rough miners
called The Luck" in Bret Harte's ador-
able story. Its red stucco face is per-
/ fectly anonymous, without form and
void. You call that dab OF putty nose.
| 1t is nothing but couple OF nest holes
in bank. 1t has no more bridge than
half-made fiddle. The baby was never
born with Roman nose. It's nose has
no more character than a childs mud
lpie. And the mouth is a cash. There
could be no more wrinkles unless the
face was enlarged. 1t may have a thatch
or funny wig of hair, or it may be hald-
headed, or tonsured like a monk. It Is
utterly stark, and unfurnished, bodily,
mentally. spiritually. 1t gets it's first
clothes from the hand OF charity. 1t is
perfectly destitute, doesn't know
thing, has no endowment but inherited
instincts. 1t has not even pocket.
How can it carry the money 1t will one
day make? 1t is worse off than even the
marsupial cubs-they are born with
natural pockets in which to stow away
strings, marbles and all the curious
bric-a-brac boy acquires.
We'd like to know where these comical
waits came from. Neither science nor
theology can plainly, positively tell
whence they come, or whittier they go
after their appartition in nature, which
we call life. Where were these ridicu-
lous. absurd, puny red creatures five
years ago. nay, twelve months ago?
Where will they be hundred years
hence? All we know Is this infinite CEN
sus of souls was in the protoplasmic
stream. they were organized In It, welled
up out of it into the light Of day, born
in state of coma, SO singuarly uncon-
scious that, tho they have eyes. they
see not. having ears, they hear not, in q
discriminating way; regular little know
nothings, having everything to learn
precisely like lamb, a calf, a pig,
colt and a pup-absolute nonentities,
and even weaker than the cub OF the
lower animals. So weak, they can't peel
an eyelid. and could not really see any
thing If they could raise that curtain to
TIE eye.
1t ts well. and wise, that we are born
In that bare, unfurnished, empty, for
lcrn state. If the goddess Minerva in
deed sprang, full size and complete and
mature and adult from the awful brow
of Jove, she was not to be congratulated.
We would not do thing il we knew all
things beforehand. We dream, expert
ment. work. venture and bring things to
pass because we lack knowledge of the
issue. 1t is the element Of chance and
surprise in enterprises that make them
a!luring to us, and we are Indebted to
cur ignorance and lack of knowledge for
everything We enjoy in civilization
Tramps and sons of rest may get what
consolation they find in that philosophy.
1T goes against the grain to think that
these red babies are in the same boat
with the cubs of animals-organized
born, turned loose to shift for themselves
IA the self-same way. 1t is, indeed, hui
initiating. and cuts the proud flesh comb
OF human dignity and vanity. Under the
same vulgar necessities. young calf
Is even nimbler than a baby; 1t gets up
quickly on its weak. sprawly, wobbly
spired legs. and looks at you like the
idiot 1t is. The red, slippery, wriggly,
bieakabie red babe came out of like
iunatic asylum and when after three or
tour weeks of strange somnolence it
opens its eyes and moons about and fee