The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1904-02-21


that proverb. The second thought is
the open door to duplicity when it
comes to a. question of morals. You
ask small boy who has been in
swimming when he ought to have been
at Sunday school why his shirt is wet.
His first thought is naturally to re-
ply along the line of fact and say
why, because it fell into the pond
But second thought comes along with
visions of hard spanking and a sup
PEERLESS bed in store for him, and sug-
gests the idea that there was a leak
in the Sunday school roof right over
the place where l was sitting or I
sat down on the teachers glass of
water. That's the sort of thing Sec
ond thought does in the matter of
morals
How about business?" demanded the
Bibliomaniac.
We'll, l know from experience that
it was second thought that lead me
to buy Hot Air Preferred at AZ, when
first thought said Flee or you're a
busted community" said the Idiot.
II took second thoughts advice,
relying on that dear old proverb back
ed up by John w, Midas opinion
that Hot Air Preferred would go to
par in six months. It's worth one
eighth of one per cent. now, and my
broker told me the other day he
thought he knew a man who'd take
it off my hands IL I'd pay him sixty
dollars and guarantee him against an
assessment for a year. / admit, of
course, that there are times when sec
| ond thoughts are better than first ones
for instance If your first thought is
to name the baby Jimmie and Jim
mic turns out to be a girl 1t Is bet
| ter to obey your second thought and
| call her Gladys or Samantha-but 1t
| is not always so, and I object to the
nerve of the broad. general statement
| that il is so. Sometimes fifth thoughts
are best. In science I guess you'll
| find that the man who thinks the
seven hundred and ninety-seven
| thought along certain lines has got
| the last and best end of It.. And
| so 1t goes-out of the infinitesimal
number of numbers, every mothers
| son of 'em may at the psychological
| moment have a claim to the suprem-
acy, but your self-sufficient old prov
erb maker falls back behind the i'm
penetrable wall of his own conceit and
announces that because he has moth
ing but second hand thoughts, there
| fore, the second thought is best, and
| we, like a flock of sheep, follow this
| leader and go blatting that senti-
ment down through the ages as If
it proved beyond peradventure by the
| sum lOLdl OF eNpeT1eHGe.
| We'll you needn't get mad about
| It," said the Lawyer. "I never said it
so you cant blame NE. .
| Still, there are some proverbs"
said MIR. Whitechoker blandly, that we
may not so summarily dismiss. Take.
for instance, you never miss the
water till the we'll runs dry"
zone of the worst of the lot, Mr..
| Whitechoker," said the idiot. "I've
missed the water lots of times when
the we'll was full as ever. You miss
| the water when the pipes freeze up,
| don't you? You-or rather II some
! times miss the water like time at
! five o'clock in the morning after a
pleasant evening with some jovia1
| friends, when there's no end of it in
| the well, but not a drop within reach
of my fevered hand, and I haven't
the energy to grope my way down
stairs to the ice pitcher. There's
more water in that proverb than tam
! gible assets. From the standpoint of
veracity that's one of the most inn
moral proverbs OF che lot-and If you
came to apply 1t to the business world
oh, Lud. AS a rule these days you
never find the water till the we'll has
| been pumped dry and put in the hands
of a receiver for the benefit of the
bond-holders. Fact is, all these water
| proverbs are to be regarded with sus
picion."
IT don't recall any other" said Mr..
| Whitechoker.
"Well,' said the idiot, there's one,
and it's the nerviest of 'em all. Water
never runs up hill Ask any man in
Wall street how high the water has
run up in the last five years and
see what he tells you. And then You
may drive a horse to water. but you
cannot make him drink is another
choice specimen of the Waterbury
School of Philosophy. / know a lot
of human horses who have been driven
to water lately and such drinkers as
they have become! It's really awful.
If / knew the name OF that particular
Macmillan who invented those water
proverbs I'd do my best to have him
indicted for doing business without a
license
tits very unfortunate" said Mr..
Whitechoker that modern conditions
should so have upset the wisdom of the
ancients."
ut is too bad" said the idiot "Aud
/ am just as sorry about 1t as you are;
but after all the wisdom of the ancients,
wise and wisdomatic as it was, should
not be permitted to put at nought all
modern thought. Why not adopt the
wisdom of the ancients to modern con-
dtions? You can't begin too soon, for
ing up, and / know of no better outlet
for reform than in these self-same
Spencerian proverbs, which the poor
kids have to copy, copy copy, until they
are sick and tired of them. Now in
writing lessons why not adopt your
means to your ends? Why make a be-
ginner in penmanship write over and
over again "A bird in the hand is worth
two i'm the bush (which It isn't by
the way, to a man who is a good shot
when you can bear in on his mind that
A dot on the ] is worth two on the
T.; or, for the instruction Of your school
teachers, why don't you get up a pro-
verb like It's long lesson that has no
learning or If you are interested in
having your boy brought up to the
strenuous life why don't you have him
make sixty copies of the aphorism A
punch In the Solar is worth six on the
Nose. You tell your children never to
whistle until they are out of the woods.
Now where in the name of all that's
lovely should a boy whistle II not in the
woods? That's where birds whistle.
That's where the winds whistle. II ma
ture whistler anywhere II is I'm the
woods. Woods were made for whistling,
and any man who ever sat over a big
log fire IN camp or In library who has
not noticed that the logs themselves
whistle constantly-well he Is a pachy-
derm."
well as far as I can reach a conclu-
zion from all that you have said" put
Ina Mr. Whitcchoker, the point seems
10 be that the proverb OF the ancients
IA not suited 10 modern conditions, and
that YOU think they should be revised"