The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1911-12-30


(which is more about Cotton and
his Imitation is the sincerest fattery,' -
and other things he so aptly said
Daily one sees the aptness of the
quotation used several times in these
chapters: Imitation in the sincerest
flattery' The author of that terse
saying, Rev. C. c. Cotton, was referred
to in former chapters.
Cotton, the preacher who fell from
grace, was born in London in 1880,
dying in 1892 in Paris when ffty-two
years old, with a tragic end by blowing
out his brains with a revolver pending
a proposed surgical operation which he
feared In those days, anesthetics and
modern surgery were not known at all,
or scarcely known or used and to I'M
dergo a surgical operation then. was
almost like being led to deaths door
and pushed in
Cotton had made s125,O0O, a re-
markable sum, from the publication of
his book. "Lacon," which is evidently
taken from the word laconic. On Col
toms title page he uses this expression:
"A Book of Terse Sayings for Those
Who Think Colton's money seems to
have turned his head, for he gambled
and squandered and fell into limitless
London to avoid his creditors who
Pre- ;ed him for payment of his bills,
which he was unable to make.
He remained in New York but a
short time. returning to Europe and
locating in Paris where he became a
newspaper correspondent, and shortly
thereafter came to his end by his own
hand, as already described.
Here are some of the other wonder
full sayings by Cotton taken from his
''Lacon."
Fortune has been considered the
guardian divinity of fools; and, on this
score, she has been accused of blind
ness; but it should rather be adduced
as a proof of her sagacity, when she
helps those who certainly cannot help
themselves.
In the obscurity of retirement, amid
the squalid poverty and revolving pri-
vatlons of cottage, it has often been
my lot to witness scenes of magma
nimity and self-denial as much beyond
the belief as the practice of the great
a heroism borrowing no support either
from the gaze of the many or the adj
miration of the few, yet f1ourishlng
amidst ruins and on the confines of the
grave; spectacle as stupendous in the
moral world as the falls of the Mis-
souri, in the natural; and, like that
mighty cataract. doomed to display its
grandeur only where there are no eyes
to appreciate its magnifcence-
There is this difference between
those two temporal blessings, health |
and money; money is the most en-
We'd, but the least enjoyed; health is |
the most enjoyed but the least en-
wed: and this superiority of the latter |
is still more obvious when we reflect
that the poorest man would not part |
with health for money, but that the |
richest would gladly part with all their |
for health.
To know a man, observe how he |
wins his object rather than how he |
supports US, when we succeed it be- |
trays us
After hypoerites. the greatest dupes
the devil has are those who exhaust an |
anxious existence in the disappoint-
ments and Vexations of business, and |
live miserably and meanly, only to die /
and rich. For, like the
hypocrites, the only disinterested ac-
ton these men can accuse themselves
Of is, that of serving the devil, without |
receiving his wages: for the assumed |
fOrmality of the one is not a more eff |
-ectua1 bar to enjoyment than the real |
3varice of the other. He that stands
every day of his life behind a counter,
until he drops from it into the grave,
may negotiate many very profitable 1
bargains: but he has made a single
bad one, so bad indeed that it counter
all the rest; for the empty /
fOOlery of dying rich, he has laid
Town his health, his happiness, and his
integrity; since very old author OBJ
serves, that las mortar sticketh be-
tween the stones so Sticketh fraud be-
tween buying and selling Such a I
worldIing may be compared to a mer-
chant who should put rich cargo into
1 vessel, embark with it himself and
encounter all the perils and privatiOns
Of the sea, although he was thoroughly
convinced beforehand that he was only
for a shipwreck at the end |
IF (; troublesome and tedious voyage.
Two things, well considered, would
prevent many quarrels first, to have
iisputing about terms rather than
things; and. secondly. to examine
whether that on which We differ is
worth contending about.
1t is an unfortunate thing for fools,
hat their pretensions shOulc rise in an
heir presump tion with their weak
ness; and for the wise, that diffidence
should be the mpanion of talent,
md doubt the fruit of investigation.
Were a plain unletJered man, but
endowed with common sense and a
certain quantum of observation and of
to read over attentively the
our Gospels and the Acts of the Apos-
les, without any note or comment, /
hugely doubt whether it would enter
nto his ears to hear, his eyes to see,
)r lis heart to conceive the purport of
many ideas signified by many words
ending in ism, which nevertheless have
cost Christendom rivers Of ink and
oceans of blood.
should the world applaud, we must
thankfully receive it as a boon; for,
{ the most deserving of US appear to
expect it as a debt, it will never be