The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1907-1939, 1913-01-06
BY ESTHER GRIFFIN WHITE.
Nothing dies harder than a lie.

This holds as we'll among the rank
and file
How many persons are misjudged or
taken at their own estimate or so
down to family or local history as OF
a certain type or possessing certain
characteristics.
When they possess the exact oppo-
site.
Someone with good healthy pair OF /,
lungs will make an oracular statement |
about somebody else.
II will sound authoritative because |
of the tone OF voice or ignorance or
the truth by the person to whom il is
said or for variety of other reasons.
This person will hand IL on to the
next.
And so on down the line.
And the object of the original re-
mark can never shake of the incubus
fastened 10 him.
It's not worth while to deny it.
Or try to convince OF its absurdity
or utter baselessness.
So and so said il and so and so said
it and of course il must be true.
Where there is so much smoke
there must be little fre.
This is one of the most degenerate
and illegitimate old saws of all the
repertoire.
Ii has done more TO ruin regulations,
blast character. smirch white lives and
carry general devastation in its wake
than any other combination of damn
ing words.
When some one isn't sure of his
ground when he has been pushed up
against the wall in a fabrication or the
basis of a rumour-he will always side
| step with this old saw.
| Well" he'll say. where there is SO
much smoke there must be a little
/ fire"
| And slip out the door before anyone
has a chance to refute him.
| These casual remarks follow a per
usal of some remarks made about Ed
gar Allen Poe which the writer saw in
Sunday paper.
To the effect that Poe led life of
dissipation"
There never has been nor never will
be anything more despicable than the
leffort-made originally by Poe's enc
mics and jealous detractors and car
ried on by the callow. the misinformed
and the uncou-to brand Poe as a
drunken degenerate.
Poe was a great genius.
One of the greatest this country
any country-has ever produced
He was and is so recognized in
France.
And in England.
And because he was a great genius
of his contemporaries.
The worlds affairs are administer
led by mediocrities.
You only have to take a snapshot
at officialdom to recognize that.
Very few geniuses are thrust into
the official limelight.
When they are.
There's something doing in the
language of the street
Although one brilliant mind recent.
ly published a pronouncement to the
effect that something doing was OF
Shakesperean origin.
And rubbed it In by citing page and
act and line.
But this is by the mark.
1t is the truth, however. that when
geniuses take hand at Matchmaking
or otherwise adjusting geographical
boundaries or guiding the famed
ship of state"-things happen.
Napoleon in instance.
And Bismarck
Abraham Lincoln.
And Cromwell-let us say.
But didn't they have the whole pack
snarling at their heels?
Sure-it's a mere matter of history
Get 'em out of the way-they'rt
dangerous" is the cry of the scared
mediocrities.
J Scared, because they know there IL
no chance for their own exploitation
while the god-like mind is fermenting
It was thus with Poe
Poe was one of the keenest, the
most trenchant of critics.
} He tore some of the mediocritie:
who were posing in the spotlight, Of
tiers.
They never forgave him.
The truth is that Poe was not a hare
nor heavy drinker.
A single glass would throw him on
of focus sooner than series would al
feet the ordinary stodgy male.
1t produced immediate excitation.
But he never INDUCED in "sprees" o.
orgies.
Poe was. indeed, singularly pure
minded man.
OF fascinating personally he attract
ed women.
But his love affairs were of an en-
tirely romantic character
He loved and adored his younl
: wife, Virginia, who died in the famou
Fordham cottage-died from the ei
fects of the stress of poverty.
A year or so ago single copy of
small edition of Poe's earlier work
thin volume containing one poem. il
short, of which but three known COP
les were known to exist-sold for owe
one thousand dollars.
And yet Poe at one time wrote
u magazine editor who had bought bu
not paid for an article
For Gods sake send me forty do