The Catholic bulletin. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1911-1995, 1919-01-25
THE NARROW-MINDED MAN.

This man is a wonder; but not
in the sense that lion is a won
der or whale is a wonder, but
in the sense of how he came into
our family at all. AS he is at
present-We find him a sort Of re-
claimed wizard, but with his
mind still under the wizard in
fuence. Of one thing we. may be
certain, viz, that this narrow
gentleman will be always with us
as sure as a camel will always
have a hump. SO, we might as
well make the most Of him, though
the strange thing is that we shall
be able to make nothing out OF
him, and he will make it a point
to squeeze us dry so as to get the
last drop Of blood or sweat, or
whatever it happens to be, out of
us.
Now let us come to close quar-
ters with this narrow man and
try to analyze him. To define a
narrow-minded man is as hard as
to take the pledge for life. Let us
trot him out and see what account
he can give Of himself. The first
real characteristic of being mar
row-minded is to be jealous of the
success Of your neighbor. This
is the bedrock Of narroW-minded-
ness-jealousy, base, jaundiced
jealousy. Narrow mindedness
thrives in meanness as beetles
thrive in ordure. Meamess is to
the narrow-minded what manure
is to plants, they grow only poorly
without it; meanness is as neces-
sary to the small-minded as dark
ness is for owls or birds of the
night-it is their food-their life.
The narrow-minded man thinks
that the world was specially
created for him, to enable him to
live, to show off, and to rule over
all others. From this thinking to
jealousy there is a logical sequence
that is quite correct. If he is
destined to have monopoly, what
right have any Of us to lay claim
to anything? What he wants is
breadth Of thought-horizon
enough to be able to see how much
Of the world he occupies and his
neighbours portion, too. I don t
believe it is possible to cure a mar
row-minded man, for the simple
reason that he has taken set,
like cement, or cooled down like
molten steel and become hard, aye,
harder than any steel, even harder
than the diamond. Besides he is
too grabbed to be affected by
salves Or unguents; and too cute
to be caught and treated to big
doses Of acids and salts or Scared,
roasted, or cauterized.
The pity of it is that he should
be obliged to wait for a crisis to
expand his soul to just and gen.
erous proportions after having
plagued and tortured many poor
soul by trying to apply his own
narrow principles to the solution
of all the complex problems of life
by having recourse to Fluctions
where the simple rules Of Arith
metic would do, he so confuses the
issue that you feel yourself caught
and strangling in the narrow
meshes Of his cunningly laid net
before you know where you are
before you know exactly what hi
is up to-.
| The next characteristic of the
Inarrow-minded man is his vindic
| tive spirit. He remembers the lit
| tie incident, that happened t.
| bring Jones into handigrips will
| him, with as much tenacity o
memory as an Armenian miser re
members the amount Of interes
he is to get from his debtors. TIL
snake is vengeful by all accounts
the injured watchdog will not for
/ get the wicked boy who threw tn!
stone, there are two other NOR
i vengeful creatures, but for tn
sake Of edifcation won t men
ton them, though the narrow
minded man is sufficiently accom-
plished to compete with either O
|, them.
Spite, or a vengeful spirit is al
off-shoot Of jealousy.
A narrow-minded man finds i
very difficult to forgive hi
enemies, simply because he canno
, look along any line but straigh
one, and on the straight one RICH
[ in front Of him he sees his neigh
boris faults like little black hill
frowning on him; he is unable t
look over these hills or unde
i them or to any side, owing to hi
narrow outlook on life altogether
Iso he constantly looks at them an
! finds that they are inexcusabl
! manners Of offence; how then ca
he forgive, he thinks. Loo
) / through the hills, you old rarrov
4 sire and see ynur brother hehin