The Birmingham age-herald., 1919-12-27
From ihe Montgomerv Advertiser

From the Montgomery Advertiser. l ny w. HOWE, the Kansas editor and | lGdo critic, made a. collection of his
 aphorisns and printed them in book. H. L. Mencken, brilliant wit. and critic, wrote an enthusiastic preface to the book. The New York Tribune en- gagged somebody to write a review of the volume. The reviewer-she's a woman makes Il savage attack upon the philoso- phy and the mental equipment of MT. Howe and of M-. Howes book, and raps Mir Mepcken for praising it. Her review is curious example of narrow-gauged, literary snobbery which sometimes makes the atmosphere heavy, and while we are not interested in MT. Howe except as a distinguished representative of very im- portant type of American. we quote a paragraph or two from reviewers re- marks. She says:
 | MT Howe mas some fame as home spun philosophers sage of the alfalfa. 1 By homely aphorism and pointed saying, through the Atchinson Globe, and later In his own weekly, he has disseminated native wisdom far and wide. It has been the talent of the long line of homespun philosophers we have bred that they were able by some salt of wit to give new relish to an old saw. What they lacked in depth they made up in point But point is precisely what these apothegms lack Here IS every blanket assumption clothed in sentiousness, every triteness uttered in tones of revelation, every virtue made dull. Iage by page this rolls itself up into monumental achievement in l banality
 The undiluts1 statement that honesty is the best policy appears at least 40 l times in these aphorisms, unqualified by 1 any realization that what has been agi- tating mems souls for thousands of years has been the search for new light on what is honest. MT. Howes own concep- tion is the simple Yankee one expressed in his succinct aphorism, The long and 1 the shortsof it is, whoever catches the fool first is entitled to shear him.
 There is the flavor of the corn belt in this stuff, but who shall say where the corn belt begins and ends in American thinking? The corn belt estimate of im- ponderables is the estimate of all Amer ica. And the appalling thing in all this is that this common sense that MT Howe avows is the common sense by which America lives"
 Mr. Howe rasps the nerves of this re- viewer because at different places in his book he takes q fling at "artists, educa- tors and sdissenters of every knd,' as she puts it. Perhaps this particular para graph is most irritating to the esthete of the Tribune's staff: ''I admire the clever writers and am entertained by them But I deny that they are a moral force. they are mere entertainers as are strollng players, circus performers and music ] ians." The reviewer is quick to show Old Ed that he cannot be more of an icono- clast than sine
 But the point that interests us is that Howe is anatnein atized apparently be- caus he isn't a Wells~ or John Spargo, or an Ellen Key or Nietzsche or Tol- stoi. He doesn's pretend to be- He only pretends to see through persons of this itype more clearly than they themselves could see; he pretends to see the weak nesses and the mischief that sound thinker may find in their preachments. He undertakes to break many illusions enter tained by many so-called 'frontiersnen. At least he is entitled to his point of view, and only frppant. incompetent critic will say that he supports his point of view weakly or duly
 ! The reviewer is not aware, apparently, that it IS the common sense of her 'corn belt philosophers" and other common, Ievery. day people that preserves and susl tains the republic and all its institutions. that sits in judgment on all the pubHe issues and finally determines how those issues shall be settled. She forgets that 1t 1 is the hard headed common sense of the American people that has made them worthy the institutions they have sus- tain edit is the only thing that has saved the republic. It is unfortunate that the l artistic tastes and standards of the aver age American are not as high as they are in some older countres but it is very important to remember the canny wisdom of the mass of the people, some l times misdirec;ed, but ultimately as- serte1 rightly and justly The common sense of the Ieople is our only stay against weakness and decay.
 l Mir Howe is one of several competent spokesmen of American common sense Are suca spokesmen worthy the scorn and contempt of our oobbed-halr frontiersmen