The Washington times., 1919-07-08
Can You See Straight?
Would You Be Willing That Your Testimony About
What You Saw Should Convict Mani

| What You Saw Should Convict Mani
The human eye and the human BRAIN working NOgsther
Oftentimes achieve strange results.
Much more useful than an analysis of the blows struck
at Toledo last Friday which adds nothing to the Of
human existence is comparison Of what the various
OnloOkers or thought they
What the color of the umbrella that
hoisted Dempsey when he first into the rngi
half dozen different observers that sunshade in a
half dozen different coors But maybe Of them were
color blind
~ Did Dempsey stand with his back to the ring until
the call to battle had been sounded twice, did he
stand glazing at Willard eagerly waiting the summons
Two old and seasoned writer's of pugism totally dis
agree to why the battle did not begin when the gong
the whistle or both first sounded.
Who struck the first blow7 Was it left lead
landing lightly the upper part of Dempseys head,
was it a smashing left to the champion's rbsi
You read the accounts and get either record and
believe whichever suits you
Who threw the towel or the sponge, whichever it
into the ring and gave the victory to the youth
full battleri
There are three or four answers to this in the dispatches
which were sent over the wires.
In themselves no one of these questions, or all COM
bined of the least moment
But suppose that the life of depended upon the
answers.
Suppose that the verdict of jury was to be based on
the testimony of the who watched that fight what sort
Of chance would the defendant have Of getting just
Judgment?
And yet every one of these men were sent to Toledo
because they trained observers Of things pugisc
Many of them have hundreds of ring battles Some
them have themselves been fighters and two had
been champions And yet the same things and
put them down in agreement.
Of course, on the big result they all were in unison
Of the number of times that Willard foored all but
two agree but to the details there hopeless
confusion.
Very few men have wendeveloped powers of Obser-
vstion
professor in one of the big universities tried the
experiment Of having strangely dressed walk through
his classroom and then asked his students to write descp
ton of what they had seen
No two of the students agreed the height weight
complexion color of hair and details of dress And only
small minority were approximately correct.
The power of observation like the power of memory
needs to be exercised to have strength.
Most 60 through the day without observing much
Of anything.
Their minds are aimless. They have eyes, but they
see not.
It is great misfortune.
There is so much in the world worth seeing, so much
worth studying and thinking about that has right
to 60 laundering through life.
Teach yourself to be observant
Train your eye to correctly.
Be certain of what you that you swear to it.
Carlyle said of Macaulay that he with spec
tscles instead of eyes, Carlyle said good many things
which not true especially about his contemporaries
Correct eyesight and mind that accurately registers
what your eyes may sometime be of nestmable use to
You. 1t may another mans e it might be that it
would save your own.
If this editorial has dragged out of prize fight and
into your mind thought that will be useful and hepful
something out of nothing for prize fights about as bar
rem of things to think about anything could we'll be-
Once-Overs