The Catholic bulletin. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1911-1995, 1921-01-15
ESSAY ON MAN.

L0tS OIL men nave written on this
subject, but fear they have not told
the truth. They seem to have been
misled by a certain foreign gentleman,
who used to write poetry for a living
in England. He once wrote that the
proper study of mankind is man. be-
lieve my thoughts on this subject are
worth recording, because l believe my
thoughts are closer to the truth than
rare most of the~essays Un=this~subject
that l have read. think | know why
most writer's scribble falsehood, for
l have learned from sad experience
that it is not the safest thing in the
world to tell the truth. learned that
in tender infancy, and I have not yet
discovered a reason big enough to
make me change my mind.
l have read in books that man is a
rational animal, but agree with my
Professor who says we would never
suspect it. if we didn't read it in the
books. Like most common express
sions, it holds only a half-truth, and
the truth is in the second half-the
animal part. The nationality of man
is extremely doubtful; the animality
is most obviously evident.
If you doubt the truth of my asser-
ton, appeal to your own words. Re-
call some of the names you have ap-
piled to your friends, and to those
who are not your friends. A man is
glutton for work; he is bear. If
this bear is ball player, and plays the
game to our personal satisfaction, he
is whale. Let him buy some fake
stock and he becomes a sucker. If a
woman doesn't meet her sisters re-
quirements she is cat. If man is
clever at getting out of difficulties he
is fox. If he will not let another
have what he doesn't need himself, he
is a dog in the manger. If he leaps
out of the manger and speaks and acts
in way we don't like, he is a cur. If
babe is born in Minnesota he is a
gopher; if it happens in Wisconsin he
is badger. A man, born in France, is
a frog for the rest of his life. A boob
is the center of the girls attentions;
he is social lion. If woman is not
as graceful as we want her to be, she
is COW; but if she wears meek ex-
preston on her face, the cow turns in,
to a dove. If no collar is high enough
for a mans neck he is giraffe. If a
woman doesn't take our advice she is
goose. If man allows another to
walk all over him and is slow to take
revenge he is lamb, but if he is cow
ardly in his method of attack he is a
snake. When we don't like another
style of laughing we call him hyena.
If man is enthusiastic over some
thing that does not interest us he is a
bug. If a man tries to get everything
OUT of us he is leech. If another eats
more or faster than we do, it is be-
cause he is hog. If man is much
larger than we are physically, he is an
elephant; it, in the same respect, he
is smaller than we are, we. call him a
shrimp. II he says too little to suit us
he is a clam. If we don't like the way
he wears his face or the way he talks
and acts, he is crab. In a hundred
various circumstances. a man is a
bird; but if the night witnesses his
activities he is an owl. If a man gets
the worst of deal he Is the goat II
man swallows anything you hand out
to him he is fish. If the man is one
of the many who are constitutionally
silly, he is monkey. II men blindly
J follow another they are sheep. Men
and women, too, affectionately refer
to the neighbors children as little rats
And every man. sooner or later, and
after that nearly always proves him
self an ass.-Jam in New World.