Evening star., 1935-07-06
THIS AND THAT
BY CHARLES E. TRACEWELL.

Templeton Jones sometimes wondered
II he didn't permit the bad traits Of
humanity to impress him more than
the good ones.
In this he was very human and
normal.
If this were a fault, he thought, to
concentrate on the faults Of humanity,
he had o. great deal Of company.
Mostly he found other people, as well
as himself, gave others credit for the
worst motives.
They did this cheerfully, as If ex-
pecting nothing else.
A grouchy person, for instance, was
called a crouch, just 50.
No one ever called him q sick man.
Yet often enough he was so, and
Jones, for one, wondered why he wasn't
given credit for it.
There was too much calling criminals
sick, not enough calling sick men sick.
No doubt there was something in
tensely wrong with the person who sold
his birthright. but that there was any
thing not right with the Ill man seemed
too seldom recognized.
Some Of the Ill In the world could
be assuaged, if some attention were
placed on trying to recognize the speech,
habits and mentality of the physically
sick person who perhaps does not
show it.
One might think that after all these
centuries Of living, as race, mankind
would recognize the sufferer, even when
he attempted to hide 1t. but nothing Is
farther from fact. Every one knows of
men and women who have gone CON-
pletely through their lives, without once
being recognized as invalids or semi
invalids, by the amazing obtuse persons
around them.
Why was talking to him yesterday"
they declare. as II that ought to settle
the fact of his health, when all it shows
was their own complete unawareneSs of
the signs of i'll health.
Not all is gold that glitters, and often
the desperate attempts the chronically
i'll person makes to hide his or her def
ciencies fool every one. But the ques-
tion remains why they do. If we had
half as much sense as we think we
have, we should be able to detect the
fraud, not to lecture or make misguided
attempts to cure, but to treat with
charity and kindness one who needs
it most.
What is more cruel, after all in this
curious life. than the treatment meted
out, in all ignorance, to the many
persons who show no particular signs
of illness. but who nevertheless carry
in them the seeds of speedy dissolution?
II they were in beds, or rolling chairs,
no one would be so cruel as to expect
much of them, in the ordinary harsh
ways of the world but because they
are on their feet and attempting to 60
through the battle with the strong, they
| are treated on a par with the latter.
1t is no wonder they are grouchy, i'll
at ease, complaining. querulous. unable
to take it," unwilling to see the joke
in life.
The sad part Of it is that the great
average person-how many of him and
her there are, to be sure-never makes
the slightest attempt to judge on the
possibility of these facts.
Because he has made brave attempt
to take part in the battle on his own
feet, and with his own hands, he Is
accepted as one of the soldiers, and
treated accordingly. The spectacle will
remind the observer. perhaps, OF the
war days, when men with concave chests
were listed as AL" when the very men
who so listed them knew they would.
or at least ought to, be thrown out at
the encampment.