Year: 1874

OUR THUMBS.


"The thumb is the whole of life. .
Taine is accountable for this state
ment.


Newton said that, in the absence of
all other proof, our thumbs would con-
vince him of the existence of a God.


Chiromancy asserts this digit as
standing first, greatest, and strongest
among the fingers, and superior to any
other part of the hand. From philos-
ophers down to the smallest urchin we
have, any day, proof of the truth of
this assertion. Even little Jack Hor-
ner, as all remember, gave unconscious
evidence in its favor when, eating his
Christmas pie, he did not rely on fore,
middle, fourth, or little finger, but


Put in his thumb


And pulled out the plum,


which at that particular period of his
life was the coveted object Of his desire.


According to palmistry, our thumbs
represent the reasoning will, logic and
decision. Those versed in this science
place the sign of the mind or moral
sense at the base or root of these men,
bers, and judge of the intensity of our
reasoning faculties By the measure of
the length and thickness of the rising,
or mount, rs it is termed by the initi-
ated, found there. By the shape and
size of the thumb is also expressed our
love and affection.


Representing then, as they do, intel
ligence and feeling, We find it an inter-
esting fact, that, in the same measure
as the hands are defective and incom-
plete without the thumbs, so when the
moral will and reasoning faculties, of
which the thumbs in different. degrees
offer different signs, are found blunted
or imperfectly developed, these men,
bers which denote them are inert or
wholly wanting. Common sense teaches
us this is but natural, and the world
freely illustrates in this instance, rs in
every other, the truth of the statement
that Nv hen the substance is absent the
symbol must fail"


In general parlance We say "a man
has put away his thumb to convey the
idea that he has resigned all power of
power of voluntary action.


Born idiots, as medical statistics
show, frequently come into the world
without any thumbs, or, having them,
they are found TO be powerless and in
active.


Infants, until they arrive at the age
when ray of intellect comes to their
aid, constantly keep their tiny hands
closed with the fingers folded above
the thumb. Open the little hands,
straighten >out the passive fingers as
often as You choose, and soon rs the
restraint of your own touch is gone
the thumbs will seek their accustomed
place beneath the other fingers. Bv
and by, as the mind develops with the
body, the thumbs in turn shut over
the other fingers in convenient and
tempting position for ease, and are, as
all can testify who are conversant with
nurseries, the members which first re-
ceive the first intelligent attention from
their young owners. The epileptics,
in their fits, fold the thumbs first, the
fingers afterwards closing over them.


At the approach of death the thumbs
of the dying, rs if impelled by some
vague fear, seek refuge under the fin
gers, and when thus found are an al
most certain announcement of the end.
SO in leaving this world it would seem
that our hands in their last desire for
movement assume with our growing
unconsciousness the same suggestive
position in which the hands of the new
born babe, with faculties all dormant,
first shape themselves.


People with small thuinbs are gov
erned by the heart rather than the
head; they breathe more freely in the
atmosphere of sentiment and romance
than tnat of thought and earnest pur-
pose. The possessors of large thumbs
are endowed more generously with in
tellectual gifts, and are controlled by
the dictates of reason and common
sense rather than feeling. They are
also free from those rash and oft times
disastrous impulses which urge the
the sentimental and mawkish possess
sor of thumb small in proportion
with the remainder of the hand to the
attainment of ends which do not justi-
fly the means of their accomplishment,
to the enjoyment of pleasures which
too quickly fade away, leaving the dis
enchanted illusionist with the full ap-
probation of the folly of attempting
happiness without the aid of principle
and Judgment. ..- ,..., l,..t ., b..


And in turn a hand with thumb
out of symmetry, because too large to