Democratic Sentinel, Volume 2, Number 24, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 July 1878 — The Failures of Great Men. [ARTICLE]

The Failures of Great Men.

Brother Gar Iner.of the Limekiln Club, Detroit, recently made the following remarks in introdwni»er G-mpnaiini Qnnm. 1 11 GeTii ifh, "tus exfiueuistieci ’ poet, leckturer, housepainter, filosopher, and shoemaker am arreve heah on his way to Montreal, where he am gwine to fill a first-class engagement. He was received at the depot iu due form; he hez lin booked heah in reglar order, an’ at my earnest solissytasbum he will no deliber a speech, de front name of which am ‘ De Failures of Great ftjen !’ ” After the applause had subsided the gentleman came forward, with a boil on his neck and a broad grin on his face, and began : . “Fiens, I am befo’ you on dis occashun to inflate a few suspicious remarks gleaned from de broad pages of history. You hev all heard of Socrates. He was a great man. He wore No. 10 butes, carried a silver baccy box, an’ he wiped his nose on a handkercheef with stars printed on de co’ners. He advised de world; he made rules for society *he whooped up filoeophy till de folks had de nightmare in tie day-time. Yit, my dear frens, Socrates didn’t invent de long-handled shovel, de garden spade, de clothes pin, nor de padlock, which stan’s between de tramp and de hams in the smoke-house. He war a dead failure.’* [Applause, during which Waydown Be bee bit his tongue.] “An’ dar was Napoleon de fust,” continued the speaker. “He killed off heaps o’ men, made trouble for lots o’ nashuns, learned de world how to sharpen a lead pencil wid an old case-knife, an’—but he stopped right dar. He didn’t invent de peach-basket which kin be made to hole eight quarts or only two, just as de peach man strikes a customer. He didn’t invent doze long, flat brandy bottles, which kin be car ed in de pocket widou*. suspicion. He didn’t build de fust ice-house, turn de fust cider-mill, nor put up de fust sign of ‘Sample Rooms’ in de door of a low-down dive. Cato was a great man. De hotel folks cut down de price of board for him, he got his shirts washed for 10 percent, off, and when he went up to see de races he was posted so dat he could bet on de winnin’ boss. Yet dat man Cato couldn’t mend a pig-hole in de fence; he couldn’t sharpen an ax; he couldn’t put down a carppt, an’ he neber voted but once on lelshum day. Shakspeare writ - books, but he couldn*t cord up a bed, hor oil up a clock, nor splice a rope. ’* De woruld hez known of dozens of odder great men —de woruld hez witnessed deir failures. What am de moral ? What am de lesson ? It am this : Bein’ great am simply fillin’ out cloze. Bein’ industrus, perseverin’ an’ pashient am what puts poetry on de tombstun an’ mem’ry in de public heart.” - After the usual applause accorded to all eminent men, Brother Gardner said : “We will now inflict homewards. Keep de ha’r short, de eyes open, de ears up whar’ natur’ growed ’em, an’ time wjil give us de best seats in the parkay circle.”