Democratic Sentinel, Volume 5, Number 23, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 July 1881 — Popular Delusions. [ARTICLE]

Popular Delusions.

That milk is a compound of water, chalk and sheep’s stomach. Milk always comes from the cow—a great way from the cow. That brass band music is unpleasant to the ear. We know of a man who has lived for years next door to a bandroom and has never uttered one complaint in all that time. He is a deaf mute. That railroads are intended for the benefit of corporations. They are intended for the benefit of the people—the people who hold the majority of stock. That a small boy hates an overcoat. He dislikes it so well that he dislikes to wear it out. That whistling is disagreeable. It is always agreeable—to the whistler. That druggists are extortionate in their prices. They pay such high salaries to their clerks that they are forced to sell their goods at one thousand per cent, above cost in order to make any money for themselves. That the market is overburdened with spring poetry. The waste basket captures so much of it that but very little of it comes on the market. That any fool can write poetry. It is only a fool here and there that can do it. That women go to church to see other women’s bonnets. They merely go to show their own. That a boy thinks he knows more than his father. He only prides himself on his superior intelligence. That a widow wears weeds to catch a husband. She would rather catch a man who is not a husband. That a silver watch will tell the time just as well as a gold one. A gold watch will tell the time ten times to a silver watch’s once, and be just as fresh as ever. The shopkeepers never mark their goods below cost. They frequently mark them down much below what the goods cost the purchaser, especially if he be a particular friend, you know. That the self-conceited man thinks everybody is a fool. He does not include one person in that category, namely, himself. That extemporaneous speakers prepare their speeches beforehand. They get somebody else to do that. That the average married man dislikes marriage. He is all the time yearning for another opportunity to enter the sacred state. That parents love their children because the little ones are so much like themselves. That is just what they punish them Tor. That people hate to be laughed at. Look at the low comedian, for instance. That it is hard to attend to one’s business. Lots of people think nothing of it, and have plenty of time to attend to the business of a score of others.