Democratic Sentinel, Volume 11, Number 36, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 7 October 1887 — Flights of Genins. [ARTICLE]

Flights of Genins.

“You look,” said an Irishman to a pale, haggard smoker, “as if you had got out of your grave to light your cigar, and couldn’t find your way back again." A schoolmaster, describing a moneylender, says: “He serves you in the present tense, he lends you in the conditional mood, keeps you in the subjective, and ruins you in the future.” A close observer of human nature remarks: “Time marches on, with the slow, measured tread of the man working by the day. ” A French author is charged with the prediction that France will throw herself into the arms of the liberating sword. This is not quite so bad as the Democrat’s speech: “We will burn our ships, and with every sail unfurled, steer boldly out into the ocean of freedom!”

A clergyman on board a ship began a sermon in the following manner; “Dear friends, I shall embark my exhortation on the barge of my lips, in order to cross the stormy ocean of your attention, and in hope of arriving safely at the port of your ears.” A learned counselor, in the middle of an affecting appeal in court on a slander suit, treated his hearers to the following flight of genius: “Slander, gentlemen, like a boa-constrictor of gigantic size and immeasurable proportions, wraps the coil of its unwieldly body about its unfortunate victim, and heedless of the shrieks of agony that come from the uttermost depths of its victim’s soul—loud and verberating as the night thunder that rolls in the heavens—it finally 'breaks its unlucky neck upon the iron wheel of public opinion, forcing him first to desperation, then to madness, and finally crushing him in the hideous jaws of mortal death.” A young American lawyer employed to defend a culprit charged with stealing a pig resolved to convince the court that he was born to shine. Accordingly, he proceeded to deliver the following brilliant exordium: “May it please the court and gentlemen of the jury, while Europe is bathed in blood; while classic Greece is struggling for her rights and liberties, and trampling the unhallowed altars of the bearded infidels to dust; while America shines the brightest orb in the politicial sky —I, with due diffidence, rise to defend the cause of this humble hog-thief.” “Pray, my lord,” said a gentleman to a late respected and rather whimsical Judge, “what is the difference betw’een law and equity courts?” “Very little in the end,” replied his 'lordship; “they only differ as far as time is concerened. At common law you are done for at once; in equity you are not so easily disposed of. The former is a bullet, which is instantaneously and charmingly effective; the latter is an angler’s hook, which plays with its victim before it kills it. The one is prussic acid, the other laudanum.” — Chambers’ Journal.