PROFESSIONALISM
The subtle casuistry of Johnson's reply in this dialog from Boswell's "Life of Johnson" would excuse any amount of lying, if it were only in the interest of one's profession.
Boswell—"But, sir, does not affecting a
warmth when you have no warmth, and appearing
to be clearly of one opinion, when
you are, in reality, of another opinion—does
not such dissimulation impair one's honesty?
Is there not some danger that a lawyer may
put on the same mask in common life, in
the intercourse with his friends?" Johnson—"Why,
no, sir. Everybody knows you are
paid for affecting warmth for your client;
and it is, therefore, properly no dissimulation;
the moment you come from the bar
you resume your usual behavior. Sir, a man
will no more carry the artifice of the bar
into the common intercourse of society than
a man who is paid for tumbling upon his
hands will continue to tumble upon his hands
when he should walk upon his feet." (Text.)—Croake
James, "Curiosities of Law and
Lawyers."
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PROFIT
S. E. Kiser expresses in the verse below the thought that our kind words and deeds are helpful to ourselves, no matter how small their objective effect:
You may not profit by my word of cheer,
The cares you have may weigh upon you still;
My word of kindness may not dry your tear,
Nor smooth your path upon the storm-*swept hill.
The word of hope I speak may not impart
To you the courage that I wish it might;
But, speaking it, I win new strength of heart
And make the burden I am bearing light.
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PROFIT FROM PESTS
Some points in muskrat-farming are related
by a Vermont man in the New England Homestead as his own experience. Some years ago he dammed a small brook on his farm for the purpose of making a trout-pond. The muskrats, however, speedily took possession of it and made it their home, from which they organized forays into the farmer's corn-field. This suggested a way of getting even. The next year he enlarged his dam, making a shallow pond covering four acres of marsh-land of no use for crops. The rats appreciated the enlarged accommodations and also the marginal corn crop which he planted for their sustenance, and did not suspect the wire traps set for them when the water should be drawn off. After a couple of seasons he considered the quarry sufficiently mature to test results. The water was drawn off and the game was caught in the netting. A hundred of the largest and darkest of the captives were returned to the pond for breeding purposes, while more than four hundred were put under tribute of their pelts. The result was more than enough to pay for the construction and labor, and he expects a much larger return of better fur next year. Hundreds of New England farms have brook-fed marshes that could be utilized to equal advantage. The fur market is a rising one; more in proportion, perhaps, for cheap furs than for the more expensive. The trolley and automobile have increased the demand enormously. The people who buy rich furs are constantly becoming more numerous, and they have their imitators among the many who can afford only the lower grades.—Boston Transcript.
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Prognosis, Cure in—See Wounds, Curious. PROGNOSTICATION OF WEATHER Character has its signs, often accurately read by the simple-hearted man, as easily as farmers foretell the weather. "I reckon we'll have to stop hay-carting to-morrow," said a laborer to me one splendid cloudless July day. "Why?" "'Cause I heerd one o' them old wood-*peckers hallerin' fit to bust hisself while I was a-gettin' my dinner." Next morning the daily paper spoke of settled fine weather, but the rustic was right—it rained heavily. He was a man utterly uneducated, who, without reference to any scientific instrument, could forecast the morrow's weather with accuracy, when the meteorological office, with all its appliances, was at fault. "Hinery" was only a specimen of hundreds of his fellows who can predict to-morrow's (and often longer) weather with unerring accuracy, merely from noticing common details of natural phenomena open to every one.—Cassell's Magazine.
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