Life — December 17, 1896 — page 14: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

NO FOOL OF A DOG. A SOLACE FOR THE UNKNOWN. ITERATURE may roughly be —~ divided into two parts: that which pays before death, and that which pays after death. At the first blush the former may seem the more intrinsically de- sirable, for what doth it profit a man if he gain the whole world afterwards, and lose his credit during life? There is, however, about the latter method a compensation not to be sneezed at. For it is not necessary to be great; it is only neces- sary to believe you are so, and all the s and scorns of an unappreciative au- dience will be healed by the balm of this sweet solace. To know that the MSS. which you have just been told is lack- ing in merit, or unavailable for ten thou- sand other reasons, is nothing to you as you smile and think cheerily that one hundred years from now it will be posing on the shelves of some future bibliomaniac as one of his priceless treasures. And why should there be any doubt of this? We are asked to base our whole hopes of happiness on other beliefs not one whit more prob- able. And so, budding authors, when you scribble your unknown thoughts on the backs of unreceipted bills, do so in the sweet consciousness that there is a great time coming ; And when with wings you pause To hear faint sounds from earth, You'll know ‘tis the applause At thoughts you've given birth. “ELREFE®= THE GREAT SUNDAY PAPER. HE Great Sunday Paper is an insti- tution that hascome tostay. How happy homes got along without it until now it is hard to say. Suffice it that its circulation and size have grown until one wonders when it will be that both shall reach the end of their respective tethers. The one by reason of the fact that there will soon be a time when every breathing human buys it, and it can gain no more for the simple reason that everybody on earth secures acopy. The other reason arises from the fact that there is not, or will not be, enough paper made to supply the demand should The Great Sunday Paper ACQUIESCENCE. HE pictures of the Might-have-been Before our mental visions dance; How, while we supped at Idle Inn, Before the gate passed Fleeting Chance; How while we loitered by the stream And listened to the zephyrs sigh, Along the highway on to Fame Great Opportunity sped by; How, though 't were morning bright and clear, We yielded unto sleep once more, And consequently failed to hear Good Fortune knocking at our door. And yet, the while we've had our ease, Calm joys without Ambition’s stress— Ah! it is better to know these Than wicld the Sceptre of Success. Wood Levette Wilson. decide to increase the size of its issue from two thousand to three thousand pages. Not to count the over-supply of material for the making of paper boxes, if it be true, as some assert, that paper boxes are mostly made from the ground over unsold Great Sunday Papers with fake circulations. But we could not do without The Great Sunday Paper. The pleasing chromatically colored supplement, in the hues of the Mandril monkey, gladdens the artistic eye; and the chaste, gentle, refined humor of that particular portion, both in literary and illustrative form, appeals to the most cultured home circle. In the other portions of The Great Sunday Paper pleasing descriptive, trated articles on freaks, fat boys, and contagious diseases of all kinds, arouse all that is best and noblest in our natures. These are given variety in turn by “young lady reporters,” with accounts of nights spent in sewers, dissecting- rooms, and other pleasant places, that hold the reader's interest by their accu- racy of detail in every sickening circum- stance. These are spiced and served up with descriptive headlines, such as. ‘How It Fecls to Be a Floater! One of the World’s Young Women Reporters Lays Four Days in the Morgue Awaiting Identification.” Pleasing pictures accompany this. Signed articles by persons who, if they have not achieved fame, have gained “MACHINE IS ALL RIGHT, MISS MARY,”