Life, 1900-09-20 · page 15 of 20
Life — September 20, 1900 — page 15: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This *Life* magazine page contains three satirical pieces about early 20th-century social issues: 1. **"A Method of Popular Education"**: The article proposes that highway billboards should display excerpts from the Constitution and Declaration of Independence instead of advertisements for pills, whiskey, and soap. It's satire criticizing both aggressive commercial advertising and the naive belief that constitutional quotes would meaningfully educate the public. 2. **"Just to Even Things Up"**: A cartoon showing a teacher punishing a student (William Lawless) for striking another student (Thomas Smith) by making him cut a switch to be beaten with. The satire critiques the hypocrisy of corporal punishment as "justice"—the authority figure commits the same violence the child did. 3. **"Ballade of the Unemployed"**: A poem lamenting joblessness and boredom among the idle wealthy or leisured class—people with time but no purpose. It's unclear whether this satirizes their complaint or genuinely sympathizes with ennui. 4. **"A Test"**: A brief humorous dialogue where a woman returning from Europe demonstrates seasickness's severity by her indifference to ruining her hat.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
y, S § A Method of Popular Education. HERE has been some agitation recently in what fy gmweren ehee tue We, Lire regards as a very righteous cause, and it is to be hoped that “a Society for the Suppreasion of Public Advertisements” will be formed to combat a growing evil. If it be necessary, however, that signs should greet us on every hand as we travel about, let them be of such a nature as to promote-reflection. Instead of the doubtful merits of a particular brand of pills, whiskey or soap, couched in lame lines, we might line our highways with extracts from the United States Constitution and the Declaration of Inde- pendence, which would be wholesome reading to many. JUST TO EVEN THINGS UP. “WILLIAM LAWLESS, DID YOU STRIKE THOMAS SMITH AT RECESS?" E MADE PACES AT ME." V'VE SENT HIM OUT To CUT A SWITCH FOR ME, AND WHEN RE RETURNS 1 SHALL PUNISH YOU REVERELY.” Ballade of the Unemployed. the morning dawns with its golden glow, And the glories bright of the day unfold— What the deuce to do, where the deuce to go, We should like to learn ; can we ne'er be told? Can we find no mart where some pastime's sold With the taste of which we have not been cloyed? Is there no more hope? ~ Don’t the wise men know Of a way to succor the Unemployed? "Tis a weary world of a flecting show, And its strolling players have so long strolled In the beaten paths of their play, we know ‘That the lines they'll speak are the lines of old ; But we take our seats, when we've paid our gold, In the hopeless hope that we may avoid All our idle selves as Time's backward rolled Through the tiresome days of the Unemployed. Would Good Fortune kindly on us bestow Of her gifts one more we could have and hold, We should only ask that we'd ne'er outgrow Our delightful youth that could be cajoled, Ere the heart had felt satiation's cold, And the morrow's pledge kept us pleasure-buoyed ; But the knell of purpose has long since tolled, And Life's weary work for the Unemployed. L'ENVOL. Pleasure, you shine with alluring glow To the busy souls you have ne'er decoyed, But the sorry fact is you're dev'lish slow To the jaded hosts of the Unemployed. Wood Levetle Wilson, A Test. Bute (to Ethel, who has just returned from Europ): O, Ethel, were you seasick? ETHEL: Seasick! Why, Edith, I went into the stateroom and sat down on my best hat—and I didn’t care. Thomas Smith: wene rt 18, MOM.