Life, 1909-12-02 · page 31 of 80
Life — December 2, 1909 — page 31: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This Life magazine page contains two distinct pieces: **Upper silhouette:** "Good Will Toward Men" depicts women engaged in domestic labor—cleaning, cooking, childcare, sewing. The title's ironic juxtaposition suggests commentary on society's expectation that women perform unpaid household work as a moral duty or virtue. **Lower cartoon:** "To Him That Hath Shall Be Given" shows what appears to be a Salvation Army or charitable worker distributing aid to poor children in winter. The biblical title (Matthew 25:29) sarcastically critiques wealth inequality: those already privileged receive more, while the poor struggle. The scene depicts class disparity and inadequate charity. **Text sections:** Arthur Brisbane's birthday tribute praises someone for intellectual simplicity and journalistic clarity (unclear who specifically). "What Every Baby Knows" humorously lists infant frustrations—restrictive clothing, forced feeding, discomfort from well-meaning adults—expressing the baby's perspective on parental/societal impositions. The page overall satirizes social hypocrisy: domestic servitude, inadequate charity, and adult disregard for children's actual needs.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
to your discredit. We like you for an other thing. It would have becn easy for you to have grown pedantic as time wore on, and to have occupied yourself with splitting philological hairs. “Instead of this you have always been a man first and a student afterwards, We have al- ways regarded it as a great pity that it should have fallen to your lot to ex purgate our sixteenth century fri household use, but the work wou done by someone no doubt, and w of nobody who could have done it any better than you did. We take off our hat to you and wish you well and many happy returns! ARTHUR BRISBANE. Born December 12, 1864 “Loquendum ut vulgis, sentiendum ut docti.” In an age of unmitigated mental com plexity and verbal smartness this young man possesses the extraordinary gift of simplicity, united with what may be termed a journalistic purity of diction; for he rarely descends to slang or the use of any fantastic means to convey his meaning His sincerity and originality have often been brought into question; but what does it matter? It is enough that he has the supreme ability to seize upon an idea which some one else has clouded with words and free it from verbiage with a colloquial directness unequalled. He knows how to focus words. He is a show window of thought, a lightning change artist in expression. And he is never tiresome. Sir, you have interested and amused us. We trust that you will continue to do so for many years to come. We wish you joy and a hat full of birthdays! What Every Baby Knows HAT a cry will bring a quicker re sponse than a laugh. That baby clothes must have been the invention of the devil That it is not hungry every time a nipple is shoved into its mouth. That some day it will get even with the people who chuck it under the chin That the efforts to make it comfortable “TO WIM THAT HATH SHALL BE ’ usually have the opposite effect comicbooks.com.