ComicBooks.com Register / Loginit's free!

Life, 1911-07-13 · page 38 of 44

Life — July 13, 1911 — page 38: what you’re looking at

📖 Open the full issue in the page-flip reader →
Life — July 13, 1911 — page 38: Life, 1911-07-13

What you’re looking at

This page consists primarily of **advertisements**, not political cartoons. The three ads promote Martell's Brandy, Fisk Tires, and appear on a page featuring a satirical essay titled "Philosophers and Financiers." The essay, attributed to Joseph Smith, uses **Diogenes the ancient Greek philosopher** as a reference point to comment on modern society. The satire argues that while times have changed, human nature hasn't: wealthy parvenus (newly rich people) still lack manners, and society still prefers materially comfortable people to virtuous ones. The piece mocks **reformers and philosophers** of the author's era as self-righteous busybodies, and draws a sharp contrast between **philosophers and financiers**—suggesting they rarely coexist harmoniously. The implication is that reformers are hypocritical and ineffectual, while financiers are practical but ruthless. The tone is cynical, suggesting that moral posturing is less important than economic reality in modern life.

📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)

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

MARTELL’ BRANDY Five Points Worth Remembering: enters MARTELL’S distilleries. 1 That only the finest Charente wine ° That it is there distilled with utmost . care by MARTELL & CO. themselve: This ensures its extraordinary qual 3 That there are tens of thousands of *° puncheons developing and maturing in MARTELL'S stores. That consequently MARTELL & CO. ‘© never have to bottle a ‘Brandy until it is perfectly fit and ready for the mark it is to carry. 5 That to call a brandy better than ° MARTELL’S is an empty boast—to beat MARTELL’S for Quality a frank impossibility. G. S. Nicholas & Co. Fisk Tires For Every Rim Bolted-On The Fisk Rubber Company Clincher Dept. S, Chicopee Falls, Mass. D. Clincher Are entitled to your ntion because of exceptional wearing qualities and of our p sonal interest in tire investment a satisfactory and _ profitable one to you. Before You Buy Again.” Illustrated Bocklet ‘isk-Dunlop Factury Branches Philosophers and Financiers IOGENES, whom we call a philosopher, was in his time a classic hobo, who had a surplus of words, a dearth of civility, a lack of personal property and a scorn of wealth, work and water. Reading in the socicty column of the Topics of Athens that Alexander the Great had attended a tea and poured, he snorted and snecred “This effete monarch never re Macedonian 1s a parveny, a vulgar “What is a parvenu, Diogenes?” queried a disciple. do not find the term in the bright lexicon of Greece “A parvenu, the Philosopher, tapping his tub thoughtfully, “1s a combination of good money and bad manners.” he pours, The ca In those classic days, when microbes and paper were un- known and water had not become the fourth dimension of , all money was good; but manners were mere mat- ters of taste. Diogenes was stronger on philosophy th fi etary platitude, “a contented mind is a con- med literary Greece, but it did not dimin- ish the traffic of the Athenian restaurants. Humanity pre- fers matter to mind when it tackles a bill of fare; it would her be a well-fed parvenu than a perfect gentleman with a hollow mockery ur Times have cha Athens, but hi numerous to-day 2 with a searchli nes did with his whom the Athenians called philosophers we call reformers; © of to-day are mere echoes of the Athenians of classic Greece. An abiding faith in lungs and adjectives is as pro- er his waistband, ones tubbed and s the same. Honest me of them rn, Those dl we can find as the opinions and Jan nounced now as then, only the terminology has changed. Carn has had his antetypes, who, when asked for bread, handed stone libraries, marble temples and other petrified forms of nourishment. Hence the harsh and heated language of Diogenes & Co. Our reformers be- lieve that the open sesame to public office and the kingdom of heaven is the golden text, “Knock and it shall be opened to you.” In older and simpler days knockers were nailed on doors and reform ardly orna- this a: uck on anti-Tamm: they are tickets; the former were useful; the 1. cr are mental Philosophy and money, philosophers and financiers, sel- dom harmonize, and lit hungry and hard up, has favored philosophy in its pure reading matter and finance in its advertising columns. According to a Colorado litterateur, a financier is a gentleman who robs a stage coach; a philoso- pher, a passenger who 8; yet these distine- neral_ proposition he is violent and ature, being tions are local and geogra a philosopher neither sighs nor submi \ociferous; he 1s an incarnated kick, down the law that in finance nomenclature is a mere question of domicile, and this rule covers burglary, insurance, breaking, banking, larceny, litig: tion, embezzlement, stockbroking, promotion and other finan- cial transactions. If the financier be in jail he is a thicf; should the thief be at large he is a financier. This rule shows the vital amportance of judges, jurics and similar bodies to conservative financiers, It is not always safe to follow the dictum of Diogenes in finance; he was soaplessly insanitary and hopelessly insane on money matters. Should a financier exclude us from his house, butt into us with his auto, refuse our pa- per at the bank and garb his feminine kin more gorgeously than we do, we are warranted in stigmatizing him as a par- venu; when he offends us in none of these things we philoso- phers accept him as one of Nature's noblemen, a rough dia- mond, a gentleman of the old school, or some such proper person The philosopher may achieve postprandial applause post-mortem honors, but it's the financier who tips the w: settles at the desk and pays the undertaker. Joseph Smith. Dispassionate writers Bana and « ete. he sa pen © is Ni becor is from us b in Ty (You | It is done | Nopa » sible hart and it fa: | Intw | time, you comicbookMes ql