Seldom, If Ever, Does Wisdom Come, Shall

There Is No Surer Way To Misread Any Document Than To Read It Literally. As Nearly As We Can, We Must Put Ourselves In The Place Of Those Who Uttered The Words, And Try To Divine How They Would Have Dealt With The Unforeseen Situation; And, Although Their Words Are By Far The Most Decisive Evidence Of What They Would Have Done, They Are By No Means Final.

We All Have Our Prayer-wheels Which We Set Up On The Steppes. The Indifferent Winds Come And Carry Most Of Them Away To Gasp Out Their Little Lives In The Desert, For Few Reach Heaven.

We Recently Had A Referendum In New York About Extending The Forest Preserve. The City Voted For It By A Large Majority; Yet As I Walk The Streets I Do Not See Afforestation Written With Conviction On The Harried Faces Of My Fellow Citizens.

For Myself It Would Be Most Irksome To Be Ruled By A Bevy Of Platonic Guardians, Even If I Knew How To Choose Them, Which I Assuredly Do Not.

Political Agitation, By The Passions It Arouses Or The Convictions It Engenders, May In Fact Stimulate Men To The Violation Of The Law. Detestation Of Existing Policies Is Easily Transformed Into Forcible Resistance Of The Authority Which Puts Them In Execution, And It Would Be Folly To Disregard The Causal Relation Between The Two. Yet To Assimilate Agitation, Legitimate As Such, With Direct Incitement To Violent Resistance, Is To Disregard The Tolerance Of All Methods Of Political Agitation Which In Normal Times Is A Safeguard Of Free Government.