The city itemizer., August 28, 1913, Image 1

About The city itemizer. (Water Valley, Miss.) 1894-1918

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The City itemizer.
H. A. LEE, Editor "Devoted to the Interest of the Editor, Exclusively." 91.00 Tex*
VOLUME, 19 WATER VALLEY, MISS., AUGUST 28, 1913. NUMBER 45
Following the Crowd.
It is easy to follow the crowd,
That’s why there are crowds.
It requires neither exertion,
originality nor stamina to follow
the crowd. Each individual is like
a chip floating down stream with
the current.
It is the man who stands by
himself, who tries to force his way
against the crowd, who does
things differently from his fel
lows, who must have stamina and
originality, who must exert to the
utmost his efforts if he would suc
ceed. But it is the man who does
these things who really counts.
The man in the crowd has no
individuality. He is one of a
mass, moving without conscious
thought or voluntary volition, a
creature of circumstances carried
where the whim of the mass leads
him. Of his own volition he does
nothing. The leader wills and he
follows.
But the man who stands alone
or who attempts to sway the crowd
must exercise to the utmost every
faculty. He meets with opposition
at every step which must be over
come. Because he is different
from the crowd, he is styled a
crank or egotist, scoffed at as a
dreamer of chimerical visions and
an impractical reformer. It is
said of him that he stands aloof
to attract attention by his isolation,
that he seeks notoriety by eccen
tricity. In short, the sneers and
gibes which are hurled at the man
who is different, are multitu
dinous and varied.
Yet it is the man who is differ
ent who wins. It is unnecessary
to cite historical instances to prove
the truth of this assertion. History
bristles with corroberation, but so
does local environment. It is nec
essary only to look about you, at
the men iu your own state, your
own country, your own neighbor
hood, to gain evidence of the man
who succeeds, who wins a promi
nent place, who has done some
thing really worth while. It’s not
the man of the crowd but the man
who stands aloof, who does things
in his own way and according to
his own standard—the man may
become the leader of a crowd,
frequently he draws the crowd
about him, but he never becomes
one of the crowd. His individ
uality makes for him a place and
marks a distinction which the
follower of the crowd can never
hope to attain —Commonwealth.
Distant Fields Not Greener.
“How often we flatter ourselves,”
says an exchange, “with the delu
sion that we would be much better
if we were only somewhere else
and that we would do better if
some other task were ours. The
place that someone else is filling,
the work that someone else is doing
looks easy and comfortable com
pared with our own. But, if we
would only stop to think one min
ute we would know that it is dis
tanoe that makes the difference.
If I am not doing good and being
good where I am, there isn’t one
chance in a hundred that I wdl
ever be gopd anywhere, unlesss I
get to be a different man from
what 1 am now, that change that
will set me at doing my task well,
may be made now just as well as
any time.”
Influence of Habit.
It way be supposed by some
that the soul is just as big, and as
warm and as sympathetic as its
Divine Creator made it, and that
nothing the individual man or
woman may or can do will expand
or enlarge it. That is a mistake.
It is just as much a mistake as it
would be to say that nothing one
may or can do will have influence
in making the physical body
healthful, normal and strong.
Every one knows that the habits
of a man or woman have much to
do with bodily comfort and
etrength. Many a man who is
endowed with a strong physique,
has made of himself a weakling,
often a physical and mental wreck,
by his habits of intemperance.
When the term intemperance is
used in this connection, it means
intemperance in eating or intem
perance in drinking, intemperance
in the gratification of the lusts of
the flesh, intemperance in any
thing. One in yielding to the
slavery of habit may deceive him
self and presume that he is having
a good time. But he will not have
to live very many years to find out
that his good time is lacking in
the quality of longevity, it will be
short lived, says the Knoxville
Journal and Tribune. And when
his capacity for enjoyment has
been pinched, shriveled and robbed
of the essence of life by the frosts
and the storms of time, he is likely
to become of all men the most
miserable.
Doggone the Thing, Anyway]!
At a recent meeting of the Board
of Supervisors of Claiborne county
a proposition to tax dogs was de
feated, only one member voting
for it. Another member said such
a tax would offend the negroes to
such an extent that they would
leave the county. “The question
of taxing dogs in Mississippi seems
to be a delicate one,” says the Can
ton Herald. “Men who uncom
plainingly pa all other taxes, kick
against pay a tax on dogs, and
many men claiming to be too poor
to hire a cook, pay more monthly
for dog feed to be cooked by their
wiveB than the salary of a cook
would amount to. Verily, the way
of a man with a dog is a doggoned
hard proposition to comprehend.
—Scott County Register.
We’ll be doggoned if you ain’t
just about registering the truth
about this serious questions.