Thursday, January 5, 1922
The troubles of this world are due to ignorance and meanness. Take our troubles in this country. They are all due to our stupidity. Our taxation system is doing more than anything else to destroy the peace and prosperity of the country. Any sensible man could take a lead pencil and go out behind a gum stump and devise a more sensible system in an hour. The trouble with the tax laws are that they are not American – unequitable, unjust and a general damnation to the country. Business is refusing to function under them, and they are going to break down by the weight of their own stupidity. They were conceived in sin and born in iniquity. Every law written in the statutes of this or any other country was conceived by the demagogue, the fanatic and the liar. I do not care what it is or what its purpose, it is a bad law and fosters lying and deceit. It is known that the worse violators of some of the laws of this country are the very legislators who enacted them and the very people who voted for them. If the people of this country were as dishonest and as drunken and as low down and mean as some of our laws indicate, we would perish in our own putridity in twenty years…
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A few years ago, it was customary for the adult male to resolve not to drink anymore, which resolution was usually taken in the days of his remorse following a good old Virginia Christmas spree, when the “tide of life ebbed in his veins,” and most of them kept the resolution for quite a while. Long enough to sober up anyway. Now there are so few that make a habit of drinking that the poor sinners look around for other blemishes to cure…
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The resolution business seems to have been a subject of a good deal of study and comment. Personally, we never had any special experience with it except in the case of liquor. Swearing off always meant swearing off from drinking. But there are a number of other things that are made the subject of good resolutions when the one great defect has been remedied… Tobacco is another bad habit, and coffee and tea, and eating rattlesnakes, and chewing gum and swearing not to swear, and to quit your lying and cheating and harlotting, and things like that.
Mark Twain treated the bad habit business in a quaint way. He lived to a good old age, and he said that having consulted a wise doctor, he learned the secret of a quick and sure recovery from illness. When he got sick, he quit his bad habits, such as drinking, smoking, swearing and the like, and he was well in a very short time. And wishing to do good in the world, he advised a maiden lady who was sick to do the same, and it then appeared that she had no bad habits, and so she passed away, because she had no ballast to throw overboard…
LOCAL MENTION
The Marlinton Hospital is being repaired, and Dr. Solter hopes to have it ready to receive patients by January 15th or 20th. Miss Carrie Overholt has accepted the position of head nurse. Associated with Dr. Solter will be Dr. L. E. Walton. He will give special attention to the diseases of the ear, nose and throat.
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Born to Mr. and Mrs. Granville Madison, January 2, a daughter.
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Uncle Billy Wilson, veteran butcher, tells us that during the year 1921, he butchered 219 head of stock. This is doing pretty well for a man well past his 75th birthday.
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A Winchester shot gun exploded in the hands of T. J. Mason last Saturday, slightly injuring his hand. It was a very narrow escape, as the gun barrel was torn open a distance of six inches or more.
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There was general exodus from Marlinton on the afternoon train Monday. Misses Agnes and Margaret Price, Alice McClintic, Mildred Yeager and Mary Priscilla Collins started back to their respective schools.
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A lot of Marlinton men and boys have been enjoying the good old fashioned sport of fox chasing the past few weeks. A lot of fine fox hounds are kept and there are a lot of red and gray foxes and wild cats on the hills around about the town.