Page:Cyclopedia of illustrations for public speakers, containing facts, incidents, stories, experiences, anecdotes, selections, etc., for illustrative purposes, with cross-references; (IA cyclopediaofillu00scotrich).pdf/167



The catbird has the courage of his convictions, and one of these convictions is that he has the right to the satisfaction of an ungovernable and enormous curiosity. Bait your bird-trap in the woods with something which strikes a bird as a curiosity that courts immediate investigation and you will catch a catbird. Other birds might start for it, but the catbird would distance them.—, "Wild Pastures."

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Curiosity in a Boy—See.

CURIOSITY, RATIONALE OF

When the child learns that he can appeal to others to eke out his store of experiences, so that, if objects fail to respond interestingly to his experiments, he may call upon persons to provide interesting material, a new epoch sets in. "What is that?" "Why?" become the unfailing signs of a child's presence. At first this questioning is hardly more than a projection into social relations of the physical overflow which earlier kept the child pushing and pulling, opening and shutting. He asks in succession what holds up the house, what holds up the soil that holds the house, what holds up the earth that holds the soil; but his questions are not evidence of any genuine consciousness of rational connections. His why is not a demand for scientific explanation; the motive behind it is simply eagerness for a larger acquaintance with the mysterious world in which he is placed. The search is not for a law or principle, but only for a bigger fact. Yet there is more than a desire to accumulate just information or heap up disconnected items, altho sometimes the interrogating habit threatens to degenerate into a mere disease of language. In the feeling, however dim, that the facts which directly meet the senses are not the whole story, that there is more behind them and more to come from them, lies the germ of intellectual curiosity.—, "How We Think."

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Current, Double—See.

CURRENTS OF LIFE

The waters of the Pacific are tempered for a certain width with a warm current flowing north from the tropics. The temperature of Alaska is affected by it, and the result of its genial influence is increased vegetation and civilization. But for this life-giving stream Alaska would be as destitute and uninhabitable as Labrador.

But for the enriching stream of Christian life the whole world would now be a moral Labrador. (Text.)

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CURRENTS, UTILIZING

Sir Wyville Thompson and, later, Sir John Murray, unraveled some of the mysteries of the hidden depths of the sea, such as the Gulf stream and the waters that wash the Cape of Good Hope. They have found that there are currents flowing over one another in different directions, as in the case of air-currents above us. The aim is to be able to utilize these cross-currents, both of air and water, for the benefit of man.

Still more were it wise to use the many and even the contrary currents of life so as to make all serve man's best interests.

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Curse of Drink—See.

CURSING FORBIDDEN

Bishop Benzler used to be a great favorite of the German Emperor, but recently the bishop fell into one of those quarrels about burial-grounds that in Germany, as well as in England and Wales, seem to have a great power of making people forget Christian charity. The bishop, because a Protestant had been buried in this ground, went to the extreme step of declaring that the ground had been desecrated, and decided to curse it.

The Emperor was furious when he heard of this, and when the bishop was imprudent enough to demand an audience, he let loose upon the head of the unfortunate ecclesiastic a flood of eloquent wrath which submerged him. Here is the principal passage:

"Your Reverence," said the Emperor, "has asked for an audience, and I have granted it because I, also, have a few words to say to you. Before leaving Alsace-Lorraine I must tell your Reverence that your attitude has greatly displeased me. You were represented to me as a mild and peaceable man; your actions prove the contrary. You have done worse things than the worst fanatic. You have curst a cemetery situated on German soil, the German soil over which I rule. Do not forget, your Reverence, that I, as German Emperor, will never tolerate that even one inch of German soil should be