Page:Cyclopedia of illustrations for public speakers, containing facts, incidents, stories, experiences, anecdotes, selections, etc., for illustrative purposes, with cross-references; (IA cyclopediaofillu00scotrich).pdf/816



graceful sweetness. Black Agnes was again a heroine of the virago type, and Queen Philippa, Queen Margaret, and others of the same kind honored their adopted nationality by their courage and devotion. Meaner women were as brave. In a skirmish at Naworth (1570) Leonard Dacres had in his army "many desperate women, who there gave the adventure of their lives and fought right stoutly."—The Fortnightly Review.

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WOMEN'S FRIVOLITY

What most women want to-day is a donkey-*load of Paris dresses for their bodies, an automobile to pull them around, an army of servants to hook them up and then to unhook them. The mammonism of men to-day is the outer and physical embodiment of the inner and essential vulgarity of the whole pleasure-loving mob of women on the avenues, with their sipping of cocktails at the beginning of the meal in great restaurants, their flashing of jewels, their parade of gowns, their killing of time through bridge and games of chance. Killing time! When these golden hours are more precious than the purple drops of paradise itself. Oh, these superficial, frivolous, vapid women, who have turned their beautiful bodies into something scarcely better than the wire stands that exhibit gowns in merchants' windows. And they use their very beauty as exemption from duty!—

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Wonders of Nature—See. WONDERS UNSEEN BY MAN  The insect must see a whole world of wonders of which we know little or nothing. True, we have microscopes, with which we can see one thing at a time if carefully laid upon the stage; but what is the finest instrument that can be produced compared to that with twenty-five thousand object-glasses, all of them probably achromatic, and each one a living instrument, with its own nerve-branch supplying a separate sensation. To creatures thus endowed with microscopic vision, a cloud of sandy dust must appear like an avalanche of massive rock fragments, and everything else proportionally monstrous.—, "Science in Short Chapters." (3490)   Word, Effect of a Tender—See. WORD IN SEASON  Buckingham, the war governor of Connecticut, one day met a young man named Simmons as both were walking along the street, and putting both hands on the young man's shoulders, the governor said solemnly: "Simmons, we are none of us living as well as we ought to," and passed on. Simmons, as an old man, declared that that act had a most powerful and permanent influence on his life. (Text.)  (3491)   WORD JUGGLING   There are three hundred and sixty-five prohibitions in the law, said the Rabbins, just as many as there are days in the year, and two hundred and forty-eight positive commands, corresponding to the number of members of the body, according to their anatomy; the whole number making six hundred and thirteen precepts. "There can be no more precepts or any less," reasoned the wise Pharisees, "because there are just six hundred and thirteen letters in the decalog." Or if one had not liked this interpretation, they would have given him another equally satisfactory reason why there should be just six hundred and thirteen precepts. In Numbers 15:38, the Jews are commanded to wear fringes, called in the Hebrew tsitsith, upon the border of their garments. Now, as there are eight threads and five knots in each fringe, making the number thirteen, and as the letters of the word tsitsith stand in Hebrew for the number six hundred, therefore, as was proved before, there must be just six hundred and thirteen precepts in the Mosaic law. To such silly word jugglery had the Pharisees recourse in placing upon men's shoulders burdens too grievous to be borne.—The Golden Rule.

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WORD OF GOD FREED

When Elizabeth of England succeeded to the throne she was petitioned to release, according to custom, four or five principal prisoners. "Who shall they be?" she asked. The reply was: "The four evangelists and the apostle Paul." (Text.)

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WORD OF GOD UNIVERSAL

The following is by Frank Dempster Sherman:

Not only in the Book Is found God's word, But in the song of every brook And every bird.