f thought go
back to his native paradise of ignorance and rest. Let him cling to his
old ideas. Humanity can do better without such a man, and humanity will
be better without him. The time is past when his type is needed, and let
us hope that it is nearly past when it can be found. He may have been
abreast of the time in 1840, but his grave was dug, his epitaph written,
in 1841. Science did not wait for him, and the world forgot his name!

Do you think the world has any farther use for the man who can gravely
tell those stories about Samson, for instance, as truth--as the word of
God? Do you think they do honor to the most attenuated intellect? Now
just stop and think of it. Just think of one thousand able-bodied men
(1,000 is a good many men) quietly standing around waiting for Sampson
to knock them on the head with a bone! And how does the durability of
that bone strike you?

If prowess with arms were estimated, I should say that was about the
most effective piece of generalship on record. If the gentleman who
conducted that neat little skirmish were living to-day there would not
be a question as to his eligibility for a third term, unit rule or no
unit rule. If we could provide our generals with a bone like that, we
might reduce the standing army sufficiently to reassure the most timid
congressman of the whole lot. It would not take more than four or five
generals and a captain to guard the whole frontier. Then we might keep
a private to keep the peace at the polls, and that would give us
sufficient force to readily murder several thousand people any morning
before breakfast, and I don't see how you could ask for anything better
than that. Two live men and one dead mule could raise a siege in a
quarter of an hour. Now, if there is anybody who wants to start "a
brilliant foreign policy," here is his chance. He could at the same time
make a record for economy, for it would be an enormous saving to this
country in arms and ammunition alone. For durability, cheapness, and
certainty not to miss fire there is simply no comparison at all.

It may be objected that our soldiers are not so strong as Samson; but
I am told by those who are intimately acquainted with mules, that they
have not deteriorated. They have simply transferred their superior
strength and durability from their jaw-bones to their heels--and they
engineer them themselves. So if our men can stand his voice and aim him
right, they won't have to wear long hai