Government and Administration of the United States
JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY STUDIES IN HISTORICAL AND POLITICAL SCIENCE HERBERT B. ADAMS, Editor History is past Politics and Politics present History--_Freeman_ NINTH SERIES I-II GOVERNMENT AND ADMINISTRATION OF THE UNITED STATES BY WESTEL W. WILLOUGHBY, A.B.
NOVEMBER 17, 1864.
WHAT IS A GOLDEN DEED?
We all of us enjoy a story of battle and adventure. Some of us delight
in the anxiety and excitement with which we watch the various strange
predicaments, hairbreadth escapes, and ingenious contrivances that are
presented to us; and the mere imaginary dread of the dangers thus
depicted, stirs our feelings and makes us feel eager and full of
suspense.
This taste, though it is the first step above the dullness that cannot
be interested in anything beyond its own immediate world, nor care for
what it neither sees, touches, tastes, nor puts to any present use, is
still the lowest form that such a liking can take. It may be no better
than a love of reading about murders in the newspaper, just for the sake
of a sort of startled sensation; and it is a taste that becomes
unwholesome when it absolutely delights in dwelling on horrors and
cruelties for their own sake; or upon shifty, cunning, dishonest
stratagems and devices. To learn to take interest in what is evil is
JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY STUDIES IN HISTORICAL AND POLITICAL SCIENCE HERBERT B. ADAMS, Editor History is past Politics and Politics present History--_Freeman_ NINTH SERIES I-II GOVERNMENT AND ADMINISTRATION OF THE UNITED STATES BY WESTEL W. WILLOUGHBY, A.B.