HALF-BAKED KNOWLEDGE
It will take more than a _star shell_ to light up the pathway of a
man who clutters his brain with half-baked knowledge. Pitfalls galore
are ahead of him no matter which way he may turn. Such people are, by
nature, of the cocksure variety, going in where angels fear to tread,
and gaining nothing for certain by reason of their experiences. In time
they earn the reputation of being _bull-headed_ and sooner or later are
on their way downstream without a rudder.
Sometimes the strong-willed fellow of fragmentary knowledge isn’t to
blame for his affliction. Every little circumstance has something to
do with his future course and if he happens to be born “on the wrong
side of the moon,” his course is more or less _predestined_. He views
things through a film--hazy-like, and inaccurate. To him investigation
means nothing. His mind is like a sieve that will not retain the fine
particles which must accumulate until a firm foundation forms upon
which to bear _a permanent housing for his reasoning powers_.
The worst phase of the ever-ready reckoner of uncertain statistics is
that he usually circulates among the credulous. Who of us is there that
hasn’t at some time in our variegated careers sat across from him at an
old-fashioned boarding house _table d’hote_? Even now we can hear him
saying, “_My notion of that is this!_” And wasn’t it fun to watch those
who drank it all in and gulped it down with their coffee? The green
cheese story about the moon would have been swallowed by some of them
if our _half-baked know-it-all_ persisted in its truth.
For such as him, no doubt, was composed Kipling’s wonderfully cynical
line, “alas, we know he never could know and never could understand.”
And also for such as him it was ordained that he should never stay
in one place long. Something tells him to keep moving--perhaps the
giggling that breaks out in the midst of a lofty peroration; a snort
of derision at some observation intended to be philosophical but which
fell far short of the mark.
While it doesn’t take long to pack up and locate elsewhere, it must
be tedious work to have continually the task on hand of making new
friends--_only to lose them_. But that is the penalty of becoming the
butt of the jokester, who will not be denied. Once he finds a victim
it’s time for that victim to move. The jokester has no pity, and in
lofty speech he tells his victim so--accompanied by shouts of approval
from those who hear and understand.
[Illustration: “What ho!” says the King. “Ho hum!” replied his guest.]
The ego of ignorance which stands by its false assumptions from sheer
lack of correct understanding invites pity that it seldom receives. In
due course of human events the distributor of half-baked wisdom will be
grafted with a twig from the tree of learning and thus the species will
become extinct. This, as Shakespeare says, “is devoutly to be wished,”
and while wishing it seems perfectly all right to express the hope that
those who read this short chapter will make a point of sowing a few
seeds in certain gardens where tall weeds now grow, “just for the
lack of the rake and the hoe.” A little sarcasm will turn the trick.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
[Illustration]