A distinguished public man once said to the Easy Chair that after an
election in which he had taken part, and in which his party had
succeeded, he always signed the recommendations of anybody who asked him
for any office he wished. And when the Easy Chair remarked that he must
have sadly cheapened his name with the appointing power, the excellent
statesman answered, "Not at all; because I wrote by mail that no
attention was to be paid to my request." Perhaps he thought that this
was not cheapening his name. But what must the appointing power have
secretly thought of a man who respected his own name so little? And an
eminent public officer of long service told the Easy Chair that a
recommendation was once delivered to him by an office-seeker from a
President of the United States; and when the officer, delaying the
applicant, asked the President if he really wished the person appointed,
the President replied, "Not in the least; but I gave the letter to him
to get rid of him."
Any Easy Chair must be often reminded of such incidents when it reads in
the papers the cards and notices and invitations and petitions to which
conspicuous names are attached. It discovers, for instance, that the
most eminent ministers, merchants, lawyers, and capitalists are very
anxious to hear Dr. Dunderhead upon the history of chaos. They
compliment the learned doctor's erudition and eloquence, and beg him to
name the evening when he will speak to them. The doctor replies in
blushing rhetoric, and will yield to their desires on Thursday evening,
the 32d. On that evening the Easy Chair, which has perused the
correspondence with eager expectation, and which has a profound interest
in chaos, repairs to the hall, finds a dozen surprised stragglers like
itself, but not one of the conspicuous clergymen, lawyers, merchants,
or capitalists, and goes home in bewilderment to read in the morning's
paper an elaborate report of Dr. Dunderhead's lecture, delivered at the
request of the following distinguished gentlemen--who are duly named;
and it slowly dawns upon the Easy Chair that it has been assisting at an
advertisement, that the invitation to Dr. Dunderhead was also written by
Dr. Dunderhead, that the gentlemen signed because they were asked to do
so, and that the whole proceeding is intended to impress the rural
districts, and to procure the learned and erudite Dunderhead invitations
to lecture in other places.
Have these gentlemen no respect for their names? They would not indorse
the note of a stranger for a thousand dollars because somebody asked
them to do it for good-nature. But it is just as dishonorable to indorse
a man's learning and eloquence when you know nothing of it as to indorse
a man's promise to pay of whose solvency you are equally ignorant.
Indeed, in the one case you could supply the money if the maker of the
note failed. But, dear sirs, can you supply the eloquence and erudition
which you indorsed in Dr. Dunderhead, for which many Easy Chairs paid
many dollars, and which Dunderhead failed to display? You cannot,
indeed, be sued at the City Hall, but you are prosecuted at another,
even loftier tribunal, and you are mulcted in damages. Your own good
name pays the penalty, and is thereafter less respected. If a man does
not respect his own name, who will? But if he publicly announces that
his name is of no weight, how can he complain if it becomes a jest?
There are every day great public meetings at which a long list of
familiar names appears as vice-presidents. Very often the gentlemen are
notified that their names are to be used, and that if they are unwilling
they may inform the managers. But very often, also, they know nothing of
the complicity until they read their names in the report of the meeting.
Upon this discovery most men shrug their shoulders, and wish impatiently
that people wouldn't do so. But they have a feeling that the occasion is
passed; that they will be derided as courting notoriety if they write
to the papers stating that their names were used without authority; so
they grumble and acquiesce. But they nevertheless connive at the abuse
of their names. They embolden to further abuse, and they weaken both the
power and the effect of disavowal. They condoned the abuse when they
were made vice-presidents of the immense and enthusiastic meeting in
favor of the annexation of Terra del Fuego; and why, sneers Mrs. Grundy
and Mrs. Candour--why should they be too nice to assist at the grand
demonstration of fraternity for the Philippine Islands? If the
correspondents of Dr. Dunderhead would show that they respected their
own names, they would soon find that other people would not trifle with
them.
But neither must they cheapen them by constant use. There are well-known
names that appear upon every occasion. They ask all the Dunderheads to
lecture; they petition for and against all public objects; they
recommend everything from a Correggio to a corn-plaster; they offer
benefits to actors; they are honorary directors of institutions of which
they are painfully ignorant; their names appear so universally and
indiscriminately that they have no more effect upon public attention or
confidence than the machines with which the Chinese bonzes grind out
prayers can be supposed to have upon the Divine intelligence. The
consequence is that all sensible men come to regard these signatures as
those of men of straw. And why not, since they give straw bail for the
appearance of that which does not appear, or for the excellence of that
of which, if it be excellence, they know nothing?
And so, says the old story, after crying wolf so long that the shepherds
no longer heeded him, one day the boy cried wolf lustily, for the wild
beast had really come. But the louder he cried, the louder they sneered:
"No, no; we've learned your tricks at last, you wicked boy, and you may
shout until you are hoarse!" And while they laughed the wolf devoured
the boy. Remember, then, dear Dunderhead correspondents, that, when
Plato himself comes, and some foolish touter obtains your names, or
even yourselves this time know that the truly seraphic doctor has
arrived, whose golden wisdom would make the whole world richer, it will
be in vain. You have invited discredit for your names; and we, who have
been deluded, when we see that you earnestly invite us all to hear
Plato, shall only smile incredulously--"Plato indeed! 'tis only
Dunderhead Number Twenty."