But chiefly them that walk after the flesh in the lust of uncleanness, and despise government. Presumptuous are they, self-willed, they are not afraid to speak evil of dignities.
—II Peter 2:10
6065 Japan’s Stubbornness Club
Stubbornness has caused a split in Japan’s Stubbornness Club—formed a year ago by 20 people who considered themselves obstinate, but wanted to be worthwhile members of society. Their monthly meetings became increasingly heated, and the vice-president has resigned to form a rival Society for the Preservation of Stubborness.
6066 Stubborn Disease
At least a quarter-million and possibly a million citrus trees in California suffer from “stubborn disease,” according to Dr. E. C. Calavan, University of California plant pathologist.
While the cause of “stubborn disease” in citrus is not known, the cause of “stubborn disease” in man is no mystery. This ailment can be traced back to the Garden of Eden.
—The Bible Friend
6067 Stubborn Man’s Twenty Minutes
The world is always twenty minutes ahead of one man in Coventry, England.
“In 1922,” he said, “the clocks were advanced twenty minutes. I never accepted this. Nobody was going to take twenty minutes out of my life.”
So he kept his watch set for the old time. He is twenty minutes late for every appointment. As a result, the determined man has been fired from half a dozen jobs.
“They won’t beat me,” he declared. “I’m going to die twenty minutes late to show them I was right.”
6068 Strong Jaws
In Darwin, Australia, a captured burglar, George Dean, demonstrated for police how he broke into buildings by prying apart metal louvers with his teeth. Policemen say Dean, 22, developed his jaw power as a cattleman chewing on bones and partly-cooked meat.
6069 Mr. Serious Misconduct
Hatfield, England (UPI)—Margaret Elms, the municipal registrar of births, marriages and deaths, recorded the name on the death certificate: “Mr. Serious Misconduct of Mill Lane, Welwyn, aged 74.” She wrote it without batting an eyelash.
With the death of Mr. Misconduct, there died the stain on the character of former railwayman Malcolm Mactaggart that he carried for 34 years.
Mactaggart had a row with his employers, the London Midland and Scottish Railway Company, in 1939 because he took two weeks vacation when they said he was entitled to only one week. He was fired for “serious misconduct.”
Mactagart never forgave them and adopted the slur as his name. He used it on all his official documents, including his social security payments book, and when he died his widow registered his death in that name.
6070 Cebu’s Party Line’s Fault
Cebu City, Philippines—A homeowner blames her telephone party line which was kept busy when burglars broke into her home. The busy line prevented Teresa Tolot in reporting the presence of burglars to the police. Miss Tolot said she saw the burglars grab a box of jewelry and flee.
Asked whether she requested the other party to give preference to her emergency call, Tolot said the other woman on the other line got mad and even replied: “Mine is also an emergency call.”
6071 A Court Goes To Court
Faced with steeply-rising costs for clerks, probation officers and the like, Philadelphia’s Court of Common Pleas asked the city council for an extra $5,230,817. The money, argued the court’s judges, was essential to the orderly administration of justice. Turned down, the judges took unusual action: the court went to court, seeking a writ ordering the city to pay.
In a remarkable decision, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court had just found for the Philadelphia judges. Because the three branches of state government are co-equal, said the court, “the independent judiciary must possess rights and powers co-equal with its functions and duties, including the right and power to protect itself against any impairment thereof.”
Although the Philadelphia case gives courts some unexpected financial clout, the city council will hardly give up the purse strings. It can always force the court to go to court again if it wants more money that the city is willing to give.
6072 Civil War’s End For Town
After 85 years officially at war with the Union, a small village in New York named Town Line, ended their official hostile relations with the rest of the country on January 24, 1946.
It appears that Town Line seceded from the Union in 1861 because of trouble over the Underground, a system that was transporting runaway slaves from the South to Canada across their territory, and had never got around to vote upon officially returning to the Union before. And even then there were 23 negative votes, against 90, on the proposition. The Stars and Bars, official flag of the Confederacy, was pulled down from its place over the old blacksmith shop, where the original secession papers had been signed, and amid much pomp and celebration the Stars and Stripes was run up in its place, thus ending 85 years of official rebellion.
—Evangelistic Illustration
6073 Ignoring Gas Poison Warning
Henry Nelson, of Wilmington, Delaware, was a veteran of World War II. He had served as an instructor in the Army Chemical Warfare Department. Yet he ignored a warning by the superintendent of the Riverside Housing Development that the apartment he lived in was being fumigated with hydrogen-cyanide gas, tore down the barricade at the door and went in after two blankets.
The neighbors saw him remove the sign and barricade and go in, and they called the Development office. But when employees arrived it was too late. Nelson lay sprawled on the living room floor with the two blankets in his arms. Despite both written and verbal warnings, and despite his training in the Army, he had gone to his death.
—G. Franklin Allee
6074 Boy Still Standing Inside
A mother repeatedly told her little boy to sit down. The boy continued to stand, disobeying his mother. Finally, the mother went to him, and plopped him down in a chair. Fuming, the boy said, “I may be sitting down on the OUTSIDE, but I am standing on the INSIDE!”
6075 Silly Question’s Answer
Perhaps the most incisive story about the progressive method is the one about the school psychologist who was putting a young girl through a series of tests to determine her intellectual fitness.
“Now first,” said the psychologist, “are you a boy or a girl?
“A boy,” said the girl promptly.
“Well,” said the psychologist, taken aback, “that’s interesting. And what are you going to be when you grow up?
“A father,” said the child.
“But darling,” interrupted her mother, “you know better than that. Why do you say such things to the doctor?”
“Because,” said the child in all seriousness, “if he’s going to ask silly questions I’m going to give silly answers.”
6076 Fishing, Anyway
A man motoring through a rural village stopped at a country store for cigarettes. On the wall was a sign: “This store will be closed Aug. 23 on account of the weather.” As it was only Aug. 15 the man asked the proprietor how he could know what the weather would be so far in advance. “Well,” said the proprietor, “if she rains light, I’m going fishing. If she rains heavy, I’m going to stay home and work on my tackle.”
“But how do you know it’s going to rain?” asked the man.
“Don’t care if it rains or not,” explained the proprietor, “if it’s sunny I’ll go fishing, or work on my tackle anyway. All depends on the weather.”
—Indiana Conservation
6077 Ad Charges Never Change
Charlie Stow, press agent for the Adam Forepaugh circus, used to delight in telling this experience with a midwestern weekly. Stow dropped in on the editor and asked the cost of a full page ad for a single insertion.
“One hundred dollars,” was the response.
“That’s a lot of money,” mused Stow. “How much for a half-page?”
“One hundred dollars.”
“And a quarter-page?”
“One hundred dollars.”
“That’s an odd rate schedule,” observed the press agent, “a new one on me. How do you figure it?”
“Well, sir,” said the editor candidly and cannily, “your show is due here on July 12, and on the 13th I’ve got a note due for one hundred dollars.”
He got the ad!
6078 To Move A Cow
The thing about cows is if you push them, they push back. So if you want a cow to move left, you push right and she will push back to the left.
6079 Like Father Like Son
A father and son were both very stubborn and would never yield to anybody. One day the father had invited a guest to dinner, and told the son to go into the town and buy some meat. When he had done so, the son was just going through the city gate on his way home when he met another man face to face. Neither would give way, and there they stood, until at length the father went in search of his son. On seeing the boy, he said, “You hurry home with the meat. I will take over this fellow.”
—Chinese Humor
6080 Epigram On Stubbornness
• Some minds are like finished concrete—thoroughly mixed and permanently set.
• Charles Simmons gave us a sentence sermon when he wrote, “No man has a right to do as he pleases, except when he pleases to do right.”
—Church and Home
See also: Individualism ; Rebellious ; Rom. 1:32.