To Hierocles, who lived in the sixth century, is attributed a book called “Asteia,” which contains twenty-one jests, the most of which are now alive, and passing themselves off as “real, original Jacobs.” Among them is the man who would not venture into the water until he had learned to swim; the man whose horse died just as he had taught it to live without eating; the other who stood before the mirror with his eyes shut, to see how he looked when asleep; the other who apologized for a negligence by saying, “I never received the letter you wrote me”; the other who kept a crow expressly to satisfy himself if the creature did live to the age of two hundred years; and the old philosopher who carried a brick about as a specimen of the house he desired to sell. But, older than Hierocles—old as Horace—is the stupid fellow who, wanting to cross a stream, sat down upon the bank to wait for all the water to run by. The French king who said, “After me, the deluge,” was thought to be original, but the phrase is found in the Greek of two thousand years ago; as is also the proverb, “There is many a slip between the cup and the lip,” which was the appropriate inscription upon the drinking cup of a rich Greek. Every one knows the lady who insists that her age is but thirty, and whose friend asserts that he believes her, because he has heard her say so “any time these ten years.” Bacon, in his “Apothegms,” asserts that the same anecdote is told of Cicero.—Edmund Kirke, North American Review.
(1685)
Jesus All Right—See [Christ Approved].
Jesus as a Character-builder—See [Character-building].
JESUS AS COMPANION
A missionary riding on horseback through one of the cotton States of the South came upon an old tumble-down cabin in the doorway of which stood a poor crippled negress. Her back was bent nearly double with years of hard work and her face was deeply wrinkled and her hair was white, but her two eyes were as bright as two stars. The man called out cheerily, “Good-morning, Auntie—living here all alone?” “Jes me n’ Jesus, Massa,” she replied with a bright smile. The missionary dismounted and went in for a little visit with her—and he said as he was riding away, and looked back for a last glimpse of the happy old saint, “It seemed as if he could see the form of one like unto the Son of God” standing by her side in the doorway of the poor little cabin.
(1686)
Jesus as Guide—See [Guide, The Perfect].
Jesus, Canceler of Sin—See [Christ Destroyer of Sin].
Jesus Crowned with Thorns—See [Christ’s Face].