PRAISE, UNNECESSARY
An interesting story in regard to General Miles comes from a recent encampment of the Grand Army at San Francisco, and is published in The Saturday Evening Post. The General, while being entertained at a club, was rallied good-humoredly by an old-time comrade for his failure to win a laudatory “send-off” in his retirement papers.
“In reply to that,” remarked General Miles, “let me tell a story. The application may seem a trifle egotistical, but as the story is a good one, I’ll venture it.
“In the early days of the West an itinerant preacher, stopping for refreshment one day at the pioneer home of one of his parishioners, was served, among other things, with apple-pie. It was not a good pie. The crust was heavy and sour, but the encomiums which that preacher heaped upon it were great. The good wife knew that she had had bad luck with the baking, and as she was in reality an excellent cook, she determined that the next time that preacher came her way he should have a pie that was faultless.
“He told her when he was to return, and on that day she set before him an apple-pie that was the real thing. He ate it, but to her astonishment vouchsafed not a word of commendation. This was more than the housewife would stand.
“‘Brother,’ she exclaimed, ‘when you were here last you ate an apple-pie that wasn’t more than half-baked, and you praised it to the skies. Now you have eaten a pie that nobody needs to be ashamed of, but you haven’t a word to say in its favor. I can’t understand it.’
“‘My good sister,’ replied the preacher, ‘that pie you served me a few days ago was sadly in need of praise, and I did my full duty in that direction; but this fine pie, bless your heart, does not require any eulogy.’”
(2436)
Praising Rival—See [Self-estimate].
PRAYER