Word: dictum
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Trucks Before Men. Dr. Page likes to quote Jonathan Edwards' dictum of 200 years ago: "Man is entirely, perfectly and unspeakably different from a mere machine." However, he says, "in all too many American corporations, management may be aware of this but, for some inexplicable reasons, devotes more concern to the machine than the man. It is not uncommon to find an executive who worries more about tire replacement on his fleet of trucks than the health of his employees...
...hierarchy of battle victories is highly important to a writer. Foremost, of course, is the proposition that Americans win all wars and most skirmishes. This dictum also applies to Indians, unless pitted against real, government-type Americans. In the latter case, the Indians are pretty sneaky about fighting, almost always attacking the women and children hidden in the wagons. Naturally this deprives the wily natives of their benefits as citizens...
...days old (the Journal considers Nieman its "founder"). Nieman was disgusted with the timidity of the city's half-dozen dailies, which he thought were more interested in pleasing businessmen and politicians than in covering the news. He set the Journal on a different course with his dictum: "Never care about classes, but about people. Get all of the information [;you can] about matters of importance to the public, giving them all sides of the question." When more than 70 people died in a hotel fire and the other papers called it an unavoidable tragedy, the Journal said...
...whites' solution is to rewrite Rhodes's dictum to read "Equal rights for all responsible men," and themselves judge who is responsible. Last week, sipping orange juice at Government House, Colonial Secretary Lyttelton came close to endorsing their view. "It is quite clear," he said, "that any modern form of franchise here would mean Europeans being swamped by African voters. That would mean a complete arrest of progress ... at worst a reversal. The oversea investor would be chary of risking his money. If we stand still, we get constitutional arthritis and risk losing the cooperation of the African...
TIME'S quoted words are not, as readers will think, the sputtering of an English jingo, but are, marvelous to relate, the considered dictum of TIME . . . Come Fourth of July next, I'll be eagerly watching for its berating of cantankerous Patrick Henry, and other scurvy fellows...