Word: offhand
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Dates: during 1910-1919
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Professor Perry spoke of "Richard Henry Dana as a Man of Letters." "The popular impression of Richard Henry Dana is that he was a man of one book, 'Two Years Before the Mast.' Such impressions are not always infallible, and yet the offhand, instinctive judgment upon which they rest is usually right enough for all practical purposes. In Dana's case the popular verdict is not likely to be reversed. It is one of the ironies of literature that this son of a poet, inheriting so much that was finest in the old New England culture, a pupil of Emerson...
...right; that the general ignorance and utter lack of acquaintance with culture of the average American undergraduate was almost tragic. He waved his arms, and said he believed, apropos of the time-honored legend of Semitic 12 at Harvard, that a chance half-dozen college men could not answer offhand the question, "Who was Jehovah?" We asked a chance half-dozen, and only four of them answered, "I don't know," and our pride limped away. Now perhaps this is not a fair question; perhaps, however, Mr. Johnson speaks the truth. Recalling Mr. Stover's psychology on various occasions...