p. 10 | A GOOD LISTENER

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, Cal. · Jul 18, 1900

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 26, No. 29.

A GOOD LISTENER.

No BRILLIANCY or force will prevent the incessant talker from being a bore. The weariness of their hearers has come down to posterity with the story of the wit and wisdom of many a great converser.

"O, that Macaulay would give us a brilliant flash of silence!" sighed an exhausted listener.

"Coleridge," we are told, "talked with the eloquence of a divine being; but a divine patience was needed to listen to him."

"Margaret Fuller," said an old Quaker who knew her, "had the wisdom of a dozen men—and their tongues, too. Ordinary mortals fled before her unending flood of speech."

A young woman entering the world should remember that, tho her wit and sentiment seem to her of the choicest vintage, no man wishes to be drowned, even in costly wine.

Any intelligent person can be a good listener; and while the brilliant talker gains the applause of the world, the good listener wins their hearts.—Anon.