| 1078 | 1079 | 1080 | 1081 | 1082 |
| 1 | 314 | 629 | 943 | 1257 |
|
enough to turn up some time or other and be mistaken by him for his own.
No doubt we are constantly littering our literature with disconnected
sentences borrowed from books at some unremembered time and now
imagined
to be our own, but that is about the most we can do. In 1866 I read Dr.
Holmes's poems, in the Sandwich Islands. A year and a half later I stole
his dictation, without knowing it, and used it to dedicate my "Innocents
Abroad" with. Then years afterwards I was talking with Dr. Holmes about
it. He was not an ignorant ass--no, not he: he was not a collection of
decayed human turnips, like your "Plagiarism Court;" and so when I said,
"
I know now where I stole it, but whom did you steal it from," he said,
I don't remember; I only know I stole it from somebody, because I have
"
never originated anything altogether myself, nor met anybody who had."
To think of those solemn donkeys breaking a little child's heart
with their ignorant rubbish about plagiarism! I couldn't sleep for
blaspheming about it last night. Why, their whole lives, their whole
histories, all their learning, all their thoughts, all their opinions
were one solid ruck of plagiarism, and they didn't know it and
never suspected it. A gang of dull and hoary pirates piously setting
themselves the task of disciplining and purifying a kitten that they
think they've caught filching a chop! Oh, dam--
But you finish it, dear, I am running short of vocabulary today. Ever
lovingly your friend,
1080
Page
Quick Jump
|