Read "The Last Harvest" by John Burroughs online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
The palm is for friendship, hospitality, and good will; the fist is to smite the enemies of truth and justice.
How many men are like the clenched fist -- pugnacious, disputatious, quarrelsome, always spoiling for a fight; a verbal fisticuff, if not a physical one, is their delight. Others are more conciliatory and peace-loving, not forgetting that a soft answer turneth away wrath. Roosevelt was the man of the clenched fist; not one to stir up strife, but a merciless hitter in what he believed a just cause. He always had the fighting edge, yet could be as tender and sympathetic as any one. This latter side of him is clearly shown in his recently published "Letters to His Children. " Lincoln was, in contrast, the man with the open palm, tempering justice with kindness, and punishment with leniency. His War Secretary, Stanton, wielded the hard fist.