"two reasons for doing anything"

[Jonathan Lighter]

You mean there's one index entry for "reason" and another for "reasons"?

Fiendish.

JL


On Mon, Feb 10, 2014 at 11:54 PM, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu>wrote:

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: "two reasons for doing anything"
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> On Feb 10, 2014, at 10:35 PM, Shapiro, Fred wrote:
>
> > You're a tough guy to please, Jon.  It is in the index under "reasons."
>
> Or as Pascal once (almost) said, somewhere in the YBQ, "L'index a ses
> 'raisons' que la raison ne connait pas."
>
> LH
> >
> >
> >
> > ________________________________________
> > From: American Dialect Society [ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] on behalf of
> Jonathan Lighter [wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM]
> > Sent: Monday, February 10, 2014 8:45 PM
> > To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> > Subject: Re: "two reasons for doing anything"
> >
> > Thanks for the citation, Fred. But it isn't in the index under "reason."
> >
> > JL
> >
> >
> > On Mon, Feb 10, 2014 at 8:38 PM, Shapiro, Fred <fred.shapiro at yale.edu
> >wrote:
> >
> >> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> >> -----------------------
> >> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> >> Poster:       "Shapiro, Fred" <fred.shapiro at YALE.EDU>
> >> Subject:      Re: "two reasons for doing anything"
> >>
> >>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >>
> >> The Yale Book of Quotations has the following:
> >>
> >> A man always has two reasons for what he does -- a good one, and the
> real
> >> one.
> >> J. P. Morgan, Quoted in Owen Wister, Roosevelt: The Story of a
> Friendship
> >> (1930)
> >>
> >> Fred Shapiro
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> ________________________________________
> >> From: American Dialect Society [ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] on behalf of
> >> Laurence Horn [laurence.horn at YALE.EDU]
> >> Sent: Monday, February 10, 2014 8:27 PM
> >> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> >> Subject: Re: "two reasons for doing anything"
> >>
> >> On Feb 10, 2014, at 8:23 PM, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
> >>
> >>> I don't see this in the archives, though I've been thinking about it
> for
> >> a
> >>> long time.
> >>>
> >>> Many years ago I was told that Sigmund Freud had once said, "There are
> >>> always two reasons for doing anything: a good reason and the real
> >> reason."
> >>>
> >>> Sounds like Freud in principle, but not in style.
> >>>
> >>> Google Books wants to attribute it to J. P. Morgan, but Morgan died in
> >> 1913
> >>> and the "reported" quote doesn't show up till 1940.
> >>>
> >>> A few minutes ago I was watching a short film on TCM called "Teddy the
> >>> Rough Rider" (1947). It shows Theodore Roosevelt insisting, "A man
> always
> >>> has two reasons for whatever he does: a good one and the real one."
> >>>
> >>> This attribution is presumably bogus as well, but evidently the quote
> >>> gained traction in the 1940s.
> >>>
> >> Or three reasons for doing anything--the right reason, the wrong reason,
> >> and the Army reason?
> >>
> >> LH
> >>
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> >
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> truth."
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