THE CAMELS COLD NOSE by Lydia Sigourney

The United States has lost its Free Republic years ago in trade for a much cheaper brand of government which our Founding Fathers found repulsive – a full blown democracy in which the laws of Liberty and Freedom no longer obtain to every citizen equally, but rather special groups enjoy special privileges  and benefits in exchange for their compromising vote. Lydia Sigourney wrote a poem more than 150 years ago that describes our present predicament to a tee – The Camel’s Nose. In the United States, it is no longer the camel’s nose, admitted to the tent under Roosevelt and Johnson, but the whole ungainly trunk that has invaded our living space:

THE CAMEL’S NOSE

AN ARAB FABLE

Once in his shop a workman wrought

With languid hand, and listless thought,

When through the open window’s space

Behold!-a Camel thrust his face.

“My nose is cold,” he meekly cried,

“Oh, let me warm it by thy side.”

Since no denial word was said,

In came the nose,- in came the head,

As sure as sermon follows text

The long, excursive neck came next,

And then, as falls the threatening storm

In leap’d the whole ungainly form

Aghast the owner gazed around,

And on the rude invader frown’d,

Convinc’d as closer still he prest,

There was no room for such a guest,

Yet more astonish’d, heard him say,

“If incommoded, go your way,

For in this place I choose to stay.”

Oh, youthful hearts, to gladness born,

Treat not this Arab lore with scorn.

To evil habit’s earliest wile

Lend neither ear, nor glance, nor smile,

Choke the dark fountain ere it flows,

Nor even admit the Camel’s Nose.*

To illustrate the danger of the first approach of evil habit, the
Arabs have a proverb, “Beware of the Camel’s nose.”

A more straightforward use, also not without its charms, is found in
Spurgeon, C. H. (Charles Haddon), 1834-1892, Feathers for arrows;
or, Illustrations from my note book. [1870]

WHEN a sin is let in as a suppliant, it remains in as a

tyrant. The Arabs have a fable of a miller who one day was

startled by a camel’s nose thrust in the window of the room

where he was sleeping. “ It is very cold outside,” said the

camel, “ I only want to get my nose in.” The nose was let

in, then the neck, and finally the whole body. Presently the

miller began to be extremely inconvenienced at the ungainly

companion he had obtained in a room certainly not big enough

for both. “If you are inconvenienced you may leave,” said

the camel; “ as for myself, I shall stay where I am.” There

are many such camels knocking at the human heart. Take,

for instance, compliance with a single worldly custom - dancing.

First, the custom creeps humbly to the door of the heart,

and says, “Let me in; what am I but putting one foot

before another? certainly you do not object to music, and I

would not for the world have a full band.” So in comes the

nose of the camel, and it is not long before the entire body

follows. The Christian then finds his heart occupied in full

figure by the very vice which a little while before peeped in

so meekly. “ Being up,” it says to him, “ all night at a ball,

with the eyes dazzled by lights, and the ears stunned with a 

full band, interferes, you say, with your private devotions.

So it does. But your private devotions will have to go, for I

will not.”