Well, April Fool’s Day is nearly done as I write this, but even as we pass into the week that follows it, it might be worthwhile to consider the Great Detective’s thoughts on fools. Given his great mental powers, fools were undoubtedly a subject he was all-to familiar with. So what did he have to say on the matter?

“A fool takes in all the lumber of every sort that he comes across, so that the knowledge which might be useful to him gets crowded out, or at best is jumbled up with a lot of other things, so that he has a difficulty in laying his hands upon it.” 

“The blundering fool! Just to think of his having such an incomparable bit of good luck, and not taking advantage of it.”

“For example, what a fool a builder must be to open a ventilator into another room, when, with the same trouble, he might have communicated with the outside air!”

“I think, Watson, that you are now standing in the presence of one of the most absolute fools in Europe.”

“Your friend seems to be no fool.”

“Oh, Watson, Watson, what a fool I have been!”

“It may be some fussy, self-important fool; it may be a matter of life or death. I know no more than this message tells me.”

“Too late, Watson, too late! Fool that I was not to allow for that earlier train!”

“So also is it that young Dr. Ernest, an unmarried man, played chess with Amberley, and probably played the fool with his wife.”

“All this country that I passed over to-night is as flat and clean as the palm of your hand, and the man we are following is no fool, as he very clearly showed to-night.”  

Looking at all those, you’ll quickly notice that even a fellow as intelligent as Holmes, with every reason to call most of the folk in London fools, only directly refers to one other person a fool, and then only in a seeming emotional moment. He actually calls himself a fool more than anyone around him.

Hmmm, there might be a lesson in that for the rest of us . . .

Your humble correspondent,

Brad Keefauver