Worcester daily spy. [volume] (Worcester [Mass.]) 1850-1888, 1863-08-21
W ORCE S T Err:
FRIDAY. AUGUST FL. 1863.
The strength of a Republio-Men.


and beauty, trained the body to wonderful
perfection; 1.-THE, graceful, symmetrical, each
limb, in its freedom, gave the esthetic law;
each motion was harmonious; each pose
study for the sculptor, grander than his ideal.
The head poised itself in conscious command,
the exquisitely chiseled features glowed with
the triumph of victory in battle or in game,
and the flush and splendor of the physical life
hung like shining veil before the holy of ho-
lies of a more spiritual development.
The marble gives us perfectly the old ideal,
which is so evidently a copy of the real, and
in the Venus OF Milo we see the typical wo-
man, in the Jupiter and Apollo the desirable
manhood to which the old nations aspired, to
which they attained.
There is no Virgin so beautiful as Venus
or Clytie,-no head of Christ is so grand and
calm the Jupiter,-so serene and majestic
as the Apollo. The manhood poised on the
self-reliant, individual will, could breathe
through the marble with an almost divine life
the higher manhood, found in self-renuncia-
ton, in the loss of self.wil, inhabits no earth
Swallowed forth in statue or picture. The
modern Republic should give us this higher
manhood, browning the olden ideal with the
rare, sweet graces of the christian gentleman,
producing something that no marble can en-
body, no canvass retain, because it belongs to
the spirit and blossoms only in the heroisms
the abnegations, the self-sacrifces, that dim
ming the eye with such quick tears of adni-
ration that we cannot see the outward form, or
note the fashion of it.
The duty Of Republic, such as we claim
our own to be, is to train her sons into this
christian manhood, to teach them, as Kings
ley says, to think the finest thing in the world
to be a gentleman" and to understand by this
term not elegant Incidence, nor selfish ease,
nor the privilege? of doing nothing, nor
outward graces and accomplishments, but
''the habit of speaking the truth and keeping
their temper" the knowledge that sit is inf
nitely noble to do right, and infinitely base to
do wrong" the chivalry that makes it de-
light 'to sacrifice their own pleasure for the
pleasure of those weaker than themselves"
A republic should train her sons by the rule
given in Kenelm Digby's "Broad Stone of
Honor" whereby christian gentleman gov
erns all his actions: ave are not to examine
whether an action be expedient that it may be
virtuous, for here is point which we may not
be able to determine; but whether it be virtu.
Gus, or, in other words, whether it be agree
able to God, that it may be expedient; which
is an inquiry that will never terminate in un.
certainly" This should be inscribed in every
scEoolroom, and written over the altar of ev-
cry home.
We find in 'Amyas Leigh this portrait of
Sir Richard Grenvile, one of the most noted
gentlemen of Queen Elizabeth's court =
"AmOng all the heroic faces which the paint
ers of that age have preserved, none, perhaps,
hardly excepting Shakspeare's or Sponsors,
Alva's or Parmas, Is more heroic than that of
Richard Grenvile. The forehead and whole
brain are of extraordinary holiness, and per-
fectly upright; the nose long, aquelne, and
delicately pointed; the mouth, fringed with
short, silky beard, small and ripe, yet firm as
granite, with just pout enough of the lower
lip to give hint of that capacity of noble indig-
nation which lay hid under its usual courtly
calm and sweetness; the complexion is dark,
the figure tall and graceful; altogether the
likeness of a wise and gallant gentlemen,
lovely to all good men, awful to all bad men;
in whose presence none dare say or do mean
or a rbald thing whom brave men left, feel.
ing themselves moved to do their duty better,
while towards slipped away, as bats and owls
before the SUM-
And. this Is the way that gallant gentleman
tells how gentlemen are made, and what they
are. 1.-The best reward for having wrought
well already, is to have more to do; and he
that has been faithful over few things, must
find his account in being made ruler over
many things" That is the true and beroical
rest, which alone is worthy of gentlemen and
sons OF God AsfUr those who, either in this
world or the world to come, look for idleness,
and hope that God shall feed them with pleas
ant things, as it were with spoon, count
them towards and base even though they
call themselves saints and elect We have
yet to learn what closing life to save it, means.
1871
business OF every man to save his own soul
after he dies, every one for himself; and that
that, and not divine self sacrifice, is the one
thing needful"
'tor me, If l could hang up such teacher
on high, as an enemy of mankind and a cor
rupter ofyouth, l would gladly Is there not
cowardice and self-seeking enough about the
hearts of US fallen sons of Adam, that these
false prophets, with their bats of heay.
en-, and their terrors of hell, must ex-
alt our dirtiest vices into heavenly vir.
tues and the means of bliss? Farewell
to chivalry and desperate valor, farewell to
patriotism and loyalty, farewell to manhood
and to liberty, if once it shall become the
fashion of our preachers to bid every man
take care first of what they call the safety of
his soul. Every man will be afraid to die at
his post because he will be afraid that he is
not fit to die. Do thy duty like man, to thy
country and thy God and count thy life a
worthless thing as did the holy men of old
DO thy work, and leave thy soul to the care
OF Him who Is just and merciful in this, that
he rewards every man according to his
works"