The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1868-03-05
DIR. Chapin,s Lecture.

One of the largest audiences of the season
greeted DR.. Chaplin who delivered the seventh
lecture of the Mercantile Library course last
evening. The eloquent divine becomes more
popular every time he comes to Portland be-
cause he always brings with him that valua-
BILE thing, thought-thought that is vigorous
and fresh as well as patriotic and manly.
Last evening his subject was Building and
Being" One sentiment we single from the
many gems that were thickly scattered through
his discourse as being in itself worth coming
from New York to declare, or worth going to
New York to hear; and that is the lecturers
application of the mechanical principle that
the strength of material-of stick of timber
or a bar of iron--is equal to its strength in it's
aoedkest part, to the structure of a common
wealth. The strength of a state is measured
not by the condition of its highest, but of its
to,oest classes; and the only way in which its
stability can be satisfactorily assured is to ed
ucate and elevate the lower strata of society
DR.. Chaplin, in the opening of his discourse,
illustrated the ceaseless operation of processes
in the physical world-a continual building,
constant changing of atoms The grain of the
rock was Clipped off and carried away by
wind and rain, but nothing was lost. AlldiS-
banded elements were drafted into some other
service and rebuilt into some other structure
This process of construction was paralleled in
every other department of existence and was
characteristic of all the details of personal eff
fort and work. But associated with these ele-
ments of construction was another element
that some thing, or end, which the construc-
ton sought or served. All things were either
means or ends, and in human life there were
two great states-building and living For
the purposes of application he divided life in
to three heads-its personal, social and gene
raj aspects. Man, though subject to outward
influences, was to great extent the construc-
tor of his own life. The whole fabric of his
life was wrought by forces within as well as
by forces without. His conscience even might
be DETECTED by some remote ancestral polari-
ty. Man was greatly nodded by the influen-
ces surrounding him. and was shaped by that
which was built for him. Thus those that
were born in the dens of great cities, amid all
that was vile and brutalizing, must necessari-
ly become like brutes their habitations and
lives shaping them to this end. But even to
these men there were duties inextricably wo-
ven with their lives. 1t might be impossible
IOr d HAL " tSCdpo tHe IaIallGleS OF MS own
organization, but he could not shun the du-
ties of his existence, nor neglect its privileges
There was no complete attainment to the life
of any man, nation or thing. Perfection was
impossible in this world. Human nature
could never stop in its career of advancement.
No man should be satisfied with mere exist
ence, but each should do his best with all his
faculties-moral, intellectual and physical.
Some men lived by one class of these faculties
alone and whose lives therefore were like
haunted houses. man might live too much
at the heart, or toe much at the brain, or too
much at the stomach. The speaker then went
on to praise the present devotion to muscular
pursuits, and said that muscular Christian"
should not be sneered at. The two ideas were
not inconsistent, for the world had got beyond
the delusive idea that a man, in order to be fit
for heaven, must have racked BRAN, support
ed by chickens body and sparrow's legs.
A man need not be less devout because he
breathed through both lungs. The lecturer
then referred to the "womans rights question
and said that he approved of extending wo-
mar's sphere by giving her the right of suf
frage, but cautioned her that if her privileges
should be widened, her responsibilities would
be also heightened. He also made some highly
eulogistic illusions to the bravery and endur-
ance of our soldiers in the late war, which, he
said, were greatly owing to their noble train
ing at home. t
The close of his lecture was devoted to APP
plying the ideas of his discourse to our ma
tional life and progress.
Next Wednesday evening George William
Curtis delivers his lecture on Dickens.
AT meeting of the Portland Army and
Navy Union, held Tuesday evening, the fol-
lowing resolutions ON the death of Lieut.. Col.
Frank L. Jones, were adopted:
Whereas, 1t has pleased Almighty God in
His mysterious providence, to remove from
our Union, our brother, Brevet Lieut. Col.
Frank L. Jones:
Resolved That in the decease of Col Jones
our Union loses an honored and valued mem