The Louisiana Democrat. [volume] (Alexandria, La.) 1845-1918, 1869-07-28
instruction at Gen. Lees College
The Dignity Of Labor-A Popu-
lar Fallacy- Stonewall Jackson,

The Rev. DR.. r. A. Holland delivered
an address before the literary societies of
Gen. Lees Washington College, in LexiDg-
ton, Va, during the recent commencement
His remarks upon the
F." Dignity of Labor and upon Gen. Stone
wall Jackson are of interest.
There has been of late heard great roar
of Carlylean rant about the nobleness of
work reverberating through our materials
tic literature and what, when soberly in
terpreted, does all its grandiloquent jargon
import? Is work indeed the sublime pur-
pose of existence? Was man created a
little lower than the angels to hoe carrots
and cabbage, mould CRATES and gridirous :?
Dwells there in labor any inherent dignity
to excite the admiration Of its miserable
thrails, or consists the dignity rather in the
patient Promethean bearing of what we
feel to have been imposed as a punish
ment. l would rot disparage work as igg-
noble, for it is a law of our present normal
condition, and as such enforces obedience
to its exactions by attaching severe pains
to ideness but that this curse should be
called blessing, this drudgery ritnalized
into worship, md man exhorted to cheer
fully wear the yoke of servitude as royal
carcanet, instead of encouraged to throw it
off whenever able, that he may range at
will over the fencelcss fields of thought
that invite the play OF his powers, is sub
stitution Of Deuteronomy for the gospel
which | protest against as insulting alike
to the instincts aud attachments of human
ity. We must work, bu: it is our prerog
alive to hold work subsidiary 70 selfim-
provement. lie who voluntary takes from
the cultivation of mis- highest attributes
those energies OF thought aud affection
which have no other excuse for the pursuit
of an inferior object than to gain by the ac-
QUESTION of it greater freedom from their
rightful employ, commits upon himself an
act Of vandalism like that of the Turks
who mutilated the columns of Baalbec to
forge horse-shoes, out of the inner masses
of iron that joined their superposed stones
into Corinthian shafts, which the world
had for centuries rcckoned miracles oil
grand and graceful architecture.
In speaking of Stonewall Jackson and
his soldiers, DIR. Holland became snthusias-
tic, addressed the pupils Of Gen. Lee as
follows:
"We are near the grave of martyr chief
tain, whose name need not mention in
the village which his memory, like precious
spkenard poured out Of the rudely broken
aiabaster box Ola pure life, has amounted
with perfumes Paradise. We are on the
halIowed soil of a State which, for tn.
llustrous dead that sleep beneath Its
cloud freiied roof, seems Natures owl
Westminster Abbey. Its valleys, like
alcovied aisles, are hung to- fancy's eye witt
battle scenes that depict the sacrifice o
self for principle. Its mountains, like
memorial pillars, record The pufe-hearted
ness of the heroes who, in the path ofduty
marched up to death as to a friend, ant
took from his Outstretched hand the vic
tors wreath of Immortality. Under it:
sod, as in sacred crypts, repcse the dust o
an army whose remembered deeds of patri
otto valor make US proud, even amid all tut
| corrnptions which degrade our race, tina
we, too, are men. From its wind-swep
forests, as from the pipes of grand cathe
dral organ, rolls ccaseless requiem TO
! the fallen, which ever and anon swelIs will
swifter time into martial strain that bid
the living emulate their virtues. Here
then, as in quiet chapel Of this grand oil
State Basilca-where to study excellence
of manhood is to hold intercourse with it
best examples--so order the steps of you
ambi ton that when, in pursuing its celes
tial end, you depart from the time-shore O
life it may be but to join the glorifed BAN
of soldiers for the true and right who hav
already crossed over the river, and wit
Jackson are resting in the shade Of tn
tree"