The Newberry herald. [volume] (Newberry, S.C.) 1865-1884, 1881-06-22
INNOVATEON AND REFOs-
NATION.
BY PROF. G.. B. CR0MER.
Before the Alumni Association Of Newberry
College Tuesday Morning, June 21st, 1881.

Before the Alumni Association Of Newberry
College Tuesday Morning, June 2lst' 1881.
Gentlemen Of the Alumnl ASs0ci0-
ton
One of the most difficult and
most important things for 4 young
man to learn is-that he knows
nothing another, that be is moth
ing, and is not likely to become Of
very great importance. The sooner
we realize that we are clphers;
that while we are the darlings of
our mothers, we are not and are
not destined to be the worlds
darlings, the better will it be for
our future comfort and happiness.
1t is not difficult for most of US to
remember when we left home
glowing with enthusiasm, and in
cited by an unfaltering faith that
we were born TO distinguish our
selves and our country; never
doubling that, when we die, the
great heart Of humanity will throb
with quicker puIsatious the mad
racing world, pause to shed bitter
tears over our graves and the
chisel, trace on our tom bs--not
what we were, but what We ex-
pected to be.
The colIegian, when Sopho-
more, feels that they who are
wiser than he, have some know
ledge not worth the knowing; as
q Junior, if u faithful student, be,
begins to realize that his know.
ledge does not exceed the com
bined intelligence of the Seven
Sages; when a Senior, he is per
picked to know on what he can
rest any claims to excellence and,
after graduation, he finds that be
is not a little child picking up a
pebble here and there ON the
shore Of the great ocean of truth,
but a wayward boy whose faintest
glimpse of the limitless expanse
Of the ocean Of knowledge, is in
tercepted by towering mountains
whose rugged heights can be
scaled only by the unfagging dill
gence Of q lifetime. To the student
who stumbles over Greek roots
and frowns amidst Latin moods
who, with faItering trust, attempts
to steer between the Scylla and
Chary bdis of Physics, and Meta
physic, who glides along the mar
rows Of Ditferential Calculus, and
is fain to regard Bishop Butler as
the natural enemy Of the human
race ito the student whose pre-
sent is so discouraging, the future
is sipgularly inviting. The future
Of our college days was sQnIlt and
enchanting; it lay along ways
made happy BY trilling songsters
that poured out their little souls in
music; it was not unattended with
somewhat of the golden CLEANS
Of the poetic fancy. But now
it begins to dawn upon US
that the bost-laid schemes of
mice and men gang af, agley,'
Johnnie has become plain Jack,
and the world does not applaud
him and lovingly pat him on the
head. The flowers of hope that
bloomed for the school. l.boy are as
dead unfragrant weeds; - the
roseate beauty was only q dream
Of the imagination and this
eternally springing nope is still
weaving fantastic visions, and
Turing us onward, ever onward
to what? The college student,
displacing a punctuation mark,
believes. There's q Divinity that
shapes our ends rough: hew
them how we will And are we
always ready, looking at the
world, and not above the world,
10 acknowledge that There's a
Divinity that shapes our ends,
rough-hew them how we will p
Or are we not rather inclined to
regard man as only a sigh-a sob
"a pulse beat-a heart-pang-a
playthirg of chance? Pausing to-
day on thesummlt Of the ages; and
assuming that we know something
Of what has been done, let US give
thought to the present, and in
vestigate some Of the influences
that affect US as we stand with
the joslIing throng- in the vesti-
brle Of the great hereafter. We
are in the world not only so, We
are of the world ; and it is becom-
ing that we seek: to know what
the world is doing. One lesson
is we'll learned: that life is full of
mysteries; or rather, that life is
the great mystery of mysteries.
And when unaided human iudg-
ment tries to 60 to the hidden
arcana Of life and unveil the Sc
cret principles that control the
human heart, it must acknow-
ledge the insignl6cance Of the
known and mbIe on the verge Of
the infinite unknown. The poet
OF many sided geDius-the great
reader OF human uaLure-puts H.
TO the mouth Of q man who is
dangerous because he thinks TOO
much these words:
Men, at some times, are masters of their
fates;
The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars,
But in ourselves, that We are underlings.
This sentimen is dear to every
independent, manly y nature every
po+rro that 6ooc pnt cnal- tO av-