The true northerner. [volume] (Paw Paw, Mich.) 1855-1920, 1881-04-08

The following sermon was delivered by Rev.
H. w. Harvey, at the memorial service held at
the Presbyterian church, on the death OF d. b.
Dewey:
We have come here to day, not to displays
grief, but TO reverence and respect memory.
1t seems fitting and appropriate that We should
meet together to pay tribute to . worthy life.
We need not fear to think or speak too highly
Of such life. II Is the one grand thing on
this earth, and calls for our warmest, best
thought and language. The bad person dies
and no one lays 1t greatly to heart, unless it be
IN sorrowful regret for the evil that has been
done; but when the good pass away, the peo
pie mourn. II Is public calamity, and more
or less we all share in it. We have need for the
good on earth, we can hardly spare them; they
fill chief place in our hearts and lives, and we
mourn for them when they are gone. Call it
not custom call it not ceremony, conven-
tionailty or hypocrisy 1t grief, deep, true and
genuine, and more or less we all share 1t.
In such manner we recall the life whose
memory we have come here 10 honor to-day.
His passing away from us (for / love not to
call it deatb,) was personal loss to every good
man and woman who sits before me and lis
tens to my voice this hour. We could i'll af-
ford to lose even one good person from our
midst, we needed him so. But the memory Of
his life at least is left to US, and If with SER
ious thought we review that to day, we shall be
benefited, and go from this place stronger
men and women, prepared to do cur duty in
the world.
Iwould that He might seem to speak through
me to-day, not audbly, for that cannot be, but
through the eloquent silent language OF the
heart, that is most deeply felt when its voice is
not heard All ! those silent voices, this silent
language in the world is there anything 30 FAR
reaching, so potential rs this? II thus, He
seems to speak to Us to-day, LET it stir the man
hood and womanhood within rs into new life,
and make Of it more earnest and beautiful
thing than it has been in the past.
We sit here to-day in the hush Of the even
ing OF departed hfe, . life suddenly, mys-
reriously gone from Us, all but Its twilight Of
memory. The reflection of that is upon all
about US, in our minds and in our hearts this
hour. Do We pass through tenderer, holier
hours than these in all our lives. If our hearts
are touched and softened by them? They
purify, they refine, they elevate us. They
bring NJ nearer to the divine, to the mysterious
border land Of this and the other world, and
cause rs to feel the earnestness Of the one
!, and the infinitude OF the other. Oh! II God
stamps wonderful things anywhere upon these
skies Of our life, for N to look upon and learn
il 10 the twilight sky Of sacred memory, the
hush. the close, the afterglow OF life just
sunk to rest. The night Of sorrow gathers
quickly-a very midnight sometimes 1t seems
but thank God for the CLEAN In the upper sky
q fadeless memory, it cannot be ali dark while
that remains, even midnight will have its Joy
while memory and hope irradiate it with CLEANS
OF starlight and twilight from the other world
Thus tenderly and with reverence we sit here
to-day in the aftergow OF the worthy life gone
from us, we would utter no panegync-lt needs
none; but IL we lay warm enconiums upor
goodness and lf-denial, upon patient, earn
est devoted, faithful life, need we apologies
No. let us rather apologize, If we speak no
warmly enough OF such virtues. They are tn,
gems among the dross, the gleam amid The
gloom, the rock among the drift of our human
hfe-the world s safe while these remain.
Let me now speak few practical thought
as CLEAN them from the life whose memory i
before us to-day. And 1st, the thought o
young manhood, what it is, aud what IT may
be.
, i cannot suffer this example OF what it ma
} be, so far as the real trimuphs or life are con
cerned, to pass without gathering up its inval
liable lesson, pressing It upon the young WIN
, hear me. I cannot tell why God took hin
from US, unless that 1t might be to show VIII:
an inestimable value one such life may be il
the world. A community mourn, and meet to
: gether to do him honor. II was not becaus
he had made an ostentatious show in the world
quite otherwise; but only that his life OF ser
vice and toll for others had made him indis
pensible. Is it not a mark OF true manines
that it Is retiring and modest? repeat tbos
two worde, retiring and modest-words almos
, dropped out Of the vocabulary Of our youn
manhood to-day. Is it not mark of true man
liness that it seeks to do it's unobtrusive wor
unnoticed and unknown; that it labors not 70
the love OF praise or appreciation OF men al
together? But only because il thus loves t
labor it Is a pleasure, = sacred duty. How thes
lowly, patient ways Of advancing in life are to
day despised by young manhood in genera
they seem to them to lack brilliance and rapi
progress; therefore the world is being file
! with a premature young manhood-men be
fore their time-men with heavy cumbersom
top and very little root fixed IN what should b
the firm soil OF an unshaken principle beneatl
Manhood does not come by magic, nor by an
> forcing process, it grows as all things els
grow, from root to stem, from stem to bu,
II from bud to blossom, from blossom to fruit.
Alas for the world that this hot-house cor
g ception is becoming so much the ideal OF youn
Q. manhood to-day. 1t fills many home wit
J sorrow, that ought to be only an abode of JOY
s. and it honey combs society with hallowness, Il
it trembles sometimes upon the very brink
= it's own insecurity.
~ 10 rafraobiuo fo 6nd bara snd fbora 81