Abilene weekly reflector. [volume] (Abilene, Kan.) 1888-1935, 1890-03-06
TALMAGE ON GRADY.
The Great Preacher Eulogizes the
Great Editor.
Wonderful Achievements of a Brief Life
The Responsibilities of Newspaper Men
The Example of Christian
Life.

Witt Talmage was: The Life and
Death of Henry w. Grady, the Editor
and Orator" He took for his text
Isaiah viii. 1: Take thee a great roll
and write in it with mans pen" The
preacher said:
To Isaiah, with royal blood in his
veins and habitant of palaces, does
this divine order come. He is to take a
roll, a large roll, and write On it with
pen, not an angels pen, but a mans
pen. So God honored the pen and so
honored manuscript. In our day the
mightiest roll is the religious and secu-
lar newspaper, and the mightiest pen is
the editors pen, whether for good or
evil. And God says now to every lit
erary man, and especially to every
journalist: Take thee a great roll and
write in it with a mans pen"
Within a few weeks one of the strong
est, most vivid and most brilliant of
those pens was laid down on the editorial
desk in Atlanta, never again to be re-
Bumed. l was far away at the time. We
had been sailing up from the Mediter-
ranean sea, through the Dardanelles,
which region is unlike any thing ever
saw for beauty. There is not any other
water scenery on earth where God has
done so many picturesque things with
islands. They are something like the
Thousand islands of our American st.
Lawrence, but more like Heaven. Indeed,
we had just passed Patmos, the place
from which John had his apocalyptic
vision. Constantinople had seemed to
come out to greet US, for our approach to
that city is different from any other city.
Other cities as you approach them seem
to retire, but this city with its glitter
ing minarets and pinnacles, seems al
most to step into the water to greet you.
But my landing there, that would
have been to me an exhilaration, was
suddenly stunned with the tidings of
the death of my intimate friend, Henry
w. Grady. l could hardly believe the
tidings, for l had left on my study table
at home letters and kilograms from him,
those letters and kilograms having a
warmth and geniality and a wit such as
he only could express. The departure
of no public man for many years has so
affected me. For days l walked about
as in a dream, and | resolved that, get
ting home, would, for the sake of his
bereaved household, and for the sake of
his bereaved profession, and for the
sake of what he had been to me and
shall continue to be as long as memory
lasts, l would speak word in apprecia-
ton of him, the most promising of
and learn some of the salient
lessons of mis- departure.
I have no doubt that he had enemies,
for no man can live such an active life
as he lived or be so far in advance of his
time without making enemies, some be-
cause he defeated their projects and |
some because he outshone them. Owls |
and bats never did like the rising sun. |
But shall tell you how he appeared to
me, and l am glad that told him while
he was in full health what l thought of
him. Memorial orations and gravestone
epitaphs are often mean enough, for they
say of man after he is dead that which
ought to have been said of him while
living. One garland for living brow
S worth more than a mountain
IF japOnicas and Gala lilies heaped
IN a funeral casket. BY a little
black volume of fifty pages containing
he eulogiums and poems uttered and
written at the demise of Clay and Web
,ter and Calhoun and Lincoln and Sum-
Ter the world tried to pay for the forty
years of obloquy heaped upon those liv-
ng giants. If say nothing in praise
IF man while he lives l will keep ST.
ent when he is dead. Myrtle and weep
ng willow can never do what ought to
nave been done 10y amaranth and palm
branch. No amount of Dead March in
SAUL rumbling from big organs at the
'bsequies can atone for non-apprecia-
ion of the man before he fell asleep.
The hearse can not do what ought to
lave been done by chariot.
But there are important things that
iced to be said about our friend, who
vas a prophet in American journalism
md who only few years ago heard the
of my text: Take thee a
-reat roll and write in it with mans
Den!" His father dead, Henry w. Grady,
boy of fourteen years of age, took up
he battle of life. 1t would require a
ong chapter to record the names of
orphans who have come to the top.
When God takes away the head of the
household he very often gives to some
ad in that household a specific qualif-
alton. Christ remembers how that His
wn father died early, leaving him to
Import himself and His mother and His
'rothers in the carpenters shop at Naza-
eth, and He is in sympathy with all
'oys in the struggle. You say: 20, if
ny father had only lived l would have
lad more promising start, and there
re some wrinkles on my brow that
would not have been there" But l
ave noticed that God makes a special !
Tay for orphans. You would not have
zen half the man you are if you had {
lot been obliged from your early days {
o fight your own battles. What other {
oys got out of Yale or Harvard you got
n the university of hard knocks. Go !
mong the successful merchants, law
ers, physicians and men of all occupa- /
ion and professions, and there are Z
Many of them who will tell you: SAT '
en-, or twelve or fifteen years of age l {
tarted for myself; father was sick, or I
ather was dead" But somehow they !
ot through ard got up. account for S
{ by the fact that there is a special S
of God for orphans. All S
all the fatherless and the motherlessi q
he Lord Almighty will see you through. I
'arly obstacles for Mr.. Grady were only
be means for development of his intel I
ect and heart And 10! when at thirty '
inc years of age he put down his pen t
nd closed his lips for the perpetual 81 a
snce, he had done work which many +
man who lives on to sixty and seventy G