The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1891-06-19

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old hero's tomb with it's recumbent
effigy and inscription:
"His bones are dust,
His good sword rust,
His soul is with the
Saints we trust.
The mediaeral Knight is gone. But
the idea for which he stood has not
gone and knighthood has not gone. |
speak this morning to knights of the
nineteenth century: the men who
show us that knighthood still exists,
under the glare of electric lights and
in-the whirl of the commerce of these
days. You, my brethren, show US a
knighthood without lances and with
out tournaments, indeed, but a knight
hood just as real as that of Galadah.
You show us the modern knighthood
and the Knight in plain clothes. You
show US the old knightly spirit finding
itself home in our modern offices
and stores. In your order is crystal
lied spirit that ruled the helmetted
men of centuries gone. Your presence
here is the proof that we still have the
substance of the middle-age idea. A
man, say, does not vanish when he
changes his clothes. God is no longer
a white-headed man looking over a
desk railing in the sky. Still God was
never SO real as He is to-day. Heaven
is no longer flower gardens and jasper
streets and intoXication. He'll is no
longer high temperature. These
things are not what they used to be,
but the realities for which they stand
to-day are just as real as ever. Those
realities have not vanished with the
changing of the clothes. The theory
of evolution leaves the world still the
world, more wonderful, perhaps, than
it was, more clearly the work of a Su-
preme Intelligence. And just as
God did not vanish, and heaven and
hell and the world did not vanish
when the last of the mail-coated men
gave up the ghost. Knighthood was
not driven out of the world by the
shrek of the locomotive and the
GROWING of commerce as king. Re-
ligion lived on through these and will
live. on, because it is not the inyen-
tion of priests but a part OF the con-
stitution CT man; and knighthood
lived on through them and will live
on, crystalized as / see it crystalized
before me to-day. Religion does not
hang upon a surplice or four-walled
church or book of prayers: knight
hood does not depend upon helmets or
tournaments or coats of mail. Both
of them will make homes for them
selves in every age, and both of them
will be as real in one age as in another.
Again / say that man does not
vanish when he changes his clothes:
and what is true of a man is true of
an institution and of an instinct. And
So ii one of these old tombs could
give up it's dead this morning, and if
one Of those old time Knights could
stand forth, armed head to foot, he
would find the citizens clothes in
stead of FURNISHED armor, he would
find the street-car instead of the
tournament: he would find strange
customs and strange language, but
he would find the old familiar knight
strike the hand of a modern Knight
of Pythias. Down below all the differ
ences and all the changes he would
find an unchanged essence-something
to make the centuries as if they were
not-the knightly spirit shrined in
your brother-helping, brother-loying
order.
Now this knighthood of yours does
not consist in pageants or the wear
ing of regalia any more than religion
consists, in it's essence, in vestments
or in saying prayers. These things
are only the outward expression of
spirit-most necessary expressions,
but expressions. .Knighthood, sup
pose, means the life of mutual service.
It means, [ suppose, the opposite of
self1shness. 1t means brother-helping.
It means working by the Golden Rule
seven days every week. 1t means
lend hand. And SO say that it is a
Christ-like thing. The knightly spirit
would exist without your order, and
religion would exist without the
church. But an idea comes to little so
long as it is floating in the air. 1t is
only by means of an organization that
an idea became evident that an idea
becomes a working force. The sun
shines everywhere; but to focus it's
rays and make them burn, you must