Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1896-06-29
AT COLBY.
The Commencement Exercises
Begin, Sunday Forenoon.
Henry F. Robbmsof Rochester, N. Y,
Delivers Baccalaureate Sermon.
Address an Able One and Attentivcly Listened
to BY the Audience.

| Waterville June 2S.-(SpeciaD.- The
first Of the series of exercises of Colby
commencement was held, today. at
the Baptist church. when ex-President
Henry E. Robbins, d. D.. of Roches-
ter, n. ~, delivered the baccalaureate
scrm6n to a large and interested audi
ence.. The sermon, is given below:
A student ef current phase of soci-
| ETY. afiirms that "a gray shadow of
melancholy spreads over the question
| ing, disillusioned age" If this be the
temper of the age when another class
| is about to go forth from yofider halls
to contribute to its work and its spirit,
l trust that my theme and my text
| may not be uniting to the time and
| the occasion. My theme is Christian
| optimism; my text,
! Romans. XIV: IS: Now the God of
| hope fill You with all joy and peace in
believing, that We may abound in hope
in the power of the Holy Ghost"
| Nothing attracts us more than a
youth Astounding in vigor, undismayed
by obstacles, full of courage pressing
eagerly forward to grasp the prizes
| which he is sure the future has in
| store for him. There is no more mel
! ancholy spectacle than such man
| bowed under the burden of years
| overcome in the struggle of life. his
| courage gone, his hope faded from his
| eye, shrinking within himself in a bit
| ter consciousness of defeat The ships
| that went out of the harbor under pro-
| pitious skies, all sails set to the favor
| ing breeze, gay with streamcrs. proud
| ly casting the resisting waters from
| her bow, returns from her battle with
| the seas. weather beaten. leaky, dis
mantled and well nigh a wreck The
ship is an image of the man. Now how
can young man. every young man.
setting out on the voyage OF life. en-
sure himself against such an expert
ence? Is it possible. in view of the
differing capacities of men, their yari-
Gus environments and the thronging
uncertainties of the future? Who shall
answer? AS one moves among men he
finds one class persistently looking on
the bright side of things, and the other
on the dark side of things. The first
class we may call the natural optim-
lSlS, TIE TWO GRASSES InQl0G tnEC
counterparts in the higher ranges of
rhilosophic thought Between these
two classes accepting at their full
value all the facts upon which they
respectively base their conclusions
and so mediating between them. is the
Christian optimist. He alone has an
answer to the question we have raised
His answer is that God sends no man
whatever his heredity, whatever his
environment whatever his capacity
into the battle of life to inevitable and
final defeat, but, on the contrary. if
he will, to certain victory. Paul was a
Christian optimist and gives us the
secret of his triumphant life in the
words of our text: Now the God of
hope fill you with all joy and peace
In believing that We may abound in
hope in the power in the Holy Ghost"
This is one of those outbursts of bene.
diction and supplication character
istic of the epistles of the great apos-
tie. In this letter. having reached in
the course of his glowing argument the
lofty conception of the universally of
grace as designed for all people and
not for Jews only, he contemplates as
from some height of vision the source
and issues of redemption and insprits
those to whom he is writing by this
note of triumph He gave also hope
which upbore Him as upon an eagles
wing from the beginning to the end of
Ills marvellous apostolic career. and
was his by the inspiration of the Holy
Spirit through faith. Through faith. |
we say: for it is to be noted that faith
is not credulity. 1t rests on the truth |
of things; it is not baseless senti- |
ment, not a fond dream of the imagi- |
nation. The Holy Spirit is by the Mas
ter himself styled the spirit of truth |
1t is by the use of truth that he in
spred the unconquerable hope of the |
Christian optimist. But by the use of |
what truth? All truth. we answer,
supplemented and interpreted by the
revealed truth of the Christian Script
ures.
In the first place, then, the Christian
optimist does not overlook Whatevert
truth there is in the dark side of
things He admits and carefully pom
ders on all that the thorough going
pessimist alleges in support of his
view that this is. according to Schopen-
hauer. the worst of all possible worlds,
tenanted by the worst of all possible
beings While he refuses to accept
this conclusion of gloom misanthropy
and despair, he clearly sees that there
is much in certain phases of nature
and society to warrant it. He remem-
bers that no falsehood is altogether
false for if it were it could have no
currency. If such a pessimsm, how
ever. is an untenable opinion it is at
least more intellectually respectable
than the callow optimism that ex-
cludes from its view the dark side of
things. No man, indeed, can perma-
rently exclude it. For a time he may
be insensible to it, in the transitory
selfish security of personal exception
from its ills. but. sooner or later, it
thrusts itself upon his attention
1t is more humane not to wait for
the severe surgery of personal suffer {
ng to open our eyes. but rather court I
ing nothing that concerns humanity
'oreign to ourselves, to look with SYM !
int crest on the things Of t
others. So seeking. what do We see?
Vars, pestilences, earthquakes, famines, / t
he nameless horrors Of Turkish astro- y
Continued on page % il