The Princeton union., 1896-11-12

xxxviii., 81. E ,se 5s5 ~
We have seen the ceremony at the
laying of the cornerstone of church,
asylu or Masonic temple. Into the
hollow of the stone were placed scrolls
of history and important documents,
to be suggestive if, 100 or 200 years
after, the building should be destroyed
by fire OF torn down. We remember
the silver trowel or iron hammer that
smote the square piece of granite into
sanctity. We remember some venera
bic man who presided, welding the
troWel OF hammer. We remember also
the music as the choir stood on the
scattered stones and timber of the
building about to be constructed The
leaves of the note books futtered in
the wind, and were turned over with
a great rustling, and we remember
how the bass, baritone, tenor, con-
trftlto and soprano voices commingled.
They had for many days been rehears-
ing the special programme, that it
might be worthy of the cornerstone
laying.
5slIn my text the poet Uz calls us to a
grander cerelmony-the laying OF the
foundation of this great temple of a
world. The cornerstone was a block
of light and the troWel was a celestial
crystal ALI about and on the enbank-
ments of clouds stood the angelic
choiristers unrolling their ibrettos of
overture, and other worlds clapped
shining cymbals while the ceremony
nd t1,o 1,xy
stroke Of light after stroke of light,
dedicated this great cathedral of a
world, with mountains for pillars. and
sky for frescoed ceiling, and Towering
fields for a floor, and sunrise and mid
night aurora for upholstery. 'Who
laid the cornerstone thereof, when the
morning stars sang together?"
The fact is that the whole universe
was a complete cadence, an unbroken
dithyramb, musical portfolio. The
great sheet of immensity had been
spread out, and written on it were the
stars, the smaller of them minims, the
larger of them sustained notes. The
meteors marked the staccato passages,
the whole heavens a gamut with all
sounds, intonations, modulatiOns, the
space between the worlds musical
interval, trembling Of stellar light q
quaver, the thunder bass clef, the
wind among the trees a treble clef.
That is the way God made all things
a perfect harmony vi"
But one day harp string snapped
in the great. orchestra .One day a
voice sounded out of tune. One day a
discord, harsh and terrific, grated upon
the glorious antiphon, 1t was sin that
made the dissonance, and that harsh
discord has been sounding through the
centuries. All the work Of Christians
and philanthropists and reformers of
all ages is to stop that discord and get
all things back into the perfect har-
mony which was heard at the laying
Of the cornerstone when the morning
stars sang together. Before I get
make it plain that sin is discord and
righteousness harmony. That, in gen
eral, things are out of tune is as plain
as to a musicians ear is the unhappy
clash of clarionet and bassoon in an
orchestral rendering. =, - ~
The worlds health out of tune.
Weak lungs and the atmosphere in col
liSion. diSOrdered eye and monday
light in quarrel, rheumatic limb and
damp weather in struggle, neuralgias
and pneumonias end conSUmptiOns and
epilepsies in fOcks, sweep upon neigh
borhoods and cities. Where you find
one person with sound throat and
keen eyesight and alert ear and easy
respiration and regular pulsation and
supple limb and prime digestion and
steady nerves you find hundred who
have to be very careful because this or
the other physical function is disor-
dered, n s-o-5.-r ~. = 4~<7~s-.,
+ .. =. -r.. r
The human intellect out Of tune: The
Judgment wrongly swerved or the
memory leaky or the will or the tenn
per infammable, the well balanced
mind exceptional.
Domestic life out Of tune: Only here
and there a conjugal outbreak Of in
compatibility of temper through the
divorce courts or a tilial outbreak about
a fathers will through the surrogate's
court, or a case of wife beating or hus-
band poisoning through the criminal
courts, but thousands Of families with
June outside and January within.
Society out of tune. Labor and capt
tai, their hands on each others throat
Spirit of castle keeping those down In
the social scale who are struggling to
get up, and putting those who are up
in anxiety lest they have to come
down. No wonder the old pianoforte
of society is all out Of tune, when
hypocrisy, and lying, and subterfuge,
and double dealing, and revenge have
for six thousand years been banging
away at the keys and stamping the
pedals.
On all sides there is a shipwreck of
harmonies Nations in discord without
realizing it; so wrong is the feeling of
nation for nation that symbols chosen
are fierce and destructive. In this
country, where our skies are full of
robins and doves and morning larks,
we have our national symbol the fierce
and filthy eagle, as q cruel bird as
can be found in all the pathological
catalogues. In Great Britain, where
they have lambs and fallow deer, their
symbol is the merciless lion. In Rus
sda. where between her frozen north
and blooming south all kindly beasts
dwell, they choose the growing bear;
and in the worlds heraldry fayorite
figure is the dragon, the tabled winged
serpent, ferocious and dreadful And
so fond lis the world of contention that
; we climb through the heavens and hap-
tie one or the other planets with the
spirit of battle and call it Mars, after
the god of war, and we give to The
o;<r ,cSxr, In