The herald., 1896-09-20
THE IDEAL


We are unsatisfied, and. know not why;
We seek for the ideal OF our Dreams,
And strive to reach 1t guided by the
OF truth and faith. Setting our standard
We struggle on; but when the prize is nigh
We find that it eludes us, and 1t seems
TO beckon onward, knocking with It's
Like some bright mirage in the eastern
sky. ,,,
Our thoughts forever turned away from
We see e. no beauty round US. and the
Hidden in humble things we never know.
We grope and pass unheeding on the
The good that we are seeking day by
day.
THE CONVENTION OF TODAY.
Gerald Stanley Lee In the Critic.)
IA wise men will be wise enough
alone, but twenty wise men in row
will be fools-and proud of it. Then
there will be twenty more. Then there
will be a convention. Then there will
be an epigram, and then-tell it not in
Gath, publish 1t not in the streets OF
Askelon, lest the daughters of the Phi
listine rejoice-there will be toot-
. scraping of feet-a president Of the
United States"
From the National Undertakers' and
the Launderers' League to the Chris
tian Endeavorers and the Worlds con-
gress. the convention bestrides the
world with righteousness. The slnece
that descends from the hills is filled
with ceaseless din. The smallest ham,
let in the land has learned to listen rev.
erent from afar to its vast, inceseant
roar as the voice Of the Spirit Of the
Times. Every idea we have is to run
into constitution. We cannot think
without chairman. Our whims have
secretaries, our fadS bylaws. Litera-
ture is a club, philosophy a society.
Our reforms are mass meetings. Our
culture is a summer school. We mourn
our mighty dead with forty vice presi-
dents. We remember our poets with
trustees, and the Immortality of a gen.
ius is duly arranged by standing
committee. Charity is an association
Theology Is a set of resolutions. Re-
ligon is an endeavor to be numerous
and communicative. We awe the i'm
penitent with crowds, convert the
world with boards, and save the lost
with delegates; and how Jesus of NaZ-
areth could have done so great a work
without being on committee is beyond
our ken. What Socrates and Solomon
would have come to If they had only
had the advantage Of conventions, it
would be hard for us to say; but in
these Gays, when the excursion train is
dppttsu u WlSuOIl-Wnen, having little
enough, we try to make it more by
pulling 1t about-when secretaries urge
us, treasurers dun us, programs unfold
out of every mail-where is the man
who guilelessly can look his brother in
the face. who can declare upon his hon
or that he has never been delegate,
never belonged to anything, never been
nominated, elected, imposed on, in his
life?
Everything convenes, resolves, petit
tons. adjourns. Nothing stay adjourn
ed. We have reports that think for us,
committees that do our duty for us; and
Platforms spread their wooden lengths
across everything we love, until there is
hardly an inch Of the dear old living
earth to stand on. where, fresh and
sweet and from day to day, we can live
our lives ourselves, pick the flowers, look
at the stars. guess at God, garner our
grain and die.
1t is half of the vitality of a govern
ment or a religion that it shall take the
characteristic emphasis of it's age, but
1t is the other half of it's vitality, its sin
certify, its steadfastness, that it shall
resist that emphasis, that it shall bal
ance the narrow extravaganza Of man
with the universally Of God. He is only
a true believer in the unity of the world,
who is doing something-being some
thing-by himself, that will make it
worth uniting. Every great truth shall
have it's hero and it's fool-the man who
thinks of 1.-THE man who thinks of
nothing else. We have passed the day
of the convention fool He thinks; but
1t takes ten thousand men to make him
think. He has crowd-soul, crowd
creed. Charged with convictions from
one convention to another, he manages
to live. With sense of multitude, ap-
plause and cheers he warns his
thoughts. He exhorts, dictates, places
his little lever on the world and jerks.
10 thu bigotry of the man who knows
because he speaks for himself, is added
new bigotry on the earth-the bigotry
of the man who speaks for the nation"
who with more colossal prejudice
than before returns from a mass meet
ing of himself and with the effronery
that only convention can give, backs
walks the streets of his native town in
the uniform of all humanity
But having said this much of the noise
and possible mischief of the convention,
and limited at how the Individual judg-
ment is often surrendered to the demand
of the mob and the hour, the writer goes
on to pay fine tribute to the staying
powers of the people and the wisdom OF
the worlds democracy, as follows:
THE democratic form of government
is the safest among men who think,
whether their thinking is right or wrong,
OcCduSe IL 10 d. government CndL OarSS
to question and expects to live. 1t is the
most purely spiritual form Of govern
ment on the earth, because 1t is the most
dependent on the spirit. Its charter is
its need of God. It's defense is it's faith
in men. The awfulness of it's trust-its
sublime helplessness-is the hush upon
every spirit that would do it wrong
Love and disease lie open in its heart,
Its purity is the sun and wind. Its shell
ter is the storm. Making every man
greater than himself by needing him, its
homes are more eloquent than orators
and its children more powerful than
kings.
THE only government that literally
believes In men, 1t deliberately risks
It's life IN that belief. The supreme ad-
venture of the human SOUL in it's consti-
tuition Is organized the trust of Christ.
Inough prophecy shall be fulfilled and
It's mighty desire shall fail, though its
dlv1ne, appeal shall be stifed on the
earth. no failure can dim it's beauty or
take away the passing glory of its life
from the dreams of men. Though II per
1sh as the leaf perisheth or as the free
falleth In the forest, it shall be the ma ster
passion of the human heart, fading from
the centuries like the New Testament
only to come from the haunts Of free
dom Fastening back-to cover the hills
and valleys of the EARTH"
AUGUST BOOK SALES.
The sales of books in the great eastern
markets have been very small during
the late summer. The publishers have