Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1897-03-29

AMERICAN scIidtc ttiu Nell tu5 JULIET udJ
when in that capitol building which
owes to Greece it's columnar impressive
ness they passed hearty resolution Of
sympathy for that nation. Would that
all who have potent words that can be
heard in Europe would utter them now.
when they are so much needed! Let us
repeat to them in English what they
centuries ago declared to the world in
Greek, blessed are those who are per-
secuted for righteousness sake, for
heirs is the kingdom of heaven.
An Infinite Obligation.
Another way of partly paying our
debt TO the Greeks is by higher appreci-
alton of the learning and self sacrifice
of the men who in our own land stand
for all that the ancient Greeks stood.
While here and there one comes TO pub
lie approval and reward, the most of
them live in privation or on salary dis
gracefully small The scholars, the
arch9ologists, the artists, the literati-.
most of them live up three or four flights
of stairs and by small windows that do
not let in the full sunlight. You pass
them every day in your streets without
any recognition. Grub street, where
many of the mighty men of the past
suffered, is long enough to reach around
the world. No need of wasting our
sympathy upon the unappreciated think
ers and workers of the past, though
Linneus sold his works for a single
ducat, though Noah Webster's spelling
book yielded him more than his diction-
airy, though Correggio, the great paint
er. receiving for long continued work
payment of $50, died from overjoy;
though when Goldsmith IS friends visited
him they were obliged to, sit in the
window, as he had but one chair; though
Samuel Boyse, the great poet, starved
to death; though the author of ''Hudi-
bras' died in a garnet; though para
disc LOST brought its author only $40
cash down, with promise of $50 more if
the sale warranted it, SO that $50 was
all that was paid for what is considered
the greatest poem ever written. Better
turn our attention to the fact that there
are at this moment hundreds of authors,
painters, sculptors, architects, brain
workers without bread and without fuel
and without competent apparel. AS far
as you can afford it, buy their sculpture,
read their books, purchase their pic
lures, encourage their pen, their pencil,
their chisel. their engraver' S knife, their
architects compass. The world calls
them "bookworms' or "Dr. Dryas-
DUST but if there had been no book
worms or dry doctors of law and science
and theology there would have been no
Apocalyptic angel They are the Greeks
of our country and time, and your obli-
CATION to them is infinite.
victory Through Sacrifice.
But there is better way to pay them,
and that is by their personal salvation,
which will never come to them through
books or through learned presentation,
because in literature and intellectual
realms they are masters. They can out
argue, outquote, outdogmatize you. Not
through the gate of the head, but through
the gate of the heart, you may capture
them. When men of learning and might
are brought to God, they are brought
by simplest story of what religion can
do for soul. They have lost children.
Oh, tell them how Christ comforted you
when you lost your bright boy or blue
eyed grill They have found life strug-
gle. Oh, tell them how Christ has helped
you all the way through! They are in
bewilderment. Oh, tell them with how
many hands of joy heaven beckons you
upwardl when Greek meets Greek,
then comes the tug of war;" but when
warm hearted Christian meets a man
who needs pardon and sympathy and
comfort and eternal life then comes
victory. If you can, by some incident of
self sacrifice, bring to such scholarly
men and women what Christ has done
for their eternal rescue, you may bring
them in. Where Demosthenic eloquence
and Homeric imagery would fail,
kindly heart throb may succeed. A gen
tleman of this city sends me the state
ment of what occurred few days ago
among the mines of British Columbia.
It seems that Frank Conson and Jem
Smith were down in the narrow shaft
of a mine. They had loaded an iron
bucket with coal, and Jim Hemsworth,
standing above ground, was hauling
the bucket up by windlass, when the
windlass broke, and the loaded bucket
was descending upon the two miners.
Then Jim Hemsworth, seeing what
must be certain death to the miners be-
meath, threw himself against the cogs
of the whirling windlass, and, though
his flesh was torn and his bones were
broken, he stopped the whirling wind
lass and arrested the descending bucket
and saved the lives of the two miners
beneath. The superintendent of the
mine flew to the rescue and blocked the
machinery. When Jim Hemsworth's
bleeding and broken body was put on a
litter and carried homeward and saSle
one exclaimed, s'Jim, this is awful
he replied, "Oh, what's the difference
so long as saved the boys?"
What an illustration it was of suffer
ing for others, and what a text from