The Princeton union. [volume] (Princeton, Minn.) 1876-1976, 1898-08-11
THE COLLEGE GRADUATE.

The sweet girl graduate and the coll
lege honor man are again in evidence
70 all their glory, but they have to be
content with only secondary place in
we ~ public interests this year The al
engrossing subject Of war has thrown
them into temporary eclipse. This is
rather hard, too, since most Of these
graduates now stand upon pinnacle
OF prominence which will never be
reached again by them after they de-
scend to the dead level Of the great
seeming world in which the rest Of
tneir lives must be passed. The only
really fortunate students are those few
VINO have enlisted and are able to come
pack in their uniforms to be graduated
with their classes. These are the he
roes Of the hour The valedictorian
and the prize winner are common peo-
pie compared with these fortunates.
IL is not fair that all the glory should
go to those few who have been able to
uon uniforms and go to the front. A
nations strength lies with the sturdy
nome and do their duty there quite as
much as with those who go 20 battle.
Ihose young men who have found it
10 De their duty to complete their col
lese work and enter business or pro-
Iesslonal lines in which they can re-
pay the debts incurred in getting their
education may serve their country no
less than the other brave fellows who
nave enlisted. The girls and young
women now about to receive their
diplomas from high schools and col
leges, in so far as these parchments
are testimonials to their fitness for TAX
Ing useful places in the nations homes
and offices and schoolrooms, deserve
all the transient glory that can be shed
upon their commencement exercises
For the moment, however, action and
not learning is in the ascendant. Brave
deeds have always counted for more
than wise words in the worlds history,
and 1t is not strange that book lore
IS for the time cast into the shade. Both
nave their places; in fact, learning
and thought are the forerunners of
great deeds. If Lieut.. Hobson had not
been a thorough student and a skilled
mechanic he could never have con-
celved or executed the gallant deed
that will perpetuate his name. If Ad-
miral Dewey had not had third of a.
century of training he could never have
won so brilliant victory at Manila
II our American sailors were not men
OF intelligence and mechanical skill
they would be as helpless on their
great battleships as the Spaniards
have been. Thus, though the glorious
deeds are apt to eclipse the years of
humdrum schooling as the flower
eclipses the bud, the school years and
the bud are none the less valuable for
all that.
1t is necessary to strike a balance
once in a while between thought and
action. This is what the country is
doing just now. We had drifted into
a state where almost all the energies
OF the nation were being turnedtinward.
Such state is not permanently health
full and a reaction was bound to come
some time. Like the reaction against
retrospective novels, seen in the recent
vogue of swashbuckling romances, the
present martial spirit of the nation is
natural and healthful. For the moment
1t may be little disconcerting to the
students and graduates who find them
selves robbed of the public eclat which
they had a right to expect, but their
turn will come later in the enlarged op-
portunities that will belong to them as
citizens in an enlarged and glorifed ma
ton.
Then give the college graduate all
the honor that can be spared from the
brave boys at the front, and tell him
that his book lore is of use only in so
far as it can be made to blossom
henceforth into deeds Whether the
deeds be martial ones, or commercial
or professional, they may be equally
patriotic and honorable. But the spe-
cial need of glory will still be reserved
for the soldier, and it is we'll that it is
SO. It will be sorry day for the nation
when it's pulses fail to thrill to the
sound of the martial bugle-Ex.
. Suicides in Paris.
In Paris, where in 1856 seven or
eight suicides were recorded per year.
the number now reaches from threa
hundred to three hundred and fifty,
4bOIt nno Hoi1v