The age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1897-1902, 1899-05-21
THE MURMUR
OF THE WORLD

Thrice is he arm'd that has his quarrel Just
And he but naked, though 1ockd up In
Whose conscience with injustice Is
/ corrupted
With no intolerant mind can there be an
| untaintod heart. As well might we seek to
find virtue in scarlet robes seated upon a
| muek-heap and cheered by brawiers from
| the dwelling places Of nameless sin. Who
soever shall condemn unheard fellow
| creature stumbling and struggling along
| the rocky way up that mount given to
every human to ascend bearing a cross,
that man or that woman cannot be pure
| OF heart and unspotted from the world.
Inat unit OF the struggling, fighting, toll
| ing, shining billions whose heart moves
| not the tongue to tender words of cheer and
| hope and brave speech of courage to him or
her who falters weary and weak at the
Sign OF Sin upon the highway of SORROW is
| forbidden of God to wear the strongest
| breast-plate He has placed within reach
| of all the children of earth. That heart is
| tainted which does not softer beat at sound
| of the low cry of Shame as Ii hides its
painted face in tho Implying drapery of
| the couch over which the serpent has
given over to hardness which warns not
| TO the pteous prayer of remorse and re-
pentanee when the black burden of vice too
| heavily presses upon the soul burning In
| the hot furnace of outraged righteousness
| That heart cannot be the companion of
| happiness or hold acquaintance of laughing
| joy which broods in the shadow of intoler-
| ance and would cast no ray of light into
| lives known of sorrow and pain, unrestful
shame and vice and that spiritual terror
| that abides forever with the wicked.
There need be no quarrels, just or unjust.
| There was never yet a quarrel since the
| first murderer slew his brother that might
not have been honorably avoided and never
yet one that resulted in any lasting good.
| Rum and low passions, greed and hate and
| RIGHTEOUSNESS, intolerance and bigotry and
| covetousness; untamed wrath and evil spite
rioting in the abandon of selishness, with
reckless disregard of the radiance beaming
| from the soul-orb of the Loving Eye--these
| have conspired to burden the gallows and
/ to fill the almshouses, the prisons, the
churchyards, and hell From that I'M
| seemly saturnalia of viciousness have
| sprung the forces that have robbed home
| of peace, the sanctuary of holiness and
paradise of purity. All this has caused the
| flowers to wither out of loving lives, the
sunlight to fade from the fields, and hope
| to sink to the lowest depths of despairs
| cavernous deeps. There can be no just
| quarrel; for calm, bandage-eyed justice and
anger not controllable cannot be mated in
any cause. Rudeness in any form is mere
vulgarity, and whenever refinement goes
| out to do battle with the vulgar it sinks
| itself to the vulgar's dead and colorless and
| loathsome level, and the learned eye comes
| to weep salt-tears of shamefaced sorrow.
That teaching would be immoral which
| should seek to convey the conviction that
| the time is come when the forces of civili-
| cation may put off their armor and lie
down side by side with ignorance and SIM
| wrapped in the entrances of sweet dreams
| of peace. No such eventime ever came
| none shall ever come so long as there re-
mains unobliterated the thin red line PLAN
NEG by nature and fixed by justice to mark
| the boundary between the perfumed gar
dens of virtue and the noisome marshes of
| vice. The day Is not and shall never be
| when intelligence shall cease to contend
| against ignorance, or when wfckedness
and sinlessness shall kiss each other and
go forth in adulterous union to riot in for
hidden ways and work for the worlds
damnation. The hour is not struck and
shall never strike when bloated vice may
reel with goodness in boastful lawlessness.
Hard by the gutter is set the shrine, but
the emblem of the worlds redemption may
not be dragged down to the reeking mire,
| and filth may not pollute the altar-cloth
of religion.
No white flag may float upon favoring
| winds in truce between that which is right
| and that which is wrong. No plea for
| peace between the moral and the immoral
| may issue so long as crime f1aunts itself
| and defies. But there be eternal plea for
| tolerance and mercy and charity. Lessons
| Numbered from the sacred desk cannot
| cure us of our evils unless spoken in
| mercifulness and charitableness. Bigotry
| never yet saved a soul from perdition; and
| bitter intolerance drives far away many
| a yearning seeker after goodness. The
| incense that rises from the altar too sell
| dom settles as blessed balm in the abiding
| places of the perversely wicked. A gentle
word in the soft tone of suasion cannot
| fail to accomplish good; but no individual
| was ever yet made virtuous by the man.
| date of king or parliament. Often we
| make law-givers of fools and knaves and
| leave to them the task of shaping and
| defining our morals, thus playing mad
| pranks with justice and smothering per-
sonal liberty with the statutes of folly;
| forcing freedom into the devious ways of
| libertinism and confiscating our heritage to
| the purposes of ignorance and narrow.
mindedness That spirit which in days of
old did drive the men of God to the stake
| because they were the men of God, pre-
| walls. That intolerable intolerance which
| bound maidens to the stones of the sea-
| shore when the tide was out, there to await
| death as it fioated in upon waves of the
| tide when it rose still finds abiding place in
| breasts which know not mercy and are
] unacquainted with that divine impulse
| that stirs blessed souls that are generous