The Globe-republican., 1901-09-19
OUR MARTYRED PRESIDENT
A Memorial Sermon.


terian church. Sunday morning, delivered
the following sermon on the life and
character of President Mckinley, whose
death the Nation mourns. 1t is a fine
tribute to our martyred President, and
should be read by all patriotic and Chris
rian people. Mr.. Westwood read the
18Th Chapter of Romans, after which he
delivered his sermon. as follows:
The proof that man is the destroyer of
things beautiful and noble is found in
the fact that our histories are full of the
ruins of empires and cities.
To visit the lands where civilization
cradIed is but to find the palaces, the
galleries and the temples with all the no
bile and pathetic architecture of the great
est peoples. devastated by mans wars
and ruined by his rage.
Looking upon those spots named Garth
age, Athens and Ephesus, we find the sea
weed tossed npon the marble steps of the
deserted palace-the sea breezes sobbing
through the ruined galleries-and the
grass growing upon the fortresses that
once were famous. Blind bats aud owls
find their nesting places i'll the chambers
that were once fashioned for kings.
When Byron sends Childe Harold on
his pilgrimage he turned his eager foot
steps toward those spots where law and
government, art and learning, morals and
religion, had their rise. But he only
finds cities that had once been brave with
towers and glorious with temples, stand
ing forth wrecked by mans rage and
ruined by his venonous hate. Should
we move backward along the pathway of
ancient history we would find 1t iInpossi-
BILE to discover one city that has not been
blackened by mans war, or defiled by his
passion. 1t is not time, then, that is the
arch destroyer, but man.
Nature guards her treasures. She pro-
tects the beautifuI. Il is not rain and
snow; 1t is not fire and frost; it is not
summer and winter that have been the
destroyer of cities
-sTime has neither tooth nor scythe.H
Had it not been for mans greed and
hate the statues of the Pdrthenon would
be standing today in the zenith of their
protection and in the full splendor of
their beauty.
Mans venom is the tooth that gnaws.
Mans band-the hammer that breaks.
Mans hate-fiame, blackens.
Mans sin-moth. consumes.
AS worm coils itself in the petals of
a rose for evening, mans passion has
hidden itself in palace, in temple and in
gallery, and plotted for their overthrow
and destruction.
AS the clllQ places the sea smell TO ner
ear, that through the deep coils of the
shell she may hear the echo of the roar of
Lhe far resounding sea, so down the long
aisles of time come the sound of blows,
the cry Of rage and the shrek of men
death struck and dying.
But the ruin of cities is only the outer
type, the pathetic symbol of such a trag-
edy enacted on the 9th day of September,
1901, in Buffalo, n. Y. For that great
soul of William McKiuley's was, indeed,
a palace, where the eyes and ears were
windows, where reason the library
and Imagination the gallery ;-where the
heart was the chamber of affection, and
aspiration a dome that opened toward
the skies. palace whose walls have
become heap aud ats towers ruin by
the dastarily blow of the assassin And
the fall has shocked the heart of this
great Nation, aye, of the whole civilized
world.
sly text might be the cry of the anar-
chists of 10 centuries ago: ttWe will not
have this man rule over u.s.
The echo of this cry is what heard
in the pistol shot at Buffalo,
Who was the man shot?
The President of the United States
one of the noblest of the noble men who
have served this nation its chief ex-
eeutive. He is the man who has helped
TO lead the Nation to victory and success;
who has been honored by the nation for
a second time with ITS greatest gift; who
has endeared himself to political friends
and enemies alike till he had hardly a
personal enemy in the nation. A man of
pure aud noble life, a model husband and
\ devoted Christian.
This man is shot down.
No man ever showed more clearly the
Spirit of his Master, Jesus of Nazareth.
In the hour of his death Jesus CON-
mitted HIS mother to the keeping of His
disciple John, with the request that he
care for her as he would for his own
mother.
President Mckinley said, '.break the