The Republican journal. [volume] (Belfast, Me.) 1829-current, 1901-06-13
GRADUATION SERMON.

| The graduation sermon before the Belfast
| High school class of 1901 was given sunday
! forenoon, June 9th, at the Universalist
church by Rev. A. A. Smith, before large
congregation. The pulpit was very prettily
decorated, the prevailing colOrs being white,
yellow and green. The pulpit was covered
| with the white altar cloth, and bore on the
front, in green leaves and yellow blossoms
the figures 'O1 Handsome palms, clusters
of buttercups, apd other flowers in the
prevailing colors were arranged with
pleasing effects The graduating class, to
the number of eighteen, accompanied by
their teachers, occupied the front pews on
the centre aisle. The exercises opened with
a voluntary followed by responsive reading
of 1O3d Psalm. The pastor then read por-
tions of the I'd and Sd chapters of Proverbs,
and the 18th of Ecelesiastes, and offered
prayer. Miss Marion Wells sang a solo ''The
Singing in Gods Acre. by Jules Jordan );
the congregation and choir sang Glove
Divine by Charles Wesley, and Miss
Susan Dinsmore sang a solo, $50 Divine Re
deemer,' by Gounod.
Mr. Smith took for his text the words:
''Let no man despise thy youth; but be
thou an example to believers, in word, in
conversation, in charity, in spirit, in purity,
l Tim. 4:12. He said, in part:
| have chosen as the subject this morning
"The Excellences of YOUTH and largely
for two reasons first, because think these
eXcellencieS lie at the foundation of every
true, noble and vrtuous life; and secondly
because there is great deal which we, as
young men and women, can do for them.
The old counsel of the Greeks, ''Know thy
SELF might be termed the command of wis
dom, but the counsel of Christ, ''Rue thy
sef,' might be termed the command of
righteousness. 1t is the education of self
control that makes human life strong and
worthy. Education does not consist in fill
ing the mind with so many facts about the
universe, in SO much knowledge acquired
in symmetrical development of the whole
nature of man or woman. If man cannot
use the facts he has acquired then his educa-
tion has been failure. "My education is
finished, we are apt to say as we sing the
parting song of graduation day, as if all
development came to an end. We, rather,
graduate into the greater University of the
world, wherein the teacher is experience
and the taskmaster duty, and the honors or
dishonors are ours as we enter that univer-
sity with noble or ignoble aims. sOur
school hours,' said Carlisle, "are all the
days and nights of our existence
Among older people there has always been
tendency to disparage youth and its as
plrations, but the opening lines of the text
strike the key note to the value of youth
The excellences of youth must be built on
the foundation of truth, honor, virtue, love-
Character has no more solid masonry than
these.
We are told to be an example in word
The power of speech is one of the highest
gifts to man, but it is often made the agent
of evil. How much evil is summed up in
the words ISLANDER and gossip" A little
story is enlarged until it becomes an absurd
ity, or as is too often the case, until it ruins
a young life. We formerly looked with
contempt on the boy or girl who told tales
out of school, and we must look with the
same feeling upon the larger school of hui
man life There is no thief so low as he
who steals a good name.
Be an example also in conversation is
translated in the revised version as 'sman-
mer OF life 1t is the young men and wo-
men of the land that form the growing and
progressive society of the country. They
cot fha Sta ardc IF l. Il
to ''plain living, high thinking rather than
to the present growing tendency to luxury.
The true aristocracy of the country
should not be based on wealth, but on intel
ectual and moral superiority. The greatest
men of all time were men of plain living.
Especially is this true of that great saint of
sacrifice and human service, Jesus of Naz-
areth. Young people also set the standards
in art, in music, in literature.
! All the best teachers and prophets are
| agreed that love is the greatest, the surest
| thing in this world Confucius said, ..'knowl-
| edge is to know all men benevolence is to
| love all men," Let your sympathy go out
! towards the entire world. Learn what
Goldsmith calls the luxury of doing good,
| Nliu thhC eAO loCA CudplCI VI EllSG COI
thians as our rule in life.
Be examples also in faith and spirit.
| Have faith in goodness and truth and hold
| fast to that faith. Have faith in the life
work that you choose, no matter how lowly,
and 60 about it with an undaunted spirit.
Every kind of honorable labor is means
! of serving God. You serve him in the field,
the household or the workshop, as we'll as
in attending church. 1t is not the mere
workmen, the mere carpenter, the mere
physician or the mere minister that the
world needs, but these plus manhood, plus
faithfulness.
My last topic, said Mr.. Smith, is that OF
purity, and all the great, dark shadow of
impurity. l dare not say how much is
bound up in these words. Every day young
lives are growing up and alas growing down
in our cities What can we do for them ?
Not much, perhaps; and yet we can be ex.
amples. What this country is twenty OF
thirty years hence rests with us. 1t is not
how we talk and preach, but how we live
that will make difference by and by
Who will term it salvation this going or
fifty or sixty years, living coarse, de
graded life, and then manage to save
the little dwindled, distorted, defaced