Evening times-Republican. [volume] (Marshalltown, Iowa) 1890-1923, 1902-05-26
SERMON IO STUDENTS
DR.. F. M. Coleman Delivers Raca
calaureate Sermon to the
Class OF '02.
Brilliant Address Before an Inn.
mense Audience on the SUBJ
iect. "0ur Heritage"
Rev. F. w. Russell breaches to
the Old Soldiers on Sunday
Morning.

day evening 10 near tiie bstSSe'ie'u VI S''S
sermon delivered by the pastor, Dr.
NJ. Coleman and be present at tn
first public function of commencement
week. Probably 1000 people crowded
the large edifice, the cool and pleasan
weather and the dismissal OF othel
CONGREGATIONS for the evening bringing
out a brilliant audience to listen tt
one of the best sermons. ever deliV-
I cred on a similar occasion in this city
The members of the senior and Jun
Tor classes and the teachers in the high
school sat together in seats reserved
for them in the front of the auditor
iurn. The decorations of the church
were simple, and consisted of hugs
bunch of carnations placed on the al
tar. DR.. f. w. Parsons of the Baptist
church gave the invocation, Rev. w
H. Scott of the Christian church offer-
ed prssyer and Rev. f. W. Russell OF
the Presbyterian church read the
scripture lesson. DR.. Coleman took as
his text John 4:SS-"Other men nave
labored, and We have entered their Ia
bcr.' He said in part:
SAT first 1t may seem that this text
is not appropriate to the occasion Al
the end of school course. lasting Tor
years, in which You are sure there has
Keen very much of personal achieve
nent, in which you have worked out for
yourselves really great results, 1t may
seem to you as more fitting to talk
about what you have done than about
what others have done for you.
81 want to assure you that / do not
use this text to convey any such mean
ing as did the college professor who
went to call on certain student at his
loom and found the door open and the
student out. Walking into the room
he saw on the study table a Latin pony.
assume that not one of this class has
ever used such pony, but that you
know what it is because you know so
many things. But this pony was
literal translation of the Latin work
that the student was, supposed to be
translating for himself. The professor
penciled on the fly leaf, Other men Ia
bored: and We have entered into their
labor. That was a case of the wrong use
of anothers labor. My use of the text
has no such Implication. In fact feel
what you have done for yourselves that
could spend much of our time in con-
graduating you on the merit of your
worthy work. But l am sure your
nlodesty will be saved strain in this
public presence, and you will be better
satisfied to have me stimulate you to
further undertaking and success by
pointing out the opportunity and obi
81.
is yours thru the work of others.
"The unity of the human race is
proven by the capacity of universal CO.
operation The powers and needs of
men are enough alike that no extremes
are found where they are unable to
work with and for each other. The
product of the hand of prehistoric
man, as tools were fashioned for him.
self and those of his day. If preserved,
can be used by men today to meet their
need under conditions like those when
the tools were made. Your hand could
WELD the stone hammer fashioned by
the man in the stone age just as his did
You could shoot with the first bow and
arrow ever made as well as the man
who made it. The houses builded by
the sons of Noah would shelter you as
they did them and meet your need as
theirs If you had no better. True, we
DO not use their hammers nor live in
their houses, but before the hammer or
the house there was an idea in that |
primitive mind, and tho the hammer is
lost and the house perishes in its use, |
the idea never dies and becomes the |
germ from which expanding thought |
develops. And just as true as that the |
blood of Adam is in our veins is the
thought of Adam in our most advanced |
thinking. A letter written a thousand |
years before Moses wrote can be read |
by our scholars today, and their |
thought is Ineligible to our minds
Not only can men of the earliest |
time serve us. but the widest extremes
OF the present generation can work to
each others hand. Livingstone and
Stanley in Africa, best examples of
modern culture, could not have lived |
without the work and wisdom of saw
ages farthest from civilization. And no
che questions that we of larger light
and greater attainments can minister
much to the profit of the tribes of Al
RIGA. The learning that has been
accumulated by the brightest races
and assimilated by the brighter minds
of Africa and the islands of the sea.
This power of ministry each to the
other thru all the races and all time
makes possible the accumulation thru
all the ages the heritage which has
been used, increased and passed on thru
successive generations until at last we
pre- the heirs of all the ages.
4
to decay. No house builded by the I,
sons of Noah shelters human head h
today. And their generations for two .
thousand years have left us only ruins /
Of what their hands fashioned Their
ships are gone, their implements de-
,ayed, and only buried ruins tell us
where their cities once had been But
thought never perishes. And the unity
II the race is evident in nothing more
han in the similarity of the mind And
his makes easy the communication of |
he thought of one mind to another. He /
yho imparts knowledge is like God in {
his that giving doth not impoverish, 5
lor Withholding make him rich The {
highest achievement of one mind is Ii
transferred with little loss to another $
md is the foundation from which he
tarts to build anew by original think 7
ng. Aristotle, the greatest of all Greek (
received from others 1
more than he originated. The founda- c
ion from which he started had been [
by all of Plato's thinking, for I
,Info had been his teacher for twepty /