The Montgomery advertiser., 1903-09-18

he had sight of the possibility of an un- divided country. rid of sectionalfsm and provincialism. conscious of its destiny. as- sured of nationality. striving to 1t itself
 Tor the work of great nation in civili-
 zation. He had sight, too. of his section.
 ideaiized. to him, by fortitude and woe
 adjusting itself in silence and dignity and
 suffering and power to the spirit of the
 modern world. What was there for . strong man to do?--we may fancy him.
 self asking himself in the silence of his
 soul. There could be no chickering's
 for such men as he, no using
 of his great powers to find place for
 himself by nursing the feeling of hatred
 and revenge in the breasts of proud and
 passionate races. There could be no
 racial scorn, no theatrical pettiness. no
 vain. fatuous blindness or puerile obsti-
 macy? Not painlessly had God remolded
 and cast anew the nation The pain had
 indeed smitten his soul but his eyes
 were clear enough to see Gods hand in
 the movements of society and to realize
 the glory of new birth out of pain, and
 his desire was afiame to be about the
 work that recreates and sets in order.
 Like all sincere. unselflsh men. he saw
 his task lying before him-like a suniit
 road stretching straight before the trav-
 eler's feet. He was to walk in that path for all his remaining days. No academic or political honors could tempt
 him to turn aside. No consideration of self or fortune could swerve him from his course.
 The Vision of Gen. Lee.
 lover at Lexington. by the quiet. how- ing river and the simple noble hills, Rob- ert E. Lee saw the same vision, because there dwelt in him, too, the same utter simplicity, sincerity and unseinshness. The philosophic student of our nationai story will one day appraise ana relate how much it meant to that story that the vision of Lee was not disturbed nor distorted by dreams or fancies that in all ages have beset the brain of the hero of the people. This quiet man at Lexing- ton had led mighty armies to victory, and had looked defeat and ruin In the face with epic fortitude. He had stood the supreme figure amid the fierce joys and shoutings of a mighty war. His name rang around the world foremost in the fel- iowship of heroes of the English race; but the vision that appeared to Lee, the conqueror and warrior, was the same that appeared to Curry, the scholar and student and orator. It was vision Of many millions of childhood and youth standing impoverished and untaught amid new duties, new occasions, new needs. new worlds of endeavor, appealing muteiy and with outstretched hands to the grown-up strength of their generation, to know why they. thrilling with the inn pulses of youth and strength should not
 have a country to love, an age to serve, a
 work to do. and a training for that work. Alien to this new generation were the
 subtelties of divided sovereignty or re-
 sponsIbility for the presence of the Afri-
 can in our life; and strange to their
 eyes and ears the fading fires and retreat
 ing noises of battle and of war. The
 vision was life unconQuered. tumultuous,
 beautiful, wholesome, regenerative, young
 life-asking a chance of its elders to live
 worthily in It's world and time. The eid- CTS had had their day, and had had &C., uuaintance with achievement and sadness and defeat. but here stood undefeated youth Life is greater than any theo- ries said this vision. We ask the right to live!
 ''The Good Master once set little child in the midst of His warning disciples ana declared to them that that pathetic little figure prefigured to men forever the king dom of Heaven. Again and again in the long. dark story of the struggles of the race, that figure has appeared, and real greatness of soul has never failed to catch the meaning of the radiant pres ence. We may be sure that 1t was pres- ent to the eyes of William the Silent, and that the German has seen 1t in nis
 dark hours, and the Frenchman and the Englishman and the Greek and all great races which have brought things to pass Lee and Curry saw it. and thousands of like souls followed their leading and found their work and were happy as we are today with our work lying before us and our hearts asking no other blesseo- ness. Let all Americans be grateful to the God of nations that He had us enough Fnr d- CTS as these whose strength was as the strength of ten. because their hearts were pure' Lee gave his great example and a few years of noble service to the nation, and then passed, ike Arthur, while the new sun arose upon the new day A happier fortune befell Dr. Curry. There was left to him over two decades of time in which to strike for the realization of his dreams and the fulfllment of his plans.
 His 1.-Two Opportunities.
 "The general agency of the Peabody and of the Slater boards, two of the mob
 lest creative forces which have ever been
 set to work upon the life of the repub- lie. came to him as the opportunity of his life. and his last years were to be years of unfailing youth, wherein he was able in the service of these boards to think clearly, to will resolutely, to work joyfully toward high national ends. The task that confronted him, in its larger lines, was to democratize the point of view of an aristocratic society, to rena- tionalize it's impulses and aspirations. to preach the gospel of national unity to both sections, to stimulate the habit Of community effort for public ends, to en- rich the concept of civic virtues, to ex- empIify the ideal of social service, and l to set the public school in its proper CO., relation to all other educational agencies. in the front of the public mind as the chief concern of constructive statesman ship His task, in it's more technical as- poets, was to reveal the public school as it should be actually at work in a democratic Society-with all of it's neces- l sities-trained and cultured teachers, va ried curricula appealing to hand and eye and mind. industrial training, beautiful surroundings, nourished by public pride and strengthened by public confidence. The first ten years of his work were years of battle for the development of public opinion, and it was to be great struggle, for many heresies were afield. | He was told by those who sat in high places that public schools were goddess, and that the State had no right to tax one man to educate another mans child. that 1t was dangerous to educate the | masses and that the educated negro or
 poor white meant spoiled laborer. His | reply to all this was: Ignorance is no
 remedy for anything If the State has
 right to live at all it has right to | educate Education Is a great national | investment.
 l And so. that solemn, majestic thing called public opinion, got born, and few | men as earnest as death became some