The Manning times. [volume] (Manning, Clarendon County, S.C.) 1884-current, 1904-06-08

roots are nourished in the fruit.
full soil of woman's unsullied pur.
ity, watered by the dews Of hel
gentle sympathy. enriched by the
subtle and vivifying power OF
her deathless love and constancy!
So dear to heaven is sanity chastity,
That. when soul is found sincerely So
A thousand liveried angels lackey her
Surely. the blind bard Of Albion
did not depict in colors too glow.
ing the unspeakable value and
dignity Of a spotless womanhood.
Would it be deemed extravagant
to declare that, as the woman is,
so will the man be-: That as she
sinks or rises, so will society
sink or rise2 That as she keeps
alive upon the Vestal alters the
pure flame Of an undlmmed
faith and a loyal devotion to no.
bic ideals, humanity itself will
be uplifted and ennobled and
brought nearer to the realization
of it's own ideals of truth and
justice? Some one has said that
the ''press is the palladium of a
peoples liberties. Let me par
aphrase the saying-';The purity
of woman is the palladium Of
mans happiness and greatness. !"
Let US return for a moment to
the thought with which I began
these remarks-the thought Of
''faithfulness" in work. Poor
Louis, dead in his palace, clad
in his gorgeous funeral vestments
points the moral. He had been
a mighty monarch. In his youth
the excellence of his character,
the amiability of his manner and
the kindliness of his disposition
won for him the title of :'Louis
Bien- n-aime"-:'Louis, the we'll
beloved" Yet his career was
marked by slow process of de-
terioration, which swept him
gradually. but surely, through
the successive downward stages
of a selfish pleasure loving exis-
tence. until he plunged into the
abyss of grossest sensualism and
debauchery. And so he came
to his earthly end, amid the exc.
crations Of his oppressed people,
embittered by the pangs of re,
morse and tormented by the ter
rors of superstition which
could only humble the name OF
God and knew neither His Love
nor his mercy. What does this
catastrophe mean?
The secret Of this tragedy OF
the human soul lies in the fact
that the French king was false
to his ideals. For truth he sub
stituted Hypocrisy; for justice
he substituted wrong; for kind
ness he substituted cruelty; for
virtue he substituted vice; for
purity he substituted lust.
And so the light slowly faded
out of his sky, and the Prince
became a grounding. Could
there be a more terrible object
lesson: a more awful illustration
of the disaster which must over
take the soul Of the nan who
forgets the dreams of his boy
hood and the ideals of his youth?
Because he was unfaithful, Louis
fell. Let no young man lay the
fattering JUNCTION to his soul that
he may be unfaithful and yet
grow up "unto the measure of
the stature Of the fullness" of a
perfect and noble manhood. Let
no guileless maiden hug to her
bosom the delusion that she may
do unfaithfully and yet, when
the years of thoughtless selfish
ness and frivolous pleasure have
stamped their indelable impress
upon her soul. turn her eye in
ward and gaze upon a page all
fair and white which she may
lay bare unafraid to the sight OF
man and God.
Much that I have said, l am
aware, must seem vague and IN
definite. It is easy to deal in
glittering generalities but to put
truth in concrete form, to clothe
it in words which bring it home to
the mind and heart and compel
it's recognition as a living force
from which there is no escape
this, and nothing less, must be
demanded of him who would
seek to help his fellows in their
efforts to live high life or do a
noble work. True. Look, then,
at the concrete form of the truth
which we have been considering.
Loyalty to our ideals means sim.
ply faithfulness in the doing OF
the work allotted to US IN this
life. For no man can be faithful
| in his work unless he is able and
willing to emulate those ideal
virtues which marked the char
acter of our Great Exemplar-
s;obedience, devotion, purity,
truthfulness, kindness, resistance
to temptation. selfsacrifce. y
This, I think, must, in some OF
its phases, be the meaning OF
that quaint verse of the sanity
George Herbert's:-
a servant with this clause
Makes drudgery divine:
Who sweeps room as for thy laws
| NI,1-o- +bo+ an6 tho action fine