The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1905-07-02

much less the moral, strength of any
human being. Taken by itself it has
but little to do with the measurement
IF manhood or womanhood," and then
ldded:
eff book learning makes civilization
md the Southern people didn't have
t. how. do you account for their his
DRY? For the first sixty years of the
ife of this republic they controlled its
lestinies, and have never failed in any
period of it's existence to maintain
heir prestige, in peace or war. To
What then is to be attributed this re-
markable record? To just that which
sustained them under their unparalleled
ed calamities, and has secured the
marvellous results which have since
aollowed-character which is infinite
" greater than book learning or any
other of the mere veneerings of So
called Observation-Disclosures that
reVerences God, honors womanhood,
owes home and native land. and fears
not the face of any man. That is the
bedrock on which their civilization
rests and their history has been built,
and it will endure when those who af-
feet to sneer at and belittle it have
persisted and been forgotten. And my
plea to you, young gentlemen, is to
preserve that character, and. by all
Your fathers were never influenced by
the "get rich quick idea that seems
TO be the special curse of this genera
ton. They did not believe that the
main object of life and the highest
ambition that man could cherish was
the accumulation of money. There
were some things that they did not
consider marketable, and those things
hey hold sacred. This characteristic
81 1ix lizof inya fna
time ridiculed and Knocked at as
Southern chivalry," but as the de-
moralizaton of society has progressed
(and it certainly has) there has-re-
luctantly, perhaps, but no less certain
ly-groWn up an increasing respect
for the spirit that persistently adhered
to that ideal, and / am satisfied that
it is more widespread today among
thinking people outside the South than
ever before. 1t is the only salt that
can, under God, preserve American
civilization. and when it's SAVIOR no
longer seasons our social life, decay
and destruction are inevitable.
1.-The duty and responsibility of pre-
serving and perpetuating that ideal
rests upon the young men of the South
and especially upon those who, like
yourselves, have had the advantage of
liberal education. Cherish it, culti
Vate it as q priceless inheritance to be
transmitted to your successors forever.
II is the highest service~you can rend-
er to your country and to posterity.
"Of course there were exaggerations
of the ideal of which / refer that af
forded some ground for satire and
ridicule; there is not and never has
been a social or political-or even u
religious-system that has not suf~
fered from the fanaticism or folly of
some of its professed adherents. But
a society that adopts as cardinal prin-
cipals high sense of personal honor
the sanctity of the home, honesty in
the administration of public affairs,
civility and courtesy of department
everywhere and at all times and unaf-
fected reverence for God and holy
things, is a society that will endure
through every i'll that may befall it.
That is the civilization you inherited
and which 1t is incumbent on you to
maintain.
"You cannot maintain it if you relax