The daily morning journal and courier., 1907-06-03

'~T - - ~~-N ~-Sl
 
 ing him ample excuse for abandoning the undertaking: and, last of all, when he refused to accept his life as the price of service to the British crown. In a letter written at the time of en- tering the army he declared that "a sense of duty urged him to sacrifice ! everything for his country These were not idle words; they were those of young man trained to look at life in 8 certain way, one who believed with all his soul that the supreme loy- alties of life were those of man to his country and to God Out of this belief came the voluntary offering of himself. Most of the great sacrifices, the heroic deeds of history, have been achieved under some compelling au- thority. The martyrdom of Hale was one to which he elected himself; and the glory of it consists in this-that his live for his friends, for his country, was so great as to lift him above all considerations of himself or his own fame Hear the words of Major Andre, who, four years later, met similar death under sentence from Washing ton. Speaking to those about him, he exclaimed; T pray you to bear me witness that I meet my fate like a brave man!" The words betray his thought; it is of himself and his own fame as a soldier. T only regret" said Hale, that have but one life to lose for my country" His words also betray his thought; 1t is of his country, of the cause of liberty, of his duty to God. It seems almost as if our Puritan lpoet must have had him in mind when he wrote the words:
 "So near is grandeur to our dust, So near is God to man,
 When, duty whispers low, Thou must
 The youth replies, I can. /" l As we go out from here to-day hope l 1t may be with the simple and yet pros found lesson of Hale's life deeply root- ed in our minds. And what is that lesson but the lesson of the text-the test of love is sacrifice; and the tsu- ipreme sacrifice is to lay down ones life for his friends The higher meaning of lpatriotism is that mans nature is so lenlarged that his countrymen become his friends; and to give his fife for his friends means to give his life for his Icountry. One there was who rose even above this, who laid down his life for his enemies, who gave himself for the world. And though his death was a shameful one, even the death of the cross, he had an unconquerable faith that the love that lay back of 1t would lsome day bring the world to his feet And some day it will, Slowly but sure- ly the race is rising into realization that love alone conquereth all things More and more clearly men are begin ming to see that the lover of men be comes, in the end, the judge of men and fixes the standards of men. The Iignominies of one age become the her oisms of the next If the motive is Hove, if the end be ajgreat cause, ther a hangman's moose may become the |symbol of honor. The young martyr ot whom we have been speaking to-day died what men called a shameful death yet he is being spoken of on all sides al "the Lycdas of our historic dead.' | you would know how much that means turn to the noble poem of Milton ant Tread until you come to those lines O iindefinable beauty:
 "So sinks the day-star in the ocear
 bed,
 And yet anon repairs his dropping
 head. ss And tricks his beams. and with new
 spangled ore
 Flames in the forehead of the morning
 sky"
 Thus went down in darkness the sta of Hale's young life, and of his fame went down only to rise again, and nov 1t burns brightly in the morning sky His place in our history is assured His fame will grow as grows our ap lpreciation of all that is simple, manl, and unsefish in human character, O all that partakes of the highest mora courage. It remains for us adequateI, and rightly to interpret his life, ant enforce the lessons of his martyrdom 1t remains for us to fulflll the prophec! of those last exquisite lines of poen that you have read and, I trust, will read again:
 From Fame-leaf and Angel-leaf,
 From monument and urn,
 The sad of Earth, the glad of Heaven
 His tragic fate shall learn;
 And on Fame-leaf and Angel-leaf 1 la- -aIa