Iowa County democrat. [volume] (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1877-1938, 1908-09-24

DISTINGUISHED EXAMPLES CHAT
TERTON, KEATS, BRYANT, BY
RON, AND SHELLEY.
INSTANCES IN OTHER
FIELDS JEFFERSON, LAFAY-
ETTE, AND NAPOLEON.

Chicago has caused a renewal Of the
talk about this as the age Of young
men that springs UP whenever a citi-
zen still a year or so on the bright side
Of forty is made president of a na
tional bank or head Of great cor
pOratiOn, a senator of the United
States or the mayor of a great city.
We speak OF our Schwabs and Beve-
ridges and McClellans, and ask if ever
before such opportunities fell to the
lot Of those ungrizzled by advancing
years.
Over the youth of the republican
standard bearer, accidental president
Of the United States at 43, there were
and still are headshakings on the part
of grave and reverend seigniors. To
William of Germany at IS men will
scarcely yet accord his imperial title
without the detractive prefix young
or youthful" and when William OF
Nebraska, an unusually mature man
of SO, was first nominated for the presI-
dency vast numbers Of his fellow
countrymen persisted in regarding
him in the light of boy orator.
But, after all, are these and several
celebrities OF varying degree really
such prodigies of youthful achieve
ment that former generations cannot
equal or surpass them? A glance a.
history fOrbids an affirmative answer.
On the contrary, the instances where
men much younger, men really in the
first bloom Of youth and almost en-
titled to be called boys, have achieved
fame for themselves and left deep
marks on the earth's hoary surface
are thick as autumnaI leaves in Val
Iombrosa.
In the realms where imagination
holds sway our age is hopelessly dis
tanced. Where are our parallels
among poets to Chatterton, who died
at II, and Keats, whose years We're
25; to Rosetci, who wrote his blessed
DamozeH' at IS, and Bryant, who pub
lished ''ThanatOpsis" when one year
older; to Schiller, whose Robbers
was composed before he was 20, and
Shelley, who "Iisped in numbers, for
the numbers came,' and Byron, who
awOke and found himself famous az
"a; to the mighty young dramatists
Of Elizabethan days, or to Milton,
Burns, CoIeridge, Tennyson, Hugo,
Lowell and a score Of others whose
title to fame was secure before they
entered on their 30s? Can our youth
full musicians match the achievements
of the young Handel and the young
Mozart or our youthful painters mea-
sure brushes with the Raphaels Of the
past?
But, objection will be made, imagin-
ative genius and administrative gen
Jus are vastly different. The former
shows itself in early life or not at all,
and as regards it no one will claim
eminence for our intensely practical
and commercial age. Our young men
of genius are administrators and ma
ton builders, and it is with such men
Of former generations that comparison
must be sought. Let it be so. A few
examples taken almost at random Of
young men who, whether actuated by
patriotism or ambition. have in mod
ern times welded vast power for good
or i'll will serve to show un-founded
is the notion that the present age is
especially advantageous to the energy
of youth.
In America 12S years ago a man OF
80, already eminent in his native VIr-
ginia, drew up the most famous declar-
alton of political rights since Magma
Charra-a task and triumph which
would certainly never have been his
had Jefferson's contemporaries thought
of him as one who had not reached the
age of prudence. Fired by this docu-
ment, Lafayette, youth Of 19, left
France to throw in his lot with the
revolutionists and achieve in a few
short years a fame that will endure
as long as American history. Alex
ander Hamilton at 20 was Washing
tons aid re camp, at so a most inhu-
entail delegate to the constitutional
convention, at SO secretary of the
treasury, and he was only 47-or two
years more than President Roosevelt
| is now-when Burr's bullet laid him
low
Other instances in plenty could be
picked from American history, but Eu-
rope offers q still more fruitful field.
There was Charles MI, the Iron
hearted Swede," who at IS defeated
the allied nations, Denmark, Russia
and Poland, and with his troops passed
like a whirlwind into the latter
country 10 submerge it and set his
creature on its throne. Thencefor-
ward his meteoric career dazzled and
terrified Europe. until at q Russia 5
inhospitable plains and the military
genius of another extraordinary young
monarch. Peter the Great, brought
about his overthrow at Pultowa and
left a name at which the world
grew pale
To point a moral and adoTn tale.
He was SO when a cannon ball ended
his life in Norway.
There was Antoine Saint-Just, child
of the revolution. the youngest and