The Lake County times. [volume] (Hammond, Ind.) 1906-1933, 1909-02-08

and bureau departments. Certain it is
this nation will have been found to be
| greater and richer in every material
way. The population has increased.
agricultural and Industrial wealth i'm
m~easurably greater. banks will reveal
large deposits. There have been great
additions to the scientific, medical and
literary wealth of this country. No one
doubts that this United States Of Amer
lea has developed wonderfully in the
past decade.
Notwithstanding all the increases in
population and wealth; the in
all lines of study and research, in all
that aid and embeilish civilized life,
there is a feeling. not altogether de-
fined, that perhaps we are growing a
little too fast; that in this eager race
for financial and material pre-eminenee
in this hurried, selfish, bitter contest,
some tradition are being forgotten,
some sentiments are being smothered,
some cherished ideals are being sacri-
feed. vicarious offerings at the shrine
of wealth and luxury.
In the economy of business, modern
methods have assumed formidable pro-
portions. In law and in medicine,
even in music and in the arts, a spirit
of commercialism seems to have enter
ed, and what was once a professior-
work that delighted the worker for the
work itself-seems to nave succumbed
tc the spirit of the times and is being
measured from the standpoint of hnan-
cial profit, in short to the practical
mind, nave become business ventures.
He who labors in these various fields
is counted a success or a failure in pro-
portion to the financial fruits of his
labor, study, and research.
If indulge in impractical ideas in
this practical age. in this great center
of high strung energy, in this great
whirlpool of ambition and advance
ment, in this city of tempestuous and
prodigious endeavors, | seek excuse in
the belief that / am addressing those
whose day dreams have not become al
together barred illusions. who have
carried away with you, when you
away on troubled seas went ~voyaging
with care" some ideas which you are,
even not unwilling to surrender. 1 feel
more assured of my position when l
remember that the institution in whose
honor and affection we have assembled
tonight, set down perhaps not in its
written curriculum. but nevertheless
preserved with fidelity and instilled it,
even unconsciously in all of us the
idea of faith in our particular work
and the necessity of preserving some
of the cherished ideals natured and
developed within her cherished pre-
cincts.
Frankly and without hattery 1 say
it. On the campus, in the class room.
in the modest quarters which material
horizons could never circumscribe.
when all thongs were possible be-
cause all were then untried" there was
the atmosphere through which we then
clearly discerned the future life work,
the success of which depended upon
the faithfulness to our ideals and the
desire and determination to live ac-
%cordingly and to become physicians,
educators, lawyers, scientists, %unsullied
bv the dress and materialism Of the
twentieth century brand of progress.
It is sometimes argued that it all de-
ponds upon the Point of View and
lconceding this to be true If material
gain be the sole object, if the ends
Justify the means, and If success be
measured by our bank accounts, then
he who dreams Of fidelity to ideal is
hopelessly out of tune with the music
wagon of the age. But II the object OF
|. wealth and progress, of science and
discovery, of law and government, of
preaching and teaching, to be develop
man in a better. nobler, m happier
being then may we not look with some
alarm at the census returns of the COM
ing year.
our census bureau will, no doubt
be able in a short time. to tell of great
progress in wealth, science, discoveries
and inventions that will illumine the
page with a blaze of glory. but let Us
not forget that side by side is this
record where the failure is as serious
as the success is great. Has the in
dividual risen as his Knowledge has
widened or his environment improved.
What he is, is still held to be less i'm
~portant than what he possesses and
uses. In the mad race for wealth null
: titudes are sacrificed as pitilessly as in
(; warfare. They are dragged by compe-
t tition to the verge of starvation. Greed
t has led to a worldwide struggle more
4 cruel than that of nature in which
t only the strongest. the most cunning
: and conscienceless survive. Our so.
ciety makes criminals and our pena
}, institutions harden them in wrongado-
ling. The people are taxed to supper