Middlebury register. (Middlebury, Vt.) 1886-1937, 1913-06-20
18TH COMMENCEMENT.


old spirit is by no means dead. All
we need is organization, the power and
the habit of working together and hold
ing together for a fixed and determined
purpose. And all we need for organza-
ton is leadership-leaders who see the
goal plain, and who will consecrate
themselves to its attaining in high
patriotic devotion.
would like to call haystack prayer
meeting of few devoted college men
of Vermont, not for the sake of peoples
of a distant cline, but for our own
people, who have been laboring under
untoward conditions, who have loved
their country not wisely but too well,
and have poured out their life too free
ly, for its saving, who are today scat
tered among our own Green Mountains
as sheep not having a shepherd. Why
not social settlements in the losing
towns of Vermont? The idea, as
understand it, is to go among people
and live there, not to preach to them,
but to share their life. Who of you
will go to live in a hill town of YER
mont, not where there is the best job,
but where is the greatest need? Why
not take your training and your spirit
there, and work out the problem Not
to live as they live, and be contented
as they are contented but to show first
yourself how a more generous liveli-
hood can be attained, and more generous
thoughts cultivated, and then to COM
municate these to others. One man of
the right calibre and the right power,
consecrated to the work as only relig-
ious faith can consecrate him, could lift
a whole community, and one community
so inspired would change a whole
county, and one county leading the
way, the whole State would follow.
The call of Vermont today is for vol
unteers, as truly as from 81 to '65.
They paid men only S13 a month then,
and they sent them to shot and shell
and to the rank prison holes of Vir-
ginia There were found 10000, sires
of the children who today need your
help. Our college empted its halls into
the ranks. And now the call is from
the children of the mountains. Their
faces will look up at you first in Won
der, then in the answer of understand
ing, then in the deep gratitude of sym
pathy. Each one of you could take a
| -, g., Il
make it a beacon for a countryside
And then you might be master of a
score of schools, and the leader of the
life of group of towns, and get them
to throw away the old books and repair
the shattered building, and bring new
life to their industries, their churches,
their whole society, and some day they
might lay you to rest in the old Gem
etery its weeds cleared away, the
trees all pruned and neatly tended, and
under the great hills a community
restored to its heart and continuing on
many days in the prosperity of peace
in grateful recognition of the leader
who showed it the way.
Aem6ers Of tie Graduating Class: You
go into world in which it is difficult to
! see the far and the near in proper pros
pective. There is always a glamour in
distance and in the dimly known, and
always tendency to undervalue what
one knows well and whatever is close
at hand. You will find it difficult to
idealize the near, especially since the
hundreds about you suspect nothing but
the tame and ordinary in the life imme-
diately about them. | charge you to
open your eyes to opportunity in your
immediate environment, wherever the
good God may place you. Palestine
was not once the holy land men of
faith and men of insight made it so.
Assist was not once the home of saints,
but ST. Francis loved the poor there
and the ages seek out his home. You
have attended four years our little col
lege in Vermont's green hills. We are
ambitious to make this a center of ser
vice, for the State which nourishes US,
LOT Tie UdllOII 10 WHICH we owe dlle-
glance. The thoughts of communities
the world over, East and West and
beside the seven seas, turn to this col
lege as the place whence men of large
and holy service departed for their
work in the world. 1t is yours today to
take up the holy succession. And your
alma mater will watch you, and pray
for you, and find her gladdest JOY when
pilgrims find their way thither to thank
God for what we did for you here and
for what you have done for them in the
place where God called you to serve.
On Monday the class day exercises
on the campus were held. A large
stand had been erected to accommodate
the graduating class. Banked with
evergreens and decorated with bunting
it presented fitting appearance. Led