Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1914-06-13

all very affecting, l admit, but l cam
not believe that any person OF our
age, having all life before him can
sincerely hold such a cruelty cold and
hopeless view of life. No days can
die but the ones which are so unhappy
that we forget them gladly. Days that
have been joyous must live forever
| in happy memory. The world We are
going to enter is not cruel and cold.
| Unsympathetic people we find every
where, as We have already found
them; but to those who come to it,
young. warm hearted, and courageous,
above all courageous the world must
prove warm hearted and generous in
return.
As for the hope that we shall meet
in better land, it is a good Chris
tian sentiment, and if we live we'll
here upon earth, there is no reason
to doubt that We shall so meet. But
after ALL, we are none of us at the
point of death; it even seems pos
sible that some few of us may live to
see old age, is it not conceivable
that we should meet again here upon
earth? Indeed l scarcely think that
any of us, if the question were put
to him directly, would be ready yet
TO leave this cruel world, even for
the better land" of which these
mournful individuals speak.
1t must be confessed that greater
ones than these have held the same
gloomy views. Wordsworth in his
ode, ..Intimations of Immortality"
says:
Heaven lies about us in our infancyy
Shades of the prison house begin to close
Upon the growing Boy
But he beholds the light and whence 1t
flows.
He sees it in his joy,
The Youth who daily farther from the
east
Must travel, still is Natures priest
And by the vision splendid
Is on his way attended
At length the Man perceives 1t die away
And fade into the light of common day.
Here we have a poetic and truly
beautiful description of the glamour
and the illusions that glorify every
day life for a child, but We have some
thing besides that is utterly untrue,
the implication that with the coming
of maturity, comes also disillusion-
ment, and consequently the end of all
happiness since no one who is dis
illusioned can be quite happy. But
thing so cruel one must have lost all
faith in the CREATOR himself Even
Wordsworth. himself could not have
believed that a merciful God would
place men upon earth, foredoomed to
utter misery and unhappiness.
1t is not true that all illusions fade
as one grows up. To be sure child
ish beliefs are destroyed but new ones
have the child's irresponsible happi-
ness, but in a deeper. graver way, his
powers of perception and enjoyment
increased by training and experience
he can feel joy that the simple ma
ture of a child could never under
stand and however many illusions
may be built up only to be shattered,
the human heart possesses infinite
strength to cling to its conception OF
what is highest and best.
Let others take whatever unhappy
point of view they will, We will go out
into the world with faith in ourselves,
and with courage to fight and to suf-
fer if need be, for our ideals.
So, high in soul, and high in heart,
we, the class of Nineteen Fourteen,
bid you Farewell
To the Class.
1t seems scarcely day since we
entered Gardiner High, dear class
mates, yet four years have fled. and
tonight We stand together for the last
time as Seniors. Tonight, however
reluctantly, We must say farewell and
pass out forever from the kindly
doors that have sheltered us so long.
Yet though we do pass on as many
another class has done. though we are
forgotten as many better class
doubtless has been. still in the heart
of each of us gathered here tonight,
Nineteen Fourteen will never cease
to be the one great class. and her
spirit will never die.
The spirit of class fellowship has to
q certain extent. always been present
with us. though l must admit it there
have been times when it was not very
much in evidence, was even in dan
ger of humiliation but somehow it