The Washington herald., 1920-11-14
The world is wheel, and it viii
tonne around al right-Disraei.
The Power Of Symbolism.

i Abbey the remains of an unidentified
common soldier who fought for his
country and her allies in the great war.
France also announces her intention to
honor m similar way the vast number
OF her sons who fought in national self
defense and against the enemy of democ-
r1cy and national independence. The site
OF the interment of this unknown" war
nor, symbol of valor and self-sacri6ce,
has yet to be settled; but it will be in the
heart of the nations capital where its in
spring and educational work can 60 on
ncessantly for unknown but multitudinous
years
To the thoughtful few and the loving
many" of the British and the French peo-
pies these decisions will come with COM
forting pride. They show that their gov
ernors are not lacking in some of the
hnest attributes of humanity, such as
gratitude, recognition of the worth of the
common man, and of the common democ-
racy of death, whether by violence as in
war or by running down of the bodily
frame as m times of peace. In the noblest
OF the shrines erected by each nation for
the eoPmemoration of its rulers, lis states
men, its men of letters and its Captains
courageous" where humanitys highest
ideals are set forth, they will set up mon
uments over the dust of the man in the
ranks who never came back to receive
honors or love from the kinsmen he died
to save, and who first found his grave on
the field where he fought and died
The world has had to wait some time
for postwar. display of democracy of
this kind. Emperors, kings, marshals and
commanders of armies and navies, and
prime ministers and premiers have never
lacked for burial in shrines of splendor
and renown. Nor have the hosts who.
dying in the ranks, escaped loss of iden-
tity, gone uninterred of late in suitably
prepared and often beautifully environed
graves Witness the American nations
great cemeteries for the men who died
IN the Civil War, such as the one at
Arlington. But now mans reverence and
sense of symbolic values has taken high
er form. He has said to himself. Let
me pay homage to the host who though
nameless forever are equally deserving of
recognition with those combatants who in
dying did not become mysteries; let me
be as reyerent in my awesome ignorance as
the ancient kthenians were in their altar
to "The Unknown God"
How far reaching the spiritual influence
of these graves for the unknown" dead
will be they best can appreciate who
know the mystic power of symbolism.
The most moving Of ancient Egypt's mon
uments is not the Great Pyramid but the
Sphinx. The European getting his first
glimpse of New York harbor TODAY NAV
wonder at the audacity and the beauty of
the Woolworth building, but his heart is
more deeply stirred by the statue of
Liberty Enlightening the World" The
simple, massive, towering and uninscribed
granite shaft on the, Mall teaches both
tourist and resident to know the real
Washington better than the house in
which he lived at Mt. Vernon does. The
cross and the crescent alike have more
power to incite self-sacrifcing devotion to
faith than the vast collection of books
about Jesus or Mohammed
A symbol is the truth-and something
more. 1t is fact plus imagination 1t sat-
isles the mind, but also the elemental feel.
ings- 1t may be expanded to take on all
finer shadings of human experience, or it
may be the only solace of a presaic mind
burdened with life and finding its only
escape into idealism by devotion to some
thing it loved in its youth or that its for
; bears died for in more heroic age
Too often the so-called elite of the in
telleetual world, with Pharisaic pride in
their rationalism. scof at the symbolists.
They wonder why the sight of yellow
harp on green background stirs the
Irish Celto to fervor.- They cannot COM
prehend why so many men of all races
like to attire themselves in raiment hav-
ing symbolic significance. They prefer
cloquence stripped of all figures of speech
or use of symbolic words They decline
IN time OF war to wear the emblem of
their country or to allow it to float over
their homes. They mistrust all rites of
religion that are ritualistic and symbolic
They would have no Westminster Abbey
or Pantheon. Their idealism is deadly
and dezdening They stand in the ,v,v