The daily Gate City and constitution-Democrat. (Keokuk, Iowa) 1916-1922, 1920-06-01
Rector OF St. Johns Episcopal Church
Delivers Sermon to Soldiers of
Three Wars Sun
day.
LIBERTY IS ACQUIRED
What Il Means and What It Will Come
to Considered by Pastor IN An
n1a! Memorial Day Ad-
dress.

war and world war aLLenu6d OWNS
services Sunday morning at the ST.
Johns Episcopal church. The Rev
w. S. D. Lamont, rector of St. Johns
preached to the veterans, and in his
sermon said:
The old thought of this day was
that it should be the epoch of patriot
ism, and especially a memorial Of
! heroism of the soldiers; but we know
now that the era of the war of the re-
bellion was great era in the history
| of the republic. If we read the pages
Of the past we recognize at once that
whenever any nation has gone through
period Of stress and of grievous
peril. everything that has been best
and yet latent in the genius of the peo-
pie has suddenly come forth in its
| strength All that was finest in the
genius Of Athens came out with that
great struggle with Philip of Mace
donna And when that hour came In
which everything that was finest in
the civilization was threatened, then
suddenly the genius of Venice famed
| forth and reached its apex in cathed-
raj and glorious chapel, in painted
ceiling and fresco. Not otherwise was
| it in the history of this our own re-
public When war came to this great
! republic, everything that was strong
est in the nation came to the front
It was incidentally an era of patriot
ism; it was essentially an era Of great
soldiers-Gr Sherman, Sheridan,
on the one side and of Lee and Stone
wall Jackson on the other, and many
other which we cannot mention. 1t
-, of al
great orators, like Philips Beecher,
Curtise were pleading for patriotism.
It was an era of great editors, when
men like Horace Greedy were writing
their arguments for liberty. It was
also great era for the great merch-
ants who were sending food and
clothing for the cause of liberty; and
time, when all through this land, the
enthusiasm of the young men, and es-
pecially the best scholars was signally
manifest for the saving of the ma
ton. In that struggle the colleges
were emptied and the universities
we're silent Soon million men were
under arms. And then we had our
army of crippled heroes, and our
armies of widowed women and weep
ing mothers and children; and now
| that long time has passed. we under
stand that it IS not possible for any
man to wear any badge OF more sig
nal honor in this republic than those
badges that bear witness to mans
having marched with the army Of the
republic, sailed with the navy under
the stars and stripes wherever they
have led, at home or abroad under
| foreign skys. In memory of these sol
oilers, heroes, living or dead, the whole
nation celebrates this the national
feast of patriotism
| Perspective is Needed.
All great wars, like g"caI mountain
ranges, need perspective and distance.
The man who lives in Colorado
Springs for instance, can not under
stand the perspective Of the great
ranges of the Rockies. He needs to
take journey of a few hundred miles
to the east of the west, and then turn
his eyes to the horizon and behold
these lofty SUBMITS standing like
Gods sentinels, guarding the liberty
of this great nation. Not otherwise
/ is it in Connection with great men.
We need perspective. We could I'm
derstand this great law better if we
could 60 and stand under the great
dome of St. Peters at Rome, close up
to the dome itself, and see what
would seem to us as great blotches
of crimson, huge red splashes and Of
blue and of yellow as meaningless
Ida1bs but if we descend to the floor
of the cathedral and to as great dis
lance as possible within its walls, till
oh-f fryn foot
away from them, suddenly the daub
Wonder would be lost in the features
of a saint and angel and a surface that
seemed meaningless and ugly, through
distance was made beautiful. We
have now what is spoken Of as the
philosophy of history. The events Of
the civil war are no longer a success
sion of battles and of marching regi-
ments OF men. We begin to see the
place that those soldiers of ours oc-
c7,pv. and that they march side by side
with the great heroes of the past, and
of the present; and just as we think
of Abraham Lincoln we want to think
and know what was his relation as
an emancipation with the work of
Cromwell and Hampden, and what
was their relation with men like
r nther. Calvin and Wiclif, and what
was their relation with the marching
and counter-marching of all the sol
diers on the plains of history past and
,resent so we want to know what was
the relation of our soldiers and the
soldiers of other lands who marched
beside them. separated it may be by
long periods of time; and what was
the relation between our civil war
and other great wars of the world
Strangely enough it is in the history
of those wars that we can study how
the five great liberties have been
achieved. ....
It is not necessary to call the roll
of the centuries. One simple view
will explain the four epochs of the