The Birmingham age-herald., 1921-03-28
M E N !, w o M E N
 A ND T HIN c s


 Rotary has run round the world.
 Perhaps one of the strangest things about it comes from the fact that with out ritual or ceremony and with only weekly meeting around the table, it yet has functioned in such a way as to make it about the most popular insti- tuition of its kind ever called into be- ing for the Rotary idea has caught on and is going strong.
 There have been dinner clubs galore, for ever since man got at all civilized 1t has been the order of the day to make much of dining together. The story of how a neighbor was first called in to break bread until out of the i'm novatton there came into being great banquets would show the upward trend of the innate desire among men to lose themselves in the pleasure of the table.
 do not know the name or even the nation or race, of the first after din ner speaker, but this I do know, that, like Abraham of old. he is the father
 
 overrun the world, and today might easily be called the after dinner speakers age" for he flourisheth as never before since the first man stood up after eating, and said, MT. Chair man, Ladies and Gentlemen" It's a national custom in America
 It is easy to see how men of the same profession, business or trade would find it pleasant to meet around the festive board on stated occasions to discuss the matters of common in- terest; but none of the ones restricted to any one class has ever had such suc- cess as that of Rotary, for 1t has with in fits membership the picked men be enrolled in it places no one under any obligation to treat Rotarian on any other basis than any of his fellow men.
 It is not, then, a community of in- terest either from commercial po- litical. social or religious standpoint. The members meet on the common ground of humanity. and while coming such identity as soon as they find themselves around the table. The cap italist is on just the same footing as the man who is wage earner. The college graduate has no adventage over the man who is without a diploma The preacher is just good fellow like the man who has made no profession of his faith. There is room for the rich and the poor, the high and the low, the saint and the sinner. the educated and the self-made man.
 It's big experiment in true democ. racy, the realization of the dream so beautifully expressed by Robbie" Burns. which is as fresh today as when he wrote 1t in spite of its frequent quo- tation, "A Mans a Man for a That" Then let us pray that come it may
 As come it will for a that
 That sense and worth, OCT a. the earth
 May bear the gree and a that.
 For a that, and a that
 It's coming yet, for a that When man to man, the world OCT
 Shall brothers be for a that"
 I suppose just because it is coming faster among Rotarians than among any one else is why the "Rotes" are multiplying so fast at home and get ting such foothold abroad. But try as we may it is no easy thing to catch the Snirit nf mi per. It is hard to define an ideal Not only is this true, but only a privileged few know our own ideals. It has been well said that an ideal, properly de- fined, is both the child and the father of the real; it is both desirable and ent need which imagination proposes but imagination directed and subdued by experience, and fortified and re- trained by the will.
 I'll say. then, that Rotary is an ad- venture in democracy shot through and through with ideals, yet rock ribbed in service. It's each Rotariap making an honest effort to articulate his own life
 
 community, his state, his country, and humanity. The ideals which get hold of his imagination he seeks to realize not only in his own life but are the ones he wishes to rule in the lives of others, thereby shaping the destiny of the de- mocracy in which he lives. Do not let us forget, however, as Rotarians, that an ideal is not genuine, even though it be practicable. until our will is en- listed to achieve it.
 The true Rotarian does not wish to avoid responsibility. If this were not true, the motto He profits most who serves best" would be merely a hypo- critical label. Just because it is shib- boleth of which he Is proud the Ro- tarian sets himself against the cult of responsibility which is the rock on which democracy will break itself un- less men of ideals and men of courage set themselves resolutely to fight against those who are ready to surren- der what our forefathers won at great price to the threats of anarchy, which just now is spreading so fast among us.
 The Rotarians stood the test of war, but now comes the acid test of peace. If we are to preserve our democracy, if we are to remain free. each one of us must assume his share in the drudg- cry of freedom. A much harder thing to do than to thrill to. the call of the colors to meet foreign foe. There be foes of our own household who are a peril to this republic. There is a pseudo o-democracy which is the spawn of demagogery abroad in the land which seeks to array class against class