5 If the faults or the crimes of thy youth Are a burden too heavy to bear, What hope can rebloom on the desolate waste Down, down with the fetters of fear! In the strength of thy valor and manhood arise, With the faith that illumes and the will that defies. "Too late!" through God's infinite world, From his throne to life's nethermost fires, 10 "Too late!" is a phantom that flies at the dawn Of the soul that repents and aspires. If pure thou hast made thy desires, There's no height the strong wings of immortals may gain 15 Which in striving to reach thou shalt strive for in vain. 20 Then, up to the contest with fate, Unbound by the past, which is dead! What though the heart's roses are ashes and dust ? What though the heart's music be fled? Still shine the fair heavens o'erhead; And sublime as the seraph who rules in the sun Beams the promise of joy when the conflict is won! THE HEBREW RACE ZEBULON BAIRD VANCE ZEBULON BAIRD VANCE (1830-1894), an American statesman, was born in Buncombe County, North Carolina. He was educated at Washington College, Tennessee, and at the University of North Carolina. Even as a college boy he was distinguished for wit, common sense, tact, and good-fellowship. In 1852 he was admitted to the bar, and two years later was elected to the state legislature. In 1857 he was sent to Congress. In May, 1861, North Carolina having seceded, he entered the Confederate army with the rank of captain. In August of the same year he was promoted to be colonel of his regiment. In 1862 he was called from the field to serve his people as governor. Through the trying days of civil war his administration was able and popular. At the close of the war he was imprisoned for two months in the old Capitol Prison in Washington. 5 10 In 1870 Vance, after having practiced law for a year or two, 15 was elected to the United States Senate, but was not permitted to take his seat. In 1876 he was a third time elected governor. Before his term of office was out he was elected to the Senate, and served his state in that body until his death. The Jew is beyond doubt the most remarkable 20 man of the world, past or present. Of all the stories of the sons of men, there is none so wild, so wonderful, so full of extreme mutation, so replete with suffering and horror, so abounding in extraordinary providences, so overflowing with 25 scenic romance. There is no man who approaches him in the extent and character of the influence which he has exercised over the human family. His history is the history of our civilization and progress in this world, and our faith and hope in that which is to come. From him have we derived 5 the form and pattern of all that is excellent in earth or in heaven. He was the priest and faith-giver to mankind, and as such, in spite of the jibe and jeer, he must ever be considered as occupying a peculiar and 10 sacred relation to all other peoples of the world. Even now, though the Jews have long since ceased to exist as a consolidated nation inhabiting a common country, and for eighteen hundred years have been scattered far and near over the wide earth, 15 their strange customs, their distinct features, personal peculiarities, and their scattered unity make them still a wonder and an astonishment. Time would not permit me, if I had the power, to describe the chief city of the Jews, their reli20 gious and political capital-"Jerusalem the Holy," "the dwelling of peace." In the days of Jewish prosperity it was in all things a fair type of this strange country and people. Enthroned upon the hills of Judah, overflowing with riches, -the free25 will offerings of a devoted people, decked with the barbaric splendor of Eastern taste, it was the rival in power and wondrous beauty of the most magnificent cities of antiquity. Nearly every one of her competitors has moldered into dust. The bat and the owl inhabit their towers, and the fox litters her young in the corridors of their palaces, 5 but Jerusalem still sits in solitary grandeur upon the lonely hills, and though faded, feeble, and ruinous, still towers in moral splendor above all the spires and domes and pinnacles ever erected by human hands. Abridged. 10 LOVE OF HOME HENRY WOODFIN GRADY The man who kindles the fire on the hearthstone of an honest and righteous home burns the best incense to liberty. He does not love mankind less who loves his neighbor most. 5 The germ of the best patriotism is in the love that a man has for the home he inhabits, for the soil he tills, for the trees that give him shade, and the hills that stand in his pathway. I teach my son to love Georgia, to love the soil that he stands 10 on, the broad acres that hold her substance, the dimpling valleys in which her beauty rests, the forests that sing her songs of lullaby and of praise, and the brooks that run with her rippling laughter. The love of home-deep-rooted and abid15 ing that blurs the eyes of the dying soldier with the vision of an old homestead amid green fields and clustering trees, that follows the busy man through the clamoring world, persistent though put aside, and at last draws his tired feet from 20 the highway and leads him through shady lanes and well-remembered paths until, amid the scenes of his boyhood, he gathers up the broken threads |