Aquinas Institute - Arete Yearbook (Rochester, NY)

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THE ARETE Cfje £ lt) Stamping @rounb Alas! Alack! What shall we do, We boys carefree and gay, When northward we must turn our steps And lakeward wend our way? We’ll find we know a building fine, Its like ne’er was before; But often shall we yearn for The happy days of yore. For days when in the study hall From porous ceiling fell The liquid regularly found Within the much sung well. For days when in Brown Square we played, Its mud seemed campus grand, Before we knew the blessings Of a spacious, verdant land. We’ll miss the paneless windows Through which blasts came so cold And the desks so deftly hand carved Which kindled memories old. We’ll miss the tiny bulletins Where we jammed to view a sign “I’ll see those at two-thirty Who were not here at nine.” We’ll miss the dreaded office Where our Principal held sway And pointed out the perfect path The narrow, righteous way. We’ll miss that store of Bridgie’s, Its counters and their rails, O’er which was graciously exchanged Our money for his sales. In truth we’ll miss ’most everything We had at Frank and Brown; But we’ll never miss an honest chance To add to its renown. C. Martin. twenty-six

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THE ARETE twenty-five

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THE ARETE z )t cou of RACTICALLY every highly prized and truly cherished quality which man can possess is secured, directly or otherwise, by arduous and sincere exertion and application. Man’s physical and mental talents, excepting of course those which are hereditary or immanent, he obtains by study, by training, by developing his organs through exercise and utilization of them. And the results of this assiduous and conscientious schooling of his faculties, of this preparation for the great professional and social world in which his field of life will be located, constitute what man calls his character, the amalgam and organization of all the strong, virile, self-reliant, and resourceful powers of mental individuality and ruggedness. Character differs in the several concepts of it which men may possess, but the true essence of real intellectual and moral goodness and culture and refinement and strength which the word connotes is something of which man has but a vague comprehension, but which he realizes is derived from mortification, ascetic-like, self-denial, and physical and mental self-sacrifice. For centuries upon centuries, through all phases and vicissitudes of time, in every period of history, war, and the awful toll of misery and horror and death it exacts, have been influential factors in retarding and delaying the progress that civilization has steadily striven to make. In any difference between nations, at any fleeting chance whim of an arrogant and self-centered sovereign, on a signal from the ruling body of a peaceable and tranquil power, a disastrous conflict may be precipated, and great peoples of the earth, united perhaps by creed, by laws of humanity, by the universal knowledge of God’s love and realization of a Divine Being which are the heritage of every man, proud or humble, friend or enemy, comrade or alien, may be plunged inextricably and helplessly into a maelstrom of hate and lust, of frenzy and passion, of ill-advised and deluded pseudo-patriotic trammels and despotism. No more noxious and primitively ignorant influence exists in man’s domain than militarism; no factor more deplorable, none whose effects and tolls are more abject and miserable. Doyle. . It happened in one of the many classes which Father Napier presides over that the topic of conversation drifted to fools, past and present. In the course of the discussion every one of us was in doubt as to just what was a fool. It was left to Martin, who was a trifle more interested than the rest to pop the question: “What is a fool?” Father Napier was taken off guard, and for a moment was bewildered as to what answer he should give to this very direct question. Finally the solution of his difficulty dawned upon him. He now took us back into early Greek History and informed us that one of the great philosophers of early Greece defined a fool as a man who could ask more questions than any ten wise men could answer. This statement then came from Martin rather suddenly: “Now I know why we flunk so many of our examinations.” Charles Coyle. twenty-seven