Medina High School - Medinian Yearbook (Medina, OH)

Page 12 text:

a Amtital Here let me pause to say that efficiency demands its price. You must be thoroughly trained. Your graduation from high school completes a part of that training, but only a part. Y on are not yet fully trained to be really efficient in life. You need more than you have now. Go to college, if at all possible. If not possible, then continue your study at home. A liberal education is almost an absolute necessity in these days. Get it in college if you can, get it alone from books if you must, but by all means, get it. “ How priceless,” said our martyred President McKinley, “is a liberal education! In itself what a rich endowment ! It is not impaired by age, but its value increases with use. No one can employ it but its rightful owner. He alone can illustrate its worth and enjoy its rewards. It cannot be inherited or purchased. It must be acquired by individual effort. It can be secured only by perseverance and self-denial. But it is as free as the air we breathe. Neither race nor nationality nor sex can debar the earnest seeker for its possession. It is not exclusive, but inclusive in the broadest and best sense. It is within the reach of all who really want it, and are brave enough to struggle for it. The earnest rich and worthy poor are equal and friendly rivals in its pursuit, and neither is exempted from any of the sacrifices necessary for its acquisition. The key to its title is not the bright allurements of rank and station, but the simple watchword of work and study. A liberal education is the greatest blessing that a man or woman can enjoy, when supported by virtue, morality and noble aims.” Another characteristic of this age is its youthfulness. This is the day of the young man and the young woman. In the past generation a patient would hardly trust his case in the hands of a doctor unless he wore a beard betokening age; now the young physician is sought because it is believed that he represents the latest in medical science. Then the preachers that were in demand were the men who had back of them many years of experi- ence and study; now the seminaries can not supply the demand of the churches for young- preachers. Then great business enterprises were managed by men whose years gave evidence of discretion and conservatism ; now the great corporations give their most responsible offices and pay their largest salaries to young men. The trend of the time is anti-conserva- tive and ultra-progressive. The fact that these are distinctively youthful qualities explains the remarkable demand for youthful leadership. It is being predicted that the pendulum is soon to swing back the other way; but be that as it may, you young people are fortunate in being young when the age is youthful, and the demand is for young people. The third characteristic of the age is its idealism. The world is day-dreaming. It is dreaming of a coming golden age, when things will be better than they are now, when the evils of intolerance and intemperance and ignorance and oppression and superstition will be driven out. The world is dreaming of the Kingdom of Heaven on earth. And there are many and abundant signs that the world is awakening from its dream. When it awakens, it will set to work to make its dreams come true. Already we hear reports of fulfilment. The air is intense with expectation. Something is coming, coming, coming ! Christ is coming — not in the fantastic and crude notion of antiquated theology, but Christ is coming into the life and heart of organized human society! Even so come quickly, Lord Jesus! Happy are you who are young in these electric times! Y ou will be in it ! Y T ou will see it ! III. But I find that I have just been speaking in the future tense, and this leads me to say that the Future is yours. Thus far I have spoken mostly of possession, now let me connect up the idea of possession with the thought of service. Possession for service. The future is yours. Yours is the future. The past belonged to “them,” and they built well; the present belongs to us, the older generation, and we are building as best we can; but the future belongs to you, and it will be what you make it. The past lays its treasures at your feet, the present puts its opportunities into your hands — you have all the material necessary to build a glorious future. In the glowing words of Edwin Markham,

Page 11 text:

Annual 7 Yours all the wise and bright things that men have ever thought, from King Solomon even unto Elbert Hubbard ! The legacy of history makes yours the net results of the lives of the world’s good and great. Civilization has been blood-bought. Men have deposited their lives in the bank of humanity, and yours is the accrued interest. Yea, yours is the principal, to re-invest for humanity. The legacy of art makes all beauty yours. Raphael is yours, Michael Angelo is yours, Titian is yours, and all the other artistic souls who glimpsed the ideals and dreams of humanity and splashed them upon canvas. Beethoven is yours, Mendelssohn is yours, Schubert is yours, and all those super-sensitive souls who captured the passions and sor- rows and joys of human hearts and interpreted them in music. The Temple of Solomon in old Jerusalem is yours, the Parthenon of Old Athens is yours, the Taj Mahal of India is yours, and yours all the “ frozen music ” in temple, tower and statue. To the legacy of the true, the good, and the beautiful, bequeathed in literature, history, and art, must also be added the useful, bequeathed in the results of invention and discovery. Some years ago, the International Harvester Company issued a picture book showing the evolution of the grain harvester. The first picture described a man using the simple grass hook. But the manipulation of the hook was hard on the back; and as necessity is the mother of invention, the next picture showed that the hook had grown a long handle and become a scythe. The third stage saw a cradle added to the scythe. The fourth was a mower, many small scythes on a bar vibrated by machinery. Fifth came the man-rake, followed by the self-rake, then the self-binder, and now that complicated machine by which the grain is cut, threshed, and sacked in one operation. Similar charts might be drawn of the evolution of every phase of industry ; of illumination, from the pine-torch to the X-ray ; of transportation, from the log raft to the aeroplane ; of communication, from the foot runner to wireless telegraphy; of thought preservation, from Egyptian hieroglyphics to Edison’s cameraphone. In every case progress has been possible only because each succeeding generation inherited and built upon the achievements of the past. Young people, I congratulate you because the past is yours. Behold, she stands behind you tonight with emptied arms and says, “ All things are yours. All my treasures are yours. Yours to possess. Take them; go, and serve your age.” II. The Present is yours. It used to be a boyish pastime for me to dream and wish myself born under different circumstances or in another age ; instead of having been born an obscure widow’s son, to have been born of royal blood ; instead of living in this present age, to have lived in the strange ages of the past, or to live in the golden ages of the future. But since I have grown to manhood, I have ceased dreaming about these fantastic impossibilities, and am content to be just plain “ me,” and am thankful that I live in the “ now.” This is a good time in which to live, young people, and you and I ought to be glad that our visit to earth was not timed a hundred years earlier or a hundred years later. There are, among many others, three peculiar characteristics of the present age which make it highly auspicious for young people. First, this is a practical age. The question that the world now asks is not, “Where were you born? Who were your ancestors? What is your pedigree? What were your antecedents? ” The question that the world now snaps out is, “ What can you do? ” Not blue blood, but red blood counts in these days. Your ancestors may have come over in the Mayflower, but the world will forget it if you don’t make good. Your parents may have come over in the steerage, and the world will forget it if you make good. This age cares naught for the aristocracy of birth, it cares everything for the aristocracy of worth. Not the antecedents of your life, but the consequences, matter. Young people, you ought to rejoice and be exceedingly glad that you are living in an age when the only thing that really rates you is efficiency.

Page 13 text:

®ljr Amutal 9 “ We men of earth have here the stuff Of Paradise — we have enough! We need no other thing to build The stairs into the Unfulfilled — No other ivory for the doors — No other marble for the floors — No other cedar for the beam And dome of man’s immortal dream. Here on the path of every day — Here on the common human way — Is all the busy gods would take To build a heaven, to mould and make New Edens. Ours the stuff sublime To build Eternity in time ! ” Oh that you young people may today catch a vision of the possibilities for service ! You are world builders! You are epoch makers! You are servants of the age! God grant that as you leave this place tonight you may carry away in your hearts a sense of the consecreation of your life for humanity ! All things are yours to serve the age — aye, to serve the ages. Your work will not die with your age. As the past lives today, so will the future live throughout the ages. You are building, not for time, but for eternity. The possibilities for service are unlimited as eternity itself! This body, fashioned of the clay, Will turn again unto the dust; Yon sun, whose light illumes the day. Like ancient shield of brass will rust. Those hills, which stood since time began, Will slumber in the valley’s bed: Those stars, bespangling heaven’s span, Like flower petals will drop dead. But I, e’en I, my self, my soul, A citizen eternal dwell : For me there is a far-off goal Staked out beyond both heaven and hell! And on that goal I’ll fix today The eager vision of my eye, And watch and wait and work and pray Till I shall reach it by and by.