A Classic Is A Book That Doesn't

So Often Do You See Collegians Enter Life With High Resolve And Lofty Purpose And Then Watch Them Shrink And Shrink To Sordid, Selfish, Shrewd Plodders, Full Of Distrust And Sneers.

One Is Astonished In The Study Of History At The Recurrence Of The Idea That Evil Must Be Forgotten, Distorted, Skimmed Over. We Must Not Remember That Daniel Webster Got Drunk But Only That He Was A Splendid Constitutional Lawyer. We Must Forget That George Washington Was A Slave Owner . . . And Simply Remember The Things We Regard As Creditable And Inspiring. The Difficulty, Of Course, With This Philosophy Is That History Loses Its Value As An Incentive And Example; It Paints Perfect Man And Noble Nations, But It Does Not Tell The Truth.

At Best, The Natural Good-nature Is Edged With Complaint Or Has Changed Into Sullenness And Gloom. And Now And Then It Blazes Forth In Veiled But Hot Anger.

I Believe That All Men, Black And Brown And White, Are Brothers, Varying Through Time And Opportunity, In Form And Gift And Feature, But Differing In No Essential Particular, And Alike In Soul And The Possibility Of Infinite Development.

The Favorite Device Of The Devil, Ancient And Modern, Is To Force A Human Being Into A More Or Less Artificial Class, Accuse The Class Of Unnamed And Unnameable Sin, And Then Damn Any Individual In The Alleged Class, However Innocent He May Be.