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IV

IN THE HALL OF FAME

"That in all things he might have the preeminence.”— COL. I: 18.

F

AME may be a vapour, and popularity a very fickle thing, nevertheless men realize that it

is good to render honour unto whom honour is due. Where one is preeminent in ability and in achievement, it is natural that he should be prominent in influence and in the recognition of men's thought.

Just because it seemed but a right recognition of real worth a wave of enthusiastic approval swept over the country a few years ago when it was announced that to the beautiful buildings of New York University on the banks of the Hudson should be added a stately colonnade, five hundred feet long. A Hall of Fame should it be, containing on its ample walls one hundred and fifty bronze tablets, each seven feet long and one and a half feet in width, on which should be engraved the name and a thought of a native American preëminently distinguished in statescraft, in science, in art, in religion, or in letters. A committee of one hundred leading educators, professional, and business men was given the right of selecting names for this temple of the immortals. A majority of these must pass favour

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ably upon all names nominated. No name was eligible whose honoured bearer had not been dead ten years. Fifty of these could be selected in 1900 and five additional names could be chosen each succeeding five years, so that the panels could not all be occupied until the year two thousand. Of the two thousand names suggested in 1900, only twentynine were acted upon favourably. If you read the roll today you will find statesmanship and great manhood immortalized by George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Daniel Webster, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, and Henry Clay. Adding glory to the royal purple of the law are John Marshall, Joseph Story, and James Kent. Military prowess is personalized by U. S. Grant, Robert E. Lee, and Admiral Farragut. Shedding undying light on the problems of science are John James Audubon and Asa Gray. Invention seems to live with Robert Fulton, Eli Whitney, and Samuel F. B. Morse. Because of his living portraits Gilbert Stuart seems rightly to symbolize art. Emerson, Longfellow, Washington Irving, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Edgar Allan Poe are there because they have lent their genius to literature that will not die. Horace Mann still proclaims the evangel of education. Philanthropy marks the path of Peter Cooper and George Peabody, while Jonathan Edwards, William Ellery Channing, and Henry Ward Beecher tell the deep toned truth of religion.

Halls of Fame for rendering honour to im

mortal mortals are not new. Long ago the Northmen in their myths sent their heroes to Walhalla, the Hall of Fame for the fallen in battle. This renowned hall stood in Gladsheim; before it was the grove of Glasur, whose trees bore golden leaves. Above this towering building whose roof could scarce be seen, a wolf was hung as a symbol of war, over which sat an eagle. The Hall itself was ornamented with shields and wainscoted with spears. It had five hundred and forty doors, through each of which eight hundred heroes could walk abreast. Every morning they marched out with the crowing of the cock and fought furiously with one another, but at midday all wounds were healed and the heroes assembled to feast with Odin. The guests ate of the bacon from the boar Sohrimmur and refreshed themselves with beer and mead, while the attendant Valkyries handed them the drinking horns under Freyja's direction.

Far up in the heights of the Danube Valley, in Bavaria, stands another Walhalla-a German temple of Fame. A singularly beautiful and imposing structure it is. It was completed in 1842. It is fashioned of grey marble in imitation of the Parthenon. Its graceful length of two hundred and forty-six feet is crowned by fifty-two Doric columns. The interior is Ionic in design. Inside this classic edifice are found the busts of one hundred and one eminent Germans.

In the midst of the consideration of those who dwell in the seats of the mighty comes a tumult and

a shouting. It is as if some herald were demanding entrance in the name of a distinguished personage. His challenge is that "In all things he might have the preeminence."

Who is this in whose name entrance is demanded among the general assembly of earth's great ones, and not only that He be admitted there, but that He be crowned as the King of all kings of achievement and Lord of all the lords of thought? Who is this that he should be so highly exalted?

What a man is, what he thinks, what he doesthis alone measures his fitness for preeminence.

I fancy we can hear the voice of His champion from behind prison walls: "Examine what he is, measure the profundity of his mind, the magnificence of his achievement, and you shall see that in all things he does hold the preeminence."

He appears only a Jewish Peasant, a Man of Sorrows, and acquainted with grief. I see Him associated with the poor and the outcast. What very wonderful thing is there about Him? Accept the challenge of His herald. Examine and see.

To appreciate Him we must see Him towering above the horizon of nineteen centuries. No one can see the whole Christ at once.

figure of history.

He is the gigantic

HIS INTELLECTUAL LEADERSHIP

1. Looking back through the perspective of the centuries, catch the magnificent sweep of His mind and mark His preeminence.

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The annals of human intellect set on high, deep sea thinkers like Socrates and Plato and Aristotle. But with all their profundity, these men never conceived of their knowledge as final. Their attitude has been modest and qualified. This, I think, is true; but you must not believe it as my word. Examine for yourself. I am like you, a seeker and a sinner." Their disciples accepted this situation and so Simias said to Socrates, "We must learn or we must discover for ourselves the truth of these statements, or, if that be impossible, we must take the best and most impregnable of human doctrines and, embarking on that as on a raft, risk the voyage of life, unless a stronger vessel, some divine word, could be found on which we might take our journey more safely and more securely. Cebes and I have been considering your argument and we think that it is barely sufficient." "I dare say you are right, my friend," said Socrates in the "Phædo."

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Far different was it with this teacher. He had absolute confidence in Himself. Ye have heard it hath been said by them of old time,-but I say unto you." He never doubted but that His dictum was true and would be true through all time. He hesitated not to say, "I am the Truth."

Marvellous to say, time has tested and found Him true. Great, indeed, was the insight of that mind that could penetrate to abstract truth and state that truth in such winning terms that it is simple enough for the ignorant, learned enough for the wise; that

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