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This significant season suggests some sidelights on freedom: One fact concerning freedom is that we seem so readily to recognize an enemy that assails our freedom with force, but do not always so readily recognize the loss of freedom by quiet encroachment.
There was once perpetrated on the public a two-word phrase that is contrary to truth and goodness and good sense: "Live dangerously." Many do it, and many have done it—of which the rising accident rate is eloquent evidence, and of which there are other evidence also, with broken lives, and broken bodies, and broken minds—and broken hearts—and senseless waste and sorrow.
Life gives us many memories—of home, of mothers, of fathers and family. And as to fathers, we should like to turn today to some passing pictures and impressions: First of all, fathers commit themselves to rearing and providing for a family, to providing a home and taking on obligations which, however wonderful, require an immeasurable amount of faith and an immeasurable amount of work.
Often, we enter each season with new plans and new purposes—but time is so swift, and the months move by, and we look back and wonder how they could have gone so suddenly and soon.
Whenever we arrive anywhere, wherever we are is but a place from which to proceed to the next place. Those who have come to Commencement have arrived at this realization—for life is a process, and not a finished product; and so is learning—or should be—all of which is somewhat summarized in this quoted sentence: "If you were graduated yesterday, and have learned nothing today, you will be uneducated tomorrow."1 This may, in a sense, seem discouraging, but in reality, it is what keeps our interest in life fresh and alive.
Not long ago from the window of a waiting train we watched a young mother with two young daughters, all dressed in their best, eagerly, anxiously looking at the passengers alighting. And then there was a light in their eyes as there came into view the one they were waiting for—the young father, who completed the family circle: then running steps, and arms wide open, and arms tightly closed around one another, with everyone talking, and everyone looking lovingly at everyone as they walked to the waiting car. Father had come home. Mother and children were there. All were together again.
In the memorable play, Our Town, one of the philosophizing characters speaks these telling lines: "I'm awfully interested in how big things . . . begin. You know how it is: you're [young] and you make some decisions; then whissh! you're seventy: you've been a lawyer for fifty years, and that white-haired lady at your side has eaten over fifty thousand meals with you. How do such things begin?"1
Two thoughts come sharply through today—two questions really, almost always asked by children, young or old, when they come home from anywhere at any hour: "Is mother home?" "Where is mother?" And mothers in turn, blessedly and earnestly, ask their own kind of questions: "Are the children at home?" "Are they all in?"1 One doesn't belong to someone else without having absence felt. One doesn't give life, and birth, and sweetly dedicated service with a sense of emptiness in absence.
There is a sentence from an unidentified author which says in substance: "There is no limit to the good a man can do, if he doesn't care who gets the credit."1 But sometimes the good that could be done is slowed down by petty comparisons—by people who want to make sure they don't do more than their share.
There comes to mind today a stanza of a hymn which has some special meanings for the discouraged and the heavyhearted, part of which consists of these two short sentences: "Why should this anxious load Press down your weary mind? Haste to your Heavenly Father's throne, And sweet refreshment find."1
May we turn today to another phase of freedom—to the question of freedom and conformity: How much does conformity come into conflict with freedom? How much freedom do we have if we must live according to the law? This is a question that young people often wrestle with, even from. the earliest years of youth.
The question of freedom is always before us: what it is—and how much men were meant to have—and how much freedom one can have within the limits of the law.
Last week we talked of the reality of the resurrection and of man's immortality. Scripture and reason and revelation, as well as the very awareness within us, all attest to man's eternal continuance. Since this is so, since men are immortal, how should we best use our time, what should we most try to acquire?
It is a good thing sometimes to examine the reasons for some of the things we do. Customs and habits are relatively easy to make and relatively difficult to break. And among our most persistent habits and customs are those which have to do with traditional days and seasons, one of which is Easter. And we should like to look at it a moment to see, if separated from some of its unessentials, how much it really means to each of us.
There is an old hymn which could well be quoted often, and oftener remembered: "There is beauty all around, When there's love at home; There is joy in ev'ry sound, When there's love at home . ."1
A thoughtful physician recently remarked: "I used to think of impatience as simply a natural part of some people's personality, but over the years I have come to conclude that habitual impatience is a mark of immaturity. "1
In a sense we should never be content with what we know. But neither should we be cynical about what we don't know. With a little knowledge, there is always the danger of assuming that what we don't know isn't so, that what we can't see isn't there, that what lies beyond our eyes and explanation is beyond the realm of reality. But the fact that we don't know something doesn't mean that it isn't so.
It is an odd thing, in a way, how each generation seems to feel that each preceding generation is somewhat old-fashioned—how each generation listens impatiently to the lessons of the last. Youth is so sure the rules have changed. Age is sure they haven't.
Someone once wrote, "If the stars came out only once a year, the whole world would go out and look at them."' But since they can so easily and so often be seen, we become accustomed to them and let them seem somewhat commonplace.
One of the very wonderful things of life is a sense of belonging. And one of the most wonderful things to belong to is a loyal and affectionate family— family who have each their own individual activities and interests but who feel real oneness with one another.
There is much said concerning Lincoln—but not too much for so sincerely great a subject. Men do many things for their own comfort and convenience, and for their own survival, and will put forth almost superhuman effort to save themselves—physically—to lengthen out their mortal lives.
Sometimes there comes a cleavage between people who should be close to one another—because of inability either to give or to take counsel and criticism and correction kindly.
Hardly does it seem possible that a twelfth part of another year already has passed. But however swiftly or slowly time goes, it is still and always happiness that we pursue, whether we know it or not, whether we recognize it or not. But with poor decisions or thoughtless acts or utterances, some of us sometimes seem to clutter and confuse our lives—so much so that others wonder how we could do it.
Again, we turn to happiness—the happiness which all people pursue. "There is even a happiness," wrote Thomas Hood, "that makes the heart afraid."1
At this time of new beginnings, new purposes, new records, new resolve, we turn a moment to a subject that is timeworn, yet always timely: the subject of "happiness" - which all people pursue. But, said Publilius Syrus some twenty centuries since: "No man is happy unless he believes he is."1
On this question again of success and failure, and of closing the books upon the past, and then having immediately to turn around and repeat our performance: Life is very much like that— always—every week, every day, every hour—almost. We do continually have to repeat our performance.
There is this sobering thought which the New Year suggests: In a sense, “success is never final". The moment we close the books on one year we open them on another and compare our performance with the past.
On this day, and even at this hour, there comes into our consciousness a sense of countless scenes and settings that we should like to look in upon, across this beloved land, and beyond, in many other blessed places, across the wide world: the sending of sincere messages; the giving and the getting of gifts; the going and the coming from places of worship; the warm exchange of greetings of families and friends; the turning homeward; the being at home (or the wishing that we were); the sweet, whispered conspiracies; the bursting in of children; the light in their eyes; the laughter on their lips; the arms around Grandma and Grandpa; the appreciation to parents; the tempting odors from the kitchen with their promise of a wonderful kind of overeating (approved or tolerated "just this once") ; the mellowing of feelings; the melting of hearts; the wonderful sense of doing something for someone!
Recently a wise physician was speaking of the very favorable chances of recovery from certain diseases and from certain kinds of surgery.
We should like to look once more at the uses of daylight and darkness, with something more to say concerning the darkness of discouragement. As to the distortions of darkness—many things are imagined. Troubles are magnified, and symptoms also, and worries become weightier in the hours of the night.