Image provided by: University of Nebraska-Lincoln Libraries, Lincoln, NE
About Hesperian student / (Lincoln [Neb.]) 1872-1885 | View Entire Issue (Jan. 1, 1878)
No. 1. C'OIITKZ. &a V IS F t B ilr tnin goats arc robbed of a herdsman to make a shepherd in the pastures or the Lord. The true aim should be to rise in a vocation and not to rise out of it. If 3011 be a mechanic aim to be the best me chanic, if a physician, aim to be the best physician, if a farmer, aim to be the best farmer, if a professional politician quit the business. It has been said that patriotism is the security of popular government. The love of country, however, is but an instinct, the love of humanity is a virtue. Away with that patriotism that leads one half of our country to seek the destruction of the other. Out with that patriotism mat would array the East against the West or the North against the South. Down with that statesman that cannot sec beyond the nar row limits of his own native State. Shall we live at peace with all the world and aj swords' points among ourselves? If we are to succeed us a nation it must be with mutual forbearance and confidence. Hut to-day we see towering far above State jealousy and sectional prejudice, one sub lime figure, forsaken by one 1111113 and opposed by the other. And the Amer ican people may still hope to again boast of a president, not of the North, not of the South, not of the East or of the West, but a president of the whole country. And you and I may yet live to see the Mason and Dixon line a matter only of history. It is not the heroes of great deeds that we need, but the heroes of the common affairs of life. The army never lacks a leader. The stake is never without its martyr. Erect the gibbet and you will always find those who are ready to mount it and die for their faith. Hut wc have seen the general brave the cannon's open mouth on the field of buttle, mid yet prove false to himself, and false to his country, when honored as secretary of war. What the country needs, what it imperatively demands, is a little practical ethics, a little every-day honesty and business integrity. I believe no government rests on a linn er basis than our own. This security, however, lies not. in the professional poli tician, neither can it be found in the learn ed professions. It is the great middle class that is the bone and sinew of the nation. Aiyl if our government is to be preserved, if our national existence is to be maintained, it must be by that large and substantial class of citizens who sup port our industries. And any public sen timent that drives honest nion from our industries must tend to demoralize society and finally to overthrow the government itself. ' II. II. Wilson. OORTEZ. To-day the 'name of Cortex has become a synonymc. for recklessness, cruelty and inhumanity. Why is it? i Because he really was so merciless and cruel ? Yes No. Yes. because by looking from our standpoint he was cruel. No, for by re garding his career through the light which then existed he was not. Mothers have instille iis idea into the minds of their children through old songs and ballads. Teachers have expatiated upon the crimes of Cortex before their pupils, and in general, orators and writers of every degree have ofttimcs.unitcd with the com. inou throng in disgracing his name, never for a moment, dwelling upon any of the good which he accomplished. The rca sou of this is (as I have hinted) that the' cither do not wish or are 'not competent to judge another by any standpoint other than their own. Such persons, I verily believe, had they been placed in Cortez' time and position, would have been sati ated only by the most inhuman practices. This caution cannot too often beheld up to view we must judge others by the times and situations in which they live. You would say that, to pass judgment from our standpoint upon the acts of a bar. barons chief, who had never seen or heard of any thing which we call civilization would be a gross act of inhumanity. Hut