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About Hesperian student / (Lincoln [Neb.]) 1872-1885 | View Entire Issue (April 15, 1884)
THE HESPERIAN STUDENT. derived great benefits from the ioscrirtfions on ancient coins and we can see no reason why wc should not pay to posterity the debt we thus owe to antiquity. There is moreover an advantage to the present gen eration; those men whose likenesses are used on the more common of the postage stamps are more easily remembered than others, and though in this case it may be more of a cause than an effect, if we add the date and see the two always together as would be the case in our coinage it would be a great help to the memory. It would fix one fact relating to each four years to serve as a nucleus for our knowledge concern ingU. S. history. And to crown all, such a change would break the monotony of seeing the same cross looking female on each dollar as it passes through our hands, always seeming to throw it in our faces that she can only help us by leaving us, and give in her stead a regular picture gallery of former "dark horses" and fathers of their country. gjjhe students' grtf $ooh, Wlicro countless thousands knool and stubborn heads Incline In humble revoronco, before tho universal God, dlvluo. When onch has trod his pilgrim way along tho "Valo of Tears," And In tho silent gravo, has hid tho burden or his years, Whllo tho mortal clay lies sleeping 'neath tho Bod, Tho ovcrlastlng spirit takes Us homeward night to God. FAUBT. X. TIME. The clock striken twelve recording Time's uuceaplngflight, And singing in our listening ears tho great Creator's might. Unnumbered years have passed away nud countless ages lied Unmarked, unnoticed nud unknown except by tho.e who tread The golden streets of New Jerusalem, whero whispering angels wait To chime tho hours of man's dcstluctlou, and the universal fat0 Of planetary dwellers In worlds besidto our own, Where God's eternal light has for endless age shown. Six thousand, years have moved in quick succession through Ktarnlty't) over open gates, and still our ca.'th is now, Although proud man has grown apace, and seemed inclined To jostle those immortal watchmen from their time-worn towers, And mark with Instruments of human mako the swiftly (lying hours. 'TIs night and darkness hangs in solemn grandeur o'er tho earth Where but a few brief moments sinco, the lively signs of mirth And revelry were heard; and tho busy tramp of mauy feet, And the hum or labor, which echoed through thucrudwed street, Arc hushed, and peaceful slumber closes many an eye, Of erring, sinful mortals, still unprepared to die. The lovely maiden slcops and dreams of him who gave Such fond assurances of love and pledged himself to brave All earthly danger and submit with joy to torturing pain If he could thus her straying, fickle lovo regain. In changeful dreams the noble youth behold' All he holds dear, on earth and rapturously folds Her fair form In his arms and whispers In her ear Those oft repeated vows, and seals them with a sacred tear. The miter sees his golden heaps miraculously grow And all his native streams with golden waters How. The pensman dreams of want, of misery gone past, And prays each breath ho draws may be his last. Thus in the visions of the night Time's rapid flight it known, And Immortal spirits bow In holy awe before the lordly throne Of Morpheus, and speed with hasty step through every scene, Abjuring their allegiance to midday's transceudant queen. Those evanescent shades, which flit so quickly through the brain, Are counterpart of things enacted; and the taadowy .rain Of thoughts, that gush spontaneously from the abundant store Of sweet Ideas in.the soul, hate all been thought before. Time flics regardless of proud mau's estate, tnd guides him safely to the eternal gates, There hiwo been many attempts by modern writers to mntcrlallr.o Mio spirit of the "Dark Ago," toitypily its undoi lying principle, generally with little success. Among the Gorman people however, lias gradually I grown up and from Ucrmauy spread auroau over unris- tendom a true conception of tho soul at Hint timo inhab iting tho body of civilized humanity a conception in which wc see most truly the blind gropings, the fumb lings, tho failures, of tho ungnidod intellect of tho timo; a strong intellect, but with strength misdirected, over striving to cnvolve the universo from its own inner con sciousness instead of seeing in itself only an inflnitosi mal port of n divine audMnflnito whole. Seeing tho profound darkness surrounding even the wisest of tho time we liud it hard to realize that it was a part of men themselves and hnd naught to do with tho outwnrd forms of uulure; that, while isolated facts un connected by a priuiplc of uuily wcrcjas will-o-the-wisps leading into quagmires of error, thatprinciplc of unity the one increasing purposedwelt in all 'things then as now and beyond the clouds and darkness produced alone by the magician, the great sun was shining where natuio held open her Bible in tho sunlight. Travelers in tho Alps looking down into its valleys when dayl'ght first finds entrance to their depths, see the fogs that have lain there througlithc night writhing and tossing as it in pain while slowly disappearing. Thus also the clouds overhanging the mind of past centuries rolled in terrible contortions as they dissolved in the clear thought which brought about the Reformation. As a shadow; dies in seeing the light which muxes possible its cxistanco so the crruis of thai timo in vanishing become a purl of tho general illumination. The legend of Doctor Fausltts, who suld.bis soul to the devil for twenty-four years of unhesitating service, origi nated in Geimauy some time in tho sixteenth century. Thence it spread to the literatures of France, England and Italy, Marlowe writing his playof thnl name from a prose translation Under his hand it became a drama of con siderable power though his treatment shows that he did not sec the great possibilities of the theme." His Faust is no moro than a conjuring, inquisitive libertine and a coward at that, frightened alternately at tho devil he has raised and the compact he has made with Ji'in. His is not tho fearless soul which makes of evil a servant not a master; and in conscious strength sees that "he only earns his freedom and cxisteucc who daily conquers them anew." Marlowe's Mcphistophebs too, can linrdly be identified with the proud and confident picture of Lucifer drawn by 3Iiiton.; ho Is too weak spirited too mindful of his own misfortunes to drag down such a man as Fnust should be. It l.us been well said that lie is much the better Chriataln of the two. It was reserved for Goethe in tho first part of his neat lUe work to give to the world its true rcprecnuUo . We see this time no slight of Jmud trickier in the crar bearded old man who sits "hemmed in by cureedgloomj Jill lmKM PESO NWI
