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About Hesperian student / (Lincoln [Neb.]) 1872-1885 | View Entire Issue (Nov. 15, 1884)
THE HESPERIAN STUDENT. necessary for the advancement of this great and im portant work so that every student can not only get a theoretical, but also a practical knowledge of the subject. The theoretical is useless without the piac tical, the practical can only be obtained by means of a thoroughly equipped laboratory. Iowa has dis covered this and built a fine laboratory. Colorado has also felt the importance and built agood labora tory, Kansas has followed Iowa and Col.; Nebraska alone is behind. The Student sincerely hopes that ere another year rolls around, Nebr. will ha'e follow ed the footsteps of her sister states and have built a laboratory which is so earnestly demanded by the stu dents throughout the state. THE PI GRIM FOREFATHERS, By II. II. 'Neath hoary iuosb on crumbling stones Their names arc fading day by day; The fashions of their lives and; perch From Bight and pound have passed away. The shores they found so bleak, so bare Shine now with riches gay and proud; And we, light-hearted, dance on ground Where they in anguish wept and bowed. Unto the faith they bought so dear We pay each day less rev'rent heed; And boast, perhaps, that we outgrow The narrowness which ninrked their creed. A shallow boairt of thankless hearts, In evil generation born; Uy side of thoe old Pilgrim men The ages shall hold us in scorn. Find mc the nien on earth who care Enough for faith or creed to-day To seek a barren w lldernen For simple liberty to pray; Men who for simple cake of God All titles, rlcheb would refuse, And In their ttead disgrace and shame And bitter poverty would choose. Wo And them not. Alasltheagc, In all its light, hath blinder growu; In all its plenty, starves because It seeks to live by bread alone. We owe them all wo have of good; Our sunny skies, our fertile fields: Our freedom, which to all oppressed A continent of refnga yields. And what we have oi ill, of shame, Our broken word, our greed for gold, Our reckless schemes and treacheries, In which men's souls are bought and sold- All these have come because wo left The paths that those Forefathers trod; The simple, single-hearted ways In which they feared and worshiped God, Despise tbelr narrow creed who will I Pity their poverty who dare I Their lives knew joys, their lives wore crowns We do not know, we cannot wear. And if so be that it is saved. Our poor Kopnbllc, stained and bruised, 'Twill be because wo lay again Their corner-stones which we refused. OUR INDEBTEDNESS TO STOIC PIIILOSOPII Y. We live in an age of Progress. The veil of darkness, superstition, and tyranny, whicli has rested over mankind for so many ages is lifting, and day is breaking. Step by Btep men rise from the degradation of (lie inquisitorial persecution of an Alexander, the tyranny of a Louis XIV, or ihe oppression of a George III. Liberty and progress go hand in hand. As the bonds arc burst and thu shackles loosed which have kept men's iiioughts and actions so long in servitude, hesucceees to his lawful in herilar.ee, the dignity and majesty of man. Various philosophies have arisen lending towards the elevation of man; but in no system do we And such noble principles, sucii lofty aims, as in that of the Stoics. Duty and especially duty to their country, was the inspiring thought. Rome was pre-eminently the homo of Stoicism, and because duty carried the Stoic into public life, ho was brought into close alliance with the Roman lawyers, and durine the centuries of that alliance, thoroughly in corporated his principles in Ihe civil law, Rome's price lees legacy to Modern Nations. The fundamental prin ciples of this philosophy was the Law of Nature. This law is scarcely definable, and has been variously inter preted. The Sloics were the first to recognize it as "Symmetrical Order." As all things in Nature were Hub ject to Iter laws, man a creature of Nature, must also bo subject to Ithciu. The Roman lawyers, stimulated by the Stoicial theory of Natural Law, held that man had originally !ecn governed by it, hut had departed from that ideal stale. Conservative and opposed lo violent changes, they believed that gradually all laws and cus toms were again to be brought into confonnily to this "Symetrical Order." Thus the functions of Natural Law wereremedial. This view is no doubt the rational one, and was to a certain extent the result or the condition of society at that time. But what was the condition of Biiclety in the most brilliant period of Roman ascend ency, the nge of Anumine Cuesarh? The Romans were the ruling class. They were then masters or the civilized world,-the makers and adminis trators of law. Their subjects were usually content with their subordinate position. Many of them had been but a short time under Roman rule. Attracted by the superior wisdom or their conquerors, and initiated ns members of a clvilzed state, their condition was belter than it had ever been before. Where an organized system of governs ment had previously existed, the Romans made it an in tegral part of their policy lo leave a large portion of the local ndminstratmn in the hands of newly conquered peo. pie. Thc.r l.berty was gradually diminished. Rome supplanted the native institutions by those of Iter own, and often so gradually as to awaken no rebellion. But to. gether wiih ibis subjection .hero was a tendency to sore . yise and admin.stcr the law, that justice should be dono to all. The leveling power of Natural Law was uncon-
