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3 TUP M j-s'' c ' ""vgSajwtL .<>' iBwJM T k in TH£-- the statejJ’ VOL UME ONE. NUM-BEE NINE. Henry W. Grady—an Appreciation and an 'Estimate By S. T. DALSHEIMER. F ALL forces generated by Nature there is, perhaps, no force more far-reach ing and more significant than that em bodied in the personality of some rare individual. Such an one was that of Henry W. Grady, of Georgia, whose earthly career closed more than fifteen years ago, but is still a power in the hearts and minds of the people he loved O so well. Like Luther, Calvin, Cromwell and Washington, he labored for a common goal— the people’s good; and so laboring, left his impress on the history of his country. One might almost trace the passage and the pro gress of a country or a cause by the record of the individual lives which have combined to create the one and to uplift the other. This is especially true of the South to-day, and more particularly in the State of Georgia, where great issues are at stake—issues which have drawn the nation’s gaze upon us. These issues are all championed by “good men and true”, but even in the living and virile pres ent there comes a strong memory of the past and almost instinctively we recall the person ality of that great Georgian, Henry W. Grady, and we feel it will be befitting to re view, in some measure, his life and his work. No facts and figures, however, can in any measure estimate the work done by this man for his beloved state; no set record of work accomplished, nor of work planned out by him can be mentioned now to illustrate or to substantiate his claim to greatness, for it lies more in the unwritten record impressed upon the hearts of men and subtly infused into their souls and spirits, bearing perennial fruit in renewed effort for good and a higher stan dard of ideas and ideals. In these materialistic times, when personal advancement and personal gain are the key notes to so much in our municipal and national life it has. unfortunately, become difficult for us to remember and to consider that the only real progress for a people is that embodied in a pure phil osophy of living’ which shall have for its main fea ture a universal good rather than an individual gain. Yet it is a fact that Henry Grady’s life was, per haps, the truest exemplification of this high philoso phy. that the State of Georgia has ever known. It is well for us to remember, and well for our young men to know that when the question is asked, “Who was Henry Grady? what did he do? what position did he hold?” The answer cannot be given in any set phrase, or by the mention of any office given by the people he loved, but that the answer must be found in the record of a life of steadfast effort for his people’s good and his State’s advance ment. The fact that Henry Grady was a newspaper man ATLANTA, GA., APRIL 19, 1906. of distinction, and the further fact that he held an editorial position for many years on the leading paper in Georgia, but that he never was at any time a candidate for office, although always vitally interested in political questions, is recalled just at this time with telling force. The editorial chair is a powerful factor for good and as such its force was used by Mr. Grady, but never at any time, with even the most remote thought of personal ad- HENRY W. GRADY. vancement. He said himself that “journalism is a jealous profession and demands the fullest alle giance of those who seek its honors or emoluments. Least of all can it be made the aid of the demagogue or the handmaid of the politician. The man who uses his journal to subserve his political ambition, or writes with a sinister or personal purpose, soon loses his power and had best abandon a profession he has betrayed Therefore, devoted as I am to my profession, believing as I do that there is more of honor and usefulness for me along its way than in another path, and that my duty is clear and unmistakable, I am constrained to reaffirm in my own mind, and to declare to you the resolution I made when I entered journalism, namely, that as long as I remain in its ranks I will never become a candidate for any political office, or draw a dollar from any public treasury. This rule I have never broken, and I hope I never shall I think it has been the curse of the South that our young men have considered little else than political pre ferment worthy of an ambitious thought. .... lieally there is no career that brings so much of unhappiness and discontent—so much of subser vience, sacrifice and uncertainty as that of the poli tician.” If one were seeking a clear exponent of Mr. Grady’s life, his intentions and his philoso phy it could not be found more concisely ex pressed than in these words. Unlike most men, however, his opinions were not merely theories, but were facts which he carried out in his own career. He never did “subserve the purposes” of his journal for any personal purposes, and although he was often accused by his enemies of having political preferment in mind, and although he was often approach ed by his friends with suggestions of the the possibilities along this same line, he was fixed and immovable in his determination. It means so little to mention the different papers in Georgia with which Mr. Grady was connected from time to time; it means even less to speak of his marvelous powers of ex pression, his brilliant word pictures, his quick perceptions, his miraculously retentive mem ory for these were all merely adjuncts of the man himself. And it is here that the writer finds a new difficulty in explaining how and where and why the work of Henry Grady made an ineffaceable impression on the city of Atlanta, on the State of Georgia, and even on the entire South, if not, indeed, on the na tion itself. We are so ready to label an un known force with the all-embracing term “magnetism,” and for lack of a better ex pression, it may be used to account for Mr. Grady’s power with the people; but we be lieve there was something higher and greater than even that magic word implies. Personal magnetism of a rare order he did have, but underly ing all else was a deep and unswerving and a most profound devotion to humanity; a pity for its pains, a sincere wish to alleviate its sufferings, to increase its joys and promote its ultimate good. It will be no exaggeration to say that every line Mr. Grady wrote, every word he spoke during his extensive lecture tours throughout the length and breadth of the country, were written and spoken with a well-de fined object—the betterment of the people and of the state. Quick to realize industrial possibilities, Mr. Gra dy may be said to be almost a pioneer in the devel opment of the agricultural interests of Georgia. His own plans and dreams of domestic and material happiness were centered around a farm which he purchased and which he loved; that he did not sue- TWO DOLLARS A YEAK. FIVE CENTS A COPY.