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Every Day That the Sun Rises—This World Is Better Copyright, 1912, by Ameri- an-Journal-Examiner. Great Britain Right# Reserved --Z3Sil ‘ 'WWW- "w 'tf, <— z 1. ■ Cw ■KS®S^W S Z"' : lJ T WigZWM^Zn;.. YOU do not know this earth or its beauty, unless you have seen the sun rise—often. The dark night softens and loses power. The stars, soon to he conquered by the great star nearest to us, grow dim as a greater light approaches. Those other stars, each in its distant spot, tell of the work that is done by light and power on end less millions of planets throughout the infinite universe. Blackness changes to gray that is almost black. The trees become distinct. The birds wake up and with twittering and fluttering pre pare for another day. Toward the east the sky becomes softer, the light of dawn spreads across the fields, and then come the first rays shooting upward against the round surface of our earth to tell that the great sun is coming. R R R To the eye and the imagination of man nothing is more beautiful and impressive than that rising sun, increasing imperceptibly and yet with marvellous speed from the faintest beginning of light to the full splendor of bril liant day. Billions upon billions of times the sun in % his rising is reflected in the dewdrops on the leaves, in the spray that the ocean w aves throw into the air. in the eyes of waking creatures. A night that was black and a planet that was asleep are changed into a wonderful day of light and into a wonderful earth of activity and eager labor. Throughout the ages, the thousands and the hundreds of thousands of centuries, that wonderful sight has been repeated every day— the sun rising and doing his work upon the planet, and setting to continue that, work— always rising, always setting, never still, never absent—and every second improving the planet given to us. R R R The sun’s heat and light, his bombardment of * ur planet by imperceptible bodies neces sar\ Io our existence, his influence upon our atmosphere and our vegetation have changed th- earth from dreadful chaos into the planet that we now know and inhabit. And the sun's Each day, for millions of years, never failing, the beau tiful sun has risen upon this continent, or upon the great waste of waters that covered what is a continent to-day. Each rising of the sun found the earth better, nearer the per fection that is the earth 9 s destiny. What the sun in the heavens is to this material planet, education, the sun of knowledge and progress, is to the human mind. Its rising drives away the clouds and promises the new and better day. work continuing through the thousands of centuries ahead of us w ill make of this planet a most beautiful and perfect garden, ready for the perfect civilization that will exist bore one day, realize the dreams of the boldest dream ers, and put to shame those that have dared to set a limit to man's n°"’ p r and to the grandeur of the home that is given to him. R R R What the sun. our great father and giver of light, is to the material earth and to material man, education, THE SUN OF KNOWL EDGE. is to the mind of man and to his spirit ual life. ♦ Truth and knowledge, like the sun, have travelled around this earth through the cen turies. From the east so the west knowledge b s gone steadily—a brilliant sun growing in brightness with the years. Toward the sun of education men turn their faces hopefully, and the hope will not be dis appointed. The sun that lights our planet and the sun of knowledge that brings light to the mind of man both dissipate clouds and drive away darkness. R R R This planet of ours was a dreadful abode in the old days before the sun had done his splendid work. Monsters inhabited it, flying lizards, giant dinosaurs bigger than ten ele phants. Fearful swamps and morasses covered it. The air was so heavy, so filled with noxious gases that no creature now living could pos sibly have breathed on the earth in those days. Day by day, year by year, century by cen tury. through millions upon millions of years, the sun has worked, and we have a planet now upon which man can live and upon which he has .JUST BEGUN the task of arranging for himself a harmonious home worthy of a think ing being. R R R Education has done for the mind of man what the sun has done for the planet beneath our feet. Education has driven away the clouds of brutality, superstition, ignorance and hatred— some of them at least. And the clouds that remain grow thinner day by day. and the light through them grows clearer. Men in the beginning were as barbarous and vile, comparatively, as was the old earth in the day of dinosaurs and pterodactyls. Read the history of men, especially the his tory of their religious beliefs—reflecting men’s ow n vices and virtues—and you see a picture almost too dreadful for contemplation. In history you can look upon men when they were all cannibals—except a few’ too feeble and timid to kill and eat their fellow’s. You can look upon nations calling them selves “civilized" as we call ourselves civilized to-day. and you find those nations believing that they could please their gods by sacrifices of living beings—even of living human beings. You find the man of power slaughtering helpless slaves and burying them beneath the cornerstone of a new house “to bring good luck and propitiate the evil spirits.” And later you found conditions as vile— infinitely w orse, in fact, since they existed side by side with intelligence and knowledge fairly well developed. You found in Europe in the Middle Ages and later men possessing all the knowledge accumulated by the Greeks and Romans BURNING ONE ANOTHER ALIVE. You found the hearts of diTcront religions, each in the name of a Being w ho had given < His life for the poo”. burning, torhirir* ■-■y enuring all4hat failed tn agree w»fh their vic’v —ALTHOUGH THEY HAD THE SAME GOD. You could sec men burned alive b n ca”'2 they discovered new’ truths you could see threatened with death because fhwv ba r - d n ’ 1 to announce that 4 hc earth v?s rnuid Y”»’i could find human brings nrricrdinv 4 o ex ■- else the now 7 ers of God—savages in A jungle, witch doctors fooling a chief jpfo lieving that ho had syallmrri r riHynfor, or equally nronosterovs leaders of reliri«n m Europe of various denominations leading rulers to believe that tbpv could giv n eternal happiness for a financial consideration. nr punish with eternal hell and damnation the withholding of that financial consideration. R R R 4 This was a vile earth, in the savage days before our beautiful sun had begun to put it in order. It is had enough still w ith its desert? and its swamps, but it shows signs of im provement. This was a vile earth of ours, before <he great and beautiful sun of education had be gun to put the human mind in order. It is h 1 enough still, with its prejudices, its supersti tions, its hatreds, its wars, its billions for bat tle. its coldness toward the poor. But it is a better world than it was; th? H is breaking; those that nave their faces turned toward the sun of knowledge see the clouds disappearing, know that the full day is com ing and hope that it is not far olb R R R Among those that in the old days made and w orshipped the gods of their ow n manuf?" 4 ” or invention, the most dignified perhaps were the sun worshippers. They worshipped Gi? most beautiful thing within the range of their vision. M e do not any longer w orship inanimate objects. And those that are intelligent do not worship any imitation of man. any revenge!?’*, repulsive, torturing and hating creature. Me are not sun worshippers, but we are in a n ent I sense worshippers of the new sun. the sun of knowledge and education, the sun that will make men equal, that will put light in the dark places, the sun that is destined in the years to come to answer upon this planet that most beautiful prayer. “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”