Publisher's Synopsis
Excerpt from The Memorial of Virtue: A Sermon Preached in the West Church, Jan. 22, 1865, After the Death of Edward Everett
The question Whether we should care for reputation or posthumous renown, we need not debate. It is settled in our constitution. The breath is no sooner out of a man's body than we consider his career to decide his character. The present condition of his Spirit, I heard proposed for discussion respecting a distinguished deceased person, on the very day when he died.
Virtue is her own supreme motive; but What may be said of our conduct re-enforces Virtue that is not quite strong enough, as with most of us it is not, to go alone. So the guileless Charles Lamb quaintly speaks of the delight of doing good by stealth, and having it found out by accident; and the strong Willed Andrew Jackson declared, that, looking into his heart for the brave deed, he also believed all brave men would approve it. So the memorial of virtue, Wherever may stand its living record of thehuman soul, is the true scripture and only holy book. With what a thrill we follow that famous succession of short but great eulogies, in the Epistle to the Hebrews, of Abraham and Moses and Joseph and the rest! Over the old-testament stories of Adam and Cainan and Jared, which we peruse with a dog ged perseverance, from an inherited sense of the duty of reading the Bible through, when we come to Enoch, why are we startled! Because, of all those mentioned before, it is only written, that they lived so many hundreds of years, and begat sons and daughters but of Enoch it is added, that he walked with God. This makes his title in every letter ven crable, till history be no more. We are informed in Genesis of many dukes. Why do we know nothing about them but their names? Because by no excel lence were they, any more than a thousand modern dukes, embalmed in the recollection of their race. Teman, Zepho, Kenaz, and Gatam are forgotten Abel, dead long before them, is remembered still. What will be told of us, after we are gone? The date of our birth and death, our parentage and genea logical tree, the descent of our estate and blood; but beyond these inferior, transitory tri?es, our worth, if we have any, will be the main thing in the mouths of men, bad men and good men alike. It was the Roman centurion, the agent in Christ's crucifixion, with the sword in his hand, that gleamed over andguarded the dreadful doom, who cried out, Certainly this was a righteous man. A good name is better than precious ointment, and it should be prized.
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