OCR Text |
Show xliere are people in tne past •. . . people too far in the past for us to rememberor think of with confidence.We have the museums and the storiesand the blossomed desert in testimony,but the tableaus are still and the dusty relics unfamiliar,and even the strangest hour or deepest sensitivityfail to give substance to those who were before us.It would be good to truly know their texture,those who diverted the streams and hauled the granite and woodfor cathedrals and schools and organs in a wilderness.It would be good to know the reality of their privation,their doubt, and their weaknessand of the variant strength with which each glimpsedthe dream of those before him.For they built,and always their building was a process and a preparation.They built beyond their means and beyond their times . . .straight, wide streets, an opera house, a department store,a culture, a morality and a university . . .There were many ways to build,and always the builders that followedfound evidence of this dreamand made it their own: |