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BOOKENDS

THE YOUNG MAN WASHINGTON, by Samuel Eliot Morison, Harvard University Press. Cambridge.

THIS short lecture delivered by Professor Morison on Washington's birthday, at Sanders Theatre is both very interesting and amusing. He takes up the youth of Washington, which has always been enshrouded in the unauthentic myths and stories that often accompany extraordinary posthumous fame, and makes of him a real boy and real young man.

In speaking of the attitude of most people toward Washington, Professor Morison quotes the epitaph on the tomb of Plato, "Here lies a man whom it is neither permissable nor proper for the irreverent or ignorant to praise;" and the portrait he draws is of a man to whom this would apply. He tells of Washington's self-discipline, of how he formulated his own philosophy, which was a sort of combination of stoicism and aristocracy, and accounts for his almost perfect balance and serenity. Professor Morison also describes how Washington learned to handle men, and treats his dignified, manly love for Sally Cary.

All in all it is a delightfully intimate study of the development of a great man. Those who heard the lecture last February will be glad to possess it in print; those who didn't will find it fascinating.

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