The Sun 42 WYNDHAM STREET AUCKLAND FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 19, 1930. A LOFTY TOMB

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 1081, 19 September 1930, Page 8

The Sun 42 WYNDHAM STREET AUCKLAND FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 19, 1930. A LOFTY TOMB

TIME, which makes polities obsolete, lias passed quickly over * the tomb of William Ferguson Massey. Five full years have gone since the statesman’s death, but to someone every day his memory is something good that lives and must live forever because the hilltop place of his rest commands the scene and centre of the man’s work and worth and compels attention. Whose tomb on the hill 1 Who was the man to whom so noble a memorial was raised and what were his character and service- These questions for generations to come will he asked of men in the busy streets of the Dominion’s capital and on all the ships that round Point Halswell at the front gate of a maritime city. And the answers will recall the man and his statesmanship long after the details of his political achievements have been forgotten. This, surely, is a commemoration few men, even much greater men, ever secure as a reward for duty well clone or memorable deeds. Today, the Massey Memorial will be unveiled. Tt is good that politicians should break away from party chaffering for a day and, with the King’s representative and citizens, take part in a dignified ceremony and find inspiration in commemorating an administrator who, at worst, never did less than his best for his country and the British Commonwealth of Nations. It is, of course, quite true that the late Mr. Massey also knew how to fight party battles and press shrewd assault upon the political enemy, but in that warfare lie was a chivalrous fighter, taking and giving blows with ardent and honest goodwill. For lie was not so much a great statesman as he was a great patriot and a staunch-lieartecl citizen. And those who knew him best admired him most for the sturdy qualities which, in the stress of difficulties and “among the leaping devils” of politics enabled him to keep his feet and stand. The eloquence of tribute may he left to politicians. Enough to say here, in a poet’s phrase, that at Point Halswell nothing is there for tears . . . “no weakness, no contempt, dispraise or blame, nothing but well and fair and what may quiet us in a death so noble.” These famous lines of Milton’s were among Mr. Massey’s favourite quotations (although a politician he could appreciate true poetry) and his appreciation surely is symbolised beautifully in the memorial tomb overlooking the haunts of his active political life. For thirteen years he served the Dominion as its Prime Minister. Of course, he had his faults as a forceful administrator, but these can be left in the past, for they were not frailties. He began his working life as a ploughman, and throughout a Jong political career had to plough his way through stiff ground. Need anything more be said than that he maintained a straight furrow? Apart from the memory of the statesman and the record of 1 1 is work, the memorial is unique in its simplicity and beauty. It almost represents the first departure from that architectural standard of commemorative art, which, in respect of memorable individual men, has littered this country with cairns, obelisks and other monumental monstrosities. A better conception of marbled commemoration has been secured at last, and it is to be hoped that the inspired design of the Massey Memorial, as prepared by Mr. S. Hurst Seager, of Christchurch, in collaboration with Messrs. Gummer and Ford, of Auckland, will serve as an example for New Zealand architects in the future. If the personality of famous men and their achievements must be perpetuated in monuments and memorials let them be symbolised in truth and beauty, as in the manner of the shrine on Point Halswell. And in remembering Mr. Massey today many minds will spare thoughts for the memory of the late Sir Joseph Ward whose great services also must be commemorated in an adequate form. Both statesmen were as the Poles apart as regards political ideas, but they were colleagues in almost every other sense, and particularly as to the patriotic aim and earnestness of national* purpose. In these grey political days let us remember our ablest statesmen and render honest tribute to their highest and best qualities.