[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 82 (Thursday, June 12, 1997)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5647-S5648]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                      FAREWELL TO THE SENATE PAGES

  Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, my attention has just been called to the 
fact that this is the last day in which we will all be blessed by the 
services rendered to all Senators on both sides of the aisle by these 
wonderful young people who sit on the dais, to our right and to our 
left, who are the pages. Daniel Webster appointed the first page. 
Tomorrow, these pages will graduate. They go to school while they do 
this work here for us and for our country. They work for our country, 
just as we Senators seek to do our best in serving our country. Without 
these pages, we would find our work to be more difficult, and we can't 
thank them enough.
  They get up early and they go to school. They have to continue to 
maintain good grades while they are doing the Senate's work. And this 
is demanding work. They run here, they run there. They are at the beck 
and call of every Senator all day long.
  Tennyson said, ``I am a part of all that I have met.'' I hope these 
young pages, when they go back to their homes and to their communities

[[Page S5648]]

throughout the country, will take with them, as I know they will, a 
part of us, as we will keep with us a part of them.
  I take occasion to talk with these young people every now and then. I 
have told them some stories over the days and weeks. I have told them 
the story of ``The House with the Golden Windows.'' I have told them 
Tolstoy's story, ``How Much Land Does a Man Need?'' And then I related 
to them a story that was told by Russell Conwell, one of the early 
Chautauqua speakers, which he had related 5,000 times--the story titled 
``Acres of Diamonds.'' And, of course, there have been other stories. 
But I have found the pages to be so eager--eager to learn, eager to 
serve.
  I think we can all be proud of our young people. We hear sometimes 
about the bad apples, and there are a few bad apples around. The 
problem is, they crowd out our view of the good apples. Most of our 
young people are wholesome, fine young people. They are working in the 
school rooms, the libraries, the laboratories, and seeking to develop 
their minds. Perhaps we don't hear as much of them. But they are the 
future citizens of this country, the great resource of the country. And 
one day, they will be the chemists, the architects, the teachers, the 
ministers, the lawyers, the Senators. I know, I have seen that gleam in 
their eyes. Some of them are thinking about coming back here already--
as Senators.
  I hope that we Senators have conducted ourselves in a way that will 
make the pages feel proud of us--proud that you have had the honor and 
the good fortune to serve here, because it is an honor and you have 
been fortunate. There are millions of young people throughout this 
country who would love to serve as pages in the Senate. So I hope that 
we have, in some way, inspired you to serve and to want to learn. I 
hope that you will continue to learn. Always seek to excel, to be the 
best at whatever you are doing. There is always a place for you at the 
top.
  Unfortunately, not too many people want to start at the bottom 
anymore. But you should be willing to start at the bottom and seek to 
excel and to learn. In due time, you will be rewarded. Solon said, ``I 
grow old in the pursuit of learning.'' So continue to learn all of your 
lives.
  We praise the great athletes, but no ballgame ever changed the course 
of history. Study math, science, chemistry, physics, read well; and in 
due time, you will contribute to your community and to your country.

       A careful man I want to be, a little fellow follows me.
       I do not dare to go astray, for fear he will go the self 
     same way.
       He thinks that I am good and fine, believes in every word 
     of mine.
       The base in me he must not see, that little chap that 
     follows me.
       I must remember as I go, through summer's sun and winter's 
     snow,
       I am building for the years to be, that little chap that 
     follows me.

  That is the way we feel about you. Most of us, certainly, have 
children and grandchildren, and you are somebody's children and 
somebody's grandchildren, and we know that they are proud of you.

       I took a piece of plastic clay,
       And idly fashioned it one day.
       And as my fingers pressed it still,
       It moved and yielded to my will.
       I came again when days were past,
       The bit of clay was hard at last.
       The form I gave it, it still bore,
       And I could change that form no more.

       I took a piece of living clay,
       And gently formed it day by day.
       And molded with my power and art,
       A young child's soft and yielding heart.
       I came again when years were gone,
       He was a man I looked upon.
       He still that early impress wore,
       And I could change him nevermore.

  As I look back across the 80 years of my life, I have lived a full 
life, and it seems that it was only a little while ago when I was 
young, like the boys and girls who are our pages. Even then, I wanted 
to learn all that I could cram into my head, and I wanted to make 
something of myself, and to be somebody when I grew up to be a man. I, 
too, like you, had dreams of all the future years, of what I would do 
in the days to come.

       Ah, how great it is to believe the dream,
       As we stand in youth by the starlit stream,
       But greater still to live life through,
       And find at the end that the dream is true.

  One thing, finally, I want to leave with you. Always take God with 
you. I have lived beyond the psalmist's promise.

       The days of our years are threescore years and ten. and if 
     by reason of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their 
     strength, labour and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we 
     fly away.

  I have lived almost 80 years and I have seen times when I have felt 
God was near me and listening to me, and you will see those times, too. 
There will be times in your lives when you will be walking in deep 
valleys, and you may walk in crowds, but there will be someone closer 
than the crowd to you. There may be no one else around you, but there 
is someone with whom you can communicate, someone who will share your 
grief, and someone who will give you strength, someone who will help 
lift you up from under great burdens, and that someone is the Heavenly 
Father. No man is good. We all fall short of the glory of God. But 
there is a God up there.

  Look at the stars tonight, if the skies are clear, and see God's 
wonderful handiwork. And remember that some of those stars are so far 
away that the light from them has been traveling millions of light-
years--millions of light-years, that some of those stars are so large 
that they would not be able to pass between the Sun and the Earth. The 
Sun is 93 million miles away. Yet there are stars so huge that they 
could not pass between the Earth and the Sun.
  Napoleon, as he sat listening to the discussions about material 
things on the deck of a ship one night, pointed upward and said, ``Say 
what you wish. Who made all of that?''
  So you will come across doubters and skeptics and cynics. But you can 
trust in God. Remember, there are great physicists, great scientists, 
men and women who have earned degrees from the higher institutions of 
learning, but they know that there is a hand greater than the hand of 
man that has created the Earth and the universe--the universes. Keep 
your faith in Him.
  These are the little random thoughts that I have, as we say goodbye 
to you tomorrow. We will always wish for you these things: work for 
your hands, a straight path for your feet, sunshine on your windowpane 
in the morning, a song in your treetop at evening, soft rains for your 
garden, happiness in your hearts, love at your firesides, and God's 
blessings always.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.

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