Part 19

He was not only a great composer and conductor, but a great pianist as well. He was also keenly sensitive as to his art and highly exacting in regard to the attitude of others toward it. Once when, in a private home, he was playing a duet with his pupil, Ferdinand Ries, two persons disturbed the performance by conversation. He immediately ceased playing and would neither play nor allow Ries to do so again during the evening.

His music was to him an absorbing passion. No matter in what capacity he might be ministering at its shrine, he always did so with entire devotion. About 1813 an incident occurred in which his entire self-forgetfulness in his work caused him to play a ludicrous part. He was playing one of his own compositions in a public concert when he so far forgot himself as to think he conducting instead of playing. Leaving his seat, he began violently directing. He knocked the lights from the piano. Two boys were directed to hold the lights while the managers and audience waited for the seemingly mad man to become quiet. One of the boys, light and all, was soon floored by a blow in the mouth from the swinging arm of the musician. The other boy dodged and ducked in his efforts to escape a like fate, while the audience roared with mirth.

Beethoven had a certain admiration for Napoleon Bonaparte as a soldier and statesman. The symphony now known as “Eroica” was written in Napoleon’s honor and was to bear his name. About the time of the completion of the first score, which was to be sent to the Corsican, the word came that its subject had proclaimed itself emperor. Beethoven at once tore the title from the score and changed the name of the composition to “Eroica.” Upon Napoleon’s death, he remarked that the symphony contained the funeral march of the conqueror.

During most of the active years of his life, Beethoven had been planning a musical setting for Schiller’s “Ode to Joy.” In the evening of his life it was at last completed. In 1824, just about two years before his death, Beethoven directed a rendering of this music in Vienna. During this performance a pathetic scene was enacted. At the close the applause became so deafening and was so prolonged that a serious public disturbance was feared, and the police were called in. Beethoven, who could hear no sound of all that was transpiring, stood with his back to the audience, wholly unconscious of the situation. At length someone touched him and caused him to turn around. When the people saw the look of surprise that spread over his face and realized the pathos of the situation, they broke out in a fresh demonstration, during which many faces were wet with tears.

By the time he was thirty years of age Beethoven had begun to be a victim of failing hearing. The dawn of this realization, which would have broken the spirit of many a man and which was a deep grief to him, did not daunt him nor greatly interfere with the completion of a great musical career. He did not dwell unduly upon his misfortune and, for a time, he even kept it a secret. Through the remaining years of his life, he patiently endured the difficulty, hindrance, and poverty of musical enjoyment which it brought him. That it had been to him a constant source of mental anguish, however, is indicated in the closing hour of his life. That hour came at the close of an illness which had been brought on by an undue exposure. It was while a severe thunderstorm was in progress outside that the great master lay surrounded by a group of friends who had been very faithful to him during his last illness, and some of whom were themselves eminent men. He indicated to them his knowledge that the end was near and then, after a silence, he said, “I shall hear in heaven,” and in a little time he was gone.

This was the ending of an unselfish life. Nothing but real devotion can leave the record that is his self-sacrifice. For the reckless and undeserving son of a dead brother, he denied himself real necessities for years, a sacrifice which met with neither appreciation nor effort to be worthy. The uncle remained true, however, and after his death when he was found to have held some unsuspected wealth in the form of bonds, it was supposed that he had kept it intact through his own days of severe personal need in order that it might go to his unworthy charge.

Beethoven was deeply religious. His ideas of religion were not weak and sentimental but were characterized by the same strength which pervaded his life in general. He had a keen sense of the Divine Power, but he did not allow it to destroy his companion sense of human responsibility. His pastor was a trusted friend. It was with that friend that he first shared the secret of his growing deafness and who helped him for a time to keep that secret from the ears of the world. Interesting and often illuminating correspondence between the two is still preserved. It is doubtful whether a mastery so great of an art so heavenly could have been possible to a man who did not have a strong sense of the Divine. The majesty of his music came from a majesty within, which probably knew better than it could tell the sweetness of that music which was breaking on his newly-opened ears in the moment of his assurance that he should “hear in heaven.”

The Obligation of Good Cheer (1916)

To say that there is no virtue in melancholy and no harm in cheerfulness only half states the case. Melancholy is positively wrong, and good cheer is a Christian grace. Whoever has a cheerful disposition has that much of a start toward positive and complete goodness.

From every viewpoint, both of the life to come and the life that now is, cheerfulness is a thing to be cultivated. It makes for happiness, it constitutes a guard against the danger of misjudgment and censoriousness, and it makes for success in the affairs of life. Everybody seeks out and likes the cheerful person. The world has no time—nor ought it to have—for the complainer and the grumbler.

Happiness is not a thing to be bought nor to be obtained from any external source. The only happiness which has lasting quality comes from within. No one can be happy long who is not happy in soul. Toys lose their gay color, baubles fade, treasures vanish, but a merry heart is glad forever. Happiness is not exclusive in its choice of where to go. It will go anywhere that anyone is willing to receive it. It graces the hovel as well as the mansion, and it is perfectly willing to pulsate in a breast covered with the rags of poverty. Anyone, anywhere, can be happy.

Melancholy is harmful to the individual. It not only spoils life for him, but it breaks down his health as well. No unhappy person can remain healthy long. On the other hand, no unhealthy person can cultivate the grace of joy without receiving substantial physical benefits therefrom.

The reasons for this are natural and plain. The unhappy person is never relaxed. He lives between a high tension of discontent and the lifeless reaction which follows. Today he is writhing in his self-inflicted misery. Tomorrow he is drowsy and languid as the inevitable result.

No one can feel well or go efficiently about his duties with his nerves on a strain. Every muscle must be free and loose. Each organ must be at ease and liberty to proceed in the performance of its function. The physical life cannot move by fits and starts without harm to itself. We cannot go in jerks without soon feeling the harmful results of so doing.

There is a still deeper reason than this for the harmful effect of discontent on the health. Unhappy emotions promptly set up processes which form poisons and pour them out into the system. These poisons have a paralyzing effect upon muscle and nerve. This accounts for the fact that indigestion or other organic inactivity will often follow a fit of violent anger or deep grief.

The Japanese are said to cultivate the habit of forcing themselves to smile. They do this, it is said, for the general benefit it renders both to disposition and health. It is a fact that a relaxed and smiling countenance has a tendency to put the rest of the body at its ease.

The conclusion is that every cheerful moment contributes to long life and physical well-being, and that it is not possible to give way to an uncontrolled torrent of unpleasant feelings or to the chilling hold of gloom without by so much shortening the days one has to live.

Melancholy is anti-social. It would scarcely be too much to say that it is criminal. If it is a crime to trespass upon the rights or the happiness of others, then gloom is a crime, for the reason that it does increase the burden and detract from the happiness of every person who ever comes into its chilling and blighting presence.

It does not dispose of the responsibility to say that other people need not be affected by our feelings. As a matter of fact, other people cannot help being affected by our feelings. Nothing is more contagious than feeling. The warm and genial spirit sheds light and joy wherever it goes—as a matter of course. The chilled and crabbed soul makes its presence a place of arctic coldness—and equally without effort. Where there is cheer, there we find spontaneity and freedom. Where there is gloom, there are weakness and constraint.

It is a serious question whether anyone ought to be allowed so to add to the world’s burden. Having been near someone who was constitutionally unhappy has more than once unfitted someone else for his daily task. No one cares how long his day or how hard his work so long as he can keep a courageous spirit, but when he is robbed of that, he is shorn of practically all his power.

Men are not looking for more troubles. They already have more than enough. They are looking for genial souls who know the value of a smile and can teach it to men. The world really owes a large debt to the men who have made it their business to coax a laugh occasionally to its weary and hardened face. The man who has made the way a little more sunny for some far stranger whose face he will never see in this world shall in no wise lose his reward.

It may often happen that one could render no other service quite so great as to just keep happy. The other man may not need a lift with his load. He may only need a fresh supply of gladness in his heart to make him feel that it is a little lighter. The world treasures its little supply of hearty good cheer as it might treasure gold and precious gems. Furthermore, it loves none so much as it loves those who try to pluck some of its thorns and plant flowers in their places.

Melancholy is not only unhealthful and anti-social, it is also sinful. The person who treasures an unhappy spirit sins not only against himself and his fellow men, but he also sins against the Almighty.

Of course, it should be understood that in order to be happy there is no need of questionable and dangerous diversions. Let it be said once more that happiness does not come from without but from within. The whole outside world takes on the color of the spectacles we wear. It is just as unpleasing as the person who sees it is unpleasant. It is just as rosy and beautiful as the eye that looks upon it is bright and hopeful. We are speaking here not of diversions but of the inner spirit of our lives. Happiness, if it is anything, is a quality of character.

In his story of “The Laughing Man,” Victor Hugo has sketched a remarkable character. Gwynplaine is a traveling showman, who as a baby was stolen from noble parents, and so disfigured by surgical means that his face always bore the appearance of a laugh. All through his life, however heavy might be his heart, Gwynplaine had no choice but to wear a laugh upon his face. The tears might flow from his eyes, but his features never lost their look of merriment. He laughed in sun and shadow, joy and woe.

After all, there is something wonderfully suggestive in this supposedly unfortunate character. He at least helped others too to be merry. He at least did not impose the chill of a downcast countenance upon any companion while he lived. This is worth while. It would be infinitely better if more could bury their sorrows beneath their cheer. Not only would others about them fare better, but the sorrows themselves would the sooner disappear. We cannot banish sorrow, but we can learn to bear it well.

If one will look to the Bible for a vindication of the statement that cheerfulness is Christian and gloom sinful, he will find abundant evidence to that effect. Everything there goes to indicate the gladness that clings about that One in whose presence is fulness of joy and at whose right hand there are pleasures forevermore. The person who thinks religion must be sombre has misread his Bible and misinterpreted his Master. It may be serious and earnest, but never morose and gloomy.

The Man of Galilee was indeed a man of sorrows, but He was too much of a man of joy to burden the world with His sorrows. He did not dwell upon them in the presence of others. He was content to endure them manfully, and to give the world an example of courage to the last.

A despondent person is no ornament to religion. It is the joy-lighted face which inspires and wins. It is the light of joy about the altar that makes it an impressive place. It is the glad service which lifts the world a little farther in its long, hard climb.

Worship and Service (1916)

Francisco Pizarro, the conqueror of Peru, was an important force in early Western history. However, he stained his hands again and again with helpless blood. Selfishly he pursued his end both by fair means and foul. When the last of the Incas, from the prison into which Pizarro had thrown him to await death, offered a roomful of gold as his ransom, Pizarro accepted the gold, but the promise of life and liberty was broken, and the old man was led to his death.

One day as the conqueror sat at dinner, he was surprised by a group of avengers and was struck down. As he lay dying, Pizarro dipped his finger into the stream of lifeblood that flowed from him, drew with it the figure of a cross upon the floor, and kissed it as he died.

A beautiful thing, it may perhaps be called, that the dying thoughts of a great explorer and conqueror turned to the cross, and that his lips were last pressed against its sacred image. But a life of cruelty is not atoned for by kissing the picture of the emblem of love. Years of wrong are not changed by one symbolic act of devotion at the last. The old Inca chief and all the others who had met death at the point of Pizarro’s sword remained in their graves, their rights and treasures unrestored. The fact that their overcomer died kissing the cross was of no avail to them.

To kiss the cross at twilight will never take the place of playing the man through the day. It is better to live, simply and nobly, the spirit and principles of the cross for a single hour than to embrace its image for an eternity. Peace and love are not symbols, but realities; and righteousness is not shadow but substance. Simple fidelity in common ways far transcends the one picturesque performance done when all the world is looking. It is only the path of simple duty that leads to peace at last. He who would die in the spirit of the cross must live there. The cross is truly pictured in the life of true devotion, not with the blood of selfishness upon the couch of death.

Do It Right (1917)

The other day I saw painted behind the seat of an express truck, where the expressman would see it each time he loaded or removed a package, the simple sentence: “Do it right.”

The express company knew human nature. It also understood the laws of success. It had taken the trouble to place before the eyes of its employe the maxim which pointed the way to their mutual success.

For what will make an express company prosperous will also make its workers prosperous, namely, doing things right. And if that principle will give success in the handling of express packages, it will also result in success in the performance of any other task. There is not a walk of life in which profitable use may not be made of the maxim: “Do it right.” Whether one works with tools, with books, with facts, or with men, he cannot be a success in his line unless he does it right.

It takes longer to do a thing right. Nervousness and hurry are the foes of perfect work. The master workman must be deliberate. He will not take more time than he needs, but he must take that much. It takes longer to do a thing right, but it never has to be done over when once it is finished.

Life’s Handicaps (1918)

One day a group of Galilean people wanted to carry a sick friend to Jesus to be healed. He was in a house, and when they came near they found such a crowd about the doors and windows that they could not get in. Not to be defeated in their purpose, they cut an opening through the roof and let the sick man, bed and all, down to where the Great Physician was. Of course, the result was that the afflicted person received the gift of a whole body as the reward for their insistent attitude. The story is simply another version of the value of importunity in seeking the gifts of the Great Helper.

This story of the long ago indicates one of the great principles of life, and one which has played a part in the activities and struggles of every age. It suggests that one may at any time have to reckon with handicaps, but that there is usually a way to overcome them if one has the will to seek and follow that way. There is something highly admirable about the spirit of this group of people who, when they could not accomplish their desire in one way, promptly found another in which they could accomplish it.

The Scriptures say a good many things by implication which they do not say in exactly so many words. It is said that in an experience meeting in which the attendants fell to quoting favorite passages of Scripture, an old lady arose and stated that of all the beautiful and helpful Scripture texts in which she had found strength and comfort, her favorite was this: “Grin and bear it.” The Bible does not contain such a text, but it does contain such a teaching, and the old lady was not so far wrong after all.

This Scripture story of the sick man and his friends suggests another adage of the world, which has expression at least by implication in the Scriptures. The Bible does not contain such a text as: “Where there’s a will there’s a way,” yet such is the exact teaching implied in the story outlined above.

Along whatever way one’s path may happen to lie, and whatever may be the task which he undertakes to perform, his life would be utterly unnatural if it were devoid of difficulties. A life without handicaps would be no more natural than a summer without showers or a year without a winter. It is not even desirable that one should live without encountering more or less resistance to his efforts to realize his best and highest hopes.

Furthermore, these difficulties are often unforeseen. They cannot be calculated, but they must be allowed for. At the beginning of the carrying out of any enterprise, the proper thing to do is to reckon one’s resources and to count the cost. At the beginning of any journey, the barriers in the way must be a calculation in the plan. At the outset of any endeavor, one must realize that not every part of his task will be altogether easy. If it were, the finished product would hardly be worth while, and certainly the toiler himself would not have benefited largely from his labor. Difficulties, expected and unexpected, are as certain to come as is the succession of the days and nights.

Life is frequently likened to a race. It is true that it is a progress toward a goal, and that in it there are many who are contending against each other for what they look upon as a victory. Life is not a race, however, in which every element of the situation is ideal for every runner. It is only in dreams where such perfect conditions may be found. In the hard facts of life it is otherwise. In the real race each contestant has at least some odds against him.

Life, then, is a race in which each runner is hampered with a handicap. Each situation presents some difficulty, and occasionally the most brilliant of successes is made in spite of this hindrance. The ideal race would not be one without handicaps. It is rather one in which a man plays his part well in spite of handicaps. The ideal victory is not that which is won because the contestant had everything in his favor. It is rather the one which is gained in spite of the odds which the contestant had against him.

Homer and Milton were blind, yet each won for himself a secure place among the world’s small group of immortal poets. It would have been easy for either to have made his affliction an excuse for failure. Instead, each made his handicap an added reason for success. Each learned to glimpse a glory which is hidden to most who are blessed with faultless vision.

Demosthenes was born with a faulty utterance and with a hollow chest. Nevertheless, he conceived a great desire to be an orator. Most men would have found their physical unfitness a sufficient handicap to discourage them from any effort. Demosthenes determined to overcome the hindrances which had been born with him. He sought a remote and secluded place, shaved his head in order that he might not soon venture back among his friends, and exercised his voice and body until the weakness of both had been overcome. All the world is familiar with the final results of his efforts.