Part 20

On the day when Demosthenes was uttering the amazing words which so tellingly advocated his right to receive a crown at the hands of his fellow citizens, the explanation of his achievement did not lie in his birth. It lay rather in the fact that he had willed to overcome the limitations with which nature had surrounded him. It is true that he had seized a psychological moment, but he was able to seize that moment because he had not feared the long period of painstaking effort which had been necessary to overcome his handicaps. The secret of his success was not opportunity, but toil. He had merely refused to surrender to the forces which would have destroyed the usefulness of many men. His triumph was but the result of a task patiently performed in spite of its difficulty.

During the last century, Spain produced a remarkable artist in the person of Daniel Vierge. He attained eminence in his work while still a young man. At the early age of thirty, however, he suffered complete paralysis of the right side. It would have been easy to have admitted that his work with the brush and pencil was done, and to have resigned himself to what seemed to be a hard fate. Such was not his spirit, however. He had no intention of relinquishing the tools of his art. He still had the use of his left arm, and he determined that it should be trained to possess the power which the other had lost.

The long and tedious period of training had to be gone through again. He accomplished his task, however, and in spite of the difficulty which he had encountered he learned to draw nearly as well with his left hand as he had ever been able to do with the other. By making the most of the one resource which was left to him, he managed to retain his place in the front rank of his profession as an illustrator. The work which he produced after his affliction can scarcely be distinguished in quality from his earlier efforts.

Dr. Holmes once said that the best way to live long is to become afflicted with some serious disease. What he meant was that such an affliction sometimes teaches people the care of their bodies, when enduring health would leave them utterly careless of the essential laws of well-being. It does sometimes happen that, even in this regard, a handicap is found to be a helpful thing. There are cases on record which tell the story of renewed effort to cultivate health and strength, when life was rapidly slipping away, and of the crowning of that effort with success, health, and long life.

The old story of the hare and the tortoise is re-enacted daily in modern life. The battle does not always go to the strong, nor is victory in the race the inevitable portion of the swift. The winner is more apt to be the patient toiler who has chosen a purpose, and who struggles in the direction of his goal in spite of handicaps. His progress may not always be swift, but it is at least continuous.

The Riverside (1918)

“It is not what we would like to do in this life,” says Clarence E. Flynn in ‛The Riverside,’ “but what we really get done that counts.”

“Heaven in its mercy may take the will for the deed, but human destiny in its justice never does.”

“What the world of men needs is not kindly thoughts which never come to expression nor the good will which never reaches the form of action. What it needs is the helpful word and the real deed of kindness. It is for the concrete service that the hearts of men rise up in thankfulness.”

“And, in the working out of our own careers, progress is not made by the dream which never become more than a dream nor the purpose which was never carried to fulfillment. ‛We rise by the things that are under our feet,’ and push forward by the virtue of the things really accomplished. Fate, like men, does not ask how we have felt, but what we have done.”

“Upon the record of our own characters and personalities we may get credits for feelings and our purposes, even though they were all smothered silence and inaction, but these things do not enter into the record formed by the impressions we make upon our age. It is a record of deed, and it stands when the eyes of this world have ceased to see any other.”

“A thought or a feeling of aspiration, however great or strong, is not meant to be an end within itself. It is a means to the end of its actual realization in action and accomplishment.”

“A heavenly vision is given only to shed light on a way to perform a heavenly deed. A great thought is given only to make possible a great work. A noble feeling is God’s way of pointing to a noble mission. Columbus did not have a conviction that a new world lay beyond the sea for naught. The conviction led the way to the fact and its important result. It has been so in countless similar instances.”

“It is what men do that lives after them. There is an earthly side to immortality. The deeds done in the flesh make an epitaph which cannot deceive.”

Determinants (1921)

Two trees grow together on the same hillside. They draw their sustenance from the same soil, yet each has its own peculiar bark, leaf, and fruit. Both exude gum, yet one gum contains arabic acid while the other contains none. The difference is not in the food they consume nor the environment in which they grow. It is in some hidden fact which determines the nature of each.

Two animals feed in the same pasture. They eat the same food and graze upon the same kind of grass. Yet one is covered with hair and the other with wool. The difference is not in the material of which their coats are made. It is in some unseen force which determines their natures.

Two human beings grow up together in the same home. They eat together from the same food at the same table. They have the same parental guidance. They enjoy the same physical and social environment. Yet one becomes a good man and the other a bad one. The same sustaining properties have entered into their making, but in one they bring forth good fruit, while in the other they bring forth evil fruit.

No tree ever violates the dictates of that hidden force. Its fruitage never varies. One could not change its output unless he could first change its nature. Men do not gather grapes from thorns, or figs from thistles. Fortunately, however, this rule does not hold in the case of men. The nature of a man can be altered or reversed.

This can be done because it is possible to change the heart, and from the heart are the issues of life. Nothing can change the determinant in a tree, but there is a power that can change it in a life. This is because a man has a will, while a tree has none. It is the power of the will to resist or submit.

Love’s Burdens (1921)

A little boy sat in a wheel chair. The hand of Fate had already rested heavily upon his tender years. A paralysis had laid hold upon him and had left him as helpless as an infant. His drawn lips could not speak. His eyes could not keep themselves focussed upon any object. Only one thing about him remained normal. His mind continued to function. He knew, felt, joyed, desired, and suffered.

In some unfeeling, intellectually ideal republic, such a pitiful piece of human wreckage might have been cast upon the junk heap. It was so done in the old day, and so it would be done again if a certain type of statesman might have his pitiless way. Utopias too seldom make proper allowance for such poor unfortunates. They cannot produce anything. They are necessarily a care and a burden to others. They are worth nothing in money to society. They are not social assets. They are social liabilities.

Fortunately, this child did not dwell in a state which reckoned things on such a basis. He was born a citizen of the blessed kingdom of love. The disposition of his poor, stricken life was not determined by the dictates of the head. It was decided by the kindlier judgments of the heart. It was not a question of expediency. It was one of affection. Had his parents been ruled by the icy processes of a certain brand of common sense, they might have despised and neglected him because he was not a creditable representative of their kind. However, it was not so. Being ruled by the gentler spirit of parental love, they cared for him a little more tenderly than for any other of their children.

There is a reason. It is the fact that love is so constituted that it finds joy in bearing burdens. It deliberately reaches out to help the poorest and most unfortunate. It lavishes itself on those from whom it can expect nothing save gratitude in return. The feelings of the heart constitute the only coin in circulation in love’s domain.

Day after day an aged mother sat in her chair by the window. Her faded eyes looked continually out upon the street. One might have thought that they were looking at the stream of passers-by. It was not so. She could hardly see the friends and neighbors as they came and went. She was really looking back over the long vista of vanished years. She was seeing departed faces, and listening to voices long hushed by the blanketing clay.

A day came when she could no longer sit at the window. The thin old frame that was her body had grown too weak to support itself in a chair, so she lay upon her bed. Neglected? No. She was more tenderly cared for than ever. She was a great care for the tender, loving hands that ministered to her, but her very weakness and helplessness called the louder to loving hearts and they responded.

One day the worn-out machinery of her physical body stopped running. At evening time it had suddenly grown light, and then the darkness had fallen. The old face was the picture of peace, with its closed eyes and a certain satisfied expression upon its features.

A wise friend came and stood in the darkened room with the daughter who had faithfully cared for the aged one while she lived. She said to her:

“I know how many times your arms will ache for the burden that has been taken from them.”

She knew the law of love. It craves burdens to bear. When it has carried a heavy load through years of time and that load is suddenly lifted from its shoulders, it does not rejoice. It weeps and wishes for the burden back again. This is a part of its strange, beautiful nature. Without this nature it would not be love. The world has gone on and the race has accomplished something of an upward climb because love has always been among us, lifting, pushing, and helping. Without it we should still be a race of savages.

A little blind girl walked in the park day after day. She stepped among flowers that she had never seen. She listened to the birds, though she did not know what they looked like. She lived in a world the beauty or ugliness of which she had no power to realize. She was always led about by the same hand—that of her father. He was patient and faithful. He seemed to be trying to do all that could be done to compensate for the great lack in her life. Since joy could not find its way in through her eyes, he did what he could to help a little more of it to trickle in through her heart. He succeeded, for across her sightless face occasionally flashed a brightness announcing the arrival of gladness within.

There were other children in the family. All save this one were in full possession of their normal powers. The logical thing, after a fashion, would have been for the hearts of the parents to incline toward the well-favored. However, such was not the type of logic that prevailed. The heart of love does not lavish its affection upon those who have no need. It pours itself out for those who need help and care. Therefore, this sightless child was more tenderly cared for than any one of the rest.

It was in accordance with an established law. The troubled heart is a magnet to the spirit of affection. Moreover, the very toil and sacrifice spent for an object of love beget a greater devotion. The greater care one needs the more he is loved.

It is so among men because it is so with God. We are made in His image, and our normal feelings and efforts are only a poor human struggle to be like Him.

A beautiful thing is said in the opening sentences of the Bible. The barren picture of the first stage of creation is first sketched. It is said that the earth was waste, and void, and that darkness was upon the face of the deep. Then comes the significant sentence. It relates that the Spirit of God brooded upon the face of the waters.

This is the explanation of all the progress that has been achieved since. The waste became order, the void became substance, and the darkness became light. Gradually civilization established itself, and the world keeps moving on toward the realization of its better day. Some time we shall see the realization of the promise of a new heaven and a new earth in which no sin or sorrow shall be known. There will be just one explanation. God has brooded in love over every shadow, and sin, and sorrow that we have ever had, and His love has always struggled on with us to better things.

One day when Jesus showed some special solicitude for those whom the correct and the respectable despised, He answered the criticism of His friends by saying that it was not the well but the sick who needed a physician. Such is the law of love. The heart of the world’s Saviour went out first to those who needed His care most. It was love looking for a burden to bear.

One evening time Jesus prayed in a garden. He was looking at the whole world that night as He had looked at the city when He wept over it. He was the divine spirit brooding that night over the needs of a race. Next morning He hung upon the cross. He was only going to the limit of the last bitter extremity for those He loved. Why do we call Him the world’s highest example of love? Because He was the world’s outstanding burden-bearer.

Love is the sweetest and the costliest thing in the world. It is the sweetest because it is the spirit and atmosphere of heaven. It is the costliest because its arms are always aching for loads to carry.

The Successors of Tantalus (1921)

Tantalus was a legendary Grecian king who is said to have displeased the gods. As punishment he was condemned to dwell by a pool, the waters of which receded when he attempted to drink from them, and to dwell just out of reach of an abundance of overhanging fruit.

Tantalus lives in many of us today. His pool of water and evasive food supply are like the visions which fade before we reach them or the hopes that burst like bubbles before they are realized. They are like the mirage that leads the traveler across the desert and fades before he has quenched his thirst at its promised springs. They resemble the summer flower that falls to pieces before one can lay hands upon it.

Yet these unrealized hopes are among the most valuable experiences we have. The traveler on the desert may not reach his palm-sheltered spring, but he often approaches nearer to the end of his journey for having followed its image. In life we do not always get what we seek, but we often find that in what seemed an hour of failure we have achieved real progress.

At maturity one often finds that the joys he sought in youth are only empty husks after having been so laboriously obtained. It may seem tragic that the name and place to which he early aspired lose so much of their appeal when they have been attained. The effort spent on the upward climb has not been in vain, however. In the struggle his ideals have lifted. He is no longer satisfied with the superficial and the unreal.

We plan endeavors and strive to successfully complete them. Sometimes we succeed, but often we fail. When we fail in a righteous cause the labor has not necessarily been in vain. One can never be robbed of the best fruit of his striving, which is the added sinew of strength gained in the trying.

The Christian Standard of Greatness (1922)

The life and destiny of a nation are largely determined by what it considers great. If its hero is a ruthless warrior, its nature will be militaristic, and its end will be that of those who fight and kill. If its idol is a man whose chief distinction is wealth, its career will be one long struggle after gold, and its journey will be to the grave of profligacy. If its ideal is a man whose sole objective is position and power, its life will be a struggle for place, and its end the decadence which such things always suffer.

This principle is true because greatness is a mirage after which all men seek. It is a rainbow’s end to which, though we may never quite reach it, we are always struggling. When a thing once comes to be considered great, it at once becomes popular. Men of every kind and condition immediately seek it. It becomes the fashion and, therefore, determines the life of the period.

=The Question of Relative Greatness=

It was a perfectly natural thing that the disciples of Jesus should concern themselves so much about the question of relative greatness in the kingdom which their Master had proclaimed. It was nothing but the world-old lust for chief positions. It was planted deeply in their natures, just as it has been in the natures of those who have lived in every age. Jesus understood it, and He realized the inevitableness of their obsession with it. He dealt gently with some of their mistakes because He knew these mistakes had their origin in this fact.

One day that wonderful little company of men arrived in the city of Capernaum, tired out with their travel on the country road. When they were safely in the house, Jesus sat down among them and asked what it was they had been discussing on the way. He made this inquiry only to open up the question, for He knew that they had been disputing about the question as to who was greatest. Then He settled the question once and for all by proclaiming a new standard of greatness. “If any man would be first,” He said, “he shall be last of all and the servant of all.”

=A Permanent and Dependable Standard=

In those words, Jesus set forth the Christian measure of greatness. With a wave of the hand, He set aside the ordinary standards and conceptions of the world. Passing show and display, temporary wealth and position, the deceitfulness of name and rank, the needless privilege of lording it over others as some great one in the land—all these are disregarded in the kingdom of things as they should be. Jesus measures greatness by the only standard which is permanent and dependable. Since we are His followers, we must do the same.

=The Paradoxes of Jesus=

The teachings of Jesus are full of the appearance of paradox. He frequently said such things as He said to the disciples that day in Capernaum. He said that to gain one’s life he must lose it, that to be first one must be last, and that to be great one must not seek to be served but to serve.

The world in general has never come to see that these things are really true. At least it has not come to act as though it realized their truth. However, the experiences of life are continually proving them. Repeatedly we have seen that one carries nothing out of the world except what he has given away. In a very real sense, one possesses only that which he has lost. One is made of account in this world as well as the next not by being ministered unto but by ministering.

=The Teachings of Jesus in Terms of Life=

Jesus was not one who preached one gospel and lived another. He preached a possible gospel and proved its possibility by living it. He himself was a perfect example of His own teachings worked out in terms of life. He went about doing good. He is the supreme figure in the life of the ages because He was the supreme servant of men. He was the divine Son of God. Therefore, His life is full and sufficient proof to us that service is more than great. It is divine.

This Christian conception of greatness has not been altogether easy for the world to accept. Men have been so long steeped in the human love for the gleam of gold, the trappings of power, and the couch of luxury that they do not readily part with the old habits of thought and the old ambitions of life.

Age-long ideas are not easy to banish. Nearly two-thousand years have passed since Jesus preached His little sermon on greatness at Capernaum, and we have not yet wholly learned the lesson. We are in process of learning it, however. The world makes progress, and some day we shall have reached the goal of high thinking, noble ideals, and great conceptions.

=Our Changing Conception of Greatness=

A little while ago one might have seen the marks of the old standard of greatness on the walls of almost any school building in the land. He would have seen displayed there a collection of pictures the great majority of which were portraits of warriors and representations of battle scenes. A census of the pictures in the ordinary school history would have revealed the same situation. This is all in accordance with an ancient law. We are hero worshippers. We have always pictured our idols on the schoolhouse walls. And in accordance with the inevitable law of suggestion, they have effected the life of the generations accordingly.

Today we see fewer warriors and battle scenes pictured. Instead we see an increasing number of portraits of the great servants of humanity. Where yesterday we saw the pictures of Alexander, Caesar, and Napoleon, today we see the faces of Faraday, Watts, Fulton, Pasteur, and Burbank. This simply means that our conception of greatness is changing. We admire the great destroyers less and less. We admire the great builders and servants of the race more and more.

=Ancient and Modern Wonders of the World=