Superiority is to make erring men unerring and slow minds swift. Then, indeed, comes the better day—pray God it be not far off—when strength uses its wealth as the net of the sacred fisher to gather souls of men out of the deep.
In overplus of strength we have the measure of a man's greatness. Soul-power is resource for finding and feeding the hidden springs of life and thought in others. Not all have the same capacity. The Lord of the vineyard still sends into the white fields ten-talent men, two-talent men and one-talent men. Each hath his own task, and each must grasp the handle of his own being. Genius is widely distributed. Not many Platos—only one, and then a thousand lesser minds look up to him and learn to think. Not many Dantes—one, and a thousand poets tune their lyres to his and catch its notes. Not many Raphaels—one, and a thousand aspiring artists look up to him and are lifted by the look. Not many royal hearts—great magazines of kindness. Few are great in heart-power, effulging all sweet and generous qualities. Happy the community blessed with, a few great hearts and a few great minds. One such will civilize a whole community.
Classic literature charmed our childhood with the story of an Arabian sheik. He dwelt in an oasis near the edge of the desert. Wealth was his, with flocks and herds and wedges of gold. One night sleep forsook his couch. Yet the gurgle of falling water was in his ear. The odors of the vineyard were in his nostril; and to-morrow his servants would begin to gather the abundant harvest. Ten miles away ran the track of the caravan where his herdsmen had found a traveler dead from the fierce heat of the desert. Yonder the desert and a dying traveler; here an oasis with living water. Then the sheik arose; he bade his servants fill two leathern water-bottles and bring a basket full of figs and grapes. The next day a caravan came to a booth protecting two water-bottles sunk in the sand. Beside them were bunches of fruit. On a roll were these words: "While God gives me life each day shall a man be—as springs of water in a desert place." This beautiful story interprets for us the ministry of the higher manhood, as the great heart becomes the shadow of a great rock in a weary land.
This law of human helpfulness asks each man to carry himself so as to bless and not blight men, to make and not mar them. Besides the great ends of attaining character here and immortality hereafter, we are bound to so administer our talents as to make right living easy and smooth for others. Happy is he whose soul automatically oils all the machinery of the home, the market and the street. And this ambition to be universally helpful must not be a transient and occasional one—here and there an hour's friendship, a passing hint of sympathy, a transient gleam of kindness. Heart helpfulness is to enter into the fundamental conceptions of our living. With vigilant care man is to expel every element that vexes or irritates or chafes just as the husbandman expels nettles and poison ivy from fruitful gardens.
For nothing is so easily wrecked as the soul. As mechanisms go up toward complexity, delicacy increases. The fragile vase is ruined by a single tap. A chance blow destroys the statue. A bit of sand ruins the delicate mechanism. But the soul is even more sensitive to injury. It is marred by a word or a look. Men are responsible for the ruin they work unthinkingly! To-day the engine drops a spark behind it. To-morrow that engine is a thousand miles away. Yet the spark left behind is now a column of fire mowing down the forests. And that devastating column belongs not to another, but to that engine that hath journeyed far. Thus the evil man does lives after him. The condemnation of life is that a man hath carried friction and stirred up malign elements and sowed fiery discords, so that the gods track him by the swath of destruction he hath cut through life. The praise of life is that a man hath exhaled bounty and stimulus and joy and gladness wherever he journeys. To-day noble examples and ten thousand precepts unite in urging every one to become a great heart. Every individual must bring together his little group of pilgrim friends, companions, employes, using whatever he has of wisdom and skill for guiding those who follow him on their desert march. For happiness is through helpfulness. Every morning let us build a booth to shelter someone from life's fierce heat. Every noon let us dig some life-spring for thirsty lips. Every night let us be food for the hungry and shelter for the cold and naked. The law of the higher manhood asks man to be a great heart, the shadow of a rock in a weary land.
THE INVESTMENT OF TALENT AND ITS RETURN.
"The universal blunder of this world is in thinking that there are certain persons put into the world to govern and certain others to obey. Everybody is in this world to govern and everybody to obey. There are no benefactors and no beneficiaries in distinct classes. Every man is at once both benefactor and beneficiary. Every good deed you do you ought to thank your fellowman for giving you an opportunity to do; and they ought to be thankful to you for doing it."—Phillips Brooks.
"Pity is love and something more; love at its utmost."—T. T. Munger, "Freedom of Faith."
"The great idea that the Bible is the history of mankind's deliverance from all tyranny, outward as well as inward, of the Jews, as the one free constitutional people among a world of slaves and tyrants, of their ruin, as the righteous fruit of a voluntary return to despotism; of the New Testament, as the good news that freedom, brotherhood, equality, once confided only to Judea and to Greece, and dimly seen even there, was henceforth to be the right of all mankind, the law of all society—who was there to tell me that? Who is there now to go forth and tell it to the millions who have suffered and doubted and despaired like me, and turn the hearts of the disobedient to the wisdom of the just, before the great and terrible day of the Lord come? Again I ask—who will go forth and preach that gospel and save his native land?"—Charles Kingsley, "Alton Locke."
CHAPTER III.
THE INVESTMENT OF TALENT AND ITS RETURN.
In all ages man has been stimulated to sowing by the certainty of reaping. Tomorrow's sheaves and shoutings support to-day's tearful sowing. Certainty of victory wins battles before they are fought. Armed with confidence patriots have beaten down stone castles with naked fists. Uncertainty makes the heart sick, takes nerve out of arm and tension out of thought. The mere rumor of war along the border-lines of nations destroys enterprise and industry. Men will not plow if warhorses are to trample down the ripe grain. Men will not build if the enemy are to warm hands over blazing rafters. Why should the husbandman plant vines if others are to wrest away his fruit? The individual and the race need the stimulus of hope and a rational basis of security that nothing shall cut the connection between the causes sown and the effects to be reaped. Therefore, the divine word: "Send forth thy gift and talent, and nature and providence shall invest it securely and give the talent back with interest and increase."
What a promise for civilization was that of Christ: "Give and it shall be given unto you!" Let the husbandman give his seed to the furrows; soon the furrows will give back big bundles into the sower's arms. Let the vintner give the sweat of his brow to the vines; soon the vines will give back the rich purple floods. Give thy thought, O husbandman! to the wild rice; soon nature will give back the rice plump wheat. Give thyself, O inventor! to the raw ores, and nature will give thee the forceful tools. Give thyself, O reformer! to the desert world; soon the world-desert will be given back a world-garden. Give sparingly to nature, and sparingly shalt thou receive again. Give bountifully, and bounty shall be given back. Give scant thought and drag but one plank to the stream, and thou shalt receive only a narrow bridge across the brook. Give abundant thought to wires and cables and buttresses, and nature will give the bridge across the Firth of Forth. Give God thy one talent and, investing it, he returns ten. Give the cup of cold water and thou shalt have rivers of water of life. Share thy crust and thy cloak, and thou shall have banquet and robe and house of many mansions. This is the pledge of nature and God: "Give, and good measure pressed down and shaken together,