Jesus
He never
put his foot
inside a big city. He never traveled two
hundred
miles from the place where he was born.
He never did
one of the things that usually accompany
greatness.
He had no credentials but Himself. He
had nothing to
do with the world except the naked power
of His
divine manhood.
While still a
young man, thy
tide of public opinion turned against
Him. His
friends ran away. One of them denied
Him.He was
turned over to his enemies. He went
through the
mockery of a trail. He was nailed to a
cross between
two thieves. His executioners gambled
for the only
piece of property He had on earth while
He was
dying--and that His coat. When He was
dead He was
taken down and laid in a borrowed grave
through the
pity of a friend.
Nineteen wide
centuries have
come and gone and today He is the
centerpiece of the
human race and the leader of the column
of
progress.
All the armies that ever
marched, and
all the navies that ever were built, and
all the
parliments that ever sat, and all the
kings that ever
reigned, put together have not affected
the life of
man upon this earth as powerfully as has
that one
solitary life.
from Words
of a
Believer
by Felicite
De
Lamennais
You have but
one day to pass
upon earth: order it so that you may
pass it in
peace.
Peace is the fruit of love;
for love lies
at the bottom of pure hearts as the drop
of dew in
the calyx of a flower.
Oh, if you
knew what it was
to love!
You say that you love, and
many of your
brothers lack bread to sustain life;
clothing to
cover their naked limbs; a roof to
shelter them; a
handful of straw to sleep upon; while
you have
abundance of everything.
You say
that you love,
while there are sick ones in great
numbers,
languishing on their wretched couches
without help;
unhappy ones weeping, and no one to weep
with them;
little children going about all stiff
with cold, from
door to door, asking the rich for a
crumb of bread
from their tables, and not getting
it.
You say
that you love your brothers, and what
would you do if
you hated them?
In School
Days
by John
Greenleaf
Whittier
He
saw her lift
her eyes; he felt
The soft
hand'slight
caressing,
And heard the tremble of
her
voice,
As if a fault
confessing,
"I'm sorry
I spelt the word;
I hate to go before
you,
Because,"--the brown eyes lower
fell--
"Because, you see, I love
you!"
Still
memory to a gray-haired man
That
sweet child-face
is showing.
Dear girl! the grasses on
her
grave
Have forty years been
growing!
He
lives to learn, in life's hard
school,
How few who
pass above him
Lament their triumph
and his
loss,
Like her--because they love
him.
If there were a
man who dared
to say all that he thought of this world
there would
not be left him a square foot of ground
to stand
on.When a man appears the world bears
down on him and
breaks his back. There are too many
rotten pillars
left standing, too much festering
humanity for man to
bloom.
The superstructure is a lie
and the
foundation is a huge quaking fear. If at
intervals of
centuries there does appear a man with a
desperate,
hungry look in his eye, a man who would
turn the
world upside down in order to create a
new race, the
love that he brings to the world is
turned to bile
and he becomes a scourge.
If now
and then we
encounter pages that explode, pages that
wound and
sear, that wring groans and tears and
curses, know
that they come from a man with his back
up, a man
whose only defenses left are his words
and the words
are always stronger than the lying,
crushing weight
of the world, stronger than all the
racks and wheels
which the cowardly invent to crush out
the miracle of
personality.
If a man ever dared
to translate
all that is in his heart, to put down
what is really
his experiece, what is truly his truth,
I think the
world would go to smash, that it would
be blown to
smithereens and no god, no accident, no
will could
ever again assemble the pieces, the
atoms, the
indestructible elements that have gone
to make up the
world.
She
loves sweat,
weariness, self-sacrifive. She will be
found not in
palaces but lurking in cornfields and
factories and
hovering over littered desks; she crowns
the
unconscious head of the busy child. If
you look up
suddenly from hard work you will see
her, but if you
look too long she fades sorrowfully
away.
There
is something fine in hard physical
labor. One
actually stops thinking.I often work
long without any
thought whatever, so far as I know, save
that
connected with the monotonous repetition
of the labor
itself--down with the spade, out with
it, up with
it--and repeat. And yet sometimes,
mostly in the fore
noon when I am not at all tired, I will
suddenly have
a sense as of the world opening around
me--a sense of
its beauty and its meaning--giving me a
peculiar deep
happiness, that is near complete
content.
Of Thee, Spirit serene:
Strength for the daily task,
Courage to face the road,
Good cheer to help me bear the traveler's load,
And, for the hours of rest that come between,
An inward joy of all things heard and seen.
These are the
sins I fain
Would have Thee take
away;
Malice
and cold disdain,
Hot anger, sullen
hate,
Scorn
of the lowly, envy of the great,
And
discontent
that casts a shadow gray
On all the
brightness of
the common
day.
We, the people of
the United
States, in order to form a more perfect
Union,
establish justice, insure domestic
tranquillity,
provide for the common defense, promote
the general
welfare, and secure the blessings of
liberty to
ourselves and our posterity do ordain
and establish
this constitution for the United States
of
America.
When in the course of
human
events, it becomes necessary for one
People to
dissolve the Political Bands which have
connected
them with another, and to assume among
the Powers of
the Earth, the separate and equal
Station to which
the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God
entitle them,
A decent Respect to the Opinions of
Mankind requires
that they should declare the causes
which inpel them
to the separation.
We hold these
Truths to be
self-evident, that all Men are created
equal, That
they are endowed by their Creator with
certain
inalienable Rights, that among these are
Life,
Liberty, and the Pursuit of
Happiness--That to secure
these Rights, Governments are instituted
among Men,
deriving their just Powers from the
Consent
of the Governed, that whenever any Form
of Government
becomes destructive of these Ends, It is
the right of
the people to alter or abolish it, and
to institute
new Government, laying itsFoundation on
such
principles, and organizing its Powers in
such Form,
as to them shall seem most likely to
effect their
Safety and Happiness.
There's a bright, golden haze on the meadow.
The corn is as high as a elephant's eye
An' it looks like it's climbin' clear up to the sky.
Oh, what a
beautiful
mornin',
Oh, what a beautiful
day.
I got a
beautiful feelin'
Ev'rythin's goin'
my
way.
All the cattle are standin'
like
statues,
All the cattle are standin'
like
statues.
They don't turn their heads
as they see
me ride by,
But a little brown
mav'rick is winkin'
her eye.
Oh, what a beautiful
mornin',
Oh,
what a beautiful day.
I got a
beautiful
feelin'
Ev'rythin's goin' my
way.
All the
sounds of earth are like music,
All
the sounds of
earth are like music.
The breeze is
so busy it
don't miss a tree
And a ol' weepin'
willer is
laughin' at me!
Oh, what a
beautiful
mornin',
Oh, what a beautiful
day.
I got a
beautiful feelin'
Ev'erthin's goin'
my
way---
Oh, what a beautiful
day!
And lo! across the chasm of the deep
All darkness fled
Dismayed before the One
Whose radiance outshines a noonday sun;
And dawn came on,
And morning out of night,
When God, sweeping across the chaos, said,
"Let there be light!"
"Let there be light,"
God
said;
And lo! from out my sinful
heart
The
darkness fled;
From bondage I was
free.
I only
looked in faith to Calvalry,
Saw One
and loved
Him;
Thus I gained my sight
When
God swept down
across my soul, and said,
"Let there
be
light!"
To begin the work of the day,
Don't neglect the little chances
You find along your way;
For in lifting another's burden,
And speaking a word of cheer;
You will find your own cares lighter,
And easier for you to bear.
Forget each kindness that
you do
As
soon as you have done it;
Forget the
praise that
falls to you
The moment you have won
it.
Forget
the slander that you hear
Before you
can repeat
it
Forget each slight, each spite,
each
sneer
Wherever you may meet
it.
Remember
every kindness done
To you whate'er
its
measure;
Remember praise by others
won,
And
pass it on with pleasure;
Remember
every promise
made,
And keep it to the
letter,
Remember those
who lent you aid,
And be a grateful
debtor.
f rom Merchant Of Venice
It droppeth as gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath: it is twice blessed,---
It blesseth him that gives, and him that takes:
'T is mightiest in
the
mightiest; it becomes
The throned
monarch better
than his crown;
His sceptre shows the
force of
temporal power,
The attribute to awe
and
majesty,
Wherein doth sit the dread
and fear of
kings;
But mercy is above this
sceptred
sway,---
It is entroned in the hearts
of
kings,
It is an attribute to God
Himself;
And
earthly power doth then show likest
God's,
When
mercy seasons
justice.
And then--and then, the silent Door
Swings on its hinges---
Opens...Closes---
And no more
I pass this way,
So while I might,
I will essay
Sweet comfort and delight
To all I meet upon the Pilgrim Way,
For no man travels twice
The Great Highway
That climbs through darkness up to light
Through night to day.
We who lived in the concentration camps can remember the men who walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece of bread. They may have been few in number, but they offer sufficient proof that everything can be taken from a man but one thing: The last of his freedoms to go--to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way.
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