Chapter D: W. Whittle tells of a soldier who was posted in a forest to (8)

The almost superhuman pluck of certain prize-fighting
animals--bulldogs and badgers, for instance--may in reality be
founded on a temporary insensibility to pain, and the evident
advantages of that negative endowment suggest its development by
the agency of natural selection. Individuals gifted with that
faculty of emotional anesthesia were less likely to succumb to
the terrors of a life-and-death struggle, and therefore more
apt to prevail in that struggle for existence which in a state
of nature is implied by the frequent necessity of contesting
the physical superiority of sexual rivals or alien antagonists.
The invigorating tendency of certain passions may have been
developed in a similar manner. The formidable and, indeed, quite
abnormal strength of infuriated man is so well known that even
an athlete will hesitate to try conclusions with an adversary
under the influence of raging passions, and in such moments
fury-inspired vigor has often accomplished feats which afterward
surprized even the hero of the exploit. “The saints do help a
man in a desperate plight,” said an old Creole planter, who had
rescued his family from the attack of a brutal negro. The same
strength-sustaining influence of fury may explain the almost
miraculous victories of small bodies of desperate men over large
armies of better-armed foes, as in the three murderous battles
which the rustic avengers of John Huss gained against the
ironclad legions of his enemies, or in that still less expected
defeat of an entire Russian army by a few hundred followers of
the hero-prophet Shamyl. Religious frenzy has often produced a
similar effect, and on any other theory only a miracle could
explain the almost constant victories of the Saracens, who, in
spite of determined resistance of millions of better disciplined
and physically superior opponents, succeeded in less than a
century in extending their empire from the Ganges to the Bay of
Biscay.--FELIX OSWALD, _The Open Court_.

(1176)

FUTURE DISCOVERIES

In view of the marvelous discoveries which the last half century
has witnessed no one can doubt that there is quite as much that
is marvelous to come. The dweller on the planet in the year
2000 will undoubtedly look back on these times with a good deal
of the same feeling that we of the present day have for those
who lived in the days of the stage-coach and the weekly mail;
and it is quite likely that the philosopher of that period will
speak of ours as “the good old times.” But however that may
be, and whatever the advance they have made in our condition,
we may be sure that they will find all their improvements as
necessary to existence as we now find the telegraph and railroad
and electric. If they have established intercommunication
between the planets, they will be just as dependent on those new
features as we are on the latest appliances of our civilization.
And if the air line to Jupiter should break down in such a way
as to cripple the Mars cut-off or the branch to Saturn, the
public will be just as much hindered and embarrassed as we are
by a wire-disabling blizzard in the commercial metropolis or a
fire in a central telegraph office.--Detroit _Free Press_.

(1177)

=Future, Forcasting the=--See PREVISION.

FUTURE LIFE

I trace the river, swelling out by degrees from the spring
to a rill, from the rill to a brook, from the brook to a
mill-stream, from the stream to a river, taking into itself all
minor tributaries, and rolling on with a current that bears the
ship and the steamboat with the easiest majesty, still cleaving
its way through meadow and hill, through forest and mountain,
untroubled toward the sea. Shall I believe, then, that when that
river has rounded a promontory, beyond which, as yet, I can not
follow it, it is all at once dissolved into mist? or emptied
into a cavern so deep and obscure that no trace of the stream
reappears upon the earth? Nay, but I know--tho I have not seen
the end, it is as certain to me as if already my vision embraced
it--that that river flows on continuous to the ocean, and
mingles its wave with all the waters that gird the globe, and
are drawn into the skies!

And so I know that the great soul of man, aspiring from its
birth to a nobler development, still matching its companions,
still surpassing its circumstances, with ideas within it which
no present can unfold, and with a deep self-centered force,
to which the body is only an accident, will still go on when
this body has decayed, and be only nobler and princelier in
each power when mingling with that illustrious concourse of
intelligent and pure beings who already have been gathered in
the courts of the future! It were to reverse and violently
over-ride every palpable probability, to deny or to doubt this!
(Text.)--RICHARD S. STORRS.

(1178)

* * * * *

Sometime--dear hands shall clasp our own once more,
And hearts that touched our hearts long years before
Shall come to meet us in the morning land;
And then, at last, our souls shall understand
How, tho He hid His meaning from our sight,
Yet God was always true and always right;
And how, tho smiles were often changed for tears,
Along this tangled pathway of the years,
Yet only so these lives of yours and mine
Have caught the likeness of the life divine. (Text.)

(1179)

=Future Life, Pledge of=--See LIFE A CYCLE.

FUTURE POSSIBILITIES

The field of mental effort is not measurable, and so far as
we know, is unlimited. To fix its bounds would be to set an
arbitrary limit to the progress of the human race. In science,
art, literature--in all that exalts and embellishes life--the
space yet available for progress comes as near infinitude as
anything we are capable of conceiving. To one who stands in
a valley, the horizon is near; let him climb a hill, and his
view is expanded. When he attains a greater height the prospect
appears still wider. The inventive genius of the world is
rising higher and higher every day. Its prospect never appeared
so utterly boundless as now. All that has been achieved, all
the grand conquests that are recorded, are but an atom in the
balance weighed when brought against the possibilities of the
future.--_The Inventive Age._

(1180)

FUTURE REUNION

Richard Watson Gilder is the author of this:

Call me not dead when I, indeed, have gone
Into the company of the ever-living
High and most glorious poets! Let thanksgiving
Rather be made. Say, “He at last hath won”
Rest and release, converse supreme and wise,
Music and song and light of immortal faces;
To-day, perhaps, wandering in starry places,
He hath met Keats, and known him by his eyes.
To-morrow (who can say) Shakespeare may pass--
And our lost friend just catch one syllable
Of that three-centuried wit that kept so well--
Or Milton, or Dante, looking on the grass
Thinking of Beatrice, and listening still
To chanted hymns that sound from the heavenly hill.

(1181)

FUTURE, THE

Ethel Ashton writes of the value of the things not yet in view:

Beyond the forms and the faces I see ineffable things,
Above the cry of the children I hear the beating of wings;
Gracing the graves of the weary are blossoms that never were blown,
And over the whole of knowledge stands all that shall yet be known.

The city is not my prison--the world can not stay me there;
For whole wide earth and its beauty there’s beauty beyond compare.
The wealth of the wind-blown music, the gold of the sun are mine.
In light of the light men see not--in sight of the things divine.

For truer than all that is written is all that has not been told.
The yet unlived and unliving are truer than all the old.
The fairest is still the furthest; the life that has yet to be
Holds ever the past and present--itself the soul of the three.

--_The Outlook_ (London).

(1182)

=Future Uncertain=--See TO-MORROW, UNCERTAINTY OF.

FUTURE WELFARE

A nation may now become educated; a people may now be safe
against poverty or famine; the world is even now probably past
the critical point and sure of unintermitted future progress.
We may be allowed to hope that later generations may continue
to see an interminable succession of advances, made by coming
men of science and by learned engineers and mechanics that shall
continually add to the sum of human happiness in this world, and
make it continually easier to prepare for a better world and a
brighter. Who knows but that the telescope, the spectroscope,
and other as yet uninvented instruments may aid us in this by
revealing the secrets of other and more perfect lives in other
and more advanced worlds than ours, despite the head-shaking
of those who know most of the probabilities? Who can say that
the life of the race may not be made in a few generations, by
this ever-accelerating progress of which the century has seen
but the beginning, a true millennial introduction into the
unseen universe and the glorious life that every man, Christian
or skeptic, optimist, or pessimist, would gladly hope for and
believe possible? (Text.)--R. H. THURSTON, _North
American Review_.

(1183)

G

GAIN THROUGH LOSS

Ella Wheeler Wilcox writes:

I will not doubt, tho sorrows fall like rain,
And troubles swarm like bees about a hive;
I shall believe the heights for which I strive
Are only reached by anguish and by pain;
And tho I groan and tremble with my crosses,
I yet shall see, through my severest losses,
The greater gain. (Text)

(1184)

=Gain and Loss=--See FAST LIVING.

GAIT AND CHARACTER

The firm foot is the ordinary type in men. A firm walk is a sign
of self-control as well as of power. When the shoe thickens so
obstinately that the foot can not bend it, and when the walker
does not care what noise he makes, the firmness and power are
developing to a degree that may inconvenience weaker or more
sensitive folk. The weak foot is the more common. The stand
suggests a knock-kneed body and a mind not strong enough to make
the best of life--one might almost say, altogether a knock-kneed
character that is always stepping crooked and going its way with
an uncertain gait.--_Cassell’s Family Magazine._

(1185)

=Gait of Criminals=--See CRIMINALS, GAIT OF.

GAMBLING

The chaplain in charge of the penitentiaries in Kings County,
N. Y., states that one-half of all the young men whose
careers he has investigated show that the race-track and its
attendant evils were the beginning of their downward course.
The records of the evil and criminal courts, are replete with
similar testimony. Bankrupts, women who risk their married
happiness, clerks, pilfering from the till, embezzlers,
forgers, defaulters, suicides, show how, to quote a victim who
stole and then lost at one time $10,000 at the races, “that
betting is the devil’s own joke,” and there are many full-sized
victims.--S. PARKES CADMAN.

(1186)

See JUVENILE COURT EXPERIENCE.

GAMBLING AS RELIGIOUS DUTY

One of the three great annual Hindu festivals is in memory of
the occasion when three of the Hindu gods sat down to gamble.
Krishna, the guileful god, won. This festival is celebrated by
universal gambling. Indeed, the people believe that unless they
gamble at this time, they will be born as rats, or take some
other undesirable form in the next life.

After the festival is over, thousands of families have to start
life again from the very bottom without a stick of furniture, as
all has been lost at gambling.

(1187)

=Gambling, Some Results of=--See JUVENILE COURT EXPERIENCE.

GAME OF GREED

Ask a great money-maker what he wants to do with his money--he
never knows. He doesn’t make it to do anything with it. He gets
it only that he may get it. “What will you make of what you
have got?” you ask. “Well, I’ll get more,” he says. Just as, at
cricket, you get more runs. There’s no use in the runs, but to
get more of them than other people is the game. And there’s no
use in the money, but to have more of it than other people is
the game. So all that great foul city of London there--rattling,
growling, smoking, stinking--a ghastly heap of fermenting
brickwork, pouring out poison at every pore--you fancy it is a
city of work? Not a street of it! It is a great city of play;
very nasty play, and very hard play, but still play. It is only
Lord’s cricket-ground without the turf--a huge billiard-table
without the cloth, and with pockets as deep as the bottomless
pit; but mainly a billiard-table, after all.--JOHN
RUSKIN.

(1188)

GATE, THE, OF STARS

H. Aide writes this apt fancy of the stars:

“Stars lying in God’s hand,
We know ye were not planned
Merely to light men on their midnight way.
Shine on, ye fiery stars!
It may be through your bars
We shall pass upward to eternal day.”

(1189)

=Generalship=--See OPINION CHANGED.

GENEROSITY

A pleasant story about Andrew Carnegie is told by a tourist from Scotland in the New York _Tribune_:

At Skibo Castle, Mr. Carnegie had during the summer a beautiful
rose-garden. There were thousands of red and white and yellow
roses always blooming there, and the villagers were free to
saunter in the garden paths to their hearts’ content.

One day the head gardener waited upon Mr. Carnegie. “Sir,” he
said, “I wish to lodge a complaint.” “Well?” said the master.
“Well, sir,” the gardener began, “I wish to inform you that the
village folk are plucking the roses in your rose garden. They
are denuding your rose-trees, sir.” “Ah,” said Mr. Carnegie
gently, “my people are fond of flowers, are they, Donald? Then
you must plant more.” (Text.)

(1190)

* * * * *

There is a beautiful incident connected with the fall of the
stronghold of the Cumberland which General Grant was too modest
to include in the “Memoirs.” Many years after the event, General
Buckner, speaking at a Grant birthday gathering, said: “Under
these circumstances I surrendered to General Grant. I had at a
previous time befriended him, and it has been justly said that
he never forgot an act of kindness. I met him on the boat (at
the surrender), and he followed me when I went to my quarters.
He left the officers of his own army and followed me, with
that modest manner peculiar to him, into the shadow, and there
he tendered me his purse. It seems to me that in the modesty
of his nature he was afraid the light would witness that act
of generosity, and sought to hide it from the world.”--Col.
NICHOLAS SMITH, “Grant, the Man of Mystery.”

(1191)

* * * * *

A noble spirit despises pay and money. Garibaldi was always
penniless; so, when he had occasion to give, as was constantly
the case, he had to borrow or sacrifice personal belongings.
Once he brought home an Italian exile, who, he explained, was
poorer than himself. “I have two shirts and he has none,” and
he proposed dividing. But one shirt happened to be in the wash,
so, had he stript off the one on his back, as he was wholly
capable of doing, the division would still have been unequal. “I
have it!” then exclaimed Garibaldi. “There is the red shirt in
my trunk that I haven’t worn since Rome. He shall have that!” A
friend, however, intervened, and the Garibaldian red badge of
courage was peremptorily rescued. (Text.)

(1192)

* * * * *

If I were poor, and had no means, and was obliged to throw my
remaining days on the generosity of the public for food and
clothes and comfort, I should appeal to the Korean, knowing that
he would never see me want, would be respectful while generous,
and would never be so mean as to cast up my good-for-nothingness
to me.--JAMES S. GALE, “Korea in Transition.”

(1193)

* * * * *

Of Samuel Johnson, William J. Long in “English Literature” writes:

In all London there was none more kind to the wretched, and none
more ready to extend an open hand to every struggling man and
woman who crossed his path. When he passed poor, homeless Arabs
sleeping in the streets he would slip a coin in their hands, in
order that they might have a happy awakening; for he himself
knew well what it meant to be hungry. Such was Johnson--a “mass
of genuine manhood,” as Carlyle called him, and as such, men
loved and honored him.

(1194)

See ACKNOWLEDGMENT; HUMOR AND GENEROSITY; TACT.

=Generosity Betrayed=--See DISPLACEMENT.

GENEROSITY, CHRISTIAN

If business men generally followed the Golden Rule, after the example of Mr. Frank Crossley, the great promoter of London missions, as indicated below, what a different world this would soon become!

One unfortunate man who had put in one of Mr. Crossley’s
engines, and found it too small, but was unable to replace
it, and was threatened with bankruptcy, found in him a
rare benefactor, who not only replaced the old engine by
a new and larger one without charge, but actually made up
to him the losses in his business which had resulted from
his own blunder. That man said to a friend, “I have found a
man who treated me just as Jesus Christ would have done!”
(Text.)--PIERSON, “The Miracles of Missions.”

(1195)

GENEROSITY, THOROUGHGOING

Rev. A. J. Potter, the “Fighting Parson” of Texas, tells this:

Holding services at a place one time I took up a collection
for the support of missions. There was a poor old lady present
who I noticed dropt a $5 gold piece in the hat. I knew she was
very poor and not able to afford so much, and thought she had
intended to throw in a quarter, but made a mistake. So next day
I met her husband and said to him: “Look here, your wife put a
$5 gold piece in the hat yesterday; I think she must have made a
mistake.” “No, no,” he replied, “my wife didn’t make no mistake.
She don’t fling often, but, let me tell you, when she flings she
flings.”

It is just such “flings” of the generous giver that lend “wings” to the glorious gospel.

(1196)

GENIUS

Oh, some there are with beauty bright,
And they are lust of eyes,
And some who blind us with the mind
Our spirit them defies.
But genius is the great white light
Nor mind nor beauty buys.

And some will play a wanton air
To catch the vagrant soul;
Some find it sweet with dancing feet
To foot it toward the goal;
But he who hears the whirling spheres
Can ne’er again be whole.

Oh, he who hears the whirling spheres
Wher’er his steps have trod,
Has reached the end of human trend;
With wings his feet are shod,
For he has seen, beyond the screen,
Into the face of God.

--FREDERICK TRUESDELL, _Appleton’s Magazine_.

(1197)

* * * * *

The cultivated man is not in every case the best reporter. One
of the best I ever knew was a man who could not spell four words
correctly to save his life, and his verb did not always agree
with the subject in person and number; but he always got the
fact so exactly, and he saw the picturesque, the interesting,
and important aspect of it so vividly, that it was worth another
man’s while, who possest the knowledge of grammar and spelling,
to go over the report and write it out. Now, that was a man
who had genius; he had talent the most indubitable, and he got
handsomely paid in spite of his lack of grammar.--CHARLES A.
DANA.

(1198)

See SMALL BEGINNINGS.

GENIUS AND WORK

Edison, when asked his definition of genius, answered: “Two per
cent is genius, and ninety-eight per cent is hard work.” When
asked on another occasion: “Mr. Edison, don’t you believe that
genius is inspiration?” he replied: “No! Genius is perspiration.”

(1199)

GENIUS CAN NOT BE HIDDEN

The author of “Uncle Remus” apparently succeeded because he did
not try. The literary world and the publishers came to him;
he did not go to them. Here was a young, unknown, untraveled
printer, of narrow school advantages, tho profitably educated
in the best classics, and possessing, besides, much curious
knowledge of negroes, of dogs, of horses, of the way of the red
stream in the swamp, and of the folk of the woods. He had some
familiar old stories to tell--so old and so familiar that no one
had thought them worth while writing down--and he told them as
quietly and as simply as he talked. But good work, tho hidden
away in an obscure newspaper, gets itself recognized sooner or
later, and one day Harris received an invitation to write some
of his tales for one of the foremost of American magazines. He
couldn’t understand it at all, but he wrote the stories, among
them an account of the amusing adventures of Br’er Rabbit, Br’er
Fox, and the Tar Baby, which clinched his literary fame. His
tales succeeded far beyond his expectations, and for the same
reason that made “Æsop’s Fables” an imperishable classic. For
they were the slow fruitage of the wonder, the humor, and the
pathos of a race of primitive storytellers. They were instinct
with those primal passions which appeal to human nature,
savage and civilized, the world over. (Text.) RAY STANNARD
BAKER, _The Outlook_.

(1200)

GENIUS DISCOUNTED

Those who know Goldsmith best had recognized his genius so
little that when he published “The Traveler” it was difficult to
persuade them that he had written it himself. He was throughout
life the butt of inferior wits, and in the arts which secured
earthly success was completely distanced by inferior men,
because he had no power of impressing himself as others. He had
the finest wit, but it was not at command; he had genius and
eloquence, but an invincible awkwardness and timidity prevented
the display of either when their display would have won him
respect. In conversation he was like a man who has a purse of
gold, but who can not produce the single silver coin which is
wanted at the moment.--W. J. DAWSON, “The Makers of
English Prose.”

(1201)

GENIUS, DISCOVERING

Two boys, mistreated by their employer, ran away, taking the road to Rome. They reached the Eternal City. Peter was taken as cook’s boy in a cardinal’s house, Michael could find nothing to do, so he almost despaired and almost starved. But he liked to visit the churches and gaze at the fine pictures therein.

Something stirred within him, and he took bits of charcoal and
sketched pictures on the walls of Peter’s attic room. One day
the cardinal discovered them. The boys were frightened, and
Michael declared that he would rub them all out. But he did
not understand the cardinal, who was amazed at their accuracy
and power. He took Michael to a drawing-master, and gave Peter
a better position in his house. Michael worked diligently and
became an enthusiast in his art.

His other name was Angelo. This was the humble beginning of
the man who was almost a universal genius--painter, architect,
sculptor and poet. (Text.)

(1202)

=Genius Neglected=--See FRIENDSHIP.

GENIUS NOT ALWAYS FORESEEN

It is not always easy to pass final judgment, or to say who will
or will not become famous. The nestling’s first awkward attempts
to use its wings seem to contain no presage of the warbling
flight that will come hereafter. Once, at a literary banquet,
Aldrich reminded Dr. Holmes that he had declared he could see no
poetic promise in some of Aldrich’s youthful verses that were
submitted to him.--New Orleans _Times-Democrat_.

(1203)

GENIUS, PERSECUTED

The last part of Milton’s life is a picture of solitary grandeur
unequaled in literary history. With the Restoration all his
labors and sacrifices for humanity were apparently wasted. From
his retirement he could hear the bells and the shouts that
welcomed back a vicious monarch, whose first act was to set his
foot upon his people’s neck. Milton was immediately marked for
persecution; he remained for months in hiding; he was reduced to
poverty, and his books were burned by the public hangman. His
daughters, upon whom he depended in his blindness, rebelled at
the task of reading to him and recording his thoughts. In the
midst of all these sorrows we understand, in Samson, the cry of
the blind champion of Israel:

Now blind, disheartened, shamed, dishonored, quelled,
To what can I be useful? Wherein serve
My nation, and the work from heaven imposed?
But to sit idle on the household hearth,
A burdenous drone; to visitants a gaze,
Or pitied object.

--WILLIAM J. LONG, “English Literature.”

(1204)

GENIUS, PORTRAYING

When David, the painter, was commissioned to paint his picture
of Napoleon crossing the Alps, he asked the First Consul to
name a day when he would sit. “Sit!” said Bonaparte; “to what
good? Do you suppose the great men of antiquity sat for their
portraits?” “But I paint you for your own times, for men who
have known and seen you; they expect a good likeness.” “A good
likeness! It is not the exactitude of the features, the little
wart on the nose, that makes a likeness. What ought to be
painted is the character of the physiognomy. No one inquires if
the portraits of great men are alike; it is quite enough if they
manifest their genius.”--_Magazine of Art._

(1205)

GENIUS, SECOND RATE

If a man can not be a great genius, is it worth his while to
be a little one? Some learned men say not. Of the poets who
flourished and were famous a hundred years ago, how many are
known now? Of all the bright volumes that brought fame to their
authors and made the booksellers of old wealthy, how many can
we find upon the shelves of the bookstores to-day? Only a few.
And yet, their authors, lauded by friends and flattered by
reviews, threw all their souls into their songs, and fondly
dreamed of earthly immortality. The fittest survive, and the
world has sorted them out with unerring judgment. From the good
it has taken the best, and we are thankful. But these little
geniuses--did they live their lives in vain because they are
forgotten now? Was all their music meaningless, and did the
world never miss it when their harps were silent? They fulfilled
their mission; their songs went home to human hearts and
quickened them with feeling. They sang as sang the birds--brief,
tender songs that made the world glad for a day; and tho their
names are now unknown, their graves unmarked, their work has not
been unrewarded. So let the little geniuses be of good cheer;
their footsteps may not go echoing down the ages, but they
may sound very pleasantly in the pathways of to-day. If they
feel that they must sing, let no man say them nay; there will
be ears to listen, voices to applaud, and hearts to feel. The
world needs the low, soft notes of the humble singer, the homely
harpings of the little poet, as a rest from the deep bass of the
bards sublime.--Atlanta _Constitution_.

(1206)

GENIUS SHOULD BE FAVORED

A man of genius is so valuable a product that he ought to
be secured at all cost; to be kept like a queen-bee in a
hothouse, fed upon happiness and stimulated in every way to the
greatest possible activity. To expose him to the same harsh
treatment which is good for the hod-carrier and the bricklayer
is to indulge in a reckless waste of the means of a country’s
greatness. The waste of water-power at Niagara is as nothing
compared with the waste of brain-power which results from
compelling a man of exceptional qualifications to earn his own
living.--JOEL BENTON, _Lippincott’s_.

(1207)

See GREAT MEN SHOULD BE PROVIDED FOR.

GENIUS THE GIFT OF GOD

Let Raffael take a crayon in his hand and sweep a curve; let an
engineer take tracing paper and all other appliances necessary
to accurate reproduction, and let him copy that curve--his
line will not be the line of Raffael. Rules and principles are
profitable and necessary for the guidance of the growing artist
and for the artist full grown; but rules and principles, I take
it, just as little as geology and botany, can create the artist.
Guidance and rule imply something to be guided and ruled. And
that indefinable something which baffles all analysis, and which
when wisely guided and ruled emerges in supreme excellence, is
individual genius, which, to use familiar language, is “the gift
of God.”--JOHN TYNDALL.

(1208)

GENIUS VERSUS TOOLS

A young Italian knocked one day at the door of an artist’s
studio in Rome, and, when it was opened, exclaimed: “Please,
madam, will you give me the master’s brush?” The painter was
dead, and the boy, filled with a longing to be an artist, wished
for the great master’s brush. The lady placed the brush in the
boy’s hand, saying: “This is his brush; try it, my boy.” With a
flush of earnestness on his face he tried, but found he could
paint no better than with his own. The lady then said to him:
“You can not paint like the great master unless you have his
spirit.”

The same great lesson was taught once in a museum of old-time
armor. When a visitor was shown the sword of Wallace, he said:
“I do not see how it could win such victories.” “Ah, sir,” said
the guide, “you don’t see the arm that wielded it.”

We need all the grace and tact we can acquire through studying the best models and imitating their example; but if we are mere imitators, our lives will be void of real power. (Text.)

(1209)

GENTILITY, FALSE STANDARDS OF

The story about Chief Justice Marshall has been told a good
many times, but will bear telling again. As he was taking a
morning walk, plainly drest, he encountered a young man who was
standing at a market stall, evidently in great perplexity. A
basket of moderate size was before him and he was saying to the
market-man: “I wonder where all the niggers are this morning. I
can’t find any one to carry my basket home.” The Chief Justice
said: “Where do you live?” “No. 200 Avenue A,” was the reply.
“Well,” he said, “as I am going your way, I will carry your
basket for you.” They started, the judge carrying the basket.
The young man noticed that the people they met all bowed very
politely to his volunteer porter, and wondered who he could
be. The basket was deposited at the door. Pay was offered, but
refused. What did it mean? The next day, while walking with a
friend, this young man saw his volunteer porter in a group of
lawyers. He asked: “Who is that plain old fellow that they are
all listening to?” “John Marshall, Chief Justice of the United
States.” “He carried my market-basket home for me yesterday;
why do you think he did it?” “To teach you the difference
between a real gentleman and a snob,” was the caustic reply. If
some of these modern aristocrats who consider labor degrading
had gone into the carpenter-shop of Joseph about A.D.
28 or 29, and seen a young man named Jesus at work there, they
would have decided at once that he was no gentleman. If they had
gone into the rooms of Aquilla at Corinth, a few years later,
and seen Paul sewing on tents (“For he abode with them and
wrought,” Acts 7:3), they would have despised him because his
hands ministered to his necessities. They would not have gone
into the synagog next Sabbath to hear that tent-maker preach.
No, indeed! Now, can a standard of gentility that excludes Hon.
John Marshall, Apostle Paul, and our adorable Savior be a true
one?--OBADIAH OLDSCHOOL, _The Interior_.

(1210)

=Gentle Auxiliaries=--See HANDIWORK OF NATURE.

=Gentleman versus Snob=--See GENTILITY, FALSE STANDARDS OF.

=Gentlemanliness=--See KINDNESS.

=Genuineness, Tests of=--See TESTS.

=Germs, Moral=--See SIN, SUBTLETY OF.

GESTURES AND USE OF HANDS IN THE EAST

As we (missionaries) talk in the street, or in chapels, we
begin to gesture. Remember that many gestures have well-known
and disreputable meanings. For instance, I have been holding my
hand behind my back as I have been speaking to you. It is a most
offensive thing in some countries to hold your hand behind your
back. An African missionary was just about concluding difficult
negotiations with a chief, when he closed his eyes and placed
his hands over them. Instantly chief and subjects alike arose
in wrath and nothing further could be done with them. That use
of the hand had lost the missionary all that he had gained. The
Westerner, in Kipling’s phrase, is always hustling. He must get
to a place just as quickly as possible, but in getting there he
offends propriety. He ought not to walk rapidly; he is not a
letter-carrier nor a coolie. Why does he not walk as a gentleman
should?--H. P. BEACH, “Student Volunteer Movement,”
1906.

(1211)

GETTING AND GIVING

In South America grows a species of the palm known there as “the
rain-tree.” It is so called because of its remarkable power of
abstracting moisture from the atmosphere and dropping it in
copious and refreshing dew on the earth around it. In this way
it makes an oasis of luxuriant vegetation where it flourishes.

Is not that the ideal life that gets and gives; that draws the good only to communicate it to others, so blessing the world with moral verdure and fruitfulness? (Text.)

(1212)

See CONSERVATION.

=Ghosts, Discredited=--See REALITY VERSUS ILLUSION.

GIANTS

A scheme to produce moral and spiritual giants would be of more value to the world than the following:

Some time since Count Alfred de Pierrecourt left a legacy of
$2,000,000 to his native city of Rouen to pay the expense of
the propagation of giants. The will was contested by his heirs,
who naturally enough did not see the necessity of having giants
on the earth in these days, particularly when they were to be
bred, raised, fed and clothed at their personal expense. The
courts, however, sustained the will to the extent of endowing
the Brobdingnagian experimenters with a quarter of the estate,
so that an institution has been established with an endowment
of $500,000, under the supervision of the municipality, for
the culture of giants and the production of monstrosities. The
trustees are to search the four corners of the globe for men and
women of large stature, and are to pair them off in couples and
place them in the homes on a farm near Rouen. (Text.)

(1213)

GIANTS AND DWARFS

It is of more consequence whether we are giants or whether we are dwarfs in our moral and intellectual stature, than whether our physical stature is great or small:

Pliny mentions the giant Gobbara, who was nine feet nine inches,
and two other giants, Poison and Secundilla, who were half a
foot taller; Garopius tells of a young giantess who was ten
feet high, and Lecat of a Scotch giant eleven and one-half feet
in height. But we may take it for granted that these figures
are greatly exaggerated, while we have a right to regard as
authentic giants whose height runs up to eight and one-half
feet. The Grecian giant, Amanab, at eighteen years old, was
seven feet eight inches tall; the Chinese giant, Chang, eight
feet three inches. The Austrian giant, Winckelmeier, who was
recently exhibited in Paris, measuring eight feet and one-half,
may be regarded as a specimen of the highest stature attained
by the human species. At the opposite extreme may be found
numerous dwarfs not more than twenty inches, and some even as
little as sixteen and even twelve inches in height; but such
dwarfs are only monsters with atrophied limbs or twisted back
bones, or stunted infants, whose age is usually exaggerated by
their Barnums. One of the most remarkable dwarfs on record was
the celebrated Borulawsky, who was born in 1789, and died in
1837, who was never more than twenty-eight inches in height,
but was perfect in every limb and proportion and was bright and
intelligent.--M. GUYOT DAUBES, translated from _La
Nature_.

(1214)

=Gift, A, that Increased in Power=--See LITTLE GIFTS.

GIFT, A FREE

There is a legend of a rich man who sent a message to a poor
neighbor: “I want to give you a farm.” The neighbor set out
to get it, but carried with him what he thought was a bag of
gold. Arriving at the rich man’s mansion, he said: “I got your
message. I want your farm. Here is the gold to buy it.” “Let me
see your gold,” said the generous donor. It was not even silver.
The poor man’s eyes filled with tears. “Alas, I am undone!”
“Why, it is not even copper,” he added; “it is only ashes. I
have nothing to pay. Will you give it me?” “Why, yes,” said
the rich man; “that was my offer. Will you accept the farm as
a gift?” “Yes, indeed,” replied the poor man, “and a thousand
blessings on your kindness.”

(1215)

=Gift and Giver=--See LIKENESS OF GOD.

=Gift, Using Our Best=--See ADVANTAGE, WORKING TO THE BEST.

=Gifts=--See LOVE’S ACCEPTABLE OFFERING.

GIFTS ADJUSTED TO TASKS

In the hour of success, let not pride vaunt itself, while vanity
looks down upon the crowd, exclaiming, “Why did they not work
as I did? Why did they not have courage to launch out into
the deep? Why did they not fling their plans as a whaler his
harpoon, or a hunter his spear?” Well, because God and your
fathers made you the child of special good fortune, through
unique gifts of body and of mind. Why did not the poor and
unsuccessful do as you have done? Why does the turtle-dove not
soar like the eagle, and lift its stroke against any enemy?
Why does not a lamb go out for its prey like a wolf or a lion?
Why did not a modest violet grow tall as a redwood-tree? Why,
because God had planned something other for a violet and a dove
and a lamb, and quite another thing for an oak and an eagle and
a lion. Men’s gifts vary because their tasks are unlike. What
God asks is not success, but fidelity in the appointed sphere,
in the ordained equipment.--N. D. HILLIS.

(1216)

=Gifts from God=--See GOD SENDS GIFTS.

GIFTS, SIGNIFICANT

When the Chinese make gifts they intend each gift to carry
a meaning, so adding a peculiar charm. The peach and
oleander-blossoms express the wish for long life rich in
sustenance and beauty. The lotus-leaf indicates purity and
modesty; as one writer puts it, “The superior man, like the
lotus, altho coming through mire, is untainted; altho bathed in
sparkling water and rising in beauty is without vanity.” The
aster means superior to circumstances. The orange marigold,
so fragrant and brilliant in the declining season, signifies
beautiful in age. These emblematic flowers frequently accompany
rich gifts to give them speech.

Every gift of the hand will be eloquent with a sentiment of the heart if the heart’s love is behind it.

(1217)

=Girdle=--See BIBLE CUSTOMS TO-DAY.

=Girls, Betraying=--See TRAPS FOR GIRLS.

=Girl’s Devotion, A=--See LOYALTY.

=Girls in Factories=--See GREED.

=Girl’s Interest in Missions=--See HARVEST FROM EARLY SOWING.

GIRLS, LITTLE, AND SLAMMING DOORS

A trick that every one abhors
In little girls is slamming doors.

A wealthy banker’s little daughter,
Who lived in Palace Green, Bayswater
(By name Rebecca Offendort),
Was given to this furious sport.
She would deliberately go
And slam the door like Billy-Ho!
To make her uncle Jacob start.
(She was not really bad at heart.)

* * * * *

It happened that a marble bust
Of Abraham was standing just
Above the door this little lamb
Had carefully prepared to slam,
And down it came! It knocked her flat!
It laid her out! She looked like that!

* * * * *

Her funeral sermon (which was long
And followed by a sacred song)
Mentioned her virtues, it is true,
But dwelt upon her vices, too,
And showed the dreadful end of one
Who goes and slams the door for fun!

--H. BELLOC.

(1218)

GIRLS, TRAFFIC IN

Twenty-six years ago in New York City, when I first began to
feel an interest in unfortunate girls, and established the first
Florence Crittenton home, now known as the Mother Mission, one
of the things which surprized and imprest me most in coming
close in touch with the subject, was that almost every girl
that I met in a house of sin was supporting some man from her
ill-gotten earnings. Either the man was her husband, who had
driven her on the street in order that he might live in luxury
and ease, or else he was her paramour, upon whom with a woman’s
self-forgetful devotion she delighted to shower everything that
she could earn. In addition to this form of slavery, I also
found that the majority had to pay a certain percentage of their
earnings to some individual or organization who had promised
them immunity from arrest and to whom they looked for protection.

But when we began to get closer to the hearts of the girls, to
know their true history, we discovered that the commencement
of this form of slavery had been even in a baser form--that
before the girls had become so-called “willing slaves” they
were “unwilling slaves.” Many of them had fought for their
liberty and had submitted only because they had been overcome
by superior force. Some of them had been drugged; others kept
under lock and key until such time when either their better
nature had been drugged into unconsciousness or hardened into a
devil-may-care recklessness.--ERNEST A. BELL, “War on
the White Slave Trade.”

(1219)

GIVERS, CLASSES OF

First, those who give spontaneously and generously, but only to
themselves--auto-givers they might be called.

Second, those who give thoughtlessly, without any real or high
motive--givers of the occasion, as it were.

Third, those who give as a sop to conscience and self-esteem; in
a species of atonement for the evil they do--penitential givers.

Fourth, those who give as a matter of display, to win public
applause for their generosity--theatrical givers.

Fifth, those who give because others give, because they are
expected to give, and are ashamed not to give, and therefore
give grudgingly--conventional givers.

Sixth, those who give because they feel they ought to give; who
give through a sense of duty and not through love--moral givers.

Seventh, those who give in the spirit of Jesus; who give because
they love their neighbor as themselves, and above all things
desire to help him--spiritual givers.

To which do you belong?

There are lots of men who will sing with gusto in a missionary
meeting:

“Were the whole realm of nature mine,
That were a present far too small,”

but when the collection-plate is put under their nose and they
are asked to put their sentiments into cold, hard cash, they
drop a five-cent piece upon it with a sigh of regret, which
suggests these other well-known lines,

“When we asunder part,
It gives us inward pain.”

--E. L. MEADOWS, Pittsburg _Christian Advocate_.

(1220)

GIVING

Kerman, in Persia, has been sacked at least six times. In 1794
the city was almost entirely destroyed by Agha Mohammed Khan,
who later demanded twenty thousand pairs of human eyes before
he would withdraw his troops. Kerman never recovered from
this terrible blow, and to-day is a byword for its poverty and
beggars. There is a quaint saying among its beggars:

“Khuda guft, ‘Beddeh’;
Shaitan guft, ‘Neddeh.’”

This means, “God says, ‘Give’; Satan says, ‘Don’t give.’”

The generous impulse is a divine motion: the selfish, is satanic. Many are poor because they are first blind and do not possess the enlightenment of good sense and God’s grace.

(1221)

* * * * *

Forever the sun is pouring its gold
On a hundred worlds that beg and borrow;
His warmth he squandered on summits cold,
His wealth on the homes of want and sorrow;
To withhold his largeness of precious light
Is to bury himself in eternal night.
To give
Is to live.

(1222)

See ALMSGIVING; BENEVOLENCE; GENEROSITY; GETTING AND GIVING;
HAPPINESS; PERSONAL PREACHING.

GIVING, FAITHFUL

In the station over which Mr. C. T. Studd ministered in China
every man who was a Christian gave one-tenth of his annual
income to the Lord. One day a young man who was earning
seventy-two shillings a year came to Mr. Studd and said,
“Pastor, I want you to give me a few days’ grace. I have not
yet got together quite all my tenth.” He handed a good sum to
him, and the pastor asked, “Haven’t you been helping to support
your father and mother?” “Yes.” “And kept your little brother at
school?” “Yes.” “Well, that is more than your tenth,” said Mr.
Studd. “You need not bring any more.”

“No,” said the young man, “I have promised God my tenth, and no
matter what I give beside, I am going to give my full tenth to
God.” And he did. (Text.)

(1223)

=Giving that Grows.=--See MISSIONARY, A LITTLE.

GIVING THE MINIMUM

During the Civil War coins became difficult to obtain, and paper
money was furnished in their place, and at one time the lowest
denomination was a “five-cent scrip.” The time came when the
government minted the three-cent nickel piece. The treasurer of
a church, a fine man, who had a brother, a missionary in Siam,
said to me, “Pastor, it is very unfortunate that the government
should have issued this three-cent piece, because when we had
nothing smaller than a five-cent scrip, people put that into the
collection, but now, that we have got something so small as a
three-cent nickel, our collections will fall off two-fifths!”

(1224)

GIVING THROUGH LOVE

Queen Tyi was a woman of marked ability, the consort of
King Amenhotep III, who ruled in Egypt from 1414 to 1379
B.C. Recently Egyptologists discovered her shrine in
Thebes. It was cut out of solid rock. Approach to it was by a
descent of twenty steps, adjoining that of Rameses I. Around and
within were all that material, wealth and skill of Egyptian art
could offer. The coffin, itself intact, is a superb example of
the jeweler’s craft, the woodwork covered with a frame of gold
inlaid with lapsis lazuli, carmelian and green glass. The royal
mummy was wrapt from head to foot in sheets of gold, bracelets
on the arms, a necklace of gold, beads and ornaments encrusted
with precious stones around the neck, and the head encircled by
the imperial crown of the queen of ancient Egypt. “Behold how
he loved her,” can be said of the king whose consort she was.
Nothing is too precious for love to give. (Text.)

(1225)

=Giving, Unostentatious.=--See BENEVOLENCE, MODEST.

=Giving What We Have=--See TALENTS.

GLITTER VERSUS DEPTH

To have an overwhelming flow of words is one thing; to have a
large vocabulary is another; and very often Swinburne’s torrent
of speech reminds us not so much of a natural fountain whose
springs are deep and abundant, as of an artificial fountain,
which is always ready to shoot aloft its glittering spray, and
always reabsorbs itself for some further service; so that while
the fashion of the jet may differ, the water is pretty much the
same.--W. J. DAWSON, “The Makers of English Poetry.”

(1226)

=Gloom Dispelled=--See SUNSHINE, SCATTERING.

GLORY, FADED

When Charlemagne died, he was buried at Aix la Chapelle,
“keeping royal state and semblance still.” The purple robe was
around him, the crown glittered on his pallid brow. The sword of
state lay near him, and the scepter rested in his hand. Seated
on a chair of state, with all these insignia of royalty upon him
and around him, he was left in the chamber of death. A century
afterward, that silent chamber was opened by the barbarian Otho.
And now the purple robe was dust and ashes. The crown was a
faded spangle, the sword of state corroded metal, and all that
remained of Charles the Great, a ghastly skeleton.

(1227)

=Glory in Duty=--See DUTY MORE THAN GLORY.

GLORY IN IDEALS

It is glory enough to have shouted the name
Of the living God in the teeth of an army of foes;
To have thrown all prudence and forethought away
And for once to have followed the call of the soul
Out into the danger of darkness, of ruin and death.
To have counseled with right, not success, for once,
Is glory enough for one day.

It is glory enough for one day
To have dreamed the bright dream of the reign of right;
To have fastened your faith like a flag to that immaterial staff
And have marched away, forgetting your base of supplies.
And while the worldly-wise see nothing but shame and ignoble retreat,
And tho far ahead the heart may faint and the flesh prove weak--
To have dreamed that bold dream is glory enough,
Is glory enough for one day.

--WILLIAM HERBERT CARRUTH, _The American Magazine_.

(1228)

GLORY OF CHRIST

Emery Pottle is the author of this sentiment appropriate to Advent season:

Strange, we so toil to fashion for our unseen ends
The splendors that the tarnish of this world doth mar--
Such palaces that crumble to a ruined age,
Such garbled memories upon Fame’s fragile page--
When all the lasting glory of our life depends
Upon a little Child, a stable, and a star. (Text.)

(1229)

GLORY OF NATURE

A teacher in Alaska went out one day with one of her pupils to
do some sketching. The little girl she took with her was about
ten years of age and quite skilful with her brush. When the day
was nearly over the teacher looked at the sky where the sun
was setting. “Try to make a picture of that sunset,” said the
teacher to the pupil. The little girl looked at the beautiful
sight in the heavens and then turned to her teacher and said, “I
can’t draw glory.” It was a bright answer made by that little
Alaska girl. It is God who has painted the sunset sky, and
there is no human skill that can draw the glory which He has
created.--W. M. VINES.

(1230)

GOD

God! Thou art Love! I build my faith on that!
I know Thee, Thou hast kept my path and made
Light for me in the darkness--tempering sorrow,
So that it reached me like a solemn joy;
It were too strange that I should doubt Thy love.
BROWNING.

(1231)

=God, A Coworker with=--See CHILDREN’S RELIGIOUS IDEAS.

=God a Protector=--See FAITH, A CHILD’S.

=“God and We”=--See GRATITUDE.

=God Cares=--See EXTREMITY, GOD IN.

“=God Claims Me=”--See CLAIM, GOD’S.

GOD FIRST

Here is a lesson on pronouns in Christian grammar according to the Bishop of Cambridge:

We have learned to say, “First person, I; second, thou; third,
he.” But to put it right, we must turn it upside down: “First
person, He; second, thou; third, I.” “He,” means God, the first
person in the first place; “thou,” my fellow man; and “I,”
myself, comes last.

(1232)

GOD, FULNESS OF

The Scandinavian mythology tells of a mortal who attempted to
drain a goblet of the gods. The more he drank, however, the more
there was to drink. His amazement grew, until he found that the
goblet was invisibly connected with the sea, and that to empty
it he must drink the ocean dry.

So the soul may drink of God’s life forever without exhausting or diminishing the supply.

(1233)

GOD, GREATNESS AND SMALLNESS OF

Collins, the infidel, met a plain countryman going to church.
He asked him where he was going. “To church, sir.” “What to do
there?” “To worship God.” “Pray, is your God a great or a little
God?” “He is both, sir.” “How can He be both?” “He is so great,
sir, that the heaven of heavens can not contain Him, and so
little that he can dwell in my heart.”

Collins declared that this simple answer of the countryman had
more effect upon his mind than all the volumes the learned
doctors had written against him. (Text.)

(1234)

=God Help Us All=--See FORBEARANCE.

GOD, IDEAS OF

The Indian’s god falls in his estimation as he himself declines.
When confronted by a people greater than themselves, the Indians
were easily convinced that their deity also must be greater.
We find similar ideas among all uncivilized and semi-civilized
peoples; when the people show great power it is evidence that
their god is a powerful one. Thus Israel felt assured that
Jehovah, or Yahveh, was greater than the gods of other people,
because His people had conquered others under His banner.

(1235)

GOD, IMMANENCE OF

The works of God, above, below,
Within us and around,
Are pages in that Book to show
How God Himself is found.

* * * * *

Thou who hast given me eyes to see
And love this sight so fair,
Give me a heart to find out Thee
And read Thee everywhere.

--KEBLE. (Text.)

(1236)

GOD IN A HUMAN LIFE