Architects of Fate Part 23

"Do you know him, then?" said Aristides, "or has he in any way injured you?" "Neither," said the other, "but it is for this very thing I would he were condemned. I can go nowhere but I hear of Aristides the Just."

Aristides inquired no further, but took the sh.e.l.l, and wrote his name on it as desired. The absence of Aristides soon dissipated the apprehensions which his countrymen had so idly indulged. He was in a short time recalled, and for many years after took a leading part in the affairs of the republic, without showing the least resentment against his enemies, or seeking any other gratification than that of serving his countrymen with fidelity and honor. The virtues of Aristides did not pa.s.s without reward. He had two daughters, who were educated at the expense of the state, and to whom portions were allotted from the public treasury.

The strongest proof, however, of the justice and integrity of Aristides is, that notwithstanding he had possessed the highest employments in the republic, and had the absolute disposal of its treasures, yet he died so poor as not to leave money enough to defray the expenses of his funeral.

Men of character are the conscience of the society to which they belong; they, and not the police, guarantee the execution of the laws. Their influence is the bulwark of good government.

It was said of the first Emperor Alexander of Russia, that his personal character was equivalent to a const.i.tution. Of Montaigne, it was said that his high reputation for integrity was a better protection for him than a regiment of horse would have been, he being the only man among the French gentry who, during the wars of the Fronde, kept his castle gates unbarred. There are men, fortunately for the world, who would rather be right than be President.

Fisher Ames, while in Congress, said of Roger Sherman, of Connecticut: "If I am absent during a discussion of a subject, and consequently know not on which side to vote, when I return I always look at Roger Sherman, for I am sure if I vote with him, I shall vote right."

Character gravitates upward, as with a celestial gravitation, while mere genius, without character, gravitates downward. How often we see in school or college young men, who are apparently dull and even stupid, rise gradually and surely above others who are without character, merely because the former have an upward tendency in their lives, a reaching-up principle, which gradually but surely unfolds, and elevates them to positions of honor and trust. There is something which everybody admires in an aspiring soul, one whose tendency is upward and onward, in spite of hindrances and in defiance of obstacles.

We may try to stifle the voice of the mysterious angel within, but it always says "yes" to right actions and "no" to wrong ones. No matter whether we heed it or not, no power can change its decision one iota.

Through health, through disease, through prosperity and adversity, this faithful servant stands behind us in the shadow of ourselves, never intruding, but weighing every act we perform, every word we utter, p.r.o.nouncing the verdict "right" or "wrong."

Francis Horner, of England, was a man of whom Sydney Smith said, that "the ten commandments were stamped upon his forehead." The valuable and peculiar light in which Horner's history is calculated to inspire every right-minded youth is this: he died at the age of thirty-eight, possessed of greater influence than any other private man, and admired, beloved, trusted, and deplored by all except the heartless and the base. No greater homage was ever paid in Parliament to any deceased member. How was this attained? By rank? He was the son of an Edinburgh merchant.

By wealth? Neither he nor any of his relatives ever had a superfluous sixpence. By office? He held but one, and that for only a few years, of no influence, and with very little pay. By talents? His were not splendid, and he had no genius. Cautious and slow, his only ambition was to be right. By eloquence? He spoke in calm, good taste, without any of the oratory that either terrifies or seduces. By any fascination of manner? His was only correct and agreeable. By what was it, then?

Merely by sense, industry, good principles and a good heart, qualities which no well const.i.tuted mind need ever despair of attaining. It was the force of his character that raised him; and this character was not impressed on him by nature, but formed, out of no peculiarly fine elements, by himself. There were many in the House of Commons of far greater ability and eloquence. But no one surpa.s.sed him in the combination of an adequate portion of these with moral worth. Horner was born to show what moderate powers, unaided by anything whatever except culture and goodness, may achieve, even when these powers are displayed amidst the compet.i.tion and jealousies of public life.

"When it was reported in Paris that the great Napoleon was dead, I pa.s.sed the Palais Royal," says a French writer, "where a public crier called, 'Here's your account of the death of Bonaparte.' This cry which once would have appalled all Europe fell perfectly flat. I entered," he adds, "several cafes, and found the same indifference,--coldness everywhere; no one seemed interested or troubled. This man, who had conquered Europe and awed the world, had inspired neither the love nor the admiration of even his own countrymen. He had impressed the world with his marvelousness, and had inspired astonishment but not love."

Emerson says that Napoleon did all that in him lay to live and thrive without moral principle. It was the nature of things, the eternal law of man and of the world, which balked and ruined him; and the result, in a million attempts of this kind, will be the same. His was an experiment, under the most favorable conditions, to test the powers of intellect without conscience. Never elsewhere was such a leader so endowed, and so weaponed; never has another leader found such aids and followers. And what was the result of this vast talent and power, of these immense armies, burned cities, squandered treasures, immolated millions of men, of this demoralized Europe? He left France smaller, poorer, feebler than he found her.

A hundred years hence what difference will it make whether you were rich or poor, a peer or a peasant? But what difference may it not make whether you did what was right or what was wrong?

"The 'Vicar of Wakefield,'" said George William Curtis, "was sold, through Dr. Johnson's mediation, for sixty pounds; and ten years after, the author died. With what love do we hang over its pages! What springs of feeling it has opened! Goldsmith's books are influences and friends forever, yet the five thousandth copy was never announced, and Oliver Goldsmith, M. D., often wanted a dinner! Horace Walpole, the c.o.xcomb of literature, smiled at him contemptuously from his gilded carriage.

Goldsmith struggled cheerfully with his adverse fate, and died. But then sad mourners, whom he had aided in their affliction, gathered around his bed, and a lady of distinction, whom he had only dared to admire at a distance, came and cut a lock of his hair for remembrance. When I see Goldsmith, thus carrying his heart in his hand like a palm branch, I look on him as a successful man, whom adversity could not bring down from the level of his lofty nature."

Dr. Maudsley tells us that the aims which chiefly predominate--riches, position, power, applause of men--are such as inevitably breed and foster many bad pa.s.sions in the eager compet.i.tion to attain them. Hence, in fact, come disappointed ambition, jealousy, grief from loss of fortune, all the torments of wounded self-love, and a thousand other mental sufferings,--the commonly enumerated moral causes of insanity. They are griefs of a kind to which a rightly developed nature should not fall a prey. There need be no envy nor jealousy, if a man were to consider that it mattered not whether he did a great thing or some one else did it, Nature's only concern being that it should be done; no grief from loss of fortune, if he were to estimate at its true value that which fortune can bring him, and that which fortune can never bring him; no wounded self-love, if he had learned well the eternal lesson of life,--self-renunciation.

Soon after his establishment in Philadelphia Franklin was offered a piece for publication in his newspaper. Being very busy, he begged the gentleman would leave it for consideration. The next day the author called and asked his opinion of it. "Well, sir," replied Franklin, "I am sorry to say I think it highly scurrilous and defamatory. But being at a loss on account of my poverty whether to reject it or not, I thought I would put it to this issue: At night, when my work was done, I bought a two-penny loaf, on which I supped heartily, and then, wrapping myself in my great coat, slept very soundly on the floor till morning, when another loaf and mug of water afforded a pleasant breakfast. Now, sir, since I can live very comfortably in this manner, why should I prost.i.tute my press to personal hatred or party pa.s.sion for a more luxurious living?"

One cannot read this anecdote of our American sage without thinking of Socrates' reply to King Archelaus, who had pressed him to give up preaching in the dirty streets of Athens, and come and live with him in his splendid courts: "Meal, please your Majesty, is a half-penny a peck at Athens, and water I get for nothing!"

During Alexander's march into Africa he found a people dwelling in peace, who knew neither war nor conquest. While he was interviewing the chief two of his subjects brought a case before him for judgment. The dispute was this: the one had bought of the other a piece of ground, which, after the purchase, was found to contain a treasure, for which he felt bound to pay. The other refused to receive anything, stating that when he sold the ground he sold it with all the advantages apparent or concealed which it might be found to afford. The king said, "One of you has a daughter and the other a son; let them be married and the treasure given to them as a dowry." Alexander was surprised, and said, "If this case had been in our country it would have been dismissed, and the king would have kept the treasure." The chief said, "Does the sun shine on your country, and the rain fall, and the gra.s.s grow?" Alexander replied, "Certainly." The chief then asked, "Are there any cattle?" "Certainly," was the reply.

The chief replied, "Then it is for these innocent cattle that the Great Being permits the rain to fall and the gra.s.s to grow."

A good character is a precious thing, above rubies, gold, crowns, or kingdoms, and the work of making it is the n.o.blest labor on earth.

Professor Blackie of the University of Edinburgh said to a cla.s.s of young men: "Money is not needful; power is not needful; liberty is not needful; even health is not the one thing needful; but character alone is that which can truly save us, and if we are not saved in this sense, we certainly must be d.a.m.ned." It has been said that "when poverty is your inheritance, virtue must be your capital."

During the American Revolution, while General Reed was President of Congress, the British Commissioners offered him a bribe of ten thousand guineas to desert the cause of his country. His reply was, "Gentlemen, I am poor, very poor; but your king is not rich enough to buy me."

"When Le Pere Bourdaloue preached at Rouen," said Pere Arrius, "the tradesmen forsook their shops, lawyers their clients, physicians their sick, and tavern-keepers their bars; but when I preached the following year I set all things to rights,--every man minded his own business."

"I fear John Knox's prayers more than an army of ten thousand men," said Mary, Queen of Scotland.

When Pope Paul IV. heard of the death of Calvin he exclaimed with a sigh, "Ah, the strength of that proud heretic lay in--riches? No. Honors?

No. But nothing could move him from his course. Holy Virgin! With two such servants, our church would soon be mistress of both worlds."

Garibaldi's power over his men amounted to fascination. Soldiers and officers were ready to die for him. His will power seemed to enslave them. In Rome he called for forty volunteers to go where half of them would be sure to be killed and the others probably wounded. The whole battalion rushed forward; and they had to draw lots, so eager were all to obey.

What power of magic lies in a great name! There was not a throne in Europe that could stand against Washington's character, and in comparison with it the millions of the Croesuses would look ridiculous. What are the works of avarice compared with the names of Lincoln, Grant, or Garfield? A few names have ever been the leaven which has preserved many a nation from premature decay.

"But strew his ashes to the wind Whose sword or voice has served mankind-- And is he dead, whose glorious mind Lifts thine on high?-- To live in hearts we leave behind Is not to die."

Mr. Gladstone gave in Parliament, when announcing the death of Princess Alice, a touching story of sick-room ministration. The Princess' little boy was ill with diphtheria, the physician had cautioned her not to inhale the poisoned breath; the child was tossing in the delirium of fever. The mother took the little one in her lap and stroked his fevered brow; the boy threw his arms around her neck, and whispered, "Kiss me, mamma;" the mother's instinct was stronger than the physician's caution; she pressed her lips to the child's, but lost her life.

At a large dinner-party given by Lord Stratford after the Crimean War, it was proposed that every one should write on a slip of paper the name which appeared most likely to descend to posterity with renown. When the papers were opened every one of them contained the name of Florence Nightingale.

Leckey says that the first hospital ever established was opened by that n.o.ble Christian woman, Fabiola, in the fourth century. The two foremost names in modern philanthropy are those of John Howard and Florence Nightingale. Not a general of the Crimean War on either side can be named by one person in ten. The one name that rises instantly, when that carnival of pestilence and blood is suggested, is that of a young woman just recovering from a serious illness, Florence Nightingale. A soldier said, "Before she came there was such cussin' and swearin'; and after that it was as holy as a church." She robbed war of half its terrors.

Since her time the hospital systems of all the nations during war have been changed. No soldier was braver and no patriot truer than Clara Barton, and wherever that n.o.ble company of Protestant women known as the Red Cross Society,--the cross, I suppose, pointing to Calvary, and the red to the blood of the Redeemer,--wherever those consecrated workers seek to alleviate the condition of those who suffer from plagues, cholera, fevers, flood, famine, there this tireless angel moves on her pathway of blessing. And of all heroes, what n.o.bler ones than these, whose names shine from the pages of our missionary history? I never read of Mrs. Judson, Mrs. Snow, Miss Brittain, Miss West, without feeling that the heroic age of our race has just begun, the age which opens to woman the privilege of following her benevolent inspirations wheresoever she will, without thinking that our Christianity needs no other evidence.

"Duty is the cement without which all power, goodness, intellect, truth, happiness, and love itself can have no permanence, but all the fabric of existence crumbles away from under us and leaves us at last sitting in the midst of a ruin, astonished at our own desolation." A constant, abiding sense of duty is the last reason of culture.

"I slept and dreamed that life is beauty; I woke and found that life is duty."

We have no more right to refuse to perform a duty than to refuse to pay a debt. Moral insolvency is certain to him who neglects and disregards his duty to his fellow-men. Nor can we hire another to perform our duty.

The mere accident of having money does not release you from your duty to the world. Nay, it increases it, for it enables you to do a larger and n.o.bler duty.

If your money is not clean, if there is a dirty dollar in your millions, you have not succeeded. If there is the blood of the poor and unfortunate, of orphans and widows, on your bank account, you have not succeeded. If your wealth has made others poorer, your life is a failure. If you have gained it in an occupation that kills, that shortens the lives of others, that poisons their blood, or engenders disease, if you have taken a day from a human life, if you have gained your money by that which has debauched other lives, you have failed.

Remember that a question will be asked you some time which you cannot evade, the right answer to which will fix your destiny forever: "How did you get that fortune?" Are other men's lives in it; are others' hope and happiness buried in it; are others' comforts sacrificed to it; are others' rights buried in it; are others' opportunities smothered in it; others' chances strangled by it; has their growth been stunted by it; their characters stained by it; have others a smaller loaf, a meaner home? If so, you have failed; all your millions cannot save you from the curse, "thou hast been weighed in the balance and found wanting."

When Walter Scott's publisher and printer failed and $600,000 of debt stared them in the face, friends came forward and offered to raise money enough to allow him to arrange with his creditors. "No," said he proudly, "this right hand shall work it all off; if we lose everything else, we will at least keep our honor unblemished." What a grand picture of manliness, of integrity in this n.o.ble man, working like a dray-horse to cancel that great debt, throwing off at white heat the "Life of Napoleon," "Woodstock," "The Tales of a Grandfather," articles for the "Quarterly," and so on, all written in the midst of great sorrow, pain, and ruin. "I could not have slept soundly," he writes, "as I now can under the comfortable impression of receiving the thanks of my creditors, and the conscious feeling of discharging my duty as a man of honesty. I see before me a long, tedious, and dark path, but it leads to stainless reputation. If I die in the harness, as is very likely, I shall die with honor."

One of the last things he uttered was, "I have been, perhaps, the most voluminous author of my day, and it is a comfort to me to think that I have tried to unsettle no man's faith, to corrupt no man's principles, and that I have written nothing which, on my deathbed, I would wish blotted out."

Although Aga.s.siz refused to lecture even for a large sum of money, yet he left a greater legacy to the world, and left even more money to Harvard University ($300,000) than he would have left if he had taken the time to lecture for money.

Faraday had to choose between a fortune of nearly a million and a life of almost certain poverty if he pursued science. He chose poverty and science, and earned a name never to be erased from the book of fame.

Beecher says that we are all building a soul-house for eternity; yet with what differing architecture and what various care!

What if a man should see his neighbor getting workmen and building materials together, and should say to him, "What are you building?" and he should answer, "I don't exactly know. I am waiting to see what will come of it." And so walls are reared, and room is added to room, while the man looks idly on, and all the bystanders exclaim, "What a fool he is!" Yet this is the way many men are building their characters for eternity, adding room to room, without plan or aim, and thoughtlessly waiting to see what the effect will be. Such builders will never dwell in "the house of G.o.d, not made with hands, eternal in the heavens."

Some people build as cathedrals are built, the part nearest the ground finished; but that part which soars towards heaven, the turrets and the spires, forever incomplete.

Many men are mere warehouses full of merchandise--the head and heart are stuffed with goods. Like those houses in the lower streets of cities which were once family dwellings, but are now used for commercial purposes, there are apartments in their souls which were once tenanted by taste, and love, and joy, and worship; but they are all deserted now, and the rooms are filled with material things.

CHAPTER XII.

WEALTH IN ECONOMY.