Life and Conduct Part 5

4. Take time enough for sleep. Do not worry.

5. Watch yourself, but not too closely, to find out what exercise, air, diet, etc., agrees with you. No man can be a rule for another.

6. If you consult a physician, it is better to do it before you are unwell than later.[3]

We close this chapter with the powerful words of Thomas Carlyle, addressed to the students of the University of Edinburgh: "Finally, I have one advice to give you which is practically of very great importance. You are to consider throughout much more than is done at present, and what would have been a very great thing for me if I had been able to consider, that health is a thing to be attended to continually; that you are to regard it as the very highest of all temporal things. There is no kind of achievement you could make in the world that is equal to perfect health. What to it are nuggets or millions?"

[1] Frederic Harrison, _Popular Science Monthly Supplement_.

[2] _Plain Living and High Thinking_.

[3] These rules are given by J. Freeman Clarke in his work on Self-Culture.

CHAPTER IX.

EARNESTNESS.

Another word for earnestness is enthusiasm. The Scriptural equivalent is zeal. It means putting our whole heart into whatever we are doing.

It is a sweeping, resistless energy, which carries everything before it, like a river in full flood. Its nature is well expressed in the saying of the old huntsman, "Throw over your heart, and your horse will soon follow."

Earnestness is not to be confounded with noise, vehemence, or outward demonstration.--It is often exceedingly quiet and undemonstrative.

Notice when the machinery of an engine is standing still, how the steam makes a great noise as it issues from the safety-valve, but when the vapor is turned into the cylinder and is used in driving the engine all that thundering sound disappears. It does not follow that there is no steam. It is going in another direction, and doing its appropriate work. It is a great mistake to imagine that enthusiasm and what is called _fuss_ are identical. The most enthusiastic men are often the quietest. No one can doubt the enthusiasm of a man like Livingstone.

He had enthusiasm for science, for philanthropy and for religion. It was unflagging; yet not a boast, not a murmur escaped his lips. He did the thing he meant to do, and made no noise in doing it.

Earnestness is often regarded with suspicion and condemned.--It is the fashion with many to sneer at it. It is often alone, and then it is not respectable. It is often in excess, and is therefore ineffective.

It is often disturbing to the sleepiness of others, and is therefore hated by them. Our Lord was an enthusiast in the eyes of the Pharisees. St. Paul was an enthusiast to Festus. The early Christians were enthusiasts to the pagan world because they turned it upside down.

The martyrs and confessors of all times have been regarded as enthusiasts by those of their own time who were not in sympathy with them. An enthusiast is called by many a fanatic, and a fanatic in the eyes of some is a most dangerous member of society.

All the great leaders of the world have been men in earnest.--Emerson says truly that "every great and commanding movement in the annals of the world is the triumph of enthusiasm." Our civil and religious liberties we owe to enthusiasts for freedom. The enthusiasm of Columbus gave us America; the enthusiasm of Knox reformed Scotland; the enthusiasm of Wesley regenerated English religious life; the enthusiasm of men like Garibaldi and Cavour and Mazzini has made in our own time a new Italy. These men were all denounced in their day, cold water was thrown on all their projects, but their burning earnestness carried them on to triumph. The scorned enthusiast of one generation is the hero of the next.

Earnestness is a great element in securing success in life.--A well-known writer and preacher, Dr. Arnot, tells that he once heard the following conversation at a railway station between a farmer and the engineer of a train: "What are you waiting for so long? Have you no water?" "Oh, yes, we have plenty of water, but it is not boiling." So there may be abundance of intelligence and splendid machinery, and all the appliances that help to success, but what is wanted is intense boiling earnestness. We have a good ill.u.s.tration of the power of earnestness in speaking. One man may say the right thing, and say it in a pleasing and cultured manner; every phrase may be well placed, every sentence polished, every argument in its proper place. Another man may have no elegance of diction, his words may be unpolished, his sentences even ungrammatical, and yet he may move a great mult.i.tude, as the leaves of the trees are moved by the wind, through the intense earnestness and enthusiasm by which he is possessed. We see the same thing in Christian effort. The organization of a church may be perfect, its resources may be large, and it may have in its service an army of able and well-disciplined men; but without enthusiasm and burning zeal its efforts are powerless and come to nothing. When, as at Pentecost, the Holy Spirit descends upon a church in tongues of fire, then there is quickening, and souls are gathered in. No man has ever had a supreme influence over others without more or less enthusiasm in his nature.

There are three directions we may give in regard to earnestness or enthusiasm.

1. _Respect it in others_.--Do not join with those who regard it as something that is not respectable. It is always preferable to what is cold and formal. Life is better than death, and when there is life there is energy and earnestness. Even when enthusiasm takes forms that we cannot altogether approve of, it is worthy of respect. "Next to being Servetus who was burnt," said one, "I would have been Calvin who burnt him." That was a strong way of saying that zeal is a beautiful thing in itself, though "zeal that is not according to knowledge" is not good. We may not approve of many of the opinions and methods of Francis Xavier, the great missionary and saint of the Roman Church, but we cannot fail to admire his burning zeal in the cause of Christ, and look with something like awe on his high-souled devotion to the work of an evangelist. He was swept on by an enthusiasm that never failed, and which carried him over obstacles that would have daunted any ordinary man. The Puritans were denounced by many good people of their time, and the great preacher, Dr. South, delivered a sermon against them, ent.i.tled "Enthusiasts not led by the Spirit of G.o.d." But we all know how great the men were, and how great a work they did through the very enthusiasm that he condemned. "It is better," according to the proverb, "that the pot should boil over than not boil at all." The word enthusiasm literally means filled, or inspired, by G.o.d, and the meaning of the word may teach us how n.o.ble a thing enthusiasm is in itself, and how worthy it is of admiration and respect.

2. _We should cultivate it in ourselves_.--It is a virtue, like all others, that can be cultivated. (_a_) By resolutely setting our face against doing anything in a languid and half-hearted way. If a thing is worth doing, it should be done "with all our might." (_b_) By studying the lives of great men. When we do so we catch something of the earnestness that inspired them. This is perhaps the best result of reading biography. We feel how n.o.ble was the enthusiasm of the heroes of the past, and how, by means of it, they were able to do great things, and to march on to victory. (_c_) By a.s.sociating with those who are in earnest. There is nothing so contagious as enthusiasm, and when we come in contact with those who live under the impulse of grand ideas, something of their force and power is conveyed to ourselves.

The great soul strengthens the weak soul. While the solitary coal on the hearth will go black out, when it is heaped up with others it springs into a blaze.

O ever earnest sun!

Unwearied in thy work, Unhalting in thy course, Unlingering in thy path, Teach me thy earnest ways, That mine may be a life of steadfast work and praise.

O ever earnest stars!

Unchanging in your light, Unfaltering in your race, Unswerving in your round, Teach me your earnest ways, That mine may be a life of steadfast work and praise.

O ever earnest flowers!

That with untiring growth Shoot up and spread abroad Your fragrance and your joy, Teach me your earnest ways, That mine may be a life of steadfast work and praise.

O ever earnest sea!

Constant in flow and ebb, Heaving to moon and sun, Unchanging in thy change, Teach me thy earnest ways, That mine may be a life of steadfast work and praise.

HORATIUS BONAR.

3. _We should carry earnestness into our religious life_.--This above all. There are many who tolerate earnestness in other things, but who look upon it as dangerous in connection with religion. It is regarded as of very questionable value, and spoken of with doubt and suspicion.

Let a man become earnest in prayer, earnest in work, or rise in any way above the dead level in which so many are content to rest, and he will be often spoken of in tones of pity, sneered at as a fanatic, or denounced as an impostor. This suspicion with which earnestness in the Church of Christ is often regarded may be accounted for. (_a_) There has been a vast deal of zeal in the Church about religion which has not been zeal for religion: about matters of ritual, Church government, and the like. (_b_) Zeal has been often expended in contentions about small points of doctrine; often about those very points which are shrouded in mystery. (_c_) Zeal has been often manifested in the interest of sect and party rather than of Christ. (_d_) Zeal has often taken persecution for her ally, and wielded among men the weapons of earthly warfare. For these reasons its appearance in the Church is often regarded as we might regard the erection in a town of a gunpowder magazine which, at any moment, might produce disorder, ruin, and death.

_Yet Scripture regards earnestness in religion as essential_.--Indifference and lukewarmness it regards as hateful (Rev.

iii. 15, 16). It calls us to a solemn choice and to a lifelong service. Its heroes are those who lived in the spirit of Brainerd's prayer, "Oh, that I were a flaming fire in the service of my G.o.d."

There is an allegory of Luther which may be quoted here. "The devil,"

he says, "held a great anniversary, at which his emissaries were convened to report the results of their several missions. 'I let loose the wild beasts of the desert,' said one, 'on a caravan of Christians, and their bones are now bleaching on the sands.' 'What of that?' said the devil; 'their souls were all saved.' 'I drove the east wind,' said another, 'against a ship freighted with Christians, and they were all drowned.' 'What of that?' said the devil; 'their souls were all saved.' 'For ten years I tried to get a single Christian asleep,' said a third, 'and I succeeded, and left him so.' Then the devil shouted, and the night stars of h.e.l.l sang for joy."

There are three spheres of religious life in which earnestness should be specially shown.

1. _In prayer_.--This is specially inculcated in the two parables of our Lord, the "unjust judge" and "the friend at midnight," and in His own words, "Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you." One, it is said, came to Demosthenes, the great orator, and asked him to plead his cause. He heard him without attention while he told his story without earnestness. The man saw this, and cried out anxiously that it was all true. "Ah!" said Demosthenes, "I believe you _now_." The earnest prayer is the prevailing prayer.

2. _In sacrifice_.--This is in all life the test of earnestness. The student giving up time for the acquisition of knowledge; the merchant giving up his hours to the pursuit of business; the explorer braving the heat of the tropics and the cold of the arctic regions in his zeal for discovery. It is the same in religion. We must count all things, with St. Paul, "as loss, that we may win Christ, and be found in Him."

3. _In impressing others_.--It is "out of the heart that the mouth speaketh," and power to impress others is given only to those who do so with a full heart, and who are consumed with a burning zeal for the salvation of souls. These are they whom G.o.d has, in all ages, blessed in the conversion of men.

CHAPTER X.

MANNERS.

The word manners comes from the Latin _ma.n.u.s_, the hand, and literally means the mode in which a thing is handled--behavior, deportment.

Manners may be defined as the pleasing or unpleasing expression of our thoughts and intentions, whether in word or action. We may say or do a thing in an agreeable or a disagreeable way. According as we choose the one or the other, our manners may be said to be good or bad.

Good manners are the result of two things.--(_a_) Self-respect and (_b_) consideration for the feelings of others. The man who respects himself will be careful to say or do nothing that may seem to others degrading or unworthy. The man who has consideration for the feelings of others will be equally careful to do or say nothing that may give them pain, or be offensive to them.

Good manners beautify character.--It was a celebrated saying of an old bishop, William of Wykeham, "Manners maketh man." This is, however, only partially true. Manners do not make a man any more than good clothes make a man, but if he _is made_ they greatly improve him. Some have been truly excellent who have had an uncouth and unpolished address, but that was rather to their disadvantage than otherwise.

"Rough diamonds" are always precious, but a diamond that is cut and polished, while it retains its value, is much more beautiful. Civility of speech, politeness of address, courtesy in our dealings with others, are qualities that adorn a man, whilst rudeness, incivility, roughness in behavior, detract greatly from his value, and injure his usefulness.

Tennyson's words are true:

Manners are not idle, but the fruit Of n.o.ble nature and of loyal mind.

Good manners tend greatly to success in life.--Coa.r.s.eness and gruffness lock doors, gentleness and refinement open them, while the rude, boorish man is shunned by all. Take the case of a speaker addressing a public meeting. What he says is weighty and important. His arguments are powerful and well marshalled, but his speech is uncouth and disagreeable. He says things that are coa.r.s.e and vulgar. His bad manner vastly takes away from the impression which he desires to make, and which, if his manner had been different, he would have made.

Again, two young men serve in a place of business. The one is gentle in his demeanor, meets his customers with a pleasant smile, is always polite. The other is rough in his deportment, apparently does not care whether those he deals with are pleased or not. The one is a favorite with everybody; the other, who may be equally worthy as far as character is concerned, is disliked.

Good manners often disarm opposition.--People may have a prejudice against ourselves personally, or against the cause we represent. It is wonderful, however, how much may be done to soften them by habitual courtesy towards them, and by studiously avoiding anything calculated to offend them or rouse their anger. A wise man will always endeavor to be specially civil towards any one who differs from him. It is related that in the early days of the Abolition movement in the United States, two men went out preaching: one, a sage old Quaker, brave and calm; the other, a fervid young man. When the Quaker lectured, the audience were all attention, and his arguments met with very general concurrence. But when it came to the young man's turn, a tumult invariably ensued, and he was pelted off the platform. Surprised by their different receptions, the young man asked the Quaker the reason.

"Friend," he said, "you and I are on the same mission; we preach the same things; how is it that while _you_ are received so cordially, I get nothing but abuse?" "I will tell thee," replied the Quaker; "thee says, 'If you do so and so, you shall be punished,' and I say, 'My friends, if you will _but_ do so and so, you shall not be punished.'

It is not what we say, but how we say it." [1] In _The Memorials of a Quiet Life_ it is said of Augustus Hare that, on a road along which he frequently pa.s.sed, there was a workman employed in its repair who met his gentle questions and observations with gruff answers and sour looks. But as day after day the persevering mildness of his words and manner still continued, the rugged features of the man gave way, and his tone a.s.sumed a softer character. Politeness is the oiled key that will open many a rusty lock.