Self-Reliance and Self-Reverence

The Sweet Influence of A Loving Sympathy.

      We should do poorly with our content with life as it is, if we did not find one of the strongest and firmest of our stepping-stones as we cross the stream to our shining goal of happiness, in the habit of self-reliance and self-reverence. The eloquent preacher Whitefield is reported to have asked Tenant: " Do you not rejoice that your time is so near .at hand, when you will be called home and freed from all the difficulties of this checkered scene?

      "No," was the reply. "My business is to live as long as I can, as. well as I can, and to serve my Lord and Master as faithfully as I can, until He shall think proper to call me home."

      The aged saint knew that to every one is appointed his place and duty, and that he is to fill it and to fulfill it till relieved, and that thus his character is developed and strengthened. "The greater the power of thought in any individual," some one has said, "the greater is his spontaneous action; and the greater the spontaneous action the more completely will he live and be. A thousand influences lie in wait to ensnare mortal man. The whole world is an influence. The strongest of all is individual character. Character makes the man. Man can boast of nothing as his own, except the energy which he displays. If unable to arouse this energy let him assume it, let him place himself by a sudden effort in circumstances where he must will." Character then is developed by doing and not by dreaming.

Has made me King! Now in my new estate

What duties must I do, what honors bear?

More than all men the King must feel the weight

Of constant self-restraint, of watchful care;

Beneath his firm control his passions bring,

And rule himself if he would be a King.

                                            --S. M. Day. 

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