Lincoln always yearned for a rounded wholeness of character; and his fellow lawyers called him "perversely honest." Nothing could induce him to take the wrong side of a case, or to continue on that side after learning that it was unjust or hopeless. After giving considerable time to a case in which he had received from a lady a retainer of two hundred dollars, he returned the money, saying: "Madam, you have not a peg to hang your case on." "But you have earned that money," said the lady.
"No, no," replied Lincoln, "that would not be right. I can"t take pay for doing my duty."
Aga.s.siz would not lecture at five hundred dollars a night, because he had no time to make money. Charles Sumner, when a senator, declined to lecture at any price, saying that his time belonged to Ma.s.sachusetts and the nation. Spurgeon would not speak for fifty nights in America at one thousand dollars a night, because he said he could do better: he could stay in London and try to save fifty souls. All honor to the comparative few in every walk of life who, amid the strong materialistic tendencies of our age, still speak and act earnestly, inspired by the hope of rewards other than gold or popular favor. These are our truly great men and women. They labor in their ordinary vocations with no less zeal because they give time and thought to higher things.
King Midas, in the ancient myth, asked that everything he touched might be turned to gold, for then, he thought, he would be perfectly happy.
His request was granted, but when his clothes, his food, his drink, the flowers he plucked, and even his little daughter, whom he kissed, were all changed into yellow metal, he begged that the Golden Touch might be taken from him. He had learned that many other things are intrinsically far more valuable than all the gold that was ever dug from the earth.
The "beggarly Homer, who strolled, G.o.d knows when, in the infancy and barbarism of the world," was richer far than Croesus and added more wealth to the world than the Rothschilds, the Vanderbilts and Goulds.
An Arab who fortunately escaped death after losing his way in the desert, without provisions, tells of his feelings when he found a bag full of pearls, just as he was about to abandon all hope. "I shall never forget," said he, "the relish and delight that I felt on supposing it to be dried wheat, nor the bitterness and despair I suffered on discovering that the bag contained pearls."
It is an interesting fact in this money-getting era that a poor author, or a seedy artist, or a college president with frayed coat-sleeves, has more standing in society and has more paragraphs written about him in the papers than many a millionaire. This is due, perhaps, to the malign influence of money-getting and to the benign effect of purely intellectual pursuits. As a rule every great success in the money world means the failure and misery of hundreds of antagonists. Every success in the world of intellect and character is an aid and profit to society.
Character is a mark cut upon something, and this indelible mark determines the only true value of all people and all their work. Dr.
Hunter said: "No man was ever a great man who wanted to be one." Artists cannot help putting themselves and their own characters into their works. The vulgar artist cannot paint a virtuous picture. The gross, the bizarre, the sensitive, the delicate, all come out on the canvas and tell the story of his life.
Who would not choose to be a millionaire of deeds with a Lincoln, a Grant, a Florence Nightingale, a Childs; a millionaire of ideas with Emerson, with Lowell, with Shakespeare, with Wordsworth; a millionaire of statesmanship with a Gladstone, a Bright, a Sumner, a Washington?
Some men are rich in health, in constant cheerfulness, in a mercurial temperament which floats them over troubles and trials enough to sink a shipload of ordinary men. Others are rich in disposition, family, and friends. There are some men so amiable that everybody loves them; some so cheerful that they carry an atmosphere of jollity about them. Some are rich in integrity and character.
"Who is the richest of men?" asked Socrates. "He who is content with the least, for contentment is nature"s riches."
"Do you know, sir," said a devotee of Mammon to John Bright, "that I am worth a million sterling?" "Yes," said the irritated but calm-spirited respondent, "I do; and I know that it is all you are worth."
A bankrupt merchant, returning home one night, said to his n.o.ble wife, "My dear, I am ruined; everything we have is in the hands of the sheriff." After a few moments of silence the wife looked into his face and asked, "Will the sheriff sell you?" "Oh, no." "Will the sheriff sell me?" "Oh, no." "Then do not say we have lost everything. All that is most valuable remains to us--manhood, womanhood, childhood. We have lost but the results of our skill and industry. We can make another fortune if our hearts and hands are left us."
"We say a man is "made"," said Beecher. "What do we mean? That he has got the control of his lower instincts, so that they are only fuel to his higher feelings, giving force to his nature? That his affections are like vines, sending out on all sides blossoms and cl.u.s.tering fruits?
That his tastes are so cultivated that all beautiful things speak to him, and bring him their delights? That his understanding is opened, so that he walks through every hall of knowledge, and gathers its treasures? That his moral feelings are so developed and quickened that he holds sweet commerce with Heaven? O, no--none of these things. He is cold and dead in heart, and mind, and soul. Only his pa.s.sions are alive; but--he is worth five hundred thousand dollars!
"And we say a man is "ruined." Are his wife and children dead? O, no.
Have they had a quarrel, and are they separated from him? O, no. Has he lost his reputation through crime? No. Is his reason gone? O, no; it is as sound as ever. Is he struck through with disease? No. He has lost his property, and he is ruined. The _man_ ruined! When shall we learn that "a man"s life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth?""
"How is it possible," asks an ancient philosopher, "that a man who has nothing, who is naked, houseless, without a hearth, squalid, without a slave, without a city, can pa.s.s a life that flows easily? See, G.o.d has sent you a man to show you that it is possible. Look at me who am without a city, without a house, without possessions, without a slave; I sleep on the ground; I have no wife, no children, no praetorium, but only the earth and heavens, and one poor cloak. And what do I want? Am I not without sorrow? Am I not without fear? Am I not free? When did any of you see me failing in the object of my desire? or even falling into that which I would avoid? Did I ever blame G.o.d or man? Did I ever accuse any man? Did any of you ever see me with a sorrowful countenance?"
"You are a plebeian," said a patrician to Cicero. "I am a plebeian,"
replied the great Roman orator; "the n.o.bility of my family begins with me, that of yours will end with you." No man deserves to be crowned with honor whose life is a failure, and he who lives only to eat and drink and acc.u.mulate money is surely not successful. The world is no better for his living in it. He never wiped a tear from a sad face, never kindled a fire upon a frozen hearth. There is no flesh in his heart; he worships no G.o.d but gold.
Why should I scramble and struggle to get possession of a little portion of this earth? This is my world now; why should I envy others its mere legal possession? It belongs to him who can see it, enjoy it. I need not envy the so-called owners of estates in Boston and New York. They are merely taking care of my property and keeping it in excellent condition for me. For a few pennies for railroad fare whenever I wish I can see and possess the best of it all. It has cost me no effort, it gives me no care; yet the green gra.s.s, the shrubbery, and the statues on the lawns, the finer sculptures and paintings within, are always ready for me whenever I feel a desire to look upon them. I do not wish to carry them home with me, for I could not give them half the care they now receive; besides, it would take too much of my valuable time, and I should be worrying continually lest they be spoiled or stolen. I have much of the wealth of the world now. It is all prepared for me without any pains on my part. All around me are working hard to get things that will please me, and competing to see who can give them the cheapest. The little I pay for the use of libraries, railroads, galleries, parks, is less than it would cost to care for the least of all I use. Life and landscape are mine, the stars and flowers, the sea and air, the birds and trees. What more do I want? All the ages have been working for me; all mankind are my servants. I am only required to feed and clothe myself, an easy task in this land of opportunity.
There is scarcely an idea more infectious or potent than the love of money. It is a yellow fever, decimating its votaries and ruining more families in the land, than all the plagues or diseases put together.
Instances of its malevolent power occur to every reader. Almost every square foot of land of our continent during the early buccaneer period (some call it the march of civilization), has been ensanguined through the madness for treasure. Read the pages of our historian Prescott, and you will see that the whole anti-Puritan history of America resolves itself into an awful slaughter for gold. Discoveries were only side issues.
Speak, history, who are life"s victors? Unroll thy long scroll and say, have they won who first reached the goal, heedless of a brother"s rights? And has he lost in life"s great race who stopped "to raise a fallen child, and place him on his feet again," or to give a fainting comrade care; or to guide or a.s.sist a feeble woman? Has he lost who halts before the throne when duty calls, or sorrow, or distress? Is there no one to sing the paean of the conquered who fell in the battle of life? of the wounded, the beaten, who died overwhelmed in the strife? of the low and humble, the weary and broken-hearted, who strove and who failed, in the eyes of men, but who did their duty as G.o.d gave them to see it?
"We have yet no man who has leaned _entirely_ on his character, and eaten angel"s food," said Emerson; "who, trusting to his sentiments, found life made of miracles; who, working for _universal aims_, found himself fed, he knew not how; clothed, sheltered, and weaponed, he knew not how, and yet it was done by his own hands."
At a time when it was considered dangerous to society in Europe for the common people to read books and listen to lectures on any but religious subjects, Charles Knight determined to enlighten the ma.s.ses by cheap literature. He believed that a paper might be instructive and not be dull, cheap without being wicked. He started the "Penny Magazine," which acquired a circulation of two hundred thousand the first year. Knight projected the "Penny Cyclopedia," the "Library of Entertaining Knowledge," "Half-Hours with the Best Authors," and other useful works at a low price. His whole adult life was spent in the work of elevating the common people by cheap, yet wholesome publications. He died in poverty, but grateful people have erected a n.o.ble monument over his ashes.
How many rich dwellings there are, crowded with every appointment of luxury, that are only glittering caverns of selfishness and discontent!
"Better a dinner of herbs where love is, than a stalled ox and hatred therewith."
"No man can tell whether he is rich or poor by turning to his ledger,"
says Beecher. "It is the heart that makes a man rich. He is rich or poor according to what he _is_, not according to what he _has_."
If our thoughts are great and n.o.ble, no mean surroundings can make us miserable. It is the mind that makes the body rich.
Howe"er it be, it seems to me, "Tis only n.o.ble to be good.
Kind hearts are more than coronets, And simple faith than Norman blood.
--TENNYSON.
Be n.o.ble! and the n.o.bleness that lies In other men, sleeping, but never dead, Will rise in majesty to meet thine own.
--LOWELL.