The grapes we can"t reach are not, as a general thing, sour grapes; and it is a despicable kind of philosophy that a.s.serts them to be so.
Why should we despise good things because we do not possess them?
Cicero, indeed, says that "if we do not have wealth, there is nothing better and n.o.bler than to despise it." But this a.s.sertion was artificial in the case of Cicero, and it is no nearer the truth now than it was two thousand years ago.
In fact, on the question of money this dictum appeals to us with great force; for though it may be true that some of the best things of life cannot be bought with money, it is equally true that there are other good things that nothing but money can buy. Therefore, to follow Cicero"s advice and despise wealth if we have not got it, is to despise a great many excellent things; and not only that, it is to despise also the power of imparting these excellent things to other people. The golden grapes may be out of our reach, but we need not say the fruit is sour; rather let us give thanks that others have been able to gather and press the rich vintage and to give graciously to the world of its wine of consolation.
In the same way it has long been, fashionable to a.s.sert a contempt for "the bubble reputation," whether sought on the battlefield or in the senate, or forum, or study. But why despise one of the grandest moral forces in the universe? For when a man can get out of self to follow the fortunes of an idea, when he can fall in love with a cause, when he can fight for some public good, when he can forfeit life, if need be, for his conviction, the "reputation" that is sure to follow such abnegation and courage is not a "bubble;" it is a glorious fact,--one through which the general level of humanity is raised and the whole world impelled forward.
I do not say that all persons who conscientiously use to their utmost ability the one or two talents they possess are not as happy as they can be. Thank G.o.d! life can be full in small measures. But if any man or woman has been given five or ten talents, I do say they have no right to keep them for their own delectation, falling back upon such cheap sentiments as the hollowness of fame and the "bubble reputation." Fame is not a bubble; it is a power whose beneficent achievements have done a great deal toward making this world a comfortable dwelling-place.
A great many high-sounding maxims in use at the present day have lost their application. There was a time, centuries ago, when the humiliations attending any upward climb were sufficient to deter a sensitive, honorable soul. But such days are forever past. Any one now bearing precious gifts for humanity finds the gates lifted up and a wide entrance ready for him. Men and women can make what mark they are able to make, and the world stands watching with sympathetic heart.
They will not find its "reputation" a "bubble."
Another fine, windy theme of warning from "sour-grape" philosophers is the hollowness of friendship and the general insincerity of the world.
They have "seen through" the world, they know all its falseness and worthlessness; and, as the world is far too busy to dispute their a.s.sertions or to defend itself, the superior discernment of this cla.s.s of people is not brought to accurate accounting. As a matter of fact, however, people generally get just as much consideration from the world, and just as much fidelity from their friends, as they deserve.
A friend may ask us to dinner, but not therefore should we expect that he share his purse with us. Community of taste and sentiment does not imply community of goods. But, for all this, friendship is not hollow, nor are the grapes of its hospitality sour.
I may notice here the prevalent opinion that there is no such friendship now in the world as there used to be. "There are no Davids and Jonathans now," say the unbelievers in humanity. Very true, for David and Jonathan did not belong to the nineteenth century. To keep up such a friendship, we require, not a spare hour now and then, but an amount of certain and continuous leisure. There are still great friendships among boys at school and young men in college, for they have a large amount of steady leisure; and this is necessary to signal friendship. When we have more time, we shall have more and stronger friendships.
The vanity of life, the deceitfulness of women, the falseness of love, the impossibility of happiness, the pa.s.sing away of all that is lovely and of good report, are old, old, old texts of complaint. Men and women talk about them until they feel ever so much better than the rest of the world; and such talk enables them to look down with proper contempt upon the hypocrisies of society,--that is, of their next-door neighbors and near acquaintances,--and fosters a comfortable, but dangerous self-esteem. The world, upon the whole, is a good world to those who try to be good and to do good, and every year it is growing better. During the last fifty years how much it has grown! How sympathetic, how charitable, how evangelizing it has become! Yes, indeed, if we choose to do so, we shall meet with far more good hearts than bad ones, and the topmost grapes are not sour.
Burdens
There are two kinds of burdens--those that G.o.d lays on us, and those which we lay on ourselves. When G.o.d lays the burden on the back, he gives us strength to carry it. There never was a Christian who, in his weariest and dreariest hours, could not say, "His grace is sufficient." If G.o.d smiles on him, he can smile under any burden that he may have to carry. He can go up the "hill of difficulty"
singing, and walk confidently into the very land of the shadow of death. For G.o.d"s burdens are easy to bear; because he walks with us, and when the journey is too great, and the burden too heavy, and our hearts begin to fail and faint, he is sure to whisper, "Cast thy burden upon me, and I will sustain thee."
The burdens that are hard to bear are those we lay upon ourselves.
What a burden to themselves, and to every one around them, are the lazy and the unemployed! If it is a man, prayers should be offered up for his family and his dependents,--for who is so morbid and melancholy, so pettish and fretful, so devoured by spleen and ennui, as the man with nothing to do? There is a lion in every way to him. He is out of G.o.d"s order of creation; the busy world has no sympathy with him; society has no use for him; no one is the better for his life, and no one is sorry for his death. He is simply the fungus of living, active, breathing humanity. The lazy lay a burden on their backs which would appall men who have fought winds and waves, and searched the bowels of the earth, and bound to their will the subtle forces of electricity and steam.
The burdens we bind for ourselves we shall have to bear alone. G.o.d is not going to help us, and angels stand afar off; good men and women are not here bound by the injunction, "Bear ye one another"s burdens."
The envious, the proud, the drunkard, the seducer, the complainer, the lazy, etc., must bear their self-inflicted burdens, till they perish with them.
If the kingdom of heaven could be taken by some wonderful _coup d"etat_, many would be first that are now last. But of great deeds little account is to be made. They are indigenous in every condition of society. It is a great life that is never a failure. A great life composed of a mult.i.tude of little burdens, cheerfully borne, and little charges faithfully kept. And this is a kind of Christian warfare, that is specially to be carried on in the sphere of the home.
Many a professor, faithful in all the weightier matters of the law and the sanctuary, and blameless in the eyes of the world, is a rock of offence in his own household. His wife doubts his religion, his children fear him, and his servants call him a hard master. He pays all his t.i.thes of mint, anise, and c.u.mmin to the church and society, but as regards the little burdens of his own household, he is worse than a publican.
Small burdens make up the moral and religious probation of a majority of women, for they have but rare occasion for the exercise of such faith and fort.i.tude as commands the eye of the world. But these burdens, though apparently small and contracted in their sphere, are not only very important in their results, but often singularly irritating. Sickly, fretful children--impertinent, lazy servants--a thoughtless, irregular husband--a hundred other burdens so small she does not like to say how heavy she feels them to be and how sorely they weary her,--these are "her warfare;" and because the Master has laid them upon her, shall she not bear them? The world may call them "little burdens," but there is nothing small in the eyes of Infinity.
In no way can a woman cultivate beauty and strength of character so well as in the patient bearing and carrying of the small burdens that every day await her--the headaches and toothaches--the weariness and weakness incident to her position and condition. For it is the glory of a woman that her weakness or weariness never shrouds a household in gloom, or makes the atmosphere electrical with impatience and irritability. To carry her burden, whatever it may be, cheerfully, is not a little victory, and such daily victories make the last great one easy to be won. It is hard to die before we have learned to live; but death is easy to those who have conquered life. To such the grave is but a laying down of all burdens, a rest from labor and obligation, while yet their works of love and unselfishness do follow them with fruit and blessing.
We must not forget that in our journey through life, there are burdens which we may lawfully make our own. We may help the weak and the struggling on to their feet, when they have fallen in the battle of life. We may comfort those "touched by the finger of G.o.d." We may copy the Good Samaritan, not forgetting the oil and two pence. We may wipe the tears from the eyes of the widow and the fatherless. In bearing such burdens as these, we shall find ourselves in good company; for in the tabernacles of sanctified suffering we may come near to the Divine Burden Bearer; and going on messages of mercy, we may meet angels going the same way.