Unconquering but unconquered still!
And mark again with what ‘manly grace’ and beauty of expression Stevenson turns our thoughts to the ‘Giver of all strength.’
‘Give us grace and strength to bear and to persevere. Offenders, give us the grace to accept and to forgive offenders. Forgetful ourselves, help us to bear cheerfully the forgetfulness of others. Give us courage and gaiety and the quiet mind. Spare us to our friends, soften us to our enemies. Bless us, if it may be, in all our innocent endeavours. If it may not, give us the strength to encounter that which is to come, that we be brave in peril, constant in tribulation, temperate in wrath, and in all changes of fortune, and down to the gates of death, loyal and loving one to another.’
If there is a more helpful bedside author than Stevenson, I should much like to make his acquaintance. To few is it given to speak ‘the word that cheers’ with such a fine combination of tenderness and courage.
‘It is a commonplace,’ he says, ‘that we cannot answer for ourselves before we have been tried. But it is not so common a reflection, and surely more consoling, that we usually find ourselves a great deal braver and better than we thought. I believe this is every one’s experience; but an apprehension that they may belie themselves in the future prevents mankind from trumpeting this cheerful sentiment abroad. I wish sincerely, for it would have saved me much trouble, there had been some one to put me in a good heart about life when I was younger; to tell me how dangers are most portentous on a distant sight; and how the good in a man’s spirit will not suffer itself to be overlaid, and rarely or never deserts him in the hour of need.’
To the troubled, relaxed mind such words come as a bracing tonic. Too often have we passed sleepless hours for the want of a word in season—something to put a little ‘grit’ into us for the duties of the morrow. Where the average mortal is concerned Stevenson certainly supplies that need. Should he by any chance fail—well, there is an essayist of our own day, waiting to minister to the most exacting needs. I have in mind the many beautiful and tender pages written by one whom we associate with a certain college window. Certainly of him it may be said that he seeks to comfort and console, and to soothe and lull to rest.
X
OLD FRIENDS
Come, and take choice of my library,
And so beguile thy sorrow.
Goldsmith.