“To strive always to do unto others as we would have them do unto us.
“In brief—to be honest, to be fearless, to be just, to be kind. This will make our part in life’s great and as yet not fully understood play truly glorious, and we need then stand in fear of nothing—life nor death; for death is life.
“Or, rather, it is the quick transition to life in another form; the putting off of the old coat and the putting on of a new; a passing not from light to darkness, but from light to light, according as we have lived here; a taking up of life in another form just where we leave it off here; a part in life not to be shunned or dreaded or feared, but to be welcomed with a glad and ready smile when it comes in its own good way and time.”
IV
ON FRIENDS
Who shall estimate the value of a cheery, breezy, hopeful friend? Nobody can get along without her. She keeps us in good humor, she switches off the bores, she lights us up and keeps things in motion; in her company our spirits rise, our wits grow bright and our tongues loosen, so that we really believe after half an hour’s contact with her that we are in ourselves as brilliant and as happy as she makes us. A friend that can raise everybody around her from a state of practical imbecility to that of a brilliant and beautiful song bird is a being we may all envy. If we would be such a friend ourselves, there is but one way: we must be agreeable at all times, kindly serviceable to every outward call, never see a slight or notice a snub, and never allow ourselves to get into the dumps. “To be warped unconsciously under the magnetic influence of all around is the destiny to a certain extent of even the greatest souls.” We cannot be too careful of our friendships, nor value too highly the love of the good women whom we meet in life.
The late “Jennie June,” Mrs. Croly, said at one of the celebrations in honor of her seventieth birthday: “I am glad to have lived so many years because I have come to know that most beautiful thing on earth, the love of one woman for another—the love of good women for one another.” And truly, if any woman on earth has reason to know it, this “mother of clubs,” who did more than any other one woman to introduce women to one another, ought to from long and intimate experience. Through her pen, that of the first regular, trained woman-journalist in the world, and through her long, active experience as president of the foremost woman’s club in the country, Mrs. Croly did more, perhaps, for the emancipation of women in a social way than almost any other woman of her age, and we may well pause to consider her words for a moment.
It has long been the custom, even among women, to sneer at the love of woman for woman; to say that women cannot be true, cannot overlook peculiarities in other women, have not charity for one another’s shortcomings. But the women who say this to-day are not trained thinkers and observers. The more we associate with other women along any definite line, the broader grows the individual outlook, the more charitable the mental attitude. It is the beginner who believes women are not true to each other, mainly because she hasn’t it in her own heart to be true to others. It is a case where the verdict of the immortal bard is illustrated:
“To thine own self be true;
And it must follow, as the night the day,