This is what we all need, the high vision of the lowly things, the sight of the fact that the least piece of work is an essential part of the service of the whole universe, that a man serves the Divine not by wearing a black coat but by doing, as in God's name, with high motives the least duties that may be his. It is not place nor authority nor wage that makes the work high or low; it is the spirit of the service and the part it plays in the world's great business of perfecting humanity.
Would you ward off old age, cherish vitality and give value to your days, seek the things that are above, the life that serves some worthy end. One is young as long as his heart leaps responsive to a noble call. But he who lives to pleasure, to the satisfaction of self, who has shut his eyes to the high things that call for self-denial, for toil and loss, is dead already.
VIII
Sources of Strength and Inspiration
Strength for the Daily Task The Sense of the Infinite The Great Inspiration
Living heartily is one secret of living happily.
Life is early blighted if it knows no clouds.
You can tell the character of any age by the place it gives to character.
There is little danger in the discontent with conditions that is equalled by discontent with character.
Heart health never comes so long as the hand is kept on the pulse.