Does it pay? Ask that Mother; ask that Son now. “How do you know?” How do you know anything, except as you see, or experience it?
Character reveals itself. It cannot long hide itself. When the check goes to the bank the resources are there. The Bank of God, and of Nature, and of Compensation, and Eternal Justice, cannot fail. Its resources are infinite.
Independent of time, place, or circumstance, I said: Intrinsic, Inalienable.
Take another illustration almost at random. A cultured soul, winning its way alone, and at great disadvantage.
In the middle of the tenth century lived Farabi, or Alfarabi. He did not confine himself to the Koran, but fathomed the most useful and interesting sciences. He visited Sifah Doulet, the Sultan of Syria. The Sultan was surrounded by the learned who were conversing with him on the sciences.
Farabi entered the salon where they were assembled and remained standing till the Emperor desired that he should be seated; at which the philosopher, by a freedom rather astonishing, went and sat on the end of the Sultan’s sofa. The Prince, surprised at his boldness, called one of his officers and commanded him, in a tongue not generally known, to put out the intruder. The philosopher heard him, and replied in the same tongue, “O Signor! he who acts so hastily is subject to repent.” The Prince was no less astonished by his reply than by his manner and assurance.
Wishing to know more of him, he began a conference among his philosophers, in which Farabi disputed with so much eloquence and energy that he reduced all the doctors to silence. Then the Sultan ordered music, and when the musicians entered, Farabi accompanied them upon the lute with so much delicacy as to win the admiration of all present. He then drew out, at the Sultan’s request, a piece of his own composition, and sang it with his own accompaniment, and had the audience first in laughter, and then in tears—and to complete his Magic, changed to another piece and put them all asleep.
The Sultan in vain urged Farabi to remain near his person, and offered him a high position in his household.
Voluminous writings of Farabi are preserved in the library at Leyden.
“A tale of the Arabian Nights,” you may say, and yet it is historic. It reveals the fact that resources, character, and wisdom, in the end triumph and surmount all obstacles. They are intrinsic and permanent values.