(842)
DUTY MORE THAN GLORY
The citizen on great occasions knows and obeys the voice of his country as he knows and obeys an individual voice, whether it appeal to a base or ignoble, or to a generous or noble passion. “Sons of France, awake to glory,” told the French youth what was the dominant passion in the bosom of France, and it awoke a corresponding sentiment in his own. Under its spell he marched through Europe and overthrew her kingdoms and empires, and felt in Egypt that forty centuries were looking down on him from the pyramids. But, at last, one June morning in Trafalgar Bay there was another utterance, more quiet in its tone, but speaking also with a personal and individual voice: “England expects every man to do his duty.” At the sight of Nelson’s immortal signal, duty-loving England and glory-loving France met as they have met on many an historic battle-field before and since, and the lover of duty proved the stronger. The England that expected every man to do his duty was as real a being to the humblest sailor in Nelson’s fleet as the mother that bore him.—George Frisbie Hoar.
(843)
Duty Plus a Little More—See [Overplus of Duty].
DUTY, SENSE OF
Calif Omar, with his venerable teacher, Abou-Zeid, walked forth in the darkness of the night, far from his palace gate, where he saw a feeble fire burning. He sought it and found a poor woman trying to bring a caldron to the boiling-point while two wretched children clung to her, piteously moaning. “Peace unto thee, O woman! What dost thou here alone in the night and the cold?” said the calif. “I am trying to make this water boil that my children may drink, who perish of hunger and cold; but for the misery we have to bear, Allah will surely one day ask reckoning of Omar, the calif.” “But,” said the disguised calif, “dost thou think, O woman, that Omar can know of thy wretchedness?” She answered: “Wherefore, then, is Omar, the calif, if he be unaware of the misery of his people and of each one of his subjects?” The calif was silent. “Let us go hence,” he said to Abou-Zeid. He hastened to the storehouses of his kitchen, and drew forth a sack of flour and a jar of sheep’s fat. “O Abou-Zeid, help thou me to charge these on my back,” said the calif. “Not so,” replied the attendant; “suffer that I carry them on my back, O Commander of the Faithful.” Omar said calmly: “Wilt thou also, O Abou-Zeid, bear the weight of my sins on the day of resurrection?” And Abou-Zeid was obliged to lay the jar of fat and the sack of flour on the back of the calif, who hastened to the woman by the fire, and with his own hands did put the flour and the fat into the caldron over the fire, which fire he quickened with his breath, and the smoke whereof filled his beard. When the food was prepared, with his own breath did he cool it that the children might eat. Then he left the sack and the jar and went his way saying: “O Abou-Zeid, the light from the fire that I have beheld to-day has enlightened me also.”—James T. White, “Character Lessons.”
(844)
See [Faithfulness].
Dying Like Ladies—See [Pride].