Yesterday is dead; to-morrow is unknown. Where we have been, where we will be, we know not. Where we are to-day, we know, and only God in His omniscience knows the final answer as to our future estate.
He will take us and hold us and place us in His keeping and according to His purpose, even though we do not or cannot follow or believe any one of the little man-formed creeds, isms or cults as the measure and rule for our beliefs.
Those stars testify to the certainty of God, and I believe in Him.
51.
Success and Envy.
When a man by his brains, or by a fortunate combination of circumstances, rises to a position of prominence, he becomes a target for the envious and a pattern for the imitator. Emulation and envy are ever alert in trying to steal the fruits of the leader or the doer of things.
The man who makes a name gets both reward and punishment. The reward is his satisfaction in being a producer, a help to the world, and the glory that comes from widespread recognition and publicity of his accomplishment. The punishment is the slurs, the enmity, the envy and the detraction, to say nothing of the downright lies which are told about him.
When a man writes a great book, builds a great machine, discovers a great truth or invents a useful article, he becomes a target for the envious many.
If he does a mediocre thing, he is unnoticed; if his work is a masterpiece, jealousy wags its tongue and untruth uses its sting.