GENUINENESS Running through the warp and woof of every true and lovable character are two principal threads, one of silk, and the other of gold. The golden thread is genuineness, and the silken is tenderness or affection. When these are strong and well-woven, we have useful and influential people. As a rule, these two threads go together, and should do so. Tenderness and genuineness make the perfect lady. Show me the woman whose individuality is her own prompter, whose mission is to fulfill her own manifest calling as wife, mother, home-keeper, or social worker, firm in her convictions, tender in her requirements, and I will show you a woman whose society is coveted, whose friendship is prized, and whose life is a marked example of beauty and strength. Nothing is so strong as gentleness, and nothing so gentle as real strength. Gentleness and strength make the gentleman. Genuineness is manhood or womanhood, and affection is life. In these we have our being, and from them come whatever is lovely, noble, sweet, powerful, and swaying in what we say and do. Of all earthly music, that which is heard the farthest and sounds the sweetest is the beating of a sound, true, and loving heart. Search out the great and mighty from the records of fame, and find how every one of them had in himself the ring of soundness, the tone of genuineness, the stamp of being himself and not another, the real, original metal, and not a sham or counterfeit. Moreover, these brave and independent leaders were, as a rule, tender of heart, considerate in spirit, faithful in friendship, and both loved and loving in the domestic relations. Men want other men to be themselves; that is, to be as God made them, not pretenders, or apes, or copyists, assuming airs of importance and living in coldness, hardness, deceit, meanness, and consequent impotency. As Cicero said: "True glory strikes root, and even extends itself; all false pretensions fail as do flowers, nor can any feigned thing be lasting." CONTENTMENT Man's duty is to make himself useful, and thus life becomes interesting, while being comparatively free from anxiety. No man can fill his life with everything sweet, valuable, energetic, and interesting and yet keep care outside. "Mark Antony sought for perfect happiness in love, Brutus in glory, Cæsar in dominion: the first found disgrace, the second disgust, the last ingratitude, and each destruction." Wealth is good, but it rarely comes without trouble, temptation, and danger, making life unhappier than it was before. Sometimes people dream that entire happiness would be found in freedom; but this is only a dream. As Ruskin observed, "A fish is freer than a man, and a fly is the incarnation of freedom, but neither rises to a life of much interest, and both are in danger of quick death." Persons who give way to the craving for freedom usually fall under a most terrible tyranny, being slaves to temptation, and often the victims of appetite and lust. True self-control has more happiness in it in one minute than self-indulgence has in a whole lifetime. Man can not use much of the earth upon which he has his home, and the more he craves the less contented he will be. It is told that Cineas the philosopher once asked Pyrrhus what he would do when he had conquered Italy. "I will conquer Sicily." "And after Sicily?" "Then Africa." "And after you have conquered the world?" "I will take my ease and be merry." "Then," asked Cineas, "why can you not take your ease and be merry now?" A man is his own best world. Let him conquer that and he has conquered all. He that conquers can rest. Complacency follows struggle. The ruler of his own spirit is a prince enjoying peace. His heart has room for every delight, and it is there that sweet Content is most likely to find her mild abode. |