nite relation to what he takes in, as it is for the
best strength of a country that its imports and exports should be in
proper balance. Indeed, this law is much more evident in the case of
the individual, if we look only a little below the surface. A man can
no more expect to live without giving out to others than a shoemaker
can expect to earn his bread and butter by making shoes and leaving
them piled in a closet.

To be sure, there are many men who are well and happy, and yet, so far
as appearances go, are living entirely for themselves, with not only no
thought of giving, but a decided unwillingness to give. But their
comfort and health are dependent on temporary conditions, and the
external well-being they have acquired would vanish, if a serious
demand were made upon their characters.

Happy the man or woman who, through illness of body or soul, or through
stress of circumstances, is aroused to appreciate the strengthening
power of useful work, and develops a wholesome sense of the usefulness
and necessity of a rational care of self!

Try to convince a man that it is better on all accounts that he should
keep his hands clean and he might answer, "Yes, I appreciate that; but
I have never thought of my hands, and to keep them clean would make me
conscious of them." Try to convince an unselfishly-selfish or
selfishly-unselfish person that the right care for one's self means
greater usefulness to others, and you will have a most difficult task.
The man with dirty hands is quite right in his answer. To keep his
hands clean would make him more conscious of them, but he does not see
that, after he had acquired the habit of cleanliness, he would only be
conscious of his hands when they were dirty, and that this
consciousness could be at any time relieved by soap and water. The
selfishly-unselfish person is right: it is most pernicious to care for
one's self in a self-centred spirit; and if we cannot get a clear sense
of wholesome care of self, it is better not to care at all.

With a perception of the need for such wholesome care, would come a
growing realization of the morbidness of all self-centred care, and a
clearer, more definite standard of unselfishness. For the self-centred
care takes away life, closes the sympathies, and makes useful service
obnoxious to us; whereas the wholesome care, with useful service as an
end, gives renewed life, an open sympathy, and growing power for
further usefulness.

We do not