now you have something to do worth doing, you are conscious of
the Divine Benediction, and who can worry when the smile of God rests
upon him? This is a truism almost to triteness, and yet how few fully
realize it. It is the unworthy potterers with life, the dabblers in
life-stuff, those who blind themselves to their high estate, those who
are unsure of their footing who worry. The true aristocrat is never
worried about his position; the orator convinced of the truth of his
message worries not as to how it will be received; the machinist sure
of his plans hesitates not in the construction of his machinery;
the architect assured of his accuracy pushes on his builders without
hesitancy or question, fear, or alarm; the engineer knowing his engine
and his destination has no heart quiver as he handles the lever. It is
the doubter, the unsure, the aimless, the dabbler, the frivolous,
the dilettante, the uncertain that worry. How nobly Browning set this
forth in his Epilogue:

What had I on earth to do
With the slothful, with the mawkish, the unmanly?
Like the aimless, helpless, hopeless, did I drivel
--Being--Who?
One who never turned his back but marched breast forward,
Never doubted clouds would break,
Never dreamed, though right were worsted, wrong would triumph,
Held we fall to rise, are baffled to fight better,
Sleep to wake.
No, at noonday in the bustle of man's worktime
Greet the unseen with a cheer!
Bid him forward, breast and back as either should be,
'Strive and thrive!' cry 'Speed,--fight on, fare ever
There as here!'

And this is not "mere poetry." Or rather it is because it is "mere
poetry" that it is _real life_. Browning had nearly seventy years of
it. He knew. Where there are those to whom "God has whispered in the
ear," there is no uncertainty, no worry. The musician who knows his
instrument, knows his music, knows his key, and knows his time to play
never hesitates, never falters, never worries. With tone clear, pure,
strong, and certain, he sends forth his melodies or harmonies into
the air. Cannot you, in your daily life, be a true and sure musician?
Cannot you be _certain_--absolutely, definitely certain--of your right
to play the tune of life in the way you have it marked out before you,
and then go ahead and play! Play, in God's name, as God's and man's
music-maker.

CHAPTER XIII

RELIGIOUS WORRIES AND WORRIERS

Misunderstandings, misconceptio