endation.

It may not be amiss to look a little at the meaning of the word as a
standard of moral requirement. In general, it implies the doing of all
our work as well as we can. All our work includes, of course, our
business, our trade, our household duties, all our daily task-work, as
well as our praying, our Bible-reading, and our obeying of the moral
law. We must not make the mistake of thinking that there is no
religion in the way we do the common work of our trade or of our
household, or our work on the farm, or in the mill or store. The
faithfulness Christ requires and commends takes in all these things.
Ofttimes, too, it would be easier to be faithful in some great trial,
requiring sublimity of courage, than in the little unpicturesque duties
of an ordinary day. Says Phillips Brooks: "You picture to yourself the
beauty of bravery and steadfastness. You let your imagination wander
in delight over the memory of martyrs who have died for truth. And
then some little, wretched, disagreeable duty comes, which is your
martyrdom, the lamp of your oil; and if you will not do it, how your
oil is spilt! How flat and thin and unilluminated your sentiment about
the martyrs runs out over your self-indulgent life!"

Lovers of the violin are familiar with the name of Stradivarius, the
old violin-maker of Cremona. He has been dead nearly two hundred
years, and his violins now bring fabulous prices. George Eliot, in one
of her poems, puts some noble words into the mouth of the old man.
Speaking of the masters who will play on his violins, he says:--

"While God gives them skill,
I give them instruments to play upon,
God choosing me to help him."

Referring to another violin-maker, his rival, he says:--

"But were his the best,
He could not work for two.
My work is mine,
And, heresy or not, if my hand slacked,
I should rob God--since he is fullest good--
Leaving a blank instead of violins.
I say, not God himself can make man's best
Without best men to help him.
* * * * * *
'Tis God gives skill,
But not without men's hands.
He could not make
Antonio Stradivari's violins
Without Antonio."

At first reading these words may indeed seem heretical and irreverent,
but they are not. It is true, indeed, that even God cannot do our work
without us, without our skill, our faithfulness. If we fail or do our
little duty negligently, there will be a blank or a