ought, and all the
boundless regions of conception as an asylum against the cruelty, the
injustice, and the pain that may be your lot in the world--that which
will make your motives habitually great and honorable, and light up in
an instant a thousand noble disdains at the very thought of meanness and
of fraud?"

The Arabs express this by a parable that incarnates, as is their wont,
the Word in the recital. King Nimrod, say they, one day summoned his
three sons into his presence. He ordered to be set before them three
urns under seal. One of the urns was of gold, another of amber, and the
third of clay. The king bade the eldest of his sons choose among the
urns that which appeared to him to contain the treasure of greatest
price. The eldest chose the vase of gold, on which was written the word
"Empire." He opened it and found it full of blood. The second chose the
amber vase whereon was written the word "Glory." He opened it and found
it contained the ashes of the great men who had made a sensation in the
world. The third son took the only remaining vase, the one of clay; he
found it quite empty, but on the bottom the potter had written the word
"God." "Which of these vases weighs the most?" asked the king of the
courtiers. The men of ambition replied it was the vase of gold; the
poets and conquerors, the amber one; the sages that it was the empty
vase, because a single letter of the name God weighs more than the
entire globe. We are of the opinion of the sages. We believe the
greatest things are great but in the proportion of divinity they
contain.

"Although genius always commands admiration," says Smiles, "character
most secures respect. The former is more the product of brain-power, the
latter of heart-power; and in the long run it is the heart that rules in
life. Men of genius stand to society in the relation of its intellect,
as men of character of its conscience; and while the former are admired,
the latter are followed.

"Commonplace though it may appear, this doing of one's duty embodies the
highest ideal of life and character. There may be nothing heroic about
it; but the common lot of men is not heroic. And though the abiding
sense of duty upholds man in his highest attitudes, it also equally
sustains him in the transaction of the ordinary affairs of every-day
existence. The most influential of all the virtues are those which are
the most in request for daily use. They wear the best and last the
longest.