All
that they say is perfectly true. The difficulties that debar the first
of these men from undertaking the work to which you are calling him are
both real and formidable; the second man has every moment of his time
fully occupied; the third man, because he is known to be generous, is
badgered to death with collecting-lists from the first thing in the
morning till the last thing at night. We must not judge these men too
harshly. In the uncharitableness of our hearts we imagine that they
have given us excuses which are not reasons. The fact is that they
have done exactly the reverse; they have given us reasons which are not
excuses. We are on safer ground when we recognize frankly that it is
very difficult for many men to devote much time, much energy, and much
money to the kingdom of God. Many men are heavily handicapped.

II

'Isn't that one of the runners just coming in sight now?' a friend
asked, pointing along the road. I fancied that he was right, so we
rose and strolled down to the spot from which the race had started. We
must have been mistaken, for when we emerged from the lane there was no
sign of the competitors, I was not sorry, however, that we had returned
prematurely; for I noticed the handicapper strolling idly about, and
got into conversation with him.

'There seems to me to be very little sense in a race of this kind,' I
suggested to him. 'If those men win who started first, the honour is
very small in view of the start they received; whilst if the man who
started last fails to win, he feels it to be no disgrace, and comforts
himself with the reflection that he was too heavily handicapped. Is
that not so?'

'Oh, no,' replied the handicapper, politely concealing his pity for my
simplicity; 'it works out just the other way. It isn't fair, don't you
see, to keep those chaps that got away first always running in a class
by themselves. It does not call out the best that is in them. But
to-day it does them good to feel that they are being matched against
some of the finest runners in the State, and they will strain every
effort to try to beat the champions. And it does a man like Brown, who
started from scratch, no harm to see those fellows all getting ahead of
him at the start. He knows very well that he can beat any man in the
country on level terms, and in such races he will only put forth just
as much effort as is needed to get ahead of his opponent. But there is
nothing to show t