e
tolerant or charitable or generous or, for that matter, to practice any
of the ordinary virtues. Sound living should spring unbidden from the
very joy of life; it should need no justification and certainly no
urging. But unfortunately, as the world now stands, there are men and
groups of men who do not see the light. There is a wide contagion of
selfishness and short-sightedness among the well-to-do, and a necessary
federation of protection and selfishness among the poor. The practical
needs of life, artificial as they are among the rich, and terribly
insistent as they are among the poor, blind us to larger considerations.

If all matters of welfare, public or private, could be treated
unselfishly, how quickly we should be rid of some of the great evils
that afflict the race. I am inclined to think that much of the goodness
of people does come in that way, unconsciously, naturally, as the light
flows from the sun. Yet I suppose that in our present order, and until,
through the years, the better time arrives, we must very often ask
ourselves and others to be good and to be charitable, just because it is
right, or worse still because it is good policy.

A man grows better, more human, more intelligent, as he practices the
virtues. He is safer, no doubt, and the world is better. It is even true
that, by the constant practice of virtues, he may come finally to
espouse goodness and become thoroughly good. That is the hopeful thing
about it and the reason why we may consistently ask or demand the
routine practice of the virtues. But let us hold up all the time in our
teaching and in our lives the other course, the development of the
inspiration that includes all virtues and that makes all our way easy
and plain in a world where confusion reigns, because men are going at
the problem of right living the wrong way around.

The practice of good living will never be easy in its details, but if it
is sure in its inspiration there will be no question of the final
triumph. We shall have to fight blindly sometimes and with all the
strength and persistence of animals at bay. We shall fail sometimes,
too, and that is not always the worst thing that can happen. It is the
glory of life that we shall slowly triumph over ourselves and the world.
It is the glory of life that out of sore trouble, in the midst of
poverty and human injustice, may rise, spontaneous and serene, the
spirit of self-sacrifice, the unconquerable spirit of service