w; great events are impending, eloquent men are
rousing and leading; what is there for this silent Virginian? till
suddenly he finds himself the chief commander. Then comes waiting to
which all before was easy; holding away from the stronger enemy, holding
steady under the impatience and the doubts of friends; for one bold
stroke, a year of waiting and watching; till, at last, victory! And not
to Washington victorious at Yorktown do we turn for inspiration so much
as to Washington in the dead of winter at Valley Forge.

There are a great many women whose capacities and desires seem much
beyond their opportunities. This is especially true of our New England,
who stimulates the brains of her children, and consigns many of her
daughters to a secluded life with small scope for action. There are many
women who, being unmarried, or being married and childless, or left by
the flight of the young birds to brood an empty nest, have not the full
natural outlet of a woman's activities and affections, and suffer
consciously or unconsciously from a partial emptiness and idleness of
what is best in them. The burden upon such lives is that of isolation.
Isolation may be in the midst of a crowd as well as in solitude; it is
when the heart is not filled that we are truly alone. And this real
solitude, this isolation of the affections from their proper objects, is
something so bad, so against the law of our nature, that, broadly
speaking, it is a matter not so much for endurance as for speedy getting
rid of. Do you feel yourself alone and empty-hearted? Then you have
necessity indeed for fortitude and brave endurance, but above all and
before all you are to get out of your solitude. You cannot command for
yourself the love you would gladly receive; it is not in our power to do
that; but that noble love which is not asking but giving,--that you can
always have.

Wherever your life touches another life, there you have opportunity. The
finest, the most delicate, the most irresistible force lies in the mutual
touch of human lives. To mix with men and women in the ordinary forms of
social intercourse becomes a sacred function when one carries into it the
true spirit. To give a close, sympathetic attention to every human being
we touch; to try to get some sense of how he feels, what he is, what he
needs; to make in some degree his interest our own,--that disposition and
habit would deliver any one of us from isolation or emptiness.