n soul was
to have a soul not worth saving. If this life is a preparation for
another, as Simeon thought, he was not preparing himself for a world
where we would care to go. The only heaven in which any sane man or
woman, be he saint or sinner, would care to live, would be one whose
inhabitants would be at liberty to obey the Cosmic Urge just as freely
as the Monastic Impulse, and where one would be regarded as holy as the
other. So thought Saint Benedict.

* * * * *

There is a natural law, well recognized and defined by men who think,
called the Law of Diminishing Returns, sometimes referred to as the Law
of Pivotal Points.

A man starts in to take systematic exercise, and he finds that his
strength increases. He takes more exercise and keeps on until he gets
"stale"--that is, he becomes sore and lame. He has passed the Pivotal
Point and is getting a Diminishing Return.

In running a railroad-engine a certain amount of coal is required to
pull a train of given weight a mile, say at the rate of fifty miles an
hour. You double the amount of your coal, and simple folks might say you
double your speed, but railroad men know better. The double amount of
coal will give you only about sixty miles instead of fifty. Increase
your coal and from this on you get a Diminishing Return. If you insist
on eighty miles an hour, you get your speed at a terrific cost and a
terrible risk.

Another case: Your body requires a certain amount of food--the body is
an engine; food is fuel; life is combustion. Better the quality and
quantity of your food, and up to a certain point you increase your
strength. Go on increasing your food and you get death. Loan money at
five per cent and your investment is reasonably secure and safe. Loan
money at ten per cent and you do not double the returns; on the
contrary, you have taken on so much risk. Loan money at twenty per cent
and you will probably lose it; for the man who borrows at twenty per
cent does not intend to pay if he can help it.

The Law of Diminishing Returns was what Oliver Wendell Holmes had in
mind when he said, "Because I like a pinch of salt in my soup is no
reason I wish to be immersed in brine."

Churches, preachers and religious denominations are good things in their
time and place, and up to a certain point. Whether for you the church
has passed the Pivotal Point is for you yourself to decide. But remember
this, because a thing is good up to