qualities and
actions involve costs no less than vicious and abnormal. Such is the
law of the world; and it is this law of the costs of worthiness, of
knowledge and nobility, of all memorable being and doing, that I now
desire to set forth. Having obtained the scope and power of the law,
having considered it also as applying to individuals, we may proceed
to exhibit its bearing upon the present struggle of our Republic.

The general statement is this,--that whatever has a worth has also
a cost. "The law of the universe," says a wise thinker, "is, Pay and
take." If you desire silks of the mercer or supplies at the grocery,
you, of course, pay money. Is it a harvest from the field that
you seek? Tillage must be paid. Would you have the river toil in
production of cloths for your raiment? Only pay the due modicum of
knowledge, labor, and skill, and you shall bind its hand to your
water-wheels, and turn all its prone strength into pliant service. Or
perhaps you wish the comforts of a household. By payment of the
due bearing of its burdens, you may hope to obtain it,--surely not
otherwise. Do you ask that this house may be a true home, a treasury
for wealth of the heart, a little heaven? Once more the word
is _pay_,--pay your own heart's unselfish love, pay a generous
trustfulness, a pure sympathy, a tender consideration, and a sweet
firm-heartedness withal. And so, wherever there is a gaining, there
is a warning,--wherever a well-being, a well-doing,--wherever a
preciousness, a price of possession; and he who scants the payment
stints the purchase; and he that will proffer nothing shall profit
nothing; but he that freely and wisely gives shall receive as freely.

But these _desiderata_ which I have named are all prices either of
ordinary use, of comfort, or felicity; and it is generally understood
that happiness is costly: but virtue? Virtue, so far from costing
anything, is often supposed to be itself a price that you pay for
happiness. It is told us that we shall be rewarded for our virtue;
what moralistic commonplace is more common than this? But rewarded
for your virtue you are not to be; you are to pay for it; at least,
payment made, rather than received, is the principal fact. He who
is honest for reward is a knave without reward. He who asks pay for
telling truth has truth only on his tongue and a double lie in his
heart. Do you think that the true artist strives to paint well that he
may get money for his work? Or