CLOSED GATES


If any of you boys and girls, while riding through a great city on an
express train, ever chance to put your head out of the car-window and
look forward along the tracks, you will see several blocks ahead of the
train people in carriages, on foot, and in street-cars crossing the
railway-tracks in great numbers, and it seems as if the train would have
to stop, or else it would run over somebody. But the train never
slackens speed. The engineer keeps on blowing the whistle, and the train
thunders along at the usual rate.

Then you will notice when you get near those crossings that all the
gates are down and the railway-tracks are perfectly clear.

That is the way with many of the difficulties we face in life. We set
out to do the thing our conscience tells us to do, and it seems as if
the road were full of obstructions. But you just go straight ahead,
determined to do your duty, and lo, the hindrances disappear. When an
earnest man goes right ahead, the crowd usually opens up to let him
through.

As you get older and face the world you will find it looks like a great,
fierce giant. But really its fierce look is caused by a false-face that
it wears to frighten faint-hearted people. You go boldly up and take
hold of his beard, as David faced the giant, and you will be surprised