from it, or at least blunt its sting. The evil is _essentially_
unnecessary, and passes with the attainment of the object for which it
is permitted--namely, the development of pure will in man; the suffering
also is essentially unnecessary, but while the evil lasts, the
suffering, whether consequent or merely concomitant, is absolutely
necessary. Foolish is the man, and there are many such men, who would
rid himself or his fellows of discomfort by setting the world right, by
waging war on the evils around him, while he neglects that integral part
of the world where lies his business, his first business--namely, his
own character and conduct. Were it possible--an absurd supposition--that
the world should thus be righted from the outside, it would yet be
impossible for the man who had contributed to the work, remaining what
he was, ever to enjoy the perfection of the result; himself not in tune
with the organ he had tuned, he must imagine it still a distracted,
jarring instrument. The philanthropist who regards the wrong as in the
race, forgetting that the race is made up of conscious and wrong
individuals, forgets also that wrong is always generated in and done by
an individual; that the wrongness exists in the individual, and by him
is passed over, as tendency, to the race; and that no evil can be cured
in the race, except by its being cured in its individuals: tendency is
not absolute evil; it is there that it may be resisted, not yielded to.
There is no way of making three men right but by making right each one
of the three; but a cure in one man who repents and turns, is a
beginning of the cure of the whole human race.

Even if a man's suffering be a far inheritance, for the curing of which
by faith and obedience this life would not be sufficiently long, faith
and obedience will yet render it endurable to the man, and overflow in
help to his fellow-sufferers. The groaning body, wrapt in the garment of
hope, will, with outstretched neck, look for its redemption, and endure.