all things animate and inanimate rush in through open windows. For one
thus sensitively constituted every moment trembles with possibilities;
every hour is big with destiny. The neglected blow cannot afterward be
struck on the cold iron; once the stamp is given to the soft metal it
cannot be effaced. Well did Ruskin say; "Take your vase of Venice
glass out of the furnace and strew chaff over it in its transparent
heat, and recover that to its clearness and rubied glory when the north
wind has blown upon it; but do not think to strew chaff over the child
fresh from God's presence and to bring the heavenly colors back to
him--at least in this world." We are accountable to God for our
influence; this it is "that gives us pause."

Gentle as is the atmosphere about us, it presses with a weight of
fourteen pounds to the square inch. No infant's hand feels its weight;
no leaf of aspen or wing of bird detects this heavy pressure, for the
fluid air presses equally in all directions. Just so gentle, yet
powerful, is the moral atmosphere of a good man as it presses upon and
shapes his kind. He who hath made man in his own image hath endowed
him with this forceful presence. Ten-talent men, eminent in knowledge
and refinement, eminent in art and wealth, do, indeed, illustrate this.
Proof also comes from obscurity, as pearls from homely oyster shells.
Working among the poor of London, an English author searched out the
life-career of an apple woman. Her history makes the story of kings
and queens contemptible. Events had appointed her to poverty, hunger,
cold and two rooms in a tenement. But there were three orphan boys
sleeping in an ash-box whose lot was harder. She dedicated her heart
and life to the little waifs. During two and forty years she mothered
and reared some twenty orphans--gave them home and bed and food; taught
them all she knew; helped some to obtain a scant knowledge of the
trades; helped others off to Canada and America. The author says she