Classic literature charmed our childhood with the story of an Arabian
sheik. He dwelt in an oasis near the edge of the desert. Wealth was
his, with flocks and herds and wedges of gold. One night sleep forsook
his couch. Yet the gurgle of falling water was in his ear. The odors
of the vineyard were in his nostril; and to-morrow his servants would
begin to gather the abundant harvest. Ten miles away ran the track of
the caravan where his herdsmen had found a traveler dead from the
fierce heat of the desert. Yonder the desert and a dying traveler;
here an oasis with living water. Then the sheik arose; he bade his
servants fill two leathern water-bottles and bring a basket full of
figs and grapes. The next day a caravan came to a booth protecting two
water-bottles sunk in the sand. Beside them were bunches of fruit. On
a roll were these words: "While God gives me life each day shall a man
be--as springs of water in a desert place." This beautiful story
interprets for us the ministry of the higher manhood, as the great
heart becomes the shadow of a great rock in a weary land.

This law of human helpfulness asks each man to carry himself so as to
bless and not blight men, to make and not mar them. Besides the great
ends of attaining character here and immortality hereafter, we are
bound to so administer our talents as to make right living easy and
smooth for others. Happy is he whose soul automatically oils all the
machinery of the home, the market and the street. And this ambition to
be universally helpful must not be a transient and occasional one--here
and there an hour's friendship, a passing hint of sympathy, a transient
gleam of kindness. Heart helpfulness is to enter into the fundamental
conceptions of our living. With vigilant care man is to expel every
element that vexes or irritates or chafes just as the husbandman expels
nettles and poison ivy from fruitful gardens.