Edith had to bear the brunt of everything. She did not do this in
uncomplaining sweetness, like an angel, but scolded the others soundly
for leaving all to her. They whined back that they "couldn't do
anything, and didn't know how to do anything."

"You know as much as I do," retorted Edith.

And this was true. Had not Edith possessed a practical resolute
nature, that preferred any kind of action to apathetic inaction and
futile grieving, she would have been as helpless as the rest.

Do you say then that it was a mere matter of chance that Edith should
be superior to the others, and that she deserved no credit, and they
no blame? Why should such all-important conditions of character be the
mere result of chance and circumstance? Would not Christian education
and principle have vastly improved the Edith that existed? Would they
not have made the others helpful, self-forgetting, and sympathetic?
Why should the world be full of people so deformed, or morally feeble,
or so ignorant, as to be helpless? Why should the naturally strong
work with only contempt and condemnation for the weak? While many say,
"Stand aside, I am holier than thou," perhaps more say, "Stand aside,
I am wiser--stronger than thou," and the weak are made more hopelessly
discouraged. This helplessness on one hand, and arrogant fault-finding
strength on the other, are not the result of chance, but of an
imperfect education. They come from the neglect and wrong-doing of
those whose province it was to train and educate.

If we find among a family of children reaching maturity one helpless
from deformity, and another from feebleness, and are told that the
parents, by employing surgical skill, might have removed the