The Greatest Thing In the World | Page 4

energy of life."
"For life, with all it yields of joy or woe And hope and fear, Is just our
chance o' the prize of learning love,-- How love might be, hath been
indeed, and is."
Where Love is, God is. He that dwelleth in Love dwelleth in God. God
is Love. Therefore love. Without distinction, without calculation,
without procrastination, love. Lavish it upon the poor, where it is very
easy; especially upon the rich, who often need it most; most of all upon
our equals, where it is very difficult, and for whom perhaps we each do
least of all. There is a difference between trying to please and giving
pleasure. Give pleasure. Lose no chance of giving pleasure; for that is
the ceaseless and anonymous triumph of a truly loving spirit. "I shall
pass through this world but once. Any good thing, therefore, that I can
do, or any kindness that I can show to any human being, let me do it
now. Let me not defer it or neglect it, for I shall not pass this way
again."
Generosity. "Love envieth not." This is love in competition with others.
Whenever you attempt a good work you will find other men doing the
same kind of work, and probably doing it better. Envy them not. Envy
is a feeling of ill-will to those who are in the same line as ourselves, a
spirit of covetousness and detraction. How little Christian work even is
a protection against un-Christian feeling! That most despicable of all
the unworthy moods which cloud a Christian's soul assuredly waits for
us on the threshold of every work, unless we are fortified with this
grace of magnanimity. Only one thing truly need the Christian
envy--the large, rich, generous soul which "envieth not."
And then, after having learned all that, you have to learn this further
thing, _Humility_--to put a seal upon your lips and forget what you
have done. After you have been kind, after Love has stolen forth into
the world and done its beautiful work, go back into the shade again and
say nothing about it. Love hides even from itself. Love waives even
self-satisfaction. "Love vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up."
Humility--love hiding.

The fifth ingredient is a somewhat strange one to find in this _summum
bonum_: Courtesy. This is Love in society, Love in relation to etiquette.
"Love does not behave itself unseemly."
Politeness has been defined as love in trifles. Courtesy is said to be love
in little things. And the one secret of politeness is to love.
Love cannot behave itself unseemly. You can put the most untutored
persons into the highest society, and if they have a reservoir of Love in
their heart they will not behave themselves unseemly. They simply
cannot do it. Carlisle said of Robert Burns that there was no truer
gentleman in Europe than the ploughman-poet. It was because he loved
everything--the mouse, and the daisy, and all the things, great and small,
that God had made. So with this simple passport he could mingle with
any society, and enter courts and palaces from his little cottage on the
banks of the Ayr.
You know the meaning of the word "gentleman." It means a gentle
man--a man who does things gently, with love. That is the whole art
and mystery of it. The gentle man cannot in the nature of things do an
ungentle, an ungentlemanly thing. The ungentle soul, the inconsiderate,
unsympathetic nature, cannot do anything else. "Love doth not behave
itself unseemly."
_Unselfishness._ "Love seeketh not her own." Observe: Seeketh not
even that which is her own. In Britain the Englishman is devoted, and
rightly, to his rights. But there come times when a man may exercise
even
THE HIGHER RIGHT
of giving up his rights.
Yet Paul does not summon us to give up our rights. Love strikes much
deeper. It would have us not seek them at all, ignore them, eliminate
the personal element altogether from our calculations.
It is not hard to give up our rights. They are often eternal. The difficult

thing is to give up ourselves. The more difficult thing still is not to seek
things for ourselves at all. After we have sought them, bought them,
won them, deserved them, we have taken the cream off them for
ourselves already. Little cross then to give them up. But not to seek
them, to look every man not on his own things, but on the things of
others--that is the difficulty. "Seekest thou great things for thyself?"
said the prophet; "seek them not." Why? Because there is no greatness
in things. Things cannot be great. The only greatness is unselfish love.
Even self-denial in itself is nothing, is almost a mistake. Only a great
purpose or a mightier