YOU ARE HEADED TOWARD YOUR IDEAL
Faith and the ideal still remain the most powerful levers of
progress and of happiness. JEAN FINOT.
If we are content to unfold the life within according to the
pattern given us, we shall reach the highest end of which we are
capable.
We tend to grow into the likeness of the things we long for most,
think about most.
The gods we worship write their names on our faces.
EMERSON.
In Hawthorne's story, "The Great Stone Face," we have an impressive
illustration of the power of an ideal. One's memory holds a vivid
picture of its hero, whose mind had dwelt from childhood on the local
tradition that a man-child should be born whose face would resemble that
of the mountain profile above the little hamlet of his nativity; and
that this child would eventually become the leader and savior of the
people. So whole-heartedly did he believe the legend, so earnestly did
he long for its fulfillment, and so constantly did his eyes dwell on
the prophetic profile, that unconsciously his own features changed
until, outwardly as well as inwardly, he completely embodied the ideal
which his mind had absorbed.
On every hand we see illustrations of the transforming power of the
ideal. It is outpictured in the faces we see in the street, in trains
and shops, in theaters and churches, wherever people congregate.
How quickly we can select from a crowd of strangers the successful
business man. His initiative, leadership, executive ability, speak out
of his face and manner. The same is true of men in other vocations,--of
the scholar, the clergyman, the lawyer, the teacher, the doctor, the
farmer, the day laborer. Go into any institution, factory, store, or
other place of business and you can quickly detect the nature of the
ideals outpictured in the faces, in the expression, in the manner of the
people you see there. Visit Sing Sing and you will see the power of the
ideal which has worked like a leaven in its inmates. The criminal
suggestion, the criminal thought, the criminal ideal is reflected in
the faces of those who visualized crime, planned and thought out its
details long before they committed the criminal act.
Whatever we hold in our minds, dwell upon, contemplate, whatever is
dominant in our motives, will stand out in our flesh so that the world
can read it. Many absolutely authentic cases of stigmata are recorded in
the lives of medieval saints, on whose bodies appeared an exact
reproduction of all the wounds of the crucified Christ. Some of these
cases were in convents and monasteries, and were the result of long and
intense concentration of the mind of the subject upon the physical
sufferings of Christ. Frequently the phenomena occurred after the
austerities of Lent, during which the monks and nuns had focused more
intensely and steadily upon the tortures of the Savior's passion and
death.
If the contemplation of those tortures, the constant mental picturing of
the sufferings of the God-man, the soul's great sympathy with its ideal
could change the very tissues of the body, could reproduce on it the
actual physical marks of the cruel spear in the side, of the nails in
the hands and feet and of the thorns in the head, think of the
wonderful possibilities in the reversal of these thoughts and this
picturing. Think of what the contemplation of the wonderful work
accomplished by the Savior on earth, of the constant mental picturing of
His glorious life, of His tenderness, and love for humanity, of His
power and dignity, of His continual outpouring of Himself in service;
think of what the constant holding of such an ideal, such a model, and
the perpetual effort to realize it would do for the race!
We tend to become like what we admire, sympathize with and persistently
hold in mind. The hero of "The Great Stone Face" became the counterpart
of his ideal. The history of Christianity is a continuous record of the
power of the ideal to raise men and women to their highest power. St.
Paul, one of the most conspicuous of these examples, is so possessed, so
enthused by the inspiration of his great model, that he cries, "I live,
not I, but Christ in me."
"The contemplation of perfection is always uplifting." Nothing so
strengthens the mind, enlarges manhood, or womanhood, widens the
thought, as the constant effort to measure up to high ideals. The
struggle to better our best, to make our highest moments permanent, the
continual reaching of the mind to the things above and beyond, the
steady pursuit of the ideal, which constantly advances as we pursue, is
what has led the race up from savagery to twentieth century
civilization.
A great artist was one day found by a friend in tears in his studio.
When asked the cause of his distress, he replied, "I have produced a
work with which I am satisfied, and I shall never produce another." It
is said he never did. The inspiration that had urged him on was his
ideal. That kept him always striving to improve on what he had
previously done. Without it there was nothing to strive for.
Without an ideal there is no growth; and where there is no growth there
is retrogression. Without a vision the people perish. Nothing in the
universe is static. None of us stands still. We are all traveling in
some direction, either forward or backward. Everything depends on the
ideal.
What we admire and aspire to enters into the very texture of our being,
becomes a part of us. If we had the power to analyze any individual, we
could tell what books he had read, could detect the type of his friends
and associates, and could name his heroes; that is, we could tell what
ideals had actuated him.
Parents and teachers should urge upon the young the importance of hero
worship, of choosing the highest human ideals. Our lives are molded
chiefly after the pattern of the ideals of our youth, and there is no
danger of too much hero worship, if only the heroes are worthy.
History is full of examples of the powerful influence of ideals upon our
great men. It is said that Alexander the Great always carried a copy of
Homer's "Iliad" in his pocket, and that he never tired of reading about
Achilles, the great hero, whom he was ambitious to resemble. Many a
young man in this country who has been inspired, encouraged and
stimulated by Lincoln's career, has not only lived a grander life and
made a truer success because he modeled his life after that of his hero,
but he has developed many qualities in common with Lincoln which
otherwise might have lain forever dormant. Many a young officer in our
army is more efficient because of his imitation of Grant and Lee, the
ideals which haunted his dreams and which have ever urged him up and on.
It is of the utmost importance to choose our ideal early in life, a high
and beautiful ideal, that shall be our pole star, the highest, brightest
light we know. A recent writer says: "My advice to all those just
starting to travel life's turnpike is:
"'Don't start until you have your ideal.
Then don't stop until you get it.'"
Of course we all have ideals of some kind when we are young; but how
many of us keep them even till middle age? What young man has entered
into active life without an ideal before him of what he is going to do,
and how the world is going to be bettered by him? What young girl but
who, leaving school, life smiling before her, dreams of the ideal love
she will find, the ideal happy home she will make, and the beautiful
work she will do in life with the ideal man of her girlish dreams by her
side? But do the youth and the maiden hold these ideals throughout the
years, with the strength of conviction that overcomes all difficulties,
or do they abandon them with the first discouragement and settle down
into a commonplace existence with interest in nothing above the
material?
To youth, naturally, come glorious ideals, not only of what one's own
life is to be, but of what life in general should be,--the ideal man,
the ideal woman, the ideal social system,--and with all these is a vague
desire or intention to help toward their fulfillment. But too often the
result of disappointment in the effort to better conditions is, first,
to give up the hope of realizing the ideal, and then to abandon the
ideal itself. Here is where the great danger of retrogression comes in.
Unless the ideal be held with a tenacity that no failure or
disappointment can relax, it is apt to fade away after the first ardor
of youth is past.
One of the greatest aids to the preservation of the youthful ideal in
all its freshness and beauty is to recall frequently, daily, the moral
heroes who first gave one a glimpse of one's possibilities and aroused
one's ambition. Read the special books, or particular chapters which
fired you to emulate some noble character. Renew yourself mentally by
visualizing the life and work of men and women who have wrought nobly
for humanity. Think of the Washingtons, the Franklins, the Lincolns, the
Emersons, the Ruskins, the Florence Nightingales, the Jane Addams, the
Susan B. Anthonys, the Frances Willards, and you will be strengthened to
resist the debasing influence of the fierce competition for wealth and
preferment, even for mere subsistence, which in so many instances pushes
out of sight the aspirations and ideals of youth. Keep constantly in
mind the grand characters whose achievements aroused you to noble
thoughts and endeavor in the springtime of life and your standards will
never drop. Character always develops according to the pattern within
us. No artist could paint the face of Christ with the model of Judas
before his mental vision. No great character can ever be built with low,
groveling ideals in the mind.
The constant struggle to measure up to a high ideal is the only force in
heaven or on earth that can make a life great, beautiful and fruitful.
If we would ever accomplish anything of worth, if we would ever
establish our oneness with the Creator, and accomplish the work He sent
us here to do, we must live up to our ideal.
With eyes fixed on this ideal, we must work with heart and hand and
brain; with a faith that never grows dim, with a resolution that never
wavers, with a patience that is akin to genius, we must persevere unto
the end; for, as we advance, our ideal as steadily moves upward.
"The situation that has not its duty, its ideal," says Carlyle, "was
never yet occupied by man. Yes, here, in this poor, miserable, hampered,
despicable Actual, wherein thou even now standest, here or nowhere is
thy ideal; work it out therefrom, and, working, believe, live, be free.
Fool! the ideal is in thyself."
Never were truer words spoken. Wrapped up in every human being there are
divine energies which, if given proper direction, will develop the ideal
from stage to stage. Who sees a sculptor at work upon a block of marble
sees what appears to be only a mechanical performance. But, out of sight
in the sculptor's brain, there is a quiet presence we do not perceive;
and every movement of the hand is impelled by that shining thought
within the brain. That presence is the ideal. Without it he would be a
mason; through it he becomes an artist.
"The ideal is the real." By it we shape our lives as the sculptor shapes
the image from the rough marble. External means alone will not
accomplish this. You must lay hold of eternal principles, of the
everlasting verities, or you never can approach your ideal. Your first
advance toward it lies in what you are doing now, in what you are
thinking. Not on some far-off height, in some distant scene, or fabled
land, where longing without endeavor is magically satisfied, will we
carve out the ideal that haunts our souls, but "here and now in this
poor, mean Actual, here or nowhere is our ideal!"
In the humble valley, on the boundless prairie, on the farm, on sea or
on land, in workshop, store, or office, wherever there is honest work
for the hand and brain of man to do,--within the circumscribed limits of
our daily duties, is the field wherein the outworking of our ideal must
be wrought.
"Your circumstances may be uncongenial," says James Allen, "but they
shall not long remain so if you but perceive an Ideal and strive to
reach it. You cannot travel _within_ and stand still _without_. Here is
a youth hard pressed by poverty and labor; confined long hours in an
unhealthy workshop; unschooled, and lacking all the arts of refinement.
But he dreams of better things; he thinks of intelligence, of
refinement, of grace and beauty. He conceives of, mentally builds up, an
ideal condition of life; the vision of a wider liberty and a larger
scope takes possession of him; unrest urges him to action, and he
utilizes all his spare time and means, small though they are, to the
development of his latent powers and resources. Very soon so altered has
his mind become that the workshop can no longer hold him. It has become
so out of harmony with his mentality that it falls out of his life as a
garment is cast aside, and, with the growth of opportunities which fit
the scope of his expanding powers, he passes out of it forever. Years
later we see this youth as a full-grown man. We find him a master of
certain forces of the mind which he wields with world-wide influence
and almost unequaled power. In his hands he holds the cords of gigantic
responsibilities; he speaks, and lo! lives are changed; men and women
hang upon his words and remold their characters, and, sun-like, he
becomes the fixed and luminous center round which innumerable destinies
revolve. He has realized the Vision of his youth. He has become one with
his Ideal."
The great curse of the average person is commonness,--the lack of
aspiring ideals. There are thousands of farmers who never get above
cattle and wheat, of doctors who never become superior to prescriptions
and diseases, of lawyers who never wholly subordinate their briefs. The
ideals of the masses rarely rise out of mediocrity. Most of us live in
the basement of our lives, while the upper stories are all unused.
Millions of human beings never get out of the kitchen of their
existence. We need aspiration and great thought-models to lift us.
God has whispered into the ear of all existence, "Look up." There is
potential celestial gravitation in every mortal. There is a spiritual
hunger in humanity which, if fed and nourished, will lead to the
upbuilding and developing of great souls. There is a latent divinity in
every son of Adam, which must be aroused before there can be any great
progress in individual uplift.
In a factory where mariners' compasses are made before the needles are
magnetized, they will lie in any position, but when once touched by the
mighty magnet, once electrified by that mysterious power, they ever
afterwards point only in one direction. Many a young life lies listless,
purposeless, until touched by the Divine magnet, after which, if it
nourishes its aspirations, it always points to the north star of its
hope and its ideal.
Every faintest aspiration that springs up in our heart is a heavenly
seed within us which will grow and develop into rich beauty if only it
be fed, encouraged. The better things do not grow either in material or
mental soil without care and nourishment. Only weeds, briers, and
noxious plants thrive easily.
The aspiration that is not translated into active effort will die, just
as any power or function that is not used will atrophy or disappear. The
ostrich, naturalists say, once had wonderful wings, but not caring to
use them, preferring to walk on the earth rather than mount in the air,
it practically lost its wings, their strength passing into its legs. The
giraffe probably once had only an ordinary neck, like other animals, but
being long used to reach up to gather its food from the branches of
trees, it lifted its body in the upward direction until it is now the
tallest of all animals, its elongated neck enabling it to gather the
leaves from lofty trees.
Something like this takes place continually in human lives. We rise or
fall by our ideals, by our pursuit or our disregard of them. The
majority of us make bungling work of our living. We spend much precious
time and effort catering to the desires of our animal natures and live
chiefly along the lines of life's lower aims and opportunities when we
might be soaring.
Everywhere we see men making a splendid _living_, but a very poor
_life_; succeeding in their vocations but failing as men, swerving from
their own highest ideals for the sake of making a little more money. On
every hand we see people sacrificing the higher to the lower, dwarfing
the best thing in them for a superficial material advantage, selling the
birthright of the soul's ideal for a mess of pottage.
Is there any reason or intelligence in a man's continuing to turn his
ability, his energies, all there is in him, into dollars after he has
many times more of these than he can ever use for living and betterment?
Is the gift of life so cheap, so meaningless, of so little importance,
that we can afford to spend time on things that do not endure,--upon
unnecessary material things which so soon pass away,--to the neglect of
those that endure? We know that life is our great opportunity to acquit
ourselves like men. Yet it is too often into these transient things that
we pour the full force of our energies, while we only sigh and "wish"
that we could achieve our ideals. We sacrifice much to gain wealth, but
practically nothing to realize the outreach of our souls.
Yet the ideal is indeed the "pearl of great price," in the balance with
which "all that a man hath" besides is as nothing. The red letter men of
the world have always been men of high ideals, to which they were ever
loyal: men who have said "this one thing I do," and have put the whole
strength of their lives into their effort to realize their ideal.
If from the start you listen to and obey that something within which
urges you to find the road that leads up higher; if you listen to and
obey the voice which bids you look up and not down, which ever calls you
on and up, no matter what its outward seeming, your life can not be a
failure. The really successful men and women are those who by the
nobility of their example contribute to the uplift, the happiness, the
enlargement of life, to the wisdom of the world,--not those who have
merely piled up selfish dollars. A rich personality enriches everybody
who comes in contact with it. Everybody who touches a noble life feels
ennobled thereby.
There is machinery so delicate that it can measure the least expenditure
of physical force. If similar machinery could be devised for measuring
character many a millionaire would be chagrined at the record of his own
just measurement, while many an humble worker would be amazed at the
high mark his earnest unceasing efforts to reach his ideal had
achieved.
I believe the time will come when not money, but growth, not lands and
houses, but mental and moral expansion in larger and nobler living, will
be even the popular measure of true riches, real success. The measure of
a successful man will be that of his soul; he will be rated in a new
sort of Bradstreet, a spiritual Bradstreet, as a large heart, a
magnanimous mind, a cultured intellect, instead of as a great check
book.
Phillips Brooks said: "The ideal life of full completion haunts us all.
We feel the thing we ought to be beating beneath the thing we are. God
hides some ideal in every human soul. At some time in his life, each
feels a trembling, fearful longing to do some great good thing. Life
finds its noblest spring of excellence in its hidden impulse to do one's
best."
Every one who substitutes the finer for the cheaper goal, each one who
to-day and every day holds to his high ideal despite the stress and
turmoil of modern daily living, in such measure hastens the day when
such an ideal will be the inspiration of the masses and the power that
moves the world.