It is related that Dwight L. Moody once offered to his Northfield pupils
a prize of five hundred dollars for the best thought. This took the
prize: "Men grumble because God put thorns with roses; wouldn't it be
better to thank God that he put roses with thorns?"
We win half the battle when we make up our minds to take the world as we
find it, including the thorns. "It is," says Fontenelle, "a great
obstacle to happiness to expect too much." This is what happens in real
life. Watch Edison. He makes the most expensive experiments throughout a
long period of time, and he expects to make them, and he never worries
because he does not succeed the first time.
"I cannot but think," says Sir John Lubbock, "that the world would be
better and brighter if our teachers would dwell on the duty of happiness
as well as on the happiness of duty."
Oliver Wendell Holmes, in advanced years, acknowledged his debt of
gratitude to the nurse of his childhood, who studiously taught him to
ignore unpleasant incidents. If he stubbed his toe, or skinned his knee,
or bumped his nose, his nurse would never permit his mind to dwell upon
the temporary pain, but claimed his attention for some pretty object, or
charming story, or happy reminiscence. To her, he said, he was largely
indebted for the sunshine of a long life. It is a lesson which is easily
mastered in childhood, but seldom to be learned in middle life, and
never in old age.
"When I was a boy," says another author, "I was consoled for cutting my
finger by having my attention called to the fact that I had not broken
my arm; and when I got a cinder in my eye, I was expected to feel more
comfortable because my cousin had lost his eye by an accident."
"We should brave trouble," says Beecher, "as the New England boy braves
winter. The school is a mile away over the hill, yet he lingers not by
the fire; but, with his books slung over his shoulder, he sets out to
face the storm. When he reaches the topmost ridge, where the snow lies
in drifts, and the north wind comes keen and biting, does he shrink and
cower down by the fences, or run into the nearest house to warm himself?
No; he buttons up his coat, and rejoices to defy the blast, and tosses
the snow-wreaths with his foot; and so, erect and fearless, with strong
heart and ruddy cheek, he goes on to his place at school."
Children should be taught the habit of finding pleasure everywhere; and
to see the bright side of everything. "Serenity of mind comes easy to
some, and hard to others. It can be taught and learned. We ought to have
teachers who are able to educate us in this department of our natures
quite as much as in music or art. Think of a school or classes for
training men and women to carry themselves serenely amid all the trials
that beset them!"
"Joy is the mainspring in the whole
Of endless Nature's calm rotation.
Joy moves the dazzling wheels that roll
In the great timepiece of Creation."
SCHILLER.