The reformers of the world are its men of mighty purpose. They are men
with the courage of individual conviction, men who dare run counter
to the criticism of inferiors, men who voluntarily bear crosses for
what they accept as right, even without the guarantee of a crown. They
are men who gladly go down into the depths of silence, darkness and
oblivion, but only to emerge finally like divers, with pearls in their
hands.
He who labors untiringly toward the attainment of some noble aim, with
eyes fixed on the star of some mighty purpose, as the Magi followed the
star in the East, is a reformer. He who is loyal to the inspiration
of some great religious thought, and with strong hand leads weak
trembling steps of faith into the glory of certainty, is a reformer.
He who follows the thin thread of some revelation of Nature in any
of the sciences, follows it in the spirit of truth through a maze of
doubt, hope, experiment and questioning, till the tiny guiding thread
grows stronger and firmer to his touch, leading him to some wondrous
illumination of Nature's law, is a reformer.
He who goes up alone into the mountains of truth and, glowing with the
radiance of some mighty revelation, returns to force the hurrying world
to listen to his story is a reformer. Whoever seeks to work out for
himself his destiny, the life-work that all his nature tells him should
be his, bravely, calmly and with due consideration of the rights of
others and his duties to them, is a reformer.
These men who renounce the commonplace and conventional for higher
things are reformers because they are striving to bring about new
conditions; they are consecrating their lives to ideals. They are the
brave aggressive vanguard of progress. They are men who can stand a
siege, who can take long forced marches without a murmur, who set their
teeth and bow their heads as they fight their way through the smoke,
who smile at the trials and privations that dare to daunt them. They
care naught for the hardships and perils of the fight, for they are
ever inspired by the flag of triumph that seems already waving on the
citadel of their hopes.
If we are facing some great life ambition let us see if our heroic
plans are good, high, noble and exalted enough for the price we must
pay for their attainment. Let us seriously and honestly look into our
needs, our abilities, our resources, our responsibilities, to assure
ourselves that it is no mere passing whim that is leading us. Let us
hear and consider all counsel, all light that may be thrown on every
side, let us hear it as a judge on the bench listens to the evidence
and then makes his own decision. The choice of a life-work is too
sacred a responsibility to the individual to be lightly decided for him
by others less thoroughly informed than himself. When we have weighed
in the balance the mighty question and have made our decision, let us
act, let us concentrate our lives upon that which we feel is supreme,
and, never forsaking a real duty, never be diverted from the attainment
of the highest things, no matter what honest price we may have to pay
for their realization and conquest.
When Nature decides on any man as a reformer she whispers to him his
great message, she places in his hand the staff of courage, she wraps
around him the robes of patience and self-reliance and starts him on
his way. Then, in order that he may have strength to live through it
all, she mercifully calls him back for a moment and makes him—an
optimist.
The way of the reformer is hard, very hard. The world knows little of
it, for it is rare that the reformer reveals the scars of conflict,
the pangs of hope deferred, the mighty waves of despair that wash
over a great purpose. Sometimes men of sincere aim and unselfish high
ambition, weary and worn with the struggle, have permitted the world
to hear an uncontrolled sob of hopelessness or a word of momentary
bitterness at the seeming emptiness of all effort. But men of great
purpose and noble ideals must know that the path of the reformer is
loneliness. They must live from within rather than in dependence on
sources of help from without. Their mission, their exalted aim, their
supreme object in living, which focuses all their energy, must be their
source of strength and inspiration. The reformer must ever light the
torch of his own inspiration. His own hand must ever guard the sacred
flame as he moves steadily forward on his lonely way.
The reformer in morals, in education, in religion, in sociology, in
invention, in philosophy, in any line of aspiration, is ever a pioneer.
His privilege is to blaze the path for others, to mark at his peril
a road that others may follow in safety. He must not expect that the
way will be graded and asphalted for him. He must realize that he must
face injustice, ingratitude, opposition, misunderstanding, the cruel
criticism of contemporaries and often, hardest of all, the wondering
reproach of those who love him best.
He must not expect the tortoise to sympathize with the flight of the
eagle. A great purpose is ever an isolation. Should a soldier leading
the forlorn hope complain that the army is not abreast of him? The
glorious opportunity before him should so inspire him, so absorb him,
that he will care naught for the army except to know that if he lead
as he should, and do that which the crisis demands, the army _must_
follow.
The reformer must realize without a trace of bitterness that the busy
world cares little for his struggles, it cares only to joy in his final
triumph; it will share his feasts but not his fasts. Christ was alone
in Gethsemane, but—at the sermon in the wilderness, where food was
provided, the attendance was four thousand.
The world is honest enough in its attitude. It takes time for the
world to realize, to accept, and to assimilate a large truth. Since
the dawn of history, the great conservative spirit of every age, that
ballast that keeps the world in poise, makes the slow acceptance of
great truths an essential for its safety. It wisely requires proof,
clear, absolute, undeniable attestation, before it fully accepts.
Sometimes the perfect enlightenment takes years, sometimes generations.
It is but the safeguard of truth. Time is the supreme test, the final
court of appeals that winnows out the chaff of false claims, pretended
revelation, empty boast, and idle dreams. Time is the touchstone that
finally reveals all true gold. The process is slow, necessarily so,
and the fate of the world's geniuses and reformers in the balance of
their contemporary criticism, should have a sweetness of consolation
rather than the bitterness of cynicism. If the greatest leaders of the
world have had to wait for recognition, should we, whose best work may
be but trifling in comparison with theirs, expect instant sympathy,
appreciation, and coöperation, where we are merely growing toward our
own attainment?
The world ever says to its leaders, by its attitude if not in words,
"If you would lead us to higher realms of thought, to purer ideals of
life, and flash before us, like the handwriting on the wall, all the
possible glories of development, _you_ must pay the price for it, not
we." The world has a law as clearly defined as the laws of Kepler:
"Contemporary credit for reform works in any line will be in inverse
proportion to the square root of their importance." Give us a new fad
and we will prostrate ourselves in the dust; give us a new philosophy,
a marvelous revelation, a higher conception of life and morality, and
we may pass you by, but posterity will pay for it. Send your messages
C.O.D. and posterity will settle for them. You ask for bread; posterity
will give you a stone, called a monument.
There is nothing in this to discourage the highest efforts of genius.
Genius is great because it is decades in advance of its generation. To
appreciate genius requires comprehension and the same characteristics.
The public can fully appreciate only what is a few steps in advance;
it must grow to the appreciation of great thought. The genius or the
reformer should accept this as a necessary condition. It is the price
he must pay for being in advance of his generation, just as front seats
in the orchestra cost more than those in the back row of the third
gallery.
The world is impartial in its methods. It says ever, "you may suffer
now, but we will give you later fame." Posthumous fame means that
the individual may shiver with cold, but his grandchildren will get
fur-lined ulsters; the individual plants acorns, his posterity sells
the oaks. Posthumous fame or recognition is a check made out to the
individual, but payable only to his heirs.
There is nothing the world cries out for so constantly as a new idea;
there is nothing the world fears so much. The milestones of progress in
the history of the ages tell the story. Galileo was cast into prison in
his seventieth year and his works were prohibited. He had committed no
crime, but he was in advance of his generation. Harvey's discovery of
the circulation of the blood was not accepted by the universities of
the world till twenty-five years after its publication. Frœbel, the
gentle inspired lover of children, suffered the trials and struggles
of the reformer, and his system of teaching was abolished in Prussia
because it was "calculated to bring up our young people in atheism." So
it was with thousands of others.
The world says with a large airy sweep of the hand, "the opposition to
progress is all in the past, the great reformer or the great genius is
recognized to-day." No, in the past they tried to kill a great truth by
opposition; now we gently seek to smother it by making it a fad.
So it is written in the book of human nature: The saviours of the world
must ever be martyrs. The death of Christ on the cross for the people
he had come to save, typifies the temporary crucifixion of public
opinion that comes to all who bring to the people the message of some
great truth, some clearer revelation of the divine. Truth, right, and
justice must triumph. Let us never close the books of a great work and
say "it has failed."
No matter how slight seem results, how dark the outlook, the glorious
consummation of the past, the revelation of the future, _must_ come.
And Christ lived thirty years and he had twelve disciples, one denied
him, one doubted him, one betrayed him, and the other nine were very
human. And in the supreme crisis of His life "they _all_ forsook him
and fled," but to-day—His followers are millions.
Sweet indeed is human sympathy, the warm hand-clasp of confidence and
love brings a rich inflow of new strength to him who is struggling, and
the knowledge that someone dear to us sees with love and comradeship
our future through our eyes, is a wondrous draught of new life. If we
have this, perhaps the loyalty of two or three, what the world says or
thinks about us should count for little. But if this be denied us,
then must we bravely walk our weary way alone, toward the sunrise that
must come.
The little world around us that does not understand us, does not
appreciate our ambition or sympathize with our efforts, that seem to
it futile, is not intentionally cruel, calloused, bitter, blind, or
heartless. It is merely that busied with its own pursuits, problems and
pleasures, it does not fully realize, does not see as we do.
The world does not see our ideal as we see it, does not feel the glow
of inspiration that makes our blood tingle, our eye brighten, and our
soul seem flooded with a wondrous light. It sees naught but the rough
block of marble before us and the great mass of chips and fragments of
seemingly fruitless effort at our feet, but it does not see the angel
of achievement slowly emerging from its stone prison, from nothingness
into being, under the tireless strokes of our chisel. It hears no
faint rustle of wings that seem already real to us nor the glory of
the music of triumph already ringing in our ears.
There come dark, dreary days in all great work, when effort seems
useless, when hope almost appears a delusion, and confidence the
mirage of folly. Sometimes for days your sails flap idly against the
mast, with not a breath of wind to move you on your way, and with a
paralyzing sense of helplessness you just have to sit and wait and
wait. Sometimes your craft of hope is carried back by a tide that seems
to undo in moments your work of months. But it may not be really so,
you maybe put into a new channel that brings you nearer your haven than
you dared to hope. This is the hour that tests us, that determines
whether we are masters or slaves of conditions. As in battle of
Marengo, it is the fight that is made when all seems lost that really
counts and wrests victory from the hand of seeming defeat.
If you are seeking to accomplish any great serious purpose that your
mind and your heart tell you is right, you must have the spirit of
the reformer. You must have the courage to face trial, sorrow and
disappointment, to meet them squarely and to move forward unscathed and
undaunted. In the sublimity of your perfect faith in the outcome, you
can make them as powerless to harm you, as a dewdrop falling on the
Pyramids.
Truth, with time as its ally, always wins in the end. The knowledge of
the inappreciation, the coldness, and the indifference of the world,
should never make you pessimistic. They should inspire you with that
large, broad optimism that sees that all the opposition of the world
can never keep back the triumph of truth, that your work is so great
that the petty jealousies, misrepresentations, and hardships caused by
those around you, dwindle into nothingness. What cares the messenger
of the king for his trials and sufferings if he knows that he has
delivered his message? Large movements, great plans, always take time
for development. If you want great things, pay the price like a man.
Any one can plant radishes; it takes courage to plant acorns and to
wait for the oaks. Learn to look not merely _at_ the clouds, but
through them to the sun shining behind them. When things look darkest,
grasp your weapon firmer and fight harder. There is always more
progress than you can perceive, and it is really only the outcome of
the battle that counts.
And when it is all over and the victory is yours, and the smoke clears
away and the smell of the powder is dissipated, and you bury the
friendships that died because they could not stand the strain, and you
nurse back the wounded and flint-hearted who loyally stood by you,
even when doubting, then the hard years of fighting will seem but a
dream. You will stand brave, heartened, strengthened by the struggle,
re-created to a new, better and stronger life by a noble battle, nobly
waged, in a noble cause. And the price will then seem to you—nothing.