| The Building of Character |
Chapter 13 |
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Thus the words which describe wrong-doing all suggest marring, spoiling, the failure to fulfil the perfect design. It is as if an architect were to make a plan for a perfect building, and the builder, through ignorance of carelessness, should spoil the house, not making it like the plan. The building is not beautiful when finished, because it is not what the architect intended it to be. A life which fulfils the divine Architect’s purpose, whether it be great and conspicuous, or lowly and obscure, is beautiful. We need not seek to do large things; the greatest thing for ny human life in this world is God’s will for that life. That is the only true beauty.
There are some special words which may be said to hold the secret of beauty in a life. One is “victoriousness.” Many people let themselves be defeated almost habitually. It begins in childhood. The lessons are hard, and the child does not master them. It costs exertion to succeed in the games, and the boy indolently concludes that he cannot win, and does not do his best. The girl finds that she cannot play her exercises on the piano without a great deal of tiresome practice, and lets herself be defeated. It is hard to restrain temper and appetite in youth, and the young man gives up the struggle, and yields to the indulgence. Thus at the very beginning the battle is lost, and ofttimes all life afterward carries the debilitating effect. Always duty is to large, and lessons are too hard, and discipline is too severe, and passion is too strong. To its close the life is weak, never victorious, unable to cope with its environment. It is a fatal thing to form in youth the habit of permitting one’s self to be defeated. Life then never can be what it might have become.
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