I have learned to
feel by contrast the beauty of truth and love and goodness.

It is a mistake always to contemplate the good and ignore the evil,
because by making people neglectful it lets in disaster. There is a
dangerous optimism of ignorance and indifference. It is not enough to
say that the twentieth century is the best age in the history of
mankind, and to take refuge from the evils of the world in skyey
dreams of good. How many good men, prosperous and contented, looked
around and saw naught but good, while millions of their fellowmen were
bartered and sold like cattle! No doubt, there were comfortable
optimists who thought Wilberforce a meddlesome fanatic when he was
working with might and main to free the slaves. I distrust the rash
optimism in this country that cries, "Hurrah, we're all right! This is
the greatest nation on earth," when there are grievances that call
loudly for redress. That is false optimism. Optimism that does not
count the cost is like a house builded on sand. A man must understand
evil and be acquainted with sorrow before he can write himself an
optimist and expect others to believe that he has reason for the faith
that is in him.

I know what evil is. Once or twice I have wrestled with it, and for a
time felt its chilling touch on my life; so I speak with knowledge
when I say that evil is of no consequence, except as a sort of mental
gymnastic. For the very reason that I have come in contact with it, I
am more truly an optimist. I can say with conviction that the struggle
which evil necessitates is one of the greatest blessings. It makes us
strong, patient, helpful men and women. It lets us into the soul of
things and teaches us that although the world is full of suffering, it
is full also of the overcoming of it. My optimism, then, does not rest
on the absence of evil, but on a glad belief in the preponderance of
good and a willing effort always to cooeperate with the good, that it
may prevail. I try to increase the power God has given me to see the
best in everything and every one, and make that Best a part of my
life. The world is sown with good; but unless I turn my glad thoughts
into practical living and till my own field, I cannot reap a kernel of
the good.

Thus my optimism is grounded in two worlds, myself and what is about
me. I demand that the world be good, and lo, it obeys. I proclaim the
world good, and facts range themselves to prove my proclamation
overwhelmingly true.