s and
nutritious fruitage of scholarship, of wide knowledge, of much reading, of
deep meditation, and keen observation. But these elements, either singly
or in combination, are but veneer unless they strike their roots into the
spiritual nature and are thus nourished into spiritual qualities.
Excavating into serenity, we shall discover the pure gold of scholarship;
we shall find knowledge in great abundance; we shall find the spirit of
the greatest and best books; and we shall come upon the cloister in which
meditation has done its perfect work.

The machine that is run to the extreme limit of its capacity splutters,
sizzles, hisses, and quivers, and finally shakes itself into a condition
of ineffectiveness. But the machine that is run well within the limits of
its capacity is steady, noiseless, serene, effective, and durable. So with
people. The person who essays a task that is beyond his capacity is
certain to come to grief and to create no end of disturbance to himself
and others before the final catastrophe. If the steam-chest or boiler is
not equal to the task, wisdom and safety would counsel the installation of
a larger one. Here is one of the tragedies of our scheme of education. The
spirit is the power-plant of all life's operations and in this plant are
many boilers. Instead of calling more and more of these into action, we
seem intent upon repressing them and thus we reduce the capacity of the
plant as a whole. When we should be lighting or replenishing the fires
under the boilers of imagination, initiative, aspiration, and reverence,
we spend our time striving to bank or quench these fires and in playing
and dawdling with the torches of arithmetic, grammar, and history with
which we should be kindling the fires. Thus we diminish the power of the
plant while life's activities are calling for extension and enlargement.
We seem to be trying to train our pupils to work with one or but few
boilers when there are scores of them available if only we knew how to
utilize them.

Hence, it must appear that reserve-power and serenity are virtually
synonymous. The teacher who has achieved serenity never uses all the power
at her command and, in consequence, all her actions are easy, quiet, and
even. She is always stable and never mercurial or spasmodic. She
encounters steep grades, to be sure, but with ease and grace she applies a
bit more power from her abundant supply and so compasses the difficulty
without disturbing