der that men may
be more sharply aroused to seek some practical solution. It is an
encouraging sign when an evil begins to be intensely felt, and the
demand for relief becomes desperate. The civilization of our time is
imperfect; involves many incongruities; perhaps creates some evils; but
that it is an improved civilization, is evinced by the fact that it is
_self-conscious_; for perception is the necessary antecedent of endeavor
and success. The contrasts of human condition, then, that unfold
themselves in the crowded street, may teach us our duty and our
responsibility in lessening social inequality and need.

But a solution of this problem, clearer perhaps than any other, appears
when we consider another lesson of the street; a lesson which requires
us to look a little deeper, but which, when we do look, is no less
evident than these diversities. That lesson unfolds the essential
_unity_ of humanity. For, we find that the differences between men are
_formal_ rather than _real_; that, with various outward conditions, they
pass through the same great trials; and that the scales which seem to
hang uneven at the surface, and to be tipped this way and that by the
currents of worldly fortune, are very nearly balanced in the depths of
the inner life. We are shallow judges of the happiness or the misery of
others, if we estimate it by any marks that distinguish them from
ourselves; if, for instance, we say that because they have more money
they are happier, or because they live more meagrely they are more
wretched. For, men are allied by much more than they differ. The rich
man, rolling by in his chariot, and the beggar, shivering in his rags,
are allied by much more than they differ. It is safer, therefore, to
estimate our neighbor's real condition by what we find in our own lot,
than by what we do not find there. And now, see into what an essential
unity this criterion draws the jostling, divergent masses in yonder
street! Each man there, like all the rest, finds life to be a
discipline. Each has his separate form of discipline; but it bears upon
the kindred spirit that is in every one of us, and strikes upon motives,
sympathies, faculties, that run through the common humanity. Surely, you
will not calculate any _essential_ difference from mere appearances; for
the light laughter that bubbles on the lip often mantles over brackish
depths of sadness, and the serious look may be the sober veil that
covers a divine peace. Yo