across the pathway; not
even mere content, and cordial or joyful submission however noble that
attitude may be; but there is a loftier state in which the denial can be
met; it is not merely an acceptance of God's manifest leading that is so
informed with faith that it becomes ceaselessly joyful, but it is to
even discern in limitation, in denial, new and sublime opportunities.

One's dearest hopes are suddenly, by circumstances and conditions
entirely outside his control, totally cut off. What then? At that moment
an entire world of new possibilities opens, and it rests with the man
himself to develop these into something far greater than the scope of
his former hope or expectation could reveal. He can bring to bear a
power of spiritual energy that shall transform the very ill-fortune
itself into one transcendently beautiful and even angelic. He can lift
all the factors of his individual problem to the divine plane of love.
For love is the spiritual alchemy,--not merely the love for friends and
for those near and dear to us; not merely the love for those who are
agreeable and winning and whose high qualities inspire it,--but love,
love and good will for all. The command to love one's enemies is not an
idle nor even an impossible one. The whole law--the whole philosophy, it
may be--of life can be read in the counsel, "As ye have therefore
opportunity, do good unto all men." Do good,--do the right thing, the
kind, the generous thing, regardless of return (for which one usually
cares little or not at all), or even of recognition (for which one
usually cares a great deal), regardless of the recognition,--let the
good be done. Let one, finding himself suddenly confronted by disaster
or defeat, resolve: All that has been, every factor and every
circumstance that has led up to this moment, shall be for good and never
for evil. It shall be for good to each and all and every one involved in
it. Even loss or sadness shall be transmuted into gain and joy on a
higher than the mere earthly plane. For life "shall be kept open, that
the Father's life may flow through it." Always may one realize the
profound truth that "the going down of the walls between our life and
our Lord's life, though it consisted of the failure of our dearest
theories and the disappointment of our dearest plans,--that, too, could
be music to us if through the breach we saw the hope that henceforth our
life was to be one with His life, and His was to be ours."