It now refuses to hold
the facts he gives it. The Latin poet interprets our principle by the
story of the maiden in the boat, holding her hand in the water while
she toyed with a string of pearls until the string snapped and the
treasure sank into the abyss. The miner interprets opportunity lost
through him who, for a rifle and a blanket, traded a rich copper mine
that has since paid its owner millions. The historian interprets it by
Napoleon's bitter signal to his General, tardy at Waterloo, "Too late!
the critical hour has passed." Froude interprets it through the old
hero bitterly condemning himself over his wife's grave, knowing that
his wild love and fierce outburst of affection were impotent now to
warm the heart that froze to death in a home.

Ruskin interprets it through a nation that allowed her noblest to
descend into the grave, garlanding the tombstone when they refused to
crown the brow; paying honors to ashes that were denied to spirit;
wreathing immortelles only when they had no use save for laying on a
grave where was one dead of a broken heart through a nation's
ingratitude. Above all, Jesus Christ interprets it at midnight in
Gethsemane, when he saw the torches fluttering in the darkness, heard
the clanking of sabers and soldiers' armor, and in sad, reproachful
irony wakened his disciples with these words: "Sleep on, now; sleep
forever if you will! Henceforth no stress of your vigilance can help
me; no negligence of your duty can harm me beyond the harm you have
already wrought. Take your ease now. Sleep; the opportunity has
gone." Then was the disciples' joy turned into mourning, and for
garments of praise did they put on ashes and sackcloth. An irreparable
loss was theirs. Yet for all of us each neglected duty means a
tragedy. It is always now or never. The treasure wrapped up in each
strategic opportunity is of infinite value. To-morrow can hold no joy
when yesterday holds this memory: "While I was busy here and there my
opportunity was gone."

How strategic the period of youth! Then the chiefest forces of life
flow together in sensitive conjunction. Then four great gifts like
four great rivers unite in one majestic current to bear up the young
man's enterprises, and sweep him on to fame and fortune. Opportune are
all the days when health spills over at the eye and ear and laughs
through the lips. Men worn out are like overshot wheels--the life
trickles and the buckets are fille