e are insistent. Optimism assumes that the
end always justifies the means, even when we are in the dark as to why
other means were not used; and that it is better to comfort ourselves
with the beneficent fact than to refuse to be comforted because we may
not penetrate the depths of the Cosmic process. The emphasis of thought
may well rest here. The austere is never merely the severe. What seems
to human sight to be evil and only evil, always has a side of benefit.
The soul is purified and strengthened as it rises above animalism; it is
made courageous by bodily pain; tears clarify its vision. Even Jesus is
said to have been made perfect by the things which He suffered. The
universal characteristic of life is growth, and growth ever reaches out
of old and narrow toward new, larger and better environment.

The soul needs strength, vision, sympathy, faith. These qualities are
the fruit of experience. Muscle is converted into strength by use; and
its use is possible only as it finds something to overcome. Vision is
largely the fruit of training. The man on the lookout discovers a ship
ahead long before the passenger on the deck. That fine accuracy of sight
has come to him as he has battled with the tempests, and learned to
distinguish between the whiteness of flying foam and the sunlight on a
sail. Clearness of spiritual vision is acquired in the same way. He who
can see even to "the far-off interest of tears" has been taught his
discernment by reading the meaning of nearer events.

Sympathy is the art of suffering with another without the definite
choice to do so. One soul spontaneously enters into the condition of
another and bears his pains and griefs as though they were his own; that
is sympathy. But who ever bore the griefs of another before he himself
had felt sadness? Sympathy is a fruit that grows on the tree of sorrow.
So intensely is this felt that even kindly words in hours of deep trial
are ungrateful if they come from one who had had no hard experience of
his own. In proportion as one has borne his own griefs he is presumed to
be able to bear the griefs of others. He who has passed through the
valley of the shadow, and who knows the way, is the only one whose hand
is sought by another approaching the same valley. No human
characteristic is more beautiful, or more appreciated, than sympathy;
but its genuineness is seldom trusted unless the one offering it is
known to have suffered himself.

Jesus is said to ha