ove all things will give you power with them;
just as it is the Cross of Christ, and the spitting and the mocking
and the scourging, and the degradation of His exposure in dying, that
gives Him His power far more than even the Sermon on the Mount. After
all, it is always what costs most that is best worth having, and if
you only see Tommy in his easiest moments, when he is at the Y.M.C.A.
or the club, you see him at the time when he is least impressionable
in a permanent manner.

Well, I must apologize for writing such an egotistical and intimate
sort of letter on so slight a provocation. But this that I have said
is all that my experience has taught me about influencing the Tommy.

No doubt there are other ways; but I have not been able to strike
them.

Yours very truly, DONALD HANKEY, 2nd Lieut.

P.S.--Of course in becoming a Second Lieutenant I have dished my own
influence most effectually. It has often appeared to me that among
ordinary working men humility was considered the Christian virtue _par
excellence_. Humility combined with love is so rare, I suppose, and
that is why it is marvelled at.

XII

"DON'T WORRY"

This is at present the soldier's favourite chorus at the front--

"What's the use of worrying?
It never was worth while!
Pack up your troubles in your old kit-bag
And Smile, Smile, Smile!"

Not a bad chorus, either, for the trenches! You can't stop a shell
from bursting in your trench, even if Mr. Rawson can! You can't stop
the rain, or prevent a light from going up just as you are half-way
over the parapet ... so what on earth is the use of worrying? If you
can't alter things, you must accept them, and make the best of them.

Yet some men do worry, and by so doing effectually destroy their peace
of mind without doing any one any good. What is worse, it is often the
religious man who worries. I have even heard those whose care was for
the soldier's soul, deplore the fact that he did not worry! I have
heard it said that the soldier is so careless, realizes his position
so little, is so hard to touch! And, on the other hand, I have heard
the soldier say that he did not want religion, because it would make
him worry. Strange, isn't it, if Christianity means worry and anxiety,
and if it is only the heathen who is cheerful and free from care? Yet
the feeling that this is so undoubtedly exists, and it must have some
foundation. Perhaps it is one of the subjects which ought to