[Editorial in the New Outlook, Toronto, Ontario, Canada]

One of life's difficult tasks is that of learning to accommodate ourselves to those with whom we are working; and it is a lesson which some of us never learn. It is seldom easy, and yet it is most necessary. Our best work is possible only when we have the cooperation of others, and the community can never do its best work unless it can secure the hearty cooperation of all its different units. Whether it be in the school, the factory, the church, or the home, the best results are attainable only when there is largest cooperation. But this means that the individual must subordinate himself, or herself, to others, for only so can they work together effectively. No one has a right to dominate all others; no one has a right to expect others to do just what he, or she, desires. The community is possible only when the units can be made to work harmoniously for a common end. If the team is to win it must play as a team. If the orchestra is to render its best service it must play as an orchestra, and the individual instrument must be lost in the whole. If we would do our best work we must learn how to labor with our neighbors so that the highest efficiency may be attained, and this is often hard to learn.

[Dr. Horton, as quoted in the Hampstead and Highgate Express, London, England]

Real love finds its pleasure in service. We talk of social service, Christian service, philanthropic service: all service is social; all service might be religious; all service should be philanthropic. There is a nexus which binds us so closely that we cannot be independent. We must serve. If we are producers, what we make is for the service of the world. We are like the bees who make their honey not for themselves. Or, if we buy and sell, we are still working for the community. Service is the necessary nexus of human life. Or are you a thinker? You think for others, you write for others, you invent for others. Are you on some governing body? You are serving all through your public life. Or are you in domestic service, or a gaslighter, or a sweeper, or engaged in transport work. You are serving all the time. Who shall say which is the greater service? All service ranks the same with God. ... God does not discriminate. All service ranks the same with Him. But we may be serving in a wrong sense—going in a wrong direction. Ask yourself therefore, What is my service doing? For there is this distinction: Do you in your daily work think of it only as a means of earning for yourself, or do you regard it as your contribution to the life of the community—of the world? Can you look all around and rejoice that you may serve and be served by your neighbor, your community, your race? Or do you regard them as competitors in the race of life? How does it appear to you? We must serve. That we cannot avoid. For as Aristotle said, "We are a social animal, bound up in an organic system which is a necessity of life."

But when love comes in and rules, that necessity is transformed into a glorious freedom. When we believe God loves us and serves us, we must not only love Him, we must love our fellow-men, and that love must run all through our life. That is the gist of religion. We find ourselves in the very heart of Christianity as we hear Christ [Jesus] say, "I am among you as he that serveth;" and we see him showing this by washing his disciples' feet. Thus all our love must be the service of men by the love of God. The practice of the presence of God gives us the key, the doing of everything for the love of God and of our fellows. ... All of us have some leisure, our Saturday afternoon and some of our evenings. With the advance of civilization we get more and more leisure, and the test of life is how will you use your leisure. A well-known speaker at a conference, held at Balliol this [last] summer, said there were only two ways of using your leisure: by playing the fool or by playing the man. If we are true men and true women we shall play the man and play the woman, less as animals, less for ourselves. Find your greatest joy in blessing the world. Take a part in the great battle of progress. The question is, Do you give noble service when you are free in your leisure to choose what you shall do? Push beyond your daily task to bless your fellow-men.

[Rev. John Q. Adams, D. D., in the Boston Evening Transcript, Massachusetts]

Always remember that your best service is in what you are, and that this counts for more than anything that you may do. ... Is it not Emerson who says, "What you are speaks so loud I cannot hear what you say"? ... Seek, therefore, the closest intimacy with your Lord, that you may be "a living epistle."

Then we must learn how to lose ourselves in our work. ... We must not measure the difficulties of our task, nor count its cost, nor seek its rewards, as the chief things to be considered. Neither must we be discouraged over the one, nor fretful over the other. The difficulties are a challenge to our best, the rewards are in God's keeping. ...

Learn how to make use of interruptions. Your plans are well laid, but they miscarry. Seldom do you have a day of perfect fulfillment. Other things and persons take your time and strength, and night brings disappointment. The results of the day's work are meager. Once more study the life of the Master with this difficulty in mind, and learn how he used interruptions to further his work.

You must learn to work, also, without haste and anxiety, cheerfully, enthusiastically, as God's freemen. Coventry Patmore has reminded us of the saints "who went about their greatest tasks like noble boys at play." "So many people have lost out of their service the sunny temper which the old monks called 'hilaritas'; we are fretful and fussy; there is little of the eager, joyful spirit of wonder, love, and praise, in anything we do. How many Christian duties sink into a barrenness and a bondage because we have not faith enough to do them eucharistically—with the glee and gratitude of childlike hearts which are redeemed from taking thought for the morrow by Him who is the same yesterday, to-day, and forever." An adequate motive and a living faith in the living God revealed in Christ, will enable anyone to accomplish the work given him to do. Do not grow weary in well doing. Trust God, and be not afraid. "In your patience ye shall win your souls."

[Editorial in the American Mutual Magazine, Boston, Massachusetts]

The real difference between men is not in their chances, but in their ability to recognize these chances. Opportunities are universal. They come in one form or another to everyone. It is safe to say that no one lives whose hand at some time has not been at the door of a genuine opportunity, if he has but raised his eyes, and discovered that his hand was no longer resting on an unbroken wall. The trouble is that we do not see—we are so intent on having things come to us after some manner which we have determined upon in our own minds that when they come to us in another guise we let them pass unnoticed. The common opportunity comes as the divinest opportunity of the world came, cradled in obscurity.

Opportunity wears the simplest dress; she hides herself behind the simplest disguises; there is nothing that assures our interest or awakens our suspicions; for the most part we pass her by as the most commonplace thing in our environment. This is the subtle and dangerous test which she applies to us. If opportunity came with its value disclosed by the splendor of its attire, there would be no test of character. We meet a king handsomely; it is only the gentleman who is courteous to a beggar. Opportunity comes in such a fashion that our reception to it determines our fitness to use it. The person of true wisdom knows that there is nothing in all this which has not noble possibilities in it, and that appearances count for naught when quality is concerned. It is by no accident, therefore, that some men seem to be passing steadily upward and others remain hopelessly stationary. The men who succeed are open-minded. They are alert to discover the true value of things. They do not estimate the importance of events or chances by their appearances. They take everything at its best and use it for its highest. So there lies at the bottom of every right use of opportunity a noble quality of character; that quality which takes life as a divine thing, full in every form of noble chances of growth and progress.

What one needs is not a new chance, but clearness of vision to discern the chance which at this very hour is ours if we recognize it.

[Editorial in the Frederick Leader, Oklahoma]

God speaks to us in many ways, urging us to greater efforts for accomplishment in good; much as the faithful teacher does the children in school. Those who respond are ready for progress, promotion, greater knowledge and greater capacity in life. They are working out their own problems, their own salvation from ignorance and limitation, and step by step are claiming the "glorious liberty of the children of God."

To those who remain obedient to the voice of Truth, the lessons go on. The obedient, humble mind listens to the voice of God, admonishing to love and good works; and with such a student there is a continual overcoming—a leaving behind of the false for the true, the small and forbidding and self-filled existence for the larger, more beautiful, more useful life, which flowers into righteousness and godly power.

The world has many of such people—men and women of noble purposes, delving deeply into truth for the benefit of mankind, giving freely of themselves for the blessing of others—and how they increase, like the Master, "in wisdom and stature, and in favour with God and man." Who can doubt that God works in those who are obedient to the heavenly vision, and that they are working out their own salvation?

[Miss Helen Keller, as quoted in the Way, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania]

Join the great company of those who make the barren places of life fruitful with kindness. Carry a vision of heaven in your heart, and you shall make your home, your school, the world correspond to that vision. Your success and happiness lie in you. External conditions are the accidents of life, its outer trappings. The great, enduring realities are love and service. Joy is the holy fire that keeps our purpose warm, and our intelligence aglow. Resolve to be happy, and your joy and you shall form an invincible host against difficulty. Keep a light bright in your spirit, and others will light their candles at it.