fairer than it is, or that the mornings and evenings may be more attractive.  Let me know as I may, and feel as I should, the truth that I am endlessly improvable, and I am assured that the soul of the universe will somehow sweeten every bitter allotment that falls to me, will “charm my pained steps over the burning marl” which belongs to the course of probationary experience, and will assist me joyfully to approximate the greatness of His own infinite and tranquil character.  It is bliss to feel that the soul is an ever-enduring entity.  Unlike the clouds and the snow-heaps, the fluids and the liquids, the rocks and the metals—­unlike all the generations of living organisms—­it neither wastes away nor loses its distinctiveness.  Nay, it outlasts every transmuting process, and, as a self-identifying self, is endlessly living.

If we reach the high plane of a perfect manhood, we must climb.  “Come up hither, and I will show thee things which must be hereafter.”—­Rev., iv, 1.  In this mystical Revelation we behold the seer, John, dreaming at the base of the celestial hill, and in his dream he hears a voice commanding him to rise to the summit of the eternities, where, standing, he shall behold all things that must be.  This vision has an infinite significance, in that no small part of the felicity associated with the| idea of eternity is the thought that, with ample mind, we shall perfectly understand the mighty plan and enterprise of God, and know with perfect knowledge that which is dark and obscure now.  But not only has this truth to us an infinite significance; it has also a temporal one, in that it tells us that there is an immediate relationship between elevation of life, between high thinking, living and doing, and the power to command the future.  “Come up hither, and I will show thee things which must be hereafter.”  That is, let us stand high and we see far and wide, let us stand high and we see deep.  Elevation grants perspective and yields the possession of those years not only that are, but that are not.  Now, so understood, these words have much inspiration, comfort and solace for all of us, for a very large part of man’s life is future.  Indeed, the great regulative force of every human spirit is not so much the present and the past—­present opportunity and past experience—­as future ideality.  The architectonic principle of life is not the momentum that sweeps down to us from the years that have been, but the ideal that lies deep in the years that are yet to be.  This is the mysterious, occult power that moulds, forms and fashions our stature, and that is determining the greatness or the littleness of our destiny.  And not only is the future architectonic, it is also an inspiration and refuge for our anxieties, defeats and inadequacy, his incompetency, how little he has achieved, realizes his inconsequence and insignificance, and he looks forward and sees triumph in tomorrow; he beholds the summit of the hill, and says, “There I shall