This is the lesson of nature—­the strong must bear the burdens of the weak.  To this end were great men born.  Nature constantly exhibits this principle.  The shell of the peach shelters the inner seed; the outer petals of the bud the tender germ; the breast of the mother-bird protects the helpless birdlets; the eagle flies under her young and gently eases them to the ground; above the babe’s helplessness rise the parents’ shield and armor.  God appoints strong men, the industrial giants, to protect the weak and poor.  The laws of helpfulness ask them to forswear a part of their industrial rights; and they fulfill their destiny only by fulfilling the debt of strength to weakness.

To identify one’s self with those in bonds is the very core of the Christian life.  Not an intellectual belief within, not a form of worship without, but sympathetic helpfulness betokens the true Christian.  God, who hath endowed the soul with capacity to endure all labors and pains for wealth, to consume away the very springs of life for knowledge, hath also given it power for pouring itself out in great resistless tides of love and sympathy.  For beauty and royal majesty nothing else is comparable to the love of some royal nature.  A loving heart exhales sweet odors like an alabaster box; it pours forth joy like a sweet harp; it flashes beauty like a casket of gems; it cheers like a winter’s fire; it carries sweet stimulus like returning sunshine.  We have all known a few great-hearted men and women who have through years distributed their love-treasures among the little children of the community and scattered affection among the poor and the weak, until the entire community comes to feel that it lives in them and without them will die.  Happy the man who hath stored up such treasures of mind and heart as that he stands forth among his fellows like a lighthouse on some ledge, sending guiding rays far out o’er dark and troubled seas.  Happy the woman whose ripened affection and inspiration have permeated the common life until to her come the poor and weak and heart-broken, standing forth like some beauteous bower offering shade and filling all the air with sweet perfume.

In crisis hours the patriot and martyr, the hero and the philanthropist, die for the public good, but not less do they serve their fellows who live and through years employ their gifts and heart-treasures, not for themselves, but for the happiness and highest welfare of others.  Richter, the German artist, painted a series of paintings illustrating the ministry of angels.  He showed us the child-angels who sit talking with mortal children among the flowers, now holding them by their coats lest they fall upon the stairs, now with apples enticing them back when they draw too near the precipice; when the boy grows tall and is tempted, ringing in the chambers of memory the sweet mother’s name; in the hour of death coming in the garb of pilgrim, made ready for convoy and guidance to the heavenly land.  Oh beautiful pictures! setting forth the sacred ministry of each true Christian heart.