that return every day, to acts of inexhaustible brotherly kindness.  And, thus considered, we find that in the everyday walk of life the solitary thing we can ever distribute among those who march by our side, be they joyful or sad, is the confidence, strength, the freedom and peace, of our soul.  Let the humblest of men, therefore, never cease to cherish and lift up his soul, even as though he were fully convinced that this soul of his should one day be called to console or gladden a God.  When we think of preparing our soul, the preparation should never be other than befits a mission divine.  In this domain only, and on this condition, can man truly give himself, can there be pre-eminent sacrifice.  And think you that when the hour sounds the gift of a Socrates or Marcus Aurelius—­who lived many lives, for many a time had they compassed their whole life around—­do you think such a gift is not worth a thousand times more than what would be given by him who had never stepped over the threshold of consciousness?  And if God there be, will He value sacrifice only by the weight of the blood in our body; and the blood of the heart—­its virtue, its knowledge of self, its moral existence—­do you think this will all go for nothing?

69.  It is not by self-sacrifice that loftiness comes to the soul; but as the soul becomes loftier, sacrifice fades out of sight, as the flowers in the valley disappear from the vision of him who toils up the mountain.  Sacrifice is a beautiful token of unrest; but unrest should not be nurtured within us for sake of itself.  To the soul that is slowly awakening all appears sacrifice; but few things indeed are so called by the soul that at last lives the life whereof self-denial, pity, devotion, are no longer indispensable roots, but only invisible flowers.  For in truth too many do thus feel the need of destroying—­though it be without cause—­a happiness, love, or a hope that is theirs, thereby to obtain clearer vision of self in the light of the consuming flame.  It is as though they held in their hand a lamp of whose use they know nothing; as though, when the darkness comes on, and they are eager for light, they scatter its substance abroad on the fire of the stranger.

Let us beware lest we act as he did in the fable, who stood watch in the lighthouse, and gave to the poor in the cabins about him the oil of the mighty lanterns that served to illumine the sea.  Every soul in its sphere has charge of a lighthouse, for which there is more or less need.  The humblest mother who allows her whole life to be crushed, to be saddened, absorbed, by the less important of her motherly duties, is giving her oil to the poor; and her children will suffer, the whole of their life, from there not having been, in the soul of their mother, the radiance it might have acquired.  The immaterial force that shines in our heart must shine, first of all, for itself; for on this condition alone shall it shine for the others as well; but see that you give not away the oil of your lamp, though your lamp be never so small; let your gift be the flame, its crown.