“Like children in a garden fair,
Who wander through each flowerful maze,
And drink from sunny founts with glee,
And look with long and lingering gaze
Upon the wondrous scene; –yet fain
Would be at home for love and rest,–
So we, in this bright world of ours,
With strange homesickness are possest!”
It is a great hour for us when we become conscious of the splendor of our immortality. A very beautiful story is told of the way the young Princess Victoria bore herself when she first became aware that she might some day be Queen. One morning, when she was twelve years of age, she opened her book of English history and found a paper which had been placed there for her information by her tutor. She read it attentively, and then said to her governess: “I never saw that before. I see that I am nearer the throne than I thought.” After pondering a few moments the princess said: “”Many children would boast, but they don’t know the difficulty. There is much responsibility.” The revelation made a deep impression on her mind. More than once she said: “I will be good.”
Every one of us is born to a life of splendor and vast possibility of beauty and power. We are born to be children of God, and to live forever. We have in us a boundless nature that makes us greater than all things in this world. Yet some people never seem to become aware that they are much better than worms. They live as if they were only bodies, mere animals, made for this present earthly life alone. The aim of their existence never extends beyond what they shall eat, what they shall drink, and wherewithal they shall eat, what they shall drink, and wherewithal they shall be clothed. They seem unaware of anything in life higher or more important than these needs of their physical nature. They have no visions of life in any loftier sphere. Their pleasures are only pleasures of the senses. They know nothing of intellectual or spiritual enjoyment.
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