The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1908-07-04
A SATURDAY SERMON.

In the world We shall have tribulations:
but be OF good cheer.-St John xvi, 80.
Statisticians accurately measure the
wealth of the mines and of the farms,
and even Of the seas and the air-and
the totals are astounding, mounting
up to billions upon billions.
But there are no figures vast enough
to express the value to mankind of
so small and simple a thing as a smile.
This Is a material world for the
great part. One is wont to value as
riches only the actual things we can
grasp and hold in the hands. And.
yet the real treasures of life. that give
to all these outward things their
meaning, are OF the heart.
Material riches? Why, but for so
intangible thing as sunlight, the
whole material universe would be
black nothingness; but for intangible
heat. not the smallest atom of or on
earth could exist; but for the intan-
gible colors and fragrances, the fair
est, sweetest flower would be but a
weed: but for the intangible light and
warmth and fragrance of a smile, the
most perfectly formed human face
would be only a lifeless cast.
1t would be extremely interesting
and instructive if one could compute
the value of the part which the smile
has played in humanity. But, like the
ray of sunshine that comes from the
boundless heart Of universal love, it is
free-it costs nothing-and so can not
be relatively valued. And. like the
sunshine again, 1t gilds with glory all
it falls upon, and so is limitless in
value.
Impossible as is this computation.
there are few of US who have not
learned the lesson that 1t is a smile,
not a frown. that makes things move
in this world. If you don't know this
you have not begun real living.
In view of this and of the further
fact that it is just as easy to smile
and be cheerful as 1t is to be surly and
disagreeable. it is surprising how
chary we are with our smiles and
kindly words. 1t is a mean form of
closeness in the world, for the miser
himself only loses by it.
Throughout every department of the
commercial and social world-every-
where-it is geniality that pays the
biggest return for the least expendi-
ture.
Given anything like the same price
and similar conditions, there is no
business man who would not prefer
to turn his business to a genial
man. It Is only by making conces-
sions that the surly man holds his own
in the business world.
The smile is no less a necessity In
the maintenance of the social and do
mestic harmonies of life. There is no
place in society for the disagreeable
man. Because of his connections he
may be tolerated with some respect,
but none seeks him, and he knows not
the comradeship that sweetens life.
SO, too, in the home life. 1t is the
smile that makes things run evenly.
The wife who greets her husband with
smile when he returns in the even
ing and who has a smile for him when
he starts out in the morning Is filling
the home. however, humble, with
greater riches than gold can buy. And
the little ones raised on smiles and
good cheer have a good heritage.
What the sunshine Is to all ma
terial nature, quickening all life. giving
to all things beauty. color and fra
GRANGE, tinting even dead matter with
glow of gold, and giving to true gold
itself a higher glisten, so the smile is
to human life, making sorrows and
dsappointments easier to bear and
giving joys themselves a richer sweet
ness.