The Washington herald. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1906-1939, 1913-04-26
when One GETS down
To HUMAN VALUES
The Work of the PIainest Toiler Is
as Great a That Of the
Genius.
BY FRANCES sHAFFER.

ny 1Aes
Probably the best and the worst Of us
have times when we sit down in the
little corners where we live and work
and play and wish and wish that some
how, some time, we might do something
worth while. Because ii seems like the
wearisome steps Of a treadmll to pick
UP the same homely tasks day by day.
tasks that apparently lead to nowhere
in particular and make little enough i'm
preston, even in our own little corners.
And at such times we look out at the
world of great workers, at the folk
seemingly born for big accomplishments.
the men and women who leave telling
footprints as they go by; and it is sort
of human to long to set aside the hum
BILE labors, to get. out and mingle with
the brilliant few and send back our pity
to the masses.
But there are several grains or so of
comfort in the fact that, after all. when
the last count is made, We are all in the
self-Same boat, with our careers before
us, to make of them what we will. Be
cause that little word, career you know,
cannot be monopolized by the great folk
Of the world, though ii is generally ap-
piled that way.
And IL the plainest kind of toiler, with
his life-work well before him, is faith
full to the end, performing his own gray
series Of duties the very best that he
can, what more can be said of the
mighty scientist, the great musician, or
the man Of wise profession? What more
than that he took his working tools and
made them yield the most that he could?
In the End.
In a way, of course there's a differ
ence, because nobody hears of the plain
toiler or pays much heed to his faithful
service, while the whole world knows
and renders its homage to the man who
achieves great things. And that is why
we humber workers have our times OF
wishing that we, too, might do some
thing to make the world pause and listen
and at last find its way to our door.
But the comfort comes in the knowl-
edge that in the end the thing that will
count the most Is to be able to look our
selves well i'm the face and honestly say
We were faithful. despite our limitations.
Some one tells a story of Emerson that
is bit consoling on the days when we
restlessly sit in our quiet corners.
young woman had complained to
him that some one she knew was not
quite as deep or as wise or as intel
lectually strong as he ought to be, and
with a PARKWAY look that spoke more
eloquently than words, the gentle phil
osopher replied:
Perhaps God is not thunderstorm by
any of our abilities"
And some one else tells of a man who
died, and, dying. left not a penny be-
hind him. He left letter to his family,
telling his deep regret at his mighty
failure, showing them how in his early
days he had dreamed that some time he
|, might come into his own and leave them
ali quite independent, but he had not
found the way to money greatness and
all over his life there was written the
one word-failure.
Left More Than Money.
1t was too late then for any one to
tell him what else he had left-things
that were better than money, or the
richness that money could buy. And he
had not guessed.
He had not dreamed that in the SIM
pie home he gave his boys and girls
while he was among them, he had
woven into their lives the truest kind
of ideals: that while he was looking out
upon the world and its actors in his
own big-minded way he was uncon-
sciously helping them 20 grow big and
splendid. if not so very wealthy. And
he could not know that in later years,
when his boys and girls had developed
into men and women, his standards
would still he supreme.
If that was not a career written all
over with greatness, what was it? Yet
there was none to sound his praises or
to measure the worth of his life.
The great singer thrills countless thou
sands with the wonderful grace of her
art and she has the world almost at
her feet, but when one gets down to
human values one is not SO sure that
her service to the world can be COM
pared at all with that of the humble
worker in the home who patiently does
kher best to fashion real men and women
out of the little boy-and-girl clay in her
hands.
Bigger Than 1t Looks.
She grows very. very weary some
times. and the monotony and the hard
ness of il make her count her little cor
ner pretty cramped and dull; and she
wishes, like the rest of us, that il might |
suddenly grow bigger and broader, and
for once be recognized. |
y But some time she may learn that her |
corner was more important far bigger |
than it looked. |
And the thing for us all to remember |
when we grow weary of the narrowed |
limits of our work is that the most that |
any one can do is to do the best that he /
can. let the applause and the honors |
drop where they may.