The Warriors

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NALD

e, and between the power of character and the tyranny of circumstance, death, and sin. The great soul is tossed into the midst of

tood apart from their tribesmen in contests of pure athletic skill,-in running, jumping, leaping, wrestling, in laying on thew and thigh with arm, hand, and curled fist in sheer delight of action, and of the display of strength. As foes arose, these athletes

oe, to sleep on the bare ground, to bear hunger and toil, summer's heat and winter's frost,-how t

nster from her lair, plunged beneath the drift of sea-foam and the flame of dragon-breath, and met the clutch of dragon-teeth. We read of Turpin, Oliver, and Roland,-the sweepers

t sorrows, who conquer the savage pain of heart and desolation of spirit which arise from heroic human grief,-Oedipus and Antigone, Iphigenia, Perseus, Prometheus, King Lear, Samson Agonistes, Job, and David in his penitential psalm. And there are the Victors in the yet de

fighting work in the Christian life, much of the intense energy and interest of the race would be unaroused. There are apathetic natures who do not want to undertake the difficult,-sluggish souls who would rather not stir from their present position. And th

hat it is to be an easy life, or one removed from toil and danger. It is pre?minently the adventurous life of the world,-that in which the most happens, as well as that in which the spiritual

s the conquest of the evil within his own nature; the outer is the struggle against the evil forces of

of water, and things that glide and swim; of sea-grasses and currents; of flowing waves that lap about the body with a cool chill; of palpitating color, that, at gre

ce between them, which they never cross? How do they, age after age, run a predestined course? We drop a stone. What binds it earthward? Under our

nd descend into the soul-world of the life of man, we find ourselves in a new environment, and with an outlook over new forms and powers. We find ourselves in a world of images and attractions, of impulses and desires, of instincts a

ss of the power of choice? Our individuality lies in the fact that we can decide, choose, and rule among the va

ay thinks and wills and loves. Heredity includes savagery and culture, health and disease, empire and serfdom, hope and despair. Each man can say: "In me rise impulses that ran riot in the veins of Anak, that belonged to Libyan slaves and to the Ptolemaic lin

. To rise above heredity is to rise above the downward drag of all the years. It is not escaping the special sin of one ancestor, but the s

uses. The conditions of this struggle and the opportunities of this conquest are the con

all the universe for his soul's demesne! His environment stretches out to towns and rivers, shore and sea. Looking upward into space, he can view a star whose distance is a thousand times ten thousand miles. Beyond the path of his feet or of his sight, there is the path of thought, which leads him into new

Customs? They exist to be changed! The tempora and the mores should be plastic to our touch. The times are never level with our best. Our souls are

ted by every previous sin. Where am I free? How am I free? Can I do as I choose? Or are there bourns of conduct

ictor is he who, in his own life, unites these two things: a great longing after the god-like, which makes him yearn

nt; life, however it may break in storms upon us, is not meant to beat down our souls. Unless we

f soul, this heroism of life, this flame-like flower of character, is to be Victor in the great combats of the race. It is the spirit of courage, energy, and love. Nothing is too hard for it, nothing too distasteful, nothing too insignifica