Читать книгу Voices for the Speechless - Various - Страница 12

Table of Contents

The disposition to raise the fallen, to befriend the friendless, is now one of the governing powers of the world. Every year its dominion widens, and even now a strong and growing public opinion is enlisted in its support. Many men still spend lives that are merely selfish. But such lives are already regarded with general disapproval. The man on whom public opinion, anticipating the award of the highest tribunal, bestows its approbation, is the man who labors that he may leave other men better and happier than he found them. With the noblest spirits of our race this disposition to be useful grows into a passion. With an increasing number it is becoming at least an agreeable and interesting employment. On the monument to John Howard in St. Paul's, it is said that the man who devotes himself to the good of mankind treads "an open but unfrequented path to immortality." The remark, so true of Howard's time, is happily not true of ours.

Mackenzie's Nineteenth Century.