reformers at the stake. Cares, too, cause us to shut these windows. We have so much responsibility to absorb us that we have "no time to look out to any distant tower of a sanctifying thought." All sorts of sights are before our windows—society, business, pleasure, study—but not God. Our life seems to open in every other direction than toward the holy city. We do not go alone into a private place and expose ourselves to the influences God stands ready to send to our hearts. It would be far better if we did. We should find that almost as gently as comes the sunlight, ideas, inspirations, and aspirations would be suggested to our hearts. They would enter our hearts, we would not know how; and if we cherished them, they would correct our false estimates of life, would re-mint our courage, would clarify the vision of our faith, and would prepare us, as they prepared Daniel, to discharge all life's duties with integrity, humanity, and composure.

It is a blessed, very blessed, way to live, this way of keeping our hearts open to the best. We all can so live. We can have a secret chamber—a very closet of the soul—into which we can go, whether we are with the multitude or are alone; and if through the broadly opened windows of that closet we look out toward the best—distant as that best may seem—back from the best will come the light that never fails and the strength that never breaks.

Winning the Best Victories.

CHAPTER II.

Winning the Best Victories.

Success in life is determined by the victories we win. Only he who triumphs over obstacles is a successful man.

There are as many kinds of victory as there are kinds of obstacles. Some kinds of obstacles call upon us for the use of our secondary powers, and some for the use of our primary powers. When the obstacles bring into play the very best powers of our natures, and those powers conquer the obstacles, then we win our best victories.

David is a most interesting illustration of the winning of victories. The Bible evidently considers him one of its greatest heroes. While it gives eleven chapters to Jacob and fourteen chapters to Abraham, it gives sixty-one chapters to David. It thus asks us to pay great heed to the story and lessons of David's life.

Almost our first introduction to David represents him in a fight. He is a mere shepherd lad, out in the wilderness, perhaps miles from another human being, when a lion springs forth and seizes a lamb from the flock he is guarding. It was a fearsome hour for a boy. He might have deserted the flock and fled, preserving himself. But not so. He faced the lion. He even attacked the lion. He wrested the lamb from its mouth, and he slew the lion. Again, when, under similar circumstances, a beast of another kind, a bear, laid hold of a lamb, David stood up to the danger, and with such weapons of club and knife as he had, fought the bear to its death.

Some years ago in Alaska, in a house hundreds of miles from any other white man's home, I saw a bearskin lying upon the sitting-room floor. The son of the house, out hunting, had suddenly come upon a bear, that rose up within a few feet of his face. The boy lifted his gun, shot, aiming at the bear's heart, and then, trembling with terror, ran for home. The next day the boy's father took associates to the spot, found the body of the bear, and brought the skin home as a trophy of the boy's skill and pluck. And a trophy it was! But when David, scarce armed at all, a boy, brought down his lion and his bear, in an actual face-to-face encounter, the skins of the lion and of the bear were trophies indeed!

The next scene in David's life is when he meets Goliath. David is still a youth. The ruddy color has not yet been burned out of his cheeks by the Oriental sun. This meeting is different from any he has faced. It is not with a beast, but with a man—a man armed, a man experienced in combat, a man of much larger size and weight than himself, a man who had an assured sense of his own strength, a man whose voice, manner, and prowess put fear into the heart of every fighter in the army of Israel. In David's previous contests there had been an element of suddenness, so there was no time for hesitation, and so no time for the cowardice often born of hesitation; in this contest there was delay, and during that delay David was twitted with the foolishness of even thinking of facing Goliath, and an effort was made to break down his courage. Right manfully, however, did he stand up to the danger. Instead of a lamb, an army was in peril. The cause was worthy of a great venture. He made the venture. He took smooth stones from the brook, he used his shepherd's sling, he conquered Goliath, and Goliath's sword and Goliath's head became trophies of a splendid victory. The youth had rescued an army from paralyzing fear, and had saved the glory of Jehovah's name! He deserved credit then. He received it then. And he became forever an inspiring example to all youth who would fight their country's battles, and win laurels for the God of battles.

These two scenes are suggestive. The one with the lion and the bear speaks to us of pure physical bravery. David has such muscular strength that he, by the power in his hands and arms, can hold beasts and fight a winning fight with them. David's strength makes the killing of a lion or bear with a rifle, whether at long distance or even near at hand, seem small. It makes the ordinary successes of those who contest in the athletic trials of our day seem insignificant. Still it glorifies those successes. Physical bravery is most desirable. People believe so. They love to see contests of physical endurance. They will go miles to watch such contests, and they will cheer the victors to the echo. In so doing to-day they follow the example of all preceding generations. Barbarian, Greek, Roman, Indian, every man everywhere is interested in muscular power. It fells trees and wins victories over the forest; it plows soil and wins victories over the fields; it breaks stone and wins victories over roadbeds. Physical victories are not to be gainsaid. May every life win them if it can against nature, against other lives in fair athletics, against any one who would rob a home or burn a house. The ambition to win muscular victories, in a right way, for the defense or honor of a worthy cause, is to be commended. Victories so won make their winners heroes. Waterloo is said to have been fought and won on the foot-ball ground of Rugby.

The other scene is likewise suggestive—of David with Goliath. It is that of a youth fighting for his country and his God. It is still a physical contest, but it is now skill and muscle combined; or rather, muscle directed by skill. The contest, physically considered, is unequal. David is no match for Goliath. They are in different classes. But a calm mind, a dexterous hand, and a high purpose are David's, and they more than compensate for lack of physical force. The strongest battalions do not always conquer. The strongest physical force is not to conquer in this instance. Patriotism may so nerve the heart that one man is equal to a hundred, and resolute purpose may develop such skill and sturdiness that a few can put a thousand to flight. It has always been so—in