CHAPTER XXXIX

THE SONGS OF THE THANKFUL HEART

A THANKFUL heart is one of the greatest blessings with which a human being can be endowed. To know the joy of thankfulness is to be a Master Singer. The heart of the thankful is always full of song, whether the lips are made vocal or not. Ingratitude is one of the meanest of vices, for it shows an insensibility of mind and heart that are the clearest possible indications of selfishness.

When I was a boy there were places that I visited occasionally, where conventional "blessings" were asked before meals. One of them was as follows: "For what we are about to receive may the Lord make us truly thankful." This made a profound impression upon me. I found myself saying: "That is no giving of thanks. Why doesn't he say: 'For what we are about to receive we are truly thankful!" And I came to the conclusion that if one was not thankful for the food and other blessings received it was beyond even the power of God to make him thankful.

When I first read the whole of Shakespeare no passage in his wonderful works made a deeper or more lasting impression on me than:

Blow, blow, thou winter wind!

Thou art not so unkind

As man's ingratitude;

Thy tooth is not so keen,

Because thou art not seen,

Although thy breath be rude.

I have always hated ingratitude, not for the reason that I have had ingratitude shown to me, but because it has seemed so contemptible and mean a spirit to show. And there need be nothing of the servile or groveling in a becoming spirit of gratitude and thankfulness. Indeed, pride alone should lead one to express his gratitude for a needed blessing or gift freely and joyously bestowed. Who is there, then, that can properly live who fails in grateful thankfulness? From birth to death most of us are the recipients of such blessings that the least we can do is to be thankful,-for good parenthood; the tender care of our blessed mothers during our period of helplessness; the loving ministrations of brothers and sisters, if we are fortunate enough to have them; the never-ceasing training of parents; the gift of health, of warmth, housing, clothes, protection, food; the anticipation of our daily wants and needs. Then, as we grow older, the tender patience and gentleness with which our childish petulances and tempers are met; the guiding into the way of character and uprightness; the bearing with our wrong-doing; the "line upon line, precept upon precept," required for our mental de

velopment; the watchfulness to prevent evil consequences to our health and happiness from our carelessness, our wilfulness or our deliberate perverseness these are a few of the things a thoughtful child will soon learn to be thankful for. Then, as our minds and hearts begin to grasp the thought of the Supreme Giver of all the good and perfect gifts of life, how every day brings up reminders of the boundless blessings we are perpetually receiving: the sun, the air we breathe, the water we drink, the infinite variety of the foods provided for us, the provision for our clothing, our ability to provide houses for our shelter from the storms of winter and the heat of summer, and the like. To me, the fluidity of water is one of the Divine marvels for which I never cease to be thankful. How wonderful it is. Its particles so arranged that we can dash our hands into it, throw it up into our faces, plunge our bodies into it, wash our clothes in it, swim in it, ride in boats on its surface, use it for a thousand and one purposes, soil it, spoil it, degrade it, and yet it ever renews and purifies itself with the aid of the sun, the atmosphere, and chemical action-all provided and in operation without a single effort from mankind-is it not enough in itself to provoke one to perpetual gratitude and thankful expression?

Then, too, I never cease to wonder at the marvelous goodness the Divine Provider has displayed in catering to our tastes in foods and fruits. For the

mere purposes of nutrition everything we need could have been given to us in foods that would have aroused no pleasure in our senses of smell, taste, sight and feeling. But God is no niggard giver. Without any knowledge, even, on our part, of what to suggest or ask for, He has filled the world with foods of exquisite shape-they allure by their very attractiveness of delicate, refreshing and permeating odor, that in itself often makes one's mouth water, of delight to the touch, and of eminent deliciousness of flavor, and so adapted them to our physical needs that they are easily digested and thus converted into power for the running of our bodiessupplying brain, bone, muscle, sinew, nerves, lungs, heart, kidneys, liver, spleen, intestines, eyes, ears, finger-nails-everything-with just what they need. Is it not marvelous, and should it not provoke our hearts to the highest expressions of thankfulness?

Were our physical needs alone provided for they would give us a long list of things for which to exercise our thankfulness, but our mental, esthetic and spiritual needs also are amply provided for. How astounding is thought-its action, its grasp, its varied range, and how many millions of things the Divine Designer and Provider for the needs of man has set before him upon which he can exercise his thought. Just to enumerate the mere names of the sciences-structures of knowledge-his thought has built out of the substances God has placed in his

hands is enough to stimulate his gratitude every hour of the day. There are astronomy, acoustics, chemistry, mechanics, hygiene, medicine, law, dynamics, creation, optics, botany, geography, chronology, conchology, correlation of forces, cosmogony, electricity, engineering, language, mathematics, zoology, anatomy, surgery, theology, sociology, psychology, ethics, logic, rhetoric, politics, economics, dietetics, navigation, esthetics, war, jurisprudence. These might have been given in classified order, but I wished to present them just as they occurred to my mind.

Each and every one of these sciences is made alluringly fascinating, bewilderingly attractive and astoundingly gripping by the infinite resource, invention, adaptability to purpose displayed. Any one of these sciences possesses enough of invention to equip a million earthly "geniuses." How we gape and exclaim, and shout and express our astonishment at the "inventions" of an Edison, a Bell, a Gray, a Morse, a Watts, a Stevenson, a Marconi, or a Wright -and yet one intelligent observer can discern more miracles of inventive genius in the common and generally unobserved things presented in an hour's walk in the country than all the genius of all the men of all ages have discovered, created, or designed since Time began.

For these things my heart is ever full of gratitude. But I cannot stop here. Every sunrise, every sun