COMPANIONED.

BY JULIA P. DABNEY.

The soul walks isolated

Adown life's valleys wide,

Disconsolate, unmated,

And spirit-unallied.

Broadcast it searcheth, burning

For compeer or for kin,

Yet evermore returning
To refuges within.

Far in the deeps of being,
Set for a guiding sign,
Unseen but not unseeing,
There is a secret shrine,

Within which fire immortal

A changeless star-doth gleam;
And who shall cross that portal
Shall know his soul supreme.

Thenceforth no power shall curb him
To worldly artifice,

Nor circumstance disturb him,

Nor mar his poisèd peace.

He knows all men his brothers,
All kindreds as his own,

Yet fares he with no others,

But walks with God alone.

"The suffering born of hatred is the only suffering for which there is no balm."

OF TRUE SUCCESS.

BY J. WILLIAM LLOYD.

The opportunity of evil cannot well be understood by a man whose views of life are all material.

For mistakes, failures and imperfect or unexpected successes are inevitable in material life, indeed more common than successes complete and planned. In fact no ability, foresight or power now possible can prevent them, because so many of them are the fruit of causes remote from us beginning ages ago, or of forces utterly beyond our ken or control.

The life of a wise, good, well equipped man may be a material failure from beginning to end without his having any folly or imprudence to reproach himself for. From the material side there is certainly such a thing as "bad luck," that is, the defeat of our little plans by the outworking of unforseeable, eternal plans in which we are but factors. The entire material failure of one man's life, or of many men's lives, may be absolutely essential to the material or spiritual success of another life or lives, and it be so worked out, for "none of us liveth to himself and no man dieth to himself,''

In the building of a house it is essential that one stone be buried in oblivion and earth as a foundation, that another stone be exalted to the battlements; that some pieces of metal be hidden as nails and bolts that another piece rise to heaven as a spire. Even so with the economy of a universe.

The important things of life are the spiritual courage, calmness, self-poise, peace, serenity, strength and sweetness; that sane, clear-eyed greatness of soul which can always hold the overlook and estimate the little frets and calamities of the moment at their proper insignificance. The important thing in life and the only thing worth living for or that gives real happiness or holds any lasting profit is to be a man, a philosopher, to live the serene life in the Lifted Land.

The true end of a man's life is to be spiritually great with greatness which is greater than the winning of fame or the mo

nopoly of love or the piling up of wealth or the conquest of countries. And whenever a man makes a mistake or reveals a weakness or sins a sin or fails in grasp or loses a loved one, money, health or reputation, if he can rise serenely above the shame, disappointment, remorse, grief, fear, despair, or whatever form the evil may take to torment his weakness and be gentle, brave, poised and sweet-natured, in spite of it, he becomes truly great, is conscious of it, comforted by it and at peace within. And this is the true success alone worth having.

But to attain this true success and happiness you must ever forget not that it is first. If you face life with the agonizing cry "I must win this love!" or "I must attain this ambition!"' or "I must save this dear one!" or "I must keep this possession! or all is lost," you have staked your happiness on a gambler's toss and the wager may be a hundred to one that the dice will turn up against you. Or even if you reach desperately and with nerve-tension for some small thing-to catch a train or to do so much in a given time--just in proportion as you concentrate your estimate of value on this thing, is your peace imperiled, or quite destroyed, if you fail.

For the power of any failure to hurt is not in proportion to its true relation to your life or the lives of others, but in exact proportion to the violence of the desire it foils. Therefore, the old philosophers, who above all things valued the serene life, preached ever against "desire," meaning thereby the violent craving for, and exaggerated estimate of, sensual and temporal things. That a man should be sublimely calm, like a peak above the clouds, under all fates, was their ideal.

But too often this beautiful truth has been degraded into the affirmation of mere indolence, apathy and pessimism as the true wisdom, and the posing of the lazy, cynical and spiritless as superior. On the contrary, the true greatness is with those who keenly desire yet serenely lose; who fight bravely and with their might, and yet endure defeat with dignity, victory without exultation or revenge; who work with all their skill and yet calmly see their products pass away or de

cay; who join heart and hand, like true and loyal comrades, in all the toil and warfare of the world about them and yet have souls floating like angels, wide-eyed and calm, in a heaven above it all. These are they who know that the battle is more than the victory and the work more than the wage. These are they who hold the paradox and the reconciliation.

The material man fixes his eye with desperate longing on wealth or power or fame or even upon the doing of some worthy work, but the spiritual man continually says to his longings, when their efforts fail: "It does not matter! it does not matter!'' for to him the great thing is not that he should win a certain regard or love, but that he should be worthy of great love, able to live above any particular or lesser appreciation, serene and happy in that larger love, which includes all with tender sympathy and blessing; it is not that he should possess coin but lay up treasure of character; not that he should get fame but be truly great; not that he should succeed in great works but have done his best and never given himself to unworthy ones; not that he should have power over others, but power to keep his own soul supreme, his centers sweet.

'What is the harvest of thy saints,

O God! who dost abide?

Where grow the garlands of thy chiefs

In blood and sorrow dyed?

What have thy servants for their pains?

This, surely to have tried."-Julia Ward Howe.

"Only eyes that have wept see clearly and far into the lives, the hopes and sufferings of their fellows: only eyes that have wept have this second sight."

"Wiser it were to welcome and make ours,

Whate'er of good, though small, the present brings,
Kind greetings, sunshine, song of birds and flowers,

With a child's pure delight in little things."-R. C. French.

WHAT THE PHILOSOPHERS AND MYSTICS SAY.

A DAILY AFFIRMATION. "The Truth Seeker," Australian Monthly Magazine of Higher Thought. Sidney, N. S. W., Australia, February, 1905.

These Affirmations are spoken to the Real Self, the true Spiritual Being within each of us, not to the physical body alone the flesh and blood-which is but the temple wherein He dwells, and is therefore not himself, but that which is at his service to transmute by the WORD into a Spiritual expression of his real God-being the perfect Likeness brought forth from the perfect Image.

The real Man and Woman of each of us is the Divine Being; and as we allow this true Self to rule our lives, we put on the "Mind of Christ," and so reveal God's Son within the Son of Man. As the God-Self thinks and acts through us, so will these true ideas or Immaculate Conceptions and good healthful thoughts be expressed in the outer self-the bodyand we thus daily build that "House not made with hands, eternal in the heavens," built by the Power of Thought, which is the one Creative Power of the Universe."

"Speak the WORD only."

"According to Thy WORD be it unto thee."

AFFIRMATION.

JEHOVAH-ALMIGHTY, Great Father-Mother God: I, thy child, acknowledge Thee to be my Creator.

Thou hast endowed me with all Thine own glorious Creative Powers.

Thou hast given me richly of Thyself. There is nothing that I lack. All is mine.

I am created in Thy perfect Image, and as a pure spiritual being must reveal Thy perfect Likeness.

The Seed of the Christ is within me. I am Thine Only Begotten and well-beloved Son, full of Grace and Truth.

Thy Word is now made flesh and dwells in me, the Son of God within the Son of Man.

Thy Eternal LIFE is my Life.

Thy Infinite WISDOM guides me.

Thy Wondrous INTELLIGENCE illumines my mind.

Thy Glorious SUBSTANCE feeds me.

Thy Perfect HEALTH is revealed in me.

Thy Infinite POWER upholds me.

Thy Almighty STRENGTH is my support.
Thy Unchanging LOVE surrounds me.