Thus far we have two principles.  Let us review them: 

   I. Thoughts become actions.

  II.  Good music being the fruit of good thought can be played rightly
      only by one who thinks good thoughts.

Now, is it not clear that this can come about only when we watch over our own thoughts and govern them as if they were the thoughts of others?  And when we do not so much as endure the thought of harm or evil or wrong we shall be living in the spirit of the Roman lady whose son’s life was lived as his mother taught.

CHAPTER XVIII.

THE GLORY OF THE DAY.

“Be not anxious about to-morrow.  Do to-day’s duty, fight today’s temptation; and do not weaken and disturb yourself by looking forward to things which you cannot see, and could not understand if you saw them.”—­Charles Kingsley.

Nearly all of us have heard about the little child who one day planted seeds and kept constantly digging them up afterward to see if they were growing.  No doubt the child learned that a seed needs not only ground and care, but time.  When it is put in the earth it begins to feel its place and to get at home; then, if all is quite right,—­but not otherwise—­it sends out a tiny rootlet as if it would say that it trusts and believes the earth will feed that rootlet.  And if the earth is kind the root grows and finds a solid foothold.  At the same time there is another thing happening.  When the seed finds it can trust itself to root it feels no longer afraid to show itself.  It goes down, down quietly for a firmer hold, and upward feeling the desire for light.

A firm hold and more light, we cannot think too much of what they mean.

Every day that the seed pushes its tender leaves and stem upward it has more and more to encounter.  The rains beat it down; the winds bend it to the very earth from which it came; leaves and weeds bury it beneath their strength and abundance, but despite all these things, in the face of death itself, the brave little plant strongly keeps its place.  It grows in the face of danger.  But how?  Day after day, as it fights its way in the air and sunshine, blest or bruised as it may be, the little plant never fails to keep at one thing.  That is, to get a firmer and firmer hold.  From that it never lets go.  Break its leaves and its stem, crush it as you will, stop its upward growth even, but as long as there is a spark of life in it there will be more roots made.  It aims from the first moment of its life to get hold strongly.