“The cross for only a day,
The crown for ever and aye—
The one for a night that will soon be gone,
The one for eternity’s glorious morn.
“The cross—that I’ll cheerfully bear,
Nor sorrow for loss or care;
For a moment only the pain and the strife,
But through endless ages the crown of life.”
Life is conflict. Every good thing lies beyond a battlefield, and we must fight our way to it. There must be struggle to get it. This is true in physical life; from infancy to old age existence is a fight with infirmity and disease. In mental life the same is true. Education is a long conflict; the powers of the mind have to fight their way to strength and development. So it is in spiritual life; enemies throng the path and contest every step of progress. No one ever attains to beauty and nobleness of character save through long and sore struggle.
Many of earth’s great historic battlefields are now spots of quiet peace. Once men met there in deadly strife — arms clashed, cannon thundered, the air was filled with the shouts of contending armies and the groans of the wounded and dying, and the ground was covered with the dead — but now, in summer days, the grass waves on the once bloody field, sweet flowers bloom, harvests yellow to ripeness, children play and the air is full of bird-songs and the voices of peace. But he who walks over the spot is continually reminded of the terrible struggle which occurred there in the bygone days.
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