2 THE ACORN are people who by the exercise of a little good will have succeeded in enrolling themselves among the followers of ministers, and have ingratiated themselves with princes. Why should you not succeed in forming relations with the poor, and making acquaintances among the workers who lack somewhat the necessities of life? When a few families are known, with their histories, their antecedents and their difficulties, you may be of the greatest use to them by acting the part of a brother, with the moral and material aid that is yours to give. It is true, you will have attacked only one little corner, but you will have done what you could, and perhaps have led another on to follow you. Instead of stopping at the knowledge that such wretchedness, hatred, disunion and vice exist in society, you will have introduced a little good among these evils. And by however slow degrees such kindness as yours is emulated, the good will sensibly increase and the evil diminish. Even were you to remain alone in this undertaking, you would have the assurance that in the fulfilling the duty, plain as a child's, which offered itself, you were doing the only reasonable thing, if you have felt it so, you have-found out one of the secrets of right living. In it's dreams, man's ambition embraces vast limits, but it is rarely given us to achieve great things, and even then, a quick and sure success always rests on a groundwork of patient preparation. Fidelity in small things is at the base of every great achievement. We too often forget this, and yet no truth needs more to be kept in mind, particularly in the trouble eras of history and in the crisis of individual life. In shipwreck, a splintered beam, an oar, any scrap of wreckage, saves us. On the tumbling waves of life, when everything seems shattered to fragments, let us not forget that a single one of these poor bits may become our plank of safety. To dispise the remnants is demoralization. You are a ruined man, or you are stricken by a great bereavemeut, or again, you see the fruit of toilsome years perish before your eyes You cannot rebuild your fortune, raise the dead, recover your lost toil, and, THE ACORN 3 in the face of the inevitable your arms drop. Then you neglect to care for your person, to keep your house, to guide your children. All this is pardonable, and how easy to understand! But it is exceedingly dangerous. To fold one's hands and let things take their course, is to transform one evil into worse. You who think that you have nothing left to lose, will by that very thought lose what you have. Gather up the fragments that remain to you, and keep them with scrupulous care. In good time this little that is yours will be your consolation The effort made will come to your relief, as the effort missed will turn against you. If nothing but a branch is left for you to cling to, cling to that branch; and if you stand alone in defense of a losing cause, do not throw down your arms to join the rout. After the deluge a few survivors repeopled the earth The future sometimes rests in a single life, as truly as life sometimes hangs by a thread. For strength, go to history and nature. From the long travail of both you will learn that future and fortune alike may come from the slight- est cause, that it is not wise to neglect detail, and, above all, that we must know how to wait and to begin again. In speaking of simple duty I cannot help thinking of military life, and the examples it offers to combatants in this great struggle. He would little understand his soldier's duty, who, the army once beaten, should cease to brush his garments, polish his rifle, and observe discipline. "But what would be the use?" perhaps you ask Are there any various fashions of being varnished? Is it an indifferent matter to add to defeat, discouragement, disorder, and demoralization? No, it should never be forgotten that the least display of energy in these terrible moments is a sign of life and hope. At once every body feels that all is not lost. During the disastrous retreat of 1813 1814, in the heart of the winter when it had become almost impossible to resent any sort of appearance, a general, I know not who, one morning presented himself to Napoleon, in full dress and freshly shaven. Seeing him thus, in the midst of the general demoralization, as elabor-