July 31

“Must all expenditure increase the material happiness of man? Are we never doing man good except when we are providing for his outward wants, or giving him an education which will enable him to get on in the world? Even in matters like food and dress, are we forced to restrain our expenditure to that which is absolutely necessary? Expenditure beyond the necessary on these things is certainly unproductive, but is it always useless? I answer that we are bound, not only to assist the poor, but also to charm our society, to shew that we have thought of others by our desire to delight them. Within certain limits, expenditure on dress is useful in producing a social ease and charm. When it is entirely neglected in a household, for instance, it produces domestic quarrels, and it really means not only carelessness of person but carelessness of pleasing.”

STOPFORD BROOKE

“What asks our father of his children save
Justice and mercy and humility,
A reasonable service of good deeds,
Pure living, tenderness to human needs,
Reverence, and trust, and prayer for light to see
The Master’s foot-prints in our daily ways?
No knotted scourge, nor sacrificial knife,
But the calm beauty of an ordered life
Whose every breathing is unworded praise.”

WHITTIER