In one of his poems Robert Browning represent the archangel Gabriel taking a poor boy’s place:
“Then to his poor trade he turned
By which the daily bread was earned;
And ever o’er the trade he bent,
And ever lived on earth content;
He did God’s will–to him all one
If on the earth or in the sun.”
Many people measure a man’s power or effectiveness by the noise he makes in the world. But this standard is not always correct. The drum makes vastly more noise than the flute, but for true, soul thrilling music and soothing power the flute is a thousand times more effective. Young men, when they start in life, usually think they must make all the noise they can; else their lives will be failures. They must make their voices heard loud above the din and clamor of the world; else they must remain unknown and die in obscurity. But thoughtful, observant years always prove how little real power there is in “the bray of brass.” Life is measured by its final and permanent results. Not by the place a man occupies before the public and the frequency and loudness of his utterances, but by the benefits and blessings which he leaves behind him in other lives, must his true effectiveness be rated. It will be seen, in the great consummation, that those who have wrought silently and without clamor or fame have in many cases achieved the most glorious permanent results.
“What shall I do lest life in silence pass?
And if it do,
And never prompt the bray of brass,
What need’st thou rue?
Remember aye the ocean’s deeps are mute–
The shallows roar;
Worth is the ocean: fame is the bruit
Along the shore.”
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