Dependent as he feels himself to be for all he is and all
he may become, the means of help--self-help even--and the law of it must
be from that same power, whose efficient working he has recognized with
a thankful heart. Where else shall he look except to that experience of
exaltation during whose continuance he plucked a natural trust for the
future, a reasonable belief in Providence, and a humble readiness to
accept the partial ills of life? In life's valleys, then, as on its
summits, in the darkness as in the light, he may retain that once
confided trust; not that he looks for miracle, or any specific and
particularizing care, it may be, but that in the normal course of things
he believes in the natural alliance of that arm of infinite power with
himself. In depression, in trouble, in struggle, such as all life
exhibits, he will be no more solitary than in his hours of blessing.
Thus, through helplessness also, he establishes a direct relation with
God, which is also a reality of experience, as vital in the cry for aid
as in the offering of thanks. The gratitude of the soul may be likened
to that morning prayer of the race which was little more than praise
with uplifted hands; the helplessness of man is rather the evening
prayer of the Christian age, which with bowed head implores the grace of
God to shield him through the night.
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