The question of paramount importance, therefore, to be kept ever before the mind, is this: How, as a matter of fact, am I influencing the persons with whom I am in contact? How, as an employer, am I influencing my employés? How, as a citizen, am I influencing my fellow-citizens? How does the effect of my personality tell on wife and children and friends? Am I supremely interested in getting the best results out of the people with whom I am in touch? Am I helping them to make the most of themselves? There are certain obvious marks of the higher life. One is Purity. This does not mean that the senses shall be suppressed, but that the inferior part of our nature shall be taken up into the superior, the senses wedded to the soul. A second mark of the higher life is Serenity, and there is perhaps no surer sign by which exalted natures can be known. To be serene under all circumstances whatsoever, even in moments of imminent peril, in times of sudden reversal of fortune, of grievous personal loss or of public calamity, is the unmistakable badge of moral ripeness. But is it possible to preserve one’s serenity in the supreme trials of life? It is possible, I should answer, if we have formed the habit of asking on every occasion. What is it right to do now? The habit of fixing our attention on how we are to conduct ourselves, on what, in a given situation and quite apart from our feelings, it is right to do, steadies the pulse, clears the eye and preserves the tranquillity of the soul. And there is always something which it is right to do, even in the most desperate circumstances, if it be only to maintain our dignity as human beings, to keep up the drooping spirits of those around us, and to assist our weaker brethren to the last. Another token of the higher life, which indeed is implied in the former, is the habit of taking what is called an objective or Impersonal View of our personal relations. This is especially important as helpful to self-control. We are at best but tyros in the art of living, so long as we continue to give effect in our dealings with others to our mere personal antipathies and sympathies. As soon as we learn to speak and act medicinally, not from personal resentment or under the impulse of personal attraction, but with a view to promoting just the good in others, the whole atmosphere in which we breathe changes; a kind of perpetual sunshine illuminates our inner world, the clouds of hate and the mists of passionate feeling dissolve and peace reigns within the borders of the soul.