"It is a very fine sword, indeed," he said, "but there is one thing about it I would have preferred different. The inscription should be on the blade, not on the scabbard. The scabbard may be taken from us; the sword, never." The world spends too much time, money and energy on the scabbard of life; too little on the sword. The scabbard represents outside show, vanity and display; the sword, intrinsic worth. The scabbard is ever the semblance; the sword the reality. The scabbard is the temporal; the sword is the eternal. The scabbard is the body; the sword is the soul. The scabbard typifies the material side of life; the sword the true, the spiritual, the ideal. The man who does not dare follow his own convictions, but who lives in terror of what society will say, falling prostrate before the golden calf of public opinion, is living an empty life of mere show. He is sacrificing his individuality, his divine right to live his life in harmony with his own high ideals, to a cowardly, toadying fear of the world. He is not a voice, with the strong note of individual purpose; he is but the thin echo of the voice of thousands. He is not brightening, sharpening and using the sword of his life in true warfare; he is lazily ornamenting a useless scabbard with the hieroglyphics of his folly. The man who lives beyond his means, who mortgages his future for his present, who is generous before he is just, who is sacrificing everything to keep up with the procession of his superiors, is really losing much of life. He, too, is decorating the scabbard, and letting the sword rust in its sheath. Life is not a competition with others. In its truest sense it is rivalry with ourselves. We should each day seek to break the record of our yesterday. We should seek each day to live stronger, better, truer lives; each day to master some weakness of yesterday; each day to repair past follies; each day to surpass ourselves. And this is but progress. And individual, conscious progress, progress unending and unlimited, is the one great thing that differentiates man from all the other animals. Then we will care naught for the pretty, useless decorations of society's approval on the scabbard. For us it will be enough to know that the blade of our purpose is kept ever keen and sharp for the defense of right and truth, never to wrong the rights of others, but ever to right the wrongs of ourselves and those around us.