The true Martha has the wishing heart, and her fingers are full of virtue. She is an argument in herself, and her presence without words works true miracles, revealing the mystic meaning of Christ in herself, and causing every one who _meets_ or _sees_ her to be miraculously affected in some way or other. * * * * * Obviously the service of Martha is always personal. Therefore nothing anonymous is Christian, and philanthropical societies, parliaments, reform movements, and the like are doomed to failure unless they are served by men and women with Christ-faces. X MAKING WEST EAST ... who made West East And gave to Man A new heaven and a new earth, As Holy John hath prophesied of Me. The West seems to have the tradition of the way of Martha, England especially. Our Victorian era, of which the popular teachers were Kingsley, Carlyle, Ruskin, was essentially an era of work and deeds rather than of faith. As children, we in our prime to-day were brought up on the gospel of work. Thoughts about one’s soul were considered rather ignoble: they were smoke that we had to consume ourselves. We were urged to forget the question of our souls and _work_. The whole world was working, all the factories of England sang together. Every man in England, from the highest to the lowest, knew when he wakened each morning that he had that day some real and indispensable work to do. The child must learn his lesson in that light. “If I hear of an artist of promise,” says Ruskin, “the first question I ask is, ‘Does he work?’” Ruskin dismissed Whistler, who painted rather in the way of Mary, because he obviously did not work. All great men whatsoever worked. The heights by great men reached and kept Were not attained by sudden flight, But they, while their companions slept, Were toiling upward in the night. If you want to be a Knox or a Luther or a Cromwell or a Frederick or a Bismarck you must work. The spirit of industry seemed to be Christianity itself. In reading Froude’s history one seemed to gain the idea that the Reformation meant getting rid of idleness and monks and abbeys, and substituting noble labour, honest craftsmen, and factories. It is a modern misapprehension. There was a time when we used to sing a hymn extravagantly opposed to the gospel of work— Doing is a deadly thing, Doing ends in death. We have a reputation for work. Most Russians would be incredulous if told that Englishmen had ever sung such words. Yet they have, and we know that we are not like the ants who have always been working and always will work. We have been out of love with work before and will be again.