But again the quarry is back of the temple. Each one's heart is the
quarry out of which comes all that the person builds into his life.
"As he thinketh in his heart so is he." Everything that appears in our
lives comes out of our hearts. All our acts are first thoughts. The
artist's picture, the poet's poem, the singer's song, the architect's
building, are thoughts before they are wrought out into forms of
beauty. All dispositions, tempers, feelings, words, and acts start in
the heart. If the workmen had quarried faulty stones in the caverns,
the temple would have been spoiled. An evil heart, with stained
thoughts, impure imaginings, blurred feelings, can never build up a
fair and lovely character.
We need to guard our heart-quarry with all diligence, since out of it
are the issues of life. The thoughts build the life and make the
character. White thoughts rear up a beautiful fabric before God and
man. Soiled thoughts pile up a stained life, without beauty or honor.
We should look well, therefore, to our heart-quarry, where the work
goes on in the darkness without ceasing. If all be right there we need
give little concern to the building of character. Diligent
heart-keeping yields a life unspotted from the world.
A little child had been reading the beatitudes, and was asked which of
the qualities named in them she most desired. "I would rather be pure
in heart," she said.
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