THOUGHTS FOR THE KIT-BAG 
 
THOUGHTS 
 FOR THE KIT-BAG 
 
 By 
 ELIZABETH GRINNELL 
 
 Foreword by Malcolm James MacLeod 
 
 ASSOCIATION PRESS 
 
 New York: 124 East 28th Street 
 1918 
 
4? & 
 
 Copyright, 1918, by 
 
 The International Committee of 
 
 Young Men's Christian Associations 
 
 APR 12 !3;8 
 
 ©CI.A494544 
 SW$ t 
 
FOREWORD 
 
 The author of this little volume is known 
 in California as an authority on birds, 
 her books being used as textbooks in the 
 schools of the state. Her lovely home in 
 Pasadena is known as the "Birds' Retreat" 
 and is a sort of Mecca for bird-lovers from 
 everywhere. 
 
 I have spent many a delightful after- 
 noon with her, roaming over her beautiful 
 grounds, as she talked on how many sorts 
 of weed-seeds the linnets eat, and the 
 phcebe's habit of "sitting all alone," and 
 how the woodpeckers scatter their chips 
 about the base of the tree they are work- 
 ing in, and how the warbler makes believe 
 he is wounded when the nest is approached, 
 and how the mocking bird can take a 
 butterfly on the wing, or a grasshopper on 
 the jump. Ah me! 
 
 "What peaceful hours I once enjoyed; 
 How sweet their memory still !" 
 
 And Mrs. Grinnell is not only an ornith- 
 ologist; she is a many-sided naturalist and 
 a voluminous writer along other lines. 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 Her first book was entitled "How John 
 and I Brought Up the Child." Then she 
 has written of "Gold-hunting in Alaska," 
 and of her ten years' life among the In- 
 dians, besides several other volumes. 
 When I last saw her some eight years 
 ago, her greatest passion was in finding 
 homes for orphan children. 
 
 I once had a rather amusing experience 
 with Mrs. Grinnell, which it may be no 
 violation of friendship to relate. She 
 called to see me one morning and said: 
 
 "I am going to have David Starr Jordan 
 and some friends dine with me on Satur- 
 day evening and I want you and your 
 good wife to join us." 
 
 I said: "Mrs. Grinnell, I'm very sorry, 
 I have never gone out to a Saturday even- 
 ing dinner in my life and I'm afraid I shall 
 have to ask to be excused." 
 
 "Oh, but," she answered, "you must 
 come. You need not dress. Come just as 
 you are, in your overalls, if that will make 
 it easier; I will excuse you immediately 
 after dinner. I want you to know Presi- 
 dent Jordan — he's such a splendid fellow!" 
 
 "But, my dear Mrs. Grinnell, it's Wed- 
 nesday, and I haven't written one solitary 
 
 vi 
 
Thoughts fo r the Kit - B a g 
 
 line of my Sunday's sermon yet, and, to 
 tell you the truth, I'm beginning to feel a 
 bit shaky. I would love to meet Dr. 
 Jordan and to enjoy your gracious hospi- 
 tality, but for the life of me I don't see 
 how I can arrange it this time." 
 
 But anyone who knows Mrs. Grinnell 
 will understand that with her friends she 
 "doesn't take No for an answer." And 
 after some further skirmishing, she said, 
 as she rose to go: 
 
 "Now, dinner is at seven o'clock. I shall 
 expect you." 
 
 Finding my pleas of no avail, and evi- 
 dently weakening somewhat under her 
 commanding insistence, I said as she was 
 passing out the door, thinking myself per- 
 fectly safe in the suggestion: 
 
 "Well, now, I'll tell you what I'll do. 
 If you write a sermon for me for Sunday 
 morning, we will be delighted to avail our- 
 selves of the great pleasure of dining with 
 you and Dr. Grinnell on Saturday even- 
 ing." 
 
 Quick as a report from a pistol, she re- 
 turned : 
 
 "It's a bargain. Good-by." And off she 
 shot into the orange grove. 
 
 vii 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 When I returned to my study and re- 
 hearsed the incident to my wife, we both 
 laughed over it and passed it off as a char- 
 acteristic pleasantry. It was a clever way 
 of excusing me and letting me down easy, 
 we agreed, after seeing my homiletical em- 
 barrassment. So for the time we thought 
 nothing more about it. 
 
 Thursday and Friday were beautiful 
 days — days that only California can boast, 
 but Saturday morning dawned in a down- 
 pour. I have rarely seen such a deluge 
 even in the wettest season of this sup- 
 posedly rainless state. Bear in mind that 
 California does everything in a big, gen- 
 erous way. It has the biggest trees, and 
 the biggest mountains, and the biggest fish, 
 and the biggest ranches, and the greatest 
 orchards, and the tallest flowers in our 
 land. It has the largest telescope in the 
 world. And when it gets down to real 
 earnest business, it rains Mississippis and 
 Amazons. Nowhere, it seems, are the 
 drops so big, or so pelting, or so wet. 
 Sometimes it takes Jupiter Pluvius a pow- 
 erful long time making up his mind to 
 start, but once his mind is made up, the 
 old Californian knows it's time to go 
 
 viii 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 closet-hunting for last year's rubbers and 
 umbrellas and rain-coats. 
 
 I spent the morning in my study, put- 
 ting the finishing touches on my sermon, 
 and rehearsing it to the accompaniment of 
 the driving storm. What was my surprise 
 when about noon a special messenger boy 
 rang my bell and there was handed me a 
 package, which, on opening, I found to be 
 a carefully written sermon of twenty-two 
 large foolscap pages, fresh from the type- 
 writer, on Matt. 4: 1, "Then was Jesus led 
 up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be 
 tempted of the devil." 
 
 I called my wife and we went into the 
 library and read it together. It was strong 
 and bright and logical and scriptural, and 
 perhaps hyper-orthodox. It had its intro- 
 duction, its headings, its conclusion. It 
 was a straight-from-the-shoulder clean-cut 
 challenge for the personality of His Satanic 
 Majesty. 
 
 "Well, dear," I ventured, as we finished 
 the last page, "it's no joke, is it ?" 
 
 "It certainly is not," she answered. "I 
 guess we're in for the dinner." 
 
 Six o'clock came, and the clouds were 
 still tumbling down in reservoirs. The 
 
 ix 
 
Thoughts for the Kit-Bag 
 
 night was dark, the wind was cold. The 
 streets were real rivers, rushing down from 
 the mountains. Oh, such a night! We 
 took our rubber-coats and top-boots and a 
 lantern, and plunged out into the black- 
 ness. The distance was about a mile and 
 a half, four blocks of which we had to 
 tramp, or rather wade. It was a fine 
 study in navigation. 
 
 On arriving at the "Retreat" and hurry- 
 ing through the shaded driveway, we re- 
 marked how quiet and damp and dimly 
 lighted the home appeared. Could it be a 
 joke after all? So, stealing up on the porch 
 and tiptoeing about, we peered through 
 the window. There was no evidence of the 
 big Stanford President or any guests in 
 drenched attire drying themselves. We 
 walked around to the rear. There was no 
 odor of canvas-back duck or fatted calf. 
 Nothing but an owl or some feathered 
 watchman from his perch in the pepper 
 tree saluted us, as much as to say, "What 
 in the world are you doing out such a night 
 as this?" Then once more we crept up on 
 the porch for another peep through the 
 lattice. But this time one of us had 
 stumbled, and a voice from within rang 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 out into the storm, challenging the burglar 
 and calling, "Who's there?" 
 
 Many a laugh we had later over our 
 dinner party. I have still the sermon filed 
 away among my literary archives. I have 
 not preached it as yet, but I have read it 
 many times with profit and interest and 
 delight. 
 
 Mrs. Grinnell has written some charming 
 stories. She has struck off from her bril- 
 liant pen some poetry of a very high order. 
 She is a sermonizer, I can vouch, of no mean 
 art. She is a great Calvinistic theologian; 
 and I think that those who read this little 
 volume will concede that she is a profound 
 religious psychologist. 
 
 Malcolm James MacLeod. 
 
 XI 
 
THOUGHTS FOR THE KIT-BAG 
 
 It is a good thing to come face to face 
 with a song bird whether alive or in a 
 picture. 
 
 I have persuaded this prince of singers 
 to sit upon my hand, and here do I send 
 his photograph, with my hand, to every 
 soldier in every land. 
 
 In his home land this thrasher bird is 
 recognized as the Caruso of arboreal sing- 
 ers. In the melody from his throat, before 
 the shadows rise and dress themselves in 
 the morning, is the combined harmony of 
 gladness and triumph, surprise and peace. 
 
 At first it is a warble of welcome, then a 
 love-song as from a joy-breaking heart, 
 then a clear note of victory as when the 
 battle is past, and then a lullaby tender 
 and low. And then he rests, caressing his 
 own breast as if well pleased with himself. 
 And yet no idle dandy is he, for he works 
 for a living, and wears, not the dress suit 
 of robin or oriole, but plain khaki uniform 
 from head to foot. 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 The melody of the thrasher's song, pro- 
 vided the heart's ear be alert, comforts 
 and rebukes, chastens and uplifts, yes, and 
 compensates. In my case, in the early 
 summer of this year 191 7, it has shamed 
 me, that I, "a soldier of the Cross," should 
 not be more loyal than to complain. 
 
 To rebel is better than to complain. If 
 a person rebel he may be victor or take his 
 punishment with a hard swallow, but to 
 whine one's way through misery is to be 
 a dog. 
 
 Under the spell of the song bird I was 
 ashamed. And this is why I am sending 
 the bird and my hand and my thoughts to 
 every soldier in every land. In his clear 
 eye may you read the message you most 
 sorely need. As you look long into that 
 clear eye, the window of his soul, some 
 voice within you or outside of you may 
 articulate the message he so silently brings. 
 
 Lying here on my cot, under the cypress 
 trees for a hospital ward, surrounded with 
 every comfort, but in the constant pain of 
 a severe wound, I discovered myself pity- 
 
Thoughts for the Kit-Bag 
 
 ing myself; and the thrasher bird's song 
 shamed me. 
 
 Pitying oneself all the time soon leads 
 one to be self-centered, peevish, covetous 
 of too speedy restoration. Thus was I 
 convinced that I, of all the world, was the 
 super-sufferer. But I came to myself with 
 long strides of resolve, while the bird sang 
 from the apex of the cypress tree, my heart 
 acting as interpreter in the gloaming. 
 Clear came the song — 
 
 "Self pity is a slow poison. 
 Rise above it or the soul of you will 
 
 dwindle to a skeleton. 
 Rise above it. Rise above it." 
 
 Then flew the bird to the tip of a blue 
 gum tree a hundred feet away and caroled 
 a love ditty. 
 
 The suggestion of shame at my self- 
 centered protest against my fate gave 
 place to the resolve that warmed my 
 heart, bidding me do something for others 
 who suffer. The resolve was the fashion- 
 ing of this little book, no bigger than a 
 breast pocket, albeit I was unable to lift 
 my head from my pillow. 
 
 3 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 With the resolve came the conviction 
 that loaned me a sense of certain achieve- 
 ment, that one can reach out in the dark, 
 as I am now doing for the pencil and pad, 
 and scrawl a decipherable sentiment, to be 
 interpreted by daylight, and huddled with 
 others of its kind, to be packed at last like 
 birdshot into a shell of a book. 
 
 My message must be a single sentiment 
 at a time, for pain and fatigue have a firm 
 grip in spite of the resolve. But now as 
 ever a resolve loyal and true will win. 
 
 It is impossible under the circumstances 
 to write in chapters, or do any consecutive 
 work. A paragraph at a time, and only 
 now and then, will make me feel the long 
 summer is not wasted. Were it only for 
 companionship to myself, I would make 
 the effort. Effort is very good medicine. 
 
 When I lifted the shotgun one day last 
 winter and took aim at a wicked feline foe 
 about to rob my thrasher's nest, I knew 
 full well that not every little shot would 
 hit the mark, but in all probability one or 
 two would. And so, my soldier friends, 
 may it be with my birdshot thoughts. 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 It doesn't take much of a genius to use 
 a shotgun. 
 
 Thoughts, like birds, sometimes stop to 
 preen themselves, as it were; more often 
 they fly swiftly in a whirr of wings. I 
 catch the whirr of wings and imprison for 
 you now and then a thought. I claim no 
 absolute originality. There is none. 
 
 Thoughts are, and were, and always 
 have been, since man began to multiply 
 and replenish the earth with rhetoric. 
 
 There is no new thought in all the world, 
 for we but catch the echo of the old ones, 
 calling them our very own, since possibly 
 we have never met them before. 
 
 Let us see to it in advance of catching 
 them, that the thoughts we would pursue 
 are worthy, or give up the chase. 
 
 I stood one day, long past it seems to 
 me, but really little longer ago than yes- 
 terday, in the path of a Great Terror. As 
 it passed it smote me hip and thigh, leav- 
 ing me in helpless agony. 
 
 No time was afforded me to resist the 
 attack, but thank God, the soul may with- 
 stand resulting conditions and triumph 
 over the flesh. 
 
 5 
 
Thoughts for the Kit-Bag 
 
 The possibility of triumph over the flesh 
 enthrones the mind as a sovereign — power- 
 ful, sublime, like God himself. An ex- 
 plosion of boiling oil in peaceful home 
 pursuits or the shrapnel of the battle field 
 may strike the unresisting flesh, while the 
 soul, the real Person, rises to strike back 
 blow upon blow at pain, and weakness, and 
 despair. 
 
 Always the Soul is the Victor. 
 
 Matters that concern us are so arranged 
 without our knowledge or consent that the 
 flesh habitually takes the soul around with 
 it wherever it goes, and so insures for itself 
 a certain inside armor as it were, like a 
 vest of steel under the coat of a soldier. 
 
 True, the soul may be relieved of the 
 flesh at any time without our will or con- 
 sent, but Life will go on, if so be we have 
 not of ourselves done violence to the soul. 
 
 Confidence in the enduring qualities of 
 the soul, like the sun at midday (which 
 day would otherwise be night), lights the 
 devious road we are traveling to Some- 
 where — Somewhere being undefined, unlo- 
 cated, but none the less certain according 
 
 6 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 to our faith, our faith in that Somewhere 
 being as reasonably assured as that to- 
 morrow's sun will rise in the east. 
 
 Thank God for thoughts that are born 
 of that same reasonable assurance as to 
 the Somewhere we are marching toward — 
 thoughts, not idle musings unworthy of a 
 soldier's mind, but thoughts that make 
 music, or invent, or carve, or calculate, like 
 the faithful tools our thoughts should be. 
 
 Thoughts left at random may become 
 pirates, or bandits, or mutineers. Trained 
 thoughts are like soldiers, obedient, brave, 
 loyal to the best Life. 
 
 I know a man who all his life has 
 missed the satisfaction of gathering luscious 
 thoughts as one picks fruit from bush or 
 tree; or, gathering a scant handful now and 
 then, he lacked the art of preserving the 
 harvest for future use before it spoiled, as 
 housewives do make marmalade. 
 
 God is the Great Will personified. The 
 strength of a human life is gone if the will 
 is gone. The will is the strength of any 
 man, as the sap of a tree is its strength. 
 
 7 
 
Thoughts for the Kit-Bag 
 
 When the sap has been drained by long 
 practice from the maple, that grand maple 
 is dead. It can be of no further use in 
 the world but to serve as back logs to the 
 chimney fire. We used to burn such back 
 in Maine, with a regretful memory of the 
 sugaring off that used to be. 
 
 God's best gift to man is the will, God's 
 Will being Himself. A man should cherish 
 the power of his will as the miser treasures 
 his hoard. 
 
 The strength of a man's will increases 
 in proportion to its use, whether for good 
 or evil. 
 
 A very strong will, made strong by use 
 in the interests of evil, soon destroys the 
 possessor of it. 
 
 A very weak will persistently exercised 
 grows high as heaven, and always toward 
 heaven, heaven representing our conception 
 of what is highest. 
 
 I said "God's best gift to man is the 
 will, God's Will being Himself." What 
 then, can we destroy that part of God 
 which He gave us to profit by? 
 
 God gave Jesus Christ, that is Himself, 
 
 8 
 
Thoughts for the Kit-Bag 
 
 to the world, to the whole world for that 
 world to possess. 
 
 It is written that by the hand of man 
 Jesus Christ met death. But Jesus Christ 
 is not dead. 
 
 A man may crucify in himself what was 
 intended for his salvation, but salvation is 
 not dead. 
 
 A man's will was intended for his salva- 
 tion, but if a man do violence to that best 
 gift, he crucifies it as far as he himself is 
 affected. 
 
 The Will of God may be changed, so far 
 as the possessor of it is concerned, by a 
 sort of spiritual chemistry into self-poison. 
 
 And God breathed into man the breath 
 of life from His own eternal Source. 
 
 If a man hold his breath until he die, 
 has he then destroyed any portion of the 
 Source? He has indeed destroyed himself. 
 The Source is forever, world without end. 
 
 The Will of God is forever. That He 
 wanted us to have and to hold that Will 
 forever, he taught us in the prayer, "Thy 
 Will be done." 
 
 9 
 
T hought s for the Kit- B ag 
 
 If a man reject the Will of God, cast it 
 out of the house of his soul as it were, he 
 has nothing left in the house but counter- 
 feit. Always counterfeit is worthless, save 
 as the means of convicting its owner of 
 felony. But the felon conserves his coun- 
 terfeit that he may pass it as genuine. 
 Some men claim to be doing God's will 
 when they are but counterfeiting. 
 
 The value of anything must be great, to 
 be worth so much trouble and danger to 
 the counterfeiter. 
 
 There are counterfeit Christians, and 
 true Christians who never heard of God 
 by that name. 
 
 How can a man know that his will is 
 God's will? God has given us the ability 
 to know. It is our duty to know. To 
 know is to be like God himself. 
 
 A person has no excuse for saying "I do 
 not know" in any vital point. 
 
 We have reason to believe that a "still, 
 small Voice" speaks to every soul. Some- 
 times it is almost inarticulate, again a 
 whisper, and again a clear insistent voice. 
 There may be evil voices, but these are 
 
 10 
 
Thoughts for the Kit-Bag 
 
 not The Voice, and it is given to every 
 man to distinguish between the voices; 
 else how can he be held accountable, as 
 he most certainly is, for his acts, which 
 grow from his thoughts? It is unexplain- 
 abfe, but none the less incontrovertible, 
 according to the best testimony we have. 
 
 The First Man heard the Voice in the 
 Garden and replied without hesitation. 
 St. Paul, hearing the voice of Jesus for the 
 first time, without visual proof, recognized 
 it and listened. 
 
 When Dr. Livingstone in darkest Africa 
 attempted to tell a native wise woman 
 about God, as we understand Him, the so- 
 called savage replied, "O, I am so glad 
 you know about this God. I have known 
 him a long while." 
 
 If one doesn't believe in the Voice, but 
 would really like to hear or know it, one 
 can ask that Voice to speak when all other 
 voices are still, and see what answer he 
 may have. "Before they call, I will an- 
 swer; and while they are yet speaking, I 
 will hear" is the Promise. 
 
 Did any great commander, any great 
 
 ii 
 
Thoughts fo r the Kit - B ag 
 
 apostle, any great statesman, any monarch 
 even, ever say to the people, "While ye 
 are yet speaking I will answer" ? 
 
 Is it so much as said of these that they 
 made such a promise? Not the closest 
 adherent of any great leader has assumed 
 so much and so great a thing of a master. 
 
 This is one reason why I believe in God 
 with all my might, God as we have been 
 introduced to Him in a very infinitesimal 
 way. 
 
 In the soul of us all we see that there 
 must be a Greater Commander of men 
 than belongs to human society. Concep- 
 tions of Him, as afforded us, are vastly 
 different and beyond our conceptions of 
 human personality, but this does not ab- 
 rogate the fact. 
 
 Not all obey the Voice. The interests 
 of man's Church, and man's State, and 
 man's financial affairs smother the Voice. 
 It is a pretty tangled labyrinth, I admit, 
 but God is able. Let us try to find Him. 
 
 What shall a man do with a will that 
 has gone wrong? That is a secret worth 
 knowing. It is one of God's secrets. "His 
 
 12 
 
Thoughts fo r the Kit - B a g 
 
 secrets are with men," the greatest book of 
 reference says. 
 
 Go straight and ask the friend of puzzled 
 soldiers, the Y M C A comrade of the puz- 
 zled soldier, who is sometimes seen with a 
 checkerboard under one arm and the Book 
 of Reference under the other. I believe he 
 can tell you what to do with a will that 
 has gone wrong. 
 
 I have a suspicion that he will tell you 
 there is no other way to relieve the situa- 
 tion when a man's will has gone wrong but 
 to get help from the outside of him. 
 
 I have not read of any savage people in 
 the world who are ashamed to be surprised 
 at their prayers, and we are assured that 
 savage folk everywhere do pray. It seems 
 strange that some who are not savages are 
 ashamed if caught at their prayers. 
 
 I heard of a man who swore by a great 
 oath, "There is no God." 
 
 Why does any man swear by God? I 
 suppose it is because there is none greater. 
 
 By his very oath a man acknowledges 
 God. 
 
 Would a soldier of any country stand 
 
 13 
 
Thoughts fo r the K i t - B a g 
 
 shamelessly by and hear without protest 
 the name of his country's ruler slandered 
 or maligned ? 
 
 When I began these notes I resolved 
 that the spirit of them should be humor- 
 ous or philosophical and not at all reli- 
 gious. 
 
 As I lie here facing the blue sky, unable 
 to fight or resent physically any possible 
 indignity that might be offered, or even 
 to help myself to a drink of water, I have 
 naturally drifted away from humor and 
 philosophy as such. 
 
 It is hard to crack a joke when one is 
 unable to go after a joke or to get away 
 with one if it happened one's way. When 
 a person has recently been or is now on 
 the brink of something desperate, some ir- 
 resistible crisis which opens upon new and 
 untried life and conditions, one is serious 
 naturally. 
 
 Perhaps it is better so, since the soldiers 
 to whom I am sending my little book must 
 of necessity be one and all upon the brink 
 of something desperately serious, whether 
 living or dying. 
 
 14 
 
Thoughts for the Kit-Bag 
 
 But note that I am not sad, though 
 serious. No soldier of the Cross and no 
 soldier of his country should be sad. Glad- 
 ness itself may be serious. 
 
 To be glad is to be good. Who ever 
 heard of a professional villain being glad? 
 He may laugh, but his laugh has no note 
 of gladness, rather of irony. 
 
 I laugh softly to myself in the darkest 
 night at some new comfortable thought 
 that visits me, as if on purpose to be a 
 comrade to me. 
 
 And perchance a sick or wounded soldier 
 will laugh softly to himself when some 
 comforting word of mine may reach him. 
 
 Thoughts of ours are one another's 
 friends, sitting beside us and holding hands 
 and smoothing the brow of pain, or cheer- 
 ing the spirit in weakness. Accept my 
 thoughts, my soldier friend, as they come 
 to me and I send them to you. 
 
 It would seem that possibly the happy 
 and healthy and unwounded are not likely 
 to get any of my message. Bless them! 
 When I shall have fought my way to a 
 
 is 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 victorious peace with pain and sleepless 
 suffering, my pen may be dipped in the 
 ink of triumphant joy, and to the gladdest 
 of the glad will I indite all the pent-up 
 merriment which has been the portion of 
 my lot hitherto. 
 
 To be merry now is out of the question. 
 Should one indulge in merriment at such 
 a time, the wise might confidently conclude 
 that surgical insanity had taken the throne. 
 What one needs is strength, the resolve to 
 win out, the determination to conquer. 
 Thoughts of God give all these and plenty 
 more. Therefore, my wounded friend, let 
 us have thoughts of God. We will be 
 merry when the time comes. 
 
 After all, am I wrong? Can a person be 
 merry under fire? 
 
 It is twelve o'clock in the night. The 
 stars shine. My pencil is feeling its way 
 across the page, as you and I feel our way 
 across life's page, each of us confident that 
 something good will come out of it all in 
 the morning. 
 
 Did I write "in the morning"? Some- 
 thing good is coming out of it now to me 
 
 16 
 
Thoughts for the Kit-Bag 
 
 and I am glad to be alive. Are you glad 
 to be alive? 
 
 When a man's conscience is at ease, the 
 citadel of his judgment is in danger of 
 pillage. 
 
 Yes, I am glad to be alive. 
 
 If a person be not loyal to his own life, 
 how can he be loyal to his commander or 
 to his country? 
 
 I am not important enough for a miracle. 
 The conceited ask for miracles. Therefore 
 I pray for patience to wait for natural 
 recovery. 
 
 Within ten feet or more of my cot is a 
 colony of honey bees. They work day and 
 night, when the night is not wet or cold. 
 I hear them making gentle melody with 
 their myriads of gauzy wings, and I can 
 see them enter and leave the hive. Always 
 the entrance to a bee hive is as clean as 
 the wax inside. 
 
 Sometimes a bee heavily laden drops at 
 the doorway, too weary to go further. She 
 
 17 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 will probably never rise again, for, once 
 losing heart in impossible work, a bee dies. 
 If she dies upon the threshold, her com- 
 panions lift her and drop her outside. She 
 may lie on the ground and she may fall 
 into a crevasse. 
 
 In like manner have I seen the native 
 American Indians deposit their dead in 
 crevasses or upon the top of the ground. 
 If in a crevasse the dead are safe from 
 marauding wolves, or if on the ground the 
 body is previously wrapped in stout dried 
 hides. 
 
 The more I watch these bees the better 
 I think of what we call inferior beings. I 
 think them superior in many ways. If a 
 honey bee sails away from home for sweets 
 she returns not without them, provided 
 there be any sweets within four or five 
 miles of her starting place. A few flights 
 as long as this enfeeble her wings so that 
 her life's work is finished in three or four 
 months. 
 
 But what of the length of any life, if so 
 be that a honey bee or a human shall have 
 done life's work or any part of it with 
 good will and efficiency ? Better be a honey 
 
 18 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 worker one short summer than an idle 
 human being for seventy years. 
 
 I think of God as a Person. I seem 
 nearer to Him when I want to call Him. 
 The theologians call Him a great "Being" 
 when they do not call him "God." I 
 think of Him as "Person," as a Father or 
 Brother of our own race, who sees and 
 hears and looks after us long after we have 
 turned away from Him, as if He thought 
 we might turn back. He is glad when we 
 turn back. 
 
 I do not trouble myself about the form 
 of that Person. I would rather know more 
 of His influence and of His spirit. The 
 spirit of any person is more important than 
 the form. 
 
 Of course many things are purposely left 
 for us to conjecture or imagine. To com- 
 prehend the exact nature of such a Person 
 as The God must be I think would crush a 
 human mind. 
 
 So I find comfort and strength in imag- 
 inings which I am confident are often 
 lighted from above, like rooms with shaded 
 lamps in the ceiling. 
 
 19 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 I do not trouble to understand about the 
 form of the wind which lifts a ship or 
 house, or coaxes a lily to bow its head or a 
 Canterbury bell to ring without sound. 
 The wind to me is Power; God is Person 
 and Power. 
 
 If you feel God-forsaken and miserable, 
 go straight and have mercy upon some- 
 body. By having a stock of mercy and 
 sympathy for others, a man joins hands 
 with God in the great work He has to do. 
 God cannot get along with the work with- 
 out our help. 
 
 How do you know that God is not more 
 miserable than you can possibly be under 
 any circumstances? How do you know 
 but God needs somebody to comfort Him ? 
 Let us have mercy on God and give Him 
 as little trouble as possible. 
 
 It is in the great heart of God to take 
 so much trouble on our behalf that He 
 would follow us down into shadows and 
 depths and even death to help us. It is a 
 good thing to have sympathy with God in 
 these trying times. 
 
 20 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 These thoughts may be new to you, but 
 God is able to make of them a sort of 
 spiritual life insurance when life's war is 
 over. 
 
 There are office-seekers in politics, the 
 more's the pity, according to the object in 
 view by the seeker. There is one office 
 the most ambitious may attain. Are you, 
 yourself, a worthy administrator or mayor 
 in your little town of Years ? 
 
 It is strange that nobody seems to re- 
 member or to know anything about Mother 
 Time. 
 
 Father Time was not gallant when he 
 had his picture taken so many times mow- 
 ing down the daisies with a scythe. Did 
 Mother Time plant the daisies? 
 
 What about a man's will being seem- 
 ingly as strong as a lion to do the wrong 
 thing ? 
 
 The Great Reference Book says some- 
 thing about the Saviour of men being a 
 Lion. Let the Lion meet the lion in your 
 soul and conquer. 
 
 A man's soul is his battle ground. Shall 
 
Thoughts fo r the Kit - B ag 
 
 this battle ground be covered one day with 
 the white skeletons of failure and despair, 
 or shall lilies of endurance nourished by 
 heart's blood bear testimony to triumph ? 
 
 After all that may be said in disfavor 
 of a hermit, no one can doubt that all 
 persons should be absolutely alone occa- 
 sionally. I suppose that sometimes and 
 under certain conditions a soldier longs to 
 be alone. A friend of mine in France 
 today writes me that "on leave" he in- 
 variably goes off by himself, into the 
 country if possible. 
 
 A person may have many things and 
 yet his whole life be as bare as a skeleton. 
 
 Some people eat hash habitually, from a 
 mental viewpoint — left-overs from such 
 things as should have gone to the dogs. 
 
 Many things are good and wholesome in 
 themselves, but when served with bad ac- 
 companiments are poor aliment for the soul. 
 The "movies" are an illustration. Pictures 
 of rare worth, of adventure and achieve- 
 ment, and love, and detective work, would 
 one and all invigorate, were it not for a 
 
 22 
 
Thoughts fo r the Kit - B a g 
 
 scrap of bad meat, an evil suggestion, or 
 a malicious slander of truth, tossed into 
 the banquet by accident or on purpose. 
 
 If one but have the discrimination which 
 is helpful, he may be able to reject the 
 suggestion or the slander and be nourished 
 by the better things. 
 
 The smell of food when one is hungry 
 excites the salivary glands of the mouth; 
 so does the sympathetic suggestion of grief 
 excite the tear ducts of the eyes. 
 
 If you have lost sight of God you would 
 better turn back; you will find Him just 
 where you left Him. 
 
 Someone has said that a brother of- 
 fended is harder to be won than a strong 
 city. Better get offended with oneself oc- 
 casionally than with a brother. 
 
 Some folk wear calico thoughts on their 
 mental backs as they wear calico shirts on 
 their bodies, that shrink and fade in the 
 wearing and washing. He is a favorite of 
 good fortune and hard work who chooses 
 shimmering silk brocade thoughts that will 
 
 23 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 "stand alone." By our thoughts we asso- 
 ciate with the nobility of every age and 
 land, or we may crawl in the mire and 
 black ooze with things that disgust, slugs 
 and other slimy forms that revel in filth. 
 
 There is some excuse for these, for they 
 continue in their native element; but man 
 belongs to the air and the sky and the 
 forests that are clean and wholesome. He 
 should abide there. 
 
 The difference between a man's wit and 
 the scythe he cuts the hay with is this. 
 He whets the scythe to make it sharp and 
 must keep whetting. Scythes grow dull 
 with the using. Wit grows keen with the 
 using. 
 
 God gave us the instinct of fear for self- 
 protection. Worry is not fear. Worry is 
 an impediment to travel which we have 
 picked up of ourselves. It does not be- 
 long in our kit. 
 
 Every act of a well-balanced man is 
 honor to God, love of country, and devo- 
 tion to duty. 
 
 Recreation is not forgetfulness of honor, 
 24 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 or love, or duty. Recreation is a stabilizer 
 of honor and love and duty. 
 
 What is it for a man to be lost ? He has 
 simply forgotten the way he was going or 
 lost his compass as to direction. When 
 one feels instinctively the lost feeling com- 
 ing on, one should call to some other 
 traveler just ahead of him, around the 
 corner, or behind the thicket. A person 
 need never stay lost, for there are always 
 other travelers in sight or hearing. This 
 is in regard to the mental or spiritual 
 status of a man. 
 
 God Himself is never out of hearing, 
 even in the din of battle or the rush and 
 sounds of a cantonment in the making; 
 no, nor on the "long hike" when there has 
 come no word as to the destination. 
 
 God is our destination. Let us hang 
 that up on the wall of the soul. 
 
 The "Better Land" of our childhood — 
 "shall we not seek it and toil no more?" 
 We call it "The Better Land" because it 
 is farthest back in memory. 
 
 I am watching a garden toad beside my 
 
 25 
 
Thoughts fo r the Kit - B ag 
 
 camp in the potatoes. He burrows with 
 his back feet until he makes a hole for half 
 his body and then he works the soil out 
 ahead of him until he is out of sight. He 
 never goes down his burrow after it is 
 made, head first. He would face the 
 enemy. 
 
 Too lazy to dig himself a burrow, or 
 hole, the toad one day appropriated that 
 of my pet ground squirrel, who had run- 
 ways all over the place. Squirrel came to 
 the door and espied Toad, saying with 
 chattering teeth at the intruder, "Get 
 out." Toad backed down an inch and 
 dared Squirrel to "come on." Squirrel 
 looked perplexed for half a minute and 
 then ran swiftly away. Toad came nearer 
 the surface with a satisfied expression of 
 countenance and blinked in the light of 
 the early sunshine. Suddenly Toad got a 
 boost from behind that sent him ten feet 
 away, a pretty surprised would-be appro- 
 priator of other folks' labors. Squirrel 
 followed, with a look of "There now" 
 plainly written upon her face. She had 
 remembered an opening somewhere at the 
 other end of this tunnel. 
 
 26 
 
Thoughts fo r the K i t - B a g 
 
 Just watching the maneuvers of these 
 two small creatures helped me to bear my 
 pain for the whole day. So does heaven 
 send us alleviation from unlooked-for 
 sources. 
 
 In all nature there is craving for light, 
 and more light. Seed germs look out of 
 windows for light; so do lily bulbs long for 
 light, and sunflowers turn their faces to the 
 east to greet the sunrise of a new morning. 
 
 Is not death the door by which we may 
 come to the Great Light which all our life 
 we are craving? 
 
 My thrasher and other birds were not 
 always birds. Neither shall we be always 
 in our present form. Somewhere in the 
 dim and distant past a reptile or a family 
 of reptiles bade good-by to the saurian 
 tribes and became a bird or birds. Other 
 reptilia remained as they were, and are — 
 no ambition; no rising out of the dust 
 and slime to scale the vault of heaven by 
 flight, and to gladden the heart of God 
 and the heart of us by song. 
 
 I saw a sparrow just now, singing to a 
 
 27 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 long green lizard, both resting on a fallen 
 log. 
 
 "Sing, bird, sing !" I cried. "You crawled 
 out of the window of opportunity and be- 
 came a great singer to cheer the heart of 
 all the world. God is the Great Oppor- 
 tunity for all living things." 
 
 I am a "living thing" and I will go to 
 the window. 
 
 It is of no use to grow sour. A little 
 sugar is essential to the nourishment of 
 the body. Sweets in some form are essen- 
 tial to the soul of us. If necessary we must 
 borrow sweet from those who have it to 
 spare. But, we must pay it back. 
 
 It is not necessary to be silly to be 
 sweet. Sweet thoughts are what makes a 
 person redolent of healthful influences. 
 The love of beauty in flowers and birds 
 and forests and fields gives a flavor of 
 sweets to the possessor. 
 
 The love of sweet music or color or 
 fragrance sweetens a life otherwise un- 
 wholesome. 
 
 The love of a sweet girl or a faithful 
 wife or a loyal comrade neutralizes the 
 
Thoughts for the Kit-Bag 
 
 bitter acid of an otherwise unwholesome 
 soul. 
 
 A single snowflake melts and passes 
 away at once, disappearing into the Noth- 
 ing". A mass of snowflakes may be moulded 
 into beautiful forms or beaten into a solid 
 wall. 
 
 One single desire, or effort, alone and 
 unaccompanied disappears without trace. 
 A mass of desires and efforts moulds beau- 
 tiful forms or unscalable walls. 
 
 Obedience to the right is a result of 
 voluntary choice. Coercion is for the 
 body, and a very good thing. 
 
 God gave terror to alleviate extreme 
 physical suffering, as physicians do give 
 anesthetics. When terror looms fierce and 
 sudden, the body forgets itself. Terror 
 cannot become habitual like fear, for pro- 
 longed terror would be a murderer of body 
 and mind. 
 
 A person of himself cannot summon 
 terror, but he may invite fear of the 
 proper things to fear, and be better 
 equipped for it. 
 
 29 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 If God, as Lincoln said, loved the com- 
 mon people best because he made so many 
 of them, then I would add God must have 
 loved the common little beings very much, 
 He made so many of them — birds and 
 bees and creeping things. He made my 
 thrasher bird, that I might by its song 
 lift me beyond my pain. 
 
 Let the birds lift you, my comrade. 
 
 For a long while I had noticed a little 
 grey, harmless house spider on a cash 
 register at my grocer's store. I asked the 
 grocer "Why?" He replied, "That little 
 spider has a mission. When I feel like 
 cursing a bad debtor the spider diverts 
 
 me. 
 
 My grocer has learned a secret. 
 
 Until one has suffered, the most essen- 
 tial of life's lessons has not been learned. 
 To "skip" suffering is to skip one of the 
 most indispensable grades in school. 
 
 One may skip a grade, but the reckoning 
 comes at the close of school. The parch- 
 ment one has worked for may be withheld 
 by the Master. I do not know how it may 
 be in the simile, but "Make it up" is a hard 
 
 30 
 
Thoughts for the Kit-Bag 
 
 word on graduation day. We must take 
 the grades as they come or ultimately lose 
 heart and the best opportunities. 
 
 The problem of suffering is no more to 
 be overlooked than that of compound in- 
 terest. 
 
 My nurse just surprised me with my 
 pencil and pad. "You shouldn't do it," 
 she said. "It is too much effort. Give me 
 the pad." "No," I replied, "I would not 
 deserve recovery if I made no effort to 
 forget." She returned the pad and pencil. 
 "You are right," she said. "Go on." 
 
 But often I find the same thought or 
 sentiment recurring to me which I wrote 
 yesterday or last week. I am repeating. 
 If my reader does not find it worth while 
 to read it twice, he may read it three 
 times. 
 
 Just at daybreak on the morning of the 
 ninth week. No one is astir save my 
 garden spider, who loves dim dawn better 
 than bright light. I can see her against 
 the silver of the sky at her aerial occupa- 
 tion, she, like the true patriot that she is, 
 
 31 
 
Thoughts fo r the Kit - B a g 
 
 hastening to the call of duty, as she un- 
 derstands it. 
 
 She is climbing an invisible line ha A .d 
 over hand, and now she drops. My im- 
 pulse is to arrest her fall, for she relin- 
 quished her seeming hold many feet above 
 the ground. I move a trifle for a cross 
 light on my vision, and behold, she is 
 spinning an infinitesimal line as she falls. 
 She does not fall, she softly descends, find- 
 ing a foothold on the apex of a slender 
 twig. She now ascends her own original 
 rope and returns to the high point where 
 she began. 
 
 This round grey spider is my daily 
 dawn companion. She inspires me. It is 
 good of God to have thought of creating 
 spiders for such a purpose. It was by her 
 manifest instinct as illustrated that the 
 familiar term has come to us concerning 
 any person in mortal peril, "His life hangs 
 by a thread." 
 
 Even so she has within herself the means 
 of arresting her fall. The life line is of her 
 own making and by her own effort she ar- 
 rests her doom. So does the Creator im- 
 part wonderful secrets to spiders. 
 
 32 
 
T hought s for the Kit-B ag 
 
 Again, at daybreak. A moth has flown 
 against the well-adjusted web of my spider. 
 The net was spread in the dark, but in the 
 open and plain view of the moths who also 
 carouse by night, night being broad day 
 to moths and spiders. 
 
 The graceful moth should have avoided 
 the net. But other moths were also abroad 
 dancing upon polished floors that never 
 existed. They are in mid-air, these in- 
 visible waxed floors; not high, moths do 
 not seek the higher altitudes, nor do 
 spiders. 
 
 The carousal is on. There is music; 
 I know it by the rhythm of gauzy wings, 
 but my gross ear cannot hear it. The 
 spider waits. This is not her first ex- 
 perience with moths at dawn. But this 
 moth is having its initiation into the 
 mazes of danger. He cannot escape, 
 though he puts forth marvelous efforts. 
 He should have had his wit earlier! 
 
 The aerial dance goes on to the har- 
 mony of the silent stringed instruments of 
 the wind. 
 
 With my long pointed stick, with which 
 I also toast marshmallows in the fireplace 
 ten feet away from my cot, I tear that 
 
 33 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 spider's web all to pieces, annihilate it. 
 The spider retreats behind a barricade of 
 cypress twigs. 
 
 Next morning at dawn. My spider 
 friend has woven a new web in place of 
 the old. It was finished while I dozed, 
 grateful for a short unconscious interrup- 
 tion of my pain. 
 
 Moths are carousing in the dim light, 
 as at yesterday's dawn. Some of these 
 also are victims of the spider's scheme. 
 This time I will not tear the web. These 
 moths have seen comrades one by one 
 caught and destroyed and they should 
 have provided themselves with forethought. 
 
 The dance goes on and the sun rises, 
 signal to the world of moths to postpone 
 further carousals. 
 
 Spiders make no secret of spreading 
 their nets for the unwary. It's "up to" 
 the moths to keep out of them. There is 
 no more familiar and entertaining com- 
 panion than a garden spider. As for the 
 moths, I never see them do anything but 
 dance in mid-air and tangle their wings 
 in spiders' webs. 
 
 34 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 An hour later. My nurse is peeping 
 from the window of her room quietly to 
 see if I am ready for company and break- 
 fast. I smile, but make no reply. God 
 has sent me company, and refreshment of 
 thought. 
 
 That fireplace of mine is a godsend. I 
 made it of cobble stones and mortar with 
 my own hands when I was well and hearty 
 of spirits. I am glad I did it. Now that 
 I am helpless I watch the fagots burn and 
 waste to ashes, or toast my bread sticks 
 with a ten foot "sucker" from the base of 
 a peach tree. 
 
 If I hadn't thought of that fireplace 
 when I was well, I should now have been 
 dependent upon the efforts of the kitchen 
 stove, which is out of my zone of sight. 
 
 If I had not, when I was well, laid the 
 cobble stones of thought into a sort of 
 fireplace in my mind, I should now have 
 been without the resources of self-enter- 
 tainment. The business of self-entertain- 
 ment is profitable "in the long run." 
 
 At midnight I woke, within me a feeling 
 of perfect serenity, though my wound was 
 
 35 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 asserting its rights in pressing diction. It 
 often speaks, as you, my wounded soldier 
 friend will realize in your own case. 
 
 As I woke I "heard" a thought. It was 
 this, the exact form of which I had not 
 before heard. I pass it on. I may live 
 indefinitely, as may you, but never shall 
 I forget the message: 
 
 "At thought of the near approach of 
 death I feel a Support which I know is 
 God." 
 
 It needs no theological commentator to 
 divulge its significance. My faith is ra- 
 diant. Can you catch the glow of it? 
 
 Now I am in lighter vein, still serious, 
 however, a day or two after the last 
 paragraph. 
 
 Humor sometimes saves the day. A 
 small boy in our little city fell in the school 
 playground and broke both legs, and one 
 arm. On the operating table he whim- 
 pered, as who would not? But the little 
 fellow had resources, saved up within his 
 small soul in advance of the hour of need. 
 No wolf of despair was at his door. When 
 the good work was nearly finished, the boy 
 looked up in his surgeon's face and said 
 
 36 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 quaveringly, yet with a faint smile of 
 humor, "Say, Doc, wish I'd broke the 
 other arm — then I wouldn't have to wash 
 my face and hands every time Mother 
 calls me in to supper. It's so trying, you 
 know, on a feller to have to wash up so 
 ofteh." 
 
 So does the memory of what was at the 
 time a really serious matter abide to cheer 
 us in later hours. The memory of just 
 soap and water struck the crazy bone of 
 that little fellow at the opportune moment 
 of his life. 
 
 Thoughts are rulers of the body. The 
 body should be a holy shrine fit for the 
 dwelling place of royalty. 
 
 What some people need is less of Things 
 and a good deal of actual poverty. Pov- 
 erty originates, and makes over, and tends 
 to make the recipient thankful. 
 
 Someone has said, "I am an old man 
 and have seen many troubles, none of 
 which ever happened." So may a soldier 
 see many battles and experience many a 
 death, none of which he will ever meet. 
 
 37 
 
Thoughts for the Kit- Bag 
 
 The grace of God can keep a person 
 from being disagreeable as well as from 
 being a criminal. 
 
 My memory is hard of hearing some- 
 times and so I catch only the tail of an 
 idea, but hold fast to it. 
 
 Some people's minds are always out at 
 the elbows, run-down as it were. They 
 need new thinking apparel, as a fellow 
 needs new shirts and shoes. Thoughts are 
 the clothing of the mind, regal or very 
 shabby. 
 
 My friend who called to see me has just 
 gone, saying on leaving, "How fascinating 
 must be the repose of inanimate things 
 after the fight; even the face of death must 
 seem beautiful in the absolute repose of 
 death." He didn't stop to think of the 
 effect which that last word might have 
 upon my mind when I am not able to 
 lift myself. 
 
 And yet, thinking it over, it shouldn't 
 make me sad. It is only the coward or the 
 remorseful soul that fears death. The 
 coward should brace himself, and the re- 
 
 38 
 
Thoughts fo r the Kit - B a g 
 
 morseful soul should make amends, and 
 then he will be glad of death. 
 
 I am not a coward; endurance assures 
 me of that. As for remorse, I settled with 
 that long ago. It is a good thing to settle 
 with remorse before disaster overtakes one. 
 
 Balzac says, "I envy God, who can read 
 the undercurrents of the heart." 
 
 Stewart Edward White says, "The 
 more tired out the native African is, the 
 louder he sings." 
 
 Are you temporarily blind ? Remember 
 the old trick of tying a handkerchief tight 
 around your eyes in the game of hide and 
 seek? Fancy yourself blind; Fancy is so 
 kind. You fancied you were blind then, 
 in the game, and you couldn't possibly 
 open your lids. Try it now with the ban- 
 dage tight. "Try to find her." "She" is 
 dodging here and there in your memory. 
 Memory is so kind and true. Let us be 
 thankful for memory. 
 
 No man can be permanently blind. Take 
 heart! Philosophy and stoical endurance 
 
 39 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 may help a fellow, but faith is the shoulder 
 to lean on. God, whose other name is 
 Jesus, has promised sight to the blind, the 
 temporarily blind. He is coming with the 
 new eyes. Wait just a little longer until 
 your turn comes. He has so many to look 
 after, but He overlooks not a single one. 
 I think He will remember the blind first. 
 
 My beloved thrashers have returned, 
 after being absent a week. So does many 
 a joy we thought had vanished return to 
 gladden us again. 
 
 Three days after. The thrashers built 
 a nest above my fireplace on a drooping 
 bough. When it was almost finished they 
 changed their mind. They are now busily 
 at work taking it all apart and carrying 
 every stick and straw to a point farther 
 away from the occasional smoke. Last 
 year they reared a nestful of birdlings 
 right in the smoke. 
 
 What a joy these birds are to me! 
 
 In appearance they are similar. I dis- 
 tinguish the male only by his song and by 
 his dominance over his mate. Now he is 
 rushing her at the nest building, following 
 
 40 
 
Thoughts fo r the Kit - B a g 
 
 her, seeming to drive her, as if any woman 
 housebuilder wouldn't make haste as fast 
 as she could! I think she should turn and 
 drive him. 
 
 Thrasher men are cowards, if but their 
 mates stand up for their rights. 
 
 I realize that one cannot help being 
 "afraid" sometimes. To be afraid is not 
 weakness; I realize this also. Fear without 
 mental hysteria is the advance scout of 
 strength. Fear means instant prepara- 
 tion. 
 
 To fear Fear is to be ready. "I am not 
 afraid" is as often the slogan of the cow- 
 ard as of the hero. 
 
 Balzac says, "The mainspring of hap- 
 piness is within ourselves." 
 
 Happiness or "calm" may become a 
 fixed habit, useful and influential — useful, 
 in tiding oneself over trials, or influential 
 to one's fellows. There is a family like- 
 ness between calm and happiness. Calm 
 is of peace; happiness is of activity. 
 
 "Never had much use for the Y M C A" 
 when you were at home and life was full of 
 
 4i 
 
Thoughts for the Kit-Bag 
 
 everything and everybody else? The 
 Young Men's Christian Association doesn't 
 lay that up against you! You used to 
 think they were "queer" ? They are queer, 
 I admit. 
 
 The synonyms for queer are "uncom- 
 mon, extraordinary, unique." Is not the 
 Y M C A all these and a hundred times 
 multiplied? There comes one of their 
 number. How invigorating is the sight of 
 him, upright, tender, every inch a man! 
 He reads you an extract from the Book 
 that is under his arm. It is neither stale, 
 nor bitter, nor sour, nor suggestive of 
 hints that irritate and censure. 
 
 What this unique man reads to you in 
 the meager light is as full of "meat" as 
 the chestnuts you used to gather back 
 home or the Christmas cocoanut. The 
 "meat" is bracing to a convalescent, or 
 even to one possibly in "the shadow" 
 just before the eternal dawn. 
 
 Now perhaps he arranges your pillow, 
 if you have a pillow. If not, he and you 
 can make-believe. And now maybe he 
 proposes a "game." Or he will crank the 
 victrola. O, these welcome heaven-sent 
 
 42 
 
Thoughts for the Kit-Bag 
 
 victrolas! You see, victrolas are not in a 
 soldier's kit. Neither are the other musi- 
 cal instruments, the organ or the piano or 
 the violin; they belong in the kit of your 
 Y M C A comrades. 
 
 I see your comrade walking away to 
 some other soldier boy and your eye fol- 
 lows him. He is whistling "Yankee Doo- 
 dle" or "Tipperary" or some other of the 
 soldier's "hymns"; perhaps it is "Abide 
 with Me/' or "Jesus, Lover of My Soul," 
 or "Nearer, My God, to Thee." Your 
 heart follows him with something like a 
 prayer, though you may not recognize it 
 as a prayer, but God does. "Queer sort 
 of a fellow," the Y M C A man? 
 
 O, the weariness of weakness when a 
 person is convalescing! Thank God for 
 the border land of sleep, where the exile 
 meets the friends of other days. 
 
 A man is like a nation, when the crisis is 
 passed. The convalescence of a man and 
 that of a nation is God's order. It takes 
 time and patience, and much philosophy 
 with a good deal of "pep" to meet the 
 situation. You see I know a little of what 
 
 43 
 
Thoughts fo r the K it - B ag 
 
 it is. Thank God that I do know a little, 
 else I couldn't think so often of my soldier 
 friends. 
 
 You may have already come to know 
 that the pain of repair is harder to bear 
 than the initial disaster. I have come to 
 know that, and to wince under the opera- 
 tion, and schemes, and blows, and gnawing 
 labors of the nerves and wounded blood 
 vessels and bruised or torn tissues, accom- 
 modating and limiting themselves to an 
 utterly new condition of affairs. 
 
 In spite of the suffering endured it is 
 interesting to "feel," if one cannot see, the 
 fight going on between the loyal cells of 
 the flesh and marauding enemies from out- 
 side, striving to arrest and even to kill the 
 patriotic invisible soldiers of the body. 
 
 Look at it that way, soldier boy. 
 
 Sometime in the fifteenth century Lau- 
 rence Sterne is said to have caught the 
 whirr of a thought, preserved it, wrapped 
 it in poesy, and tossed it over the years to 
 us. 
 
 "God tempers the wind to the shorn 
 lamb," he wrote. 
 
 44 
 
Thoughts fo r the Kit - B ag 
 
 The assurance that God cares for lambs 
 has been a satisfaction to many a per- 
 plexed and perishing one. But I do not 
 think the poet was as well acquainted with 
 God as he might have been. Had he be- 
 thought himself to give some credit to the 
 efforts of the lamb in seeking shelter and 
 relief from its shorn condition, he would 
 have but given the lamb its due, and God 
 the credit of acting impartially toward 
 lambs of whatever sort. 
 
 Laurence Sterne had more in mind the 
 storm than the lamb, the supposed miracle 
 than the object of pity. For common folk 
 like you and me to place our faith in the 
 probable interference of miracles in our 
 behalf is to insure to ourselves disappoint- 
 ment and possible loss of faith in the end. 
 
 The true meaning of the idea from the 
 view-point of one well acquainted with 
 God would seem to transpose the text to 
 read God tempers the shorn lamb to the 
 wind. This would place some responsi- 
 bility on the lamb. One lamb may stand 
 still and shiver, while another equally 
 "shorn" will take a bee line for the fold. 
 
 For all we know, storms may be the 
 
 45 
 
Thoughts fo r the K it- B ag 
 
 servants of God sent forth since the be- 
 ginning of time to their duty. 
 
 Should we ask God to interfere with His 
 orders and change His mind, so to speak, 
 on account of a solitary lamb like you or 
 me who hasn't the intelligence to run for 
 cover ? 
 
 May you and I, shorn lambs of the flock, 
 help God to keep us in good condition of 
 mind and body, that we may grow more 
 wool, so to speak, before the next wind 
 howls our way; get back the strength to 
 endure, and keep warm to every good 
 thing. We may grow even better protec- 
 tion than we had in the soul of us before 
 we were "shorn" or tempted or stricken. 
 
 We have a perfect right to lay claim to 
 the God of winds and lambs, accepting the 
 miracle of Himself, and so believe in the 
 Great Miracle, with no need of the mirac- 
 ulous interference of nature's laws. 
 
 He who prays that the north wind may 
 stop blowing because he is cold is a cow- 
 ard, deserving neither roof nor covering for 
 his shorn back. 
 
 God naturally expects more of men than 
 of lambs, and we ought to respect God 
 
 46 
 
Thoughts for the Kit-Bag 
 
 enough to see to it that He shall not be 
 disappointed in us. 
 
 We ought to see more universal respect 
 for God, though some there are who think 
 of Him or worship Him as an ideal. Do 
 we not have respect for an ideal? High 
 ideals are profitable. 
 
 God is an Ideal, but ideals are not God. 
 
 A man may seek a realization of his 
 ideals all his life and not find it, or, finding 
 it, miss the opportunity, for lack of years, 
 of going on to the finish. 
 
 "Go on to the finish" is the clamor of 
 high thoughts. Therefore, some do see the 
 emergency of death that is the halting 
 place, in advance, and grasp the ever- 
 lasting Ideal, that they may "go on to the 
 finish" of high ideals. For God alone is 
 declared to be "the author and finisher" of 
 what He promises or undertakes to do. 
 
 God is the Great Ideal. 
 
 It is just like God to think of tempering 
 a shorn lamb to the wind. That same 
 wind, in the interests of the whole flock, 
 ought not to be tempered. A good strong 
 wind right out of the north may be as 
 
 47 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 necessary as good pasture. A cold wind 
 helps to harden the flock, and to strew 
 plant seeds for next year's necessities. 
 
 Some men confuse destiny with the God 
 of destiny. Destiny is the servant and not 
 the master. God thought about destiny, 
 and so destiny is necessary. God thought 
 about men, to join hands with Him in 
 ruling the results of destiny. 
 
 God, not destiny, is the master of men 
 if men so will. Destiny is the natural re- 
 sult of God's laws. We have no right to 
 ask God to interrupt His laws, which He 
 has thought out in the silences of His own 
 eternity. 
 
 Destiny may operate in the explosion 
 of boiling oil when the victim of it has 
 been careless, or in the aim of the shrapnel 
 when a man has paused in the path of 
 shrapnel, but here destiny is done and God 
 takes a hand. When God takes a hand it 
 is time to pray. 
 
 Who ever said a prayer to destiny? 
 
 To say a prayer to destiny would be like 
 breathing upon the face of a glacier to 
 warm its heart. 
 
 48 
 
Thoughts fo r the K i t - B ag 
 
 Whom has destiny comforted in the 
 hour of death? Whom has destiny lifted 
 from the "mire and the clay," at the prayer 
 of a man, and set upon a rock, speaking in 
 eternal cadence, "I, even I, am thy God"? 
 
 In the heyday of health and prosperity 
 a man in the exuberance of his little soul 
 may exclaim, "There is no God. All is 
 destiny. Let simple folk believe in God!" 
 But let that same man face death at the 
 point of an enemy's bayonet or on the 
 verge of a mighty chasm, and he will be 
 very likely to cry, "Save me, O God." 
 And ten to one God will save him. 
 
 There may be a God after all! Some 
 say there is none because they have never 
 seen Him; neither have they seen the 
 wind nor the electric current. 
 
 God is such a strange Person, always 
 surprising the sinner with His generosity, 
 and the theological saint with a difference 
 of opinion. 
 
 Self-esteem is a virtue, provided it 
 does not breed egoism. If a man esteem 
 not himself, how can others hold him in 
 
 49 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 estimation? Self-esteem is the twin of 
 self-respect. 
 
 There are times when a man longs to 
 be a hermit, to live all by himself in a 
 bark hut and eat rabbits and wild garlic, 
 to lie around in the brush all day doing 
 nothing, excepting possibly to think 
 poetry. 
 
 It is rumored that God made the orig- 
 inal man a hermit, but that he soon re- 
 pented Himself, for reasons, we suppose, 
 perfectly obvious to Himself. 
 
 Has anybody observed a recluse who is 
 real wholesome to look at? Usually he is 
 absolutely "dirty." Those who are in the 
 business of turning men right about face 
 from being nothing to being something 
 tell us that the first step in the proceeding 
 is to make them "wash up" and look in 
 the mirror, the mirror being an excellent 
 device to aid in reforming a man. 
 
 A professional recluse in the mountains 
 was once presented with a looking-glass 
 for a Christmas gift. The glance of a sec- 
 ond was sufficient to cause this hermit to 
 dash the gift to the rocks. 
 
 50 
 
Thoughts fo r the K i t - B ag 
 
 If it be winter time and one is on a 
 march, let him pick up a small stone and 
 put it in his pocket. At the first oppor- 
 tunity heat it real hot and wrap it in paper. 
 It will retain its heat many hours and is a 
 very capable bedfellow, especially if there 
 be a crowd about the only fire in camp. A 
 hot rock, the bigger the better, is a soul 
 saver. So many rocks just the size of a 
 fellow's pocket lying about, inviting men 
 to be comfortable! 
 
 A person should covet humor as he 
 would covet a promised inheritance. The 
 man who inherits a vein of humor from 
 his ancestors has sufficient means to carry 
 him comfortably through life. 
 
 Even in pain or other discomforts a 
 man may lay hold on humor if he have 
 any about him. Without pain a man 
 would be dead before he knew it. Try 
 out a little humor on the pain. Beat it! 
 Make believe it "doesn't hurt." 
 
 If you have to cry, why cry! Some of 
 the world's greatest heroes have cried in 
 their time, and weren't ashamed of it. 
 But don't give in when the pain stabs. 
 
 5i 
 
Thoughts for the Kit - Bag 
 
 Tears make little rivulets in the mind as 
 do raindrops in the garden, draining off 
 afterwards, leaving a richer heart and a 
 better garden for the shower. 
 
 Cry hard when you cannot help it, but 
 do not whine. A dog that howls is more 
 endurable than a dog that whines. 
 
 It may take a battle or two and a score 
 of wounds to open a man's eyes upon God. 
 Then will come the angel of revelation to 
 show him that God was in the trenches 
 or in the hospital or on the open field and 
 breathing on his wounds, while as yet he 
 couldn't see God for the mist that was 
 in his eyes. Indifference is only mist. 
 Ignorance is only mist. God is clear 
 Light. 
 
 See that you sing in the dark days, as 
 the Southern darkies sang in the old slave 
 days to get "de misery" out of their 
 whipped backs. Make up a song as you 
 go along or as you sit in the shackles, 
 crude and droll like the songs of the 
 darkies — to be sung long afterward in 
 church and hall and battlefield in a 
 chorus of jubilee. 
 
 52 
 
Thoughts for the Kit-Bag 
 
 When comrades are dying, think of 
 them as getting out of prison. Let the 
 old prison crumble, it will but set the 
 prisoner free. There is always a squad of 
 heavenly hosts waiting for a fellow to get 
 out of his prison, that they may conduct 
 him to the place of his wildest imagination. 
 "Eye hath not seen nor ear heard," but O, 
 the wealth of imagination offered to a man 
 in the cup of God's eternal goodness ! 
 
 Imagination is a holy cordial; drink it! 
 
 "O, so dirty," are you ? No clean linen, 
 and no clean skin? I suppose St. John on 
 the Isle of Patmos, prisoner that he was, 
 felt the need of a bath and a shave more 
 than anything else in the world, unless it 
 were clean linen. That is why in his 
 Revelation he has left us visions of "clean 
 linen pure and white." A neglected pris- 
 oner may catch a glimpse of visions to stir 
 a world centuries after him. 
 
 Thirsty, are you? So was One on Cal- 
 vary. And yet from those same parched 
 lips there came the message, "If any man 
 thirst, let him come unto me and drink." 
 Did He thirst that He might assuage our 
 
 53 
 
T hought s for -t he Kit -Bag 
 
 thirst ? Ask the Y M C A brother-man to 
 explain it. 
 
 I suppose that if you come home to us 
 you will say that you suffered more from 
 thirst after being wounded than from the 
 wounds. I know this, that while the "fir- 
 ing line" was taking my breath away I 
 cried incessantly for water. Thinking of 
 this universal cry for water when a person 
 is in the peril of pain, as if nothing but 
 water could save, the Lord himself, being 
 the only one able to save, cried to all the 
 world, "Whosoever will, let him take the 
 water of life freely." Freely! 
 
 There seems to be just one thing that 
 God is able to forget, and that is a man's 
 sins, under certain strange conditions. 
 Let us be like God in one particular, for- 
 get the other man's sins against us, on 
 purpose. 
 
 Guard against mosquitoes; do not let 
 them bite you. They have bitten some- 
 body else first. Look sharp for attacking 
 parties that have bitten others first, very 
 much to the chagrin and misery of those 
 other fellows. 
 
 54 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 We have heard of distant tribes of men 
 who are said to carry about with thern 
 wherever they go a little prayer rug, con- 
 veniently strapped upon their back or on 
 the earners back. This comfortable me- 
 mento acts as a reminder to both body 
 and spirit. The knees naturally bend at 
 sight of the reminder and an otherwise re- 
 luctant spirit is compelled into service. 
 
 A little shrine in a man's soul is a sort of 
 prayer rug, soft and inviting for the knees 
 of his heart. If you haven't any prayer 
 rug along with you, ask the Y M C A man 
 to help you out. These strange men have 
 a wonderful faculty of supplying necessary 
 comforts. 
 
 No nightgown? No pajamas? Our 
 forebears slept without these luxuries and 
 any fellow can get used to it if he has to, 
 in the interests of a good and common 
 cause. 
 
 It is sometimes the "having to" that 
 puts the "grit" in a man. How few of us 
 would do the really disagreeable duties if 
 we didn't "have to." 
 
 Even in the face of "no pajamas" one 
 can laugh. A good hearty laugh will see 
 
 55 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 to it that a man sleeps more soundly than 
 he would in pajamas without the laugh. 
 
 A great many respectable people have 
 been in jail. It is well to recall this fact 
 when the guard has turned alike his back 
 and the key to one's cell. 
 
 If the dead do sometimes haunt their 
 old whereabouts, one may be sure of good 
 company when he finds himself in prison 
 for no crime. It is hard, though, after all 
 that can be said in favor of good company. 
 You had imagined you had hard times be- 
 fore? So I think imagined Paul and Silas, 
 loyal and true soldiers, imprisoned long ago 
 by a relentless enemy. 
 
 Paul and Silas were their simple names 
 as we know them. That they did hold, 
 and have since held, a higher rank than 
 most army officers attain, cannot be 
 doubted. They were soldiers of the Cross, 
 and are commanding today, by word of 
 mouth, a larger company, if we consider 
 the "innumerable company" St. John saw 
 in his vision, than any army commander 
 at the present time. 
 
 These soldiers of the Cross were not 
 
 56 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 men to be found without a prayer rug in 
 their kit, a little shrine in the soul of them; 
 and they immediately prayed. And for 
 whom did they pray, these men who had 
 an intimate acquaintance with our Lord; 
 who, according to His promise, had every 
 reason to believe, as you and I have rea- 
 son to believe, that He was in the prison 
 with them? Knowing the character of 
 them as well as we do, we have reason to 
 believe they were praying for those who 
 should come after them, who in every 
 land might be longing for freedom. 
 
 And then, after the prayer, immediately 
 they began to sing. A note of triumph in 
 advance of the victory! A psalm of holy 
 glee that not upon their inmost souls had 
 the jailer locked the cell door! O, cell 
 doors are strong! But stronger yet is the 
 winning force of God. 
 
 One of the first things I will do when I 
 find heaven will be to look up Paul and 
 Silas and beg them to sing once again that 
 song that reached the ear of an angel 
 somewhere and brought him straight into 
 the prison. A song from the lips of men 
 in prison, a song to move the heart of an 
 
 57 
 
Thoughts fo r the K i t - B a g 
 
 angel, though I suppose and believe that 
 it was the Lord Himself who opened the 
 prison doors! 
 
 Will an angel open your prison door? 
 I think not. God gave us this bit of 
 prison history as a sort of divine assurance 
 that a prisoner's cell may be a sanctuary. 
 But keep watch for the Angel! It is pos- 
 sible you may mistake an angel for a 
 Y M C A man. 
 
 No man, of his own deliberate intent, 
 will betray the best interests of his body. 
 A man's body may be scarred and yet be 
 glorious. It depends upon whether the 
 scars are self-inflicted or the result of 
 honorable combat. 
 
 It is good for one's body to salute one's 
 mind, as if the mind were the command- 
 ing officer, as indeed it is. 
 
 Show no mercy to insolent thoughts. 
 
 Insolence, even in a man's mind, should 
 not be tolerated. See to it that all your 
 valiant senses are genuinely loyal citizens 
 of the soul, worthy of respect and pro- 
 motion. 
 
 58 
 
Thoughts fo r the K i t - B a g 
 
 Meet possible ridicule of loyalty to 
 honor with the bayonet charge of cour- 
 age. 
 
 Repulse rude insinuation that lurks 
 under cover of secrecy. Open the soul to 
 daylight. It is from under cover that 
 some of the soul's enemies charge. 
 
 Do you remember telling me of your 
 habit of holding debates with yourself 
 upon important questions without a sound? 
 A man is never subject to melancholy who 
 is able to debate intelligently with himself, 
 rising above the temptation to regret or 
 despair. One may get a clearer view of 
 any situation in communion with himself 
 than when words darken the sky. 
 
 Midnight! Everyone asleep but me. 
 Do not pity me. The pain is sharp, but 
 sharper still is my determination to get 
 this message to you. 
 
 It is written of the righteous, "Ye are 
 the salt of the earth." It sometimes seems 
 to me, lying here in the night (it is dark 
 while I am writing now), that I am prin- 
 cipally salt, I shed so many briny tears. 
 
 59 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 Not that I am in the least "righteous" — 
 far from it! 
 
 Do you sometimes cry big salt tears 
 with the pain and weakness from sheer 
 helplessness to do anything else? I sus- 
 pect you do, though you wouldn't have 
 anybody know it for anything, because you 
 are a man. Well, it may become one's 
 legitimate business to shed tears. It is 
 written of a certain truly great man, quot- 
 ing his own words, "My tears have been 
 my meat day and night." Pretty hard 
 row for a man to hoe, though we do not 
 know exactly where the pain was. 
 
 Have you not noticed a recuperative re- 
 action following the shedding of tears, that 
 tones up the mental and physical forces, 
 like a bitter tonic doctors sometimes pre- 
 scribe ? 
 
 Better to cry and have done with it than 
 to grow irrevocably sullen. 
 
 I have concluded that mental pain can- 
 not equal physical pain, though mentalists 
 declare to the contrary. So-called mental 
 pain is not pain; it is distress. Mental dis- 
 tress may not invariably affect the body, 
 especially if the body is exercised to the 
 
 60 
 
Thoughts fo r the K i t - B ag 
 
 tiring of the muscles. But continued and 
 extreme physical pain does affect the 
 mind if the mind does not resist. 
 
 Remorse, resentment, hurt feelings, 
 homesickness or disappointment, not to 
 mention "affairs of the heart," are dis i 
 tressing; an acute attack may almost kill 
 a person, provided he do not resist. 
 Usually one can walk it off, or take to his 
 heels and run away from it. 
 
 Physical pain that has pitched its un- 
 welcome tent in that wound of yours, and 
 mine, is harder to deal with; but of one 
 thing I am certain — in the face of all diffi- 
 culties the mind can make a bold stagger 
 in attempts to "walk it off." 
 
 Fancy is the gift of God. Though you 
 may become blind, Fancy may sit upon the 
 throne of lost vision and bid you "Look." 
 
 Perhaps your sight may be soon re- 
 stored, and perhaps not; but God's gift 
 of fancy may join hands with you and 
 your comrade Memory, and lead you into 
 realms never before dreamed of. You may 
 call it "dreaming" if you will, but dreams 
 are real individuals when they come to be 
 constant companions. 
 
 61 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 Constantly to repine is to die by slow 
 degrees without a principle to die for. It 
 is preferable to get angry. Anger grows 
 immediately ashamed of itself, while com- 
 plaint justifies its grumbling on the grounds 
 of self-pity. Self-pity is poor fodder, 
 neither grain nor hay nor silage. Cut it 
 out. 
 
 Do not think about tomorrow. You are 
 blind just for today. Fancy that your boy- 
 hood days are come again and you are 
 playing blind man all over the farm, and 
 house, and school grounds. 
 
 How seldom you stubbed your toes! Do 
 not let your mind bump against this new 
 condition, rough though it is and full of 
 obstacles. Keep a level head and give 
 Fancy the bit; but see to it that you pull 
 her in before she turns the corner. 
 
 In your next interview with Fancy, 
 make her understand that you are the 
 master, not she. Even Fancy must be 
 guided or she will land you in the ditch. 
 
 Thoughts of the soldier boys at the 
 front or in training camp have helped me 
 bear my pain. 
 
 62 
 
Thoughts fo r the K i t - B ag 
 
 The command is to all of us, whether 
 absorbed in home duties or in the in- 
 evitable fatigue of the training, or in the 
 rough of the front — "Endure hardness as 
 good soldiers." We may engrave this com- 
 mand in enduring emblems, each upon his 
 own shield. 
 
 Time cannot erase such a sentiment 
 written upon personal experience and 
 character. 
 
 Do you feel that you are literally a 
 "complete wreck," ready to go home, or 
 to the permanent hospital for indefinite 
 and imperfect repair? 
 
 When a beautiful and substantial build- 
 ing has been supposedly destroyed by 
 earthquake and fire, the wreckage com- 
 pany comes to save what remains for 
 other uses. There is always a residue that 
 does not perish, twisted iron, bent pipes, 
 precious metal of every description, charred 
 pillars, broken bricks from tottering chim- 
 neys, even cement and plaster having their 
 uses. 
 
 God saves a wreck of a man because 
 even what is left of him is useful in a 
 world where nothing is wasted. 
 
 63 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 I sometimes think it comes pretty near 
 being a good thing for me to lie here so 
 long. It give* plenty of time for memory 
 to visit me. Memory has feet that scram- 
 ble into every nook and corner, and little 
 sharp eyes which nothing in our past 
 evades, and sharp ears keen for the sounds 
 we thought were dead. 
 
 My nurse is God's hands, His face, His 
 strength to me. A surgeon is God's power 
 manifest in a human form. Watch him as 
 he bends above you. Feel sure of him, as 
 you do feel sure of God. 
 
 The supports of God are tangible; noth- 
 ing mystic about His preparations and re- 
 sulting forces. 
 
 No need have you and I to make a 
 mystic of God, when we have been once 
 down into the dark drear desert of pain 
 and climbed back again to the green edge 
 of things where forget-me-nots and hearts- 
 ease are growing. 
 
 Why do we call our Great Commander 
 and Heavenly Father "God" sometimes, 
 and "Jesus" sometimes ? It is the mood or 
 
 64 
 
Thoughts for the Kit-Bag 
 
 the need we are in that decides upon the 
 name we call Him by. 
 
 Do we not call each other "husband" or 
 "wife" or "Claude" or "Mary"? Do not 
 we call loudly for "Bill" or "Brother," 
 either of the two meaning the same per- 
 son? Do we not call the Judge "Your 
 Honor" or "The Bench"? Did not our 
 parents call us "Son," or "Boy," or "Mis- 
 chief"? 
 
 At mess time? No home "grace," no 
 family greetings, no refined expeditionary 
 force from plate to lips; no napkin, no 
 conversation to facilitate digestion of con- 
 trary opinions, and no diversion of thought 
 from the bare sensuous satisfaction of eat- 
 ing? You would prefer taking your rations 
 to the shade of the old barn or down by 
 the sociable little brook of boyhood. You 
 would like to eat with the cows and the 
 tree rats, with old Bowser for extra. 
 
 Especially you do not admire your elbow 
 companion, either of them perhaps; it 
 often seems incredibly dull? 
 
 Suppose you try the experiment of say- 
 ing over and over to yourself, "He is a 
 nice fellow; really a very fine fellow, all 
 
 65 
 
Thoughts fo r the K i t - B a g 
 
 but his table manners." You have be- 
 lieved worse fibs than that many a time. 
 I have tried this method myself and found 
 it profitable and successful, especially when 
 the idea came to me that my ill-mannered 
 messmate was really dying of homesick- 
 ness, or remorse, or even possible con- 
 tempt of himself. 
 
 There was a certain Great Man, of 
 whose conduct and practices nothing could 
 be said in criticism save this charge, "He 
 eateth with publicans and sinners/' How 
 remarkable that this Man, altogether 
 lovely and of good report, should of his 
 own volition sit at "mess" with the most 
 ill-behaved men of his time. 
 
 And how strange that the historians of 
 Jesus should have chronicled so insignifi- 
 cant a circumstance! 
 
 Nothing was insignificant in that Life. 
 Was it not for your sake that He ate with 
 publicans and sinners, instead of ban- 
 queting with kings and governors of His 
 time, at whose table He properly and often 
 most welcomely belonged? Imagine Him 
 at "mess" with you, my soldier friend, as 
 
 66 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 He really is, unseen and unheard, sitting 
 between yourself and your disagreeable 
 elbow companion. 
 
 Beware of renegade thoughts! There 
 may be whole packs of them eager to de- 
 vour you piecemeal and altogether, like 
 wolves. Get away from all these hungry 
 wolves as God knows you can get away 
 if you stay with Him. If these wild crea- 
 tures have already torn you do not de- 
 spair, for they cannot make your soul 
 bleed to death if you fight to the finish. 
 
 What is a soldier for if it isn't to fight 
 to the finish! 
 
 Let go of your misery! Try not to 
 think so much about it. One's own misery 
 never can be quite equal to the misery of 
 some other fellow. It is because our own 
 misery is so near to us that we keep think- 
 ing about it all the time. If we should get 
 as near to some other person as we are to 
 our own miseries we might feel as if we 
 ourselves were pretty well off in com- 
 parison. 
 
 A soldier has wonderful opportunities 
 to be of use to his fellows, of use or of dis- 
 
 67 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 advantage. In citizen life, comrades are 
 mostly far apart in families and in occu- 
 pations, with little time for fellowship. 
 But in military life a man has opportuni- 
 ties thrust upon him. Surely each soldier, 
 brave and strong man that he now is, will 
 be summoned to give an accounting to 
 the Great Commander for all these won- 
 derful opportunities, whether improved or 
 wasted. 
 
 At first thought one might think it 
 "poor form" or very cowardly if a man, 
 for the first time, should call out to God 
 for help in trouble of some sort, when in 
 all his life he may not have given God a 
 single loyal or even respectful thought. 
 One may sometime have even ridiculed 
 the "very idea of God helping anybody 
 out of trouble." One may even have 
 blasphemed, being in company with the 
 profane. 
 
 Distress is just the proper time and 
 opportunity for God to get acquainted 
 with miserable men. Somehow one does 
 not so much need Him in glad days, not 
 having yet learned that our Lord is the 
 
Thoughts fo r the Kit - B a g 
 
 soul of gladness itself. But now this very- 
 day of a big trouble is the time to call 
 Him by name. Has He not left a message 
 especially for you, "Call upon me in the 
 day of trouble," "While they are yet 
 speaking, I will hear"? 
 
 It is just as though God, by that prom- 
 ise of His, was so near a fellow all the 
 while that it took Him no time at all to 
 answer. If a man in your place were to 
 "call" upon the President, or a command- 
 ing officer, it might take long days, if ever, 
 to gain an audience. But with God it is 
 so different. 
 
 It seems to be God's especial business 
 to be listening all the time. O, the sub- 
 limity of a Commander like Him! 
 
 Thank heaven, God is often the Last 
 Resort. 
 
 It is just like God to hear the cry of a 
 man right through the prison walls of an 
 alien land or even through the door of a 
 guardhouse in a military camp, in spite of 
 any guard. God has good hearing, and if 
 it is comfort you are wishing for, comfort 
 you will get. 
 
 69 
 
Thoughts fo r the Kit - B ag 
 
 Maybe you do not need comfort or 
 even want comfort if it were offered you. 
 You want release, and a chance to "get it 
 back" on somebody. 
 
 God can do many other things for a fel- 
 low than comfort him. God can be severe 
 as well as merciful, when a man needs 
 severity. Do not conclude that God is 
 not a dignified and stern Judge. 
 
 God is the terrible Master of men when 
 men need that kind of a God. God is able 
 to summon a man at any moment to ap- 
 pear before Him for an accounting. This 
 phase of His character should be consid- 
 ered when a man is in jail for good reasons, 
 and now is the time and place to "make 
 good" with God. 
 
 Eventually one may have more re- 
 spect for God if one comes to know Him 
 as the Soul of Justice. This comprehen- 
 sion of Him may lead you to "call upon 
 Him" in regard to some things in your 
 past life that you cannot seem to get rid 
 of, even though you may be in prison and 
 in great distress to be free once more. In 
 this frame of mind, this sort of mental 
 
 70 
 
Thoughts f o r the K i t - B a g 
 
 understanding of yourself, you will find 
 God meeting you more than halfway. 
 
 I have heard a rumor to the effect that 
 the thought of God under certain condi- 
 tions makes a fellow "mad." It is a good 
 thing for a man to get mad about God. 
 It proves that man really does believe in 
 God. Any man well brought up is likely 
 to make an apology when he has been 
 angry with another man without just 
 cause. 
 
 If a man understands the essentials in 
 his dealings with other men, apologizing 
 for instance, why should he not be a gen- 
 tleman in his attitude toward God and 
 make apologies when such are due? I am 
 sure God would appreciate and understand. 
 God is a wonderful Person. 
 
 If you do not feel quite equal to the 
 situation, considering some things you 
 know about yourself, you might write an 
 apology to that Person you have wronged 
 by word or deed and ask your Y M C A 
 friend to deliver it to Him. I believe your 
 friend would be glad to act as your am- 
 bassador and aid you in securing an in- 
 terview. 
 
 7i 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 Once you have been in the conscious 
 presence of the Greatest Man in heaven 
 or earth you will feel a certain glorifying 
 of common life and things, an uplift into 
 a divine atmosphere, different and remote 
 from the ordinary. 
 
 Homesick? This obscure disease baffles 
 description. Only one who has suffered 
 can comprehend. Some declare it is not a 
 disease at all, but an uncanny mental 
 malady subject to environment, and the 
 temporary indisposition of the entire or- 
 ganization. 
 
 Homesickness must be a disease, for its 
 other name, suited to the aristocracy of 
 the patient, is nostalgia, as described in 
 the medical works. 
 
 This name is significant. Should a ple- 
 beian like you and me have an attack it is 
 simply homesickness. If a person of rank 
 in the straight line of aristocracy be at- 
 tacked, or rather affected, his ailment is 
 nostalgia. 
 
 If a person of monetary value, with a 
 slight attack, sends for the doctor, he is 
 apportioned various drugs to be adminis- 
 tered "three times daily" with the attend- 
 
 72 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 ance of two trained nurses. There is 
 usually an operation indicated. 
 
 In our case, yours and mine, we keep 
 our troubles to ourselves if possible, lest 
 the finger of scorn be pointed toward us 
 with the whisper of "Cry baby," in place 
 of an operation. 
 
 If there be a particular time in personal 
 history when a person needs sympathy, it 
 is when he is homesick. Try as he will, he 
 cannot "throw it off" without supreme ef- 
 fort, and then it is doubtful. All the world 
 within and without is gray with the gloom 
 of extreme loneliness. Night and day are 
 one, without the glow of sunset or the ra- 
 diance of sunrise. The best of jokes ap- 
 peals not to him and food does not satisfy. 
 There is a lump in his throat as if an acorn 
 in the shell had been arrested, able neither 
 to come back nor go on. 
 
 There are rumors of antidotes. I am 
 not familiar with any one of the many as 
 being effective save one. Perhaps your 
 Y M C A friend knows of something. But, 
 in event of your being at your wits' end 
 for friends, which is usually the case, try 
 the Man of Sorrows. 
 
 73 
 
Thoughts fo r the K i t - B a g 
 
 Who ever heard of a disciple of Socrates 
 or of Plato or Browning calling upon Socra- 
 tes, or Plato, or Browning for help in time 
 of trouble ? Did they leave behind, when 
 they went on ahead of the rest, the word 
 of promise, "I will be with him in trouble" ? 
 
 Does one in extreme difficulties call upon 
 the name of Napoleon, or Washington, or 
 Lincoln, great though they were, on ac- 
 count of their dying assurance, "Lo, I am 
 with you alway"? 
 
 In and by the Name of Jesus there is, 
 when a man calls Him by Name, a personal 
 Presence unmistakable, even though the 
 person calling Him by Name has not met 
 Him before. 
 
 Fortitude and Courage are essential to 
 personal success. By his fortitude a man 
 is able to endure the ills or accidents that 
 come to him and for which he himself is 
 not responsible. Fortitude is a staff to 
 lean upon, a sort of Alpine stock by which 
 a man keeps himself to the trail up the 
 summit. 
 
 Courage is the element of a man's char- 
 acter or resolve that enables him to face 
 what he knows that he, himself, is respon- 
 
 74 
 
T hought s for the Kit-Bag 
 
 sible for, and to "go to it !" Courage is the 
 implement with which a man hews his 
 difficult and painful way to the summit of 
 triumph, or it may be death, through ob- 
 stacles which he might avoid were he a 
 coward. Courage and Fortitude are twins. 
 
 What have you in your kit, that par- 
 ticular kit which a man carries always 
 within him, always within him? Look it 
 over occasionally and find if anything has 
 been picked up on the march which does 
 not belong there and thus has made it 
 heavier or out of proportion. Have you 
 slipped into it inadvertently, a little hate, 
 or malice, or discontent, or self-pity, which 
 cannot help displacing the essentials ? 
 
 Perhaps you have on the sly added too 
 many memories of the wrong sort, mem- 
 ories that make you blue, or tempt you to 
 neglect the bugle calls to duties, military 
 or personal and private. 
 
 A soldier's kit which he carries, slung to 
 his heart's shoulder, holds all his posessions 
 worth mentioning. 
 
 It is human, and of course it is divine, 
 for a man to take a glimpse at another's 
 
 75 
 
Thoughts fo r the Kit - B ag 
 
 kit. Are your comrades' inside shoulders 
 growing stooped and weak from carrying 
 possible "extras" which a soldier has no 
 business to carry? 
 
 Unspoken rebellion against circum- 
 stances or orders over which he has no 
 control is almost as bad as outspoken re- 
 volt, if a man has a mind to analyze him- 
 self. Sullen obedience is marked upon a 
 man's face. He is sure to be registered as 
 a "suspect" by his superiors. 
 
 "God loveth a hilarious giver" (Robert 
 J. Burdette). If God loveth a cheerful 
 giver, surely a military officer loveth a 
 hearty soldier. 
 
 To be a traitor to God, as God's will and 
 commands are understood, is to invite 
 death penalty. A man may live along for 
 some time parrying blows with his con- 
 science, though sure to fall at last and be 
 left as dead. 
 
 It is a terrible thing to have a dead 
 conscience. 
 
 If the soul blushes not at memories, one 
 need not fear the telltale tint of the cheek. 
 
 76 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 The happy memory of a kiss upon the 
 forehead of the girl he loves has saved 
 many a soldier from the burning blush of 
 present horror and future stigma. 
 
 Make a submarine chaser of your re- 
 solves, for the principal dangers to char- 
 acter are out of sight, where the devils of 
 the deep sea fight with sharks over the 
 shattered remains of a sunken man. 
 
 There are deep-sea sharks of despair 
 that chase the foundering ship to devour 
 what they can find. A fellow's real ship, 
 his war ship, cannot be seriously attacked 
 while he is chasing the enemy. A man's 
 ship is his soul, his real life. 
 
 You have heard it rumored that if a 
 man "gone wrong" but "turn over a new 
 leaf" he will be "as good as before." Yes, 
 "as good as before," "as white as snow," 
 just between himself and God, for God 
 hath spoken it. 
 
 Thank God for God! 
 
 But never can a man, once dipped into 
 the indelible dye of vice, be as white, to 
 himself and his fellowkind, to his mother 
 
 77 
 
Thoughts for the Kit-Bag 
 
 and his sweetheart, who one and all may 
 accept him "as he is." However, it is 
 better to turn over the new leaf, and the 
 sooner the better. One would rather be 
 "almost white" than dreadfully black. 
 
 It is good to repent before Remorse 
 overtakes a man. Remorse is a relentless 
 foe one may wish he had never met. Re- 
 morse aims at the heart of life and is sure 
 of its target. 
 
 What shall a man do with Remorse 
 when he is attacked? Repentance wields 
 the only bayonet that can down Remorse. 
 Repentance grapples with Remorse and 
 crushes the life out. Repentance is of God. 
 
 Remorse is of that Other whose name I 
 have not used. That Other is God's op- 
 ponent. If a soldier be fighting the battles 
 of God he will find Repentance. If he is 
 fighting the battles of His opponent, in 
 ever so fascinating a uniform, both him- 
 self and the uniform he loves will perish of 
 their own decree. 
 
 See that you come by your scars hon- 
 estly, not in brawls with rioters and high- 
 waymen. 
 
 78 
 
T hought s for the Kit-Bag 
 
 It is written of Lycurgus, King of Sparta, 
 that when he sent his armies abroad he 
 exhorted the soldiers to respect the women 
 of the lands they traversed or subdued. 
 
 Joining hands with that great comman- 
 der of the dark ages, your own General 
 Pershing, upon welcoming the American 
 troops to France, is reported to have ex- 
 horted them, "Pledge honor to the women 
 of France wherever you may be located 
 
 and through whatsoever villages you may 
 
 ft 
 pass. 
 
 But what of the women who have not 
 been taught respect for themselves? Re- 
 gret for the woman who has missed her 
 lesson might lead a truly brave man to 
 teach her. 
 
 Why should the memory of a little white 
 uniform bring tears to the eyes of a soldier 
 when he lies down in his lonely corner at 
 night? The little uniform had feet into 
 whose soft warm folds the boy tucked his 
 cold toes. Above the little white night- 
 gown that uniformed the sleepy child bent 
 the face of the mother with her goodnight 
 kiss. The big soldier without any nightie, 
 weary and worn and sick at heart, may be 
 
 79 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 sadly comforted by the memory of "just a 
 nightgown." 
 
 Dionysius the tyrant, being at table 
 with Spartan soldiers, criticised the menu 
 as being insipid. 
 
 The cook replied, "I do not wonder at 
 it, for the seasoning is wanting." 
 
 "What seasoning?" questioned the ty- 
 rant. 
 
 "Running, sweating, fatigue, hunger, 
 and thirst; these are the ingredients with 
 which we season our food." 
 
 When the Spartans' aim had routed and 
 broken the enemy's forces, they then pur- 
 sued them no farther than was necessary 
 to make themselves sure of the victory; 
 after which they retired "thinking it neither 
 glorious nor worthy of Greece to cut in 
 pieces and destroy an enemy that yielded 
 and fled." 
 
 But why refer to ancient history when 
 we have our own Theodore Roosevelt, who 
 said in an address to the American soldiers, 
 "Love mercy; treat prisoners well; succor 
 the wounded; treat every woman as if she 
 were your sister; care for the little children 
 
 80 
 
Thoughts fo r the Kit - B ag 
 
 and be tender with the old and helpless. 
 Walk humbly; you will do so if you study 
 the teachings of our Saviour. May the 
 God of justice and mercy have you in His 
 keeping." 
 
 Tears are not for the battle-field. Tears 
 are for times of peace, or for the time be- 
 tween battles when a man may have an 
 attack of nostalgia. Neither are tears for 
 the man on shipboard suffering from a 
 sudden attack of mat de mer — if so be he is 
 a person of quality, or if just any person at 
 all the disease is plain seasickness. No, a 
 person doesn't cry when he is really sea- 
 sick. He is too miserable for tears. It is 
 now that one does not care if he perish. 
 
 Very likely, however, a man may have 
 trouble with his eyes just as the ship 
 leaves the wharf, and until it is out of 
 sight of land. As an excuse for "eye 
 trouble" a man waves his handkerchief in- 
 cessantly as if bidding adieu to the folks on 
 shore. In reality the handkerchief is neces- 
 sarily applied very swiftly and cautiously 
 to the brows, or passed down the face if it 
 be a warm day. 
 
 Si 
 
T 'h ought s for the Kit - B ag 
 
 It takes a long while to dry out a hand- 
 kerchief on the outward voyage. 
 
 The same man whose eyes were affected 
 on the outgoing ship may have a similar 
 attack on the one homeward bound. Thus 
 do tears express for the average of us 
 either joy or pain. The difference is only 
 this — when a person is weeping for sorrow 
 he conceals his tears, but when for joy the 
 man of tears cares not if the whole world 
 see him. 
 
 I knew a soldier who actually left one 
 little tear on the forehead of his lady-love 
 at parting with her at the wharf. And I 
 knew another who as truly lost two tears 
 upon the forehead of his sweetheart at the 
 end of a return trip. So it is well for the 
 majority of us to be provided with hand- 
 kerchiefs. 
 
 God must have had one of His sublime 
 ideas when he thought favorably of pro- 
 viding homesickness for the human fam- 
 ily. Were it not for homesickness, we 
 should probably have no home and native 
 land. Unconsciously I believe the most of 
 us are sometimes homesick for parts un- 
 known to mortal eyes, but for whose ac- 
 
 82 
 
Thoughts for the Kit-Bag 
 
 ■ - ■ m— ■ ■iiiiinwinwiiiiM ii i 
 
 tuality the Lord himself pledged his word. 
 Good and gracious Lord! 
 
 It is difficult to determine which is more 
 dangerous or unpleasant to meet single- 
 handed and alone — homesickness or sea- 
 sickness, mat de mer or nostalgia. If a 
 man be attacked by both at the same 
 time, it must be admitted by all observers 
 to be pretty rough. 
 
 It seems cruel to laugh at a person when 
 he is seasick, especially if the man who 
 laughs is just over an attack of his own. 
 To laugh at the misfortune of others is 
 usually the expression of a feeble mind; 
 but in case of the prostrate victim of sea- 
 sickness and under certain conditions to 
 laugh seems justifiable. Should the attack 
 be prolonged, it is quite likely temporarily 
 to cure the patient of self-conceit. The 
 exact time and place for a man to show 
 himself off, who is normally addicted to 
 self-conceit, is on shipboard just out of 
 sight of land, on his first voyage, with a 
 genuine attack of seasickness. 
 
 Now here is a peculiar situation. Let a 
 squad of men, for lack of something better 
 
 83 
 
Thoughts fo r the K i t - B a g 
 
 to do, discuss their various experiences with 
 seasickness. Ten to one there will be a 
 general attack, subtle, sly, but sure. Such 
 is the influence of the mind over its com- 
 panion-piece, the body, especially when the 
 object of contemplation be in the region of 
 the solar plexus, which the ancients assure 
 us is the throne of the mind. 
 
 "What is it to be saved, Mother ?" asked 
 a boy of ten. The mother replied, "My 
 boy, you know the little red card in front 
 of Willie's house, and how you and the 
 other children do not pass that way be- 
 cause Willie has diphtheria?" "Yes, 
 Mother." 
 
 "And the little red sign is to save all 
 of you from taking diphtheria." "Yes, 
 Mother." 
 
 "And you remember when you backed 
 off from the pier into the water and a 
 fisherman came in his boat and picked 
 you up?" "Yes, Mother." 
 
 "He saved you, didn't he, my boy?" 
 "Yes, Mother." 
 
 "And when you were playing with the 
 matches you smuggled from the cellar, 
 Father punished you?" "Yes, Mother." 
 
 84 
 
Thoughts fo r the Kit - B ag 
 
 "And that was Father's way of saving 
 you from being hurt, wasn't it?" "Yes, 
 Mother." 
 
 There are famous entomologists who 
 would trade their professional chairs with 
 a soldier, almost any day (when a battle 
 is not in progress), just for the oppor- 
 tunities the soldier has for studying in- 
 sects and plants. A soldier having a few 
 otherwise idle minutes on his hands may 
 collect specimens of insect and plant life, 
 send to any university for identification, 
 and so improve himself and become a 
 member of the world of nature workers. 
 
 What have you found in minute life 
 deep down in the trenches you have been 
 digging? A man I know, hard at work 
 digging a sewer main in his city, came upon 
 a nest of the wonderful little honey ants 
 which he secured in the top of his hat. 
 Afterwards he sent them to me, telling me 
 that while his back was aching with the 
 stooping and scooping he experienced ab- 
 solution from his suffering, at the instant 
 he discovered the little insects with their 
 transparent globules of honey iridescent 
 
 85 
 
Thoughts fo r the Kit-Rag 
 
 in the sunlight. These little honey people 
 live out of sight in their own original 
 trenches, and must be given moist earth 
 in confinement. 
 
 There are hundreds of interesting insect 
 folk like the so-called thousand-legged 
 worms, and snails, and beetles, who do 
 not resent being called "bugs" by those 
 unacquainted with them. And there are 
 the butterflies which often fly by their 
 own air-planes from one location to an- 
 other, a mile of them in orderly march. 
 
 If a soldier have but the wit about him 
 to gather to his mind loads of common 
 knowledge as a bee gathers pollen on her 
 thigh, he will have time for profitable 
 musings, as well as the satisfaction of 
 adding his mite to the general storehouse 
 of information. 
 
 I am in love with my nurse! I am won- 
 dering if she returns my love or if she can 
 understand the depth of mine. I would 
 like to ask her age, but can only guess it. 
 After all, age counts for nothing if the 
 heart be young. 
 
 Perhaps I would better not mention love 
 86 
 
Thoughts for the Kit-Bag 
 
 to my nurse, but wait for developments. 
 It is said that a patient always is in love 
 with the nurse. I do not doubt it or won- 
 der at it. 
 
 My feelings toward my nurse are in- 
 describable. She is like God in a little 
 human way. I am grateful to her for her 
 patience, and firmness, and gentle author- 
 ity, though I believe she could be the 
 reverse of gentleness should I obtrude be- 
 tween her and her duty. That is the 
 trouble in making love to a nurse — one 
 runs into danger of obtruding between the 
 nurse and her life-work. 
 
 We have much in common. Every nurse 
 has much in common with a patient. 
 Sometimes she must be the very soul of 
 her patient, steadfast of purpose, assuring, 
 directing even in trifles in your weakness, 
 but retreating at the advance of health, 
 that her patient may learn all over again 
 the lessons of self-reliance. 
 
 My nurse calls me her "victim." She 
 shall be my "victim" when once again I 
 am able to outrun and outwit mine ad- 
 versaries. 
 
 One day when my boy comrade joined 
 
 87 
 
Thoughts for the Kit-Bag 
 
 the ranks, he came to say "Good-by." A 
 great, splendid, true, and faithful fellow he 
 is; have you met him? 
 
 At his good-by he asked me for a word, 
 a single sentiment or promise that should 
 go with him and abide with him. I re- 
 sponded with my two hands upon his two 
 shoulders and his hands upon my shoulders, 
 "God is faithful, who will not suffer you to 
 be tempted above that ye are able; but 
 will with the temptation also make a way 
 to escape, that ye may be able to bear it." 
 
 I once wrote Red Cloud, Sioux Chief, 
 whom I had known and esteemed, to send 
 me a simple memento from his buffalo- 
 skin tepee on the banks of the Washita. 
 The Government had presented him with 
 an American flag as reward for loyalty and 
 erected a staff for it, from which I had 
 seen it wave gloriously. But I had no 
 thought of the flag; I thought he might 
 send me a spray from the bullberry bush 
 or a strip from the deer-skin door that 
 swung catercornered from the entrance of 
 his lodge. 
 
 When the memento came it was a tiny 
 strip cut from the depending corner of the 
 
 88 
 
Thoughts for the Kit-Bag 
 
 flag and a sliver from the weather-worn 
 staff. The noble old Chief wrote his reply 
 by the interpreter, "I can think of nothing 
 I would rather send you, my friend, than 
 these fragments. They are proof that I 
 remain loyal to the Government according 
 to my promise." 
 
 There is no such thing in the affairs of 
 life as a blank in a normal memory. Write 
 your memory brim full of what is worth 
 while. We write, and then we read; we 
 cannot erase. 
 
 It is a good thing to "make believe" in 
 a good cause. Stick to the make-believe 
 doctrine. Make believe you are not tired 
 to death in the long monotonous training; 
 make believe you are not thirsty when the 
 other fellow is crying for water; make be- 
 lieve you are just hiking up the home 
 mountain when the long march seems 
 never to end; make believe the pack on 
 your shoulders is just little Jimmie and 
 you are taking him pickaback to school. 
 
 It is a calamity to lose one's head; hav- 
 ing lost it once it is easier to lose it again. 
 
 89 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 To lose one's balance is to forfeit control 
 of one's self. A man's head is the throne 
 of his thought; see that it be not abdicated. 
 
 Fear at the right time and place is proof 
 of a man's courage. Fear at the wrong 
 time and place is proof of a man's weak- 
 ness. 
 
 It is a glory to have a great commander 
 who is worthy of honor. An officer must 
 have been himself loyal and true and obe- 
 dient and deferent. Honor him heart and 
 soul, my soldier friend, for there is yet a 
 greater Commander whom he himself must 
 honor. 
 
 Memory may be a cruel master or the 
 best and dearest of bosom friends. Un- 
 consciously to ourselves we are sketching 
 the background of years to come. Let us 
 dip our brushes in the indelible tints of 
 truth and honor, that Memory may not 
 deride us. 
 
 I have learned one thing essential to 
 recovery, and that is "to eat well and 
 often." Food builds new tissue and also 
 
 90 
 
T hought s for the Kit-Bag 
 
 keeps up the courage. Food also strength- 
 ens the will to recover, which is half the 
 battle. 
 
 Did the hand of a young girl ever rest 
 in yours with a delicacy of touch that 
 made you dream happy dreams of life- 
 long purity of purpose? May the mem- 
 ory of that gentle hand protect you in an 
 alien land or amid the vicissitudes of 
 cantonment life and help you to build 
 true to your dreams. She too had dreams. 
 
 Impatience at delay; to wait; to bide 
 one's time; to long for achievement of 
 coveted conditions; to remain when one 
 yearns for "the front" — these are circum- 
 stances that demand a resolute spirit. 
 
 To wait for the slow pace of convalescence 
 when one longs to be himself again; to bide 
 the tedious preparation of the body for the 
 return of strength — eleven weeks, and still 
 must I wait; but the thrasher bird sings for 
 me and some invisible joy of patience will 
 sing in the heart of a soldier in a stranger's 
 hospital. Sometimes the song is but a low 
 twitter, almost an inaudible murmur, as 
 
 9i 
 
Thoughts for the Kit-Bag 
 
 if expression were inarticulate but impel- 
 ling. 
 
 The weary heart, rising above its weak- 
 ness of speech, must articulate cheer to the 
 weary body; for the body can maintain or 
 improve its strength only by the help of 
 the heart. Take heart then, soldier friend 
 of mine ! 
 
 Here comes a comrade with the checker 
 board! Thank heaven for a checker board. 
 Let us play checkers! 
 
 My thrasher bird above me in the tree- 
 top thought of something he wanted to say 
 in the middle of the night and sang it out 
 to the moonlight and me; just as I, too, am 
 thinking of what I would say to you, my 
 soldier, here in the cheery moonlight. 
 
 Sing, thrasher bird, sing; sing, soul of 
 me, for the glory of daybreak is close at 
 hand. 
 
 Sing, my soldier, sing for the glory of 
 a tomorrow. 
 
 I sent you pencils and pads by the 
 Y M C A. Write a letter to somebody, if 
 only to God, as did the little orphan girl, 
 and see what comes of it. 
 
 92 
 
Thoughts for the Kit-Bag 
 
 See how near we come to camping to- 
 gether, the soldier at the far-away front 
 or in the nearer cantonment, myself lying 
 on my cot writing to you, perhaps with 
 the selfsame thought and perhaps with no 
 less of a wound than yourself, and the 
 thrasher bird in the tree top. Turn 
 again to the title page and look him in the 
 eye. 
 
 To enjoy the sweet perfume of a flower 
 one may simply catch a whiff of its breath 
 in passing; again one must be close, kiss 
 it as it were. Love it. 
 
 The grown-ups among the plants, the 
 stems and leaves after the flowers have 
 passed, hoard within their outer guard or 
 envelope the sweetness you covet. They 
 do not breathe it upon you, thrusting their 
 virtues on the stranger, but crush them, 
 and behold, their fragrance comes forth to 
 greet you, unsparing and satisfying. Break 
 a stem of lavender or sweet m~ry and the 
 sweetness of a faded life entrances you. 
 
 A human life may be crushed and 
 broken for its own sake. The hidden and 
 hoarded sweetness which, imprisoned, was 
 
 93 
 
Thoughts for the Kit-Bag 
 
 denied to another, escapes to satisfy and 
 revive the stranger. 
 
 I wonder if the limbs of the tree above 
 me need exercise, and the foliage, which is 
 constantly moving in the wind. The trunk 
 seems] to sit still like an old person. 
 Looking up and out upon the trees, I 
 fancy the leaves are impatient to be gone, 
 and the slender twigs long to let go of the 
 mother's apron strings. 
 
 Wish you had a pillow — of the sort you 
 used to nestle your head into at home 
 when a child, tucking it well up around 
 your ears with a good-night punch so you 
 mightn't hear the call to "get up" in the 
 morning? 
 
 Pillows have played an important part 
 in the history of all time. When Samson 
 accepted the lap of Delilah for a pillow 
 he lost everything he had in the world, 
 which "everything' was his strength. 
 Samson wasn't worth a cent when his 
 strength was all gone over to the enemy. 
 
 a 
 
 And there was Sisera, who was quite 
 off his base" when he saw a pretty 
 woman. Knowing his weakness, as any 
 
 94 
 
Thoughts for the Kit-Bag 
 
 man knows his own weakness, Sisera 
 should have taken a country road instead 
 of a walk in the city. He literally "lost 
 his head" to Jael, all because he accepted 
 her invitation to sleep upon the softest 
 pillows the house afforded. Jael was mer- 
 ciful to Sisera in that she deprived him of 
 life, and so little reason as he was sup- 
 posed to have had. 
 
 Not every soft pillow is a good one, nor 
 every hard pillow a bad one. A traveler 
 may pray for a pillow and be given a rock, 
 not knowing what may come of it. 
 
 Here is a story which I believe to be 
 perfectly true. There isn't a feature of it 
 to be challenged. We know that men do 
 get lost on the desert, and that rocks are 
 mailed sentinels of the desert, and that 
 some men are in the habit of dreaming 
 and of telling their dreams to the family. 
 Some people have nightmare. But the 
 dream of the story is no nightmare. God 
 does not send nightmares to frighten faith- 
 ful travelers and loyal soldiers. If a man 
 gets a nightmare he deserves it, and no 
 mistake. 
 
 95 
 
Thoughts fo r the Kit - B a g 
 
 A certain young man of the long ago 
 grew too tired to go another mile. It was 
 almost dark and he had to sleep exactly 
 where he was. He did so wish he had a 
 pillow — nothing but sand and stones in 
 sight. A tired man is in his right mind 
 when he wishes for a good thing, provided 
 he looks around to find the object of his 
 wish! One must hunt for the thing he 
 wishes. Only in fairy stories may a person 
 stand still and have his wish come true. 
 
 It is not told in the story if the man 
 was homesick or heartsick or just "tired to 
 death," with blistered heels and cracked 
 lips. But it is written of him that he 
 longed for a pillow. The looking around 
 for something helped him out of his diffi- 
 culty, and though the pillow he discovered 
 was as hard as a rock, it helped him to 
 the best night's rest ever, with a dream 
 thrown in. 
 
 It is just like God to surprise a man 
 with a dream. Nothing in sight but hard 
 times, like so many desert stones, unsym- 
 pathetic, barren of comradeship, cold and 
 unpromising. Nothing in sight save white 
 rocks, in shape and size not unlike the 
 
 96 
 
Thoughts fo r the Kit - B ag 
 
 pillow he so much coveted. He lifted one 
 of the rocks into place and went to sleep. 
 No thought had he of dreaming; he just 
 wanted to sleep for tomorrow's march. 
 
 One may be something of a dreamer 
 without being absent-minded. A dreamer 
 may enjoy his visions while another man 
 is grumbling about the might-have-beens 
 and the probable may-bes. It is said that 
 the brain goes on its usual course during 
 sleep. We would better have a care about 
 the route the brain is going on when 
 awake. 
 
 The sun looked into the face of the 
 young man in the morning, with a merry 
 twinkling light, as if it said, "How do you 
 like rocks for a pillow, young man?" 
 
 The young man had no time to pay 
 attention to his cramped neck or the sore 
 muscles of his shoulders. He had dreamed 
 a dream; all on account of going to sleep 
 on a rocky pillow without grumbling, nor 
 even swearing. The name of God was on 
 his lips, but not in profanity. How was it 
 possible for a man to swear about his pil- 
 low when he had that vision in his heart? 
 
 97 
 
Thoughts fo r the Kit - B a g 
 
 For want of a vision some men do swear, 
 so it is said. 
 
 If a man hasn't had any vision of his 
 own, it would be a good thing to borrow 
 one from this traveler. Second-hand vi- 
 sions come in handy when a man is so 
 dreadfully poor in his soul that he cannot 
 even think a good thought for his hungry 
 heart's breakfast. 
 
 All on account of that dream he had in 
 the night the young man arose and set the 
 stones, upon which his weary head had 
 laid, all up nice in a simple little pile, or 
 cache as it were, in and among which he 
 hid a prayer for the use of young men of 
 all ages whose pillows or resting-places are 
 particularly hard. And God has seen to 
 it that the prayer has been preserved with- 
 out must or stain or mildew. 
 
 No munitions of the enemy have scat- 
 tered that little cache of rocks, and no 
 storm has blotted out the record of that 
 vision and its accompanying prayer. 
 
 Occupation is glorious; to be unoccu- 
 pied is to be miserably debilitated. Em- 
 ployment is the antidote for the slow 
 
 98 
 
Thoughts fo r the K i t - B a g 
 
 poison of despair or the deadly bite of 
 resentment. 
 
 Our dreamer of the hard pillow, of 
 whom I was thinking yesterday, came to 
 a point in his dream when he needed 
 timber to make it work out right. He 
 had the timber within him wherewith to 
 supplement the rocks, the rocks being 
 simply a foundation for an upward slant 
 of glory, or to glory. With such timber, 
 which was within him before the dream, 
 did Jacob in his dream construct a ladder. 
 
 But what about the sanity of the man? 
 Can a ladder stand by itself, even on a 
 rock foundation, with no visible provision 
 for its upper end to lean against? 
 
 If a man do his duty by the hard things, 
 setting up his thoroughfare skyward, God 
 Himself or His angels will attend to the 
 upper end of the ladder. 
 
 And when the daybreak chased away the 
 shadows, revealing the cold monotony of 
 desert and rocks, Jacob hugged his dream 
 to his heart and vowed a great vow, some- 
 thing about doing right all the rest of his 
 life, to get even with the blessed dream. 
 
 99 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 He was so gloriously full of his vision that 
 he pledged all sorts of beautiful promises. 
 And the echo of that prayer on the lonely 
 desert has somehow come rolling down the 
 ages. 
 
 Let no man be afraid of hard things. 
 Hard things make a good foundation upon 
 which to rest earth's end of the ladder 
 skyward. Let no man fear there will be 
 no vision. No need is there of further 
 visions when one has before one's eyes the 
 vision of Jesus Christ. "Set up on the 
 earth" once, no man blasphemer can tear 
 Him down, for the ultimate, the final, the 
 shining Way "reaches unto heaven," im- 
 perishable, eternal. 
 
 It is a good thing to be the dreamer of 
 dreams that are worth while. We may 
 not see the angels of God ascending and 
 descending, but there are little visions in 
 the night very comforting and refreshing 
 when one sees nothing but rocks ahead 
 and behind him. 
 
 It is not good that life be too serene. 
 Better to do battle with the waves on a 
 
 ioo 
 
Thoughts for the Kit-Bag 
 
 rocky coast than to drift aimlessly on a 
 tideless lagoon. 
 
 Wit is the gift of God. If you haven't 
 any wit, get it by hook or crook and pray 
 for it with all your might. It will serve as 
 reserve forces behind the lines. Wit is the 
 athlete ot the soul. Without wit a man 
 becomes anemic in his soul. 
 
 Thoughts that come to us, if worthy 
 ones, are like fagots saved up to light the 
 evening fires of life. If a "bum" thought 
 knocks at your door, pack it off like the 
 hoodlum that it is, or give it a stab with 
 the Sword which the Y M C A brother will 
 explain is in the hand of every man's soul. 
 
 God is with the lonely man. God is 
 able to glorify hard things and hard times 
 into pedestals for heavenly thoroughfares 
 to begin with. 
 
 By hard things in the way God is able 
 to extort from a man such vows as do not 
 appear in dreams, and then so to fill the 
 man with His own strength that lovingly, 
 faithfully, that man will keep all of his 
 promises made in an ecstasy of joy. God's 
 
 IOI 
 
Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 promises invite man's promises. Man loves 
 nothing better than a promise from a per- 
 son who is able to keep his word. God 
 loves nothing better than a promise from 
 those He is spending all His long eternity 
 to serve and save. 
 
 "A God like a super-bishop in an apron 
 and nice top hat — O God, you are God 
 of Battles; forbid that we come to that. 
 God, you are God of Soldiers, merry and 
 rough and kind. Give to your sons an 
 earth and a heaven more to their mind, 
 meat and drink for the body, laughter and 
 song for the soul, and fighting, and clean 
 quick death to end and complete the 
 whole." 
 
 Occupation nourishes the waning vi- 
 tality of submission. Thank God for 
 work. 
 
 Blossoms are the children of the plants. 
 Their sweetness is absolute joy and beauty. 
 The lover of children and flowers owns an 
 inexhaustible mine of satisfaction, happi- 
 ness even. 
 
 But any mine must be "worked" to be 
 
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Thoughts for the Kit -Bag 
 
 profitable. One must study the plants if 
 these be one's mine, discover their possi- 
 bilities and the source of their life. 
 
 It is now fourteen weeks, and health is 
 fast coming. Autumn tints are weaving 
 themselves into the trees and fields, but 
 my California thrasher bird continues to 
 sing. He will sing on and yet more con- 
 tinuously until Merry Christmas and 
 Happy New Year bid you, my soldier 
 friend, and me, to be about the business 
 of a new life. 
 
 May thoughts of mine, conveyed to you 
 in this strange way, bring peace or har- 
 mony or patience to you like a psalm. 
 Red-lipped and red of cheek, Friendship 
 and Unity of Purpose take long breaths, 
 and skip the things that hurt — or better, 
 glorify the hurt we sometimes suffer, with 
 a balm that outwits pain. 
 
 My spirit laughs with glee that I am 
 yet alive, in spite of pain impossible for 
 tongue to give recital of. Scars are but 
 memories of the flesh. Let scars, your 
 scars or mine, be recollections visible of 
 triumph over pain. 
 
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Thoughts for the Kit- Bag 
 
 May flowers of hope and strength and 
 faith bestrew your march to Somewhere — 
 God knows where, God knows. 
 
 And we somewhere, some day as well as 
 now, will join glad hands with all who 
 hope and wait, and bide our time to con- 
 quer all things hostile to the better life. 
 
 Never say die, my boy, if your gallant 
 ship goes down; 
 Cling to your friendly spar. 
 As you march through the desert, hot and 
 brown, 
 Keep your eye on one white star. 
 With grit in your soul and fire in your 
 
 eye, 
 Crank up your courage and never say die. 
 
 Never say die, my boy, when the firing 
 line grows thin, 
 And you fall with the rest, 
 But hark to the beat, through the battle 
 din, 
 Of the heart in your breast. 
 Desert not your body, the Soul's best 
 
 ally, 
 Stay with it, stay with it, and never say 
 die. 
 
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Thought s for the Kit-Bag 
 
 Never say die, my boy, when the hurt of 
 
 the wound halts the breath. 
 Ward off the weakness of Fear 
 With the bayonet charge of Faith; and 
 
 Death 
 ' Shall not ever strike you here. 
 Bite your lip, while the aim of the foe 
 
 you defy, 
 Cling to the flag of your courage and 
 
 never say die. 
 
 105