Labor, wide as the earth, has its summit in Heaven. Sweat of
the brow; and up from that to sweat of the brain, sweat of the heart;
which includes all Kepler's calculations, Newton's meditations, all
sciences, all spoken epics, all acted heroism, martyrdoms--up to that
"Agony of bloody sweat," which all men have called divine! Oh, brother,
if this is not "worship," then, I say, the more pity for worship; for
this is the noblest thing yet discovered under God's sky!
Who art thou that complainest of thy life of toil? Complain not. Look
up, my wearied brother; see thy fellow-workmen there, in God's Eternity;
surviving there, they alone surviving; sacred Band of the Immortals,
celestial Body-guard of the Empire of Mind. Even in the weak human
memory they survive so long, as saints, as heroes, as gods; they alone
surviving; peopling the immeasured solitudes of Time! To thee Heaven,
though severe, is not unkind; Heaven is kind--as a noble mother; as that
Spartan mother, saying, while she gave her son his shield, "With it, my
son, or upon it!" Thou, too, shalt return home, in honor to thy
far-distant home, doubt it not--if in the battle thou keep thy shield.
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