p. 459 | What Is the Use? by Louise Henry

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Oct 19, 1882

What Is the Use?

By Louise Henry

A GROUP of girls were talking one day of a girl acquaintance whose acquirements were uncommon for her age and sex. As some one named over the list of languages, ancient and modern, in which this young woman was versed, one of the listeners exclaimed: "Well, what is the use of it all?" Various replies came: "The same use that your flower painting is," "Because she likes it," and so on. The questioner was silenced, yet scarcely satisfied. Many another girl, the writer inclines to think, might put the same query, which needs and deserves a fuller answer than it received on this occasion; for the particular question immediately suggests the larger one: What is the use of any intellectual pursuit?

To the questioner the girl linguist's occupation seemed strangely uninviting and profitless. By her own crewel work and china painting she not only pleased herself, but, as she believed, gave pleasure to others, who could appreciate these reproductions of the lovely forms and colors of natural things. What pleasure could any one either take or give by delving among the roots of language? To answer her in a word, one might say: My dear girl, the pleasure and the profit of all mental effort is in the effort itself; in the fact that by it the mind grows as it was meant to grow, expands to the full measure of its own capacity. You may take it for certain that, just as the muscles of your body would become lifeless and useless if you should cease to work them, in the same way any of your mental or spiritual faculties will become paralyzed if they are not actively used. The mind seldom wears out from overwork; it often rusts out from want of work. Nothing that is worth having can be had without labor. There is no royal road to learning; neither is there to any other thing one cares to possess. If one wants to be loved, he must himself love, and give, if he wishes it to be given to him, of material or immaterial goods.

Think for a moment what you are, or, rather, what your Creator intended you to be. A thinking, feeling, willing person—that is what you are; and, unless you are ready to remain a nonentity in God's universe, you would like to think, feel, and will to some purpose, not feebly and aimlessly, but strongly, fully, nobly, gladly.

To be less than what we were meant to be, to consent to stay a smaller, more insignificant creature than we might be, who wants that? God meant us to be a good deal, and so many of us are content to be so little. It is as though some one came and said to us: "Look! Here is a spacious palace. You are free to wander through its countless rooms and enjoy its splendid treasures of art; from its broad windows you may gaze over the vast surrounding domain and delight your soul with its never-failing, never-wearying abundance of beauty." And some of us reply: "Thank you; but I am content to stay where I am, in my one dark little room. It is rather plainly and scantily furnished, it is true; but then, you know, I am used to it, and its bareness doesn't distress me." Open wide every window of the soul, if you want to know what living means and the highest enjoyment of your life. Every added interest for the heart and for the mind, adds a new reason for living. What is the use of living as the animals do, to eat, to sleep, to work when they are driven to it, to stumble through the days in stupid, senseless fashion?

We are not all born alike. We have our differing gifts and tastes. We need not all labor for the same things; only labor for something, enjoy something. If you prefer not to study languages, but to do something else, you are free to choose; but do not ask what is the use of such study. It is the opening of another window for the mind. No doubt there is some difference in the value of various tastes and pursuits, and some nobler, finer, more truly satisfying and elevating than others; but the main thing, after all, is to care for something that feeds the mental and spiritual life. The greater the variety of our tastes the more possibilities of enjoyment we have, and we were meant to enjoy all that can be enjoyed in a pure, unselfish way. The more we labor, whether in one direction or in several, the greater will be our ability to work, and the more of a man or of a woman we become, the less of an unintelligent animal. To think of how much there is to enjoy and how careless we are of our happiness—of all there is to know and how little we in this life attain to; how much to do; how little gets done, with all our effort—the thought might sadden and discourage if we had no hope of continued life beyond of learning, doing, and enjoying.

—Louise Henry, in Independent.