The Value of Smiles

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Apr 8, 1886

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 12, No. 14.

The Value of Smiles.

WE were deeply impressed the other day with the value of smiles. Sitting in the Sabbath-school room, a lady stepped forward at the superintendent's request, to act as substitute for an absent teacher. It was a dark, gloomy day, and a dumpish, grumpy set of boys faced that teacher. They were in a "don't care" mood. Their teacher had deserted them; the superintendent was very slow in recognizing the fact; he had not once consulted them as to whom they would prefer; it was a plain case that nobody cared for them or showed them any respect, and they were resolved to show none to anybody. She stepped into the doubly-dark corner and smiled. It wasn't one of your goody-goody face smiles, thin and vapid, that seem to say, "Just see how nice I can be when I try." It was a heart-smile. The face had nothing to do with the smile except to wear it; and though it was a plain face it beamed, it shone. Why, the smile seemed even to light up the dark corner of that basement Sabbath-school room! The boys caught it and smiled too; they could not help it. They could not explain how; but they were fairly captured by the smile, and declared they never had such a teacher before, or such a lesson, though it was the driest lesson of the quarter. Can I explain it? Yes; it was sympathy—genuine, Christ-like sympathy—that sat on that woman's face; and when a soul filled with such love smiles, it goes straight to the heart, where mere superficial amiability—facial deceitfulness—disgusts.

Our Teacher's Journal.