The visionary form became a companion and auditor; keeping a place not only in the waking imagination, but in those dreams of lighter slumber of which it is truest to say, "I sleep, but my heart waketh"--when the disturbing trivial story of yesterday is charged with the impassioned purpose of years.
Of late the urgency of irremediable time, measured by the gradual choking of life, had turned Mordecai's trust into an agitated watch for the fulfillment that must be at hand. Was the bell on the verge of tolling, the sentence about to be executed? The deliverer's footstep must be near--the deliverer who was to rescue Mordecai's spiritual travail from oblivion, and give it an abiding-place in the best heritage of his people. An insane exaggeration of his own value, even if his ideas had been as true and precious as those of Columbus or Newton, many would have counted this yearning, taking it as the sublimer part for a man to say, "If not I, then another," and to hold cheap the meaning of his own life. But the fuller nature desires to be an agent, to create, and not merely to look on: strong love hungers to bless, and not merely to behold blessing. And while there is warmth enough in the sun to feed an energetic life, there will still be men to feel, "I am lord of this moment's change, and will charge it with my soul."

This visionary form became a companion not only in his waking imagination, but in his sleep.
Of late the urgency of time, measured by the gradual choking of life, had turned Mordecai's trust into an agitated watch for the fulfilment that must be at hand. Was the bell on the verge of tolling? The deliverer must be near - the deliverer who would save Mordecai's spiritual work from oblivion, and preserve it in the heritage of his people.
Many would have seen this yearning as an insane exaggeration of his own value. But love hungers to bless, not merely to behold blessing. And while there is warmth enough in the sun to feed life, there will still be men to feel, "I am lord of this moment, and will charge it with my soul."
