Page:Historic Girls.djvu/191

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THERESA OF AVILA.
173

like a kindred spirit to that helpful and unselfish one that actuated this girl of the Spanish sierras?

"Here and there is born a Saint Theresa," says George Eliot, "foundress of nothing, whose loving heart-beats and sobs after an unattained goodness tremble off and are dispersed among hindrances, instead of centring in some long-recognizable deed."

But if a girl or boy, desiring to do right, will disregard the hindrances, and not simply sit and sob after an unattained goodness—if, instead, they will but do the duty nearest at hand manfully and well, the reward will come in something even more desirable than a "long-recognizable deed." It will come in the very self-gratification that will at last follow every act of courtesy, of friendliness, and of self-denial, and such a life will be of more real value to the world than all the deeds of all the crusaders, or than even the stern and austere charities of a Saint Theresa.