She would be
Hesper's servant that she might gain Hesper. I would not have her
therefore wondered at as a marvel of humility. She was simply a
young woman who believed that the man called Jesus Christ is a
real person, such as those represent him who profess to have
known him; and she therefore believed the man himself--believed
that, when he said a thing, he entirely meant it, knowing it to
be true; believed, therefore, that she had no choice but do as he
told her. That man was the servant of all; therefore, to regard
any honest service as degrading would be, she saw, to deny
Christ, to call the life of creation's hero a disgrace. Nor was
he the first servant; he did not of himself choose his life; the
Father gave it him to live--sent him to be a servant, because he,
the Father, is the first and greatest servant of all. He gives it
to one to serve as the rich can, to another as the poor must. The
only disgrace, whether of the counting-house, the shop, or the
family, is to think the service degrading. If it be such, why not
sit down and starve rather than do it? No man has a right to
disgrace himself. Starve, I say; the world will lose nothing in
you, for you are its disgrace, who count service degrading. You
are much too grand people for what your Maker requires of you,
and does himself, and yet you do it after a fashion, because you
like to eat and go warm.
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