What Can I Do?
by
HE was a poor cripple–with fingers twisted out of all useful shape, and lower limbs paralyzed so that he had to drag them after him wearily when he moved through the short distances that limited his sphere of locomotion–a poor, unhappy, murmuring, and, at times, ill-natured cripple, eating the bread which a mother’s hard labor procured for him. For hours every fair day, during spring, summer, and autumn, he might be seen in front of the little house where he lived leaning upon the gate, or sitting on an old bench looking with a sober face at the romping village children, or dreamily regarding the passengers who moved with such strong limbs up and down the street. How often, bitter envy stung the poor cripple’s heart! How often, as the thoughtless village children taunted him cruelly with his misfortune, would he fling harsh maledictions after them. Many pitied the poor cripple; many looked upon him with feelings of disgust and repulsion; but few, if any, sought to do him good.
Not far from where the cripple lived was a man who had been bedridden for years, and who was likely to remain so to the end of his days. He was supported by the patient industry of a wife.
“If good works are the only passport to heaven,” he said to a neighbor one day, “I fear my chances will be small.”
“‘Well done, good and faithful servant,’ is the language of welcome,” was replied; and the neighbor looked at the sick man in a way that made him feel a little uncomfortable.
“I am sick and bedridden–what can I do?” he spoke, fretfully.
“When little is given, little is required. But if there be only a single talent it must be improved.”
“I have no talent,” said the invalid.
“Are you sure of that?”
“What can I do? Look at me! No health, no strength, no power to rise from this bed. A poor, helpless creature, burdening my wife. Better for me, and for all, if I were in my grave.”
“If that were so you would be in your grave. But God knows best. There is something for you to do, or you would be no longer permitted to live,” said the neighbor.
The sick man shook his head.
“As I came along just now,” continued the neighbor, “I stopped to say a word to poor Tom Hicks, the cripple, as he stood swinging on the gate before his mother’s house, looking so unhappy that I pitied him in my heart. ‘What do you do with yourself all through these long days, Tom?’ I asked. ‘Nothing,’ he replied, moodily. ‘Don’t you read sometimes?’ I queried. ‘Can’t read,’ was his sullen answer. ‘Were you never at school?’ I went on. ‘No: how can I get to school?’ ‘Why don’t your mother teach you?’ ‘Because she can’t read herself,’ replied Tom. ‘It isn’t too late to begin now,’ said I, encouragingly; ‘suppose I were to find some one willing to teach you, what would you say?’ The poor lad’s face brightened as if the sunshine had fallen upon it; and he answered, ‘I would say that nothing could please me better.’ I promised to find him a teacher; and, as I promised, the thought of you, friend Croft, came into my mind. Now, here is something that you can do; a good work in which you can employ your one talent.”
The sick man did not respond warmly to this proposition. He had been so long a mere recipient of good offices,–had so long felt himself the object towards which pity and service must tend,–that he had nearly lost the relish for good deeds. Idle dependence had made him selfish.
“Give this poor cripple a lesson every day,” went on the neighbor, pressing home the subject, “and talk and read to him. Take him in charge as one of God’s children, who needs to be instructed and led up to a higher life than the one he is now living. Is not this a good and a great work? It is, my friend, one that God has brought to your hand, and in the doing of which there will be great reward. What can you do? Much! Think of that poor boy’s weary life, and of the sadder years that lie still before him. What will become of him when his mother dies? The almshouse alone will open its doors for the helpless one. But who can tell what resources may open before him if stimulated by thought. Take him, then, and unlock the doors of a mind that now sits in darkness, that sunlight may come in. To you it will give a few hours of pleasant work each day; to him it will be a life-long benefit. Will you do it?”