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- 266 Poor Esau! He did not frankly abandon the flesh and take up with the spirit; he could not “scorn delights to live laborious days,” and was *rejected*, as all such men are. For men of the spirit always, in the long-run, beat men of the flesh in making their way to fame, or fortune, or the Promised Land, or handing down a covenant blessing. Abraham prayed, as Matthew Arnold said, “that Ishmael might stand before the Lord”—that is, succeed him. But no. Not the brilliant and audacious Ishmael, but the homely and humble Isaac is the child of promise, continues the good work, and is the favorite of God; for Ishmael was a man of the senses, but Isaac a man of the soul.
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268 So Isaac loved Esau, and would have preferred him; but God gave the blessing to Jacob, for, with all his faults, he was a
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271 man of the soul. He preferred the blessing to pottage; he had a Godward slope to his mind; he was interested in moral questions, and back of his timidity, craft, and many weaknesses there were a resolute will, a steady purpose, and a fixed aim—the senses second to the soul. And he got it, and became one of the fathers of that chosen people out of whom have come the religion and morality of the world.
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273 Then let all the young people who read these stories lay it to heart that men of spirit beat men of the senses; that to succeed in life, carve out a career, make a good finish, and get into any Promised Land requires more than good-nature, reckless courage, and brilliant parts. For solid faculties are better than erratic genius, and steady, plodding industry, backed on conscience, wins more than wit, charming manners, and jolly good-fellowship in any quest in life; for Esau—the man of impulses—is always beaten by the Jacobs of fixed aims and steady principles, who
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276 subordinate a present good to a future reward. Then be no Esau, with the senses your master, but a young Jacob, with the soul on top. For Esau's path across the world is lost in briers and overgrown with weeds, and obliterated before he has passed early manhood. The world sees him no more, has no use for him, no need to see him. But Jacob still lives and influences human conduct. For he was the father of Joseph, and Joseph made Moses possible, and Moses still thunders from Sinai at successive generations of mankind, therefore Jacob is alive. His path across the world is not overgrown with briers and weeds and lost. Oh no; it is open and plain from Shechem to Egypt, from Egypt to Sinai, and from Sinai to the Promised Land beyond the river.
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278 God forbid that any of my young readers should make Esau's choice for the senses above and before the soul! It does not pay for this world, for vice has more martyrs than virtue. Many people suffer more to be lost than they would
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281 have to suffer to be saved. Wickedness is wretchedness in the end, and piety is peace and a sound mind in a sound body. And it does not pay in view of eternity, for the senses die when our bodies refuse to serve us longer, of course, but the soul must give account to God.
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283 But I am too long. Never sell your birthright for any mess of pottage. Never be the degenerate and dishonest son of worthy and upright parents. Never blot a good family record—a black sheep in the household. Never throw the rein on the neck of the senses, but make the soul your master. Let duty, not inclination, control your conduct and govern your way. Bid the Esau of your senses pack and begone, and summon Jacob to the top and front of your life—the God-born man, who despised the pleasures of sin for a season, and had an eye to the issues of eternity, to spiritual qualities, to the recompense of reward. So doing, you shall share the Lord's paradise at last in the other world across the big divide.
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