WOMEN WHO INSPIRE MEN.

Shannon News, 5 March 1926, Page 4

WOMEN WHO INSPIRE MEN.

Perhaps the most wonderful and mighty of all endowments is the gift of inspiring others. It is an endowment which expresses itself in the daily doings of men and women, whatever their rank or station in life may be. Its mark is to be seen upon almost every page of the history of humanity. Palace and humble cot alike may owe much to its influence. It is one of the greatest of the Creator’s gifts to woman. Indeed one is inclined to think of it as a special gift to her. For while one man in a thousand may xbe rich in the possession of it, it is one of the very bricks that go to rear up the edifice of true (womanhood. At first sight it may seem rather strange that the women who most readily inspire . men are generally the quiet, homely sort —those gentle, sweet souls who dread the limelight as a mouse does the light of day. Yet it is just they are so unconscious of their power, so beautifully non-self that they possess the power of. inspiring men to such an uplifting extent. The brilliant, gifted women are altogether too self-assertive to inspire men. The still, small voice they hear is that which counsels them to exploit their own personalities, voice their o'frn opinions, and carve out their own destinies. They are intellectually equipped to inspire men, but they ,lack a certain spiritual warmth which is the real root of the power to inspire. A man has no desire to see his own cleverness eclipsed by his wife’s brilliance, nor his home used as a place where such brilliance may be developed or exploited. His Joys and Sorrows.

He wants his home to be a place to which, after his day’s work is done,, he can return with his joys arid his sorrows. And he wants his wire to be a woman who will listen to' him, show him that selfless sympathy which will draw out his con- J fidences and give him that measure of pity which is the perfect tonic for a tired man. A, man has little need of the woman who can plumb the profound depths of relativity, or discourse epigrammatically upon everything in general. It is the quiet, sympathetic —their brilliant sisters might call them commonplace —wofnen whom “you can sit down beside and tell things to'’ that inspire him. A man, no matter to what extent he may have # drunk of life, never grows beyond the. need of havinig someone to confide in, and someone who will meet his confidences as a sympathetic mother would. Rise Above Failures. It is the woman who can listen to men’s anguishes and exultations, say little, yet understand; the. women who are always happy in kissing bruises and soothing ruffled feathers, that inspire men to rise above failures to the high heights of worthy ’success. If the question, “What is the secret of success?” was put to me, I should feel inclined to answer , the inspiration of a selfless woman. One has only to read the life stories of some of the world’s most renowned men to find what a beau'tiful, and mighty influence in their lives was the wife or mother, of whom the world generally knew very little.