The second mile

“WHOSOEVER shall compel thee to go one mile — go with him twain.” You will recognize this text from the Sermon on the Mount as a counsel of perfection, good advice in paradoxical form which emphasizes a profound truth by an apparent denial of common sense. A preacher who was once reproached for straying rather far from his text replied: “A text is like a gate; it has two uses — you can either swing on it, or open it and pass through.” Let us swing a moment, then pass on through. Every calling has its mile of compulsion, its daily round of tasks and duties, its standard of honest craftsmanship, its code of man-to-man relations, which one must cover if he is to survive. Beyond that lies the mile of voluntary effort, where men strive for excellence, give unrequited service to the common good, and seek to invest their work with a wide and enduring significance. It is only in this second mile that a calling may attain to the dignity and the distinction of a profession.