Unselfish Days

It is my contention that humility is a spirit of selflessness while pride is the spirit of selfishness. A test of humility is a test to find evidence of unselfish behavior. A nineteenth century novelist and poet named Mary Anne Evans wrote a poem that invites us to view our day from this perspective. She is better known by her nom de plume George Eliot and her novel Silas Marner. Here is her poem titled, Count That Day Lost.

If you sit down at set of sun
And count the acts that you have done,
And, counting, find
One self-denying deed, one word
That eased the heart of him who heard,
One glance most kind
That fell like sunshine where it went –
Then you may count that day well spent.

But if, through all the livelong day,
You’ve cheered no heart, by yea or nay –
If, through it all
You’ve nothing done that you can trace
That brought the sunshine to one face –
No act most small
That helped some soul and nothing cost –
Then count that day as worse than lost.

I think I could interpret this to say: "a day without humility is like a day without sunshine." Those looking forward to an humble man's company might easily say of his arrival: "here comes the sun."