It is Sunday, January 25, 1920, and Lloyd Douglas is still preaching his series on “Personality” at the First Congregational Church of Ann Arbor. (This is from Sermons [5], Box 3, Lloyd C. Douglas Papers, Bentley Historical Library, University of Michigan. © University of Michigan.) Douglas says:
“Another desirable grace is Reserve.
“Having sold yourself to yourself and having gone out to market yourself, the very best advertising you can have is satisfied customers.
“There is a type of personality that is good for a short haul but will not stand up under an endurance test. He makes a dreadful mistake who, in an effort to impress his personality on other people, rushes at them with much palaver and a great noise. He gives the impression of having all his stock in the front window. It may be entirely untrue. He may have a great deal in reserve; only he doesn’t act like it.
“People of strong personality always give one the impression of having a tremendous amount of power that is stored against a correspondingly great demand.
“The bubbler, who is always in a state of effervescence, may have a great deal of energy laid back for a rainy day, but it isn’t sure that he has to the casual observer. At all events, don’t feel that this kind of human kinetics that is forever pip-pipping at the safety-valve is to be imitated.
“Of course, if you are a natural bubbler and can’t help it, bubble on. We don’t worry much about your future. You’ll get along, and the world will be a whole lot better off for your having been in it.
“But, all things considered, if somehow you can give out the impression that you have a little spiritual energy in repose — secreted somewhere about you — it helps greatly to make other people think that your personality is strong. And a very good way to make people think that you have it is to have it. In fact, not many people will think that you have it unless you do have it.
“We all need to cultivate Enthusiasm. But that virtue has been sufficiently extolled in our time and needs no advocate.
“Advice can be had, in plenty, to spread your canvas to the breeze; but do not forget also to carry a little ballast. It makes a longer voyage, and a safer one. Don’t talk more than you think, if you would develop some reserve power. Don’t, for the sake of seeming animated and enthusiastic, become a mere chatterbox. Don’t let it be suspected, as you talk, that your voice is in advance of your thoughts, or that, somehow, your mouth and your mind had become disengaged. Keep something back.
“Before you offer your opinions, take them out and look them over carefully. A little practice of this kind makes for that reserve power we were talking about. Mostly we refer to it as poise.
“I am sure it could be shown that they have most in reserve, and are best poised spiritually, who have deliberately planned to give some time, when it could be snatched from other duties, for reflection upon very serious considerations.
“Like ‘Destiny.’ Whence — whither — why?
“The problems of our beginnings and our ends; our future, our ambitions, and our goal; our strivings, our longings, and our consecrations — think of them in whatsoever terms you will, they are, in their last analysis, considerations which throw us back upon God.”
[Then he quotes excerpts from the poem, “Each In His Own Tongue,” by William Herbert Carruth. It’s not clear to me why he chose to recite parts of this poem, but it does address the big questions of life and includes the line, “Some call it Evolution/And others call it God.”] He continues:
“It will give you personal power to have, in reserve, some deductions of your own which have led you irresistibly into the presence of Him who is your Father.
“This is no idle fancy but an attested fact, that ‘they who wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint.”
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