At last, after many processes, it stood upon the table, a gem of graceful beauty.

In some way analogous to this every noble character is formed.
Common clay at first, it passes through a thousand processes and experiences, many of them hard and painful, until at length it is presented before God, faultless in its beauty, bearing the features of Christ himself.
Spiritual beauty never can be reached without cost.

The blessing is always hidden away in the burden, and can be gotten only by lifting the burden.

Self must die if the good in us is to live and shine out in radiance.

Michael Angelo used to say, as the chippings flew thick from the marble on the floor of his studio, "While the marble wastes, the image grows." There must be a wasting of self, a chipping away continually of things that are dear to nature, if the things that are true, and just, and honorable, and pure, and lovely, are to come out in the life.