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Kingdom for a Horse!

August 20, 1944

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A line from Shakespeare had Richard III say, “My kingdom for a horse.” This has far-reaching implications in the pattern of human behavior. When a man needs something, or thinks he does, or sets his heart on having something, immediate wants, immediate worries, small annoyances often crowd out matters of much greater moment. History has proved (and also people have proved) that a person will sometimes pay an exorbitant price to satisfy an immediate appetite. Esau, of course, is the classic example of forfeiting much for little, and of sacrificing the future for the present. And it was Esau of whom Paul said he “sold his birthright . . . for one morsel of meat.”1 There is another phrase of this same problem that suggests itself: Because we want what we want when we want it, we are often inclined to obligate ourselves for more than we can pay and to borrow beyond reason and presume that obligations will somehow be easier to meet tomorrow. Also we sometimes agree to do more things than we know we can possibly do, and so we find ourselves worried and committed and crowded from all sides, and we say to ourselves, “If I can only get through this immediate difficulty, if I can only set straight this one embarrassment, if I can only avoid the consequences of this one commitment, I’ll never let myself get into such a situation again.” There is always danger in paying too big a price for present wants or in postponing problems that should be faced and solved in the present⎯because the future will always have its own problems and its own price to pay. We should look far into the future before we offer a kingdom or a birthright or any principle or exorbitant price for any appetite, for any passing pleasure, or for any want or supposed want of the immediate moment.


1 Hebrews 12:16

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