There are other features which ought to be mentioned. Clearness of vision, capacity for hard work and quick decisions, executive force, the ability to guide the thoughts and energies of other men into the same channel as his own, and thus unite their force with his, and his mastery of details, are conspicuous elements in his character.
Charles T. Walker has his faults, like other men. These are not to be overlooked, and I mention this fact, in closing this chapter, in order to say that Charles T. Walker is not a perfect man. A perfect man has not trod this planet since Christ left it. It is said of Charles Lamb, that he liked his friends, not in spite of their faults, but faults and all. And Charles Lamb was no less right than kind. The errors of a true man are not discreditable to him, for his errors spring from the same source as his excellencies. Moreover, it is very difficult to judge character. Generally speaking, those who are familiar with a man are blind to his faults, and those who are not intimate are blind to his virtues. Still, in summing up the traits and characteristics of Dr. Walker, it may be truthfully said that he is no ordinary man, and that one would be compelled to search among sinful mortals many and many a day before he would find one man who, in all respects, possesses more of the traits of genuine honor, manhood and sterling worth than does the present pastor of the Mount Olivet Baptist Church, New York City.
Of the countless gifts which God bestows upon man, the rarest, the most divine, is an ability to take supreme interest in human welfare. If any pious soul will accurately ascertain what it is in the character of the Man Christ Jesus, the contemplation of which fills his heart with rapture and his eyes with tears, that pious soul will know what is here meant by the expression “supreme interest in human welfare.” Most of us, alarmed at the dangers which beset our lives, distracted with cares, blinded with desires to secure our own safety, are absorbed in schemes of personal advantage. Only a few men go apart, ascend the heights, survey the scene with serene, unselfish eye, and make discoveries which those engaged in their own selfish pursuits could never arrive at. But for such, the race of mankind would long ago have extirpated itself in its mad, blind strife. But for such, it never would have been discovered that no individual can be safe in welfare while any other individual is not.