When once the first inclination toward
weakness and doubt is overcome, every effort becomes easier, and the
sense of strength waxes keener day by day. Who are the most serene and
sympathetic of all people that even the most obscure among us meet?
The men and women who have come through the Valley of the Shadow of
Tribulation. By a benign ordinance which is uniform in action, it so
falls out that the conquerors derive enhanced pleasure from the memory
of difficulties beaten down and sorrows vanquished. Where then is the
use of craven shrinking? Let us rather welcome our early failures as
we would welcome the health-giving rigour of some stern physician.
Think of the heroes and heroines who have conquered, and think
joyfully also of those who have wrought out their strenuous day in
seeming failure. There are four lines of poetry which every
English-speaking man and woman should learn by heart, and I shall
close this address with them. They were written on the memorial stone
of certain Italian martyrs--
"Of all Time's words, this is the noblest one
That ever spoke to souls and left them blest;
Gladly we would have rested had we won
Freedom.
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