Leaves of Life

[Judy Harder]

JANUARY TWENTY-SIXTH

Lord George Sackville born 1716.
Benjamin Robert Haydon born 1786.
Mary Mapes Dodge born 1838.
General Gordon (Chinese Gordon) killed 1885.

Ave Maria! blessed be the hour,
That time, the clime, the spot, where I so oft
Have felt that moment in its fullest power
Sink o'er the earth so beautiful and soft,
While swung the deep bell in the distant tower
Or the faint dying day-hymn stole aloft,
And not a breath crept through the rosy air,
And yet the forest leaves seemed stirred with
prayer.
--Lord Byron.

I am quite happy, thank God, and like Lawrence, I have tried to do my duty.
--General Gordon (just before death).

For in the day of trouble he will keep me secretly
in his pavilion:
In the covert of his tabernacle will he hide me;
He will lift me up upon a rock.
--Psalm 27. 5.

Heavenly Father, teach me how to breathe in the sweetness of life. Reveal to me the life that will bring peace to the soul. May I not be dismayed, but find the "Peace that passeth all understanding," the perfect peace that comes from thee. Amen.

[Judy Harder]

JANUARY TWENTY-SEVENTH

Johannes Wolfgang Mozart born 1756.
A. W. von Schlegel born 1767.
David Friedrich Strauss born 1808.

To keep young, every day read a poem, hear a choice piece of music, view a fine painting, and, if possible, do a good action. Man's highest merit always is, as much as possible, to rule external circumstances, and as little as possible to let himself be ruled by them.
--Goethe.

Let us not always say,
"Spite of this flesh to-day
I strove, made head, gained ground upon the whole!"
As the bird wings and sings,
Let us cry, "All good things
Are ours, nor soul helps flesh more now than flesh helps soul!"
--Robert Browning.

Surely goodness and loving-kindness shall follow me all the days of my life.
--Psalm 23. 6.

Loving Father, help me to foresee that it is what I care for to-day that determines how I will find old age. May I not bring my closing years to weariness and lonesomeness, but may I have the restfulness that comes with communing with thee. Amen.

[Judy Harder]

JANUARY TWENTY-EIGHTH

Charlemagne died 814.
Sir Francis Drake died 1596.
Peter the Great died 1725.
Charles George Gordon (Chinese Gordon) born 1833.

He only is advancing in life whose heart is getting softer, whose blood warmer, whose brain quicker, and whose spirit is entering into living peace. And the men who have this life in them are the true lords and kings of the earth--they, and they only.
--John Ruskin.

Just where you stand in the conflict,
There is your place!
Just where you think you are useless,
Hide not your face!
God placed you there for a purpose,
What e'er it be;
Think you he has chosen you for it:
Work loyally.
--Anonymous.

O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and the knowledge of God! how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past tracing out!
--Romans 11. 33.

My Father, I thank thee that thou hast endowed me with a will; help me to use it aright. May I have the knowledge of what thou dost demand of my soul, that I may do my best with what thou hast given me. Help me that I may reach out for the highest ideals of life. Amen.

[Judy Harder]

JANUARY TWENTY-NINTH

Emanuel Swedenborg born 1688.
Thomas Paine born 1737.
Adelaide Ristori born 1822.
William McKinley, Ohio, twenty-fourth President United States, born 1843.

God will keep no nation in supreme place that will not do supreme duty.
--William McKinley.

Reputation is what men and women think of us; character is what God and the angels know of us.
--Thomas Paine.

The reward of one duty is the power to fulfill another.
--George Eliot.

Let thy hand be upon the man of thy right hand,
Upon the son of man whom thou madest strong for thyself.
So shall we not go back from thee:
Quicken thou us, and we will call upon thy name.
--Psalm 80. 17, 18.

My Father, I pray that I may be just and be given to kindness. May I be conscious of my virtues, and use them to overcome my faults. May I hear clearly thy call that I may be sure of the way as I lead others to duty and happiness. Amen.

[Judy Harder]

JANUARY THIRTIETH


Archbishop Butler born 1774.
Walter Savage Landor born 1775.
Henri Rochefort born 1830.

Why, why repine, my pensive friend,
At pleasures slipped away?
Some the stern fates will never lend,
And all refuse to stay.
I see the rainbow in the sky,
The dew upon the grass;
I see them and I ask not why
They glimmer or they pass.
With folded arms I linger not
To call them back; 'twere vain;
In this, or in some other spot,
I know they'll shine again.
--Walter Savage Landor.

When disappointment comes meet it, but do not carry it along with you; nor fetter your spirit by changeless haste. "Memory will always pursue some precious instance of itself," which will bring either renewed confidence or resignation.
--M. B. S.

For thou shalt forget thy misery;
Thou shalt remember it as waters that are passed away.
--Job 11. 16.

Gracious Father, help me to "Lift mine eyes unto the hills" that glorify the discouraging ways. May I appreciate thy great love, and from my limitations find the possibilities that are limitless. Amen.

[Judy Harder]

JANUARY THIRTY-FIRST


Cromwell dissolved Parliament 1655.
Charles Edward (Young Pretender) died 1788.
Franz Schubert born 1797.
James G. Elaine born 1830.

Nature demands that man be ever at the top of his condition. He who violates her laws must pay the penalty, though he sit on a throne.
--James G. Elaine.

Dig channels for the streams of love,
Where they may broadly run;
And love has overflowing streams
To fill them every one.
For we must share if we must keep
The good things from above;
Ceasing to give, we cease to have--
Such is the law of love.
--R. C. Trench.

And thy life shall be clearer than the noonday;
Though there be darkness, it shall be as the morning.
--Job 11. 17.

My Father, I would remember that it is mostly from my inspirations that I conceive life. Take away hatred and vanity that keep me in faults, and awake in me the thoughts that are responsible for visions that lead to high ideals. Amen.

[Judy Harder]

FEBRUARY FIRST


Ben Jonson born 1574.
John Philip Kemble born 1757.
Arthur Henry Hallam born 1811.
George Cruikshank died 1878.

It is not growing like a tree
In bulk, doth make man better be;
Or standing long an oak, three hundred year,
To fall a log at last, dry, bald, and sere:
A lily of a day
Is fairer far in May,
Although it fall and die that night--
It was the plant and flower of Light.
In small proportions we just beauties see;
And in short measure life may perfect be.
--Ben Jonson.

There are four things which are little upon the earth,
But they are exceeding wise:
The ants are a people not strong,
Yet they provide their food in the summer;
The conies are but a feeble folk,
Yet make they their houses in the rocks;
The locusts have no king,
Yet go they forth all of them by bands;
The lizard taketh hold with her hands,
Yet is she in king's palaces.
--Proverbs 30. 24-28.

Creator of all, lead me to see the light, and instruct me that I may be able to reason. Guard me against spectacular endeavors, that I may be genuine. Amen.

[Judy Harder]

FEBRUARY SECOND

Candlemas Day.
Nell Gwynn born 1650.
Hannah More born 1745.
William Henry Burleigh born 1812.

'Twas doing nothing was his curse--
Is there a vice can plague us worse?
The wretch who digs the mine for bread,
Or plows, that others may be fed,
Feels less fatigue than that decreed
To him who cannot think, or read.
Not all the peril of temptations,
Not all the conflict of the passions,
Can quench the spark of Glory's flame,
Or quite extinguish Virtue's name.
--Hannah More.

Sound, sound the clarion, fill the fife!
To all the sensual world proclaim,
One crowded hour of glorious life
Is worth an age without a name.
--Sir Walter Scott.

He went out, and found others standing; and he saith unto them, Why stand ye here all the day idle? They say unto him, Because no man hath hired us. He saith unto them, Go ye also into the vineyard.
--Matthew 20. 6, 7.

Eternal God, who hath weighed the mountains and measured the seas, I pray that I may not be satisfied to wait in idleness, and let thy wisdom pass away from me as the days. Steady me in my weakness, and reveal to me my strength as I draw near and ask of thee. Amen.

[Judy Harder]

FEBRUARY THIRD

Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy born 1809.
Horace Greeley born 1811.
Frederick William Robertson born 1816.
Sidney Lanier born 1842.

My soul is sailing through the sea,
But the past is heavy and hindereth me.
The past hath crusted cumbrous shells
That hold the flesh of cold sea-mells
About my soul.
The huge waves wash, the high waves roll,
Each barnacle clingeth and worketh dole
And hindereth me from sailing.
--Sidney Lanier.

To stand with a smile upon your face, against a stake from which you cannot get away--that no doubt is heroic. True glory is resignation to the inevitable. But to stand unchained, with perfect liberty to go away held only by the higher chains of duty, and let the fire creep up to the heart--that is heroism.
--F. W. Robertson.

We are pressed on every side, yet not straitened; perplexed, yet not unto despair; pursued, yet not forsaken; smitten down, yet not destroyed.
--2 Corinthians 4. 8, 9.

Gracious Father, thou knowest what I am and the condition of my life. May I seek thy will for me. Grant that I may never struggle for consolation through indulgence and indolence, but in my sorrow and failure may I reach out for thy enduring comfort. Amen.

[Judy Harder]

FEBRUARY FOURTH

Mark Hopkins born 1802.
W. Harrison Ainsworth born 1805.
Jean Richepin born 1849.
Thomas Carlyle died 1881.

Life is not a May-game, but a battle and a march, a warfare with principalities and powers. No idle promenade through fragrant orange groves and green flowery spaces, waited on by coral muses, and the rosy hours; it is a stern pilgrimage through the rough, burning, sandy solitudes, through regions of thick-ribbed ice.
--Thomas Carlyle.

For all sweet and pleasant passages in the great story of life men may well thank God; for leisure and ease and health and friendship may God make us truly and humbly grateful; but our chief song of thanksgiving must be always for our kinship with him, with all that such divinity of greatness brings of peril, hardship, toil, and sacrifice.
--Hamilton Mabie.

Thy bars shall be iron and brass;
And as thy days, so shall thy strength be.
--Deuteronomy 33. 25.

My Father, help me to choose the road that leads to my work, and may I not fail to reach it, by wandering away from it. Keep me in touch with the human side of life, holding in mind that "Truth and honesty are the noblest works of God." Amen.