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Wisdom of the Ages

By George A. Fuller

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XVII

Think ye that life is not worth the living because it is a ceaseless struggle after the unattained?

Because so many of thy hopes and aspirations fall to the ground seemingly fruitless?

If thou thinkest thus thy view is narrow and limited.

How know ye that thy hopes and aspirations are fruitless?

May not their branches extend so far above thy head that their fruits are beyond the circle of thy vision?

Trouble not the limpid waters of thy soul with fear and doubt.

Cultivate that faith that leads to belief in the divine possibilities of the soul. And when I say the soul, I mean thy soul, every soul that is. For these possibilities are not for the few, but the all.

Life never can be a failure even in the poorest expressed soul of earth.

Even in the reeking haunts of vice and crime life is fulfilling its sacred and holy mission.

All life is sacred, holy, divine, but much of life is as yet poorly expressed.

As, in the world of music, not all are geniuses who touch chords that vibrate afar, so in the great world of the ordinary expression of life, the movement is slow and sluggish—yet, even in the meanest, it is an upward movement.

Sorrow, as well as joy, hath its mission in the world, for like the refiner's fire it purifies of all dross.

Thy desires are not attained! Thy hopes fall fruitless to the ground!

Stop, my child! As much of life lies before thee as is behind.

Why spend thy time in worthless grieving over the seeming failures of life, when eternity and all her years are thine?

That for which thou grievest to-day, to-morrow, laughingly, thou wilt throw aside.

Thy hopes dead! Thy desires unattained! Never was hope more alive than when clouds of sorrow come sweeping in upon thee. Never were thy desires nearer thy grasp.

Through the pearly gate of sorrow the soul rises on wings of triumph.

Hope is the bright star whose light gives the silver lining to every cloud.

Struggle on, brave soul; be not overcome with discontent. Look up, for to! the morning dawns upon thee that dispels all shadows that have dimmed thy vision.

Be not led astray by the cunning sophistries of the world, the pessimism of the night that only points to chaos and to death. But follow the light within that points to the ultimate victory of knowledge over ignorance, and reveals good emanating out of all the evils of earth.

Over all tired and weary hearts Peace shall yet fold her wings and Love shall lull to quiet slumbers, out of which the soul shall awaken into that serene and perfect life that fully reveals the true worth of striving and living.