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.

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.

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.