Almighty God, help me to aspire, that my life may tend toward the ideal. May I be persuaded that I cannot be that which I do not possess, nor can I live in that which I do not know. Help me to put the best in what I do, that I may not feel I have failed, even though it may not seem to be a success. Amen. MAY ELEVENTH Baron Muenchhausen born 1720. William Pitt, Earl of Chatham, died 1778. Jean Leon Gerome born 1824. And methought that beauty and terror are only one, not two; And the world has room for love, and death, and thunder and dew; And all the sinews of hell slumber in the summer air; And the face of God is a rock, but the face of the rock is fair. Beneficent streams of tears flow at the finger of pain; And out of the cloud that smites, beneficent rivers of rain. --Robert Louis Stevenson. It is more shameful to be distrustful of our friends than to be deceived by them. --La Rochefoucauld. Thou shalt rejoice in all the good which Jehovah thy God hath given unto thee. --Deuteronomy 26. 11. Lord God, may I comprehend the sacredness of friendship. I thank thee for my friends, and for all the beautiful influences which they bring to my life. May I never hold friendship without the sincerity to return it. Correct my faults, and cause me to learn the secret of cheerful endurance, that I may be steadfast. Amen. MAY TWELFTH Robert Fielding died 1712. James Sheridan Knowles born 1784. Dante Gabriel Rossetti born 1828. Jules Massenet born 1842. Look in my face; my name is Might-have-been; I am also called No-more, Too-late, Farewell; Unto thine ear I hold the dead sea-shell Cast up thy Life's foam-fretted feet between; Unto thine eyes the glass where that is seen Which had Life's form and Love's, but by my spell Is now a shaken shadow intolerable, Of ultimate things unuttered the frail screen. --Dante Gabriel Rossetti. Let me not pass my work at morn And then at eve, Find for what purpose I was born-- Just as I leave. --M.B.S. We must work the works of him that sent me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work. --John 9. 4. Lord God, I do earnestly pray that thou wilt give me strength to break away, if I may be trying to free myself from habits that mar my character. May I not lose courage and fall back in the old ways, but by faith be led where I should go. Amen. MAY THIRTEENTH Carolus Linnaeus (Karl von Linne) born 1707. Alphonse Daudet born 1840. Sir Arthur Sullivan born 1842. I heard a voice in the darkness singing (That was a valiant soul I knew), And the joy of his song was a wild bird winging Swift to his mate through a sky of blue.