| Strength and Beauty |
Chapter 18 |
Page 6 |
Yet defeat does not always bring discipline. Men do not always rise from the dust the stronger. Sometimes failure leads to disheartenment which darkens into despair. All depends on the way one meets the bitter experience. Only when the spirit is unconquerable does one rise again from defeat, humbled and chastened, but not broken, ready for new struggles. But if we are even dimly conscious of the splendor and glory of the life within us, of its divine possibilities, and of the help of God that is ever within our reach, we should never for a moment despair, nor regard any failure as final. We should learn our lesson and go quietly and firmly forward to the new struggles that await us, confident that in the end we shall be more than conquerors through Christ who loves us. Some one says:
“The besetting sin may become the guardian angel. Let us thank God that we can say it! Yes, this sin that has sent me weary hearted to bed, and desperate in heart to morning work, can be conquered. I do not say annihilated, but, better than that, conquered, captured, and transfigured into a friend; so that I, at last, shall say, ‘My temptation has become my strength; for to the very fight with it I owe my force.’”
“Noble souls, through dust and heat,
Rise from disaster and defeat
The stronger,
And, conscious still of the divine
Within them, lie on earth supine
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