"There is in most of us a fiber of self-will,

of hardness,

of stubbornness which we cannot break,

but which God may be trusted to break for us,

if we desire it to be broken.

If the light is clouded, and the joy is blotted out, and the energy burns low,

it is not a sign that we have failed,

but that the mind of God is bent still more urgently upon us.

What we may pray for and desire is courage,

to live eagerly in joy

and not less eagerly in sorrow;

to be self-controlled in happiness

and courageous in trouble." John Ruskin.