Life is not to live merely, but to live well. There are some "who live
without any design at all, and only pass in the world like straws on a
river: they do not go; they are carried," [4]--but as Homer makes Ulysses
say, "How dull it is to pause, to make an end, to rest unburnished; not to
shine in use--as though to breathe were life!"

Goethe tells us that at thirty he resolved "to work out life no longer by
halves, but in all its beauty and totality."

"Im Ganzen, Guten, Schoenen
Resolut zu leben."

Life indeed must be measured by thought and action, not by time. It
certainly may be, and ought to be, bright, interesting, and happy; and,
according to the Italian proverb, "if all cannot live on the Piazza, every
one may feel the sun."

If we do our best; if we do not magnify trifling troubles; if we look
resolutely, I do not say at the bright side of things, but at things as
they really are; if we avail ourselves of the manifold blessings which
surround us; we cannot but feel that life is indeed a glorious
inheritance.

"More servants wait on man
Than he'll take notice of. In every path
He treads down that which doth befriend him
When sickness makes him pale and wan
Oh mighty Love! Man is one world, and hath
Another to attend him." [5]