The Project Gutenberg EBook of Brave Men and Women, by O.E. Fuller

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Title: Brave Men and Women
Their Struggles, Failures, And Triumphs

Author: O.E. Fuller

Release Date: November 3, 2004 [EBook #13942]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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BRAVE MEN AND WOMEN

THEIR STRUGGLES, FAILURES, AND TRIUMPHS.

BY

O.E. FULLER, A.M.

"_Find out what you are fitted for; work hard at that one thing, and
keep a brave, honest heart_."

* * * * *

COPYRIGHT
By O.E. FULLER
1884
All rights reserved.

* * * * *

PREFACE

Struggle, failure, triumph: while triumph is the thing sought, struggle
has its joy, and failure is not without its uses.

"It is not the _goal_," says Jean Paul, "but the _course_ which makes us
happy." The law of life is what a great orator affirmed of
oratory--"Action, action, action!" As soon as one point is gained,
another, and another presents itself.

"It is a mistake," says Samuel Smiles, "to suppose that men succeed
through success; they much oftener succeed through failure." He cites,
among others, the example of Cowper, who, through his diffidence and
shyness, broke down when pleading his first cause, and lived to revive
the poetic art in England; and that of Goldsmith, who failed in passing
as a surgeon, and yet wrote the "Deserted Village" and the "Vicar of
Wakefield." Even when one turns to no new course, how many failures, as
a rule, mark the way to triumph, and brand into life, as with a hot
iron, the lessons of defeat!

The brave man or the brave woman is one who looks life in the eye, and
says: "God helping me, I am going to realize the best possibilities of
my nature, by calling into action the beneficent laws which govern and
determine the development of each individual member of the race." And
the failures of such a person are the jewels of triumph; that triumph
which is certain in the sight of heaven, if not in the eyes of men.

"Brave Men and Women," the tit