mpanionship of weakness
because it is kindly offered, though it be a burden to be dropped just
inside the door, and not a treasure to be taken into the heart's
chamber, I am ready to say, Blessed are the unsuccessful.

Blessed ARE the unsuccessful, the men who have nobly striven and nobly
failed. He alone is in an evil case who has set his heart on false or
selfish or trivial ends. Whether he secure them or not, he is alike
unsuccessful. But he who "loves high" is king in his own right, though
he "live low." His plans may be abortive, but himself is sure. God
may overrule his desires, and thwart his hopes, and baffle his
purposes, but all things shall work together for his good. Though he
fall, he shall rise again. Every defeat shall be a victory. Every
calamity shall drop down blessing. Inward disappointment shall
minister to enduring joy. From the grapes of sorrow he shall press the
wine of life.

Theodore Winthrop died in the bud of his promise. As I write that
name, hallowed from our olden time, and now baptized anew for the
generations that are to follow, comes back again warm, bright,
midsummer morning, freighted with woe,--that dark, sad summer morning
that wrenched him away from sweet life, and left silence for song,
ashes for beauty,--only cold, impassive clay, where glowing, vigorous
vitality had throbbed and surged.

Scarcely had his fame risen to illumine that early grave, but, one by
one, from his silent desk came those brilliant books, speaking to all
who had ears to hear words of grand resolve and faith,--words of higher
import than their sound,--key-words to a lofty life; for all the
bravery and purity and trust and truth and tenderness that gleam in
golden setting throughout his books must have been matched with bravery
and purity and trust and truth and tenderness in the soul from which
they sprang. Looking at what might have been accomplished with
endowments so rare, culture so careful, and patience so untiring, our
lament for the dead is not untinged with bitterness. A mind so well
poised, so self-confident, so eager in its honorable desire for
honorable fame, that, without the stimulus of publication, it could
produce work after work, compact and finished, studded with gems of wit
and wisdom, white and radiant with inward purity,--could polish away
roughness, and toil on alone, pursuing ideal perfection, and attaining
a rare excellence,--surely, here was promise of great things for t