That huge hole in the Earth

Since Kelly and I both had a four day weekend for UEA Weekend (better known down here as Utah Exodus to Anaheim), we decided to road trip up to the North Rim. Despite the fact that I have had several opportunities inmylife to visit the canyon while serving a mission in northern Arizona for 1 1/2 years, and while teaching school in Page for 2 years, I never have found the time. Unfortunately right now, it is in it's last few days before completely closing down. The lodge and Visitor's Center have already closed down, in fact. But it was a beautiful drive up through the Kaibab Forest. The aspen trees were the most amazing golden color. Especially, at about 4:00 or 5:00 when the sun was getting low. There was one patch of trees on our drive back that we noticed with lots of aspens clustered together and it looked like they were on fire because of the way the sun was hitting them. It was truly amazing. I have always thought that the aspen is one of my favorite trees. We had a picnic inside the park overlooking the canyon, then drove up to the lodge and walked out to Bright Angel Point. The story, Brighty of the Grand Canyon by Marguerite Henry is about a little donkey that lived in this area of the canyon for about 40 years and helped create a trail down the canyon. He got to meet Teddy Roosevelt and was the first one to cross the bridge after it was built. I read this story to my students last year and they loved it! I love the history of this area. After enjoying the view at Bright Angel Point, we drove up to Imperial Point, the highest point in the canyon and enjoyed the view from there. It was a nice opportunity to enjoy some of God's greatest wonders and have a look into the majesty of some of the creations of the earth. The weather was wonderful with rain off and on, cool, but not too cold. There were some great looking dark clouds that were hovering over the canyon, threatening an oncoming storm, but it never really showed up. I would like to go back sometime when I can take more time and enjoy some of the hikes. My knee was not putting up well with even the short walk at Bright Angel. I would also like to take another trip down the river sometime. That is always a great experience. Maybe I will have to post some pictures from that, even though it was several years ago, and maybe I will even share my near death experience story from my first river trip when I was thrown from the pontoon boat and pulled under, frightfully close to the props. Maybe...
Oh, and I will also be getting the rest of the pictures up on Facebook soon so watch for those. They are spectacular!

More on the meaning of suffering

Facebook friends will have seen my recent update with the quote from Viktor Frankl on the meaning of suffering. "Suffering ceases to be suffering in some way at the moment it finds a meaning, such as the meaning of sacrifice. . . ‎In accepting this challenge to suffer bravely, life has meaning up to the last moment, and it retains this meaning literally to the end. In other words, life's meaning is an unconditional one, for It even includes the potential meaning of suffering." -Viktor Frankl (Holocaust survivor and author of Man's Search for Meaning). When I read this, considering all the crap I have had to deal with the past 4 months, or so, I just started to bawl. This was a man that suffered in Auschwitz saying this, and here I am suffering in my own little "garden" (which I am not minimizing at all, but it is not a concentration camp, after all), expressing such courage and strength about pain and challenges. I am on this search for meaning. (That sounds so chivalrous! "a quest for the meaning of suffering...my suffering.")
In thinking about all of this, I am reminded of a quote that a friend sent me when all this first started. Hopefully, I will someday reach this point where I can recognize the growth I have made and look back on all of it and say, "Wow, that really wasn't that bad after all! Look at me now!!!"
"No pain that we suffer, no trial that we experience is wasted. It ministers to our education, to the development of such qualities as patience, faith, fortitude and humility. All that we suffer and all that we endure, especially when we endure it patiently, builds up our characters, purifies our hearts, expands our souls, and makes us more tender and charitable, more worthy to be called the children of God....and it is through sorrow and suffering, toil and tribulations, that we gain the education that we come here to acquire and which will make us more like our Father and Mother in heaven...." ~Orson F. Whitney

Someday....

The Time Travelers Book 1 in the Gideon Trilogy

I am about half way through this really great book (author Linda Buckley-Archer)! It is the story of two 21st century children, Kate Dyer and Peter Schock, who are whisked away on a time traveling adventure when they come in contact with an anti gravity machine. They are taken back to July 1763 and the villain called, the Tar Man steals the machine taking with him their chance of returning home. They end up journeying through the English countryside with Gideon Seymour in an attempt to get back home.
This is the first in a trilogy of time travel books and is certain to be a hit among children and adult readers for a long time!

More juicy details to come as I continue reading.

The Great Kapok Tree's Bit of Wisdom

Last Friday, at school we read a story called, "The Great Kapok Tree" from the basal. This is a really neat story about a tree in the Amazon Rainforest and the animals telling a man why he should not cut it down. Anyways, there was a line in it, that never really hit me until this time and we had to stop and have a discussion about it and then write it on the board as a classroom motto for a while.
"What happens tomorrow depends on what you do today."
This can be considered on several different levels, of course. Our discussion of the story had to do with the fact that if we destroy nature today then our children won't be able to enjoy it in the future. But then, it led to a discussion about things like studying for the test if you want to get an A, or practicing for the game if you want to do your best.
But now, I am thinking about it on a spiritual level. We are children of our Heavenly Father and He loves us very much. He wants us to be our best in this life and to return to Him in the next. We can't just go through this life like a kite carried by the wind. We need to direct ourselves so that what happens tomorrow is not a surprise to us. For example, the prophets have foretold of disasters that are to come in the last days and have counseled us to be prepared by collecting food storage and getting rid of debt. If we do these things today then we can make it through the disasters on our own rather than having to rely on the help of others.
We have been promised great blessings if we follow the commandments and do the things that the prophets counsel. We have been told that God has a mansion prepared for us and that we are His divine children with a divine inheritance. What we receive tomorrow depends on what we do today.

Oh how I do appreciate Mr. Twain...

Good ol' Sammy Clemens...He had such a wonderful ability to express the true feelings of his heart without worrying about how other people will feel and react. Here are some of my favorite "Twainisms" :)


"The man who does not read good books has no advantage over the man who can't read them."

"Good friends, good books and a sleepy conscience: this is the ideal life."

"Be careful about reading health books. You may die of a misprint."

"Heaven goes by favor. If it went by merit, you would stay out and your dog would go in."

"Sometimes I wonder whether the world is being run by smart people who are putting us on or by imbeciles who really mean it."

"Now and then we had a hope that if we lived and were good, God would permit us to be pirates."

"After all these years, I see that I was mistaken about Eve in the beginning; it is better to live outside the Garden with her than inside it without her."

"Last week I stated that this woman was the ugliest woman I had ever seen. I have since been visited by her sister and now wish to withdraw that statement."

"I like a thin book because it can steady a table, a leather volume because it will strop a razor, and a heavy book because it can be thrown at a cat."

"Don't look at the world with your hands in your pockets. To write about it you have to reach out and touch it."

"I haven't any right to criticize books, and I don't do it except when I hate them. I often want to criticize Jane Austen, but her books madden me so that I can't conceal my frenzy from the reader; and therefore I have to stop every time I begin. Every time I read 'Pride and Prejudice' I want to dig her up and beat her over the skull with her own shin-bone." (I like this one, in particular, because I do not enjoy Jane Austen novels...)

"I did not attend his funeral, but I sent a nice letter saying I approved of it."

"Persons attempting to find a motive in this narrative will be prosecuted; persons attempting to find a moral in it will be banished; persons attempting to find a plot in it will be shot. BY ORDER OF THE AUTHOR per G.G., CHIEF OF ORDNANCE" (preface to The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn- my favorite book ever!)

"I was born lazy. I am no lazier now than I was forty years ago, but that is because I reached the limit forty years ago. You can't go beyond possibility."

"In a good bookroom you feel in some mysterious way that you are absorbing the wisdom contained in all the books through your skin, without even opening them."

Another great gospel allusion

Okay, so I have a bit of a one track mind at the moment. I have been in a summer school class all week and now that it is finished, I want to do nothing else but finish rereading book 7. There are so many things that I have forgotten in it and as I read it I start to remember things that are yet to come. (By the way, does anyone remember where it is that Petunia explains to Vernon and the rest of the family why Harry has to stay at the house and what the meaning of "Remember the last" is? I want to read that part again and can't remember where it is.)
So here is the passage for today. Very brief message about the atonement and resurrection/eternal life.

The headstone was only two rows behind Kendra and Ariana's. It was made of white marble, just like Dumbledore's tomb, and this made it easy to read, as it seemed to shine in the dark. Harry did not need to kneel or even approach very close to it to make out the words engraved upon it. . .

The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death.

Harry read the words slowly, as though he would have only one chance to take in their meaning, and he read the last of them aloud.
" 'The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death' . . ." A horrible thought came to him, and with it a kind of panic. "Isn't that a Death Eater idea? Why is that there?"
"It doesn't mean defeating death in the way the Death Eaters mean it, Harry," said Hermione, her voice gentle. "It means . . . you know . . . living beyond death. Living after death."
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, pg 328.

Gospel lessons in fantasy?

Yes, yes, yes... we all know it. I love Harry Potter. I am rereading book 6 right now and coming to some very, VERY interesting things. There is a selection that I have been very impressed with given the fact that Rowling does not share the same religious beliefs as I do, yet this recurring message of the story continues to help me better understand the plan of happiness, agency, and especially how Satan works and why he will never succeed as long as there are righteous people who are stalwart and willing to fight on the Lord's side. This selection hits me every time to the very core of my soul and I think it is probably the most vital message of the whole Harry Potter saga. Yes, it is somewhat long, but soooooooo amazing! I need to learn the lesson Dumbledore has been trying to teach Harry. I'm sure many of us do.

Harry sat in thought for a moment, then asked, "So if all of his Horcruxes are destroyed, Voldemort could be killed?"
"Yes, I think so," said Dumbledore. "Without his Horcruxes, Voldemort will be a mortal man with a maimed and diminished soul. Never forget, though, that while his soul may have been damaged beyond repair, his brain and his magical powers remain intact. It will take uncommon skill and power to kill a wizard like Voldemort even without his Horcruxes."
"But I haven't got uncommon skill and power," said Harry before he could stop himself.
"Yes, you have," said Dumbledore firmly. "You have a power that Voldemort has never had. You can-"
"I know!" said Harry impatiently. "I can love!" It was only with difficulty that he stopped himself from adding, "Big deal!"
"Yes, Harry, you can love," said Dumbledore, who looked as though he knew perfectly well what Harry had just refrained from saying. "Which given everything that has happened to you, is a great and remarkable thing. You are still too young to understand how unusual you are, Harry."
"So when the prophecy says that I'll have 'power the Dark Lord knows not,' it just means - love?" asked Harry feeling a little bit let down.
"Yes- just love," said Dumbledore. "But Harry, never forget that what the prophecy says is only significant because Voldemort made it so. I told you this at the end of last year. Voldemort singled you out as the person who would be most dangerous to him- and in doing so, he MADE you the person who would be most dangerous to him!"
"But it comes to the same-"
"No,it doesn't!" said Dumbledore, sounding impatient now. Pointing at Harry with his black, withered hand, he said, "You are setting too much store by the prophecy!"
"But," spluttered Harry, "but you said the prophecy means-"
"If Voldemort had never heard the prophecy, would it have been fulfilled? Would it have meant anything? Of course not! Do you think every prophecy in the Hall of Prophecy has been fulfilled?"
"But," said Harry, bewildered, "but last year you said one of us would have to kill the other-"
"Harry, Harry, only because Voldemort made a grave error, and acted on Professor Trelawney's words! If Voldemort had never murdered your father, would he have imparted in you a furious desire for revenge? Of course not! If he had not forced your mother to die for you, would he have given you a magical protection he could not penetrate? Of course not, Harry! Don't you see? Voldemort himself created his worst enemy, just as tyrants everywhere do! Have you any idea how much tyrants fear the people they oppress? All of them realize that, one day, amongst their many victims, there is sure to be one who rises against them and strikes back! Voldemort is no different! Always he was on the lookout for the one who would challenge him. He heard the prophecy and leapt into action, with the result that he not only handpicked the man most likely to finish him, he handed him uniquely deadly weapons!"
"But-"
"But it is essential that you understand this!" said Dumbledore, standing up and striding about the room, his glittering robes swooshing in his wake; Harry had never seen him so agitated. "By attempting to kill you, Voldemort himself singled out the remarkable person who sits here in front of me, and gave him the tools for the job! It is Voldemort's fault that you were able to see into his thoughts, his ambitions, that you even understand the snakelike language in which he gives his orders, and yet, Harry, despite your privileged insight into Voldemort's world (which, incidentally, is a gift any Death Eater would kill to have), you have never been seduced by the Dark Arts, never, even for a second, shown the slightest desire to become one of Voldemort's followers!"
" Of course I haven't!" said Harry indignantly. "He killed my mum and dad!"
"You are protected, in short, by your ability to love!" said Dumbledore loudly. "The only protection that can possibly work against the lure of power like Voldemort's! In spite of all the temptation you have endured, all the suffering, you remain pure of heart, just as pure as you were at the age of eleven, when you stared into a mirror that reflected your heart's desire, and it showed you the only way to thwart Lord Voldemort, and not immortality or riches. Harry, have you any idea how few wizards could have seen what you saw in that mirror? Voldemort should have known then what he was dealing with, but he did not!"
"But he knows it now. You have flitted into Lord Voldemort's mind without damage to yourself, but he cannot possess you without enduring mortal agony, as he discovered in the Ministry. I do not think he understands why, Harry, but then, he was in such a hurry to mutilate his own soul, he never paused to understand the incomparable power of a soul that is untarnished and whole."
"But, sir," said Harry, making valiant efforts not to sound argumentative, "it all comes down to the same thing, doesn't it? I've got to try and kill him, or-"
"Got to?" said Dumbledore. "Of course you've got to! But not because of the prophecy! Because you, yourself, will never rest until you've tried! We both know it! Imagine, please, just for a moment, that you had never heard that prophecy! How would you feel about Voldemort now? Think!"
Harry watched Dumbledore striding up and down in front of him and thought. He thought of his mother, his father, and Sirius. He thought of Cedric Diggory. He thought of all the terrible deeds he knew Lord Voldemort had done. A flame seemed to leap inside his chest, searing his throat.
"I'd want him finished," said Harry quietly. "And I'd want to do it."
"Of course you would!" cried Dumbledore. "You see the prophecy does not mean you have to do anything! But the prophecy caused Lord Voldemort to mark you as his equal . . . in other words, you are free to choose your way, quite free to turn your back on the prophecy! But Voldemort continues to set store by the prophecy. He will continue to hunt you . . . which makes it certain, really, that-"
"That one of us is going to end up killing the other," said Harry. "Yes." But he understood at last what Dumbledore had been trying to tell him. It was, he thought, the difference between being dragged into the arena to face a battle to the death and walking into the arena with your head held high. Some people, perhaps, would say that there was little to choose between the two ways, but Dumbledore knew, and so do I, thought Harry, with a rush of fierce pride, and so did my parents- that there was all the difference in the world. - Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, pgs 508-512

CS Lewis on Prayer

I got an awesome book for Christmas, The Quotable Lewis, which I have been wanting for a super long time. I have been having a hard time with prayer lately and so I decided to read some stuff from different authors and church leaders. I looked in this book and found some awesome, awesome, AWESOME!!! thoughts from him.

"Take not, oh Lord, our literal sense. Lord, in Thy great,
Unbroken speech our limping metaphor translate."
-Poems, "Footnote to All Prayers" (1933) p. 129

"The prayer preceding all prayers is 'May it be the real I that speaks. May it be the real Thou that I speak to.' . . . Emotional intensity is in itself no proof of spiritual depth. If we pray in terror we shall pray earnestly; it only proves that terror is an earnest emotion. Only God Himself can let the bucket down to the depths in us. . . The most blessed result of prayer would be to rise thinking 'But I never knew before, I never dreamed . . . ' I suppose it was such a moment that Thomas Aquinas said of all his theology, 'It reminds me of straw.' "
- Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer, chap. 15, para. 15-17, pp. 81-82

"We must lay before Him what is in us, not what ought to be in us."
- Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer, chap. 4, para. 15, p. 22

God Bless Us, Everyone!

So, I like to read A Christmas Carol every year. It is a quick read and very inspiring. I decided to share some of my favorite excerpts from it...


"Man of the worldly mind!" replied the Ghost, "do you believe in me or not?"
"I do," said Scrooge. "I must. But why do spirits walk the earth, and why do they come to me?"
"It is required of every man," the Ghost returned, "that the spirit within him should walk abroad his fellow men, and travel far and wide; and if that spirit goes not forth in life, it is condemned to do so after death. It is doomed to wander through the world- oh, woe is me!- and witness what it cannot share, and might have shared on earth, and turned to happiness!" . . .
"You are fettered," said Scrooge, trembling. "Tell me why?"
"I wear the chain I forged in life," replied the Ghost. "I made it link by link, and yard by yard; I girded it on of my own free will, and of my own free will I wore it. Is its pattern strange to YOU?"
pages 31-32


"At this time of the rolling year," the spectre said, "I suffer most. Why did I walk through crowds of my fellow beings with my eyes turned down, and never raise them to that blessed Star which led the Wise Men to a poor abode? Were there no poor homes to which its light would have conducted ME!"
page 34

"I am a mortal," Scrooge remonstrated, "and liable to fall."
"Bear but a touch of my hand THERE," said the Spirit,laying it upon his heart,"and you shall be upheld in more than this!"
page 45

"A small matter," said the Ghost,"to make these silly folks so full of gratitude."
"Small!" echoed Scrooge.
The Spirit signed him to listen to the two apprentices, who were pouring out their hearts in praise of Fezziwig: and when he had done so, said,
"Why! Is it not? He has spent but a few pounds of your mortal money: three or four perhaps. Is that so much that he deserves this praise?"
"It isn't that," said Scrooge, heated by the remark, and speaking unconsciously like his former, not his latter, self.
"It isn't that, Spirit. He has the power to render us happy or unhappy; to make our service light or burdensome; a pleasure or a toil. Say that his power lies in words and looks; in things so slight and insignificant that it is impossible to add and count 'em up: what then? The happiness he gives, is quite as great as if it costs a fortune."
pages 57-58

"And how did little Tim behave?" asked Mrs. Cratchit, when she had rallied Bob on his credulity and Bob had hugged his daughter to his heart's content.
"As good as gold," said Bob, "and better.Somehow he gets thoughtful sitting by himself so much, and thinks the strangest things you ever heard. He told me, coming home, that he hoped the people saw him in the church, because he was a cripple, and it might be pleasant to them to remember upon Christmas Day, who made the lame beggars walk and blind men see."
page 80

"Man," said the Ghost,"if man you be in heart, not adamant, forbear that wicked cant until you have discovered What the surplus is, and Where it is. Will you decide what men shall live, and what men shall die? It may be that in the sight of Heaven, you are more worthless and less fit to live than millions like this poor man's child. Oh God! to hear the Insect on the leaf pronouncing on the too much life among his hungry brothers in the dust!"
Scrooge bent before the Ghost's rebuke, and trembling cast his eyes upon the ground.
page 84

It was a game called Yes and No, where Scrooge's nephew had to think of something, and the rest must find out what; he only answering to their questions yes or no as the case was. The brisk fire of questioning to which he was exposed, elicited from him that he was thinking of an animal, a live animal, rather a disagreeable animal, a savage animal, an animal that growled and grunted sometimes, and talked sometimes, and lived in London, and walked about the streets, and wasn't made a show of, and wasn't led by anybody, and didn't live in a menagerie, and was never killed in a market, and was not a horse, or an ass, or a cow, or a bull, or a tiger, or a dog, or a pig, or a cat, or a bear. At every fresh question that was put to him, this nephew burst into a fresh roar of laughter; and was so inexpressibly tickled, that he was obliged to get up off the sofa and stamp. At last the plump sister, falling into a similar state, cried out:
"I have found it out! I know what it is, Fred! I know what it is!"
"What is it?" cried Fred.
"It's your Uncle Scro-o-o-o-oge!"
Which it certainly was. Admiration was the universal sentiment, though some objected that the reply to "Is it a bear?" ought to have been "Yes;" inasmuch as an answer in the negative was sufficient to have diverted their thoughts from Mr. Scrooge, supposing they had ever had any tendency that way.
pages 97-98

"They are Man's," said the Spirit, looking down upon them. "And they cling to me, appealing from their fathers. This boy is Ignorance. This girl is Want. Beware them both, and all of their degree, but most of all, beware this boy, for on his brow I see that written which is Doom, unless the writing be erased. Deny it!" cried the Spirit, stretching out his hand toward the city. "Slander those that tell it ye! Admit it for your factious purposes, and make it worse! And bide the end!"
page 102

"I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future. The Spirits of all Three shall strive within me. I will not shut out the lessons that they teach. Oh, tell me I may sponge away the writing on this stone!"
page 126

Best and happiest of all, the Time before him was his own, to make amends in!
page 127

And so as Tiny Tim observed, God Bless Us, Everyone!
page 138

Book Club

Book buddies! I love this and our expressions are awesome! You just gots to love a good book and how it brings sisters together.

Why do I do that?

I don't know why we go over the old hurts
Again and again in our minds, the false starts
And true beginnings
of a world we call the past,
As if it could tell us who we are now,
Or were, or might have been . . .
It's drizzling.
A car door slams, just once, and he's gone.
Tiny pools of water glisten on the street.
"My Father's Back,"
Edward Hirsch (as quoted in Your Father Your Self by Barry H. Gordon, Ph.D)

The House by C.S. Lewis

Okay, so a friend was asking me for this quote and I could not, (of course, who could) remember exactly how it went. I found it finally in my collection of "quotes and stuff." Awesome, awesome, aweeeeeeeeesome!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I love Mr. C.S. Lewis... someday I want to talk to him.

"Imagine yourself as a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you can understand what he is doing. He is getting the drains right and stopping the leaks in the roof and so on. You knew that those jobs needed doing and so you are not surprised. But presently, he starts knocking the house about in a way that hurts abominably and does not seem to make sense. What on earth is he up to? The explanation is that he is building quite a different house from the one you thought of- throwing out a new wing here, putting on an extra floor there, running up towers, making courtyards. You thought you were going to be made into a decent little cottage, but he is making you into a palace."

Quotes I love!

Narnian:

"What's this? It seems familiar. As if from a dream . . . or a dream of a dream!"Pevensie kids

Professor: "I don't think you'll get back in that way. You see I've already tried."
Lucy: "Will we ever go back?"
Professor: "Oh, I expect so. It will probably happen when you're not looking for it. All I'm saying is to keep your eyes open."

"I'm not a dwarf! I'm a girrrl..... and actually, I'm tallest in my class!!!" Lucy Pevensie to Mr. Tumnus the Faun.

"No matter what happens, Lucy Pevensie, I am glad to have met you. You have made me feel warmer than I've felt in a hundred years." Mr. Tumnus

"One game at a time Lu, we don't all have your imagination." Peter Pevensie

"Can you make me taller?" Edmund Pevensie to the White Witch

"If she's not mad and she's not lying then you could assume . . . logically. . . that she's telling the truth." Professor

"Don't worry, I'm sure that it's just your imagination." Lucy to her brothers and sisters upon enterning Narnia for the first time together.

"Well, I ain't gonna smell it . . . if that's what you want!" Mr. Beaver to Peter

"I think you've made a mistake. We're not heroes. We're from Finchley." Susan and Peter to the Beavers.

"It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person that you can talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw now, you would be strongly tempted to worship . . . There are no ordinary people. . . Your neighbor is the holiest object presented to your senses." C.S. Lewis

"Obedience without love is slavery. Love without obedience is a lie." C.S. Lewis

Potpourri:

"It is difficult to make a man miserable while he feels worthy of himself and claims kindred to the great God who made him." Abraham Lincoln 1862

"Thee lift me and I'll lift thee and we'll both ascend together." John Greenleaf Whittier

"Imagination is more important than knowledge." Albert Einstein

"Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm." Ralph Waldo Emerson

"The test, then, of our soul's greatness is rather to be sought in our ability to comfort and console, our ability to help others rather than our ability to help ourselves and crowd others down in the struggle of life." Joseph F. Smith

"Be kind. Everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle." Marjorie Pay Hinckley

"No act of kindness, no matter how small, is ever wasted." Aesop. The Lion and the Mouse

"There is no substitute for hard work . . . Genius is one percent inspiration and ninety nine percent perspiration." Thomas Alva Edison

"A merry heart doeth good like a medicine: but a broken spirit drieth the bones." Proverbs 17:22

"The reward of a thing well done, is to have done it." Ralph Waldo Emerson

God Bless America

E Pluribus Unum... Out of many, one.

September 17, 1787 was the day that the Constitution was ratified and became law.
In hopes of persuading some of the delegates who were somewhat uncertain and unwilling to sign, Benjamin Franklin gave the following speech on the final day.

Mr. President
I confess that there are several parts of this constitution which I do not at present approve, but I am not sure I shall never approve them: For having lived long, I have experienced many instances of being obliged by better information, or fuller consideration, to change opinions even on important subjects, which I once thought right, but found to be otherwise. It is therefore that the older I grow, the more apt I am to doubt my own judgment, and to pay more respect to the judgment of others. Most men indeed as well as most sects in Religion, think themselves in possession of all truth, and that wherever others differ from them it is so far error. Steele a Protestant in a Dedication tells the Pope, that the only difference between our Churches in their opinions of the certainty of their doctrines is, the Church of Rome is infallible and the Church of England is never in the wrong. But though many private persons think almost as highly of their own infallibility as of that of their sect, few express it so naturally as a certain french lady, who in a dispute with her sister, said "I don't know how it happens, Sister but I meet with no body but myself, that's always in the right — Il n'y a que moi qui a toujours raison."

In these sentiments, Sir, I agree to this Constitution with all its faults, if they are such; because I think a general Government necessary for us, and there is no form of Government but what may be a blessing to the people if well administered, and believe farther that this is likely to be well administered for a course of years, and can only end in Despotism, as other forms have done before it, when the people shall become so corrupted as to need despotic Government, being incapable of any other. I doubt too whether any other Convention we can obtain, may be able to make a better Constitution. For when you assemble a number of men to have the advantage of their joint wisdom, you inevitably assemble with those men, all their prejudices, their passions, their errors of opinion, their local interests, and their selfish views. From such an assembly can a perfect production be expected? It therefore astonishes me, Sir, to find this system approaching so near to perfection as it does; and I think it will astonish our enemies, who are waiting with confidence to hear that our councils are confounded
like those of the builders of Babel; and that our States are on the point of separation, only to meet hereafter for the purpose of cutting one another's throats. Thus I consent, Sir, to this Constitution because I expect no better, and because I am not sure, that it is not the best. The opinions I have had of its errors, I sacrifice to the public good. I have never whispered a syllable of them abroad. Within these walls they were born, and here they shall die. If every one of us in returning to our Constituents were to report the objections he has had to it, and endeavor to gain partizans in support of them, we might prevent its being generally received, and thereby lose all the salutary effects & great advantages resulting naturally in our favor among foreign Nations as well as among ourselves, from our real or apparent unanimity. Much of the strength & efficiency of any Government in procuring and securing happiness to the people, depends, on opinion, on the general opinion of the goodness of the Government, as well as of the wisdom and integrity of its Governors. I hope therefore that for our own sakes as a part of the people, and for the sake of posterity, we shall act heartily and unanimously in recommending this Constitution (if approved by Congress & confirmed by the Conventions) wherever our influence may extend, and turn our future thoughts & endeavors to the means of having it well administered.

On the whole, Sir, I can not help expressing a wish that every member of the Convention who may still have objections to it, would with me, on this occasion doubt a little of his own infallibility, and to make manifest our unanimity, put his name to this instrument.

What a blessed nation we have been and still are! The Lord has stood by us when we have turned our backs on him. I have been, for some reason, blessed to be born and live in the Promised Land and He is still by us and holding out his hand in protection because He has consecrated this land. But, my fear is that we are headed quickly to that horrible day when this Constitution will "hang by a thread" and we will be that "corrupt" nation that, as Mr. Franklin said, would need a despotic government... I feel like this is the time... this election is going to tell us who we are and in who we trust. Is it still in God? I hope that we as a nation are not so corrupt that "the voice of the people" will choose to trust in Satan or his servants.

In God We Still Trust!