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BYWAYS TO BLESSEDNESS 15

satisfactorily met some worldly difficulty; even so, but to a far greater degree, is the heart of a man
rendered joyous and peaceful when some vital and eternal question which has been long brooded
over and grappled with is at last completely answered, and its darkness is forever dispelled.
Do not regard your difficulties and perplexities as portentous of ill; by so doing you will make
them ill; but regard them as prophetic of good, which, indeed, they are. Do not persuade yourself
that you can evade them; you cannot. Do not try to run away from them; this is impossible, for
wherever you go they will still be there with you — but meet them calmly and bravely; confront
them with all the dispassion and dignity which you can command; weigh up their proportions;
analyse them; grasp their details; measure their strength; understand them; attack them, and
finally vanquish them. Thus will you develop strength and intelligence; thus will you enter one of
those byways of blessedness which are hidden from the superficial gaze.