The Foot-Path to Peace

To be glad of life, because it gives you the chance

    to love and to work and to play and to look up to the stars;

to be satisfied with your possessions,
    but not contented with yourself until you have made the best of them;

to despise nothing in the world except falsehood and meanness,
    and to fear nothing except cowardice;

to be governed by your admirations rather than by your disgusts;

to covet nothing that is your neighbors'

    except their kindness of heart and gentleness of manners;

to think seldom of your enemies,

    often of your friends
        and every day of Christ;

and to spend as much time as you can with body and spirit,

    in God's out-of-doors—

these are the little guideposts on the footpath of peace.

                                                       ~Henry Van Dyke


This is one of the first entries in Florence's journal.  It's pasted into the book, and along the top of the page the name Cecile Maier is written in elegant longhand. The very front of the journal has "Property of Willing Workers 1929-1930" written on the flyleaf.  For many years, Florence was a member of a charity group called The Willing Workers. These women spent long hours helping those less fortunate.  I believe that, at the start of a Willing Workers meeting, one of the members of the group would bring a favorite piece and read it aloud.  Florence would then take that member's reading and paste it or copy it longhand into the book.