The Great Devotions

Han-na Chang : Offenbach~~Les Larmes de Jacqueline

It is not the critic who counts;
not the man who points out
how the strong man stumbles,
or where the doer of deeds
could have done them better.
The credit belongs to the man
who is actually in the arena,
whose face is marred by dust
and sweat and blood;
who strives valiantly;
who errs, who comes short
again and again,
because there is no effort
without error and shortcoming;
but who does actually
strive to do the deeds;
who knows great enthusiasms,
the great devotions;
who spends himself
in a worthy cause;
who at the best knows
in the end the triumph
of high achievement, and who at the worst,
if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly,
so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls
who neither know victory nor defeat.
--Theodore Roosevelt