The story of my life ; or, The sunshine and shadow of seventy years / by Mary A. Livermore ... with hitherto unrecorded incidents and recollections of three years' experience as an army nurse in the great Civil War, and reminiscences of twenty-five years' experiences on the lecture platform ... to which is added six of her most popular lectures ... with portraits and one hundred and twenty engravings from designs by eminent artists ...

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694 THE BATTLE OF LIFE.

mighty leap forward into "cthe good time coming." They
will probably never eventuate as we have planned them, nor
accomplish just what we anticipate, but they will prove an
immense gain to the race, and will eliminate from the battle
of life many of its worst and most dreaded features. Believe me, both of these reforms are coming up the steeps of
time, and are yet to be verities. Some of you will live to
behold the near approach of their full fruition, and will
catch the foregleam of the glory of the Lord as it breaks on
the world. Whoever works for the bettering of humanity,
for the lessening of the evil things in life, and the increase
of what is good and helpful, has his hand in the hand of
God, and takes on something of God's almightiness. 'Those
who work with God will always win, and though victory
may be postponed for a time, the right ultimately triumphs.
Already the distinguishing characteristic of our nineteenth century civilization is its intense humaneness. It
looks steadily to the redressing of all wrongs, to the righting of every form of error and injustice, and an intense and
pryingv philanthropy, which is almost omniscient, is one of
the marked features of the age. It has multiplied charitable institutions till they cover almost every form of stiffering and want, and it gives to the poor the tonic of friendship and hope. It demands that international arbitration
shall take the place of war, and reiterates the immortal
declaration of Charles Sumner, that " that the true grandeur
of nations is peace." It bombards the legal enactments that
-make for drunkenness with million-voiced petitions, and pursues the inebriate with kind and loving persuasion. It hears
the demand of H6ward, the philanthropist, sounding down the