Tis The Set Of The Sail — Or — One Ship Sails East
by Ella Wheeler Wilcox
But to every mind there openeth,
A way, and way, and away,
A high soul climbs the highway,
And the low soul gropes the low,
And in between on the misty flats,
The rest drift to and fro.
But to every man there openeth,
A high way and a low,
And every mind decideth,
The way his soul shall go.
One ship sails East,
And another West,
By the self-same winds that blow,
‘Tis the set of the sails
And not the gales,
That tells the way we go.
Like the winds of the sea
Are the waves of time,
As we journey along through life,
‘Tis the set of the soul,
That determines the goal,
And not the calm or the strife.
“As we journey along through life,
‘Tis the set of the soul,
That determines the goal,
And not the calm or the strife.”
I like that. While we may not have been able to chose our early nurture (families) or our early environment, one can make decisions later on that will sometimes allow them to overcome those short-comings. Choosing the right friends comes to mind. The right spouse, etc.