Prayer in time of Failure

O God, teach us to know that failure is as much a part of life as success -- and whether it shall be evil or good depends upon the way we meet it -- if we face it listlessly and daunted, angrily or vengefully, then indeed is it evil for it spells death. But if we let our failures stand as guideposts and as warnings -- as beacons and as guardians -- then is honest failure far better than stolen success, and but a part of that great training which God gives us to make us women and men. The race is not to the swift -- nor the battle to the strong, O God. Amen.

W.E. B. Du Bois

Educated at Fisk University, Harvard University, and the University of Berlin, W. E.B. Du Bois (1868-1963) was the first African American to receive a doctorate from Harvard. A prolific author of novels, autobiographical sketches, verses, and scholarly studies, including his monumental work, "The Souls of Black Folk", Du Bois served as professor of economics and sociology at Atlanta University.

In Him, Mimi