quote · Legacy record
With every rising of the sun, Think of your life as just begun. The past has shrived and buried deep, All yesterdays; there let them sleep. Nor seek to summon back one ghost Of that innumerable host. Concern yourself with but today. Woo it, and teach it to obey Your will and wish. Since time began Today has been the friend of man; But in his blindness and his sorrow, He looks to yesterday and tomorrow. You, and today! a soul sublime, And the great pregnant hour of time, With God himself to bind the twain! Go forth, I say, attain, attain!
With every rising of the sun, Think of your life as just begun. The past has shrived and buried deep, All yesterdays; there let them sleep. Nor seek to summon back one ghost Of that innumerable host. Concern yourself with but today. Woo it, and teach it to obey Your will and wish. Since time began Today has been the friend of man; But in his blindness and his sorrow, He looks to yesterday and tomorrow. You, and today! a soul sublime, And the great pregnant hour of time, With God himself to bind the twain! Go forth, I say, attain, attain!
Approximate author period: c. 1866 AD · industrial
Meaning not yet available
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Begin with source-checked readings and explanations ↗Attribution & collection notes
- Author or tradition
- Ella Wheeler Wilcox
Attribution: attributed - Country attributed
- Not established
A country attribution does not establish the earliest origin. - Historical period
- Approximate author period: c. 1866 AD · industrial
Approximate author-period evidence for Ella Wheeler Wilcox: documented activity in 1866. Wikidata Q448376, inspected 2026-10-08. Not a quotation composition date or independent verification of attribution. Source: https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q448376 (accessed 2026-10-08).
An author lifetime, approximate period or collection date is not necessarily the date when these words were first written or spoken. - Recorded source
- The Optimist’s Good Morning (1911) (1911 AD)
Complete signed selection 137; printed byline: Ella Wheeler Wilcox; Boston: Little, Brown, and Company, 1911; printed copyright 1907
A collection's publication date can be later than the words it records.