mansellh 2nd September 2013

A reading from Jacqui's service "The steel that has suffered most is the best steel. It has been in the furnace again and again: it has been on the anvil: it has been tight in the jaws of the vice: it has felt the teeth of the rasp: it has been ground by emery: it has been heated and hammered and filed until it does not know itself, and it comes out a splen­did knife. ':And if men only knew it, what are called 'misfortunes' are God's best blessings, for they are the moulding influences which give them shapeliness and edge, durability and power." -Henry Ward Beecher (June 24th 1813- March 8th 1887) This quotation was given to jacqui 20 years ago by a nurse in Middlesex Hospital. It is based on Isaiah 48:10: "I have refined thee: I have chosen thee in the furnace of affliction."