There are things in this world that are bigger than you and me: mountains, oceans, and the sky.  Perhaps the greatest stretch for humanity is to live up to our ideals and fulfill our personal destinies.  Carl Schurz, (1829 – 1906), with all his life experience as a German revolutionary, American statesman and reformer, and Union Army General in the American Civil War, can give us a fresh approach.

“Ideals are like stars: you will not succeed in touching them with you hands, but like the seafaring man on the ocean desert of waters, you choose them as your guides, and following them, you reach your destiny.”  Carl Schurz