A Collect for Club Women

General Federation of Women’s Clubs

Keep us, oh God, from pettiness

Let us be large in thought, in word, in deed.

Let us be done with fault-finding

and leave off self-seeking,

May we put away all pretense

and meet each other face to face

without self-pity and without prejudice.

May we never be hasty in judgement and always generous.

Let us take time for all things;

Make us grow calm, serene, gentile.

Teach us to put into action

our better impulses, straightforward and unafraid,

Grant that we may realize

it is the little things that create differences,

that in the big things of life, we are at one,

and may we strive to touch and to know

the great, common human heart of us all.

And, oh Lord God, let us forget not to be kind.

Mary Stewart

1904