<P> The philosopher W.W. Bartley juxtaposes without comment Niebuhr's prayer with a Mother Goose rhyme (1695) expressing a similar sentiment: </P> <P> For every ailment under the sun There is a remedy, or there is none; If there be one, try to find it; </P> <P> Friedrich Schiller advocated the first part in 1801: "Blessed is he, who has learned to bear what he cannot change, and to give up with dignity, what he cannot save ." </P> <P> The prayer has been variously attributed (without evidence) to Thomas Aquinas, Cicero, Augustine, Boethius, Marcus Aurelius, Francis of Assisi, and Thomas More, among others . </P>

Lord grant me serenity to accept the things i cannot change