Power for a Season and in its Very Limited Sphere

Thanks to a friend who sent me this quote from Mike Mason's The Gospel According to Job:

Whatever power we human beings may appear to exercise, it is only for a season and within a very limited sphere. The President of the country is President only for a term, and in his own home he may have no authority at all. The general who commands thousands of troops might be totally powerless to command enough discipline to reduce his waistline, and he might end his days in a hospital bed being ordered around by women in white. The author of the book you are reading may have a way with words, but when it comes to dealing with people he could be quite inept. As Thomas Millar writes, "Man has a will to power, but he has no real power. Any one of us could get leukemia tomorrow. How's that for being captain of our fate? We're all just children trying to grow up. We think that means getting power. What it really means is learning to accept the powerless nature of the human condition."