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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/21622-8.txt b/21622-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..5b26c7f --- /dev/null +++ b/21622-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11134 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Architects of Fate, by Orison Swett Marden + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Architects of Fate + or, Steps to Success and Power + +Author: Orison Swett Marden + +Release Date: May 27, 2007 [EBook #21622] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ARCHITECTS OF FATE *** + + + + +Produced by Al Haines + + + + + + + + + + +[Frontispiece: Phillips Brooks] + +"The best-loved man in New England." + +"The ideal life, the life full of completion, haunts us all. We feel +the thing we ought to be beating beneath the thing we are." + +"_First, be a man._" + + + + + + +ARCHITECTS OF FATE + +OR, STEPS TO SUCCESS AND POWER + + + A BOOK DESIGNED TO INSPIRE YOUTH TO + CHARACTER BUILDING, SELF-CULTURE + AND NOBLE ACHIEVEMENT + + +BY + +ORISON SWETT MARDEN + + + +AUTHOR OF "PUSHING TO THE FRONT + OR, SUCCESS UNDER DIFFICULTIES" + + + +_ILLUSTRATED WITH SIXTEEN FINE + PORTRAITS OF EMINENT PERSONS_ + + + + "All are architects of fate + Working in these walls of time." + + "Our to-days and yesterdays + Are the blocks with which we build." + + "Let thy great deed be thy prayer to thy God." + + + + +TORONTO + +WILLIAM BRIGGS + +WESLEY BUILDINGS + +MONTREAL: C. W. COATES + +HALIFAX: S. F. HUESTIS + +1897 + + + + +Copyright, 1895, + +BY ORISON SWETT MARDEN. + + +_All rights reserved._ + + + + +PREFACE. + +The demand for more than a dozen editions of "Pushing to the Front" +during its first year and its universally favorable reception, both at +home and abroad, have encouraged the author to publish this companion +volume of somewhat similar scope and purpose. The two books were +prepared simultaneously, and the story of the first, given in its +preface, applies equally well to this. + +Inspiration to character-building and worthy achievement is the keynote +of the present volume, its object, to arouse to honorable exertion +youth who are drifting without aim, to awaken dormant ambitions in +those who have grown discouraged in the struggle for success, to +encourage and stimulate to higher resolve those who are setting out to +make their own way, with perhaps neither friendship nor capital other +than a determination to get on in the world. + +Nothing is so fascinating to a youth with high purpose, life, and +energy throbbing in his young blood as stories of men and women who +have brought great things to pass. Though these themes are as old as +the human race, yet they are ever new, and more interesting to the +young than any fiction. The cry of youth is for life! more life! No +didactic or dogmatic teaching, however brilliant, will capture a +twentieth-century boy, keyed up to the highest pitch by the pressure of +an intense civilization. The romance of achievement under +difficulties, of obscure beginnings and triumphant ends; the story of +how great men started, their struggles, their long waitings, amid want +and woe, the obstacles overcome, the final triumphs; examples, which +explode excuses, of men who have seized common situations and made them +great, of those of average capacity who have succeeded by the use of +ordinary means, by dint of indomitable will and inflexible purpose: +these will most inspire the ambitious youth. The author teaches that +there are bread and success for every youth under the American flag who +has the grit to seize his chance and work his way to his own loaf; that +the barriers are not yet erected which declare to aspiring talent, +"Thus far and no farther"; that the most forbidding circumstances +cannot repress a longing for knowledge, a yearning for growth; that +poverty, humble birth, loss of limbs or even eyesight, have not been +able to bar the progress of men with grit; that poverty has rocked the +cradle of the giants who have wrung civilization from barbarism, and +have led the world up from savagery to the Gladstones, the Lincolns, +and the Grants. + +The book shows that it is the man with one unwavering aim who cuts his +way through opposition and forges to the front; that in this electric +age, where everything is pusher or pushed, he who would succeed must +hold his ground and push hard; that what are stumbling-blocks and +defeats to the weak and vacillating, are but stepping-stones and +victories to the strong and determined. The author teaches that every +germ of goodness will at last struggle into bloom and fruitage, and +that true success follows every right step. He has tried to touch the +higher springs of the youth's aspiration; to lead him to high ideals; +to teach him that there is something nobler in an occupation than +merely living-getting or money-getting; that a man may make millions +and be a failure still; to caution youth not to allow the maxims of a +low prudence, dinned daily into his ears in this money-getting age, to +repress the longings for a higher life; that the hand can never safely +reach higher than does the heart. + +The author's aim has been largely through concrete illustrations which +have pith, point, and purpose, to be more suggestive than dogmatic, in +a style more practical than elegant, more helpful than ornate, more +pertinent than novel. + +The author wishes to acknowledge valuable assistance from Mr. Arthur W. +Brown, of W. Kingston, R. I. + +O. S. M. + +43 BOWDOIN ST., BOSTON, MASS. + +December 2, 1896. + + + + +CONTENTS. + + +CHAPTER + +I. WANTED--A MAN + +God after a _man_. Wealth is nothing, fame is nothing. _Manhood is +everything_. + +II. DARE + +Dare to live thy creed. Conquer your place in the world. All things +serve a brave soul. + +III. THE WILL AND THE WAY + +Find a way or make one. Everything is either pusher or pushed. The +world always listens to a man with a will in him. + +IV. SUCCESS UNDER DIFFICULTIES + +There is scarcely a great truth or doctrine but has had to fight its +way to recognition through detraction, calumny, and persecution. + +V. USES OR OBSTACLES + +The Great Sculptor cares little for the human block as such; it is the +statue He is after; and He will blast, hammer, and chisel with poverty, +hardships, anything to get out the man. + +VI. ONE UNWAVERING AIM + +Find your purpose and fling your life out to it. Try to be somebody +with all your might. + +VII. SOWING AND REAPING + +What is put into the first of life is put into the whole of life. +_Start right_. + +VIII. SELF-HELP + +Self-made or never made. The greatest men have risen from the ranks. + +IX. WORK AND WAIT + +Don't risk a life's superstructure upon a day's foundation. + +X. CLEAR GRIT + +The goddess of fame or of fortune has been won by many a poor boy who +had no friends, no backing, or anything but pure grit and invincible +purpose to commend him. + +XI. THE GRANDEST THING IN THE WORLD + +Manhood is above all riches and overtops all titles; character is +greater than any career. + +XII. WEALTH IN ECONOMY + +"Hunger, rags, cold, hard work, contempt, suspicion, unjust reproach, +are disagreeable; but debt is infinitely worse than all." + +XIII. RICH WITHOUT MONEY + +To have nothing is not poverty. Whoever uplifts civilization is rich +though he die penniless, and future generations will erect his monument. + +XIV. OPPORTUNITIES WHERE YOU ARE + +"How speaks the present hour? _Act_." Don't wait for great +opportunities. _Seize common occasions and make them great_. + +XV. THE MIGHT OF LITTLE THINGS + +There is nothing small in a world where a mud-crack swells to an +Amazon, and the stealing of a penny may end on the scaffold. + +XVI. SELF-MASTERY + +Guard your weak point. Be lord over yourself. + + + + +LIST OF PORTRAITS. + + +CHAP. + + I. Phillips Brooks . . . . . . . . . _Frontispiece_ + II. Oliver Hazard Perry + III. Walter Scott + IV. William Hickling Prescott + V. John Bunyan + VI. Richard Arkwright + VII. Victor Hugo + VIII. James A. Garfield (missing from book) + IX. Thomas Alva Edison + X. Andrew Jackson + XI. John Greenleaf Whittier (missing from book) + XII. Alexander Hamilton + XIII. Ralph Waldo Emerson + XIV. Thomas Jefferson + XV. Louis Agassiz + XVI. James Russell Lowell + + + + +ARCHITECTS OF FATE. + + +CHAPTER I. + +WANTED--A MAN. + + "Wanted; men: + Not systems fit and wise, + Not faiths with rigid eyes, + Not wealth in mountain piles, + Not power with gracious smiles, + Not even the potent pen: + Wanted; men." + +Run ye to and fro through the streets of Jerusalem, and see now, and +know, and seek in the broad places thereof, if ye can find a +man.--JEREMIAH. + +All the world cries, Where is the man who will save us? We want a man! +Don't look so far for this man. You have him at hand. This man,--it +is you, it is I, it is each one of us! . . . How to constitute one's +self a man? Nothing harder, if one knows not how to will it; nothing +easier, if one wills it.--ALEXANDRE DUMAS. + + "'Tis life, not death for which we pant! + 'Tis life, whereof our nerves are scant: + More life and fuller, that we want." + +I do not wish in attempting to paint a man to describe an air-fed, +unimpassioned, impossible ghost. My eyes and ears are revolted by any +neglect of the physical facts, the limitations of man.--EMERSON. + + But nature, with a matchless hand, sends forth her nobly born, + And laughs the paltry attributes of wealth and rank to scorn; + She moulds with care a spirit rare, half human, half divine, + And cries exulting, "Who can make a gentleman like mine?" + ELIZA COOK. + + +"In a thousand cups of life," says Emerson, "only one is the right +mixture. The fine adjustment of the existing elements, where the +well-mixed man is born with eyes not too dull, nor too good, with fire +enough and earth enough, capable of receiving impressions from all +things, and not too susceptible, then no gift need be bestowed on him. +He brings his fortune with him." + +Diogenes sought with a lantern at noontide in ancient Athens for a +perfectly honest man, and sought in vain. In the market place he once +cried aloud, "Hear me, O men;" and, when a crowd collected around him, +he said scornfully: "I called for men, not pygmies." + +The world has a standing advertisement over the door of every +profession, every occupation, every calling; "Wanted--A Man." + +Wanted, a man who will not lose his individuality in a crowd, a man who +has the courage of his convictions, who is not afraid to say "No," +though all the world say "Yes." + +Wanted, a man who, though he is dominated by a mighty purpose, will not +permit one great faculty to dwarf, cripple, warp, or mutilate his +manhood; who will not allow the over-development of one facility to +stunt or paralyze his other faculties. + +Wanted, a man who is larger than his calling, who considers it a low +estimate of his occupation to value it merely as a means of getting a +living. Wanted, a man who sees self-development, education and +culture, discipline and drill, character and manhood, in his occupation. + +A thousand pulpits vacant in a single religious denomination, a +thousand preachers standing idle in the market place, while a thousand +church committees scour the land for men to fill those same vacant +pulpits, and scour in vain, is a sufficient indication, in one +direction at least, of the largeness of the opportunities of the age, +and also of the crying need of good men. + +Wanted, a man who is well balanced, who is not cursed with some little +defect or weakness which cripples his usefulness and neutralizes his +powers. Wanted, a man of courage, who is not a coward in any part of +his nature. + +Wanted, a man who is symmetrical, and not one-sided in his development, +who has not sent all the energies of his being into one narrow +specialty, and allowed all the other branches of his life to wither and +die. Wanted, a man who is broad, who does not take half views of +things. Wanted, a man who mixes common sense with his theories, who +does not let a college education spoil him for practical, every-day +life; a man who prefers substance to show, who regards his good name as +a priceless treasure. + +Wanted, a man "who, no stunted ascetic, is full of life and fire, but +whose passions are trained to heed a strong will, the servant of a +tender conscience; who has learned to love all beauty, whether of +nature or of art, to hate all vileness, and to respect others as +himself." + +God calls a man to be upright and pure and generous, but he also calls +him to be intelligent and skillful and strong and brave. + +The world wants a man who is educated all over; whose nerves are +brought to their acutest sensibility, whose brain is cultured, keen, +incisive, penetrating, broad, liberal, deep; whose hands are deft; +whose eyes are alert, sensitive, microscopic, whose heart is tender, +broad, magnanimous, true. + +The whole world is looking for such a man. Although there are millions +out of employment, yet it is almost impossible to find just the right +man in almost any department of life. Every profession and every +occupation has a standing advertisement all over the world: "Wanted--A +Man." + +Rousseau, in his celebrated essay on education, says: "According to the +order of nature, men being equal, their common vocation is the +profession of humanity; and whoever is well educated to discharge the +duty of a man cannot be badly prepared to fill any of those offices +that have a relation to him. It matters little to me whether my pupil +be designed for the army, the pulpit, or the bar. Nature has destined +us to the offices of human life antecedent to our destination +concerning society. To live is the profession I would teach him. When +I have done with him, it is true he will be neither a soldier, a +lawyer, nor a divine. _Let him first be a man_; Fortune may remove him +from one rank to another as she pleases, he will be always found in his +place." + +A little, short doctor of divinity in a large Baptist convention stood +on a step and said he thanked God he was a Baptist. The audience could +not hear and called "Louder." "Get up higher," some one said. "I +can't," he replied. "To be a Baptist is as high as one can get." But +there is something higher than being a Baptist, and that is being a +_man_. + +As Emerson says, Talleyrand's question is ever the main one; not, is he +rich? is he committed? is he well-meaning? has he this or that faculty? +is he of the movement? is he of the establishment? but is he anybody? +does he stand for something? He must be good of his kind. That is all +that Talleyrand, all that State Street, all that the common sense of +mankind asks. + +When Garfield was asked as a young boy, "what he meant to be," he +answered: "First of all, I must make myself a man, if I do not succeed +in that, I can succeed in nothing." + +Montaigne says our work is not to train a soul by itself alone, nor a +body by itself alone, but to train a man. + +One great need of the world to-day is for men and women who are good +animals. To endure the strain of our concentrated civilization, the +coming man and woman must have an excess of animal spirits. They must +have a robustness of health. Mere absence of disease is not health. +It is the overflowing fountain, not the one half full, that gives life +and beauty to the valley below. Only he is healthy who exults in mere +animal existence; whose very life is a luxury; who feels a bounding +pulse throughout his body, who feels life in every limb, as dogs do +when scouring over the field, or as boys do when gliding over fields of +ice. + +Pope, the poet, was with Sir Godfrey Kneller, the artist, one day, when +the latter's nephew, a Guinea slave-trader, came into the room. +"Nephew," said Sir Godfrey, "you have the honor of seeing the two +greatest men in the world." "I don't know how great men you may be," +said the Guinea man, "but I don't like your looks. I have often bought +a much better man than either of you, all muscles and bones, for ten +guineas." + +Sydney Smith said, "I am convinced that digestion is the great secret +of life, and that character, virtue and talents, and qualities are +powerfully affected by beef, mutton, pie crust, and rich soups. I have +often thought I could feed or starve men into virtues or vices, and +affect them more powerfully with my instruments of torture than +Timotheus could do formerly with his lyre." + +What more glorious than a magnificent manhood, animated with the +bounding spirits of overflowing health? + +It is a sad sight to see thousands of students graduated every year +from our grand institutions, whose object is to make stalwart, +independent, self-supporting men, turned out into the world saplings +instead of stalwart oaks, "memory-glands" instead of brainy men, +helpless instead of self-supporting, sickly instead of robust, weak +instead of strong, leaning instead of erect. "So many promising +youths, and never a finished man!" + +The character sympathizes with and unconsciously takes on the nature of +the body. A peevish, snarling, ailing man cannot develop the vigor and +strength of character which is possible to a healthy, robust, jolly +man. There is an inherent love in the human mind for wholeness, a +demand that man shall come up to the highest standard; and there is an +inherent protest or contempt for preventable deficiency. Nature too +demands that man be ever at the top of his condition. The giant's +strength with the imbecile's brain will not be characteristic of the +coming man. + +Man has been a dwarf of himself, but a higher type of manhood stands at +the door of this age knocking for admission. + +As we stand upon the seashore while the tide is coming in, one wave +reaches up the beach far higher than any previous one, then recedes, +and for some time none that follows comes up to its mark, but after a +while the whole sea is there and beyond it, so now and then there comes +a man head and shoulders above his fellow-men, showing that Nature has +not lost her ideal, and after a while even the average man will overtop +the highest wave of manhood yet given to the world. + +Apelles hunted over Greece for many years, studying the fairest points +of beautiful women, getting here an eye, there a forehead and there a +nose, here a grace and there a turn of beauty, for his famous portrait +of a perfect woman which enchanted the world. So the coming man will +be a composite, many in one. He will absorb into himself not the +weakness, not the follies, but the strength and the virtues of other +types of men. He will be a man raised to the highest power. He will +be self-centred, equipoised, and ever master of himself. His +sensibility will not be deadened or blunted by violation of nature's +laws. His whole character will be impressible, and will respond to the +most delicate touches of nature. + +What a piece of work--this coming man! "How noble in reason. How +infinite in faculties. In form and motion how express and admirable, +in action how like an angel, in apprehension how like a god. The +beauty of the world. The paragon of animals." + +The first requisite of all education and discipline should be +man-timber. Tough timber must come from well grown, sturdy trees. +Such wood can be turned into a mast, can be fashioned into a piano or +an exquisite carving. But it must become timber first. Time and +patience develop the sapling into the tree. So through discipline, +education, experience, the sapling child is developed into hardy +mental, moral, physical timber. + +What an aid to character building would be the determination of the +young man in starting out in life to consider himself his own bank; +that his notes will be accepted as good or bad, and will pass current +everywhere or be worthless, according to his individual reputation for +honor and veracity; that if he lets a note go to protest, his bank of +character will be suspected; if he lets two or three go to protest, +public confidence will be seriously shaken; that if they continue to go +to protest, his reputation will be lost and confidence in him ruined. + +If the youth should start out with the fixed determination that every +statement he makes shall be the exact truth; that every promise he +makes shall be redeemed to the letter; that every appointment shall be +kept with the strictest faithfulness and with full regard for other +men's time, if he should hold his reputation as a priceless treasure, +feel that the eyes of the world are upon him, that he must not deviate +a hair's breadth from the truth and right; if he should take such a +stand at the outset, he would, like George Peabody, come to have almost +unlimited credit and the confidence of all, and would have developed +into noble man-timber. + +What are palaces and equipages; what though a man could cover a +continent with his title-deeds, or an ocean with his commerce, compared +with conscious rectitude, with a face that never turns pale at the +accuser's voice, with a bosom that never throbs with the fear of +exposure, with a heart that might be turned inside out and disclose no +stain of dishonor? To have done no man a wrong; to have put your +signature to no paper to which the purest angel in heaven might not +have been an attesting witness; to walk and live, unseduced, within +arm's length of what is not your own, with nothing between your desire +and its gratification but the invisible law of rectitude;--_this is to +be a man_. + + "He that of such a height hath built his mind, + And reared the dwelling of his thought so strong + As neither fear nor hope can shake the frame + Of his resolved powers; nor all the wind + Of vanity or malice pierce to wrong + His settled peace, or to disturb the same; + What a fair seat hath he; from whence he may + The boundless wastes and wilds of man survey." + [_Lines found in one of the books of Beecher's Library._] + +A man is never so happy as when he is _totus in se_; as when he +suffices to himself, and can walk without crutches or a guide. Said +Jean Paul Richter: "I have made as much out of myself as could be made +of the stuff, and no man should require more." + +Man is the only great thing in the universe. All the ages have been +trying to produce a perfect model. Only one complete man has yet been +evolved. The best of us are but prophecies of what is to come. + + What constitutes a state? + Not high-raised battlement or labored mound, + Thick wall or moated gate; + Not cities proud with spires and turrets crowned; + Not bays and broad-armed ports, + Where, laughing at the storm, rich navies ride; + Not starred and spangled courts, + Where low-browed baseness wafts perfume to pride. + No: men, high-minded men, + With powers as far above dull brutes endued + In forest, brake, or den, + As beasts excel cold rocks and brambles rude,-- + Men who their duties know, + But know their rights, and knowing, dare maintain, + Prevent the long-aimed blow, + And crush the tyrant while they rend the chain. + WILLIAM JONES. + + God give us men. A time like this demands + Strong minds, great hearts, true faith and ready hands: + Men whom the lust of office does not kill; + Men whom the spoils of office cannot buy; + Men who possess opinions and a will; + Men who have honor--men who will not lie; + Men who can stand before a demagogue + And scorn his treacherous flatteries without winking; + Tall men sun-crowned, who live above the fog + In public duty, and in private thinking. + ANON. + + Open thy bosom, set thy wishes wide, + And let in manhood--let in happiness; + Admit the boundless theatre of thought + From nothing up to God . . . which makes a man! + YOUNG. + + "The wisest man could ask no more of fate + Than to be simple, modest, manly, true." + + In speech right gentle, yet so wise; princely of mien, + Yet softly mannered; modest, deferent, + And tender-hearted, though of fearless blood. + EDWIN ARNOLD. + + + + +CHAPTER II. + +DARE. + +The Spartans did not inquire how many the enemy are, but where they +are.--AGIS II. + +What's brave, what's noble, let's do it after the high Roman fashion, +and make death proud to take us.--SHAKESPEARE. + + Better, like Hector, in the field to die, + Than, like a perfumed Paris, turn and fly. + LONGFELLOW. + +Let me die facing the enemy.--BAYARD. + +Who conquers me, shall find a stubborn foe.--BYRON. + +Courage in danger is half the battle.--PLAUTUS. + + No great deed is done + By falterers who ask for certainty. + GEORGE ELIOT. + +Fortune befriends the bold.--DRYDEN. + + Tender handed stroke a nettle, + And it stings you for your pains; + Grasp it like a man of mettle, + And it soft as silk remains. + AARON HILL. + +We make way for the man who boldly pushes past us.--BOVÉE. + + Man should dare all things that he knows is right, + And fear to do nothing save what is wrong. + PHEBE CARY. + + Soft-heartedness, in times like these, + Shows softness in the upper story. + LOWELL. + +O friend, never strike sail to fear. Come into port grandly, or sail +with God the seas.--EMERSON. + +To stand with a smile upon your face against a stake from which you +cannot get away--that, no doubt, is heroic. But the true glory is +resignation to the inevitable. To stand unchained, with perfect +liberty to go away, held only by the higher claims of duty, and let the +fire creep up to the heart,--this is heroism.--F. W. ROBERTSON. + + +"Steady, men! Every man must die where he stands!" said Colin Campbell +to the Ninety-third Highlanders at Balaklava, as an overwhelming force +of Russian cavalry came sweeping down. "Ay, ay, Sir Colin! we'll do +that!" was the cordial response from men many of whom had to keep their +word by thus obeying. + + * * * * * * + +[Illustration: COMMODORE PERRY] + +"We have met the enemy and they are ours." + + "He either fears his fate too much + Or his deserts too small, + That dares not put it to the touch, + To gain or lose it all." + + * * * * * * + +"Bring back the colors," shouted a captain at the battle of the Alma, +when an ensign maintained his ground in front, although the men were +retreating. "No," cried the ensign, "bring up the men to the colors." +"To dare, and again to dare, and without end to dare," was Danton's +noble defiance to the enemies of France. + +"The Commons of France have resolved to deliberate," said Mirabeau to +De Breze, who brought an order from the king for them to disperse, June +23, 1789. "We have heard the intentions that have been attributed to +the king; and you, sir, who cannot be recognized as his organ in the +National Assembly,--you, who have neither place, voice, nor right to +speak,--you are not the person to bring to us a message of his. Go, +say to those who sent you that we are here by the power of the people, +and that we will not be driven hence, save by the power of the bayonet." + +When the assembled senate of Rome begged Regulus not to return to +Carthage to fulfill an illegal promise, he calmly replied: "Have you +resolved to dishonor me? Torture and death are awaiting me, but what +are these to the shame of an infamous act, or the wounds of a guilty +mind? Slave as I am to Carthage, I still have the spirit of a Roman. +I have sworn to return. It is my duty. Let the gods take care of the +rest." + +The courage which Cranmer had shown since the accession of Mary gave +way the moment his final doom was announced. The moral cowardice which +had displayed itself in his miserable compliance with the lust and +despotism of Henry displayed itself again in six successive +recantations by which he hoped to purchase pardon. But pardon was +impossible; and Cranmer's strangely mingled nature found a power in its +very weakness when he was brought into the church of St. Mary at Oxford +on the 21st of March, to repeat his recantation on the way to the +stake. "Now," ended his address to the hushed congregation before +him,--"now I come to the great thing that troubleth my conscience more +than any other thing that ever I said or did in my life, and that is +the setting abroad of writings contrary to the truth; which here I now +renounce and refuse as things written by a hand contrary to the truth +which I thought in my heart, and written for fear of death to save my +life, if it might be. And, forasmuch as my hand offended in writing +contrary to my heart, my hand therefore shall be the first punished; +for if I come to the fire it shall be the first burned." "This was the +hand that wrote it," he again exclaimed at the stake, "therefore it +shall suffer first punishment;" and holding it steadily in the flame, +"he never stirred nor cried till life was gone." + +"Oh, if I were only a man!" exclaimed Rebecca Bates, a girl of +fourteen, as she looked from the window of a lighthouse at Scituate, +Mass., during the War of 1812, and saw a British warship anchor in the +harbor. "What could you do?" asked Sarah Winsor, a young visitor. +"See what a lot of them the boats contain, and look at their guns!" and +she pointed to five large boats, filled with soldiers in scarlet +uniforms, who were coming to burn the vessels in the harbor and destroy +the town. "I don't care, I'd fight," said Rebecca. "I'd use father's +old shotgun--anything. Think of uncle's new boat and the sloop! And +how hard it is to sit here and see it all, and not lift a finger to +help. Father and uncle are in the village and will do all they can. +How still it is in the town! There is not a man to be seen." "Oh, +they are hiding till the soldiers get nearer," said Sarah, "then we'll +hear the shots and the drum." "The drum!" exclaimed Rebecca, "how can +they use it? It is here. Father brought it home last night to mend. +See! the first boat has reached the sloop. Oh! they are going to burn +her. Where is that drum? I've a great mind to go down and beat it. +We could hide behind the sandhills and bushes." As flames began to +rise from the sloop the ardor of the girls increased. They found the +drum and an old fife, and, slipping out of doors unnoticed by Mrs. +Bates, soon stood behind a row of sandhills. "Rub-a-dub-dub, +rub-a-dub-dub," went the drum, and "squeak, squeak, squeak," went the +fife. The Americans in the town thought that help had come from +Boston, and rushed into boats to attack the redcoats. The British +paused in their work of destruction; and, when the fife began to play +"Yankee Doodle," they scrambled into their boats and rowed in haste to +the warship, which weighed anchor and sailed away as fast as the wind +would carry her. + +A woman's piercing shriek suddenly startled a party of surveyors at +dinner in a forest of northern Virginia on a calm, sunny day in 1750. +The cries were repeated in quick succession, and the men sprang through +the undergrowth to learn their cause. "Oh, sir," exclaimed the woman +as she caught sight of a youth of eighteen, but a man in stature and +bearing; "you will surely do something for me! Make these friends +release me. My boy,--my poor boy is drowning, and they will not let me +go!" "It would be madness; she will jump into the river," said one of +the men who was holding her; "and the rapids would dash her to pieces +in a moment!" Throwing on his coat, the youth sprang to the edge of +the bank, scanned for a moment the rocks and whirling currents, and +then, at sight of part of the boy's dress, plunged into the roaring +rapids. "Thank God, he will save my child!" cried the mother, and all +rushed to the brink of the precipice; "there he is! Oh, my boy, my +darling boy! How could I leave you?" + +But all eyes were bent upon the youth struggling with strong heart and +hope amid the dizzy sweep of the whirling currents far below. Now it +seemed as if he would be dashed against a projecting rock, over which +the water flew in foam, and anon a whirlpool would drag him in, from +whose grasp escape would seem impossible. Twice the boy went out of +sight, but he had reappeared the second time, although frightfully near +the most dangerous part of the river. The rush of waters here was +tremendous, and no one had ever dared to approach it, even in a canoe, +lest he should be dashed to pieces. The youth redoubled his exertions. +Three times he was about to grasp the child, when some stronger eddy +would toss it from him. One final effort he makes; the child is held +aloft by his strong right arm, but a cry of horror bursts from the lips +of every spectator as boy and man shoot over the falls and vanish in +the seething waters below. + +"There they are!" shouted the mother a moment later, in a delirium of +joy. "See! they are safe! Great God, I thank Thee!" And sure enough +they emerged unharmed from the boiling vortex, and in a few minutes +reached a low place in the bank and were drawn up by their friends, the +boy senseless, but still alive, and the youth almost exhausted. "God +will give you a reward," solemnly spoke the grateful woman. "He will +do great things for you in return for this day's work, and the +blessings of thousands besides mine will attend you." + +The youth was George Washington. + +"Your Grace has not the organ of animal courage largely developed," +said a phrenologist, who was examining Wellington's head. "You are +right," replied the Iron Duke, "and but for my sense of duty I should +have retreated in my first fight." That first fight, on an Indian +field, was one of the most terrible on record. + +In the reverses which followed Napoleon, he met the allies at Arcis. A +live shell having fallen in front of one of his young battalions, which +recoiled and wavered in expectation of an explosion, Napoleon, to +reassure them, spurred his charger toward the instrument of +destruction, made him smell the burning match, waited unshaken for the +explosion, and was blown up. Rolling in the dust with his mutilated +steed, and rising without a wound amid the plaudits of his soldiers, he +calmly called for another horse, and continued to brave the grape-shot, +and to fly into the thickest of the battle. + +When General Jackson was a judge and was holding court in a small +settlement, a border ruffian, a murderer and desperado, came into the +court-room with brutal violence and interrupted the court. The judge +ordered him to be arrested. The officer did not dare to approach him. +"Call a posse," said the judge, "and arrest him." But they also shrank +in fear from the ruffian. "Call me, then," said Jackson; "this court +is adjourned for five minutes." He left the bench, walked straight up +to the man, and with his eagle eye actually cowed the ruffian, who +dropped his weapons, afterwards saying, "There was something in his eye +I could not resist." + +One of the last official acts of the late President Carnot, of France, +was the sending of a medal of the French Legion of Honor to a little +American girl, who lives in Indiana. While a train on the Pan Handle +Railroad, having on board several distinguished Frenchmen, was bound to +Chicago and the World's Fair, Jennie Carey, who was then ten years old, +discovered that a trestle was on fire, and that if the train, which was +nearly due, entered it a dreadful wreck would take place. Thereupon +she ran out upon the track to a place where she could be seen from some +little distance. Then she took off her red flannel skirt and, when the +train came in view, waved it back and forth across the track. It was +seen, and the train stopped. On board of it were seven hundred people, +many of whom must have suffered death but for Jennie's courage and +presence of mind. When they returned to France, the Frenchmen brought +the occurrence to the notice of President Carnot, and the result was +the sending of the medal of this famous French society, the purpose of +which is the honoring of bravery and merit, wherever they may be found. + +After the battle of Fort Donelson, the wounded were hauled down the +hill in rough board wagons, and most of them died before they reached +St. Louis. One blue-eyed boy of nineteen, with both arms and both legs +shattered, had lain a long time and was neglected. He said, "Why, you +see they couldn't stop to bother with us because they had to take the +fort. When they took it we all forgot our sufferings and shouted for +joy, even to the dying." + +Louis IX. of France was captured by the Turks at the battle of +Mansoora, during the Seventh Crusade, and his wife Marguerite, with a +babe at the breast, was in Damietta, many miles away. The Infidels +surrounded the city, and pressed the garrison so hard that it was +decided to capitulate. The queen summoned the knights, and told them +that she at least would die in armor upon the ramparts before the enemy +should become masters of Damietta. + + "Before her words they thrilled like leaves + When winds are in the wood; + And a deepening murmur told of men + Roused to a loftier mood." + + +Grasping lance and shield, they vowed to defend their queen and the +cross to the last. Damietta was saved. + +Pyrrhus marched to Sparta to reinstate the deposed Cleonymus, and +quietly pitched his tents before Laconia, not anticipating resistance. +In consternation, the Spartans in council decided to send their women +to Crete for safety. But the women met and asked Queen Archidamia to +remonstrate. She went to the council, sword in hand, and told the men +that their wives did not care to live after Sparta was destroyed. + + "We are brave men's mothers, and brave men's wives; + We are ready to do and dare; + We are ready to man your walls with our lives, + And string your bows with our hair." + + +They hurried to the walls and worked all night, aiding the men in +digging trenches. When Pyrrhus attacked the city next day, his repulse +was so emphatic that he withdrew from Laconia. + +Charles V. of Spain passed through Thuringia in 1547, on his return to +Swabia after the battle of Muehlburg. He wrote to Catherine, Countess +Dowager of Schwartzburg, promising that her subjects should not be +molested in their persons or property if they would supply the Spanish +soldiers with provisions at a reasonable price. On approaching +Eudolstadt, General Alva and Prince Henry of Brunswick, with his sons, +invited themselves, by a messenger sent forward, to breakfast with the +Countess, who had no choice but to ratify so delicate a request from +the commander of an army. Just as the guests were seated at a generous +repast, the Countess was called from the hall and told that the +Spaniards were using violence and driving away the cattle of the +peasants. + +Quietly arming all her retinue, she bolted and barred all the gates and +doors of the castle, and returned to the banquet to complain of the +breach of faith. General Alva told her that such was the custom of +war, adding that such trifling disorders were not to be heeded. "That +we shall presently see," said Catharine; "my poor subjects must have +their own again, or, as God lives, prince's blood for oxen's blood!" +The doors were opened, and armed men took the places of the waiters +behind the chairs of the guests. Henry changed color; then, as the +best way out of a bad scrape, laughed loudly, and ended by praising the +splendid acting of his hostess, and promising that Alva should order +the cattle restored at once. Not until a courier returned, saying that +the order had been obeyed, and all damages settled satisfactorily, did +the armed waiters leave. The Countess then thanked her guests for the +honor they had done her castle, and they retired with protestations of +their distinguished consideration. + +It was the heroic devotion of an Indian girl that saved the life of +Captain John Smith, when the powerful King Powhatan had decreed his +death. Ill could the struggling colony spare him at that time. + +When the consul shouted that the bridge was tottering, Lartius and +Herminius sought safety in flight. But Horatius strode still nearer +the foe, the single champion of his country and liberty, and dared the +ninety thousand to come on. Dead stillness fell upon the Tuscans, so +astonished were they at the audacity of the Roman. He first broke the +awful silence, so deep that his clear, strong voice could be heard by +thousands in both armies, between which rolled the Tiber, as he +denounced the baseness and perfidy of the invaders. Not until his +words were drowned by the loud crash of fiercely disrupturing timbers, +and the sullen splash of the dark river, did his enemies hurl their +showers of arrows and javelins. Then, dexterously warding off the +missiles with his shield, he plunged into the Tiber. Although stabbed +in the hip by a Tuscan spear which lamed him for life, he swam in +safety to Rome. + +"It is a bad omen," said Eric the Red, when his horse slipped and fell +on the way to his ship, moored on the coast of Greenland, in readiness +for a voyage of discovery. "Ill-fortune would be mine should I dare +venture now upon the sea." So he returned to his house, but his young +son Leif decided to go, and, with a crew of thirty-five men, sailed +southward in search of the unknown shore upon which Captain Biarni had +been driven by a storm, while sailing in another Viking ship two or +three years before. The first land that they saw was probably +Labrador, a barren, rugged plain. Leif called this country Heluland, +or the land of flat stones. Sailing onward many days, he came to a +low, level coast thickly covered with woods, on account of which he +called the country Markland, probably the modern Nova Scotia. Sailing +onward, they came to an island which they named Vinland on account of +the abundance of delicious wild grapes in the woods. This was in the +year 1000. Here where the city of Newport, R. I., stands, they spent +many months, and then returned to Greenland with their vessel loaded +with grapes and strange kinds of wood. The voyage was successful, and +no doubt Eric was sorry he had been frightened by the bad omen. + +May 10, 1796, Napoleon carried the bridge at Lodi, in the face of the +Austrian batteries. Fourteen cannon--some accounts say thirty--were +trained upon the French end of the structure. Behind them were six +thousand troops. Napoleon massed four thousand grenadiers at the head +of the bridge, with a battalion of three hundred carbineers in front. +At the tap of the drum the foremost assailants wheeled from the cover +of the street wall under a terrible hail of grape and canister, and +attempted to pass the gateway to the bridge. The front ranks went down +like stalks of grain before a reaper; the column staggered and reeled +backward, and the valiant grenadiers were appalled by the task before +them. Without a word or a look of reproach, Napoleon placed himself at +their head, and his aids and generals rushed to his side. Forward +again, this time over heaps of dead that choked the passage, and a +quick run, counted by seconds only, carried the column across two +hundred yards of clear space, scarcely a shot from the Austrians taking +effect beyond the point where the platoons wheeled for the first leap. +So sudden and so miraculous was it all that the Austrian artillerists +abandoned their guns instantly, and their supports fled in a panic +instead of rushing to the front and meeting the French onslaught. This +Napoleon had counted on in making the bold attack. The contrast +between Napoleon's slight figure and the massive grenadiers suggested +the nickname "Little Corporal." + +The great secret of the success of Joan of Arc was the boldness of her +attacks. + +When Stephen of Colonna fell into the hands of base assailants, and +they asked him in derision, "Where is now your fortress?" "Here," was +his bold reply, placing his hand upon his heart. + +It was after the Mexican War when General McClellan was employed as a +topographical engineer in surveying the Pacific coast. From his +headquarters at Vancouver he had gone south to the Columbia River with +two companions, a soldier and a servant. One evening he received word +that the chiefs of the Columbia River tribes desired to confer with +him. From the messenger's manner he suspected that the Indians meant +mischief. He warned his companions that they must be ready to leave +camp at a moment's notice. Mounting his horse, he rode boldly into the +Indian village. About thirty chiefs were holding council. McClellan +was led into the circle, and placed at the right hand of Saltese. He +was familiar with the Chinook jargon, and could understand every word +spoken in the council. Saltese made known the grievance of the tribes. +Two Indians had been captured by a party of white pioneers and hanged +for theft. Retaliation for this outrage seemed indispensable. The +chiefs pondered long, but had little to say. McClellan had been on +friendly terms with them, and was not responsible for the forest +executions. Still, he was a white man, and the chiefs had vowed +vengeance against the race. The council was prolonged for hours before +sentence was passed, and then Saltese, in the name of the head men of +the tribes, decreed that McClellan should immediately be put to death +in retaliation for the hanging of the two Indian thieves. + +McClellan had said nothing. He had known that argument and pleas for +justice or mercy would be of no avail. He had sat motionless, +apparently indifferent to his fate. By his listlessness he had thrown +his captors off their guard. When the sentence was passed he acted +like a flash. Flinging his left arm around the neck of Saltese, he +whipped out his revolver and held it close to the chief's temple. +"Revoke that sentence, or I shall kill you this instant!" he cried, +with his fingers clicking the trigger. "I revoke it!" exclaimed +Saltese, fairly livid from fear. "I must have your word that I can +leave this council in safety." "You have the word of Saltese," was the +quick response. McClellan knew how sacred was the pledge which he had +received. The revolver was lowered. Saltese was released from the +embrace of the strong arm. McClellan strode out of the tent with his +revolver in his hand. Not a hand was raised against him. He mounted +his horse and rode to his camp, where his two followers were ready to +spring into the saddle and to escape from the villages. He owed his +life to his quickness of perception, and to his accurate knowledge of +Indian character. + +In 1866, Rufus Choate spoke to an audience of nearly five thousand in +Lowell in favor of the candidacy of James Buchanan for the presidency. +The floor of the great hall began to sink, settling more and more as he +proceeded with his address, until a sound of cracking timber below +would have precipitated a stampede with fatal results but for the +coolness of B. F. Butler, who presided. Telling the people to remain +quiet, he said that he would see if there were any cause for alarm. He +found the supports of the floor in so bad a condition that the +slightest applause would be likely to bury the audience in the ruins of +the building. Returning rather leisurely to the platform, he whispered +to Choate as he passed, "We shall all be in ---- in five minutes," then +he told the crowd that there was no immediate danger if they would +slowly disperse, although he thought it prudent to adjourn to a place +where there would be no risk whatever. The post of danger, he added, +was on the platform, which was most weakly supported, therefore he and +those with him would be the last to leave. No doubt many lives were +saved by his coolness. + +Many distinguished foreign and American statesmen were present at a +fashionable dinner party where wine was freely poured, but Schuyler +Colfax, then vice-president of the United States, declined to drink +from a proffered cup. "Colfax dares not drink," sneered a Senator who +had already taken too much. "You are right," said the Vice-President, +"I dare not." + +When Grant was in Houston several years ago, he was given a rousing +reception. Naturally hospitable, and naturally inclined to like a man +of Grant's make-up, the Houstonites determined to go beyond any other +Southern city in the way of a banquet and other manifestations of their +good-will and hospitality. They made great preparations for the +dinner, the committee taking great pains to have the finest wines that +could be procured for the table that night. When the time came to +serve the wine, the head-waiter went first to Grant. Without a word +the general quietly turned down all the glasses at his plate. This +movement was a great surprise to the Texans, but they were equal to the +occasion. Without a single word being spoken, every man along the line +of the long tables turned his glasses down, and there was not a drop of +wine taken that night. + +A deep sewer at Noyon, France, had been opened for repairs, and +carelessly left at night without covering or lights to warn people of +danger. Late at night four men stumbled in, and lay some time before +their situation was known in the town. No one dared go to the aid of +the men, then unconscious from breathing noxious gases, except +Catherine Vassen, a servant girl of eighteen. She insisted on being +lowered at once. Fastening a rope around two of the men, she aided in +raising them and restoring them to consciousness. Descending again, +she had just tied a rope around a third man, when she felt her breath +failing. Tying another rope to her long, curly hair, she swooned, but +was drawn up with the man, to be quickly revived by fresh air and +stimulants. The fourth man was dead when his body was pulled up, on +account of the delay from the fainting of Catherine. + +Two French officers at Waterloo were advancing to charge a greatly +superior force. One, observing that the other showed signs of fear, +said, "Sir, I believe you are frightened." "Yes, I am," was the reply, +"and if you were half as much frightened, you would run away." + +"That's a brave man," said Wellington, when he saw a soldier turn pale +as he marched against a battery; "he knows his danger, and faces it." + +"There are many cardinals and bishops at Worms," said a friend to +Luther, "and they will burn your body to ashes as they did that of John +Huss." Luther replied: "Although they should make a fire that should +reach from Worms to Wittenberg, and that should flame up to heaven, in +the Lord's name I would pass through it and appear before them." He +said to another: "I would enter Worms though there were as many devils +there as there are tiles upon the roofs of the houses." Another said: +"Duke George will surely arrest you." He replied: "It is my duty to +go, and I will go, though it rain Duke Georges for nine days together." + +"Here I stand, I cannot do otherwise, God help me," exclaimed Luther at +the Diet of Worms, facing his foes. + +A Western paper recently invited the surviving Union and Confederate +officers to give an account of the bravest act observed by each during +the Civil War. Colonel Thomas W. Higginson said that at a dinner at +Beaufort, S. C., where wine flowed freely and ribald jests were +bandied, Dr. Miner, a slight, boyish fellow who did not drink, was told +that he could not go until he had drunk a toast, told a story, or sung +a song. He replied: "I cannot sing, but I will give a toast, although +I must drink it in water. It is 'Our Mothers.'" The men were so +affected and ashamed that some took him by the hand and thanked him for +displaying courage greater than that required to walk up to the mouth +of a cannon. + +It took great courage for the commercial Quaker, John Bright, to +espouse a cause which called down upon his head the derision and scorn +and hatred of the Parliament. For years he rested under a cloud of +obloquy, but Bright was made of stern stuff. It was only his strength +of character and masterly eloquence, which saved him from political +annihilation. To a man who boasted that his ancestors came over with +the Conquerors, he replied, "I never heard that they did anything +else." A Tory lordling said, when Bright was ill, that Providence had +inflicted upon Bright, for the measure of his talents, disease of the +brain. When Bright went back into the Commons he replied: "This may be +so, but it will be some consolation to the friends and family of the +noble lord to know that that disease is one which even Providence +cannot inflict upon him." + +"When a resolute young fellow steps up to the great bully, the World, +and takes him boldly by the beard," says Holmes, "he is often surprised +to find it come off in his hand, and that it was only tied on to scare +away timid adventurers." + +It takes courage for a young man to stand firmly erect while others are +bowing and fawning for praise and power. It takes courage to wear +threadbare clothes while your comrades dress in broadcloth. It takes +courage to remain in honest poverty when others grow rich by fraud. It +takes courage to say "No" squarely when those around you say "Yes." It +takes courage to do your duty in silence and obscurity while others +prosper and grow famous although neglecting sacred obligations. It +takes courage to unmask your true self, to show your blemishes to a +condemning world, and to pass for what you really are. + +It takes courage and pluck to be outvoted, beaten, laughed at, scoffed, +ridiculed, derided, misunderstood, misjudged, to stand alone with all +the world against you, but + + "They are slaves who dare not be + In the right with two or three." + + +"There is never wanting a dog to bark at you." + +"An honest man is not the worse because a dog barks at him." + + "Let any man show the world that he feels + Afraid of its bark, and 'twill fly at his heels. + Let him fearlessly face it, 't will leave him alone, + And 't will fawn at his feet if he fling it a bone." + + +We live ridiculously for fear of being thought ridiculous. + + "'Tis he is the coward who proves false to his vows, + To his manhood, his honor, for a laugh or a sneer: + 'Tis he is the hero who stands firm, though alone, + For the truth and the right without flinching or fear." + + +The youth who starts out by being afraid to speak what he thinks will +usually end by being afraid to think what he wishes. + +How we shrink from an act of our own. We live as others live. Custom +or fashion dictates, or your doctor or minister, and they in turn dare +not depart from their schools. Dress, living, servants, carriages, +everything must conform, or be ostracized. Who dares conduct his +household or business affairs in his own way, and snap his fingers at +Dame Grundy? + +Many a man has marched up to the cannon's mouth in battle who dared not +face public opinion or oppose Mrs. Grundy. + +It takes courage for a public man not to bend the knee to popular +prejudice. It takes courage to refuse to follow custom when it is +injurious to his health and morals. To espouse an unpopular cause in +Congress requires more courage than to lead a charge in battle. How +much easier for a politician to prevaricate and dodge an issue than to +stand squarely on his feet like a man. + +As a rule, eccentricity is a badge of power, but how many women would +not rather strangle their individuality than be tabooed by Mrs. Grundy? +Yet fear is really the only thing to fear. + +"Whoever you may be," said Sainte-Beuve, "great genius, distinguished +talent, artist honorable or amiable, the qualities for which you +deserve to be praised will all be turned against you. Were you a +Virgil, the pious and sensible singer _par excellence_, there are +people who will call you an effeminate poet. Were you a Horace, there +are people who will reproach you with the very purity and delicacy of +your taste. If you were a Shakespeare, some one will call you a +drunken savage. If you were a Goethe, more than one Pharisee will +proclaim you the most selfish of egotists." + +As the strongest man has a weakness somewhere, so the greatest hero is +a coward somewhere. Peter was courageous enough to draw his sword to +defend his master, but he could not stand the ridicule and the finger +of scorn of the maidens in the high priest's hall, and he actually +denied even the acquaintance of the master he had declared he would die +for. + +"I will take the responsibility," said Andrew Jackson, on a memorable +occasion, and his words have become proverbial. Not even Congress +dared to oppose the edicts of John Quincy Adams. + +If a man would accomplish anything in this world, he must not be afraid +of assuming responsibilities. Of course it takes courage to run the +risk of failure, to be subjected to criticism for an unpopular cause, +to expose one's self to the shafts of everybody's ridicule, but the man +who is not true to himself, who cannot carry out the sealed orders +placed in his hands at his birth, regardless of the world's yes or no, +of its approval or disapproval, the man who has not the courage to +trace the pattern of his own destiny, which no other soul knows but his +own, can never rise to the true dignity of manhood. All the world +loves courage; youth craves it; they want to hear about it, they want +to read about it. The fascination of the "blood and thunder" novels +and of the cheap story papers for youth are based upon this idea of +courage. If the boys cannot get the real article, they will take a +counterfeit. + +Don't be like Uriah Heep, begging everybody's pardon for taking the +liberty of being in the world. There is nothing attractive in +timidity, nothing lovable in fear. Both are deformities and are +repulsive. Manly courage is dignified and graceful. The worst manners +in the world are those of persons conscious "of being beneath their +position, and trying to conceal it or make up for it by style." + +Bruno, condemned to be burned alive in Rome, said to his judge: "You +are more afraid to pronounce my sentence than I am to receive it." +Anne Askew, racked until her bones were dislocated, never flinched, but +looked her tormentor calmly in the face and refused to abjure her faith. + +"We are afraid of truth, afraid of fortune, afraid of death, and afraid +of each other." "Half a man's wisdom goes with his courage," said +Emerson. Physicians used to teach that courage depends on the +circulation of the blood in the arteries, and that during passion, +anger, trials of strength, wrestling or fighting, a large amount of +blood is collected in the arteries, and does not pass to the veins. A +strong pulse is a fortune in itself. + +"Rage," said Shaftesbury, "can make a coward forget himself and fight." + +"I should have thought fear would have kept you from going so far," +said a relative who found the little boy Nelson wandering a long +distance from home. "Fear?" said the future admiral, "I don't know +him." + +"Doubt indulged becomes doubt realized." To determine to do anything +is half the battle. "To think a thing is impossible is to make it so." +_Courage is victory, timidity is defeat_. + +That simple shepherd-lad, David, fresh from his flocks, marching +unattended and unarmed, save with his shepherd's staff and sling, to +confront the colossal Goliath with his massive armor, is the sublimest +audacity the world has ever seen. + +"Dent, I wish you would get down, and see what is the matter with that +leg there," said Grant, when he and Colonel Dent were riding through +the thickest of a fire that had become so concentrated and murderous +that his troops had all been driven back. "I guess looking after your +horse's legs can wait," said Dent; "it is simply murder for us to sit +here." "All right," said Grant, "if you don't want to see to it, I +will." He dismounted, untwisted a piece of telegraph wire which had +begun to cut the horse's leg, examined it deliberately, and climbed +into his saddle. "Dent," said he, "when you've got a horse that you +think a great deal of, you should never take any chances with him. If +that wire had been left there for a little time longer he would have +gone dead lame, and would perhaps have been ruined for life." + +Wellington said that at Waterloo the hottest of the battle raged round +a farmhouse, with an orchard surrounded by a thick hedge, which was so +important a point in the British position that orders were given to +hold it at any hazard or sacrifice. At last the powder and ball ran +short and the hedges took fire, surrounding the orchard with a wall of +flame. A messenger had been sent for ammunition, and soon two loaded +wagons came galloping toward the farmhouse. "The driver of the first +wagon, with the reckless daring of an English boy, spurred his +struggling and terrified horses through the burning heap; but the +flames rose fiercely round, and caught the powder, which exploded in an +instant, sending wagon, horses, and rider in fragments into the air. +For an instant the driver of the second wagon paused, appalled by his +comrade's fate; the next, observing that the flames, beaten back for +the moment by the explosion, afforded him one desperate chance, sent +his horses at the smouldering breach and, amid the deafening cheers of +the garrison, landed his terrible cargo safely within. Behind him the +flames closed up, and raged more fiercely than ever." + +At the battle of Friedland a cannon-ball came over the heads of the +French soldiers, and a young soldier instinctively dodged. Napoleon +looked at him and smilingly said: "My friend, if that ball were +destined for you, though you were to burrow a hundred feet under ground +it would be sure to find you there." + +When the mine in front of Petersburg was finished, the fuse was +lighted, and the Union troops were drawn up ready to charge the enemy's +works as soon as the explosion should make a breach. But seconds, +minutes, and tens of minutes passed, without a sound from the mine, and +the suspense became painful. Lieutenant Doughty and Sergeant Kees +volunteered to examine the fuse. Through the long subterranean +galleries they hurried in silence, not knowing but they were advancing +to a horrible death. They found the defect, fired the train anew, and +soon a terrible upheaval of earth gave the signal to march to victory. + +At the battle of Copenhagen, as Nelson walked the deck slippery with +blood and covered with the dead, he said: "This is warm work, and this +day may be the last to any of us in a moment. But, mark me, I would +not be elsewhere for thousands." At the battle of Trafalgar, when +Nelson was shot and was being carried below, he covered his face, that +those fighting might not know their chief had fallen. + +In a skirmish at Salamanca, while the enemy's guns were pouring shot +into his regiment, Sir William Napier's men became disobedient. He at +once ordered a halt, and flogged four of the ringleaders under fire. +The men yielded at once, and then marched three miles under a heavy +cannonade as coolly as if it were a review. + +Execute your resolutions immediately. Thoughts are but dreams till +their effects be tried. Does competition trouble you? work away; what +is your competitor but a man? _Conquer your place in the world_, for +all things serve a brave soul. Combat difficulty manfully; sustain +misfortune bravely; endure poverty nobly; encounter disappointment +courageously. The influence of the brave man is a magnetism which +creates an epidemic of noble zeal in all about him. Every day sends to +the grave obscure men, who have only remained in obscurity because +their timidity has prevented them from making a first effort; and who, +if they could have been induced to begin, would, in all probability, +have gone great lengths in the career of usefulness and fame. "No +great deed is done," says George Eliot, "by falterers who ask for +certainty." The brave, cheerful man will survive his blighted hopes +and disappointments, take them for just what they are, lessons and +perhaps blessings in disguise, and will march boldly and cheerfully +forward in the battle of life. Or, if necessary, he will bear his ills +with a patience and calm endurance deeper than ever plummet sounded. +He is the true hero. + + Then to side with Truth is noble when we share her wretched crust, + Ere her cause bring fame and profit, and 't is prosperous to be just; + Then it is the brave man chooses, while the coward stands aside, + Doubting in his abject spirit, till his Lord is crucified. + LOWELL. + + Our doubts are traitors, + And make us lose the good we oft might win, + By fearing to attempt. + SHAKESPEARE. + + +After the great inward struggle was over, and he had determined to +remain loyal to his principles, Thomas More walked cheerfully to the +block. His wife called him a fool for staying in a dark, damp, filthy +prison when he might have his liberty by merely renouncing his +doctrines, as some of the bishops had done. But he preferred death to +dishonor. His daughter allowed the power of love to drive away fear. +She remained true to her father when all others, even her mother, had +forsaken him. After his head had been cut off and exhibited on a pole +on London Bridge, the poor girl begged it of the authorities, and +requested that it be buried in the coffin with her. Her request was +granted, for her death occurred soon. + +When Sir Walter Raleigh came to the scaffold he was very faint, and +began his speech to the crowd by saying that during the last two days +he had been visited by two ague fits. "If, therefore, you perceive any +weakness in me, I beseech you ascribe it to my sickness rather than to +myself." He took the axe and kissed the blade, and said to the +sheriff: "'T is a sharp medicine, but a sound cure for all diseases." + +Don't waste time dreaming of obstacles you may never encounter, or in +crossing bridges you have not reached. Don't fool with a nettle! +Grasp with firmness if you would rob it of its sting. To half will and +to hang forever in the balance is to lose your grip on life. + +Abraham Lincoln's boyhood was one long struggle with poverty, with +little education, and no influential friends. When at last he had +begun the practice of law, it required no little daring to cast his +fortune with the weaker side in politics, and thus imperil what small +reputation he had gained. Only the most sublime moral courage could +have sustained him as President to hold his ground against hostile +criticism and a long train of disaster; to issue the Emancipation +Proclamation; to support Grant and Stanton against the clamor of the +politicians and the press; and through it all to do the right as God +gave him to see the right. + +Lincoln never shrank from espousing an unpopular cause when he believed +it to be right. At the time when it almost cost a young lawyer his +bread and butter to defend the fugitive slave, and when other lawyers +had refused, Lincoln would always plead the cause of the unfortunate +whenever an opportunity presented. "Go to Lincoln," people would say, +when these hounded fugitives were seeking protection; "he's not afraid +of any cause, if it's right." + +As Salmon P. Chase left the court room after making an impassioned plea +for the runaway slave girl Matilda, a man looked at him in surprise and +said: "There goes a fine young fellow who has just ruined himself." +But in thus ruining himself Chase had taken the first important step in +a career in which he became Governor of Ohio, United States Senator +from Ohio, Secretary of the United States Treasury, and Chief Justice +of the United States Supreme Court. + +At the trial of William Penn for having spoken at a Quaker meeting, the +recorder, not satisfied with the first verdict, said to the jury: "We +will have a verdict by the help of God, or you shall starve for it." +"You are Englishmen," said Penn; "mind your privileges, give not away +your right." At last the jury, after two days and two nights without +food, returned a verdict of "Not guilty." The recorder fined them +forty marks apiece for their independence. + +What cared Christ for the jeers of the crowd? The palsied hand moved, +the blind saw, the leper was made whole, the dead spake, despite the +ridicule and scoffs of the spectators. + +What cared Wendell Phillips for rotten eggs, derisive scorn, and +hisses? In him "at last the scornful world had met its match." Were +Beecher and Gough to be silenced by the rude English mobs that came to +extinguish them? No! they held their ground and compelled unwilling +thousands to hear and to heed. Did Anna Dickinson leave the platform +when the pistol bullets of the Molly Maguires flew about her head? She +silenced those pistols by her courage and her arguments. + +"What the world wants is a Knox, who dares to preach on with a musket +leveled at his head, a Garrison, who is not afraid of a jail, or a mob, +or a scaffold erected in front of his door. + + "Storms may howl around thee, + Foes may hunt and hound thee: + Shall they overpower thee? + Never, never, never." + + +When General Butler was sent with nine thousand men to quell the New +York riots, he arrived in advance of his troops, and found the streets +thronged with an angry mob, which had already hanged more than one man +to lamp-posts. Without waiting for his men, Butler went to the place +where the crowd was most dense, overturned an ash barrel, stood upon +it, and began: "Delegates from Five Points, fiends from hell, you have +murdered your superiors," and the blood-stained crowd quailed before +the courageous words of a single man in a city which Mayor Fernando +Wood could not restrain with the aid of police and militia. + +"Our enemies are before us," exclaimed the Spartans at Thermopylae. +"And we are before them," was the cool reply of Leonidas. "Deliver +your arms," came the message from Xerxes. "Come and take them," was +the answer Leonidas sent back. A Persian soldier said: "You will not +be able to see the sun for flying javelins and arrows." "Then we will +fight in the shade," replied a Lacedemonian. What wonder that a +handful of such men checked the march of the greatest host that ever +trod the earth. + +"It is impossible," said a staff officer, when Napoleon gave directions +for a daring plan. "Impossible!" thundered the great commander, +"_impossible_ is the adjective of fools!" Napoleon went to the edge of +his possibility. + +Grant never knew when he was beaten. When told that he was surrounded +by the enemy at Belmont, he quietly replied: "Well, then we must cut +our way out." + +The courageous man is an example to the intrepid. His influence is +magnetic. He creates an epidemic of nobleness. Men follow him, even +to the death. + +The spirit of courage will transform the whole temper of your life. +"The wise and active conquer difficulties by daring to attempt them. +Sloth and folly shiver and sicken at the sight of trial and hazard, and +make the impossibility they fear." + +"The hero," says Emerson, "is the man who is immovably centred." + +Emin Pasha, the explorer of Africa, was left behind by his exploring +party under circumstances that were thought certainly fatal, and his +death was reported with great assurance. Early the next winter, as his +troop was on its toilsome but exciting way through Central Africa, it +came upon a most wretched sight. A party of natives had been kidnapped +by the slave-hunters, and dragged in chains thus far toward the land of +bondage. But small-pox had set in, and the miserable company had been +abandoned to their fate. Emin sent his men ahead, and stayed behind in +this camp of death to act as physician and nurse. How many lives he +saved is not known, though it is known that he nearly lost his own. +The age of chivalry is not gone by. This is as knightly a deed as poet +ever chronicled. + +A mouse that dwelt near the abode of a great magician was kept in such +constant distress by its fear of a cat, that the magician, taking pity +on it, turned it into a cat itself. Immediately it began to suffer +from its fear of a dog, so the magician turned it into a dog. Then it +began to suffer from fear of a tiger. The magician therefore turned it +into a tiger. Then it began to suffer from fear of hunters, and the +magician said in disgust: "Be a mouse again. As you have only the +heart of a mouse, it is impossible to help you by giving you the body +of a nobler animal." + +Men who have dared have moved the world, often before reaching the +prime of life. It is astonishing what daring to begin and perseverance +have enabled even youths to achieve. Alexander, who ascended the +throne at twenty, had conquered the known world before dying at +thirty-three. Julius Caesar captured eight hundred cities, conquered +three hundred nations, and defeated three million men, became a great +orator and one of the greatest statesmen known, and still was a young +man. Washington was appointed adjutant-general at nineteen, was sent +at twenty-one as an ambassador to treat with the French, and won his +first battle as a colonel at twenty-two. Lafayette was made general of +the whole French army at twenty. Charlemagne was master of France and +Germany at thirty. Condé was only twenty-two when he conquered at +Rocroi. Galileo was but eighteen when he saw the principle of the +pendulum in the swinging lamp in the cathedral at Pisa. Peel was in +Parliament at twenty-one. Gladstone was in Parliament before he was +twenty-two, and at twenty-four he was Lord of the Treasury. Elizabeth +Barrett Browning was proficient in Greek and Latin at twelve; De +Quincey at eleven. Robert Browning wrote at eleven poetry of no mean +order. Cowley, who sleeps in Westminster Abbey, published a volume of +poems at fifteen. N. P. Willis won lasting fame as a poet before +leaving college. Macaulay was a celebrated author before he was +twenty-three. Luther was but twenty-nine when he nailed his famous +thesis to the door of the bishop and defied the pope. Nelson was a +lieutenant in the British Navy before he was twenty. He was but +forty-seven when he received his death wound at Trafalgar. Charles the +Twelfth was only nineteen when he gained the battle of Narva; at +thirty-six, Cortez was the conqueror of Mexico; at thirty-two, Clive +had established the British power in India. Hannibal, the greatest of +military commanders, was only thirty when, at Cannae, he dealt an +almost annihilating blow at the republic of Rome; and Napoleon was only +twenty-seven when, on the plains of Italy, he outgeneraled and +defeated, one after another, the veteran marshals of Austria. + +Equal courage and resolution are often shown by men who have passed the +allotted limit of life. Victor Hugo and Wellington were both in their +prime after they had reached the age of threescore years and ten. +George Bancroft wrote some of his best historical work when he was +eighty-five. Gladstone ruled England with a strong hand at +eighty-four, and was a marvel of literary and scholarly ability. + +"Not every vessel that sails from Tarshish will bring back the gold of +Ophir. But shall it therefore rot in the harbor? No! Give its sails +to the wind!" + +Shakespeare says: "He is not worthy of the honeycomb that shuns the +hive because the bees have stings." + + "The brave man is not he who feels no fear, + For that were stupid and irrational; + But he whose noble soul its fear subdues + And bravely dares the danger nature shrinks from." + + +The inscription on the gates of Busyrane: "Be bold." On the second +gate: "Be bold, be bold, and ever more be bold;" the third gate: "Be +not too bold." + +Many a bright youth has accomplished nothing of worth simply because he +did not dare to commence. + +Begin! Begin!! Begin!!! + + +Whatever people may think of you, do that which you believe to be +right. Be alike indifferent to censure or praise.--PYTHAGORAS. + +Fear makes man a slave to others. This is the tyrant's chain. Anxiety +is a form of cowardice embittering life.--CHANNING. + +Courage is generosity of the highest order, for the brave are prodigal +of the most precious things. Our blood is nearer and dearer to us than +our money, and our life than our estate. Women are more taken with +courage than with generosity.--COLTON. + + Who chooses me must give and hazard all he hath. + _Merchant of Venice_, Inscription on Leaden Casket. + + I dare to do all that may become a man: + Who dares do more is none. + SHAKESPEAKE. + +For man's great actions are performed in minor struggles. There are +obstinate and unknown braves who defend themselves inch by inch in the +shadows against the fatal invasion of want and turpitude. There are +noble and mysterious triumphs which no eye sees, no renown rewards, and +no flourish of trumpets salutes. Life, misfortune, isolation, +abandonment, and poverty are battlefields which have their +heroes.--VICTOR HUGO. + + Who waits until the wind shall silent keep, + Who never finds the ready hour to sow, + Who watcheth clouds, will have no time to reap. + HELEN HUNT JACKSON. + +Quit yourselves like men.--1 SAMUEL iv. 9. + + + + +CHAPTER III. + +THE WILL AND THE WAY. + +"The 'way' will be found by a resolute will." + +"I will find a way or make one." + +Nothing is impossible to the man who can will.--MIRABEAU. + +A politician weakly and amiably in the right is no match for a +politician tenaciously and pugnaciously in the wrong.--E. P. WHIPPLE. + + The iron will of one stout heart shall make a thousand quail; + A feeble dwarf, dauntlessly resolved, will turn the tide of battle, + And rally to a nobler strife the giants that had fled. + TUPPER. + +"Man alone can perform the impossible. They can who think they can. +Character is a perfectly educated will." + +The education of the will is the object of our existence. For the +resolute and determined there is time and opportunity.--EMERSON. + +Invincible determination, and a right nature, are the levers that move +the world.--PRESIDENT PORTER. + +In the lexicon of youth which fate reserves for a bright manhood there +is no such word as fail.--BULWER. + +Perpetual pushing and assurance put a difficulty out of countenance and +make a seeming difficulty give way.--JEREMY COLLIER. + +When a firm and decisive spirit is recognized, it is curious to see how +the space clears around a man and leaves him room and freedom.--JOHN +FOSTER. + + The star of the unconquered will, + He rises in my breast, + Serene, and resolute and still, + And calm and self-possessed. + LONGFELLOW. + + +"As well can the Prince of Orange pluck the stars from the sky, as +bring the ocean to the wall of Leyden for your relief," was the +derisive shout of the Spanish soldiers when told that the Dutch fleet +would raise that terrible four months' siege of 1574. But from the +parched lips of William, tossing on his bed of fever at Rotterdam, had +issued the command: "_Break down the dikes: give Holland back to +ocean:_" and the people had replied: "Better a drowned land than a lost +land." They began to demolish dike after dike of the strong lines, +ranged one within another for fifteen miles to their city of the +interior. It was an enormous task; the garrison was starving; and the +besiegers laughed in scorn at the slow progress of the puny insects who +sought to rule the waves of the sea. But ever, as of old, heaven aids +those who help themselves. On the first and second of October a +violent equinoctial gale rolled the ocean inland, and swept the fleet +on the rising waters almost to the camp of the Spaniards. The next +morning the garrison sallied out to attack their enemies, but the +besiegers had fled in terror under cover of the darkness. The next day +the wind changed, and a counter tempest brushed the water, with the +fleet upon it, from the surface of Holland. The outer dikes were +replaced at once, leaving the North Sea within its old bounds. When +the flowers bloomed the following spring, a joyous procession marched +through the streets to found the University of Leyden, in commemoration +of the wonderful deliverance of the city. + + * * * * * * + +[Illustration: WALTER SCOTT] + +"The Wizard of the North." + + "So nigh is grandeur to our dust, + So near is God to man, + When Duty whispers low, 'Thou must,' + The youth replies, 'I can.'" + + * * * * * * + +At a dinner party given in 1837, at the residence of Chancellor Kent, +in New York city, some of the most distinguished men in the country +were invited, and among them was a young and rather melancholy and +reticent Frenchman. Professor Morse was one of the guests, and during +the evening he drew the attention of Mr. Gallatin, then a prominent +statesman, to the stranger, observing that his forehead indicated great +intellect. "Yes," replied Mr. Gallatin, touching his own forehead with +his finger, "there is a great deal in that head of his: but he has a +strange fancy. Can you believe it? He has the idea that he will one +day be the Emperor of France. Can you conceive anything more absurd?" + +It did seem absurd, for this reserved Frenchman was then a poor +adventurer, an exile from his country, without fortune or powerful +connections, and yet, fourteen years later, his idea became a +fact,--his dream of becoming Napoleon III. was realized. True, before +he accomplished his purpose there were long dreary years of +imprisonment, exile, disaster, and patient labor and hope, but he +gained his ambition at last. He was not scrupulous as to the means +employed to accomplish his ends, yet he is a remarkable example of what +pluck and energy can do. + +When it was proposed to unite England and America by steam, Dr. Lardner +delivered a lecture before the Royal Society "proving" that steamers +could never cross the Atlantic, because they could not carry coal +enough to produce steam during the whole voyage. The passage of the +steamship Sirius, which crossed in nineteen days, was fatal to +Lardner's theory. When it was proposed to build a vessel of iron, many +persons said: "Iron sinks--only wood can float:" but experiments proved +that the miracle of the prophet in making iron "swim" could be +repeated, and now not only ships of war, but merchant vessels, are +built of iron or steel. A will found a way to make iron float. + +Mr. Ingram, publisher of the "London Illustrated News," who lost his +life on Lake Michigan, walked ten miles to deliver a single paper +rather than disappoint a customer, when he began life as a newsdealer +at Nottingham, England. Does any one wonder that such a youth +succeeded? Once he rose at two o'clock in the morning and walked to +London to get some papers because there was no post to bring them. He +determined that his customers should not be disappointed. This is the +kind of will that finds a way. + +There is scarcely anything in all biography grander than the saying of +young Henry Fawcett, Gladstone's last Postmaster-General, to his +grief-stricken father, who had put out both his eyes by bird-shot +during a game hunt: "Never mind, father, blindness shall not interfere +with my success in life." One of the most pathetic sights in London +streets, long afterward, was Henry Fawcett, M. P., led everywhere by a +faithful daughter, who acted as amanuensis as well as guide to her +plucky father. Think of a young man, scarcely on the threshold of +active life, suddenly losing the sight of both eyes and yet, by mere +pluck and almost incomprehensible tenacity of purpose, lifting himself +into eminence, in any direction, to say nothing of becoming one of the +foremost men in a country noted for its great men. Most youth would +have succumbed to such a misfortune, and would never have been heard +from again. But fortunately for the world, there are yet left many +Fawcetts, many Prescotts, Parkmans, Cavanaghs. + +The courageous daughter who was eyes to her father was herself a +marvelous example of pluck and determination. For the first time in +the history of Oxford College, which reaches back centuries, she +succeeded in winning the post which had only been gained before by +great men, such as Gladstone,--the post of senior wrangler. This +achievement had had no parallel in history up to that date, and +attracted the attention of the whole civilized world. Not only had no +woman ever held this position before, but with few exceptions it had +only been held by men who in after life became highly distinguished. +Who can deny that where there is a will, as a rule, there's a way? + +When Grant was a boy he could not find "can't" in the dictionary. It +is the men who have no "can't" in their dictionaries that make things +move. + +"Circumstances," says Milton, "have rarely favored famous men. They +have fought their way to triumph through all sorts of opposing +obstacles." + +The true way to conquer circumstances is to be a greater circumstance +yourself. + +Yet, while desiring to impress in the most forcible manner possible the +fact that will-power is necessary to success, and that, other things +being equal, the greater the will-power, the grander and more complete +the success, we cannot indorse the preposterous theory that there is +nothing in circumstances or environments, or that any man, simply +because he has an indomitable will, may become a Bonaparte, a Pitt, a +Webster, a Beecher, a Lincoln. We must temper determination with +discretion, and support it with knowledge and common sense, or it will +only lead us to run our heads against posts. We must not expect to +overcome a stubborn fact by a stubborn will. We merely have the right +to assume that we can do anything within the limit of our utmost +faculty, strength, and endurance. Obstacles permanently insurmountable +bar our progress in some directions, but in any direction we may +reasonably hope and attempt to go, we shall find that the obstacles, as +a rule, are either not insurmountable or else not permanent. The +strong-willed, intelligent, persistent man will find or make a way +where, in the nature of things, a way can be found or made. + +Every schoolboy knows that circumstances do give clients to lawyers and +patients to physicians; place ordinary clergymen in extraordinary +pulpits; place sons of the rich at the head of immense corporations and +large houses, when they have very ordinary ability and scarcely any +experience, while poor young men with extraordinary abilities, good +education, good character, and large experience, often have to fight +their way for years to obtain even very ordinary situations. Every one +knows that there are thousands of young men, both in the city and in +the country, of superior ability, who seem to be compelled by +circumstances to remain in very ordinary positions for small pay, when +others about them are raised by money or family influence into +desirable places. In other words, we all know that the best men do not +always get the best places: circumstances do have a great deal to do +with our position, our salaries, and our station in life. + +Many young men who are nature's noblemen, who are natural leaders, are +working under superintendents, foremen, and managers infinitely their +inferiors, but whom circumstances have placed above them and will keep +there, unless some emergency makes merit indispensable. No, the race +is not always to the swift. + +Every one knows that there is not always a way where there is a will, +that labor does not always conquer all things; that there are things +impossible even to him that wills, however strongly; that one cannot +always make anything of himself he chooses; that there are limitations +in our very natures which no amount of will-power or industry can +overcome; that no amount of sun-staring can ever make an eagle out of a +crow. + +The simple truth is that a will strong enough to keep a man continually +striving for things not wholly beyond his powers will carry him in time +very far toward his chosen goal. + +The greatest thing a man can do in this world is to make the most +possible out of the stuff that has been given to him. This is success, +and there is no other. + +While it is true that our circumstances or environments do affect us, +in most things they do not prevent our growth. The corn that is now +ripe, whence comes it, and what is it? Is it not large or small, +stunted wild maize or well-developed ears, according to the conditions +under which it has grown? Yet its environments cannot make wheat of +it. Nor can our circumstances alter our nature. It is part of our +nature, and wholly within our power, greatly to change and to take +advantage of our circumstances, so that, unlike the corn, we can rise +much superior to our natural surroundings simply because we can thus +vary and improve the surroundings. In other words, man can usually +build the very road on which he is to run his race. + +It is not a question of what some one else can do or become, which +every youth should ask himself, but what can I do? How can I develop +myself into the grandest possible manhood? + +So far, then, from the power of circumstances being a hindrance to men +in trying to build for themselves an imperial highway to fortune, these +circumstances constitute the very quarry out of which they are to get +paving-stones for the road. + +While it is true that the will-power cannot perform miracles, yet that +it is almost omnipotent, that it can perform wonders, all history goes +to prove. As Shakespeare says:-- + + "Men at some time are masters of their fates: + The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, + But in ourselves, that we are underlings." + + +"There is nobody," says a Roman Cardinal, "whom Fortune does not visit +once in his life: but when she finds he is not ready to receive her, +she goes in at the door, and out through the window." Opportunity is +coy. The careless, the slow, the unobservant, the lazy fail to see it, +or clutch at it when it has gone. The sharp fellows detect it +instantly, and catch it when on the wing. + +Show me a man who is, according to popular prejudice, a victim of bad +luck, and I will show you one who has some unfortunate crooked twist of +temperament that invites disaster. He is ill-tempered, or conceited, +or trifling; lacks character, enthusiasm, or some other requisite for +success. + +Disraeli says that man is not the creature of circumstances, but that +circumstances are the creatures of men. + +What has chance ever done in the world? Has it built any cities? Has +it invented any telephones, any telegraphs? Has it built any +steamships, established any universities, any asylums, any hospitals? +Was there any chance in Caesar's crossing the Rubicon? What had chance +to do with Napoleon's career, with Wellington's, or Grant's, or Von +Moltke's? Every battle was won before it was begun. What had luck to +do with Thermopylae, Trafalgar, Gettysburg? Our successes we ascribe +to ourselves; our failures to destiny. + +Man is not a helpless atom in this vast creation, with a fixed +position, and naught to do but obey his own polarity. + +Believe in the power of will, which annihilates the sickly, sentimental +doctrine of fatalism,--you must but can't, you ought but it is +impossible. + +Give me the man + + "Who breaks his birth's invidious bar, + And grasps the skirts of happy chance, + And breasts the blows of circumstance, + And grapples with his evil star." + + +It is only the ignorant and superficial who believe in fate. "The +first step into thought lifts this mountain of necessity." "Fate is +unpenetrated causes." "They may well fear fate who have any infirmity +of habit or aim: but he who rests on what he is has a destiny beyond +destiny, and can make mouths at fortune." + +The indomitable will, the inflexible purpose, will find a way or make +one. There is always room for a man of force. + +"He who has a firm will," says Goethe, "moulds the world to himself." +"People do not lack strength," says Victor Hugo, "they lack will." + +"He who resolves upon any great end, by that very resolution has scaled +the great barriers to it, and he who seizes the grand idea of +self-cultivation, and solemnly resolves upon it, will find that idea, +that resolution, burning like fire within him, and ever putting him +upon his own improvement. He will find it removing difficulties, +searching out, or making means; giving courage for despondency, and +strength for weakness." + +Nearly all great men, those who have towered high above their fellows, +have been remarkable above all things else for their energy of will. +Of Julius Caesar it was said by a contemporary that it was his activity +and giant determination, rather than his military skill, that won his +victories. The youth who starts out in life determined to make the +most of his eyes and let nothing escape him which he can possibly use +for his own advancement; who keeps his ears open for every sound that +can help him on his way, who keeps his hands open that he may clutch +every opportunity, who is ever on the alert for everything which can +help him to get on in the world, who seizes every experience in life +and grinds it up into paint for his great life's picture, who keeps his +heart open that he may catch every noble impulse, and everything which +may inspire him,--that youth will be sure to make his life successful; +there are no "ifs" or "ands" about it. If he has his health, nothing +can keep him from final success. + +No tyranny of circumstances can permanently imprison a determined will. + +The world always stands aside for the determined man. Will makes a +way, even through seeming impossibilities. "It is the half a neck +nearer that shows the blood and wins the race; the one march more that +wins the campaign: the five minutes more of unyielding courage that +wins the fight." Again and again had the irrepressible Carter Harrison +been consigned to oblivion by the educated and moral element of +Chicago. Nothing could keep him down. He was invincible. A son of +Chicago, he had partaken of that nineteenth century miracle, that +phoenix-like nature of the city which, though she was burned, caused +her to rise from her ashes and become a greater and a grander Chicago, +a wonder of the world. Carter Harrison would not down. He entered the +Democratic Convention and, with an audacity rarely equaled, in spite of +their protest, boldly declared himself their candidate. Every +newspaper in Chicago, save the "Times," his own paper, bitterly opposed +his election: but notwithstanding all opposition, he was elected by +twenty thousand majority. The aristocrats hated him, the moral element +feared him, but the poor people believed in him: he pandered to them, +flattered them, till they elected him. While we would not by any means +hold Carter Harrison up to youth as a model, yet there is a great +lesson in his will-power and wonderful tenacity of purpose. + +"The general of a large army may be defeated," said Confucius, "but you +cannot defeat the determined mind of a peasant." + +The poor, deaf pauper, Kitto, who made shoes in the almshouse, and who +became the greatest of Biblical scholars, wrote in his journal, on the +threshold of manhood: "I am not myself a believer in impossibilities: I +think that all the fine stories about natural ability, etc., are mere +rigmarole, and that every man may, according to his opportunities and +industry, render himself almost anything he wishes to become." + +Years ago, a young mechanic took a bath in the river Clyde. While +swimming from shore to shore he discerned a beautiful bank, +uncultivated, and he then and there resolved to be the owner of it, and +to adorn it, and to build upon it the finest mansion in all the +borough, and name it in honor of the maiden to whom he was espoused. +"Last summer," says a well-known American, "I had the pleasure of +dining in that princely mansion, and receiving this fact from the lips +of the great shipbuilder of the Clyde." That one purpose was made the +ruling passion of his life, and all the energies of his soul were put +in requisition for its accomplishment. + +Lincoln is probably the most remarkable example on the pages of +history, showing the possibilities of our country. From the poverty in +which he was born, through the rowdyism of a frontier town, the +rudeness of frontier society, the discouragement of early bankruptcy, +and the fluctuations of popular politics, he rose to the championship +of union and freedom. + +Lincoln's will made his way. When his friends nominated him as a +candidate for the legislature, his enemies made fun of him. When +making his campaign speeches he wore a mixed jean coat so short that he +could not sit down on it, flax and tow-linen trousers, straw hat, and +pot-metal boots. He had nothing in the world but character and friends. + +When his friends suggested law to him, he laughed at the idea of his +being a lawyer. He said he hadn't brains enough. He read law barefoot +under the trees, his neighbors said, and he sometimes slept on the +counter in the store where he worked. He had to borrow money to buy a +suit of clothes to make a respectable appearance in the legislature, +and walked to take his seat at Vandalia,--one hundred miles. While he +was in the legislature, John F. Stuart, an eminent lawyer of +Springfield, told him how Clay had even inferior chances to his, had +got all of the education he had in a log schoolhouse without windows or +doors; and finally induced Lincoln to study law. + +See Thurlow Weed, defying poverty and wading through the snow two +miles, with rags for shoes, to borrow a book to read before the +sap-bush fire. See Locke, living on bread and water in a Dutch garret. +See Heyne, sleeping many a night on a barn floor with only a book for +his pillow. See Samuel Drew, tightening his apron strings "in lieu of +a dinner." See young Lord Eldon, before daylight copying Coke on +Littleton over and over again. History is full of such examples. He +who will pay the price for victory needs never fear final defeat. Why +were the Roman legionaries victorious? + + "For Romans, in Rome's quarrels, + Spared neither land nor gold, + Nor son, nor wife, nor limb nor life, + In the brave days of old." + + +Fowell Buxton, writing to one of his sons, says: "I am sure that a +young man may be very much what he pleases." + +Dr. Mathews has well said that "there is hardly a word in the whole +human vocabulary which is more cruelly abused than the word 'luck.' To +all the faults and failures of men, their positive sins and their less +culpable shortcomings, it is made to stand a godfather and sponsor. Go +talk with the bankrupt man of business, who has swamped his fortune by +wild speculation, extravagance of living, or lack of energy, and you +will find that he vindicates his wonderful self-love by confounding the +steps which he took indiscreetly with those to which he was forced by +'circumstances,' and complacently regarding himself as the victim of +ill-luck. Go visit the incarcerated criminal, who has imbued his hands +in the blood of his fellow-man, or who is guilty of less heinous +crimes, and you will find that, joining the temptations which were easy +to avoid with those which were comparatively irresistible, he has +hurriedly patched up a treaty with conscience, and stifles its +compunctious visitings by persuading himself that, from first to last, +he was the victim of circumstances. Go talk with the mediocre in +talents and attainments, the weak-spirited man who, from lack of energy +and application, has made but little headway in the world, being +outstripped in the race of life by those whom he had despised as his +inferiors, and you will find that he, too, acknowledges the all-potent +power of luck, and soothes his humbled pride by deeming himself the +victim of ill-fortune. In short, from the most venial offense to the +most flagrant, there is hardly any wrong act or neglect to which this +too fatally convenient word is not applied as a palliation." + +Paris was in the hands of a mob, the authorities were panic-stricken, +for they did not dare to trust their underlings. In came a man who +said, "I know a young officer who has the courage and ability to quell +this mob." "Send for him; send for him; send for him," said they. +Napoleon was sent for, came, subjugated the mob, subjugated the +authorities, ruled France, then conquered Europe. + +What a lesson is Napoleon's life for the sickly, wishy-washy, dwarfed, +sentimental "dudes," hanging about our cities, country, and +universities, complaining of their hard lot, dreaming of success, and +wondering why they are left in the rear in the great race of life. + +Success in life is dependent largely upon the willpower, and whatever +weakens or impairs it diminishes success. The will can be educated. +That which most easily becomes a habit in us is the will. Learn, then, +to will decisively and strongly; thus fix your floating life, and leave +it no longer to be carried hither and thither, like a withered leaf, by +every wind that blows. "It is not talent that men lack, it is the will +to labor; it is the purpose, not the power to produce." + +It was this insatiable thirst for knowledge which held to his task, +through poverty and discouragement, John Leyden, a Scotch shepherd's +son. Barefoot and alone, he walked six or eight miles daily to learn +to read, which was all the schooling he had. His desire for an +education defied the extremest poverty, and no obstacle could turn him +from his purpose. He was rich when he discovered a little bookstore, +and his thirsty soul would drink in the precious treasures from its +priceless volumes for hours, perfectly oblivious of the scanty meal of +bread and water which awaited him at his lowly lodging. Nothing could +discourage him from trying to improve himself by study. It seemed to +him that an opportunity to get at books and lectures was all that any +man could need. Before he was nineteen, this poor shepherd boy with no +chance had astonished the professors of Edinburgh by his knowledge of +Greek and Latin. + +Hearing that a surgeon's assistant in the Civil Service was wanted, +although he knew nothing whatever of medicine, he determined to apply +for it. There were only six months before the place was to be filled, +but nothing could daunt him, and in six months' time he actually took +his degree with honor. Walter Scott, who thought this one of the most +remarkable illustrations of perseverance, helped to fit him out, and he +sailed for India. + +Webster was very poor even after he entered Dartmouth College. A +friend sent him a recipe for greasing his boots. Webster wrote and +thanked him, and added: "But my boots need other doctoring, for they +not only admit water, but even peas and gravel-stones." Yet he became +one of the greatest men in the world. Sydney Smith said: "Webster was +a living lie, because no man on earth could be as great as he looked." +Carlyle said of him: "One would incline at sight to back him against +the world." + +What seemed to be luck followed Stephen Girard all his life. No matter +what he did, it always seemed to others to turn to his account. His +coming to Philadelphia seemed a lucky accident. A sloop was seen one +morning off the mouth of Delaware Bay floating the flag of France and a +signal of distress. Young Girard was captain of this sloop, and was on +his way to a Canadian port with freight from New Orleans. An American +skipper, seeing his distress, went to his aid, but told him the +American war had broken out, and that the British cruisers were all +along the American coast, and would seize his vessel. He told him his +only chance was to make a push for Philadelphia. Girard did not know +the way, and had no money. The skipper loaned him five dollars to get +the service of a pilot who demanded his money in advance. + +His sloop passed into the Delaware just in time to avoid capture by a +British war vessel. He sold the sloop and cargo in Philadelphia, and +began business on the capital. Being a foreigner, unable to speak +English, short, stout, and with a repulsive face, blind in one eye, it +was hard for him to get a start. But he was not the man to give up. +He had begun as a cabin boy at thirteen, and for nine years sailed +between Bordeaux and the French West Indies. He improved every leisure +minute at sea, mastering the art of navigation. + +At the age of eight he first discovered that he was blind in one eye. +His father, evidently thinking that he would never amount to anything, +would not help him to an education beyond that of mere reading and +writing, but sent his younger brothers to college. The discovery of +his blindness, the neglect of his father, and the chagrin of his +brothers' advancement, soured his whole life. + +When he began business for himself in Philadelphia, there seemed to be +nothing he would not do for money. He bought and sold anything, from +groceries to old junk. He bottled wine and cider, from which he made a +good profit. Everything he touched prospered. In 1780, he resumed the +New Orleans and St. Domingo trade, in which he had been engaged at the +breaking out of the Revolution. Here great success again attended him. +He had two vessels lying in one of the St. Domingo ports when the great +insurrection on that island broke out. A number of the rich planters +fled to his vessels with their valuables, which they left for safe +keeping while they went back to their estates to secure more. They +probably fell victims to the cruel negroes, for they never returned, +and Girard was the lucky possessor of $50,000 which the goods brought +in Philadephia. + +Everybody, especially his jealous brother merchants, attributed his +great success to his luck. While undoubtedly he was fortunate in +happening to be at the right place at the right time, yet he was +precision, method, accuracy, energy itself. He left nothing to chance. +His plans and schemes were worked out with mathematical care. His +letters, written to his captains in foreign ports, laying out their +routes and giving detailed instruction from which they were never +allowed to deviate under any circumstances, are models of foresight and +systematic planning. He never left anything of importance to others. +He was rigidly accurate in his instructions, and would not allow the +slightest departure from them. He used to say that while his captains +might save him money by deviating from instructions once, yet they +would cause loss in ninety-nine other cases. Once, when a captain +returned and had saved him several thousand dollars by buying his cargo +of cheese in another port than that in which he had been instructed to +buy, Girard was so enraged, although he was several thousand dollars +richer, that he discharged the captain on the spot, notwithstanding the +latter had been faithful in his service for many years, and thought he +was saving his employer a great deal of money by deviating from his +instructions. + +Girard lived in a dingy little house, poorer than that occupied by many +of his employees. He married a servant girl of great beauty, but she +proved totally unfitted for him, and died at last in the insane asylum. + +Girard never lost a ship, and many times what brought financial ruin to +many others, as the War of 1812, only increased his wealth. What +seemed luck with him was only good judgment and promptness in seizing +opportunities, and the greatest care and zeal in improving them to +their utmost possibilities. + +Luck is not God's price for success: that is altogether too cheap, nor +does he dicker with men. + +The mathematician tells you that if you throw the dice, there are +thirty chances to one against your turning up a particular number, and +a hundred to one against your repeating the same throw three times in +succession: and so on in an augmenting ratio. What is luck? Is it, as +has been suggested, a blind man's buff among the laws? a ruse among the +elements? a trick of Dame Nature? Has any scholar defined luck? any +philosopher explained its nature? any chemist shown its composition? +Is luck that strange, nondescript fairy, that does all things among men +that they cannot account for? If so, why does not luck make a fool +speak words of wisdom; an ignoramus utter lectures on philosophy? + +Many a young man who has read the story of John Wanamaker's romantic +career has gained very little inspiration or help from it toward his +own elevation and advancement, for he looks upon it as the result of +good luck, chance, or fate. "What a lucky fellow," he says to himself +as he reads; "what a bonanza he fell into." But a careful analysis of +Wanamaker's life only enforces the same lesson taught by the analysis +of most great lives, namely, that a good mother, a good constitution, +the habit of hard work, indomitable energy, a determination which knows +no defeat, a decision which never wavers, a concentration which never +scatters its forces, courage which never falters, a self-mastery which +can say No, and stick to it, an "ignominious love of detail," strict +integrity and downright honesty, a cheerful disposition, unbounded +enthusiasm in one's calling, and a high aim and noble purpose insure a +very large measure of success. + +Youth should be taught that there is something in circumstances; that +there is such a thing as a poor pedestrian happening to find no +obstruction in his way, and reaching the goal when a better walker +finds the drawbridge up, the street blockaded, and so fails to win the +race; that wealth often does place unworthy sons in high positions, +that family influence does gain a lawyer clients, a physician patients, +an ordinary scholar a good professorship; but that, on the other hand, +position, clients, patients, professorships, manager's and +superintendent's positions do not necessarily constitute success. He +should be taught that in the long run, as a rule, _the best man does +win the best place_, and that persistent merit does succeed. + +There is about as much chance of idleness and incapacity winning real +success, or a high position in life, as there would be in producing a +Paradise Lost by shaking up promiscuously the separate words of +Webster's Dictionary, and letting them fall at random on the floor. +Fortune smiles upon those who roll up their sleeves and put their +shoulders to the wheel; upon men who are not afraid of dreary, dry, +irksome drudgery, men of nerve and grit who do not turn aside for dirt +and detail. + +The youth should be taught that "he alone is great, who, by a life +heroic, conquers fate;" that "diligence is the mother of good luck;" +that, nine times out of ten, what we call luck or fate is but a mere +bugbear of the indolent, the languid, the purposeless, the careless, +the indifferent; that the man who fails, as a rule, does not see or +seize his opportunity. Opportunity is coy, is swift, is gone, before +the slow, the unobservant, the indolent, or the careless can seize +her:-- + + "In idle wishes fools supinely stay: + Be there a will and wisdom finds a way." + + +It has been well said that the very reputation of being strong willed, +plucky, and indefatigable is of priceless value. It often cows enemies +and dispels at the start opposition to one's undertakings which would +otherwise be formidable. + +"If Eric's in robust health, and has slept well, and is at the top of +his condition, and thirty years old at his departure from Greenland," +says Emerson, "he will steer west and his ships will reach +Newfoundland. But take Eric out and put in a stronger and bolder man, +and the ships will sail six hundred, one thousand, fifteen hundred +miles further, and reach Labrador and New England. There is no chance +in results." Obstacles tower before the living man like mountain +chains, stopping his path and hindering his progress. He surmounts +them by his energy. He makes a new path over them. He climbs upon +them to mountain heights. They cannot stop him. They do not much +delay him. He transmutes difficulties into power, and makes temporary +failures into stepping-stones to ultimate success. + +How many might have been giants who are only dwarfs. How many a one +has died "with all his music in him." + +It is astonishing what men who have come to their senses late in life +have accomplished by a sudden resolution. + +Arkwright was fifty years of age when he began to learn English grammar +and improve his writing and spelling. Benjamin Franklin was past fifty +before he began the study of science and philosophy. Milton, in his +blindness, was past the age of fifty when he sat down to complete his +world-known epic, and Scott at fifty-five took up his pen to redeem an +enormous liability. "Yet I am learning," said Michael Angelo, when +threescore years and ten were past, and he had long attained the +highest triumphs of his art. + +Even brains are second in importance to will. The vacillating man is +always pushed aside in the race of life. It is only the weak and +vacillating who halt before adverse circumstances and obstacles. A man +with an iron will, with a determination that nothing shall check his +career, if he has perseverance and grit, is sure to succeed. We may +not find time for what we would like, but what we long for and strive +for with all our strength, we usually approximate if we do not fully +reach. Hunger breaks through stone walls; stern necessity will find a +way or make one. + +Success is also a great physical as well as mental tonic, and tends to +strengthen the will-power. Dr. Johnson says: "Resolutions and success +reciprocally produce each other." Strong-willed men, as a rule, are +successful men, and great success is almost impossible without it. + +A man who can resolve vigorously upon a course of action, and turns +neither to the right nor the left, though a paradise tempt him, who +keeps his eyes upon the goal, whatever distracts him, is sure of +success. We could almost classify successes and failures by their +various degrees of will-power. Men like Sir James Mackintosh, +Coleridge, La Harpe, and many others who have dazzled the world with +their brilliancy, but who never accomplished a tithe of what they +attempted, who were always raising our expectations that they were +about to perform wonderful deeds, but who accomplished nothing worthy +of their abilities, have been deficient in will-power. One talent with +a will behind it will accomplish more than ten without it. The great +linguist of Bologna mastered a hundred languages by taking them singly, +as the lion fought the bulls. + +I wish it were possible to show the youth of America the great part +that the will might play in their success in life and in their +happiness also. The achievements of will-power are simply beyond +computation. Scarcely anything in reason seems impossible to the man +who can will strong enough and long enough. + +How often we see this illustrated in the case of a young woman who +suddenly becomes conscious that she is plain and unattractive; who, by +prodigious exercise of her will and untiring industry, resolves to +redeem herself from obscurity and commonness; and who not only makes up +for her deficiencies, but elevates herself into a prominence and +importance which mere personal attractions could never have given her. +Charlotte Cushman, without a charm of form or face, climbed to the very +top of her profession. How many young men, stung by consciousness of +physical deformity or mental deficiencies, have, by a strong persistent +exercise of will-power, raised themselves from mediocrity and placed +themselves high above those who scorned them. + +History is full of examples of men and women who have redeemed +themselves from disgrace, poverty, and misfortune, by the firm +resolution of an iron will. The consciousness of being looked upon as +inferior, as incapable of accomplishing what others accomplish; the +sensitiveness at being considered a dunce in school, has stung many a +youth into a determination which has elevated him far above those who +laughed at him, as in the case of Newton, of Adam Clark, of Sheridan, +Wellington, Goldsmith, Dr. Chalmers, Curran, Disraeli, and hundreds of +others. "Whatever you wish, that you are; for such is the force of the +human will, joined to the Divine, that whatever we wish to be +seriously, and with a true intention, that we become." While this is +not strictly true, yet there is a deal of truth in it. + +It is men like Mirabeau, who "trample upon impossibilities;" like +Napoleon, who do not wait for opportunities, but make them; like Grant, +who has only "unconditional surrender" for the enemy, who change the +very front of the world. "We have but what we make, and every good is +locked by nature in a granite hand, sheer labor must unclench." + +What cares Henry L. Bulwer for the suffocating cough, even though he +can scarcely speak above a whisper? In the House of Commons he makes +his immortal speech on the Irish Church just the same. + +"I can't, it is impossible," said a foiled lieutenant, to Alexander. +"Be gone," shouted the conquering Macedonian, "there is nothing +impossible to him who will try." + +Were I called upon to express in a word the secret of so many failures +among those who started out in life with high hopes, I should say +unhesitatingly, they lacked will-power. They could not half will. +What is a man without a will? He is like an engine without steam, a +mere sport of chance, to be tossed about hither and thither, always at +the mercy of those who have wills. I should call the strength of will +the test of a young man's possibilities. Can he will strong enough, +and hold whatever he undertakes with an iron grip? It is the iron grip +that takes the strong hold on life. What chance is there in this +crowding, pushing, selfish, greedy world, where everything is pusher or +pushed, for a young man with no will, no grip on life? "The truest +wisdom," said Napoleon, "is a resolute determination." An iron will +without principle might produce a Napoleon; but with character it would +make a Wellington or a Grant, untarnished by ambition or avarice. + + "The undivided will + 'T is that compels the elements and wrings + A human music from the indifferent air." + + + + +CHAPTER IV. + +SUCCESS UNDER DIFFICULTIES. + +Victories that are easy are cheap. Those only are worth having which +come as the result of hard fighting.--BEECHER. + +Man owes his growth chiefly to that active striving of the will, that +encounter with difficulty, which we call effort; and it is astonishing +to find how often results that seemed impracticable are thus made +possible.--EPES SARGENT. + +I know no such unquestionable badge and ensign of a sovereign mind as +that tenacity of purpose which, through all change of companions, or +parties, or fortunes, changes never, bates no jot of heart or hope, but +wearies out opposition and arrives at its port.--EMERSON. + + Yes, to this thought I hold with firm persistence; + The last result of wisdom stamps it true; + He only earns his freedom and existence + Who daily conquers them anew. + GOETHE. + +Little minds are tamed and subdued by misfortunes; but great minds rise +above them.--WASHINGTON IRVING. + + +"I have here three teams that I want to get over to Staten Island," +said a boy of twelve one day in 1806 to the innkeeper at South Amboy, +N. J. "If you will put us across, I'll leave with you one of my horses +in pawn, and if I don't send you back six dollars within forty-eight +hours you may keep the horse." + +The innkeeper asked the reason for this novel proposition, and learned +that the lad's father had contracted to get the cargo of a vessel +stranded near Sandy Hook, and take it to New York in lighters. The boy +had been sent with three wagons, six horses, and three men, to carry +the cargo across a sand-spit to the lighters. The work accomplished, +he had started with only six dollars to travel a long distance home +over the Jersey sands, and reached South Amboy penniless. "I'll do +it," said the innkeeper, as he looked into the bright honest eyes of +the boy. The horse was soon redeemed. + + * * * * * * + +[Illustration: WILLIAM HICKLING PRESCOTT] + +How can you keep a determined man from success: Place stumbling-blocks +in his way, and he uses them for stepping-stones. Imprison him, and he +produces the "Pilgrim's Progress." Deprive him of eyesight, and he +writes the "Conquest of Mexico." + + * * * * * * + +"My son," said this same boy's mother, on the first of May, 1810, when +he asked her to lend him one hundred dollars to buy a boat, having +imbibed a strong liking for the sea; "on the twenty-seventh of this +month you will be sixteen years old. If, by that time, you will plow, +harrow, and plant with corn the eight-acre lot, I will advance you the +money." The field was rough and stony, but the work was done in time, +and well done. From this small beginning Cornelius Vanderbilt laid the +foundation of a colossal fortune. He would often work all night; and, +as he was never absent from his post by day, he soon had the best +business in New York harbor. + +In 1813, when it was expected that New York would be attacked by +British ships, all the boatmen except Cornelius put in bids to convey +provisions to the military posts around New York, naming extremely low +rates, as the contractor would be exempted from military duty. "Why +don't you send in a bid?" asked his father. "Of what use?" replied +young Vanderbilt; "they are offering to do the work at half price. It +can't be done at such rates." "Well," said his father, "it can do no +harm to try for it." So, to please his father, but with no hope of +success, Cornelius made an offer fair to both sides, but did not go to +hear the award. When his companions had all returned with long faces, +he went to the commissary's office and asked if the contract had been +given. "Oh, yes," was the reply; "that business is settled. Cornelius +Vanderbilt is the man. What?" he asked, seeing that the youth was +apparently thunderstruck, "is it you?" "My name is Cornelius +Vanderbilt," said the boatman. "Well," said the commissary, "don't you +know why we have given the contract to you?" "No." "Why, it is +because we want this business _done_, and we know you'll do it." +Character gives confidence. + +In 1818 he owned two or three of the finest coasting schooners in New +York harbor, and had a capital of nine thousand dollars. Seeing that +steam-vessels would soon win supremacy over those carrying sails only, +he gave up his fine business to become the captain of a steamboat at +one thousand dollars a year. For twelve years he ran between New York +city and New Brunswick, N. J. In 1829 he began business as a steamboat +owner, in the face of opposition so bitter that he lost his last +dollar. But the tide turned, and he prospered so rapidly that he at +length owned over one hundred steamboats. He early identified himself +with the growing railroad interests of the country, and became the +richest man of his day in America. + +Barnum began the race of business life barefoot, for at the age of +fifteen he was obliged to buy on credit the shoes he wore at his +father's funeral. He was a remarkable example of success under +difficulties. There was no keeping him down; no opposition daunted +him, no obstacles were too great for him to overcome. Think of a man +being ruined at fifty years of age; yes, worse than ruined, for he was +heavily in debt besides. Yet on the very day of his downfall he begins +to rise again, wringing victory from defeat by his indomitable +persistence. + +"Eloquence must have been born with you," said a friend to J. P. +Curran. "Indeed, my dear sir, it was not," replied the orator, "it was +born some three and twenty years and some months after me." Speaking +of his first attempt at a debating club, he said: "I stood up, +trembling through every fibre, but remembering that in this I was but +imitating Tully, I took courage and had actually proceeded almost as +far as 'Mr. Chairman,' when, to my astonishment and terror, I perceived +that every eye was turned on me. There were only six or seven present, +and the room could not have contained as many more; yet was it, to my +panic-stricken imagination, as if I were the central object in nature, +and assembled millions were gazing upon me in breathless expectation. +I became dismayed and dumb. My friends cried, 'Hear him!' but there +was nothing to hear." He was nicknamed "Orator Mum," and well did he +deserve the title until he ventured to stare in astonishment at a +speaker who was "culminating chronology by the most preposterous +anachronisms." "I doubt not," said the annoyed speaker, "that 'Orator +Mum' possesses wonderful talents for eloquence, but I would recommend +him to show it in future by some more popular method than his silence." +Stung by the taunt, Curran rose and gave the man a "piece of his mind," +speaking quite fluently in his anger. Encouraged by this success, he +took great pains to become a good speaker. He corrected his habit of +stuttering by reading favorite passages aloud every day slowly and +distinctly, and spoke at every opportunity. + +Bunyan wrote his "Pilgrim's Progress" on the untwisted papers used to +cork the bottles of milk brought for his meals. Gifford wrote his +first copy of a mathematical work, when a cobbler's apprentice, on +small scraps of leather; and Rittenhouse, the astronomer, first +calculated eclipses on his plow handle. + +A poor Irish lad, so pitted by smallpox that boys made sport of him, +earned his living by writing little ballads for street musicians. +Eight cents a day was often all he could earn. He traveled through +France and Italy, begging his way by singing and playing the flute at +the cottages of the peasantry. At twenty-eight he was penniless in +London, and lived in the beggars' quarters in Axe Lane. In his +poverty, he set up as a doctor in the suburbs of London. He wore a +second-hand coat of rusty velvet, with a patch on the left breast which +he adroitly covered with his three-cornered hat during his visits; and +we have an amusing anecdote of his contest of courtesy with a patient +who persisted in endeavoring to relieve him of his hat, which only made +him press it more devoutly to his heart. He often had to pawn his +clothes to keep from starving. He sold his "Life of Voltaire" for +twenty dollars. After great hardship he managed to publish his "Polite +Learning in Europe," and this brought him to public notice. Next came +"The Traveller," and the wretched man in a Fleet Street garret found +himself famous. His landlady once arrested him for rent, but Dr. +Johnson came to his relief, took from his desk the manuscript of the +"Vicar of Wakefield," and sold it for three hundred dollars. He spent +two years revising "The Deserted Village" after it was first written. +Generous to a fault, vain and improvident, imposed on by others, he was +continually in debt; although for his "History of the Earth and +Animated Nature" he received four thousand dollars, and some of his +works, as, for instance, "She Stoops to Conquer," had a large sale. +But in spite of fortune's frown and his own weakness, he won success +and fame. The world, which so often comes too late with its assistance +and laurels, gave to the weak, gentle, loving author of "The Vicar of +Wakefield" a monument in the Poets' Corner of Westminster Abbey. + +The poor, scrofulous, and almost blind boy, Samuel Johnson, was taken +by his mother to receive the touch of Queen Anne, which was supposed to +heal the "King's Evil." He entered Oxford as a servant, copying +lectures from a student's notebooks, while the boys made sport of the +bare feet showing through great holes in his shoes. Some one left a +pair of new shoes at his door, but he was too proud to be helped, and +threw them out of the window. He was so poor that he was obliged to +leave college, and at twenty-six married a widow of forty-eight. He +started a private school with his wife's money; but, getting only three +pupils, was obliged to close it. He went to London, where he lived on +nine cents a day. In his distress he wrote a poem in which appeared in +capital letters the line, "Slow rises worth by poverty depressed," +which attracted wide attention. He suffered greatly in London for +thirteen years, being arrested once for a debt of thirteen dollars. At +forty he published "The Vanity of Human Wishes," in which were these +lines:-- + + "Then mark what ills the scholar's life assail; + Toil, envy, want, the patron and the jail." + +When asked how he felt about his failures, he replied: + +"Like a monument,"--that is, steadfast, immovable. He was an +indefatigable worker. In the evenings of a single week he wrote +"Rasselas," a beautiful little story of the search for happiness, to +get money to pay the funeral expenses of his mother. With six +assistants he worked seven years on his Dictionary, which made his +fortune. His name was then in everybody's mouth, and when he no longer +needed help, assistance, as usual, came from every quarter. The great +universities hastened to bestow their degrees, and King George invited +him to the palace. + +Lord Mansfield raised himself by indefatigable industry from oatmeal +porridge and poverty to affluence and the Lord Chief Justice's Bench. + +Of five thousand articles sent every year to "Lippincott's Magazine," +only two hundred were accepted. How much do you think Homer got for +his Iliad? or Dante for his Paradise? Only bitter bread and salt, and +going up and down other people's stairs. In science, the man who +discovered the telescope, and first saw heaven, was paid with a +dungeon: the man who invented the microscope, and first saw earth, died +from starvation, driven from his home. It is very clear indeed that +God means all good work and talk to be done for nothing. Shakespeare's +"Hamlet" was sold for about twenty-five dollars; but his autograph has +sold for five thousand dollars. + +During the ten years in which he made his greatest discoveries, Isaac +Newton could hardly pay two shillings a week to the Royal Society of +which he was a member. Some of his friends wanted to get him excused +from this payment, but he would not allow them to act. + +There are no more interesting pages in biography than those which +record how Emerson, as a child, was unable to read the second volume of +a certain book, because his widowed mother could not afford the amount +(five cents) necessary to obtain it from the circulating library. + +Linnaeus was so poor when getting his education, that he had to mend +his shoes with folded paper, and often had to beg his meals of his +friends. + +Who in the days of the First Empire cared to recall the fact that +Napoleon, Emperor and King, was once forced to borrow a louis from +Talma, when he lived in a garret on the Quai Conti? + +David Livingstone at ten years of age was put into a cotton factory +near Glasgow. Out of his first week's wages he bought a Latin Grammar, +and studied in the night schools for years. He would sit up and study +till midnight unless his mother drove him to bed, notwithstanding he +had to be at the factory at six in the morning. He mastered Virgil and +Horace in this way, and read extensively, besides studying botany. So +eager and thirsty for knowledge was he, that he would place his book +before him on the spinning-jenny, and amid the deafening roar of +machinery would pore over its pages. + +George Eliot said of the years of close work upon her "Romola," "I +began it a young woman, I finished it an old woman." One of Emerson's +biographers says, referring to his method of rewriting, revising, +correcting, and eliminating: "His apples were sorted over and over +again, until only the very rarest, the most perfect, were left. It did +not matter that those thrown away were very good and helped to make +clear the possibilities of the orchard, they were unmercifully cast +aside." Carlyle's books were literally wrung out of him. The pains he +took to satisfy himself of a relatively insignificant fact were +incredible. Before writing his essay on Diderot, he read twenty-five +volumes at the rate of one per day. He tells Edward Fitzgerald that +for the twentieth time he is going over the confused records of the +battle of Naseby, that he may be quite sure of the topography. + +"All the performances of human art, at which we look with praise and +wonder," says Johnson, "are instances of the resistless force of +perseverance: it is by this that the quarry becomes a pyramid, and that +distant countries are united with canals. If a man was to compare the +effect of a single stroke of the pickaxe, or of one impression of the +spade, with the general design and last result, he would be overwhelmed +by the sense of their disproportion; yet those petty operations, +incessantly continued, in time surmount the greatest difficulties, and +mountains are leveled, and oceans bounded, by the slender force of +human beings." + +The Rev. Eliphalet Nott, a pulpit orator, was especially noted for a +sermon on the death of Alexander Hamilton, the great statesman, who was +shot in a duel by Aaron Burr. Although Nott had managed in some way to +get his degree at Brown University, he was at one time so poor after he +entered the ministry that he could not buy an overcoat. His wife +sheared their only cosset sheep in January, wrapped it in burlap +blankets to keep it from freezing, carded and spun and wove the wool, +and made it into an overcoat for him. + +Great men never wait for opportunities; they make them. Nor do they +wait for facilities or favoring circumstances; they seize upon whatever +is at hand, work out their problem, and master the situation. A young +man determined and willing will find a way or make one. A Franklin +does not require elaborate apparatus; he can bring electricity from the +clouds with a common kite. A Watt can make a model of the condensing +steam-engine out of an old syringe used to inject the arteries of dead +bodies previous to dissection. A Dr. Black can discover latent heat +with a pan of water and two thermometers. A Newton can unfold the +composition of light and the origin of colors with a prism, a lens, and +a piece of pasteboard. A Humphry Davy can experiment with kitchen pots +and pans, and a Faraday can experiment on electricity by means of old +bottles, in his spare minutes while a book-binder. When science was in +its cradle the Marquis of Worcester, an English nobleman, imprisoned in +the Tower of London, was certainly not in a very good position to do +anything for the world, but would not waste his time. The cover of a +vessel of hot water blown on before his eyes led to a series of +observations, which he published later in a book called "Century of +Inventions." These observations were a sort of text-book on the power +of steam, which resulted in Newcomen's steam-engine, which Watt +afterward perfected. A Ferguson maps out the heavenly bodies, lying on +his back, by means of threads with beads stretched between himself and +the stars. + +Not in his day of bodily strength and political power, but blind, +decrepit, and defeated with his party, Milton composed "Paradise Lost." + +Great men have found no royal road to their triumph. It is always the +old route, by way of industry and perseverance. + +The farmer boy, Elihu B. Washburn, taught school at ten dollars per +month, and early learned the lesson that it takes one hundred cents to +make a dollar. In after years he fought "steals" in Congress, until he +was called the "Watchdog of the Treasury." From his long membership he +became known as the "Father of the House." He administered the oath to +Schuyler Colfax as Speaker three times. He recommended Grant as +colonel of a regiment of volunteers. The latter, when President, +appointed him Secretary of State, and, later, Minister to France. +During the reign of the Commune, the representatives of nearly all +other foreign nations fled in dismay, but Washburn remained at his +post. Shells exploded close to his office, and fell all around it, but +he did not leave even when Paris was in flames. For a time he was +really the minister of all foreign countries, in Paris; and represented +Prussia for almost a year. The Emperor William conferred upon him the +Order of the Red Eagle, and gave him a jeweled star of great value. + +How could the poor boy, Elihu Burritt, working nearly all the daylight +in a blacksmith's shop, get an education? He had but one book in his +library, and carried that in his hat. But this boy with no chance +became one of America's wonders. + +When teaching school, Garfield was very poor. He tore his only blue +jean trousers, but concealed the rents by pins until night, when he +retired early that his boarding mistress might mend his clothes. "When +you get to be a United States Senator," said she, "no one will ask what +kind of clothes you wore when teaching school." + +Although Michael Angelo made himself immortal in three different +occupations, his fame might well rest upon his dome of St. Peter as an +architect, upon his "Moses" as a sculptor, and upon his "Last Judgment" +as a painter; yet we find by his correspondence now in the British +Museum, that when he was at work on his colossal bronze statue of Pope +Julius II., he was so poor that he could not have his younger brother +come to visit him at Bologna, because he had but one bed in which he +and three of his assistants slept together. + +"I was always at the bottom of my purse," said Zola, in describing the +struggles of his early years of authorship. "Very often I had not a +sou left, and not knowing, either, where to get one. I rose generally +at four in the morning, and began to study after a breakfast consisting +of one raw egg. But no matter, those were good times. After taking a +walk along the quays, I entered my garret, and joyfully partaking of a +dinner of three apples, I sat down to work. I wrote, and I was happy. +In winter I would allow myself no fire; wood was too expensive--only on +fête days was I able to afford it. But I had several pipes of tobacco +and a candle for three sous. A three-sous candle, only think of it! +It meant a whole night of literature to me." + +James Brooks, once the editor and proprietor of the "New York Daily +Express," and later an eminent congressman, began life as a clerk in a +store in Maine, and when twenty-one received for his pay a hogshead of +New England rum. He was so eager to go to college that he started for +Waterville with his trunk on his back, and when he was graduated he was +so poor and plucky that he carried his trunk on his back to the station +when he went home. + +When Elias Howe, harassed by want and woe, was in London completing his +first sewing-machine, he had frequently to borrow money to live on. He +bought beans and cooked them himself. He also borrowed money to send +his wife back to America. He sold his first machine for five pounds, +although it was worth fifty, and then he pawned his letters patent to +pay his expenses home. + +The boy Arkwright begins barbering in a cellar, but dies worth a +million and a half. The world treated his novelties just as it treats +everybody's novelties--made infinite objection, mustered all the +impediments, but he snapped his fingers at their objections, and lived +to become honored and wealthy. + +There is scarcely a great truth or doctrine but has had to fight its +way to public recognition in the face of detraction, calumny, and +persecution. "Everywhere," says Heine, "that a great soul gives +utterance to its thoughts, there also is a Golgotha." + +Nearly every great discovery or invention that has blessed mankind has +had to fight its way to recognition, even against the opposition of the +most progressive men. + +Even Sir Charles Napier fiercely opposed the introduction of steam +power into the Royal Navy. In the House of Commons, he exclaimed, "Mr. +Speaker, when we enter Her Majesty's naval service and face the chances +of war, we go prepared to be hacked in pieces, to be riddled by +bullets, or to be blown to bits by shot and shell; but Mr. Speaker, we +do not go prepared to be boiled alive." He said this with tremendous +emphasis. + +"Will any one explain how there can be a light without a wick?" asked a +member of Parliament, when William Murdock, toward the close of the +eighteenth century, said that coal gas would give a good light, and +could be conveyed into buildings in pipes. "Do you intend taking the +dome of St. Paul's for a gasometer?" was the sneering question of even +the great scientist, Humphry Davy. Walter Scott ridiculed the idea of +lighting London by "smoke," but he soon used it at Abbotsford, and Davy +achieved one of his greatest triumphs by experimenting with gas until +he had invented his safety lamp. + +Titian used to crush the flowers to get their color, and painted the +white walls of his father's cottage in Tyrol with all sorts of +pictures, at which the mountaineers gazed in wonder. + +"That boy will beat me one day," said an old painter as he watched a +little fellow named Michael Angelo making drawings of pot and brushes, +easel and stool, and other articles in the studio. The barefoot boy +did persevere until he had overcome every difficulty and become a +master of his art. + +William H. Prescott was a remarkable example of what a boy with "no +chance" can do. While at college, he lost one eye by a hard piece of +bread thrown during a "biscuit battle," then so common after meals; +and, from sympathy, the other eye became almost useless. But the boy +had pluck and determination, and would not lead a useless life. He set +his heart upon being a historian, and turned all his energies in that +direction. By the aid of others' eyes, he spent ten years studying +before he even decided upon a particular theme for his first book. +Then he spent ten years more, poring over old archives and manuscripts, +before he published his "Ferdinand and Isabella." What a lesson in his +life for young men! What a rebuke to those who have thrown away their +opportunities and wasted their lives! + +"Galileo with an opera-glass," said Emerson, "discovered a more +splendid series of celestial phenomena than any one since with the +great telescopes. Columbus found the new world in an undecked boat." + +Surroundings which men call unfavorable cannot prevent the unfolding of +your powers. From the plain fields and lowlands of Avon came the +Shakespearean genius which has charmed the world. From among the +rock-ribbed hills of New Hampshire sprang the greatest of American +orators and statesmen, Daniel Webster. From the crowded ranks of toil, +and homes to which luxury is a stranger, have often come the leaders +and benefactors of our race. Indeed, when Christ came upon earth, His +early abode was a place so poor and so much despised that men thought +He could not be the Christ, asking, in utter astonishment, "Can any +good thing come out of Nazareth?" + +"I once knew a little colored boy," said Frederick Douglass, "whose +mother and father died when he was but six years old. He was a slave, +and had no one to care for him. He slept on a dirt floor in a hovel, +and in cold weather would crawl into a meal-bag head foremost, and +leave his feet in the ashes to keep them warm. Often he would roast an +ear of corn and eat it to satisfy his hunger, and many times has he +crawled under the barn or stable and secured eggs, which he would roast +in the fire and eat. That boy did not wear pantaloons, as you do, but +a tow-linen shirt. Schools were unknown to him, and he learned to +spell from an old Webster's spelling-book, and to read and write from +posters on cellar and barn doors, while boys and men would help him. +He would then preach and speak, and soon became well known. He became +presidential elector, United States marshal, United States recorder, +United States diplomat, and accumulated some wealth. He wore +broadcloth, and didn't have to divide crumbs with the dogs under the +table. That boy was Frederick Douglass. What was possible for me is +possible for you. Don't think because you are colored you can't +accomplish anything. Strive earnestly to add to your knowledge. So +long as you remain in ignorance, so long will you fail to command the +respect of your fellow-men." + +Where shall we find an illustration more impressive than in Abraham +Lincoln, whose life, career, and death might be chanted by a Greek +chorus as at once the prelude and the epilogue of the most imperial +theme of modern times? Born as lowly as the Son of God, in a hovel; of +what real parentage we know not, reared in penury, squalor, with no +gleam of light, nor fair surrounding; a young manhood vexed by weird +dreams and visions; with scarcely a natural grace; singularly awkward, +ungainly even among the uncouth about him: it was reserved for this +remarkable character, late in life, to be snatched from obscurity, +raised to supreme command at a supreme moment, and intrusted with the +destiny of a nation. The great leaders of his party were made to stand +aside; the most experienced and accomplished men of the day, men like +Seward, and Chase, and Sumner, statesmen famous and trained, were sent +to the rear, while this strange figure was brought by unseen hands to +the front, and given the reins of power. + +The story is told of a man in London deprived of both legs and arms, +who managed to write with his mouth and perform other things so +remarkable as to enable him to earn a fair living. He would lay +certain sheets of paper together, pinning them at the corner to make +them hold. Then he would take a pen and write some verses; after which +he would proceed to embellish the lines by many skillful flourishes. +Dropping the pen from his mouth, he would next take up a needle and +thread, also with his mouth, thread the needle, and make several +stitches. He also painted with a brush, and was in many other ways a +wonderful man. Instead of being a burden to his family he was the most +important contributor to their welfare. + +Arthur Cavanagh, M. P., was born without arms or legs, yet it is said +that he was a good shot, a skillful fisherman and sailor, and one of +the best cross country riders in Ireland. He was a good +conversationalist, and an able member of Parliament. He ate with his +fork attached to his stump of an arm, and wrote holding his pen in his +teeth. In riding he held the bridle in his mouth, his body being +strapped to the saddle. He once lost his means of support in India, +but went to work with his accustomed energy, and obtained employment as +a carrier of dispatches. + +People thought it strange that Gladstone should appoint blind Henry +Fawcett Postmaster-General of Great Britain; but never before did any +one fill the office so well. + +John B. Herreshoff, of Bristol, R. I., although blind since he was +fifteen years old, is the founder and head of one of the most noted +shipbuilding establishments in the world. He has superintended the +construction of some of the swiftest torpedo boats and steam and +sailing yachts afloat. He frequently takes his turn at the wheel in +sailing his vessels on trial trips. He is aided greatly by his younger +brother Nathaniel, but can plan vessels and conduct business without +him. After examining a vessel's hull or a good model of it, he will +give detailed instructions for building another just like it, and will +make a more accurate duplicate than can most boat-builders whose sight +is perfect. + +The Rev. William H. Milburn, who lost his sight when a child, studied +for the ministry, and was ordained before he attained his majority. In +ten years he traveled about 200,000 miles in missionary work. He has +written half a dozen books, among them a very careful history of the +Mississippi Valley. He has long been chaplain of the lower house of +Congress. + +Blind Fanny Crosby, of New York, was a teacher of the blind for many +years. She has written nearly three thousand hymns, among which are +"Pass Me not, O Gentle Saviour," "Rescue the Perishing," "Saviour more +than Life to Me," and "Jesus keep Me near the Cross." + +Nor are these by any means the only examples of blind people now doing +their full share of the world's work. In the United States alone there +are engaged in musical occupation one hundred and fifty blind piano +tuners, one hundred and fifty blind teachers of music in schools for +the blind, five hundred blind private teachers, one hundred blind +church organists, fifteen or more blind composers and publishers of +music, and several blind dealers in musical instruments. + +_There is no open door to the temple of success_. Every one who enters +makes his own door, which closes behind him to all others, not even +permitting his own children to pass. + +Nearly forty years ago, on a rainy, dreary day in November, a young +widow in Philadelphia sat wondering how she could feed and clothe three +little ones left dependent by the death of her husband, a naval +officer. Happening to think of a box of which her husband had spoken, +she opened it, and found therein an envelope containing directions for +a code of colored light signals to be used at night on the ocean. The +system was not complete, but she perfected it, went to Washington, and +induced the Secretary of the Navy to give it a trial. An admiral soon +wrote that the signals were good for nothing, although the idea was +valuable. For months and years she worked, succeeding at last in +producing brilliant lights of different colors. She was paid $20,000 +for the right to manufacture them in our navy. Nearly all the blockade +runners captured in the Civil War were taken by the aid of the Coston +signals, which are also considered invaluable in the Life Saving +Service. Mrs. Coston introduced them into several European navies, and +became wealthy. + +A modern writer says that it is one of the mysteries of our life that +genius, that noblest gift of God to man, is nourished by poverty. Its +greatest works have been achieved by the sorrowing ones of the world in +tears and despair. Not in the brilliant salon, not in the tapestried +library, not in ease and competence, is genius usually born and +nurtured; but often in adversity and destitution, amidst the harassing +cares of a straitened household, in bare and fireless garrets, with the +noise of squalid children, in the turbulence of domestic contentions, +and in the deep gloom of uncheered despair. This is its most frequent +birthplace, and amid scenes like these unpropitious, repulsive, +wretched surroundings, have men labored, studied, and trained +themselves, until they have at last emanated from the gloom of that +obscurity the shining lights of their times; have become the companions +of kings, the guides and teachers of their kind, and exercised an +influence upon the thought of the world amounting to a species of +intellectual legislation. + +Chauncey Jerome's education was limited to three months in the district +school each year until he was ten, when his father took him into his +blacksmith shop at Plymouth, Conn., to make nails. Money was a scarce +article with young Chauncey. He once chopped a load of wood for one +cent, and often chopped by moonlight for neighbors at less than a dime +a load. His father died when he was eleven, and his mother was forced +to send Chauncey out, with tears in his eyes and a little bundle of +clothes in his hand, to earn a living on a farm. His new employer kept +him at work early and late chopping down trees all day, his shoes +sometimes full of snow, for he had no boots until he was nearly +twenty-one. At fourteen he was apprenticed for seven years to a +carpenter, who gave him only board and clothes. Several times during +his apprenticeship he carried his tools thirty miles on his back to his +work at different places. After he had learned his trade he frequently +walked thirty miles to a job with his kit upon his back. One day he +heard people talking of Eli Terry, of Plymouth, who had undertaken to +make two hundred clocks in one lot. "He'll never live long enough to +finish them," said one. "If he should," said another, "he could not +possibly sell so many. The very idea is ridiculous." Chauncey +pondered long over this rumor, for it had long been his dream to become +a great clock-maker. He tried his hand at the first opportunity, and +soon learned to make a wooden clock. When he got an order to make +twelve at twelve dollars apiece he thought his fortune was made. One +night he happened to think that a cheap clock could be made of brass as +well as of wood, and would not shrink, swell, or warp appreciably in +any climate. He acted on the idea, and became the first great +manufacturer of brass clocks. He made millions at the rate of six +hundred a day, exporting them to all parts of the globe. + +"The History of the English People" was written while J. R. Green was +struggling against a mortal illness. He had collected a vast store of +materials, and had begun to write, when his disease made a sudden and +startling progress, and his physicians said they could do nothing to +arrest it. In the extremity of ruin and defeat he applied himself with +greater fidelity to his work. The time that might still be left to him +for work must henceforth be wrested, day by day, from the grasp of +death. The writing occupied five months, while from hour to hour and +day to day his life was prolonged, his doctors said, by the sheer force +of his own will and his inflexible determination to finish the "Making +of England." He lay, too weak to lift a book, or to hold a pen, +dictating every word, sometimes through hours of intense suffering. +Yet so conscientious was he that, driven by death as he was, the +greater part of the book was rewritten five times. When it was done he +began the "Conquest of England," wrote it, reviewed it, and then, +dissatisfied with it, rejected it all and began again. As death laid +its cold fingers on his heart, he said: "I still have some work to do +that I know is good. I will try to win but one week more to write it +down." It was not until he was actually dying that he said, "I can +work no more." + +"What does he know," said a sage, "who has not suffered?" Schiller +produced his greatest tragedies in the midst of physical suffering +almost amounting to torture. Handel was never greater than when, +warned by palsy of the approach of death, and struggling with distress +and suffering, he sat down to compose the great works which have made +his name immortal in music. Mozart composed his great operas, and last +of all his "Requiem," when oppressed by debt and struggling with a +fatal disease. Beethoven produced his greatest works amidst gloomy +sorrow, when oppressed by almost total deafness. + +Perhaps no one ever battled harder to overcome obstacles which would +have disheartened most men than Demosthenes. He had such a weak voice, +and such an impediment in his speech, and was so short of breath, that +he could scarcely get through a single sentence without stopping to +rest. All his first attempts were nearly drowned by the hisses, jeers, +and scoffs of his audiences. His first effort that met with success +was against his guardian, who had defrauded him, and whom he compelled +to refund a part of his fortune. He was so discouraged by his defeats +that he determined to give up forever all attempts at oratory. One of +his auditors, however, believed the young man had something in him, and +encouraged him to persevere. He accordingly appeared again in public, +but was hissed down as before. As he withdrew, hanging his head in +great confusion, a noted actor, Satyrus, encouraged him still further +to try to overcome his impediment. He stammered so much that he could +not pronounce some of the letters at all, and his breath would give out +before he could get through a sentence. Finally, he determined to be +an orator cost what it might. He went to the seashore and practiced +amid the roar of the breakers with small pebbles in his mouth, in order +to overcome his stammering, and at the same time accustom himself to +the hisses and tumults of his audience. He overcame his short breath +by practicing speaking while running up steep and difficult places on +the shore. His awkward gestures were also corrected by long and +determined drill before a mirror. + +Disheartened by the expense of removing the troublesome seeds, Southern +planters were seriously considering the abandonment of cotton culture. +To clean a pound of cotton required the labor of a slave for a day. +Eli Whitney, a young man from New England, teaching school in Georgia, +saw the state of affairs, and determined to invent a machine to do the +work. He worked in secret for many months in a cellar, and at last +made a machine which cleaned the cotton perfectly and rapidly. Just as +success crowned his long labor thieves broke into the cellar and stole +his model. He recovered the model, but the principle was stolen, and +other machines were made without his consent. In vain he tried to +protect his right in the courts, for Southern juries would almost +invariably decide against him. He had started the South in a great +industry, and added millions to her wealth, yet the courts united with +the men who had infringed his patents to rob him of the reward of his +ingenuity and industry. At last he abandoned the whole thing in +disgust, and turned his attention to making improvements in firearms, +and with such success that he accumulated a fortune. + +Robert Collyer, who brought his bride in the steerage when he came to +America at the age of twenty-seven, worked at the anvil nine years in +Pennsylvania, and then became a preacher, soon winning national renown. + +A shrewd observer says of John Chinaman: "No sooner does he put his +foot among strangers than he begins to work. No office is too menial +or too laborious for him. He has come to make money, and he will make +it. His frugality requires but little: he barely lives, but he saves +what he gets; commences trade in the smallest possible way, and is +continually adding to his store. The native scorns such drudgery, and +remains poor; the Chinaman toils patiently on, and grows rich. A few +years pass by, and he has warehouses; becomes a contractor for produce; +buys foreign goods by the cargo; and employs his newly imported +countrymen, who have come to seek their fortune as he did. He is not +particularly scrupulous in matters of opinion. He never meddles with +politics, for they are dangerous and not profitable; but he will adopt +any creed, and carefully follow any observances, if, by so doing, he +can confirm or improve his position. He thrives with the Spaniard, and +works while the latter sleeps. He is too quick for the Dutchman, and +can smoke and bargain at the same time. He has harder work with the +Englishman, but still he is too much for him, and succeeds. Climate +has no effect on him: it cannot stop his hands, unless it kills him; +and if it does, he dies in harness, battling for money till his last +breath. Whoever he may be, and in whatever position, whether in his +own or a foreign country, he is diligent, temperate, and uncomplaining. +He keeps the word he pledges, pays his debts, and is capable of noble +and generous actions. It has been customary to speak lightly of him, +and to judge a whole people by a few vagabonds in a provincial seaport, +whose morals and manners have not been improved by foreign society." + +Columbus was dismissed as a fool from court after court, but he pushed +his suit against an incredulous and ridiculing world. Rebuffed by +kings, scorned by queens, he did not swerve a hair's breadth from the +overmastering purpose which dominated his soul. The words "New World" +were graven upon his heart; and reputation, ease, pleasure, position, +life itself if need be, must be sacrificed. Threats, ridicule, +ostracism, storms, leaky vessels, mutiny of sailors, could not shake +his mighty purpose. + +You cannot keep a determined man from success. Place stumbling-blocks +in his way and he takes them for stepping-stones, and on them will +climb to greatness. Take away his money, and he makes spurs of his +poverty to urge him on. Cripple him, and he writes the Waverley +Novels. Lock him up in a dungeon, and he composes the immortal +"Pilgrim's Progress." Put him in a cradle in a log cabin in the +wilderness of America, and in a few years you will find him in the +Capitol at the head of the greatest nation on the globe. + +Would it were possible to convince the struggling youth of to-day that +all that is great and noble and true in the history of the world is the +result of infinite pains-taking, perpetual plodding, of common +every-day industry! + +When Lavoisier the chemist asked that his execution might be postponed +for a few days in order to ascertain the results of the experiments he +was conducting in prison, the communists refused to grant the request, +saying: "The Republic has no need of philosophers." Dr. Priestley's +house was burned and his chemical library destroyed by a mob shouting: +"No philosophers," and he was forced to flee from his country. Bruno +was burned in Rome for revealing the heavens, and Versalius +[Transcriber's note: Vesalius?] was condemned for dissecting the human +body; but their names shall live as long as time shall last. Kossuth +was two years in prison at Buda, but he kept on working, undaunted. +John Hunter said: "The few things I have been enabled to do have been +accomplished under the greatest difficulties, and have encountered the +greatest opposition." + +Roger Bacon, one of the profoundest thinkers the world has produced, +was terribly persecuted for his studies in natural philosophy, yet he +persevered and won success. He was accused of dealing in magic, his +books were burned in public, and he was kept in prison for ten years. +Even our own revered Washington was mobbed in the streets because he +would not pander to the clamor of the people and reject the treaty +which Mr. Jay had arranged with Great Britain. But he remained firm, +and the people adopted his opinion. The Duke of Wellington was mobbed +in the streets of London and his windows were broken while his wife lay +dead in the house; but the "Iron Duke" never faltered in his course, or +swerved a hair's breadth from his purpose. + +William Phips, when a young man, heard some sailors on the street, in +Boston, talking about a Spanish ship, wrecked off the Bahama Islands, +which was supposed to have money on board. Young Phips determined to +find it. He set out at once, and, after many hardships, discovered the +lost treasure. He then heard of another ship, wrecked off Port De La +Plata many years before. He set sail for England and importuned +Charles II. for aid. To his delight the king fitted up the ship Rose +Algier for him. He searched and searched for a long time in vain. He +had to return to England to repair his vessel. James II. was then on +the throne, and he had to wait for four years before he could raise +money to return. His crew mutinied and threatened to throw him +overboard, but he turned the ship's guns on them. One day an Indian +diver went down for a curious sea plant and saw several cannon lying on +the bottom. They proved to belong to the wreck for which he was +looking, sunk fifty years before. He had nothing but dim traditions to +guide him, but he returned to England with $1,500,000. The King made +him High Sheriff of New England, and he was afterward made Governor of +Massachusetts Bay Colony. + +Ben Jonson, when following his trade of a mason, worked on Lincoln's +Inn in London with trowel in hand and a book in his pocket. Joseph +Hunter was a carpenter in youth, Robert Burns a plowman, Keats a +druggist, Thomas Carlyle and Hugh Miller masons. Dante and Descartes +were soldiers. Andrew Johnson was a tailor. Cardinal Wolsey, Defoe, +and Kirke White were butchers' sons. Faraday was the son of a +blacksmith, and his teacher, Humphry Davy, was an apprentice to an +apothecary. Kepler was a waiter boy in a German hotel, Bunyan a +tinker, Copernicus the son of a Polish baker. The boy Herschel played +the oboe for his meals. Marshal Ney, the "bravest of the brave," rose +from the ranks. His great industry gained for him the name of "The +Indefatigable." Soult served fourteen years before he was made a +sergeant. When made Foreign Minister of France he knew very little of +geography, even. Richard Cobden was a boy in a London warehouse. His +first speech in Parliament was a complete failure; but he was not +afraid of defeat, and soon became one of the greatest orators of his +day. Seven shoemakers sat in Congress during the first century of our +government: Roger Sherman, Henry Wilson, Gideon Lee, William Graham, +John Halley, H. P. Baldwin, and Daniel Sheffey. + +A constant struggle, a ceaseless battle to bring success from +inhospitable surroundings, is the price of all great achievements. + +The man who has not fought his way up to his own loaf, and does not +bear the scar of desperate conflict, does not know the highest meaning +of success. + +The money acquired by those who have thus struggled upward to success +is not their only, or indeed their chief reward. When, after years of +toil, of opposition, of ridicule, of repeated failure, Cyrus W. Field +placed his hand upon the telegraph instrument ticking a message under +the sea, think you that the electric thrill passed no further than the +tips of his fingers? When Thomas A. Edison demonstrated in Menlo Park +that the electric light had at last been developed into a commercial +success, do you suppose those bright rays failed to illuminate the +inmost recesses of his soul? Edward Everett said: "There are occasions +in life in which a great mind lives years of enjoyment in a single +moment. I can fancy the emotion of Galileo when, first raising the +newly constructed telescope to the heavens, he saw fulfilled the grand +prophecy of Copernicus, and beheld the planet Venus crescent like the +moon. It was such another moment as that when the immortal printers of +Mentz and Strasburg received the first copy of the Bible into their +hands, the work of their divine art; like that when Columbus, through +the gray dawn of the 12th of October, 1492, beheld the shores of San +Salvador; like that when the law of gravitation first revealed itself +to the intellect of Newton; like that when Franklin saw, by the +stiffening fibres of the hemp cord of his kite, that he held the +lightning in his grasp, like that when Leverrier received back from +Berlin the tidings that the predicted planet was found." + +"Observe yon tree in your neighbor's garden," says Zanoni to Viola in +Bulwer's novel. "Look how it grows up, crooked and distorted. Some +wind scattered the germ, from which it sprung, in the clefts of the +rock. Choked up and walled round by crags and buildings, by nature and +man, its life has been one struggle for the light. You see how it has +writhed and twisted,--how, meeting the barrier in one spot, it has +labored and worked, stem and branch, towards the clear skies at last. +What has preserved it through each disfavor of birth and +circumstances--why are its leaves as green and fair as those of the +vine behind you, which, with all its arms, can embrace the open +sunshine? My child, because of the very instinct that impelled the +struggle,--because the labor for the light won to the light at length. +So with a gallant heart, through every adverse accident of sorrow, and +of fate, to turn to the sun, to strive for the heaven; this it is that +gives knowledge to the strong and happiness to the weak." + + "Each petty hand + Can steer a ship becalmed; but he that will + Govern her and carry her to her ends, must know + His tides, his currents; how to shift his sails; + What she will bear in foul, what in fair weathers; + What her springs are, her leaks, and how to stop them; + What strands, what shelves, what rocks to threaten her; + The forces and the natures of all winds, + Gusts, storms, and tempests; when her keel plows hell, + And deck knocks heaven; then to manage her + Becomes the name and office of a pilot." + + + + +CHAPTER V. + +USES OF OBSTACLES. + +Nature, when she adds difficulties, adds brains.--EMERSON. + +Many men owe the grandeur of their lives to their tremendous +difficulties.--SPURGEON. + + The good are better made by ill, + As odors crushed are sweeter still. + ROGERS. + + Aromatic plants bestow + No spicy fragrance while they grow; + But crushed or trodden to the ground, + Diffuse their balmy sweets around. + GOLDSMITH. + +As night to stars, woe lustre gives to man.--YOUNG. + +There is no possible success without some opposition as a fulcrum: +force is always aggressive and crowds something.--HOLMES. + +The more difficulties one has to encounter, within and without, the +more significant and the higher in inspiration his life will +be.--HORACE BUSHMILL. + +Adversity has the effect of eliciting talents which in prosperous +circumstances would have lain dormant.--HORACE. + +For gold is tried in the fire and acceptable men in the furnace of +adversity.--SIRACH. + + Though losses and crosses be lessons right severe, + There's wit there ye'll get there, ye'll find no other where. + BURNS. + +Possession pampers the mind; privation trains and strengthens +it.--HAZLITT. + +"Adversity is the prosperity of the great." + +No man ever worked his way in a dead calm.--JOHN NEAL. + +"Kites rise against, not with, the wind." + + +"Many and many a time since," said Harriet Martineau, referring to her +father's failure in business, "have we said that, but for that loss of +money, we might have lived on in the ordinary provincial method of +ladies with small means, sewing and economizing and growing narrower +every year; whereas, by being thrown, while it was yet time, on our own +resources, we have worked hard and usefully, won friends, reputation, +and independence, seen the world abundantly, abroad and at home; in +short, have truly lived instead of vegetating." + + * * * * * * + +[Illustration: JOHN BUNYAN] + + "Sculptor of souls, I lift to Thee + Encumbered heart and hands; + Spare not the chisel, set me free, + However dear the bands. + + * * * * * * + +"I do believe God wanted a grand poem of that man," said George +Macdonald of Milton, "and so blinded him that he might be able to write +it." + +Two of the three greatest epic poets of the world were blind,--Homer +and Milton; while the third, Dante, was in his later years nearly, if +not altogether, blind. It almost seems as though some great characters +had been physically crippled in certain respects so that they would not +dissipate their energy, but concentrate it all in one direction. + +"I have been beaten, but not cast down," said Thiers, after making a +complete failure of his first speech in the Chamber of Deputies. "I am +making my first essay in arms. In the tribune, as under fire, a defeat +is as useful as a victory." + +A distinguished investigator in science said that when he encountered +an apparently insuperable obstacle, he usually found himself upon the +brink of some discovery. + +"Returned with thanks" has made many an author. Failure often leads a +man to success by arousing his latent energy, by firing a dormant +purpose, by awakening powers which were sleeping. Men of mettle turn +disappointments into helps as the oyster turns into pearl the sand +which annoys it. + +"Let the adverse breath of criticism be to you only what the blast of +the storm wind is to the eagle,--a force against him that lifts him +higher." + +A kite would not fly unless it had a string tying it down. It is just +so in life. The man who is tied down by half a dozen blooming +responsibilities and their mother will make a higher and stronger +flight than the bachelor who, having nothing to keep him steady, is +always floundering in the mud. If you want to ascend in the world tie +yourself to somebody. + +"It was the severe preparation for the subsequent harvest," said +Pemberton Leigh, the eminent English lawyer, speaking of his early +poverty and hard work. "I learned to consider indefatigable labor as +the indispensable condition of success, pecuniary independence as +essential alike to virtue and happiness, and no sacrifice too great to +avoid the misery of debt." + +When Napoleon's companions made sport of him on account of his humble +origin and poverty he devoted himself entirely to books, and soon +rising above them in scholarship, commanded their respect. Soon he was +regarded as the brightest ornament of the class. + +"To make his way at the bar," said an eminent jurist, "a young man must +live like a hermit and work like a horse. There is nothing that does a +young lawyer so much good as to be half starved." + +Thousands of men of great native ability have been lost to the world +because they have not had to wrestle with obstacles, and to struggle +under difficulties sufficient to stimulate into activity their dormant +powers. No effort is too dear which helps us along the line of our +proper career. + +Poverty and obscurity of origin may impede our progress, but it is only +like the obstruction of ice or debris in the river temporarily forcing +the water into eddies, where it accumulates strength and a mighty +reserve which ultimately sweeps the obstruction impetuously to the sea. +Poverty and obscurity are not insurmountable obstacles, but they often +act as a stimulus to the naturally indolent, and develop a firmer fibre +of mind, a stronger muscle and stamina of body. If the germ of the +seed has to struggle to push its way up through the stones and hard +sod, to fight its way up to sunlight and air, and then to wrestle with +storm and tempest, with snow and frost, the fibre of its timber will be +all the tougher and stronger. + +"Do you wish to live without a trial?" asks a modern teacher. "Then +you wish to die but half a man. Without trial you cannot guess at your +own strength. Men do not learn to swim on a table. They must go into +deep water and buffet the waves. Hardship is the native soil of +manhood and self-reliance. Trials are rough teachers, but rugged +schoolmasters make rugged pupils. A man who goes through life +prosperous, and comes to his grave without a wrinkle, is not half a +man. Difficulties are God's errands. And when we are sent upon them +we should esteem it a proof of God's confidence. We should reach after +the highest good." + +"If you wish to rise," said Talleyrand, "make enemies." + +There is good philosophy in the injunction to love our enemies, for +they are often our best friends in disguise. They tell us the truth +when friends flatter. Their biting sarcasm and scathing rebuke are +often mirrors which reveal us to ourselves. These unkind stings and +thrusts are spurs which urge us on to grander success and nobler +endeavor. Friends cover our faults and rarely rebuke; enemies drag out +to the light all our weaknesses without mercy. We dread these thrusts +and exposures as we do the surgeon's knife, but are the better for +them. They reach depths before untouched, and we are led to resolve to +redeem ourselves from scorn and inferiority. + +We are the victors of our opponents. They have developed in us the +very power by which we overcome them. Without their opposition we +could never have braced and anchored and fortified ourselves, as the +oak is braced and anchored for its thousand battles with the tempests. +Our trials, our sorrows, and our griefs develop us in a similar way. + +The man who has triumphed over difficulties bears the signs of victory +in his face. An air of triumph is seen in every movement. + +John Calvin, who made a theology for the seventeenth and eighteenth +centuries, was tortured with disease for many years, and so was Robert +Hall. The great men who have lifted the world to a higher level were +not developed in easy circumstances, but were rocked in the cradle of +difficulties and pillowed on hardships. + +"The gods look on no grander sight than an honest man struggling with +adversity." + +"Then I must learn to sing better," said Anaximander, when told that +the very boys laughed at his singing. Strong characters, like the +palm-tree, seem to thrive best when most abused. Men who have stood up +bravely under great misfortune for years are often unable to bear +prosperity. Their good fortune takes the spring out of their energy, +as the torrid zone enervates races accustomed to a vigorous climate. +Some people never come to themselves until baffled, rebuffed, thwarted, +defeated, crushed, in the opinion of those around them. Trials unlock +their virtues; defeat is the threshold of their victory. + +It is defeat that turns bone to flint; it is defeat that turns gristle +to muscle; it is defeat that makes men invincible; it is defeat that +has made those heroic natures that are now in the ascendency, and that +has given the sweet law of liberty instead of the bitter law of +oppression. + +Difficulties call out great qualities, and make greatness possible. +How many centuries of peace would have developed a Grant? Few knew +Lincoln until the great weight of the war showed his character. A +century of peace would never have produced a Bismarck. Perhaps +Phillips and Garrison would never have been known to history had it not +been for slavery. + +"Will he not make a great painter?" was asked in regard to an artist +fresh from his Italian tour. "No, never," replied Northcote. "Why +not?" "Because he has an income of six thousand pounds a year." In +the sunshine of wealth a man is, as a rule, warped too much to become +an artist of high merit. A drenching shower of adversity would +straighten his fibres out again. He should have some great thwarting +difficulty to struggle against. + +The best tools receive their temper from fire, their edge from +grinding; the noblest characters are developed in a similar way. The +harder the diamond, the more brilliant the lustre, and the greater the +friction necessary to bring it out. Only its own dust is hard enough +to make this most precious stone reveal its full beauty. + +The spark in the flint would sleep forever but for friction; the fire +in man would never blaze but for antagonism. The friction which +retards a train upon the track, robbing the engine of a fourth of its +power, is the very secret of locomotion. Oil the track, remove the +friction, and the train will not move an inch. The moment man is +relieved of opposition or friction, and the track of his life is oiled +with inherited wealth or other aids, that moment he often ceases to +struggle and therefore ceases to grow. + +"It is this scantiness of means, this continual deficiency, this +constant hitch, this perpetual struggle to keep the head above water +and the wolf from the door, that keeps society from falling to pieces. +Let every man have a few more dollars than he wants, and anarchy would +follow." + +Suddenly, with much jarring and jolting, an electric car came to a +standstill just in front of a heavy truck that was headed in an +opposite direction. The huge truck wheels were sliding uselessly round +on the car tracks that were wet and slippery from rain. All the urging +of the teamster and the straining of the horses in vain,--until the +motorman quietly tossed a shovelful of sand on the track under the +heavy wheels, then the truck lumbered on its way. "Friction is a very +good thing," remarked a passenger. + +The philosopher Kant observes that a dove, inasmuch as the only +obstacle it has to overcome is the resistance of the air, might suppose +that if only the air were out of the way it could fly with greater +rapidity and ease. Yet if the air were withdrawn, and the bird should +try to fly in a vacuum, it would fall instantly to the ground unable to +fly at all. The very element that offers the opposition to flying is +at the same time the condition of any flight whatever. + +Rough seas and storms make sailors. Emergencies make giant men. But +for our Civil War the names of its grand heroes would not be written +among the greatest of our time. + +The effort or struggle to climb to a higher place in life has strength +and dignity in it, and cannot fail to leave us stronger for the +struggle, even though we miss the prize. + +From an aimless, idle, and useless brain, emergencies often call out +powers and virtues before unknown and suspected. How often we see a +young man develop astounding ability and energy after the death of a +parent, or the loss of a fortune, or after some other calamity has +knocked the props and crutches from under him. The prison has roused +the slumbering fire in many a noble mind. "Robinson Crusoe" was +written in prison. The "Pilgrim's Progress" appeared in Bedford Jail. +The "Life and Times" of Baxter, Eliot's "Monarchia of Man," and Penn's +"No Cross, No Crown," were written by prisoners. Sir Walter Raleigh +wrote "The History of the World" during his imprisonment of thirteen +years. Luther translated the Bible while confined in the Castle of +Wartburg. For twenty years Dante worked in exile, and even under +sentence of death. His works were burned in public after his death; +but genius will not burn. + +Take two acorns from the same tree, as nearly alike as possible; plant +one on a hill by itself, and the other in the dense forest, and watch +them grow. The oak standing alone is exposed to every storm. Its +roots reach out in every direction, clutching the rocks and piercing +deep into the earth. Every rootlet lends itself to steady the growing +giant, as if in anticipation of fierce conflict with the elements. +Sometimes its upward growth seems checked for years, but all the while +it has been expending its energy in pushing a root across a large rock +to gain a firmer anchorage. Then it shoots proudly aloft again, +prepared to defy the hurricane. The gales which sport so rudely with +its wide branches find more than their match, and only serve still +further to toughen every minutest fibre from pith to bark. + +The acorn planted in the deep forest shoots up a weak, slender sapling. +Shielded by its neighbors, it feels no need of spreading its roots far +and wide for support. + +Take two boys, as nearly alike as possible. Place one in the country +away from the hothouse culture and refinements of the city, with only +the district school, the Sunday-school, and a few books. Remove wealth +and props of every kind; and, if he has the right kind of material in +him, he will thrive. Every obstacle overcome lends him strength for +the next conflict. If he falls, he rises with more determination than +before. Like a rubber ball, the harder the obstacle he meets the +higher he rebounds. Obstacles and opposition are but apparatus of the +gymnasium in which the fibres of his manhood are developed. He compels +respect and recognition from those who have ridiculed his poverty. Put +the other boy in a Vanderbilt family. Give him French and German +nurses; gratify every wish. Place him under the tutelage of great +masters and send him to Harvard. Give him thousands a year for +spending money, and let him travel extensively. + +The two meet. The city lad is ashamed of his country brother. The +plain, threadbare clothes, hard hands, tawny face, and awkward manner +of the country boy make sorry contrast with the genteel appearance of +the other. The poor boy bemoans his hard lot, regrets that he has "no +chance in life," and envies the city youth. He thinks that it is a +cruel Providence that places such a wide gulf between them. They meet +again as men, but how changed! It is as easy to distinguish the +sturdy, self-made man from the one who has been propped up all his life +by wealth, position, and family influence, as it is for the shipbuilder +to tell the difference between the plank from the rugged mountain oak +and one from the sapling of the forest. If you think there is no +difference, place each plank in the bottom of a ship, and test them in +a hurricane at sea. + +When God wants to educate a man, he does not send him to school to the +Graces, but to the Necessities. Through the pit and the dungeon Joseph +came to a throne. We are not conscious of the mighty cravings of our +half divine humanity; we are not aware of the god within us until some +chasm yawns which must be filled, or till the rending asunder of our +affections forces us to become conscious of a need. Paul in his Roman +cell; John Huss led to the stake at Constance; Tyndale dying in his +prison at Amsterdam; Milton, amid the incipient earthquake throes of +revolution, teaching two little boys in Aldgate Street; David +Livingstone, worn to a shadow, dying in a negro hut in Central Africa, +alone,--what failures they might all to themselves have seemed to be, +yet what mighty purposes was God working out by their apparent +humiliations! + +Two highwaymen chancing once to pass a gibbet, one of them exclaimed: +"What a fine profession ours would be if there were no gibbets!" "Tut, +you blockhead," replied the other, "gibbets are the making of us; for, +if there were no gibbets, every one would be a highwayman." Just so +with every art, trade, or pursuit; it is the difficulties that scare +and keep out unworthy competitors. + +"Success grows out of struggles to overcome difficulties," says Smiles. +"If there were no difficulties, there would be no success. In this +necessity for exertion we find the chief source of human +advancement,--the advancement of individuals as of nations. It has led +to most of the mechanical inventions and improvements of the age." + +"Stick your claws into me," said Mendelssohn to his critics when +entering the Birmingham orchestra. "Don't tell me what you like but +what you don't like." + +John Hunter said that the art of surgery would never advance until +professional men had the courage to publish their failures as well as +their successes. + +"Young men need to be taught not to expect a perfectly smooth and easy +way to the objects of their endeavor or ambition," says Dr. Peabody. +"Seldom does one reach a position with which he has reason to be +satisfied without encountering difficulties and what might seem +discouragements. But if they are properly met, they are not what they +seem, and may prove to be helps, not hindrances. There is no more +helpful and profiting exercise than surmounting obstacles." + +It is said that but for the disappointments of Dante, Florence would +have had another prosperous Lord Mayor; and the ten dumb centuries +continued voiceless, and the ten other listening centuries (for there +will be ten of them, and more) would have had no "Divina Commedia" to +hear! + +It was in the Madrid jail that Cervantes wrote "Don Quixote." He was +so poor that he could not even get paper during the last of his +writing, and had to write on scraps of leather. A rich Spaniard was +asked to help him, but the rich man replied: "Heaven forbid that his +necessities should be relieved, it is his poverty that makes the world +rich." + +"A constant struggle, a ceaseless battle to bring success from +inhospitable surroundings, is the price of all great achievements." + +"She sings well," said a great musician of a promising but passionless +cantatrice, "but she wants something, and in that something, +everything. If I were single, I would court her, I would marry her; I +would maltreat her; I would break her heart, and in six months she +would be the greatest singer in Europe." + +"He has the stuff in him to make a good musician," said Beethoven of +Rossini, "if he had only been well flogged when a boy; but he is +spoiled by the ease with which he composes." + +We do our best while fighting desperately to attain what the heart +covets. Martin Luther did his greatest work, and built up his best +character, while engaged in sharp controversy with the Pope. Later in +life his wife asks, "Doctor, how is it that whilst subject to Papacy we +prayed so often and with such fervor, whilst now we pray with the +utmost coldness and very seldom?" + +When Lord Eldon was poor, Lord Thurlow withheld a promised +commissionership of bankruptcy, saying that it was a favor not to give +it then. "What he meant was," said Eldon, "that he had learned I was +by nature very indolent, and it was only want that could make me very +industrious." + +Waters says that the struggle to obtain knowledge and to advance one's +self in the world strengthens the mind, disciplines the faculties, +matures the judgment, promotes self-reliance, and gives one +independence of thought and force of character. + +"The gods in bounty work up storms about us," says Addison, "that give +mankind occasion to exert their hidden strength, and throw out into +practice virtues that shun the day, and lie concealed in the smooth +seasons and the calms of life." + +The hothouse plant may tempt a pampered appetite or shed a languid +odor, but the working world gets its food from fields of grain and +orchards waving in the sun and free air, from cattle that wrestle on +the plains, from fishes that struggle with currents of river or ocean; +its choicest perfumes from flowers that bloom unheeded, and in +wind-tossed forests finds its timber for temples and for ships. + +"I do not see," says Emerson, "how any man can afford, for the sake of +his nerves and his nap, to spare any action in which he can partake. +It is pearls and rubies to his discourse. Drudgery, calamity, +exasperation, want, are instructors in eloquence and wisdom. The true +scholar grudges every opportunity of action passed by as a loss of +power." + +Kossuth called himself "a tempest-tossed soul, whose eyes have been +sharpened by affliction." + +Benjamin Franklin ran away, and George Law was turned out of doors. +Thrown upon their own resources, they early acquired the energy and +skill to overcome difficulties. + +As soon as young eagles can fly the old birds tumble them out and tear +the down and feathers from their nest. The rude and rough experience +of the eaglet fits him to become the bold king of birds, fierce and +expert in pursuing his prey. + +Boys who are bound out, crowded out, kicked out, usually "turn out," +while those who do not have these disadvantages frequently fail to +"come out." + +"It was not the victories but the defeats of my life which have +strengthened me," said the aged Sidenham Poyntz. + +Almost from the dawn of history, oppression has been the lot of the +Hebrews, yet they have given the world its noblest songs, its wisest +proverbs, its sweetest music. With them persecution seems to bring +prosperity. They thrive where others would starve. They hold the +purse-strings of many nations. To them hardship has been "like spring +mornings, frosty but kindly, the cold of which will kill the vermin, +but will let the plant live." + +In one of the battles of the Crimea a cannon-ball struck inside the +fort, crashing through a beautiful garden. But from the ugly chasm +there burst forth a spring of water which ever afterward flowed a +living fountain. From the ugly gashes which misfortunes and sorrows +make in our hearts, perennial fountains of rich experience and new joys +often spring. + +Don't lament and grieve over lost wealth. The Creator may see +something grand and mighty which even He cannot bring out as long as +your wealth stands in the way. You must throw away the crutches of +riches and stand upon your own feet, and develop the long unused +muscles of manhood. God may see a rough diamond in you which only the +hard hits of poverty can polish. + +God knows where the richest melodies of our lives are, and what drill +and what discipline are necessary to bring them out. The frost, the +snows, the tempests, the lightnings, are the rough teachers that bring +the tiny acorn to the sturdy oak. Fierce winters are as necessary to +it as long summers. It is its half-century's struggle with the +elements for existence, wrestling with the storm, fighting for its life +from the moment that it leaves the acorn until it goes into the ship, +that gives it value. Without this struggle it would have been +character-less, stamina-less, nerve-less, and its grain would have +never been susceptible of high polish. The most beautiful as well as +the strongest woods are found not in tropical climates, but in the +severe climates, where they have to fight the frosts and the winter's +cold. + +Many a man has never found himself until he has lost his all. +Adversity stripped him only to discover him. Obstacles, hardships are +the chisel and mallet which shape the strong life into beauty. The +rough ledge on the hillside complains of the drill, of the blasting +powder which disturbs its peace of centuries: it is not pleasant to be +rent with powder, to be hammered and squared by the quarryman. But +look again: behold the magnificent statue, the monument, chiseled into +grace and beauty, telling its grand story of valor in the public square +for centuries. + +The statue would have slept in the marble forever but for the blasting, +the chiseling, and the polishing. The angel of our higher and nobler +selves would remain forever unknown in the rough quarries of our lives +but for the blastings of affliction, the chiseling of obstacles, and +the sand-papering of a thousand annoyances. + +Who has not observed the patience, the calm endurance, the sweet +loveliness chiseled out of some rough life by the reversal of fortune +or by some terrible affliction. + +How many business men have made their greatest strides toward manhood, +have developed their greatest virtues, when the reverses of fortune +have swept away everything they had in the world; when disease had +robbed them of all they held dear in life. Often we cannot see the +angel in the quarry of our lives, the statue of manhood, until the +blasts of misfortune have rent the ledge, and difficulties and +obstacles have squared and chiseled the granite blocks into grace and +beauty. + +Many a man has been ruined into salvation. The lightning which smote +his dearest hopes opened up a new rift in his dark life, and gave him +glimpses of himself which, until then, he had never seen. + +The grave buried his dearest hopes, but uncovered possibilities in his +nature of patience, endurance, and hope which he never dreamed he +possessed before. + +"Adversity is a severe instructor," says Edmund Burke, "set over us by +one who knows us better than we do ourselves, as he loves us better +too. He that wrestles with us strengthens our nerves and sharpens our +skill. Our antagonist is our helper. This conflict with difficulty +makes us acquainted with our object, and compels us to consider it in +all its relations. It will not suffer us to be superficial." + +Men who have the right kind of material in them will assert their +personality, and rise in spite of a thousand adverse circumstances. +You cannot keep them down. Every obstacle seems only to add to their +ability to get on. + +"Under different circumstances," says Castelar, "Savonarola would +undoubtedly have been a good husband, a tender father, a man unknown to +history, utterly powerless to print upon the sands of time and upon the +human soul the deep trace which he has left, but misfortune came to +visit him, to crush his heart, and to impart that marked melancholy +which characterizes a soul in grief, and the grief that circled his +brows with a crown of thorns was also that which wreathed them with the +splendor of immortality. His hopes were centred in the woman he loved, +his life was set upon the possession of her, and when her family +finally rejected him, partly on account of his profession, and partly +on account of his person, he believed that it was death that had come +upon him, when in truth it was immortality." + +The greatest men will ever be those who have risen from the ranks. It +is said that there are ten thousand chances to one that genius, talent, +and virtue shall issue from a farmhouse rather than from a palace. + +The youth Opie earned his bread by sawing wood, but he reached a +professorship in the Royal Academy. When but ten years old he showed +the material he was made of by a beautiful drawing on a shingle. +Antonio Canova was the son of a day laborer. Thorwaldsen's parents +were poor, but, like hundreds of others, they did with their might what +their hands found to do, and ennobled their work. They rose by being +greater than their calling, as Arkwright rose above mere barbering, +Bunyan above tinkering, Wilson above shoemaking, Lincoln above +rail-splitting, and Grant above tanning. By being first-class barbers, +tinkers, shoemakers, rail-splitters, tanners, they acquired the power +which enabled them to become great inventors, authors, statesmen, +generals. + +Adversity exasperates fools, dejects cowards, draws out the faculties +of the wise and industrious, puts the modest to the necessity of trying +their skill, awes the opulent, and makes the idle industrious. Neither +do uninterrupted success and prosperity qualify men for usefulness and +happiness. The storms of adversity, like those of the ocean, rouse the +faculties, and excite the invention, prudence, skill, and fortitude of +the voyager. The martyrs of ancient times, in bracing their minds to +outward calamities, acquired a loftiness of purpose and a moral heroism +worth a lifetime of softness and security. A man upon whom continuous +sunshine falls is like the earth in August: he becomes parched and dry +and hard and close-grained. Men have drawn from adversity the elements +of greatness. If you have the blues, go and see the poorest and +sickest families within your knowledge. The darker the setting, the +brighter the diamond. Don't run about and tell acquaintances that you +have been unfortunate; people do not like to have unfortunate men for +acquaintances. + +Beethoven was almost totally deaf and burdened with sorrow when he +produced his greatest works. Schiller wrote his best books in great +bodily suffering. He was not free from pain for fifteen years. Milton +wrote his leading productions when blind, poor, and sick. "Who best +can suffer," said he, "best can do." Bunyan said that, if it were +lawful, he could even pray for greater trouble, for the greater +comfort's sake. + +"Do you know what God puts us on our backs for?" asked Dr. Payson, +smiling, as he lay sick in bed. "No," replied the visitor. "In order +that we may look upward." "I am not come to condole but to rejoice +with you," said the friend, "for it seems to me that this is no time +for mourning." "Well, I am glad to hear that," said Dr. Payson, "it is +not often I am addressed in such a way. The fact is I never had less +need of condolence, and yet everybody persists in offering it; whereas, +when I was prosperous and well, and a successful preacher, and really +needed condolence, they flattered and congratulated me." + +A German knight undertook to make an immense Aeolian harp by stretching +wires from tower to tower of his castle. When he finished the harp it +was silent; but when the breezes began to blow he heard faint strains +like the murmuring of distant music. At last a tempest arose and swept +with fury over his castle, and then rich and grand music came from the +wires. Ordinary experiences do not seem to touch some lives--to bring +out any poetry, any higher manhood. + +Not until the breath of the plague had blasted a hundred thousand +lives, and the great fire had licked up cheap, shabby, wicked London, +did she arise, phoenix-like, from her ashes and ruin, a grand and +mighty city. + +True salamanders live best in the furnace of persecution. + +"Every man who makes a fortune has been more than once a bankrupt, if +the truth were known," said Albion Tourgée. "Grant's failure as a +subaltern made him commander-in-chief, and for myself, my failure to +accomplish what I set out to do led me to what I never had aspired to." + +The appeal for volunteers in the great battle of life, in exterminating +ignorance and error, and planting high on an everlasting foundation the +banner of intelligence and right, is directed to _you_. Burst the +trammels that impede your progress, and cling to hope. Place high thy +standard, and with a firm tread and fearless eye press steadily onward. + +Not ease, but effort, not facility, but difficulty, makes men. +Toilsome culture is the price of great success, and the slow growth of +a great character is one of its special necessities. Many of our best +poets + + "Are cradled into poetry by wrong, + And learn in suffering what they teach in song." + + +Byron was stung into a determination to go to the top by a scathing +criticism of his first book, "Hours of Idleness," published when he was +but nineteen years of age. Macaulay said, "There is scarce an instance +in history of so sudden a rise to so dizzy an eminence as Byron +reached." In a few years he stood by the side of such men as Scott, +Southey, and Campbell, and died at thirty-seven, that age so fatal to +genius. Many an orator like "stuttering Jack Curran," or "Orator Mum," +as he was once called, has been spurred into eloquence by ridicule and +abuse. + +This is the crutch age. "Helps" and "aids" are advertised everywhere. +We have institutes, colleges, universities, teachers, books, libraries, +newspapers, magazines. Our thinking is done for us. Our problems are +all worked out in "explanations" and "keys." Our boys are too often +tutored through college with very little study. "Short roads" and +"abridged methods" are characteristic of the century. Ingenious +methods are used everywhere to get the drudgery out of the college +course. Newspapers give us our politics, and preachers our religion. +Self-help and self-reliance are getting old fashioned. Nature, as if +conscious of delayed blessings, has rushed to man's relief with her +wondrous forces, and undertakes to do the world's drudgery and +emancipate him from Eden's curse. + +But do not misinterpret her edict. She emancipates from the lower only +to call to the higher. She does not bid the world go and play while +she does the work. She emancipates the muscles only to employ the +brain and heart. + +The most beautiful as well as the strongest characters are not +developed in warm climates, where man finds his bread ready made on +trees, and where exertion is a great effort, but rather in a trying +climate and on a stubborn soil. It is no chance that returns to the +Hindoo ryot a penny and to the American laborer a dollar for his daily +toil; that makes Mexico with its mineral wealth poor, and New England +with its granite and ice rich. It is rugged necessity, it is the +struggle to obtain, it is poverty the priceless spur, that develops the +stamina of manhood, and calls the race out of barbarism. Labor found +the world a wilderness and has made it a garden. + +As the sculptor thinks only of the angel imprisoned in the marble +block, so Nature cares only for the man or woman shut up in the human +being. The sculptor cares nothing for the block as such; Nature has +little regard for the mere lump of breathing clay. The sculptor will +chip off all unnecessary material to set free the angel. Nature will +chip and pound us remorselessly to bring out our possibilities. She +will strip us of wealth, humble our pride, humiliate our ambition, let +us down from the ladder of fame, will discipline us in a thousand ways, +if she can develop a little character. Everything must give way to +that. Wealth is nothing, position is nothing, fame is nothing, +_manhood is everything_. + +Not ease, not pleasure, not happiness, but a _man_, Nature is after. +In every great painting of the masters there is one idea or figure +which stands out boldly beyond everything else. Every other idea or +figure on the canvas is subordinate to it, but pointing to the central +idea, finds its true expression there. So in the vast universe of God, +every object of creation is but a guideboard with an index-finger +pointing to the central figure of the created universe--Man. Nature +writes this thought upon every leaf, she thunders it in every creation. +It is exhaled from every flower; it twinkles in every star. + +Oh, what price will Nature not pay for a man! Ages and aeons were +nothing for her to spend in preparing for his coming, or to make his +existence possible. She has rifled the centuries for his development, +and placed the universe at his disposal. The world is but his +kindergarten, and every created thing but an object-lesson from the +unseen universe. Nature resorts to a thousand expedients to develop a +perfect type of her grandest creation. To do this she must induce him +to fight his way up to his own loaf. She never allows him once to lose +sight of the fact that it is the struggle to attain that develops the +man. The moment we put our hand upon that which looks so attractive at +a distance, and which we struggled so hard to reach, Nature robs it of +its charm by holding up before us another prize still more attractive. + +"Life," says a philosopher, "refuses to be so adjusted as to eliminate +from it all strife and conflict and pain. There are a thousand tasks +that, in larger interests than ours, must be done, whether we want them +or no. The world refuses to walk upon tiptoe, so that we may be able +to sleep. It gets up very early and stays up very late, and all the +while there is the conflict of myriads of hammers and saws and axes +with the stubborn material that in no other way can be made to serve +its use and do its work for man. And then, too, these hammers and axes +are not wielded without strain or pang, but swung by the millions of +toilers who labor with their cries and groans and tears. Nay, our +temple-building, whether it be for God or man, exacts its bitter toll, +and fills life with cries and blows. The thousand rivalries of our +daily business, the fiercer animosities when we are beaten, the even +fiercer exultation when we have beaten, the crashing blows of disaster, +the piercing scream of defeat,--these things we have not yet gotten rid +of, nor in this life ever will. Why should we wish to get rid of them? +We are here, my brother, to be hewed and hammered and planed in God's +quarry and on God's anvil for a nobler life to come." Only the muscle +that is used is developed. + +The constantly cheerful man, who survives his blighted hopes and +disappointments, who takes them just for what they are, lessons, and +perhaps blessings in disguise, is the true hero. + + There is a strength + Deep bedded in our hearts of which we reck + But little, till the shafts of heaven have pierced + Its fragile dwelling. Must not earth be rent + Before her gems are found? + MRS. HEMANS. + + "If what shone afar so grand + Turns to ashes in the hand, + On again, the virtue lies + In the struggle, not the prize." + + "The hero is not fed on sweets, + Daily his own heart he eats; + Chambers of the great are jails, + And head-winds right for royal sails." + + "So many great + Illustrious spirits have conversed with woe, + Have in her school been taught, as are enough + To consecrate distress, and make ambition + Even wish the frown beyond the smile of fortune." + + Then welcome each rebuff, + That turns earth's smoothness rough, + Each sting, that bids not sit nor stand but go. + BROWNING. + + + + +CHAPTER VI. + +ONE UNWAVERING AIM. + + Life is an arrow--therefore you must know + What mark to aim at, how to use the bow-- + Then draw it to the head and let it go. + HENRY VAN DYKE. + +The important thing in life is to have a great aim, and to possess the +aptitude and perseverance to attain it.--GOETHE. + +Concentration alone conquers.--C. BUXTON. + +"He who follows two hares is sure to catch neither." + +"A double-minded man is unstable in all his ways." + +Let every one ascertain his special business and calling, and then +stick to it if he would be successful.--FRANKLIN. + +"Digression is as dangerous as stagnation in the career of a young man +in business." + +Every man who observes vigilantly and resolves steadfastly grows +unconsciously into genius.--BULWER. + +Genius is intensity.--BALZAC. + + +"Why do you lead such a solitary life?" asked a friend of Michael +Angelo. "Art is a jealous mistress," replied the artist; "she requires +the whole man." During his labors at the Sistine Chapel, according to +Disraeli, he refused to meet any one, even at his own house. + +"That day we sailed westward, which was our course," were the simple +but grand words which Columbus wrote in his journal day after day. +Hope might rise and fall, terror and dismay might seize upon the crew +at the mysterious variations of the compass, but Columbus, unappalled, +pushed due west and nightly added to his record the above words. + +"Cut an inch deeper," said a member of the Old Guard to the surgeon +probing his wound, "and you will find the Emperor,"--meaning his heart. +By the marvelous power of concentrated purpose Napoleon had left his +name on the very stones of the capital, had burned it indelibly into +the heart of every Frenchman, and had left it written in living letters +all over Europe. France to-day has not shaken off the spell of that +name. In the fair city on the Seine the mystic "N" confronts you +everywhere. + +Oh, the power of a great purpose to work miracles! It has changed the +face of the world. Napoleon knew that there were plenty of great men +in France, but they did not know the might of the unwavering aim by +which he was changing the destinies of Europe. He saw that what was +called the "balance of power" was only an idle dream; that, unless some +master-mind could be found which was a match for events, the millions +would rule in anarchy. His iron will grasped the situation; and like +William Pitt, he did not loiter around balancing the probabilities of +failure or success, or dally with his purpose. There was no turning to +the right nor to the left; no dreaming away time, nor building +air-castles; but one look and purpose, forward, upward and onward, +straight to his goal. He always hit the bull's-eye. His great success +in war was due largely to his definiteness of aim. He was like a great +burning-glass, concentrating the rays of the sun upon a single spot; he +burned a hole wherever he went. The secret of his power lay in his +ability to concentrate his forces upon a single point. After finding +the weak place in the enemy's ranks, he would mass his men and hurl +them like an avalanche upon the critical point, crowding volley upon +volley, charge upon charge, till he made a breach. What a lesson of +the power of concentration there is in this man's life! He was able to +focus all his faculties upon the smallest detail, as well as upon an +empire. But, alas! Napoleon was himself defeated by violation of his +own tactics,--the constantly repeated crushing force of heavy +battalions upon one point. + +To succeed to-day a man must concentrate all the faculties of his mind +upon one unwavering aim, and have a tenacity of purpose which means +death or victory. Every other inclination which tempts him from his +aim must be suppressed. + +New Jersey has many ports, but they are so shallow and narrow that the +shipping of the entire state amounts to but little. On the other hand, +New York has but one ocean port, and yet it is so broad, deep, and +grand, that it leads America in its enormous shipping trade. She sends +her vessels into every port of the world, while the ships of her +neighbor are restricted to local voyages. + +A man may starve on a dozen half-learned trades or occupations; he may +grow rich and famous upon one trade thoroughly mastered, even though it +be the humblest. + +Even Gladstone, with his ponderous yet active brain, says he cannot do +two things at once; he throws his entire strength upon whatever he +does. The intensest energy characterizes everything he undertakes, +even his recreation. If such concentration of energy is necessary for +the success of a Gladstone, what can we common mortals hope to +accomplish by "scatteration?" + +All great men have been noted for their power of concentration which +makes them oblivious of everything outside their aim. Victor Hugo +wrote his "Notre Dame" during the revolution of 1830, while the bullets +were whistling across his garden. He shut himself up in one room, +locking his clothes up, lest they should tempt him to go out into the +street, and spent most of that winter wrapped in a big gray comforter, +pouring his very life into his work. + +Genius is intensity. Abraham Lincoln possessed such power of +concentration that he could repeat quite correctly a sermon to which he +had listened in his boyhood. Dr. O. W. Holmes, when an Andover +student, riveted his eyes on the book he was studying as though he were +reading a will that made him heir to a million. + +A New York sportsman, in answer to an advertisement, sent twenty-five +cents for a sure receipt to prevent a shotgun from scattering, and +received the following; "Dear Sir: To keep a gun from scattering put in +but a single shot." + +It is the men who do one thing in this world who come to the front. +Who is the favorite actor? It is a Jefferson, who devotes a lifetime +to a "Rip Van Winkle," a Booth, an Irving, a Kean, who plays one +character until he can play it better than any other man living, and +not the shallow players who impersonate all parts. It is the man who +never steps outside of his specialty or dissipates his individuality. +It is an Edison, a Morse, a Bell, a Howe, a Stephenson, a Watt. It is +Adam Smith, spending ten years on the "Wealth of Nations." It is +Gibbon, giving twenty years to his "Decline and Fall of the Roman +Empire." It is a Hume, writing thirteen hours a day on his "History of +England." It is a Webster, spending thirty-six years on his +dictionary. It is a Bancroft, working twenty-six years on his "History +of the United States." It is a Field, crossing the ocean fifty times +to lay a cable, while the world ridicules. It is a Newton, writing his +"Chronology of Ancient Nations" sixteen times. It is a Grant, who +proposes to "fight it out on this line if it takes all summer." These +are the men who have written their names prominently in the history of +the world. + +A one-talent man who decides upon a definite object accomplishes more +than the ten-talent man who scatters his energies and never knows +exactly what he will do. The weakest living creature, by concentrating +his powers upon one thing, can accomplish something; the strongest, by +dispersing his over many, may fail to accomplish anything. Drop after +drop, continually falling, wears a passage through the hardest rock. +The hasty tempest, as Carlyle points out, rushes over it with hideous +uproar and leaves no trace behind. + +A great purpose is cumulative; and, like a great magnet, it attracts +all that is kindred along the stream of life. + +A Yankee can splice a rope in many different ways; an English sailor +only knows one way, but that is the best one. It is the one-sided man, +the sharp-edged man, the man of single and intense purpose, the man of +one idea, who turns neither to the right nor to the left, though a +paradise tempt him, who cuts his way through obstacles and forges to +the front. The time has gone forever when a Bacon can span universal +knowledge; or when, absorbing all the knowledge of the times, a Dante +can sustain arguments against fourteen disputants in the University of +Paris, and conquer in them all. The day when a man can successfully +drive a dozen callings abreast is a thing of the past. Concentration +is the keynote of the century. + +Scientists estimate that there is energy enough in less than fifty +acres of sunshine to run all the machinery in the world, if it could be +concentrated. But the sun might blaze out upon the earth forever +without setting anything on fire; although these rays focused by a +burning-glass would melt solid granite, or even change a diamond into +vapor. There are plenty of men who have ability enough; the rays of +their faculties, taken separately, are all right, but they are +powerless to collect them, to bring them all to bear upon a single +spot. Versatile men, universal geniuses, are usually weak, because +they have no power to concentrate their talents upon one point, and +this makes all the difference between success and failure. + +Chiseled upon the tomb of a disappointed, heart-broken king, Joseph II. +of Austria, in the Royal Cemetery at Vienna, a traveler tells us, is +this epitaph: "Here lies a monarch who, with the best of intentions, +never carried out a single plan." + +Sir James Mackintosh was a man of remarkable ability. He excited in +every one who knew him the greatest expectations. Many watched his +career with much interest, expecting that he would dazzle the world. +But there was no purpose in his life. He had intermittent attacks of +enthusiasm for doing great things, but his zeal all evaporated before +he could decide what to do. This fatal defect in his character kept +him balancing between conflicting motives; and his whole life was +almost thrown away. He lacked power to choose one object and persevere +with a single aim, sacrificing every interfering inclination. He +vacillated for weeks trying to determine whether to use "usefulness" or +"utility" in a composition. + +One talent utilized in a single direction will do infinitely more than +ten talents scattered. A thimbleful of powder behind a ball in a rifle +will do more execution than a carload of powder unconfined. The +rifle-barrel is the purpose that gives direct aim to the powder, which +otherwise, no matter how good it might be, would be powerless. The +poorest scholar in school or college often, in practical life, far +outstrips the class leader or senior wrangler, simply because what +little ability he has he employs for a definite object, while the +other, depending upon his general ability and brilliant prospects, +never concentrates his powers. + +"A sublime self-confidence," says E. P. Whipple, "springing not from +self-conceit, but from an intense identification of the man with his +object, lifts him altogether above the fear of danger and death, and +communicates an almost superhuman audacity to his will." + + * * * * * * + +[Illustration: RICHARD ARKWRIGHT] + +What a sublime spectacle is that of a man going straight to his goal, +cutting his way through difficulties, and surmounting obstacles which +dishearten others, as though they were stepping-stones. + + * * * * * * + +It is fashionable to ridicule the man of one idea, but the men who have +changed the front of the world have been men of a single aim. No man +can make his mark on this age of specialties who is not a man of one +idea, one supreme aim, one master passion. The man who would make +himself felt on this bustling planet, who would make a breach in the +compact conservatism of our civilization, must play all his guns on one +point. A wavering aim, a faltering purpose, has no place in the +nineteenth century. "Mental shiftlessness" is the cause of many a +failure. The world is full of unsuccessful men who spend their lives +letting empty buckets down into empty wells. + +"Mr. A. often laughs at me," said a young American chemist, "because I +have but one idea. He talks about everything, aims to excel in many +things; but I have learned that, if I ever wish to make a breach, I +must play my guns continually upon one point." This great chemist, +when an obscure schoolmaster, used to study by the light of a pine knot +in a log cabin. Not many years later he was performing experiments in +electro-magnetism before English earls, and subsequently he was at the +head of one of the largest scientific institutes of this country. This +man was the late Professor Henry, of the Smithsonian Institution, +Washington. + +Douglas Jerrold once knew a man who was familiar with twenty-four +languages but could not express a thought in one of them. + +We should guard against a talent which we cannot hope to practice in +perfection, says Goethe. Improve it as we may, we shall always, in the +end, when the merit of the matter has become apparent to us, painfully +lament the loss of time and strength devoted to such botching. An old +proverb says: "The master of one trade will support a wife and seven +children, and the master of seven will not support himself." + +_It is the single aim that wins_. Men with monopolizing ambitions +rarely live in history. They do not focus their powers long enough to +burn their names indelibly into the roll of honor. Edward Everett, +even with his magnificent powers, disappointed the expectations of his +friends. He spread himself over the whole field of knowledge and +elegant culture; but the mention of the name of Everett does not call +up any one great achievement as does that of names like Garrison and +Phillips. Voltaire called the Frenchman La Harpe an oven which was +always heating, but which never cooked anything. Hartley Coleridge was +splendidly endowed with talent, like Sir James Mackintosh, but there +was one fatal lack in his character--he had no definite purpose, and +his life was a failure. Unstable as water, he could not excel. +Southey, his uncle, says: + +"Coleridge has two left hands." He was so morbidly shy from living +alone in his dreamland that he could not open a letter without +trembling. He would often rally from his purposeless life, and resolve +to redeem himself from the oblivion he saw staring him in the face; +but, like Mackintosh, he remained a man of promise merely to the end of +his life. + +The world always makes way for the man with a purpose in him, like +Bismarck or Grant. Look at Rufus Choate, concentrating all his +attention first on one juryman, then on another, going back over the +whole line again and again, until he has burned his arguments into +their souls; until he has hypnotized them with his purpose; until they +see with his eyes, think his thoughts, feel his sensations. He never +stopped until he had projected his mind into theirs, and permeated +their lives with his individuality. There was no escape from his +concentration of purpose, his persuasive rhetoric, his convincing +logic. "Carry the jury at all hazards," he used to say to young +lawyers; "move heaven and earth to carry the jury, and then fight it +out with the judge on the law questions as best you can." + +The man who succeeds has a programme. He fixes his course and adheres +to it. He lays his plans and executes them. He goes straight to his +goal. He is not pushed this way and that every time a difficulty is +thrown in his path; if he can't get over it he goes through it. +Constant and steady use of the faculties under a central purpose gives +strength and power, while the use of faculties without an aim or end +only weakens them. The mind must be focused on a definite end, or, +like machinery without a balance-wheel, it will rack itself to pieces. + +This age of concentration calls, not for educated men merely, not for +talented men, not for geniuses, not for jacks-of-all-trades, but for +men who are trained to do one thing as well as it can be done. +Napoleon could go through the drill of his soldiers better than any one +of his men. + +_Stick to your aim_. The constant changing of one's occupation is +fatal to all success. After a young man has spent five or six years in +a dry goods store, he concludes that he would rather sell groceries, +thereby throwing away five years of valuable experience which will be +of very little use to him in the grocery business; and so he spends a +large part of his life drifting around from one kind of employment to +another, learning part of each, but all of none, forgetting that +experience is worth more to him than money, and that the years devoted +to learning his trade or occupation are the most valuable. +Half-learned trades, no matter if a man has twenty, will never give him +a good living, much less a competency, while wealth is absolutely out +of the question. + +How many young men fail to reach the point of efficiency in one line of +work before they get discouraged and venture into something else. How +easy to see the thorns in one's own profession or vocation, and only +the roses in that of another. A young man in business, for instance, +seeing a physician riding about town in his carriage, visiting his +patients, imagines that a doctor must have an easy, ideal life, and +wonders that he himself should have embarked in an occupation so full +of disagreeable drudgery and hardships. He does not know of the years +of dry, tedious study which the physician has consumed, the months and +perhaps years of waiting for patients, the dry detail of anatomy, the +endless names of drugs and technical terms. + +Scientists tell us that there is nothing in nature so ugly and +disagreeable but intense light will make it beautiful. The complete +mastery of one profession will render even the driest details +interesting. The consciousness of thorough knowledge, the habit of +doing everything to a finish, gives a feeling of strength, of +superiority, which takes the drudgery out of an occupation. The more +completely we master a vocation the more thoroughly we enjoy it. In +fact, the man who has found his place and become master in it could +scarcely be induced, even though he be a farmer, or a carpenter, or +grocer, to exchange places with a governor or congressman. To be +successful is to _find your sphere and fill it, to get into your place +and master it_. + +There is a sense of great power in a vocation after a man has reached +the point of efficiency in it, the point of productiveness, the point +where his skill begins to tell and bring in returns. Up to this point +of efficiency, while he is learning his trade, the time seems to have +been almost thrown away. But he has been storing up a vast reserve of +knowledge of detail, laying foundations, forming his acquaintances, +gaining his reputation for truthfulness, trustworthiness, and +integrity, and in establishing his credit. When he reaches this point +of efficiency, all the knowledge and skill, character, influence, and +credit thus gained come to his aid, and he soon finds that in what +seemed almost thrown away lies the secret of his prosperity. The +credit he established as a clerk, the confidence, the integrity, the +friendships formed, he finds equal to a large capital when he starts +out for himself and takes the highway to fortune; while the young man +who half learned several trades, and got discouraged and stopped just +short of the point of efficiency, just this side of success, is a +failure because he didn't go far enough; he did not press on to the +point at which his acquisition would have been profitable. + +In spite of the fact that nearly all very successful men have made a +life work of one thing, we see on every hand hundreds of young men and +women flitting about from occupation to occupation, trade to trade, in +one thing to-day and another to-morrow,--just as though they could go +from one thing to another by turning a switch, as if they could run as +well on another track as on the one they have left, regardless of the +fact that no two careers have the same gauge, that every man builds his +own road upon which another's engine cannot run either with speed or +safety. This fickleness, this disposition to shift about from one +occupation to another, seems to be peculiar to American life, so much +so that, when a young man meets a friend whom he has not seen for some +time, the commonest question to ask is, "What are you doing now?" +showing the improbability or uncertainty that he is doing to-day what +he was doing when they last met. + +Some people think that if they "keep everlastingly at it" they will +succeed, but this is not so. Working without a plan is as foolish as +going to sea without a compass. A ship which has broken its rudder in +mid-ocean may "keep everlastingly at it," may keep on a full head of +steam, driving about all the time, but it never arrives anywhere, it +never reaches any port unless by accident, and if it does find a haven, +its cargo may not be suited to the people, the climate, or conditions +among which it has accidentally drifted. The ship must be directed to +a definite port, for which its cargo is adapted, and where there is a +demand for it, and it must aim steadily for that port through sunshine +and storm, through tempest and fog. So a man who would succeed must +not drift about rudderless on the ocean of life. He must not only +steer straight toward his destined port when the ocean is smooth, when +the currents and winds serve, but he must keep his course in the very +teeth of the wind and the tempest, and even when enveloped in the fogs +of disappointment and mists of opposition. The Cunarders do not stop +for fogs or storms; they plow straight through the rough seas with only +one thing in view, their destined port, and no matter what the weather +is, no matter what obstacles they encounter, their arrival in port can +be predicted to within a few hours. It is practically certain, too, +that the ship destined for Boston will not turn up at Fort Sumter or at +Sandy Hook. + +On the prairies of South America there grows a flower that always +inclines in the same direction. If a traveler loses his way and has +neither compass nor chart, by turning to this flower he will find a +guide on which he can implicitly rely; for no matter how the rains +descend or the winds blow, its leaves point to the north. So there are +many men whose purposes are so well known, whose aims are so constant, +that no matter what difficulties they may encounter, or what opposition +they may meet, you can tell almost to a certainty where they will come +out. They may be delayed by head winds and counter currents, but they +will _always head for the port_ and will steer straight towards the +harbor. You know to a certainty that whatever else they may lose, they +will not lose their compass or rudder. + +Whatever may happen to a man of this stamp, even though his sails may +be swept away and his mast stripped to the deck, though he may be +wrecked by the storms of life, the needle of his compass will still +point to the North Star of his hope. Whatever comes, his life will not +be purposeless. Even a wreck that makes its port is a greater success +than a full-rigged ship with all its sails flying, with every mast and +rope intact; which merely drifts into an accidental harbor. + +To fix a wandering life and give it direction is not an easy task, but +a life which has no definite aim is sure to be frittered away in empty +and purposeless dreams. "Listless triflers," "busy idlers," +"purposeless busybodies," are seen everywhere. A healthy, definite +purpose is a remedy for a thousand ills which attend aimless lives. +Discontent, dissatisfaction, flee before a definite purpose. An aim +takes the drudgery out of life, scatters doubts to the winds, and +clears up the gloomiest creeds. What we do without a purpose +begrudgingly, with a purpose becomes a delight, and no work is well +done nor healthily done which is not enthusiastically done. It is just +that added element which makes work immortal. + +Mere energy is not enough, it must be concentrated on some steady, +unwavering aim. What is more common than "unsuccessful geniuses," or +failures with "commanding talents"? Indeed, "unrewarded genius" has +become a proverb. Every town has unsuccessful educated and talented +men. But education is of no value, talent is worthless, unless it can +do something, achieve something. Men who can do something at +everything, and a very little at anything, are not wanted in this age. +In Paris, a certain Monsieur Kenard announced himself as a "public +scribe, who digests accounts, explains the language of flowers, and +sells fried potatoes." Jacks-at-all-trades are at war with the genius +of the times. + +What this age wants is young men and women who can do one thing without +losing their identity or individuality, or becoming narrow, cramped, or +dwarfed. Nothing can take the place of an all-absorbing purpose; +education will not, genius will not, talent will not, industry will +not, will-power will not. The purposeless life must ever be a failure. +What good are powers, faculties, unless we can use them for a purpose? +What good would a chest of tools do a carpenter unless he could use +them? A college education, a head full of knowledge, are worth little +to the men who cannot use them to some definite end. + +The man without a purpose never leaves his mark upon the world. He has +no individuality; he is absorbed in the mass, lost in the crowd, weak, +wavering, incompetent. His outlines of individuality and angles of +character have been worn off, planed down to suit the common thought +until he has, as a man, been lost in the throng of humanity. + +"He who would do some great thing in this short life must apply himself +to the work with such a concentration of his forces as, to idle +spectators, who live only to amuse themselves, looks like insanity." + +What a great directness of purpose may be traced in the career of Pitt, +who lived--ay, and died--for the sake of political supremacy. From a +child, the idea was drilled into him that he must accomplish a public +career worthy of his illustrious father. Even from boyhood he bent all +his energy to this one great purpose. He went straight from college to +the House of Commons. In one year he was Chancellor of the Exchequer; +two years later he was Prime Minister of England, and reigned virtually +king for a quarter of a century. He was utterly oblivious of +everything outside his aim; insensible to the claims of love, art, +literature, living and steadily working for the sole purpose of +wielding the governing power of the nation. His whole soul was +absorbed in the overmastering passion for political power. + +"Consider, my lord," said Rowland Hill to the Prime Minister of +England, "that a letter to Ireland and the answer back would cost +thousands upon thousands of my affectionate countrymen more than a +fifth of their week's wages. If you shut the post office to them, +which you do now, you shut out warm hearts and generous affections from +home, kindred, and friends." The lad learned that it cost to carry a +letter from London to Edinburgh, four hundred and four miles, one +eighteenth of a cent, while the government charged for a simple folded +sheet of paper twenty-eight cents, and twice as much if there was the +smallest inclosure. Against the opposition and contempt of the +post-office department he at length carried his point, and on January +10, 1840, penny postage was established throughout Great Britain. Mr. +Hill was chosen to introduce the system, at a salary of fifteen hundred +pounds a year. His success was most encouraging, but at the end of two +years a Tory minister dismissed him without paying for his services, as +agreed. The public was indignant, and at once contributed sixty-five +thousand dollars; and, at the request of Queen Victoria, Parliament +voted him one hundred thousand dollars and ten thousand dollars a year +for life. + +Christ knew that one affection rules in man's life when he said, "No +man can serve two masters." One affection, one object, will be supreme +in us. Everything else will be neglected and done with half a heart. +One may have subordinate plans, but he can have but one supreme aim, +and from this aim all others will take their character. + +It is a great purpose which gives meaning to life, it unifies all our +powers, binds them together in one cable; makes strong and united what +was weak, separated, scattered. + +"Painting is my wife and my works are my children," replied Michael +Angelo when asked why he did not marry. + +"Smatterers" are weak and superficial. Of what use is a man who knows +a little of everything and not much of anything? It is the momentum of +constantly repeated acts that tells the story. "Let thine eyes look +straight before thee. Ponder the path of thy feet and let all thy ways +be established. Turn not to the right hand nor to the left." One +great secret of St. Paul's power lay in his strong purpose. Nothing +could daunt him, nothing intimidate. The Roman Emperor could not +muzzle him, the dungeon could not appall him, no prison suppress him, +obstacles could not discourage him. "This one thing I do" was written +all over his work. The quenchless zeal of his mighty purpose burned +its way down through the centuries, and its contagion will never cease +to fire the hearts of men. + +"Try and come home somebody," said the fond mother to Gambetta as she +sent him off to Paris to school. Poverty pinched this lad hard in his +little garret study and his clothes were shabby, but what of that? He +had made up his mind to get on in the world. For years this youth was +chained to his desk and worked like a hero. At last his opportunity +came. Jules Favre was to plead a great cause on a certain day; but, +being ill, he chose this young man, absolutely unknown, rough and +uncouth, to take his place. For many years Gambetta had been preparing +for such an opportunity, and he was equal to it, for he made one of the +greatest speeches that up to that time had ever been made in France. +That night all the papers in Paris were sounding the praises of this +ragged, uncouth Bohemian, and soon all France recognized him as the +Republican leader. This sudden rise was not due to luck or accident. +He had been steadfastly working and fighting his way up against +opposition and poverty for just such an occasion. Had he not been +equal to it, it would only have made him ridiculous. What a stride; +yesterday, poor and unknown, living in a garret, to-day, deputy elect, +in the city of Marseilles, and the great Republican leader! The +gossipers of France had never heard his name before. He had been +expelled from the priest-making seminary as totally unfit for a priest +and an utterly undisciplinable character. In two weeks, this ragged +son of an Italian grocer arose in the Chamber, and moved that the +Napoleon dynasty be disposed of and the Republic be declared +established. + +When Louis Napoleon had been defeated at Sedan and had delivered his +sword to William of Prussia, and when the Prussian army was marching on +Paris, the brave Gambetta went out of the besieged city in a balloon +barely grazed by the Prussian guns, landed in Amiens, and by almost +superhuman skill raised three armies of 800,000 men, provided for their +maintenance, and directed their military operations. A German officer +said, "This colossal energy is the most remarkable event of modern +history, and will carry down Gambetta's name to remote posterity." +This youth who was poring over his books in an attic while other youths +were promenading the Champs Élysées, although but thirty-two years old, +was now virtually dictator of France, and the greatest orator in the +Republic. What a striking example of the great reserve of personal +power, which, even in dissolute lives, is sometimes called out by a +great emergency or sudden sorrow, and ever after leads the life to +victory! When Gambetta found that his first speech had electrified all +France, his great reserve rushed to the front, he was suddenly weaned +from dissipation, and resolved to make his mark in the world. Nor did +he lose his head in his quick leap into fame. He still lived in the +upper room in the musty Latin quarter, and remained a poor man, without +stain of dishonor, though he might easily have made himself a +millionaire. When Gambetta died the "Figaro" said, "The Republic has +lost its greatest man." American boys should study this great man, for +he loved our country, and made our Republic the pattern for France. + +There is no grander sight in the world than that of a young man fired +with a great purpose, dominated by one unwavering aim. He is bound to +win; the world stands one side and lets him pass; it always makes way +for the man with a will in him. He does not have one half the +opposition to overcome that the undecided, purposeless man has who, +like driftwood, runs against all sorts of snags to which he must yield, +because he has no momentum to force them out of his way. What a +sublime spectacle it is to see a youth going straight to his goal, +cutting his way through difficulties, and surmounting obstacles, which +dishearten others, as though they were but stepping-stones! Defeat, +like a gymnasium, only gives him new power; opposition only doubles his +exertions, dangers only increase his courage. No matter what comes to +him, sickness, poverty, disaster, he never turns his eye from his goal. + +"Duos qui sequitur lepores, neutrum capit." + + + + +CHAPTER VII. + +SOWING AND REAPING. + +Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that +shall he also reap.--GALATIANS. + +Sow an act, and you reap a habit; sow a habit, and you reap a +character; sow a character, and you reap a destiny.--G. D. BOARDMAN. + +Just as the twig is bent the tree's inclined.--POPE. + +How use doth breed a habit in a man.--SHAKESPEARE. + + All habits gather, by unseen degrees, + As brooks make rivers, rivers run to seas. + DRYDEN. + +Infinite good comes from good habits which must result from the common +influence of example, intercourse, knowledge, and actual +experience--morality taught by good morals.--PLATO. + +The chains of habit are generally too small to be felt till they are +too strong to be broken.--SAMUEL JOHNSON. + +Man is first startled by sin; then it becomes pleasing, then easy, then +delightful, then frequent, then habitual, then confirmed. Then man is +impenitent, then obstinate, then he is damned.--JEREMY TAYLOR. + +"Rogues differ little. Each began as a disobedient son." + +In the great majority of things, habit is a greater plague than ever +afflicted Egypt.--JOHN FOSTER. + +You cannot in any given case, by any sudden and single effort, will to +be true if the habit of your life has been insincere.--F. W. ROBERTSON. + + The tissue of the life to be, + We weave with colors all our own; + And in the field of destiny, + We reap as we have sown. + WHITTIER. + + +"Gentlemen of the jury, you will now consider your verdict," said the +great lawyer, Lord Tenterden, as he roused from his lethargy a moment, +and then closed his eyes forever. "Tête d'armée" (head of the army), +murmured Napoleon faintly; and then, "on the wings of a tempest that +raged with unwonted fury, up to the throne of the only power that +controlled him while he lived, went the fiery soul of that wonderful +warrior." "Give Dayrolles a chair," said the dying Chesterfield with +his old-time courtesy, and the next moment his spirit spread its wings. +"Young man, keep your record clean," thrilled from the lips of John B. +Gough as he sank to rise no more. What power over the mind of man is +exercised by the dominant idea of his life "that parts not quite with +parting breath!" It has shaped his purpose throughout his earthly +career, and he passes into the Great Unknown, moving in the direction +of his ideal; impelled still, amid the utter retrocession of the vital +force, by all the momentum resulting from his weight of character and +singleness of aim. + + * * * * * * + +[Illustration: VICTOR HUGO] + +"Every one is the son of his own works." + +"Cast forth thy act, thy word, into the ever-living, ever-working +universe: it is seed-grain that cannot die." + + * * * * * * + + "It is a beautiful arrangement in the mental and +moral economy of our nature, that that which is performed as a duty +may, by frequent repetitions, become a habit, and the habit of stern +virtue, so repulsive to others, may hang around the neck like a wreath +of flowers." + +Cholera appeared mysteriously in Toulon, and, after a careful +examination, the medical inspectors learned that the first victims were +two sailors on the Montebello, a government transport, long out of +service, anchored at the entrance to the port. For many years the +vessel had been used for storing old, disused military equipments. +Some of these had belonged to French soldiers who had died before +Sebastopol. The doctors learned that the two poor sailors were seized, +suddenly and mortally, a few days after displacing a pile of equipments +stored deep in the hold of the Montebello. The cholera of Toulon came +in a direct line from the hospital of Varna. It went to sleep, +apparently gorged, on a heap of the cast-off garments of its victims, +to awaken thirty years later to victorious and venomous life. + +Professor Bonelli, of Turin, punctured an animal with the tooth of a +rattlesnake. The head of this serpent had lain in a dry state for +sixteen years exposed to the air and dust, and, moreover, had +previously been preserved more than thirty years in spirits of wine. +To his great astonishment an hour afterward the animal died. So +habits, good or bad, that have been lost sight of for years will spring +into a new life to aid or injure us at some critical moment, as kernels +of wheat which had been clasped in a mummy's hand four thousand years +sprang into life when planted. They only awaited moisture, heat, +sunlight, and air to develop them. + +In Jefferson's play, Rip Van Winkle, after he had "sworn off," at every +invitation to drink said, "Well, this time don't count." True, as +Professor James says, he may not have counted it, as thousands of +others have not counted it, and a kind heaven may not count it, but it +is being counted none the less. Down among his nerve cells and fibres +the molecules are counting it, registering and storing it up to be used +against him when the next temptation comes. Nothing we ever do is in +strict scientific literalness wiped out. There is a tendency in the +nervous system to repeat the same mode of action at regularly recurring +intervals. Dr. Combe says that all nervous diseases have a marked +tendency to observe regular periods. "If we repeat any kind of mental +effort at the same hour daily, we at length find ourselves entering +upon it without premeditation when the time approaches." + +"The great thing in all education is to make our nervous system our +ally instead of our enemy. It is to fund and capitalize our +acquisition, and live at ease upon the interest of the fund. For this +we must make automatic and habitual, as soon as possible, as many +useful actions as we can, and guard against the growing into ways that +are likely to be disadvantageous to us, as we would guard against the +plague." + +The nervous system is a living phonograph, infinitely more marvelous +than that of Edison. No sound, however feeble, however slight, can +escape being recorded in its wonderful mechanism. Although the +molecules of this living machine may all be entirely changed many times +during a lifetime, yet these impressions are never erased or lost. +They become forever fixed in the character. Like Rip Van Winkle, the +youth may say to himself, I will do this just once "just to see what it +is like," no one will ever know it, and "I won't count this time." The +country youth says it when he goes to the city. The young man says it +when he drinks "just to be social." Americans, who are good church +people at home, say it when in Paris and Vienna. Yes, "just to see +what it is like" has ruined many a noble life. Many a man has lost his +balance and fallen over the precipice into the sink of iniquity while +just attempting "to see what it was like." "If you have been pilot on +these waters twenty-five years," said a young man to the captain of a +steamer, "you must know every rock and sandbank in the river." "No, I +don't, but I know where the deep water is." + +Just one little lie to help me out of this difficulty; "I won't count +this." Just one little embezzlement; no one will know it, and I can +return the money before it will be needed. Just one little indulgence; +I won't count it, and a good night's sleep will make me all right +again. Just one small part of my work slighted; it won't make any +great difference, and, besides, I am usually so careful that a little +thing like this ought not to be counted. + +But, my young friend, it will be counted, whether you will or not; the +deed has been recorded with an iron pen, even to the smallest detail. +The Recording Angel is no myth; it is found in ourselves. Its name is +Memory, and it holds everything. We think we have forgotten thousands +of things until mortal danger, fever, or some other great stimulus +reproduces them to the consciousness with all the fidelity of +photographs. Sometimes all one's past life will seem to pass before +him in an instant; but at all times it is really, although +unconsciously, passing before him in the sentiments he feels, in the +thoughts he thinks, in the impulses that move him apparently without +cause. + + "Our acts our angels are, or good or ill, + Our fatal shadows that walk by us still." + + +In a fable one of the Fates spun filaments so fine that they were +invisible, and she became a victim of her cunning, for she was bound to +the spot by these very threads. + +Father Schoenmaker, missionary to the Indians, tried for years to +implant civilization among the wild tribes. After fifteen years' labor +he induced a chief to lay aside his blanket, the token of savagery; but +he goes on to say, "It took fifteen years to get it off, and just +fifteen minutes to get it on him again." + +Physiologists say that dark-colored stripes similar to those on the +zebra reappear, after a hundred or a thousand generations, on the legs +and shoulders of horses, asses, and mules. Large birds on sea islands +where there are no beasts to molest them lose the power of flight. + +After a criminal's head had been cut off his breast was irritated, and +he raised his hands several times as if to brush away the exciting +cause. It was said that the cheek of Charlotte Corday blushed on being +struck by a rude soldier after the head had been severed from the body. + +Humboldt found in South America a parrot which was the only living +creature that could speak a word of the language of a lost tribe. The +bird retained the habit of speech after his teachers had died. + +Caspar Hauser was confined, probably from birth, in a dungeon where no +light or sound from the outer world, could reach him. At seventeen he +was still a mental infant, crying and chattering without much apparent +intelligence. When released, the light was disagreeable to his eyes; +and, after the babbling youth had been taught to speak a few words, he +begged to be taken back to the dungeon. Only cold and dismal silence +seemed to satisfy him. All that gave pleasure to others gave his +perverted senses only pain. The sweetest music was a source of anguish +to him, and he could eat only his black crust without violent vomiting. + +Deep in the very nature of animate existence is that principle of +facility and inclination, acquired by repetition, which we call habit. +Man becomes a slave to his constantly repeated acts. In spite of the +protests of his weakened will the trained nerves continue to repeat the +acts even when the doer abhors them. What he at first chooses, at last +compels. Man is as irrevocably chained to his deeds as the atoms are +chained by gravitation. You can as easily snatch a pebble from +gravitation's grasp as you can separate the minutest act of life from +its inevitable effect upon character and destiny. "Children may be +strangled," says George Eliot, "but deeds never, they have an +indestructible life." The smirched youth becomes the tainted man. + +Practically all the achievements of the human race are but the +accomplishments of habit. We speak of the power of Gladstone to +accomplish so much in a day as something marvelous; but when we analyze +that power we find it composed very largely of the results of habit. +His mighty momentum has been rendered possible only by the law of the +power of habit. He is now a great bundle of habits, which all his life +have been forming. His habit of industry no doubt was irksome and +tedious at first, but, practiced so conscientiously and persistently, +it has gained such momentum as to astonish the world. His habit of +thinking, close, persistent, and strong, has made him a power. He +formed the habit of accurate, keen observation, allowing nothing to +escape his attention, until he could observe more in half a day in +London than a score of men who have eyes but see not. Thus he has +multiplied himself many times. By this habit of accuracy he has +avoided many a repetition; and so, during his lifetime, he has saved +years of precious time, which many others, who marvel at his +achievements, have thrown away. + +Gladstone early formed the habit of cheerfulness, of looking on the +bright side of things, which, Sydney Smith says, "is worth a thousand +pounds a year." This again has saved him enormous waste of energy, as +he tells us he has never yet been kept awake a single hour by any +debate or business in Parliament. This loss of energy has wasted years +of many a useful life, which might have been saved by forming the +economizing habit of cheerfulness. + +The habit of happy thought would transform the commonest life into +harmony and beauty. The will is almost omnipotent to determine habits +which virtually are omnipotent. The habit of directing a firm and +steady will upon those things which tend to produce harmony of thought +would produce happiness and contentment even in the most lowly +occupations. The will, rightly drilled, can drive out all discordant +thoughts, and produce a reign of perpetual harmony. Our trouble is +that we do not half will. After a man's habits are well set, about all +he can do is to sit by and observe which way he is going. Regret it as +he may, how helpless is a weak man bound by the mighty cable of habit, +twisted from the tiny threads of single acts which he thought were +absolutely within his control! + +Drop a stone down a precipice. By the law of gravitation it sinks with +rapidly increasing momentum. If it falls sixteen feet the first +second, it will fall forty-eight feet the next second, and eighty feet +the third second, and one hundred and forty-four feet the fifth second, +and if it falls for ten seconds it will in the last second rush through +three hundred and four feet till earth stops it. Habit is cumulative. +After each act of our lives we are not the same person as before, but +quite another, better or worse, but not the same. There has been +something added to, or deducted from, our weight of character. + +"There is no fault nor folly of my life," said Ruskin; "that does not +rise against me and take away my joy, and shorten my power of +possession, of sight, of understanding; and every past effort of my +life, every gleam of righteousness or good in it, is with me now to +help me in my grasp of this hour and its vision." + +"Many men of genius have written worse scrawls than I do," said a boy +at Rugby when his teacher remonstrated with him for his bad penmanship; +"it is not worth while to worry about so trivial a fault." Ten years +later, when he had become an officer in the Crimea, his illegible copy +of an order caused the loss of many brave men. + +"Resist beginning" was an ancient motto which is needed in our day. +The folly of the child becomes the vice of the youth, and then the +crime of the man. + +In 1880 one hundred and forty-seven of the eight hundred and +ninety-seven inmates of Auburn State Prison were there on a second +visit. What brings the prisoner back the second, third, or fourth +time? It is habit which drives him on to commit the deed which his +heart abhors and which his very soul loathes. It is the momentum made +up from a thousand deviations from the truth and right, for there is a +great difference between going just right and a little wrong. It is +the result of that mysterious power which the repeated act has of +getting itself repeated again and again. + +When a woman was dying from the effects of her husband's cruelty and +debauchery from drink she asked him to come to her bedside, and pleaded +with him again for the sake of their children to drink no more. +Grasping his hand with her thin, long fingers, she made him promise +her: "Mary, I will drink no more till I take it out of this hand which +I hold in mine." That very night he poured out a tumbler of brandy, +stole into the room where she lay cold in her coffin, put the tumbler +into her withered hand, and then took it out and drained it to the +bottom. John B. Gough told this as a true story. How powerless a man +is in the presence of a mighty habit, which has robbed him of +will-power, of self-respect, of everything manly, until he becomes its +slave! + +Walpole tells of a gambler who fell at the table in a fit of apoplexy, +and his companions began to bet upon his chances of recovery. When the +physician came they refused to let him bleed the man because they said +it would affect the bet. When President Garfield was hanging between +life and death men bet heavily upon the issue, and even sold pools. + +No disease causes greater horror or dread than cholera; yet when it is +once fastened upon a victim he is perfectly indifferent, and wonders at +the solicitude of his friends. His tears are dried; he cannot weep if +he would. His body is cold and clammy and feels like dead flesh, yet +he tells you he is warm, and calls for ice water. Have you never seen +similar insensibility to danger in those whose habits are already +dragging them to everlasting death? + +Etherized by the fascinations of pleasure, we are often unconscious of +pain while the devil amputates the fingers, the feet and hands, or even +the arms and legs of our character. But oh, the anguish that visits +the sad heart when the lethe passes away, and the soul becomes +conscious of virtue sacrificed, of manhood lost. + +The leper is often the last to suspect his danger, for the disease is +painless in its early stages. A leading lawyer and public official in +the Sandwich Islands once overturned a lighted lamp on his hand, and +was surprised to find that it caused no pain. At last it dawned upon +his mind that he was a leper. He resigned his offices and went to the +leper's island, where he died. So sin in its early stages is not only +painless but often even pleasant. + +The hardening, deadening power of depraving habits and customs was +strikingly illustrated by the Romans. + +Under Nero, the taste of the people had become so debauched and morbid +that no mere representation of tragedy would satisfy them. Their +cold-blooded selfishness, the hideous realism of "a refined, delicate, +aesthetic age," demanded that the heroes should actually be killed on +the stage. The debauched and sanguinary Romans reckoned life worthless +without the most thrilling experiences of horror or delight. Tragedy +must be genuine bloodshed, comedy, actual shame. When "The +Conflagration" was represented on the stage they demanded that a house +be actually burned and the furniture plundered. When "Laureolus" was +played they demanded that the actor be really crucified and mangled by +a bear, and he had to fling himself down and deluge the stage with his +own blood. Prometheus must be really chained to his rock, and Dirce in +very fact be tossed and gored by the wild bull, and Orpheus be torn to +pieces by a real bear, and Icarus was compelled to fly, even though it +was known he would be dashed to death. When the heroism of "Mucius +Scaevola" was represented, a real criminal was compelled to thrust his +hand into the flame without a murmur, and stand motionless while it was +being burned. Hercules was compelled to ascend the funeral pyre, and +there be burned alive. The poor slaves and criminals were compelled to +play their parts heroically until the flames enveloped them. + +The pirate Gibbs, who was executed in New York, said that when he +robbed the first vessel his conscience made a hell in his bosom; but +after he had sailed for years under the black flag, he could rob a +vessel and murder all the crew, and lie down and sleep soundly. A man +may so accustom himself to error as to become its most devoted slave, +and be led to commit the most fearful crimes in order to defend it, or +to propagate it. + +When Gordon, the celebrated California stage-driver, was dying, he put +his foot out of the bed and swung it to and fro. When asked why he did +so, he replied, "I am on the down grade and cannot get my foot on the +brake." + +In our great museums you see stone slabs with the marks of rain that +fell hundreds of years before Adam lived, and the footprint of some +wild bird that passed across the beach in those olden times. The +passing shower and the light foot left their prints on the soft +sediment; then ages went on, and the sediment hardened into stone; and +there the prints remain, and will remain forever. So the child, so +soft, so susceptible to all impressions, so joyous to receive new +ideas, treasures them all up, gathers them all into itself, and retains +them forever. + +A tribe of Indians attacked a white settlement and murdered the few +inhabitants. A woman of the tribe, however, carried away a very young +infant, and reared it as her own. The child grew up with the Indian +children, different in complexion, but like them in everything else. +To scalp the greatest possible number of enemies was, in his view, the +most glorious thing in the world. While he was still a youth he was +seen by some white traders, and by them conducted back to civilized +life. He showed great relish for his new life, and especially a strong +desire for knowledge and a sense of reverence which took the direction +of religion, so that he desired to become a clergyman. He went through +his college course with credit, and was ordained. He fulfilled his +function well, and appeared happy and satisfied. After a few years he +went to serve in a settlement somewhere near the seat of war which was +then going on between Britain and the United States, and before long +there was fighting not far off. He went forth in his usual +dress--black coat and neat white shirt and neckcloth. When he returned +he was met by a gentleman of his acquaintance, who was immediately +struck by an extraordinary change in the expression of his face and the +flush on his cheek, and also by his unusually shy and hurried manner. +After asking news of the battle the gentleman observed, "But you are +wounded?" "No." "Not wounded! Why, there is blood upon the bosom of +your shirt!" The young man quickly crossed his hands firmly upon his +breast; and his friend, supposing that he wished to conceal a wound +which ought to be looked to, pulled open his shirt, and saw--what made +the young man let fall his hands in despair. From between his shirt +and his breast the friend took out--a bloody scalp! "I could not help +it," said the poor victim of early habits, in an agonized voice. He +turned and ran, too swiftly to be overtaken, betook himself to the +Indians, and never more appeared among the whites. + +An Indian once brought up a young lion, and finding him weak and +harmless, did not attempt to control him. Every day the lion gained in +strength and became more unmanageable, until at last, when excited by +rage, he fell upon his master and tore him to pieces. So what seemed +to be an "innocent" sin has grown until it strangled him who was once +its easy master. + +Beware of looking at sin, for at each view it is apt to become better +looking. + +Habit is practically, for a middle-aged person, fate; for is it not +practically certain that what I have done for twenty years I shall +repeat to-day? What are the chances for a man who has been lazy and +indolent all his life starting in to-morrow morning to be industrious; +or a spendthrift, frugal; a libertine, virtuous; a profane, +foul-mouthed man, clean and chaste? + +A Grecian flute-player charged double fees for pupils who had been +taught by inferior masters, on the ground that it was much harder to +undo than to form habits. + +Habit tends to make us permanently what we are for the moment. We +cannot possibly hear, see, feel, or experience anything which is not +woven in the web of character. What we are this minute and what we do +this minute, what we think this minute, will be read in the future +character as plainly as words spoken into the phonograph can be +reproduced in the future. + +"The air itself," says Babbage, "is one vast library on whose pages are +written forever all that man has ever said, whispered, or done." Every +sin you ever committed becomes your boon companion. It rushes to your +lips every time you speak, and drags its hideous form into your +imagination every time you think. It throws its shadow across your +path whichever way you turn. Like Banquo's ghost, it will not down. +You are fastened to it for life, and it will cling to you in the vast +forever. Do you think yourself free? You are a slave to every sin you +ever committed. They follow your pen and work their own character into +every word you write. + +Rectitude is only the confirmed habit of doing what is right. Some men +cannot tell a lie: the habit of truth telling is fixed, it has become +incorporated with their nature. Their characters bear the indelible +stamp of veracity. You and I know men whose slightest word is +unimpeachable; nothing could shake our confidence in them. There are +other men who cannot speak the truth: their habitual insincerity has +made a twist in their characters, and this twist appears in their +speech. + +"I never in my life committed more than one act of folly," said +Rulhière one day in the presence of Talleyrand. "But where will it +end?" inquired the latter. It was lifelong. One mistake too many +makes all the difference between safety and destruction. + +How many men would like to go to sleep beggars and wake up Rothschilds +or Astors? How many would fain go to bed dunces and wake up Solomons? +You reap what you have sown. Those who have sown dunce-seed, +vice-seed, laziness-seed, always get a crop. They that sow the wind +shall reap the whirlwind. + +Habit, like a child, repeats whatever is done before it. Oh, the power +of a repeated act to get itself repeated again and again! But, like +the wind, it is a power which we can use to force our way in its very +teeth as does the ship, and thus multiply our strength, or we can drift +with it without exertion upon the rocks and shoals of destruction. + +What a great thing it is to "start right" in life. Every young man can +see that the first steps lead to the last, with all except his own. +No, his little prevarications and dodgings will not make him a liar, +but he can see that they surely will in John Smith's case. He can see +that others are idle and on the road to ruin, but cannot see it in his +own case. + +There is a wonderful relation between bad habits. They all belong to +the same family. If you take in one, no matter how small or +insignificant it may seem, you will soon have the whole. A man who has +formed the habit of laziness or idleness will soon be late at his +engagements; a man who does not meet his engagements will dodge, +apologize, prevaricate, and lie. I have rarely known a perfectly +truthful man who was always behind time. + +You have seen a ship out in the bay swinging with the tide and the +waves; the sails are all up, and you wonder why it does not move, but +it cannot, for down beneath the water it is anchored. So we often see +a young man apparently well equipped, well educated, and we wonder that +he does not advance toward manhood and character. But, alas! we find +that he is anchored to some secret vice, and he can never advance until +he cuts loose. + + "The first crime past compels us into more, + And guilt grows _fate_ that was but _choice_ before." + + "Small habits, well pursued betimes, + May reach the dignity of crimes." + + +Thousands can sympathize with David when he cried, "My sins have taken +such hold upon me that I am not able to look up; my heart faileth me." +Like the damned spot of blood on Lady Macbeth's hand, these foul spots +on the imagination will not out. What a penalty nature exacts for +physical sins. The gods are just, and "of our pleasant vices make +instruments to plague us." + +Plato wrote over his door, "Let no one ignorant of geometry enter +here." The greatest value of the study of the classics and mathematics +comes from the habits of accurate and concise thought which it induces. +The habit-forming portion of life is the dangerous period, and we need +the discipline of close application to hold us outside of our studies. + +Washington at thirteen wrote one hundred and ten maxims of civility and +good behavior, and was most careful in the formation of all habits. +Franklin, too, devised a plan of self-improvement and character +building. No doubt the noble characters of these two men, almost +superhuman in their excellence, are the natural result of their early +care and earnest striving towards perfection. + +Fielding, describing a game of cards between Jonathan Wild, of +pilfering propensities, and a professional gambler, says: "Such was the +power of habit over the minds of these illustrious persons, that Mr. +Wild could not keep his hands out of the count's pockets, though he +knew they were empty; nor could the count abstain from palming a card, +though he was well aware Mr. Wild had no money to pay him." + +"Habit," says Montaigne, "is a violent and treacherous schoolmistress. +She, by little and little, slyly and unperceived, slips in the foot of +her authority, but having by this gentle and humble beginning, with the +aid of time, fixed and established it, she then unmasks a furious and +tyrannic countenance against which we have no more the courage nor the +power so much as to lift up our eyes." It led a New York man actually +to cut off his hand with a cleaver under a test of what he would resort +to, to get a glass of whiskey. It has led thousands of nature's +noblemen to drunkards' and libertines' graves. + +Gough's life is a startling illustration of the power of habit, and of +the ability of one apparently a hopeless slave to break his fetters and +walk a free man in the sunlight of heaven. He came to America when +nine years old. Possessed of great powers of song, of mimicry, and of +acting, and exceedingly social in his tastes, a thousand temptations + + "Widened and strewed with flowers the way + Down to eternal ruin." + + +"I would give this right hand to redeem those terrible seven years of +dissipation and death," he would often say in after years when, with +his soul still scarred and battered from his conflict with blighting +passion, he tearfully urged young men to free themselves from the +chains of bestial habits. + +In the laboratory of Faraday a workman one day knocked into a jar of +acid a silver cup; it disappeared, was eaten up by the acid, and could +not be found. The question came up whether it could ever be found. +The great chemist came in and put certain chemicals into the jar, and +every particle of the silver was precipitated to the bottom. The mass +was then sent to a silversmith, and the cup restored. So a precious +youth who has fallen into the sink of iniquity, lost, dissolved in sin, +can only be restored by the Great Chemist. + +What is put into the first of life is put into the whole of life. "Out +of a church of twenty-seven hundred members, I have never had to +exclude a single one who was received while a child," said Spurgeon. +It is the earliest sin that exercises the most influence for evil. + +Benedict Arnold was the only general in the Revolution that disgraced +his country. He had great military talent, wonderful energy, and a +courage equal to any emergency. But Arnold _did not start right_. +Even when a boy he was despised for his cruelty and his selfishness. +He delighted in torturing insects and birds that he might watch their +sufferings. He scattered pieces of glass and sharp tacks on the floor +of the shop he was tending, to cut the feet of the barefooted boys. +Even in the army, in spite of his bravery, the soldiers hated him, and +the officers dared not trust him. + + Let no man trust the first false step + Of guilt; it hangs upon a precipice, + Whose steep descent in last perdition ends. + YOUNG + + +Years ago there was a district lying near Westminster Abbey, London, +called the "Devil's Acre,"--a school for vicious habits, where +depravity was universal; where professional beggars were fitted with +all the appliances of imposture; where there was an agency for the hire +of children to be carried about by forlorn widows and deserted wives, +to move the compassion of street-giving benevolence; where young +pickpockets were trained in the art and mystery which was to conduct +them in due course to an expensive voyage for the good of their country +to Botany Bay. + +Victor Hugo describes a strange association of men in the seventeenth +century who bought children and distorted and made monstrosities of +them to amuse the nobility with; and in cultured Boston there is an +association of so-called "respectable men," who have opened thousands +of "places of business" for deforming men, women, and children's souls. +But we deform ourselves with agencies so pleasant that we think we are +having a good time, until we become so changed and enslaved that we +scarcely recognize ourselves. Vice, the pleasant guest which we first +invited into our heart's parlor, becomes vulgarly familiar, and +intrenches herself deep in our very being. We ask her to leave, but +she simply laughs at us from the hideous wrinkles she has made in our +faces, and refuses to go. Our secret sins defy us from the hideous +furrows they have cut in our cheeks. Each impure thought has chiseled +its autograph deep into the forehead, too deep for erasure, and the +glassy, bleary eye adds its testimony to our ruined character. + +The devil does not apply his match to the hard coal; but he first +lights the shavings of "innocent sins," and the shavings the wood, and +the wood the coal. Sin is gradual. It does not break out on a man +until it has long circulated through his system. Murder, adultery, +theft, are not committed in deed until they have been committed in +thought again and again. + +"Don't write there," said a man to a boy who was writing with a diamond +pin on a pane of glass in the window of a hotel. "Why not?" inquired +the boy. "Because you can't rub it out." Yet the glass might have +been broken and all trace of the writing lost, but things written upon +the human soul can never be removed, for the tablet is immortal. + +"In all the wide range of accepted British maxims," said Thomas Hughes, +"there is none, take it all in all, more thoroughly abominable than +this one, as to the sowing of wild oats. Look at it on what side you +will, and I defy you to make anything but a devil's maxim of it. What +man, be he young, old, or middle-aged, sows, that, and nothing else, +shall he reap. The only thing to do with wild oats is to put them +carefully into the hottest part of the fire, and get them burnt to +dust, every seed of them. If you sow them, no matter in what ground, +up they will come with long, tough roots and luxuriant stalks and +leaves, as sure as there is a sun in heaven. The devil, too, whose +special crop they are, will see that they thrive, and you, and nobody +else, will have to reap them." + + We scatter seeds with careless hand, + And dream we ne'er shall see them more; + But for a thousand years + Their fruit appears, + In weeds that mar the land. + JOHN KEBLE. + + +Theodora boasted that she could draw Socrates' disciples away from him. +"That may be," said the philosopher, "for you lead them down an easy +descent whereas I am forcing them to mount to virtue--an arduous ascent +and unknown to most men." + +"When I am told of a sickly student," said Daniel Wise, "that he is +'studying himself to death,' or of a feeble young mechanic, or clerk, +that his hard work is destroying him, I study his countenance, and +there, too often, read the real, melancholy truth in his dull, averted, +sunken eye, discolored skin, and timid manner. These signs proclaim +that the young man is in some way violating the laws of his physical +nature. He is secretly destroying himself. Yet, say his unconscious +and admiring friends, 'He is falling a victim to his own diligence!' +Most lame and impotent conclusion! He is sapping the very source of +life, and erelong will be a mind in ruins or a heap of dust. Young +man, beware of his example! 'Keep thyself pure;' observe the laws of +your physical nature, and the most unrelaxing industry will never rob +you of a month's health, nor shorten the thread of your life; for +industry and health are companions, and long life is the heritage of +diligence." + + "How shall I a habit break?" + As you did that habit make. + As you gathered, you must lose; + As you yielded, now refuse. + Thread by thread the strands we twist + Till they bind us neck and wrist. + Thread by thread the patient hand + Must untwine ere free we stand. + As we builded, stone by stone, + We must toil, unhelped, alone, + Till the wall is overthrown. + + But remember, as we try, + Lighter every test goes by; + Wading in, the stream grows deep + Toward the centre's downward sweep; + Backward turn, each step ashore + Shallower is than that before. + + Ah, the precious years we waste + Leveling what we raised in haste; + Doing what must be undone, + Ere content or love be won! + First across the gulf we cast + Kite-borne threads till lines are passed, + And habit builds the bridge at last. + JOHN BOYLE O'REILLY. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII. + +SELF-HELP. + +I learned that no man in God's wide earth is either willing or able to +help any other man.--PESTALOZZI. + +What I am I have made myself.--HUMPHRY DAVY. + +Be sure, my son, and remember that the best men always make +themselves.--PATRICK HENRY. + + Hereditary bondsmen, know ye not + Who would be free themselves must strike the blow? + BYRON. + +God gives every bird its food, but he does not throw it into the +nest.--J. G. HOLLAND. + +Never forget that others will depend upon you, and that you cannot +depend upon them.--DUMAS, FILS. + +Our remedies oft in ourselves do lie, which we ascribe to +Heaven.--SHAKESPEARE. + +The best education in the world is that got by struggling to obtain a +living.--WENDELL PHILLIPS. + +Every person has two educations, one which he receives from others, and +one, more important, which he gives himself.--GIBBON. + +What the superior man seeks is in himself: what the small man seeks is +in others.--CONFUCIUS. + + Who waits to have his task marked out, + Shall die and leave his errand unfulfilled. + LOWELL. + + In battle or business, whatever the game, + In law, or in love, it's ever the same: + In the struggle for power, or scramble for pelf, + Let this be your motto, "Rely on yourself." + SAXE. + + Let every eye negotiate for itself, + And trust no agent. + SHAKESPEARE. + + +"Colonel Crockett makes room for himself!" exclaimed a backwoods +congressman in answer to the exclamation of the White House usher to +"Make room for Colonel Crockett!" This remarkable man was not afraid +to oppose the head of a great nation. He preferred being right to +being president. Though rough, uncultured, and uncouth, Crockett was a +man of great courage and determination. + +Garfield was the youngest member of the House of Representatives when +he entered, but he had not been in his seat sixty days before his +ability was recognized and his place conceded. He stepped to the front +with the confidence of one who belonged there. He succeeded because +all the world in concert could not have kept him in the background, and +because when once in the front he played his part with an intrepidity +and a commanding ease that were but the outward evidences of the +immense reserves of energy on which it was in his power to draw. + +[Illustration: James A. Garfield (missing from book)] + +"Take the place and attitude which belong to you," says Emerson, "and +all men acquiesce. The world must be just. It leaves every man with +profound unconcern to set his own rate." + +Grant was no book soldier. Some of his victories were contrary to all +instructions in military works. He did not dare to disclose his plan +to invest Vicksburg, and he even cut off all communication on the +Mississippi River for seven days that no orders could reach him from +General Halleck, his superior officer; for he knew that Halleck went by +books, and he was proceeding contrary to all military theories. He was +making a greater military history than had ever been written up to that +time. He was greater than all books of tactics. The consciousness of +power is everything. That man is strongest who owes most to himself. + +"Man, it is within yourself," says Pestalozzi, "it is in the inner +sense of your power that resides nature's instrument for your +development." + +Richard Arkwright, the thirteenth child, in a hovel, with no education, +no chance, gave his spinning model to the world, and put a sceptre in +England's right hand such as the queen never wielded. + +"A person under the firm persuasion that he can command resources +virtually has them," says Livy. + +Solario, a wandering gypsy tinker, fell deeply in love with the +daughter of the painter Coll' Antonio del Fiore, but was told that no +one but a painter as good as the father should wed the maiden. "Will +you give me ten years to learn to paint, and so entitle myself to the +hand of your daughter?" Consent was given, Coll' Antonio thinking that +he would never be troubled further by the gypsy. About the time that +the ten years were to end the king's sister showed Coll' Antonio a +Madonna and Child, which the painter extolled in terms of the highest +praise. Judge of his surprise on learning that Solario was the artist. +But later, his son-in-law surprised him even more by his rare skill. + +Louis Philippe said he was the only sovereign in Europe fit to govern, +for he could black his own boots. + +When asked to name his family coat-of-arms, a self-made President of +the United States replied, "A pair of shirtsleeves." + +"Poverty is uncomfortable, as I can testify," said James A. Garfield; +"but nine times out of ten the best thing that can happen to a young +man is to be tossed overboard and compelled to sink or swim for +himself. In all my acquaintance I have never known a man to be drowned +who was worth the saving." + +It is not the men who have inherited most, except it be in nobility of +soul and purpose, who have risen highest; but rather the men with no +"start" who have won fortunes, and have made adverse circumstances a +spur to goad them up the steep mount, where + + "Fame's proud temple shines afar." + +To such men, every possible goal is accessible, and honest ambition has +no height that genius or talent may tread, which has not felt the +impress of their feet. + +You may leave your millions to your son, but have you really given him +anything? You cannot transfer the discipline, the experience, the +power which the acquisition has given you; you cannot transfer the +delight of achieving, the joy felt only in growth, the pride of +acquisition, the character which trained habits of accuracy, method, +promptness, patience, dispatch, honesty of dealing, politeness of +manner have developed. You cannot transfer the skill, sagacity, +prudence, foresight, which lie concealed in your wealth. It meant a +great deal for you, but means nothing to your heir. In climbing to +your fortune, you developed the muscle, stamina, and strength which +enabled you to maintain your lofty position, to keep your millions +intact. You had the power which comes only from experience, and which +alone enables you to stand firm on your dizzy height. Your fortune was +experience to you, joy, growth, discipline, and character; to him it +will be a temptation, an anxiety, which will probably dwarf him. It +was wings to you, it will be a dead weight to him; it was education to +you and expansion of your highest powers; to him it may mean inaction, +lethargy, indolence, weakness, ignorance. You have taken the priceless +spur--necessity--away from him, the spur which has goaded man to nearly +all the great achievements in the history of the world. + +You thought it a kindness to deprive yourself in order that your son +might begin where you left off. You thought to spare him the drudgery, +the hardships, the deprivations, the lack of opportunities, the meagre +education, which you had on the old farm. But you have put a crutch +into his hand instead of a staff; you have taken away from him the +incentive to self-development, to self-elevation, to self-discipline +and self-help, without which no real success, no real happiness, no +great character is ever possible. His enthusiasm will evaporate, his +energy will be dissipated, his ambition, not being stimulated by the +struggle for self-elevation, will gradually die away. If you do +everything for your son and fight his battles for him, you will have a +weakling on your hands at twenty-one. + +"My life is a wreck," said the dying Cyrus W. Field, "my fortune gone, +my home dishonored. Oh, I was so unkind to Edward when I thought I was +being kind. If I had only had firmness enough to compel my boys to +earn their living, then they would have known the meaning of money." +His table was covered with medals and certificates of honor from many +nations, in recognition of his great work for civilization in mooring +two continents side by side in thought, of the fame he had won and +could never lose. But grief shook the sands of life as he thought only +of the son who had brought disgrace upon a name before unsullied, the +wounds were sharper than those of a serpent's tooth. + +During the great financial crisis of 1857 Maria Mitchell, who was +visiting England, asked an English lady what became of daughters when +no property was left them. "They live on their brothers," was the +reply. "But what becomes of the American daughters," asked the English +lady, "when there is no money left?" "They earn it," was the reply. + +Men who have been bolstered up all their lives are seldom good for +anything in a crisis. When misfortune comes, they look around for +somebody to lean upon. If the prop is not there down they go. Once +down, they are as helpless as capsized turtles, or unhorsed men in +armor. Many a frontier boy has succeeded beyond all his expectations +simply because all props were knocked out from under him and he was +obliged to stand upon his own feet. + +"A man's best friends are his ten fingers," said Robert Collyer, who +brought his wife to America in the steerage. Young men who are always +looking for something to lean upon never amount to anything. + +There is no manhood mill which takes in boys and turns out men. What +you call "no chance" may be your "only chance." Don't wait for your +place to be made for you; make it yourself. Don't wait for somebody to +give you a lift; lift yourself. Henry Ward Beecher did not wait for a +call to a big church with a large salary. He accepted the first +pastorate offered him, in a little town near Cincinnati. He became +literally the light of the church, for he trimmed the lamps, kindled +the fires, swept the rooms, and rang the bell. His salary was only +about $200 a year,--but he knew that a fine church and great salary +cannot make a great man. It was work and opportunity that he wanted. +He felt that if there was anything in him work would bring it out. + +"Physiologists tell us," says Waters, "that it takes twenty-eight years +for the brain to attain its full development. If this is so, why +should not one be able, by his own efforts, to give this long-growing +organ a particular bent, a peculiar character? Why should the will not +be brought to bear upon the formation of the brain as well as of the +backbone?" The will is merely our steam power, and we may put it to +any work we please. It will do our bidding, whether it be building up +a character, or tearing it down. It may be applied to building up a +habit of truthfulness and honesty, or of falsehood and dishonor. It +will help build up a man or a brute, a hero or a coward. It will brace +up resolution until one may almost perform miracles, or it may be +dissipated in irresolution and inaction until life is a wreck. It will +hold you to your task until you have formed a powerful habit of +industry and application, until idleness and inaction are painful, or +it will lead you into indolence and listlessness until every effort +will be disagreeable and success impossible. + +"The first thing I have to impress upon you is," says J. T. Davidson, +"that a good name must be the fruit of one's own exertion. You cannot +possess it by patrimony; you cannot purchase it with money; you will +not light on it by chance; it is independent of birth, station, +talents, and wealth; it must be the outcome of your own endeavor, and +the reward of good principles and honorable conduct. Of all the +elements of success in life none is more vital than self-reliance,--a +determination to be, under God, the creator of your own reputation and +advancement. If difficulties stand in the way, if exceptional +disadvantages oppose you, all the better, as long as you have pluck to +fight through them. I want each young man here (you will not +misunderstand me) to have faith in himself and, scorning props and +buttresses, crutches and life-preservers, to take earnest hold of life. +Many a lad has good stuff in him that never comes to anything because +he slips too easily into some groove of life; it is commonly those who +have a tough battle to begin with that make their mark upon their age." + +When Beethoven was examining the work of Moscheles, he found written at +the end "Finis, with God's help." He wrote under it "Man, help +yourself." + +A young man stood listlessly watching some anglers on a bridge. He was +poor and dejected. At length, approaching a basket filled with fish, +he sighed, "If now I had these I would be happy. I could sell them and +buy food and lodgings." "I will give you just as many and just as +good," said the owner, who chanced to overhear his words, "if you will +do me a trifling favor." "And what is that?" asked the other. "Only +to tend this line till I come back; I wish to go on a short errand." +The proposal was gladly accepted. The old man was gone so long that +the young man began to get impatient. Meanwhile the fish snapped +greedily at the hook, and he lost all his depression in the excitement +of pulling them in. When the owner returned he had caught a large +number. Counting out from them as many as were in the basket, and +presenting them to the youth, the old fisherman said, "I fulfill my +promise from the fish you have caught, to teach you whenever you see +others earning what you need to waste no time in foolish wishing, but +cast a line for yourself." + +A white squall caught a party of tourists on a lake in Scotland, and +threatened to capsize the boat. When it seemed that the crisis was +really come the largest and strongest man in the party, in a state of +intense fear, said, "Let us pray." "No, no, my man," shouted the bluff +old boatman; "_let the little man pray. You take an oar._" The +greatest curse that can befall a young man is to lean. + +The grandest fortunes ever accumulated or possessed on earth were and +are the fruit of endeavor that had no capital to begin with save +energy, intellect, and the will. From Croesus down to Rockefeller the +story is the same, not only in the getting of wealth, but also in the +acquirement of eminence; those men have won most who relied most upon +themselves. + +It has been said that one of the most disgusting sights in this world +is that of a young man with healthy blood, broad shoulders, presentable +calves, and a hundred and fifty pounds, more or less, of good bone and +muscle, standing with his hands in his pockets longing for help. + +"The male inhabitants in the Township of Loaferdom, in the County of +Hatework," says a printer's squib, "found themselves laboring under +great inconvenience for want of an easily traveled road between Poverty +and Independence. They therefore petitioned the Powers that be to levy +a tax upon the property of the entire county for the purpose of laying +out a macadamized highway, broad and smooth, and all the way down hill +to the latter place." + +"It is interesting to notice how some minds seem almost to create +themselves," says Irving, "springing up under every disadvantage, and +working their solitary but irresistible way through a thousand +obstacles." + +"Every one is the artificer of his own fortune," says Sallust. + +Man is not merely the architect of his own fortune, but he must lay the +bricks himself. Bayard Taylor, at twenty-three, wrote: "I will become +the sculptor of my own mind's statue." His biography shows how often +the chisel and hammer were in his hands to shape himself into his +ideal. "I have seen none, known none, of the celebrities of my time," +said Samuel Cox. "All my energy was directed upon one end, to improve +myself." + +"Man exists for culture," says Goethe; "not for what he can accomplish, +but for what can be accomplished in him." + +When young Professor Tyndall was in the government service, he had no +definite aim in life until one day a government official asked him how +he employed his leisure time. "You have five hours a day at your +disposal," said he, "and this ought to be devoted to systematic study. +Had I at your age some one to advise me as I now advise you, instead of +being in a subordinate position, I might have been at the head of my +department." The very next day young Tyndall began a regular course of +study, and went to the University of Marburg, where he became noted for +his indomitable industry. He was so poor that he bought a cask, and +cut it open for a bathtub. He often rose before daylight to study, +while the world was slumbering about him. + +Labor is the only legal tender in the world to true success. The gods +sell everything for that, nothing without it. You will never find +success "marked down." The door to the temple of success is never left +open. Every one who enters makes his own door which closes behind him +to all others. + +Circumstances have rarely favored great men. They have fought their +way to triumph over the road of difficulty and through all sorts of +opposition. A lowly beginning and a humble origin are no bar to a +great career. The farmers' boys fill many of the greatest places in +legislatures, in syndicates, at the bar, in pulpits, in Congress, +to-day. Boys of lowly origin have made many of the greatest +discoveries, are presidents of our banks, of our colleges, of our +universities. Our poor boys and girls have written many of our +greatest books, and have filled the highest places as teachers and +journalists. Ask almost any great man in our large cities where he was +born, and he will tell you it was on a farm or in a small country +village. Nearly all of the great capitalists of the city came from the +country. "'T is better to be lowly born." + +The founder of Boston University left Cape Cod for Boston to make his +way with a capital of only four dollars. Like Horace Greeley, he could +find no opening for a boy; but what of that? He made an opening. He +found a board, and made it into an oyster stand on the street corner. +He borrowed a wheelbarrow, and went three miles to an oyster smack, +bought three bushels of oysters, and wheeled them to his stand. Soon +his little savings amounted to $130, and then he bought a horse and +cart. This poor boy with no chance kept right on till he became the +millionaire Isaac Rich. + +Chauncey Jerome, the inventor of machine-made clocks, started with two +others on a tour through New Jersey, they to sell the clocks, and he to +make cases for them. On his way to New York he went through New Haven +in a lumber wagon, eating bread and cheese. He afterward lived in a +fine mansion in New Haven. + +Self-help has accomplished about all the great things of the world. +How many young men falter, faint, and dally with their purpose because +they have no capital to start with, and wait and wait for some good +luck to give them a lift. But success is the child of drudgery and +perseverance. It cannot be coaxed or bribed; pay the price and it is +yours. Where is the boy to-day who has less chance to rise in the +world than Elihu Burritt, apprenticed to a blacksmith, in whose shop he +had to work at the forge all the daylight, and often by candle-light? +Yet, he managed, by studying with a book before him at his meals, +carrying it in his pocket that he might utilize every spare moment, and +studying nights and holidays, to pick up an excellent education in the +odds and ends of time which most boys throw away. While the rich boy +and the idler were yawning and stretching and getting their eyes open, +young Burritt had seized the opportunity and improved it. At thirty +years of age he was master of every important language in Europe and +was studying those of Asia. + +What chance had such a boy for distinction? Probably not a single +youth will read this book who has not a better opportunity for success. +Yet he had a thirst for knowledge, and a desire for self-improvement, +which overcame every obstacle in his pathway. A wealthy gentleman +offered to pay his expenses at Harvard; but no, he said he could get +his education himself, even though he had to work twelve or fourteen +hours a day at the forge. Here was a determined boy. He snatched +every spare moment at the anvil and forge as though it were gold. He +believed, with Gladstone, that thrift of time would repay him in after +years with usury, and that waste of it would make him dwindle. Think +of a boy working nearly all the daylight in a blacksmith's shop, and +yet finding time to study seven languages in a single year! + +If the youth of America who are struggling against cruel circumstances, +to do something and be somebody in the world, could only understand +that ninety per cent. of what is called genius is merely the result of +persistent, determined industry, is in most cases downright hard work, +that it is the slavery to a single idea which has given to many a +mediocre talent the reputation of being a genius, they would be +inspired with new hope. It is interesting to note that the men who +talk most about genius are the men who like to work the least. The +lazier the man, the more he will have to say about great things being +done by genius. + +The greatest geniuses have been the greatest workers. Sheridan was +considered a genius, but it was found that the "brilliants" and +"off-hand sayings" with which he used to dazzle the House of Commons +were elaborated, polished and repolished, and put down in his +memorandum book ready for any emergency. + +Genius has been well defined as the infinite capacity for taking pains. +If men who have done great things could only reveal to the struggling +youth of to-day how much of their reputations was due to downright hard +digging and plodding, what an uplift of inspiration and encouragement +they would give. How often I have wished that the discouraged, +struggling youth could know of the heart-aches, the head-aches, the +nerve-aches, the disheartening trials, the discouraged hours, the fears +and despair involved in works which have gained the admiration of the +world, but which have taxed the utmost powers of their authors. You +can read in a few minutes or a few hours a poem or a book with only +pleasure and delight, but the days and months of weary plodding over +details and dreary drudgery often required to produce it would stagger +belief. + +The greatest works in literature have been elaborated and elaborated, +line by line, paragraph by paragraph, often rewritten a dozen times. +The drudgery which literary men have put into the productions which +have stood the test of time is almost incredible. Lucretius worked +nearly a lifetime on one poem. It completely absorbed his life. It is +said that Bryant rewrote "Thanatopsis" a hundred times, and even then +was not satisfied with it. John Foster would sometimes linger a week +over a single sentence. He would hack, split, prune, pull up by the +roots, or practice any other severity on whatever he wrote, till it +gained his consent to exist. Chalmers was once asked what Foster was +about in London. "Hard at it," he replied, "at the rate of a line a +week." Dickens, one of the greatest writers of modern fiction, was so +worn down by hard work that he looked as "haggard as a murderer." Even +Lord Bacon, one of the greatest geniuses that ever lived, left large +numbers of MSS. filled with "sudden thoughts set down for use." Hume +toiled thirteen hours a day on his "History of England." Lord Eldon +astonished the world with his great legal learning, but when he was a +student too poor to buy books, he had actually borrowed and copied many +hundreds of pages of large law books, such as Coke upon Littleton, thus +saturating his mind with legal principles which afterward blossomed out +into what the world called remarkable genius. Matthew Hale for years +studied law sixteen hours a day. Speaking of Fox, some one declared +that he wrote "drop by drop." Rousseau says of the labor involved in +his smooth and lively style: "My manuscripts, blotted, scratched, +interlined, and scarcely legible, attest the trouble they cost me. +There is not one of them which I have not been obliged to transcribe +four or five times before it went to press. . . . Some of my periods I +have turned or returned in my head for five or six nights before they +were fit to be put to paper." + +It is said that Waller spent a whole summer over ten lines in one of +his poems. Beethoven probably surpassed all other musicians in his +painstaking fidelity and persistent application. There is scarcely a +bar in his music that was not written and rewritten at least a dozen +times. His favorite maxim was, "The barriers are not yet erected which +can say to aspiring talent and industry 'thus far and no further.'" +Gibbon wrote his autobiography nine times, and was in his study every +morning, summer and winter, at six o'clock; and yet youth who waste +their evenings wonder at the genius which can produce "The Decline and +Fall of the Roman Empire," upon which Gibbon worked twenty years. Even +Plato, one of the greatest writers that ever lived, wrote the first +sentence in his "Republic" nine different ways before he was satisfied +with it. Burke's famous "Letter to a Noble Lord," one of the finest +things in the English language, was so completely blotted over with +alterations when the proof was returned to the printing-office that the +compositors refused to correct it as it was, and entirely reset it. +Burke wrote the conclusion of his speech at the trial of Hastings +sixteen times, and Butler wrote his famous "Analogy" twenty times. It +took Virgil seven years to write his Georgics, and twelve years to +write the Aeneid. He was so displeased with the latter that he +attempted to rise from his deathbed to commit it to the flames. + +Haydn was very poor; his father was a coachman and he, friendless and +lonely, married a servant girl. He was sent away from home to act as +errand boy for a music teacher. He absorbed a great deal of +information, but he had a hard life of persecution until he became a +barber in Vienna. Here he blacked boots for an influential man, who +became a friend to him. In 1798 this poor boy's oratorio, "The +Creation," came upon the musical world like the rising of a new sun +which never set. He was courted by princes and dined with kings and +queens; his reputation was made; there was no more barbering, no more +poverty. But of his eight hundred compositions, "The Creation" +eclipsed them all. He died while Napoleon's guns were bombarding +Vienna, some of the shot falling in his garden. The greatest creations +of musicians were written with an effort, to fill the "aching void" in +the human heart. + +Frederick Douglass, America's most representative colored man, born a +slave, was reared in bondage, liberated by his own exertions, educated +and advanced by sheer pluck and perseverance to distinguished positions +in the service of his country, and to a high place in the respect and +esteem of the whole world. + +When a man like Lord Cavanagh, without arms or legs, manages to put +himself into Parliament, when a man like Francis Joseph Campbell, a +blind man, becomes a distinguished mathematician, a musician, and a +great philanthropist, we get a hint as to what it means to make the +most possible out of ourselves and opportunities. Perhaps ninety-nine +out of a hundred under such unfortunate circumstances would be content +to remain helpless objects of charity for life. If it is your call to +acquire money power instead of brain power, to acquire business power +instead of professional power, double your talent just the same, no +matter what it may be. + +A glover's apprentice of Glasgow, Scotland, who was too poor to afford +even a candle or a fire, and who studied by the light of the shop +windows in the streets, and when the shops were closed climbed the +lamp-post, holding his book in one hand, and clinging to the lamp-post +with the other,--this poor boy, with less chance than almost any boy in +America, became the most eminent scholar of Scotland. + +Francis Parkman, half blind, became one of America's greatest +historians in spite of everything, because he made himself such. +Personal value is a coin of one's own minting; one is taken at the +worth he has put into himself. Franklin was but a poor printer's boy, +whose highest luxury at one time was only a penny roll, eaten in the +streets of Philadelphia. Richard Arkwright, a barber all his earlier +life, as he rose from poverty to wealth and fame, felt the need of +correcting the defects of his early education. After his fiftieth year +he devoted two hours a day, snatched from his sleep, to improving +himself in orthography, grammar, and writing. + +Michael Faraday was a poor boy, son of a blacksmith, who apprenticed +him at the age of thirteen to a bookbinder in London. Michael laid the +foundations of his future greatness by making himself familiar with the +contents of the books he bound. He remained at night, after others had +gone, to read and study the precious volumes. Lord Tenterden was proud +to point out to his son the shop where his father had shaved for a +penny. A French doctor once taunted Fléchier, Bishop of Nismes, who +had been a tallow-chandler in his youth, with the meanness of his +origin, to which he replied, "If you had been born in the same +condition that I was, you would still have been but a maker of candles." + +The Duke of Argyle, walking in his garden, saw a Latin copy of Newton's +"Principia" on the grass, and supposing that it had been taken from his +library, called for some one to carry it back. Edmund Stone, however, +the son of the duke's gardener, claimed it. "Yours?" asked the +surprised nobleman. "Do you understand geometry, Latin, and Newton?" +"I know a little of them," replied Edmund. "But how," asked the duke, +"came you by the knowledge of all these things?" "A servant taught me +to read ten years since," answered Stone. "Does one need to know +anything more than the twenty-four letters, in order to learn +everything else that one wishes?" The duke was astonished. "I first +learned to read," said the lad; "the masons were then at work upon your +house. I approached them one day and observed that the architect used +a rule and compasses, and that he made calculations. I inquired what +might be the meaning and use of these things, and I was informed that +there was a science called arithmetic. I purchased a book of +arithmetic and learned it. I was told that there was another science +called geometry; I bought the necessary books and learned geometry. By +reading I found that there were good books on these sciences in Latin, +so I bought a dictionary and learned Latin. I understood, also, that +there were good books of the same kind in French; I bought a +dictionary, and learned French. This, my lord, is what I have done; it +seems to me that we may learn everything when we know the twenty-four +letters of the alphabet." + +Edwin Chadwick, in his report to the British Parliament, stated that +children, working on half time, that is, studying three hours a day and +working the rest of their time out of doors, really made the greatest +intellectual progress during the year. Business men have often +accomplished wonders during the busiest lives by simply devoting one, +two, three, or four hours daily to study or other literary work. + +James Watt received only the rudiments of an education at school, for +his attendance was irregular on account of delicate health. He more +than made up for all deficiencies, however, by the diligence with which +he pursued his studies at home. Alexander V. was a beggar; he was +"born mud, and died marble." William Herschel, placed at the age of +fourteen as a musician in the band of the Hanoverian Guards, devoted +all his leisure to philosophical studies. He acquired a large fund of +general knowledge, and in astronomy, a science in which he was wholly +self-instructed, his discoveries entitle him to rank with the greatest +astronomers of all time. + +George Washington was the son of a widow, born under the roof of a +Westmoreland farmer; almost from infancy his lot had been the lot of an +orphan. No academy had welcomed him to its shade, no college crowned +him with its honors; to read, to write, to cipher, these had been his +degrees in knowledge. Shakespeare learned little more than reading and +writing at school, but by self-culture he made himself the great master +among literary men. Burns, too, enjoyed few advantages of education, +and his youth was passed in almost abject poverty. + +James Ferguson, the son of a half-starved peasant, learned to read by +listening to the recitations of one of his elder brothers. While a +mere boy he discovered several mechanical principles, made models of +mills and spinning-wheels, and by means of beads on strings worked out +an excellent map of the heavens. Ferguson made remarkable things with +a common penknife. How many great men have mounted the hill of +knowledge by out-of-the-way paths. Gifford worked his intricate +problems with a shoemaker's awl on a bit of leather. Rittenhouse first +calculated eclipses on his plow-handle. _A will finds a way_. + +Julius Caesar, who has been unduly honored for those great military +achievements in which he appears as the scourge of his race, is far +more deserving of respect for those wonderful Commentaries, in which +his military exploits are recorded. He attained distinction by his +writings on astronomy, grammar, history, and several other subjects. +He was one of the most learned men and one of the greatest orators of +his time. Yet his life was spent amid the turmoil of a camp or the +fierce struggle of politics. If he found abundant time for study, who +may not? Frederick the Great, too, was busy in camp the greater part +of his life, yet whenever a leisure moment came, it was sure to be +devoted to study. He wrote to a friend, "I become every day more +covetous of my time, I render an account of it to myself, and I lose +none of it but with great regret." + +Columbus, while leading the life of a sailor, managed to become the +most accomplished geographer and astronomer of his time. + +When Peter the Great, a boy of seventeen, became the absolute ruler of +Russia, his subjects were little better than savages, and in himself, +even, the passions and propensities of barbarism were so strong that +they were frequently exhibited during his whole career. But he +determined to transform himself and the Russians into civilized people. +He instituted reforms with great energy, and at the age of twenty-six +started on a visit to the other countries of Europe for the purpose of +learning about their arts and institutions. At Saardam, Holland, he +was so impressed with the sights of the great East India dockyard, that +he apprenticed himself to a shipbuilder, and helped build the St. +Peter, which he promptly purchased. Continuing his travels, after he +had learned his trade, he worked in England in paper-mills, saw-mills, +rope-yards, watchmaker's shops, and other manufactories, doing the work +and receiving the treatment of a common laborer. + +While traveling, his constant habit was to obtain as much information +as he could beforehand with regard to every place he was to visit, and +he would demand, "Let me see all." When setting out on his +investigations, on such occasions, he carried his tablets in his hand, +and whatever he deemed worthy of remembrance was carefully noted down. +He would often leave his carriage, if he saw the country people at work +by the wayside as he passed along, and not only enter into conversation +with them, on agricultural affairs, but accompany them to their houses, +examine their furniture, and take drawings of their implements of +husbandry. Thus he obtained much minute and correct knowledge, which +he would scarcely have acquired by other means, and which he afterward +turned to admirable account in the improvement of his own country. + +The ancients said, "Know thyself;" the nineteenth century says, "Help +thyself." Self-culture gives a second birth to the soul. A liberal +education is a true regeneration. When a man is once liberally +educated, he will generally remain a man, not shrink to a manikin, nor +dwindle to a brute. But if he is not properly educated, if he has +merely been crammed and stuffed through college, if he has merely a +broken-down memory from trying to hold crammed facts enough to pass the +examination, he will continue to shrink and shrivel and dwindle, often +below his original proportions, for he will lose both his confidence +and self-respect, as his crammed facts, which never became a part of +himself, evaporate from his distended memory. Many a youth has made +his greatest effort in his graduating essay. But, alas! the beautiful +flowers of rhetoric blossomed only to exhaust the parent stock, which +blossoms no more forever. + +In Strasburg geese are crammed with food several times a day by opening +their mouths and forcing the pabulum down the throat with the finger. +The geese are shut up in boxes just large enough to hold them, and are +not allowed to take any exercise. This is done in order to increase +enormously the liver for _pâté de fois gras_. So are our youth +sometimes stuffed with education. What are the chances for success of +students who "cut" recitations or lectures, and gad, lounge about, and +dissipate in the cities at night until the last two or three weeks, +sometimes the last few days, before examination, when they employ +tutors at exorbitant prices with the money often earned by hard-working +parents, to stuff their idle brains with the pabulum of knowledge; not +to increase their grasp or power of brain, not to discipline it, not +for assimilation into the mental tissue to develop personal power, but +to fatten the memory, the liver of the brain; to fatten it with crammed +facts until it is sufficiently expanded to insure fifty per cent. in +the examination. + +True teaching will create a thirst for knowledge, and the desire to +quench this thirst will lead the eager student to the Pierian spring. +"Man might be so educated that all his prepossessions would be truth, +and all his feelings virtues." + +Every bit of education or culture is of great advantage in the struggle +for existence. The microscope does not create anything new, but it +reveals marvels. To educate the eye adds to its magnifying power until +it sees beauty where before it saw only ugliness. It reveals a world +we never suspected, and finds the greatest beauty even in the commonest +things. The eye of an Agassiz could see worlds which the uneducated +eye never dreamed of. The cultured hand can do a thousand things the +uneducated hand cannot do. It becomes graceful, steady of nerve, +strong, skillful, indeed it almost seems to think, so animated is it +with intelligence. The cultured will can seize, grasp, and hold the +possessor, with irresistible power and nerve, to almost superhuman +effort. The educated touch can almost perform miracles. The educated +taste can achieve wonders almost past belief. What a contrast this, +between the cultured, logical, profound, masterly reason of a Gladstone +and that of the hod-carrier who has never developed or educated his +reason beyond what is necessary to enable him to mix mortar and carry +brick. + +"Culture comes from the constant choice of the best within our reach," +says Bulwer. "Continue to cultivate the mind, to sharpen by exercise +the genius, to attempt to delight or instruct your race; and, even +supposing you fall short of every model you set before you, supposing +your name moulder with your dust, still you will have passed life more +nobly than the unlaborious herd. Grant that you win not that glorious +accident, 'a name below,' how can you tell but that you may have fitted +yourself for high destiny and employ, not in the world of men, but of +spirits? The powers of the mind cannot be less immortal than the mere +sense of identity; their acquisitions accompany us through the Eternal +Progress, and we may obtain a lower or a higher grade hereafter, in +proportion as we are more or less fitted by the exercise of our +intellect to comprehend and execute the solemn agencies of God." + +But be careful to avoid that over-intellectual culture which is +purchased at the expense of moral vigor. An observant professor of one +of our colleges has remarked that "the mind may be so rounded and +polished by education, so well balanced, as not to be energetic in any +one faculty. In other men not thus trained, the sense of deficiency +and of the sharp, jagged corners of their knowledge leads to efforts to +fill up the chasms, rendering them at last far better educated men than +the polished, easy-going graduate who has just knowledge enough to +prevent consciousness of his ignorance. While all the faculties of the +mind should be cultivated, it is yet desirable that it should have two +or three rough-hewn features of massive strength. Young men are too +apt to forget the great end of life which is to be and do, not to read +and brood over what other men have been and done." + +In a gymnasium you tug, you expand your chest, you push, pull, strike, +run, in order to develop your physical self; so you can develop your +moral and intellectual nature only by continued effort. + +"I repeat that my object is not to give him knowledge but to teach him +how to acquire it at need," said Rousseau. + +All learning is self-teaching. It is upon the working of the pupil's +own mind that his progress in knowledge depends. The great business of +the master is to teach the pupil to teach himself. + +"Thinking, not growth, makes manhood," says Isaac Taylor. "Accustom +yourself, therefore, to thinking. Set yourself to understand whatever +you see or read. To join thinking with reading is one of the first +maxims, and one of the easiest operations." + + "How few think justly of the thinking few: + How many never think who think they do." + + + + +CHAPTER IX. + +WORK AND WAIT. + +What we do upon some great occasion will probably depend on what we +already are; and what we are will be the result of previous years of +self-discipline.--H. P. LIDDON. + +In all matters, before beginning, a diligent preparation should be +made.--CICERO. + +I consider a human soul without education like marble in a quarry which +shows none of its inherent beauties until the skill of the polisher +sketches out the colors, makes the surface shine, and discovers every +ornamental cloud, spot, and vein that runs throughout the body of +it.--ADDISON. + +Many a genius has been slow of growth. Oaks that flourish for a +thousand years do not spring up into beauty like a reed.--GEORGE HENRY +LEWES. + +Use your gifts faithfully, and they shall be enlarged; practice what +you know, and you shall attain to higher knowledge.--ARNOLD. + +All good abides with him who waiteth wisely.--THOREAU. + +The more haste, ever the worse speed.--CHURCHILL. + +Haste trips up its own heels, fetters and stops itself.--SENECA. + +"Wisely and slow; they stumble that run fast." + +How can we expect a harvest of thought who have not had the seed-time +of character?--THOREAU. + +I call a complete and generous education that which fits a man to +perform justly, skillfully, and magnanimously, all the offices, both +public and private, of peace and war.--MILTON. + +The safe path to excellence and success, in every calling, is that of +appropriate preliminary education, diligent application to learn the +art and assiduity in practicing it.--EDWARD EVERETT. + +The more you know, the more you can save yourself and that which +belongs to you, and do more work with less effort.--CHARLES KINGSLEY. + + +"I was a mere cipher in that vast sea of human enterprise," said Henry +Bessemer, speaking of his arrival in London in 1831. Although but +eighteen years old, and without an acquaintance in the city, he soon +made work for himself by inventing a process of copying bas-reliefs on +cardboard. His method was so simple that one could learn in ten +minutes how to make a die from an embossed stamp for a penny. Having +ascertained later that in this way the raised stamps on all official +papers in England could easily be forged, he set to work and invented a +perforated stamp which could not be forged nor removed from a document. +At the public stamp office he was told by the chief that the government +was losing 100,000 pounds a year through the custom of removing stamps +from old parchments and using them again. The chief also appreciated +the new danger of easy counterfeiting. So he offered Bessemer a +definite sum for his process of perforation, or an office for life at +eight hundred pounds a year. Bessemer chose the office, and hastened +to tell the good news to a young woman with whom he had agreed to share +his fortune. In explaining his invention, he told how it would prevent +any one from taking a valuable stamp from a document a hundred years +old and using it a second time. + + * * * * * * + +[Illustration: THOMAS ALVA EDISON] + +"The Wizard of Menlo Park." + +"What the world wants is men who have the nerve and the grit to work +and wait, whether the world applaud or hiss." + + * * * * * * + +"Yes," said his betrothed, "I understand that; but, surely, if all +stamps had a date put upon them they could not at a future time be used +without detection." + +This was a very short speech, and of no special importance if we omit a +single word of four letters; but, like the schoolboy's pins which saved +the lives of thousands of people annually by not getting swallowed, +that little word, by keeping out of the ponderous minds of the British +revenue officers, had for a long period saved the government the burden +of caring for an additional income of 100,000 pounds a year. And the +same little word, if published in its connection, would render Henry's +perforation device of far less value than a last year's bird's nest. +Henry felt proud of the young woman's ingenuity, and suggested the +improvement at the stamp office. As a result his system of perforation +was abandoned and he was deprived of his promised office, the +government coolly making use from that day to this, without +compensation, of the idea conveyed by that little insignificant word. + +So Bessemer's financial prospects were not very encouraging; but, +realizing that the best capital a young man can have is a capital wife, +he at once entered into a partnership which placed at his command the +combined ideas of two very level heads. The result, after years of +thought and experiment, was the Bessemer process of making steel +cheaply, which has revolutionized the iron industry throughout the +world. His method consists simply in forcing hot air from below into +several tons of melted pig-iron, so as to produce intense combustion; +and then adding enough spiegel-eisen (looking-glass iron), an ore rich +in carbon, to change the whole mass to steel. He discovered this +simple process only after trying in vain much more difficult and +expensive methods. + + "All things come round to him who will but wait." + + +The great lack of the age is want of thoroughness. How seldom you find +a young man or woman who is willing to take time to prepare for his +life work. A little education is all they want, a little smattering of +books, and then they are ready for business. + +"Can't wait" is characteristic of the century, and is written on +everything; on commerce, on schools, on society, on churches. Can't +wait for a high school, seminary, or college. The boy can't wait to +become a youth, nor the youth a man. Youth rush into business with no +great reserve of education or drill; of course they do poor, feverish +work, and break down in middle life, and many die of old age in the +forties. Everybody is in a hurry. Buildings are rushed up so quickly +that they will not stand, and everything is made "to sell." + +Not long ago a professor in one of our universities had a letter from a +young woman in the West, asking him if he did not think she could teach +elocution if she could come to the university and take twelve lessons. +Our young people of to-day want something, and want it quickly. They +are not willing to lay broad, deep foundations. The weary years in +preparatory school and college dishearten them. They only want a +"smattering" of an education. But as Pope says,-- + + "A little learning is a dangerous thing; + Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring: + There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain, + And drinking largely sobers us again." + + +The shifts to cover up ignorance, and "the constant trembling lest some +blunder should expose one's emptiness," are pitiable. Short cuts and +abridged methods are the demand of the hour. But the way to shorten +the road to success is to take plenty of time to lay in your reserve +power. You can't stop to forage your provender as the army advances; +if you do the enemy will get there first. Hard work, a definite aim, +and faithfulness, will shorten the way. Don't risk a life's +superstructure upon a day's foundation. + +Unless you have prepared yourself to profit by your chance, the +opportunity will only make you ridiculous. A great occasion is +valuable to you just in proportion as you have educated yourself to +make use of it. Beware of that fatal facility of thoughtless speech +and superficial action which has misled many a young man into the +belief that he could make a glib tongue or a deft hand take the place +of deep study or hard work. + +Patience is nature's motto. She works ages to bring a flower to +perfection. What will she not do for the greatest of her creation? +Ages and aeons are nothing to her, out of them she has been carving her +great statue, a perfect man. + +Johnson said a man must turn over half a library to write one book. +When an authoress told Wordsworth she had spent six hours on a poem, he +replied that he would have spent six weeks. Think of Bishop Hall +spending thirty years on one of his works. Owens was working on the +"Commentary to the Epistle to the Hebrews" for twenty years. Moore +spent several weeks on one of his musical stanzas which reads as if it +were a dash of genius. Carlyle wrote with the utmost difficulty, and +never executed a page of his great histories till he had consulted +every known authority, so that every sentence is the quintessence of +many books, the product of many hours of drudging research in the great +libraries. To-day, "Sartor Resartus" is everywhere. You can get it +for a mere trifle at almost any bookseller's, and hundreds of thousands +of copies are scattered over the world. But when Carlyle brought it to +London in 1851, it was refused almost contemptuously by three prominent +publishers. At last he managed to get it into "Fraser's Magazine," the +editor of which conveyed to the author the pleasing information that +his work had been received with "unqualified disapprobation." Henry +Ward Beecher sent a half dozen articles to the publisher of a religious +paper to pay for his subscription, but they were respectfully declined. +The publishers of the "Atlantic Monthly" returned Miss Alcott's +manuscript, suggesting that she had better stick to teaching. One of +the leading magazines ridiculed Tennyson's first poems, and consigned +the young poet to oblivion. Only one of Ralph Waldo Emerson's books +had a remunerative sale. Washington Irving was nearly seventy years +old before the income from his books paid the expenses of his household. + +In some respects it is very unfortunate that the old system of binding +boys out to a trade has been abandoned. To-day very few boys learn any +trade. They pick up what they know, as they go along, just as a +student crams for a particular examination, just to "get through," +without any effort to see how much he may learn on any subject. + +Think of an American youth spending twelve years with Michael Angelo, +studying anatomy that he might create the masterpiece of all art; or +with Da Vinci devoting ten years to the model of an equestrian statue +that he might master the anatomy of the horse. Most young American +artists would expect, in a quarter of that time, to sculpture an Apollo +Belvidere. While Michael Angelo was painting the Sistine Chapel he +would not allow himself time for meals or to dress or undress; but he +kept bread within reach that he might eat when hunger impelled, and he +slept in his clothes. + +A rich man asked Howard Burnett to do a little thing for his album. +Burnett complied and charged a thousand francs. "But it took you only +five minutes," objected the rich man. "Yes, but it took me thirty +years to learn how to do it in five minutes." + +"I prepared that sermon," said a young sprig of divinity, "in half an +hour, and preached it at once, and thought nothing of it." "In that," +said an older minister, "your hearers are at one with you, for they +also thought nothing of it." + +What the age wants is men who have the nerve and the grit to work and +wait, whether the world applaud or hiss. It wants a Bancroft, who can +spend twenty-six years on the "History of the United States;" a Noah +Webster, who can devote thirty-six years to a dictionary; a Gibbon, who +can plod for twenty years on the "Decline and Fall of the Roman +Empire;" a Mirabeau, who can struggle on for forty years before he has +a chance to show his vast reserve, destined to shake an empire; a +Farragut, a Von Moltke, who have the persistence to work and wait for +half a century for their first great opportunities; a Garfield, burning +his lamp fifteen minutes later than a rival student in his academy; a +Grant, fighting on in heroic silence, when denounced by his brother +generals and politicians everywhere; a Field's untiring perseverance, +spending years and a fortune laying a cable when all the world called +him a fool; a Michael Angelo, working seven long years decorating the +Sistine Chapel with his matchless "Creation" and the "Last Judgment," +refusing all remuneration therefor, lest his pencil might catch the +taint of avarice; a Titian, spending seven years on the "Last Supper;" +a Stephenson, working fifteen years on a locomotive; a Watt, twenty +years on a condensing engine; a Lady Franklin, working incessantly for +twelve long years to rescue her husband from the polar seas; a Thurlow +Weed, walking two miles through the snow with rags tied around his feet +for shoes, to borrow the history of the French Revolution, and eagerly +devouring it before the sap-bush fire; a Milton, elaborating "Paradise +Lost" in a world he could not see, and then selling it for fifteen +pounds; a Thackeray, struggling on cheerfully after his "Vanity Fair" +was refused by a dozen publishers; a Balzac, toiling and waiting in a +lonely garret, whom neither poverty, debt, nor hunger could discourage +or intimidate; not daunted by privations, not hindered by +discouragements. It wants men who can work and wait. + +When a young lawyer Daniel Webster once looked in vain through all the +law libraries near him, and then ordered at an expense of fifty dollars +the necessary books, to obtain authorities and precedents in a case in +which his client was a poor blacksmith. He won his cause, but, on +account of the poverty of his client, only charged fifteen dollars, +thus losing heavily on the books bought, to say nothing of his time. +Years after, as he was passing through New York city, he was consulted +by Aaron Burr on an important but puzzling case then pending before the +Supreme Court. He saw in a moment that it was just like the +blacksmith's case, an intricate question of title, which he had solved +so thoroughly that it was to him now as simple as the multiplication +table. Going back to the time of Charles II. he gave the law and +precedents involved with such readiness and accuracy of sequence that +Burr asked in great surprise if he had been consulted before in the +case. "Most certainly not," he replied, "I never heard of your case +till this evening." "Very well," said Burr, "proceed," and, when he +had finished, Webster received a fee that paid him liberally for all +the time and trouble he had spent for his early client. + +Albert Bierstadt first crossed the Rocky Mountains with a band of +pioneers in 1859, making sketches for the paintings of western scenes +for which he had become famous. As he followed the trail to Pike's +Peak, he gazed in wonder upon the enormous herds of buffaloes which +dotted the plains as far as the eye could reach, and thought of the +time when they would have disappeared before the march of civilization. +The thought haunted him and found its final embodiment in "The Last of +the Buffaloes" in 1890. To perfect this great work he had spent twenty +years. + +Everything which endures, which will stand the test of time, must have +a deep, solid foundation. In Rome the foundation is often the most +expensive part of an edifice, so deep must they dig to build on the +living rock. + +Fifty feet of Bunker Hill Monument is under ground; unseen and +unappreciated by those who tread about that historic shaft, but it is +this foundation, apparently thrown away, which enables it to stand +upright, true to the plumb-line through all the tempests that lash its +granite sides. A large part of every successful life must be spent in +laying foundation stones under ground. Success is the child of +drudgery and perseverance and depends upon "knowing how long it takes +to succeed." Havelock joined the army at twenty-eight, and for +thirty-four years worked and waited for his opportunity; conscious of +his power, "fretting as a subaltern while he saw drunkards and fools +put above his head." + +But during all these years he was fitting himself to lead that +marvelous march to Lucknow. + +It was many years of drudgery and reading a thousand volumes that +enabled George Eliot to get fifty thousand dollars for "Daniel +Deronda." How came writers to be famous? By writing for years without +any pay at all; by writing hundreds of pages for mere practice work; by +working like galley-slaves at literature for half a lifetime. It was +working and waiting many long and weary years that put one hundred and +twenty-five thousand dollars into "The Angelus." Millet's first +attempts were mere daubs, the later were worth fortunes. Schiller +"never could get done." Dante sees himself "growing lean over his +Divine Comedy." It is working and waiting that gives perfection. + +"I do not remember," said Beecher, "a book in all the depths of +learning, nor a scrap in literature, nor a work in all the schools of +art, from which its author has derived a permanent renown, that is not +known to have been long and patiently elaborated." + +Endurance is a much better test of character than any one act of +heroism, however noble. + +The pianist Thalberg said he never ventured to perform one of his +celebrated pieces in public until he had played it at least fifteen +hundred times. He laid no claim whatever to genius; he said it was all +a question of hard work. The accomplishments of such industry, such +perseverance, would put to shame many a man who claims genius. + +Before Edmund Kean would consent to appear in that character which he +acted with such consummate skill, The Gentleman Villain, he practiced +constantly before a glass, studying expression for a year and a half. +When he appeared upon the stage, Byron, who went to see him with Moore, +said he never looked upon so fearful and wicked a face. As the great +actor went on to delineate the terrible consequences of sin, Byron +fainted. + +"For years I was in my place of business by sunrise," said a wealthy +banker who had begun without a dollar, "and often I did not leave it +for fifteen or eighteen hours." + +_Festina lente_--hasten slowly--is a good Latin motto. Patience, it is +said, changes the mulberry leaf to satin. The giant oak on the +hillside was detained months or years in its upward growth while its +roots took a great turn around some rock, in order to gain a hold by +which the tree was anchored to withstand the storms of centuries. Da +Vinci spent four years on the head of Mona Lisa, perhaps the most +beautiful ever painted, but he left therein, an artistic thought for +all time. + +Said Captain Bingham: "You can have no idea of the wonderful machine +that the German army is and how well it is prepared for war. A chart +is made out which shows just what must be done in the case of wars with +the different nations. And every officer's place in the scheme is laid +out beforehand. There is a schedule of trains which will supersede all +other schedules the moment war is declared, and this is so arranged +that the commander of the army here could telegraph to any officer to +take such a train and go to such a place at a moment's notice. When +the Franco-Prussian war was declared, Von Moltke was awakened at +midnight and told of the fact. He said coolly to the official who +aroused him, 'Go to pigeonhole No. ---- in my safe and take a paper +from it and telegraph as there directed to the different troops of the +empire.' He then turned over and went to sleep and awoke at his usual +hour in the morning. Every one else in Berlin was excited about the +war, but Von Moltke took his morning walk as usual, and a friend who +met him said, 'General, you seem to be taking it very easy. Aren't you +afraid of the situation? I should think you would be busy.' 'Ah,' +replied Von Moltke, 'all of my work for this time has been done long +beforehand and everything that can be done now has been done.'" + +That is done soon enough which is done well. Soon ripe, soon rotten. +He that would enjoy the fruit must not gather the flower. He who is +impatient to become his own master is more likely to become his own +slave. Better believe yourself a dunce and work away than a genius and +be idle. One year of trained thinking is worth more than a whole +college course of mental absorption of a vast series of undigested +facts. The facility with which the world swallows up the ordinary +college graduate who thought he was going to dazzle mankind should bid +you pause and reflect. But just as certainly as man was created not to +crawl on all fours in the depths of primeval forests, but to develop +his mental and moral faculties, just so certainly he needs education, +and only by means of it will he become what he ought to become,--man, +in the highest sense of the word. Ignorance is not simply the negation +of knowledge, it is the misdirection of the mind. "One step in +knowledge," says Bulwer, "is one step from sin; one step from sin is +one step nearer to Heaven." + +A learned clergyman was thus accosted by an illiterate preacher who +despised education: "Sir, you have been to college, I presume?" "Yes, +sir," was the reply. "I am thankful," said the former, "that the Lord +opened my mouth without any learning." "A similar event," retorted the +clergyman, "happened in Balaam's time." + +"If a cloth were drawn around the eyes of Praxiteles' statue of Love," +says Bulwer, "the face looked grave and sad; but as the bandage was +removed, a beautiful smile would overspread the countenance. Even so +does the removal of the veil of ignorance from the eyes of the mind +bring radiant happiness to the heart of man." + +A young man just graduated told the President of Trinity College that +he had completed his education, and had come to say good-by. "Indeed," +said the President, "I have just begun my education." + +Many an extraordinary man has been made out of a very ordinary boy; but +in order to accomplish this we must begin with him while he is young. +It is simply astonishing what training will do for a rough, uncouth, +and even dull lad, if he has good material in him, and comes under the +tutelage of a skilled educator before his habits have become confirmed. +Even a few weeks' or months' drill of the rawest and roughest recruits +in the late Civil War so straightened and dignified stooping and +uncouth soldiers, and made them so manly, erect, and courteous in their +bearing, that their own friends scarcely knew them. If this change is +so marked in the youth who has grown to maturity, what a miracle is +possible in the lad who is taken early and put under a course of drill +and systematic training, both physical, mental, and moral. How many a +man who is now in the penitentiary, in the poorhouse, or among the +tramps, or living out a miserable existence in the slums of our cities, +bent over, uncouth, rough, slovenly, has possibilities slumbering +within the rags, which would have developed him into a magnificent man, +an ornament to the human race instead of a foul blot and scar, had he +only been fortunate enough early in life to have come under efficient +and systematic training. + +Laziness begins in cobwebs and ends in iron chains. The more business +a man has, the more he can do, for be learns to economize his time. + +The industry that acquired riches, according to a wise teacher, the +patience that is required in obtaining them, the reserved self-control, +the measuring of values, the sympathy felt for fellow-toilers, the +knowledge of what a dollar costs to the average man, the memory of +it--all these things are preservative. But woe to the young farmer who +hates farming; does not like sowing and reaping; is impatient with the +dilatory and slow path to a small though secure fortune in the +neighborhood where he was born, and comes to the city, hoping to become +suddenly rich, thinking that he can break into the palace of wealth and +rob it of its golden treasures! + +Edison described his repeated efforts to make the phonograph reproduce +an aspirated sound, and added: "From eighteen to twenty hours a day for +the last seven months I have worked on this single word 'specia.' I +said into the phonograph 'specia, specia, specia,' but the instrument +responded 'pecia, pecia, pecia.' It was enough to drive one mad. But +I held firm, and I have succeeded." + +The road to distinction must be paved with years of self-denial and +hard work. + +Horace Mann, the great author of the common school system of +Massachusetts, was a remarkable example of that pluck and patience +which can work and wait. His only inheritance was poverty and hard +work. But he had an unquenchable thirst for knowledge and a +determination to get on in the world. He braided straw to get money to +buy books which his soul thirsted for. + +To Jonas Chickering there were no trifles in the manufacture of a +piano. Others might work for salaries, but he was working for fame and +fortune. Neither time nor pains were of any account to him compared +with accuracy and knowledge. He could afford to work and wait, for +quality, not quantity, was his aim. Fifty years ago the piano was a +miserable, instrument compared with the perfect mechanism of to-day. +Chickering was determined to make a piano which would yield the +fullest, richest volume of melody with the least exertion to the +player, and one which would withstand atmospheric changes and preserve +its purity and truthfulness of tone. And he strove patiently and +persistently till he succeeded. + +"Thy life, wert thou the pitifullest of all the sons of earth, is no +idle dream, but a solemn reality," said Carlyle. "It is thy own. It +is all thou hast to comfort eternity with. Work then like a star, +unhasting, yet unresting." + +Gladstone was bound to win; although he had spent many years of +preparation for his life work, in spite of the consciousness of +marvelous natural endowments which would have been deemed sufficient by +many young men, and notwithstanding he had gained the coveted prize of +a seat in Parliament, yet he decided to make himself master of the +situation; and amid all his public and private duties, he not only +spent eleven terms more in the study of the law, but he studied Greek +constantly and read every well written book or paper he could obtain, +so determined was he that his life should be rounded out to its fullest +measure, and that his mind should have broad and liberal culture. + +Emperor William I. was not a genius, but the secret of his power lay in +tireless perseverance. A friend says of him, "When I passed the palace +at Berlin night after night, however late, I always saw that grand +imperial figure standing beside the green lamp, and I used to say to +myself, 'That is how the imperial crown of Germany was won.'" + +Ole Bull said, "If I practice one day, I can see the result. If I +practice two days my friends can see it; if I practice three days the +great public can see it." + +The habit of seizing every bit of knowledge, no matter how +insignificant it may seem at the time, every opportunity, every +occasion, and grinding them all up into experience, cannot be +overestimated. You will find use for all of it. Webster once repeated +an anecdote with effect which he heard fourteen years before, and which +he had not thought of in the mean time. It exactly fitted the +occasion. "It is an ill mason that rejects any stone." + +Webster was once urged to speak on a subject of great importance, but +refused, saying he was very busy and had no time to master the subject. +"But," replied his friend, "a very few words from you would do much to +awaken public attention to it." Webster replied, "If there be so much +weight in my words, it is because I do not allow myself to speak on any +subject until my mind is imbued with it." On one occasion Webster made +a remarkable speech before the Phi Beta Kappa Society at Harvard, when +a book was presented to him, but after he had gone, his "impromptu" +speech, carefully written out, was found in the book which he had +forgotten to take away. + +Demosthenes was once urged to speak on a great and sudden emergency, +but replied, "I am not prepared." In fact, it was thought by many that +Demosthenes did not possess any genius whatever, because he never +allowed himself to speak on any subject without thorough preparation. +In any meeting or assembly, when called upon, he would never rise, even +to make remarks, it was said, without previously preparing himself. + +Alexander Hamilton said, "Men give me credit for genius. All the +genius I have lies just in this: when I have a subject in hand I study +it profoundly. Day and night it is before me. I explore it in all its +bearings. My mind becomes pervaded with it. Then the effort which I +make the people are pleased to call the fruit of genius; it is the +fruit of labor and thought." The law of labor is equally binding on +genius and mediocrity. + +Are the results so distant that you delay the preparation in the hope +that fortuitous good luck may make it unnecessary? As well might the +husbandman delay sowing his seed until the spring and summer are past +and the ground hardened by the frosts of a rigorous winter. As well +might one who is desirous of enjoying firm health inoculate his system +with the seeds of disease, and expect at such time as he may see fit to +recover from its effects, and banish the malady. Nelaton, the great +surgeon, said that if he had four minutes in which to perform an +operation, on which a life depended, he would take one minute to +consider how best to do it. + +"Many men," says Longfellow, "do not allow their principles to take +root, but pull them up every now and then, as children do flowers they +have planted, to see if they are growing." We must not only work, but +wait. + +"The spruce young spark," says Sizer, "who thinks chiefly of his +mustache and boots and shiny hat, of getting along nicely and easily +during the day, and talking about the theatre, the opera, or a fast +horse, ridiculing the faithful young fellow who came to learn the +business and make a man of himself, because he will not join in wasting +his time in dissipation, will see the day, if his useless life is not +earlier blasted by vicious indulgences, when he will be glad to accept +a situation from his fellow-clerk whom he now ridicules and affects to +despise, when the latter shall stand in the firm, dispensing benefits +and acquiring fortune." + +"I have been watching the careers of young men by the thousand in this +busy city of New York for over thirty years," said Dr. Cuyler, "and I +find that the chief difference between the successful and the failures +lies in the single element of staying power. Permanent success is +oftener won by holding on than by sudden dash, however brilliant. The +easily discouraged, who are pushed back by a straw, are all the time +dropping to the rear--to perish or to be carried along on the stretcher +of charity. They who understand and practice Abraham Lincoln's homely +maxim of 'pegging away' have achieved the solidest success." + +"When a man has done his work," says Ruskin, "and nothing can any way +be materially altered in his fate, let him forget his toil, and jest +with his fate if he will, but what excuse can you find for willfulness +of thought at the very lime when every crisis of fortune hangs on your +decisions? A youth thoughtless, when all the happiness of his home +forever depends on the chances or the passions of the hour! A youth +thoughtless, when the career of all his days depends on the opportunity +of a moment! A youth thoughtless, when his every action is a +foundation-stone of future conduct, and every imagination a foundation +of life or death! Be thoughtless in any after years, rather than +now--though, indeed, there is only one place where a man may be nobly +thoughtless, his deathbed. Nothing should ever be left to be done +there." + +The Duke of Wellington became so discouraged because he did not advance +in the army that he applied for a much inferior position in the customs +department, but was refused. Napoleon had applied for every vacant +position for seven years before he was recognized, but meanwhile he +studied with all his might, supplementing what was considered a +thorough military education by researches and reflections which in +later years enabled him easily to teach the art of war to veterans who +had never dreamed of his novel combinations. + +Reserves which carry us through great emergencies are the result of +long working and long waiting. Collyer declares that reserves mean to +a man also achievement,--"the power to do the grandest thing possible +to your nature when you feel you must, or some precious thing will be +lost,--to do well always, but best in the crisis on which all things +turn; to stand the strain of a long fight, and still find you have +something left, and so to never know you are beaten, because you never +are beaten." Every defeat is a Waterloo to him who has no reserves. + +He only is independent in action who has been earnest and thorough in +preparation and self-culture. "Not for school, but for life, we +learn;" and our habits--of promptness, earnestness, and thoroughness, +or of tardiness, fickleness, and superficiality--are the things +acquired most readily and longest retained. + +"One who reads the chronicles of discoveries is struck with the +prominent part that accident has played in such annals. For some of +the most useful processes and machinery the world is indebted to +apparently chance occurrences. Inventors in search of one object have +failed in their quest, but have stumbled on something more valuable +than that for which they were looking. Saul is not the only man who +has gone in search of asses and found a kingdom. Astrologers sought to +read from the heavens the fate of men and the fortune of nations, and +they led to a knowledge of astronomy. Alchemists were seeking for the +philosopher's stone, and from their efforts sprung the science of +chemistry. Men explored the heavens for something to explain +irregularities in the movements of the planets, and discovered a star +other than the one for which they were looking. A careless glance at +such facts might encourage the delusion that aimless straying in +bypaths is quite as likely to be rewarded as is the steady pressing +forward, with fixed purpose, towards some definite goal. + +"But it is to be remembered that the men who made the accidental +discoveries were men who were looking for something. The unexpected +achievement was but the return for the toil after what was attained. +Others might have encountered the same facts, but only the eye made +eager by the strain of long watching would be quick to note the +meaning. If vain search for hidden treasure has no other recompense, +it at least gives ability to detect the first gleam of the true metal. +Men may wake at times surprised to find themselves famous, but it was +the work they did before going to sleep, and not the slumber, that gave +the eminence. When the ledge has been drilled and loaded and the +proper connections have been made, a child's touch on the electric key +may be enough to annihilate the obstacle, but without the long +preparation the pressure of a giant's hand would be without effect. + +"In the search for truth and the shaping of character the principle +remains the same as in science and literature. Trivial causes are +followed by wonderful results, but it is only the merchantman who is on +the watch for goodly pearls who is represented as finding the pearl of +great price." + +To vary the language of another, the three great essentials to success +in mental and physical labor are Practice, Patience, and Perseverance, +but the greatest of these is Perseverance. + + Let us, then, be up and doing, + With a heart for any fate; + Still achieving, still pursuing, + Learn to labor and to wait. + LONGFELLOW. + + + + +CHAPTER X. + +CLEAR GRIT. + + I shall show the cinders of my spirits + Through the ashes of my chance. + SHAKESPEARE. + + What though ten thousand faint, + Desert, or yield, or in weak terror flee! + Heed not the panic of the multitude; + Thine be the captain's watchword,--Victory! + HORATIUS BONAR. + + Better to stem with heart and hand + The roaring tide of life, than lie, + Unmindful, on its flowery strand, + Of God's occasions drifting by! + Better with naked nerve to hear + The needles of this goading air, + Than in the lap of sensual ease forego + The godlike power to do, the godlike aim to know. + WHITTIER. + + Let fortune empty her whole quiver on me, + I have a soul that, like an ample shield, + Can take in all, and verge enough for more. + DRYDEN. + + There's a brave fellow! There's a man of pluck! + A man who's not afraid to say his say, + Though a whole town's against him. + LONGFELLOW. + +Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in rising every time we +fall.--GOLDSMITH. + + Attempt the end and never stand to doubt; + Nothing's so hard but search will find it out. + HERRICK. + +The barriers are not yet erected which shall say to aspiring talent, +"Thus far and no farther."--BEETHOVEN. + + +"Friends and comrades," said Pizarro, as he turned toward the south, +after tracing with his sword upon the sand a line from east to west, +"on that side are toil, hunger, nakedness, the drenching storm, +desertion, and death; on this side, ease and pleasure. There lies Peru +with its riches; here, Panama and its poverty. Choose, each man, what +best becomes a brave Castilian. For my part, I go to the south." So +saying, he crossed the line and was followed by thirteen Spaniards in +armor. Thus, on the little island of Gallo in the Pacific, when his +men were clamoring to return to Panama, did Pizarro and his few +volunteers resolve to stake their lives upon the success of a desperate +crusade against the powerful empire of the Incas. At the time they had +not even a vessel to transport them to the country they wished to +conquer. Is it necessary to add that all difficulties yielded at last +to such resolute determination? + + * * * * * * + +[Illustration: ANDREW JACKSON] + +"Old Hickory." + + "Stick to your aim: the mongrel's hold will slip, + But only crowbars loose the bull-dog's grip." + +"The nerve that never relaxes, the eye that never blenches, the thought +that never wanders,--these are the masters of victory." + + * * * * * * + + "Perseverance is a Roman virtue, + That wins each godlike act, and plucks success + E'en from the spear-proof crest of rugged danger." + + +At a time when abolitionists were dangerously unpopular, a crowd of +brawny Cape Cod fishermen had made such riotous demonstrations that all +the speakers announced, except Stephen Foster and Lucy Stone, had fled +from an open-air platform. "You had better run, Stephen," said she, +"they are coming." "But who will take care of you?" asked Foster. +"This gentleman will take care of me," she replied, calmly laying her +hand within the arm of a burly rioter with a club, who had just sprung +upon the platform. "Wh--what did you say?" stammered the astonished +rowdy, as he looked at the little woman; "yes, I'll take care of you, +and no one shall touch a hair of your head." With this he forced a way +for her through the crowd, and, at her earnest request, placed her upon +a stump and stood guard with his club while she delivered an address so +effective that the audience offered no further violence, and even took +up a collection of twenty dollars to repay Mr. Foster for the damage +his clothes had received when the riot was at its height. + +"When you get into a tight place and everything goes against you, till +it seems as if you could not hold on a minute longer," said Harriet +Beecher Stowe, "never give up then, for that's just the place and time +that the tide'll turn." + +Charles Sumner said, "Three things are necessary: first, backbone; +second, backbone; third, backbone." + +While digging among the ruins of Pompeii, which was buried by the dust +and ashes from an eruption of Vesuvius, A. D. 79, the workmen found the +skeleton of a Roman soldier in the sentry-box at one of the city's +gates. He might have found safety under sheltering rocks close by; +but, in the face of certain death, he had remained at his post, a mute +witness to the thorough discipline, the ceaseless vigilance and +fidelity which made the Roman legionaries masters of the known world. +Bulwer, describing the flight of a party amid the dust, and ashes, and +streams of boiling water, and huge hurtling fragments of scoria, and +gusty winds, and lurid lightnings, continues: "The air was now still +for a few minutes; the lamp from the gate streamed out far and clear; +the fugitives hurried on. They gained the gate. They passed by the +Roman sentry. The lightning flashed over his livid face and polished +helmet, but his stern features were composed even in their awe! He +remained erect and motionless at his post. That hour itself had not +animated the machine of the ruthless majesty of Rome into the reasoning +and self-acting man. There he stood amidst the crashing elements; he +had not received the permission to desert his station and escape." + +The world admires the man who never flinches from unexpected +difficulties, who calmly, patiently, and courageously grapples with his +fate, who dies, if need be, at his post. + +"Clear grit" always commands respect. It is that quality which +achieves, and everybody admires achievement. In the strife of parties +and principles, backbone without brains will carry against brains +without backbone. "A politician weakly and amiably in the right is no +match for a politician tenaciously and pugnaciously in the wrong." You +cannot, by tying an opinion to a man's tongue, make him the +representative of that opinion; at the close of any battle for +principles, his name will be found neither among the dead nor among the +wounded, but among the missing. + +The "London Times" was an insignificant sheet published by Mr. Walter +and was steadily losing money. John Walter, Jr., then only +twenty-seven years old, begged his father to give him full control of +the paper. After many misgivings, the father finally consented. The +young journalist began to remodel the establishment and to introduce +new ideas everywhere. The paper had not attempted to mould public +opinion, and had no individuality or character of its own. The +audacious young editor boldly attacked every wrong, even the +government, when he thought it corrupt. Thereupon the public customs, +printing, and the government advertisements were withdrawn. The father +was in utter dismay. The son he was sure would ruin the paper and +himself. But no remonstrance could swerve him from his purpose, to +give the world a great journal which should have weight, character, +individuality, and independence. + +The public soon saw that a new power stood behind the "Times"; that its +articles meant business; that new life and new blood and new ideas had +been infused into the insignificant sheet; that a man with brains and +push and tenacity of purpose stood at the helm,--a man who could make a +way when he could not find one. Among other new features foreign +dispatches were introduced, and they appeared in the "Times" several +days before their appearance in the government organs. The "leading +article" also was introduced to stay. But the aggressive editor +antagonized the government, and his foreign dispatches were all stopped +at the outpost, while those of the ministerial journalists were allowed +to proceed. But nothing could daunt this resolute young spirit. At +enormous expense he employed special couriers. Every obstacle put in +his way, and all opposition from the government, only added to his +determination to succeed. Enterprise, push, grit were behind the +"Times," and nothing could stay its progress. Walter was the soul of +the paper, and his personality pervaded every detail. In those days +only three hundred copies of the "Times" could be struck off in an hour +by the best presses, and Walter had duplicate and even triplicate types +set. Then he set his brain to work, and finally the Walter Press, +throwing off 17,000 copies, both sides printed, per hour, was the +result. It was the 29th of November, 1814, that the first steam +printed paper was given to the world. Walter's tenacity of purpose was +remarkable. He shrank from no undertaking, and neglected no detail. + +"Mean natures always feel a sort of terror before great natures, and +many a base thought has been unuttered, many a sneaking vote withheld, +through the fear inspired by the rebuking presence of one noble man." +As a rule, pure grit, character, has the right of way. In the presence +of men permeated with grit and sound in character, meanness and +baseness slink out of sight. Mean men are uncomfortable, dishonesty +trembles, hypocrisy is uncertain. + +Lincoln, being asked by an anxious visitor what he would do after three +or four years if the rebellion was not subdued, replied: "Oh, there is +no alternative but to keep pegging away." + +"It is in me and it shall come out," said Sheridan, when told that he +would never make an orator, as he had failed in his first speech in +Parliament. He became known as one of the foremost orators of his day. + +When a boy Henry Clay was very bashful and diffident, and scarcely +dared recite before his class at school, but he determined to become an +orator. So he committed speeches and recited them in the cornfields, +or in the barn with the horse and cows for an audience. + +Look at Garrison reading this advertisement in a Southern paper: "Five +thousand dollars will be paid for the head of W. L. Garrison by the +Governor of Georgia." Behold him again; a broadcloth mob is leading +him through the streets of Boston by a rope. He is hurried to jail. +See him return calmly and unflinchingly to his work, beginning at the +point at which he was interrupted. Note this heading in the +"Liberator," the type of which he set himself in an attic on State +Street, in Boston: "I am in earnest, I will not equivocate, I will not +excuse, I will not retreat a single inch, and I will be heard." Was +Garrison heard? Ask a race set free largely by his efforts. Even the +gallows erected in front of his own door did not daunt him. He held +the ear of an unwilling world with that burning word "freedom," which +was destined never to cease its vibrations until it had breathed its +sweet secret to the last slave. + +If impossibilities ever exist, popularly speaking, they ought to have +been found somewhere between the birth and the death of Kitto, that +deaf pauper and master of Oriental learning. But Kitto did not find +them there. In the presence of his decision and imperial energy they +melted away. Kitto begged his father to take him out of the poorhouse, +even if he had to subsist like the Hottentots. He told him that he +would sell his books and pawn his handkerchief, by which he thought he +could raise about twelve shillings. He said he could live upon +blackberries, nuts, and field turnips, and was willing to sleep on a +hayrick. Here was real grit. What were impossibilities to such a +resolute will? Patrick Henry voiced that decision which characterized +the great men of the Revolution when he said, "Is life so dear, or +peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? +Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but +as for me, give me liberty or give me death!" + +Grit is a permanent, solid quality, which enters into the very +structure, the very tissues of the constitution. A weak man, a +wavering, irresolute man, may be "spunky" upon occasion, he may be +"plucky" in an emergency; but pure "grit" is a part of the very +character of strong men alone. Lord Erskine was a plucky man; he even +had flashes of heroism, and when he was with weaker men, he was thought +to have nerve and even grit; but when he entered the House of Commons, +although a hero at the bar, the imperiousness, the audacious scorn, and +the intellectual supremacy of Pitt disturbed his equanimity and exposed +the weak places in his armor. In Pitt's commanding presence he lost +his equilibrium. His individuality seemed off its centre; he felt +fluttered, weak, and uneasy. + +Many of our generals in the late war exhibited heroism. They were +"plucky," and often displayed great determination, but Grant had pure +"grit" in the most concentrated form. He could not be moved from his +base; he was self-centred, immovable. "If you try to wheedle out of +him his plans for a campaign, he stolidly smokes; if you call him an +imbecile and a blunderer, he blandly lights another cigar; if you +praise him as the greatest general living, he placidly returns the puff +from his regalia; and if you tell him he should run for the presidency, +it does not disturb the equanimity with which he inhales and exhales +the unsubstantial vapor which typifies the politician's promises. +While you are wondering what kind of creature this man without a tongue +is, you are suddenly electrified with the news of some splendid +victory, proving that behind the cigar, and behind the face discharged +of all tell-tale expression, is the best brain to plan and the +strongest heart to dare among the generals of the Republic." + +Demosthenes was a man who could rise to sublime heights of heroism, but +his bravery was not his normal condition and depended upon his genius +being aroused. + +He had "pluck" and "spunk" on occasions, but Lincoln had pure "grit." +When the illustrated papers everywhere were caricaturing him, when no +epithet seemed too harsh to heap upon him, when his methods were +criticised by his own party, and the generals in the war were +denouncing his "foolish" confidence in Grant, and delegations were +waiting upon him to ask for that general's removal, the great President +sat with crossed legs, and was reminded of a story. + +Lincoln and Grant both had that rare nerve which cares not for +ridicule, is not swerved by public clamor, can bear abuse and hatred. +There is a mighty force in truth and in the sublime conviction and +supreme self-confidence behind it, in the knowledge that truth is +mighty and the conviction and confidence that it will prevail. + +Pure grit is that element of character which enables a man to clutch +his aim with an iron grip, and keep the needle of his purpose pointing +to the star of his hope. Through sunshine and storm, through hurricane +and tempest, through sleet and rain, with a leaky ship, with a crew in +mutiny, it perseveres; in fact, nothing but death can subdue it, and it +dies still struggling. + +The man of grit carries in his very presence a power which controls and +commands. He is spared the necessity of declaring himself, for his +grit speaks in his every act. It does not come by fits and starts, it +is a part of his very life. It inspires a sublime audacity and a +heroic courage. Many of the failures of life are due to the want of +grit or business nerve. It is unfortunate for a young man to start out +in business life with a weak, yielding disposition, with no resolution +or backbone to mark his own course and stick to it, with no ability to +say "No" with an emphasis, obliging this man by investing in hopeless +speculation, and rather than offend a friend, indorsing a questionable +note. + +A little boy was asked how he learned to skate. "Oh, by getting up +every time I fell down," he replied. + +Whipple tells a story of Masséna which illustrates the masterful +purpose that plucks victory out of the jaws of defeat. "After the +defeat at Essling, the success of Napoleon's attempt to withdraw his +beaten army depended on the character of Masséna, to whom the Emperor +dispatched a messenger, telling him to keep his position for two hours +longer at Aspern. This order, couched in the form of a request, +required almost an impossibility; but Napoleon knew the indomitable +tenacity of the man to whom he gave it. The messenger found Masséna +seated on a heap of rubbish, his eyes bloodshot, his frame weakened by +his unparalleled exertions during a contest of forty hours, and his +whole appearance indicating a physical state better befitting the +hospital than the field. But that steadfast soul seemed altogether +unaffected by bodily prostration; half dead as he was with fatigue, he +rose painfully and said, 'Tell the Emperor that I will hold out for two +hours.' And he kept his word." + +"Often defeated in battle," said Macaulay of Alexander the Great, "he +was always successful in war." He might have said the same of +Washington, and, with appropriate changes, of all who win great +triumphs of any kind. + +In the battle of Marengo, the Austrians considered the day won. The +French army was inferior in numbers, and had given way. The Austrian +army extended its wings on the right and on the left, to follow up the +French. Then, though the French themselves thought the battle lost, +and the Austrians were confident it was won, Napoleon gave the command +to charge; and, the trumpet's blast being given, the Old Guard charged +down into the weakened centre of the enemy, cut it in two, rolled the +two wings up on either side, and the battle was won for France. + +"Never despair," says Burke, "but if you do, work on in despair." + +Once when Marshal Ney was going into battle, looking down at his knees +which were smiting together, he said, "You may well shake; you would +shake worse yet if you knew where I am going to take you." + +It is victory after victory with the soldier, lesson after lesson with +the scholar, blow after blow with the laborer, crop after crop with the +farmer, picture after picture with the painter, and mile after mile +with the traveler, that secures what all so much desire--SUCCESS. + +A promising Harvard student was stricken with paralysis of both legs. +Physicians said there was no hope for him. The lad determined to +continue his college studies. The examiners heard him at his bedside, +and in four years he took his degree. He resolved to make a critical +study of Dante, to do which he had to learn Italian and German. He +persevered in spite of repeated attacks of illness and partial loss of +sight. He was competing for the university prize. Think of the +paralytic lad, helpless in bed, competing for a prize, fighting death +inch by inch. What a lesson! Before his book was published or the +prize awarded, the brave student died, but the book was successful. He +meant that his life should not be a burden or a failure, and he was not +only graduated from the best college in America, but competed +successfully for the university prize, and made a valuable contribution +to literature. + +Professor L. T. Townsend, the famous author of "Credo," is another +triumph of grit over environment. He had a hard struggle as a boy, but +succeeded in working his way through Amherst College, living on +forty-five cents a week. + +Orange Judd was a remarkable example of success through grit. He +earned corn by working for farmers, carried it on his back to mill, +brought back the meal to his room, cooked it himself, milked cows for +his pint of milk per day, and lived on mush and milk for months +together. He worked his way through Wesleyan University, and took a +three years' post-graduate course at Yale. + +Congressman William W. Crapo, while working his way through college, +being too poor to buy a dictionary, actually copied one, walking from +his home in the village of Dartmouth, Mass., to New Bedford to +replenish his store of words and definitions from the town library. + +Oh, the triumphs of this indomitable spirit of the conqueror! This it +was that enabled Franklin to dine on a small loaf in the +printing-office with a book in his hand. It helped Locke to live on +bread and water in a Dutch garret. It enabled Gideon Lee to go +barefoot in the snow, half starved and thinly clad. It sustained +Lincoln and Garfield on their hard journeys from the log cabin to the +White House. + +President Chadbourne put grit in place of his lost lung, and worked +thirty-five years after his funeral had been planned. + +Lord Cavanagh put grit in the place of arms and legs, and went to +Parliament in spite of his deformity. + +Henry Fawcett put grit in place of eyesight, and became the greatest +Postmaster-General England ever had. + +Prescott also put grit in place of eyesight, and became one of +America's greatest historians. Francis Parkman put grit in place of +health and eyesight, and became the greatest historian of America in +his line. Thousands of men have put grit in place of health, eyes, +ears, hands, legs, and yet have achieved marvelous success. Indeed, +most of the great things of the world have been accomplished by grit +and pluck. You cannot keep a man down who has these qualities. He +will make stepping-stones out of his stumbling-blocks, and lift himself +to success. + +At fifty, Barnum was a ruined man, owing thousands more than he +possessed, yet he resolutely resumed business once more, fairly +wringing success from adverse fortune, and paying his notes at the same +time. Again and again he was ruined, but phoenix-like, he rose +repeatedly from the ashes of his misfortune each time more determined +than before. + +It was the last three days of the first voyage of Columbus that told. +All his years of struggle and study would have availed nothing if he +had yielded to the mutiny. It was all in those three days. But what +days! + +"It is all very well," said Charles J. Fox, "to tell me that a young +man has distinguished himself by a brilliant first speech. He may go +on, or he may be satisfied with his first triumph; but show me a young +man who has not succeeded at first, and nevertheless has gone on, and I +will back that young man to do better than most of those who have +succeeded at the first trial." + +Cobden broke down completely the first time he appeared on a platform +in Manchester, and the chairman apologized for him. But he did not +give up speaking till every poor man in England had a larger, better, +and cheaper loaf. + +See young Disraeli, sprung from a hated and persecuted race; without +opportunity, pushing his way up through the middle classes, up through +the upper classes, until he stands self-poised upon the topmost round +of political and social power. Scoffed, ridiculed, rebuffed, hissed +from the House of Commons, he simply says, "The time will come when you +will hear me." The time did come, and the boy with no chance swayed +the sceptre of England for a quarter of a century. + +One of the most remarkable examples in history is Disraeli, forcing his +leadership upon that very party whose prejudices were deepest against +his race, and which had an utter contempt for self-made men and +interlopers. Imagine England's surprise when she awoke to find this +insignificant Hebrew actually Chancellor of the Exchequer. He was +easily master of all the tortures supplied by the armory of rhetoric; +he could exhaust the resources of the bitterest invective; he could +sting Gladstone out of his self-control; he was absolute master of +himself and his situation. You can see that this young man intends to +make his way in the world. A determined audacity is in his very face. +He is a gay fop. Handsome, with the hated Hebrew blood in his veins, +after three defeats in parliamentary elections he was not the least +daunted, for he knew his day would come, as it did. Lord Melbourne, +the great Prime Minister, when this gay young fop was introduced to +him, asked him what he wished to be. "Prime Minister of England," was +his audacious reply. + +One of the greatest preachers of modern times, Lacordaire, failed again +and again. Everybody said he would never make a preacher, but he was +determined to succeed, and in two years from his humiliating failures +he was preaching in Notre Dame to immense congregations. + +The boy Thorwaldsen, whose father died in the poor-house, and whose +education was so scanty that he had to write his letters over many +times before they could be posted, by his indomitable perseverance, +tenacity, and grit, fascinated the world with the genius which neither +his discouraging father, poverty, nor hardship could suppress. + +William H. Seward was given a thousand dollars by his father to go to +college with; this was all he was to have. The son returned at the end +of the freshman year with extravagant habits and no money. His father +refused to give him more, and told him he could not stay at home. When +the youth found the props all taken out from under him, and that he +must now sink or swim, he left home moneyless, returned to college, +graduated at the head of his class, studied law, was elected Governor +of New York, and became Lincoln's great Secretary of State during the +Civil War. + +Louisa M. Alcott wrote the conclusion to "An Old-Fashioned Girl" with +her left hand in a sling, one foot up, head aching, and no voice. She +proudly writes in her diary, "Twenty years ago I resolved to make the +family independent if I could. At forty, that is done. Debts all +paid, even the outlawed ones, and we have enough to be comfortable. It +has cost me my health, perhaps." She earned two hundred thousand +dollars by her pen. + +Mrs. Frank Leslie often refers to the time she lived in her carpetless +attic while striving to pay her husband's obligations. She has fought +her way successfully through nine lawsuits, and has paid the entire +debt. She manages her ten publications entirely herself, signs all +checks and money-orders, makes all contracts, looks over all proofs, +and approves the make-up of everything before it goes to press. She +has developed great business ability, which no one dreamed she +possessed. + +Garfield said, "If the power to do hard work is not talent, it is the +best possible substitute for it." The triumph of industry and grit +over low birth and iron fortune in America, this land of opportunity, +ought to be sufficient to put to shame all grumblers over their hard +fortune and those who attempt to excuse aimless, shiftless, successless +men because they have no chance. + +The fear of ridicule and the dread of humiliation often hinder one from +taking decisive steps when it is plainly a duty, so that courage is a +very important element of decision. In a New England academy a pupil +who was engaged to assist the teacher was unable to solve a problem in +algebra. The class was approaching the problem, and he was mortified +because, after many trials, he was obliged to take it to the teacher +for solution. The teacher returned it unsolved. What could he do? He +would not confess to the class that he could not solve it, so, after +many futile attempts, he went to a distant town to seek the assistance +of a friend who, he believed, could do the work. But, alas! his friend +had gone away, and would not be back for a week. On his way back he +said to himself, "What a fool! am I unable to perform a problem in +algebra, and shall I go back to my class and confess my ignorance? I +can solve it and I will." He shut himself in his room, determined not +to sleep until he had mastered the problem, and finally he won success. +Underneath the solution he wrote, "Obtained Monday evening, September +2, at half past eleven o'clock, after more than a dozen trials that +have consumed more than twenty hours of time." + +During a winter in the war of 1812, General Jackson's troops, +unprovided for and starving, became mutinous and were going home. But +the general set the example of living on acorns; then rode before the +rebellious line and threatened with death the first mutineer that +should try to leave. + +The race is not always to the swift, the battle is not always to the +strong. Horses are sometimes weighted or hampered in the race, and +this is taken into account in the result. So in the race of life the +distance alone does not determine the prize. We must take into +consideration the hindrances, the weights we have carried, the +disadvantages of education, of breeding, of training, of surroundings, +of circumstances. How many young men are weighted down with debt, with +poverty, with the support of invalid parents or brothers and sisters, +or friends? How many are fettered with ignorance, hampered by +inhospitable surroundings, with the opposition of parents who do not +understand them? How many a round boy is hindered in the race by being +forced into a square hole? How many are delayed in their course +because nobody believes in them, because nobody encourages them, +because they get no sympathy and are forever tortured for not doing +that against which every fibre of their being protests, and every drop +of their blood rebels? How many have to feel their way to the goal, +through the blindness of ignorance and lack of experience? How many go +bungling along from the lack of early discipline and drill in the +vocation they have chosen? How many have to hobble along on crutches +because they were never taught to help themselves, but to lean upon a +father's wealth or a mother's indulgence? How many are weakened for +the journey of life by self-indulgence, by dissipation, by +"life-sappers;" how many are crippled by disease, by a weak +constitution, by impaired eyesight or hearing? + +When the prizes of life shall be awarded by the Supreme Judge, who +knows our weaknesses and frailties, the distance we have run, the +weights we have carried, the handicaps, will all be taken into account. +Not the distance we have run, but the obstacles we have overcome, the +disadvantages under which we have made the race, will decide the +prizes. The poor wretch who has plodded along against unknown +temptations, the poor woman who has buried her sorrows in her silent +heart and sewed her weary way through life, those who have suffered +abuse in silence, and who have been unrecognized or despised by their +fellow-runners, will often receive the greater prize. + + "The wise and active conquer difficulties, + By daring to attempt them: sloth and folly + Shiver and sink at sight of toil and hazard, + And make the impossibility they fear." + + Tumble me down, and I will sit + Upon my ruins, smiling yet: + Tear me to tatters, yet I'll be + Patient in my necessity: + Laugh at my scraps of clothes, and shun + Me as a fear'd infection: + Yet scare-crow like I'll walk, as one + Neglecting thy derision. + ROBERT HERRICK. + + + + +CHAPTER XI. + +THE GRANDEST THING IN THE WORLD. + +"One ruddy drop of manly blood the surging sea outweighs." + +"Manhood overtops all titles." + +The truest test of civilization is not the census, nor the size of +cities, nor the crops; no, but the kind of man the country turns +out.--EMERSON. + +Hew the block off, and get out the man.--POPE. + +Eternity alone will reveal to the human race its debt of gratitude to the +peerless and immortal name of Washington.--JAMES A. GARFIELD. + + Better not be at all + Than not be noble. + TENNYSON. + + Be noble! and the nobleness that lies + In other men, sleeping, but never dead, + Will rise in majesty to meet thine own. + LOWELL. + + Virtue alone out-builds the pyramids: + Her monuments shall last when Egypt's fall. + YOUNG. + + Were one so tall to touch the pole, + Or grasp creation in his span, + He must be measured by his soul, + The mind's the measure of the man. + WATTS. + + We live in deeds, not years; in thoughts, not breaths; + In feelings, not in figures on a dial. + We should count time by heart-throbs. He most lives + Who thinks most, feels the noblest, acts the best. + BAILEY. + + "Good name in man or woman + Is the immediate jewel of their souls." + +But this one thing I know, that these qualities did not now begin to +exist, cannot be sick with my sickness, nor buried in my grave.--EMERSON. + + +A Moor was walking in his garden when a Spanish cavalier suddenly fell at +his feet, pleading for concealment from pursuers who sought his life in +revenge for the killing of a Moorish gentleman. The Moor promised aid, +and locked his visitor in a summer-house until night should afford +opportunity for his escape. Not long after the dead body of his son was +brought home, and from the description given he knew the Spaniard was the +murderer. He concealed his horror, however, and at midnight unlocked the +summer-house, saying, "Christian, the youth whom you have murdered was my +only son. Your crime deserves the severest punishment. But I have +solemnly pledged my word not to betray you, and I disdain to violate a +rash engagement even with a cruel enemy." Then, saddling one of his +fleetest mules, he said, "Flee while the darkness of night conceals you. +Your hands are polluted with blood; but God is just; and I humbly thank +Him that my faith is unspotted, and that I have resigned judgment to Him." + +[Illustration: John Greenleaf Whittier (missing from book)] + +Character never dies. As Longfellow says:-- + + "Were a star quenched on high, + For ages would its light, + Still traveling downward from the sky, + Shine on our mortal sight. + + "So when a great man dies, + For years beyond our ken, + The light he leaves behind him lies + Upon the paths of men." + + +The character of Socrates was mightier than the hemlock, and banished the +fear and sting of death. + +Who can estimate the power of a well-lived life? _Character is power_. +Hang this motto in every school in the land, in every home, in every +youth's room. Mothers, engrave it on every child's heart. + +You cannot destroy one single atom of a Garrison, even though he were +hanged. The mighty force of martyrs to truth lives; the candle burns +more brilliantly than before it was snuffed. "No varnish or veneer of +scholarship, no command of the tricks of logic or rhetoric, can ever make +you a positive force in the world;" but your character can. + +When the statue of George Peabody, erected in one of the thoroughfares of +London, was unveiled, the sculptor Story was asked to speak. Twice he +touched the statue with his hand, and said, "That is my speech. That is +my speech." What could be more eloquent? Character needs no +recommendation. It pleads its own cause. + +"Show me," said Omar the Caliph to Amru the warrior, "the sword with +which you have fought so many battles and slain so many infidels." "Ah!" +replied Amru, "the sword without the arm of the master is no sharper nor +heavier than the sword of Farezdak the poet." So one hundred and fifty +pounds of flesh and blood without character is of no great value. + +Napoleon was so much impressed with the courage and resources of Marshal +Ney, that he said, "I have two hundred millions in my coffers, and I +would give them all for Ney." + +In Agra, India, stands the Taj Mahal, the acme of Oriental architecture, +said to be the most beautiful building in the world. It was planned as a +mausoleum for the favorite wife of Shah Jehan. When the latter was +deposed by his son Aurungzebe, his daughter Jahanara chose to share his +captivity and poverty rather than the guilty glory of her brother. On +her tomb in Delhi were cut her dying words: "Let no rich coverlet adorn +my grave; this grass is the best covering for the tomb of the poor in +spirit, the humble, the transitory Jahanara, the disciple of the holy men +of Christ, the daughter of the Emperor Shah Jehan." Travelers who visit +the magnificent Taj linger long by the grass-green sarcophagus in Delhi, +but give only passing notice to the beautiful Jamma Masjid, a mausoleum +afterwards erected in her honor. + +Some writer has well said that David of the throne we cannot always +recall with pleasure, but David of the Psalms we never forget. The +strong, sweet faith of the latter streams like sunlight through even the +closed windows of the soul, long after the wearied eye has turned with +disgust from all the gilded pomp and pride of the former. + +Robertson says that when you have got to the lowest depths of your heart, +you will find there not the mere desire of happiness, but a craving as +natural to us as the desire for food,--the craving for nobler, higher +life. + +"Private Benjamin Owen, ---- Regiment, Vermont Volunteers, was found +asleep at his post while on picket duty last night. The court-martial +has sentenced him to be shot in twenty-four hours, as the offense +occurred at a critical time." "I thought when I gave Bennie to his +country," said farmer Owen as he read the above telegram with dimming +eyes, "that no other father in all this broad laud made so precious a +gift. He only slept a minute,--just one little minute,--at his post, I +know that was all, for Bennie never dozed over a duty. How prompt and +trustworthy he was! He was as tall as I, and only eighteen! and now they +shoot him because he was found asleep when doing sentinel duty!" Just +then Bennie's little sister Blossom answered a tap at the door, and +returned with a letter. "It is from him," was all she said. + + +DEAR FATHER,--For sleeping on sentinel duty I am to be shot. At first, +it seemed awful to me; but I have thought about it so much now that it +has no terror. They say that they will not bind me, nor blind me; but +that I may meet my death like a man. I thought, father, that it might +have been on the battlefield, for my country, and that, when I fell, it +would be fighting gloriously; but to be shot down like a dog for nearly +betraying it,--to die for neglect of duty! Oh, father, I wonder the very +thought does not kill me! But I shall not disgrace you. I am going to +write you all about it; and when I am gone, you may tell my comrades; I +cannot now. + +You know I promised Jemmie Carr's mother I would look after her boy; and, +when he fell sick, I did all I could for him. He was not strong when he +was ordered back into the ranks, and the day before that night I carried +all his baggage, besides my own, on our march. Toward night we went in +on double-quick, and the baggage began to feel very heavy. Everybody was +tired; and as for Jemmie, if I had not lent him an arm now and then, he +would have dropped by the way. I was all tired out when we came into +camp; and then it was Jemmie's turn to be sentry, and I could take his +place; but I was too tired, father. I could not have kept awake if a gun +had been pointed at my head; but I did not know it until,--well, until it +was too late. + +They tell me to-day that I have a short reprieve,--given to me by +circumstances,--"time to write to you," our good colonel says. Forgive +him, father, he only does his duty; he would gladly save me if he could; +and do not lay my death up against Jemmie. The poor boy is +broken-hearted, and does nothing but beg and entreat them to let him die +in my stead. I can't bear to think of mother and Blossom. Comfort them, +father! Tell them I die as a brave boy should, and that, when the war is +over, they will not be ashamed of me, as they must be now. God help me: +it is very hard to bear! Good-by, father. To-night, in the early +twilight, I shall see the cows all coming home from pasture, and precious +little Blossom standing on the back stoop, waiting for me,--but I shall +never, never come! God bless you all! + + +"God be thanked!" said Mr. Owen reverently; "I knew Bennie was not the +boy to sleep carelessly." + +Late that night a little figure glided out of the house and down the +path. Two hours later the conductor of the southward mail lifted her +into a car at Mill Depot. Next morning she was in New York, and the next +she was admitted to the White House at Washington. "Well, my child," +said the President in pleasant, cheerful tones, "what do you want so +bright and early this morning?" "Bennie's life, please, sir," faltered +Blossom. "Bennie? Who is Bennie?" asked Mr. Lincoln. "My brother, sir. +They are going to shoot him for sleeping at his post," said the little +girl. "I remember," said the President; "it was a fatal sleep. You see, +child, it was a time of special danger. Thousands of lives might have +been lost through his culpable negligence." "So my father said; but poor +Bennie was so tired, sir, and Jemmie so weak. He did the work of two, +sir, and it was Jemmie's night, not his; but Jemmie was too tired, and +Bennie never thought about himself,--that he was tired, too." "What is +that you say, child? Come here; I do not understand." He read Bennie's +letter to his father, which Blossom held out, wrote a few lines, rang his +bell, and said to the messenger who appeared, "Send this dispatch at +once." Then, turning to Blossom, he continued: "Go home, my child, and +tell that father of yours, who could approve his country's sentence, even +when it took the life of a child like that, that Abraham Lincoln thinks +the life far too precious to be lost. Go back, or--wait until to-morrow; +Bennie will need a change after he has so bravely faced death, he shall +go with you." "God bless you, sir," said Blossom. _Not all the queens +are crowned._ + +Two days later, when the young soldier came with his sister to thank the +President, Mr. Lincoln fastened the strap of a lieutenant upon his +shoulder, saying, "The soldier that could carry a sick comrade's baggage, +and die for the act without complaining, deserves well of his country." + +When telegrams poured in announcing terrible carnage upon battlefields in +our late war, and when President Lincoln's heart-strings were nearly +broken over the cruel treatment of our prisoners at Andersonville, Belle +Isle, and Libby Prison, he never once departed from his famous motto, +"With malice toward none, with charity for all." When it was reported +that among those returned at Baltimore from Southern prisons, not one in +ten could stand alone from hunger and neglect, and many were so eaten and +covered by vermin as to resemble those pitted by smallpox, and so +emaciated that they were living skeletons, not even these reports could +move the great President to retaliate in kind upon the Southern prisoners. + +Among the slain on the battlefield at Fredericksburg was the body of a +youth upon which was found next the heart a photograph of Lincoln. Upon +the back of it were these words: "God bless President Lincoln." The +youth had been sentenced to death for sleeping at his post, but had been +pardoned by the President. + +David Dudley Field said he considered Lincoln the greatest man of his +day. Webster, Clay, Calhoun, and others were great, each in one way, but +Lincoln was great in many ways. There seemed to be hidden springs of +greatness in this man that would gush forth in the most unexpected way. +The men about him were at a loss to name the order of his genius. Horace +Greeley was almost as many-sided, but was a wonderful combination of +goodness and weakness, while Lincoln seemed strong in every way. After +Lincoln had signed the Emancipation Proclamation he said, "The promise +must now be kept; I shall never recall one word." + +Bishop Hamilton, of Salisbury, bears the following testimony to the +influence for good which Gladstone, when a school-fellow at Eton, +exercised upon him. "I was a thoroughly idle boy; but I was saved from +worse things by getting to know Gladstone." At Oxford we are told the +effect of his example was so strong that men who followed him there ten +years later declare "that undergraduates drank less in the forties +because Gladstone had been so courageously abstemious in the thirties." + +The Rev. John Newton said, "I see in this world two heaps of human +happiness and misery; now if I can take but the smallest bit from one +heap and add it to the other, I carry a point; if as I go home a child +has dropped a half-penny, and by giving it another I can wipe away its +tears, I feel I have done something." + +A holy hermit, who had lived for six years in a cave of the Thebaid, +fasting, praying, and performing severe penances, spending his whole life +in trying to make himself of some account with God, that he might be sure +of a seat in Paradise, prayed to be shown some saint greater than +himself, in order that he might pattern after him to reach still greater +heights of holiness. The same night an angel came to him and said, "If +thou wouldst excel all others in virtue and sanctity, strive to imitate a +certain minstrel who goes begging and singing from door to door." The +hermit, much chagrined, sought the minstrel and asked him how he had +managed to make himself so acceptable to God. The minstrel hung down his +head and replied, "Do not mock me, holy father; I have performed no good +works, and I am not worthy to pray. I only go from door to door to amuse +people with my viol and my flute." The hermit insisted that he must have +done some good deeds. The minstrel replied, "Nay, I know of nothing good +that I have done." "But how hast thou become a beggar? Hast thou spent +thy substance in riotous living?" "Nay, not so," replied the minstrel. +"I met a poor woman running hither and thither, distracted, because her +husband and children had been sold into slavery to pay a debt. I took +her home and protected her from certain sons of Belial, for she was very +beautiful. I gave her all I possessed to redeem her family and returned +her to her husband and children. Is there any man who would not have +done the same?" The hermit shed tears, and said in all his life he had +not done as much as the poor minstrel. + +"A good name is rather to be chosen than great riches, and loving favor +than silver or gold." + +A gentleman, traveling through West Virginia, went to a house, and +procured food for himself and companion and their horses. He wanted to +make payment, but the woman was ashamed to take pay for a mere act of +kindness. He pressed the money upon her. Finally she said, "If you +don't think I'm mean, I'll take one quarter of a dollar from you, so as +to look at it now and then, for there has been no money in this house for +a year." + +Do not take the world's estimate of success. The real height of the +Washington Monument is not measured between the capstone and the earth, +but includes the fifty feet of solid masonry below. Many of the most +successful lives are like the rivers of India which run under ground, +unseen and unheard by the millions who tread above them. But have these +rivers therefore no influence? Ask the rich harvest fields if they feel +the flowing water beneath. The greatest worth is never measured. It is +only the nearest stars whose distances we compute. That life whose +influence can be measured by the world's tape-line of dollars and corn is +not worth the measuring. + +All the forces in nature that are the most powerful are the quietest. We +speak of the rolling thunder as powerful; but gravitation, which makes no +noise, yet keeps orbs in their orbits, and the whole system in harmony, +binding every atom in each planet to the great centre of all attraction, +is ten thousand times ten thousand times more powerful. We say the +bright lightning is mighty; so it is when it rends the gnarled oak into +splinters, or splits solid battlements into fragments; but it is not half +so powerful as the gentle light that comes so softly from the skies that +we do not feel it, that travels at an inconceivable speed, strikes and +yet is not felt, but exercises an influence so great that the earth is +clothed with verdure through its influence, and all nature beautified and +blessed by its ceaseless action. The things that make no noise, make no +pretension, may be really the strongest. The most conclusive logic that +a preacher uses in the pulpit will never exercise the influence that the +consistent piety of character will exercise over all the earth. + +The old Sicilian story relates how Pythias, condemned to death through +the hasty anger of Dionysius of Syracuse, asked that he might go to his +native Greece, and arrange his affairs, promising to return before the +time appointed for his execution. The tyrant laughed his request to +scorn, saying that when he was once safe out of Sicily no one would +answer for his reappearance. At this juncture, Damon, a friend of the +doomed man, offered to become surety for him, and to die in his stead if +he did not come back in time. Dionysius was surprised, but accepted the +proposition. When the fatal day came, Pythias had not reached Syracuse, +but Damon remained firm in his faith that his friend would not fail him. +At the very last hour Pythias appeared and announced himself ready to +die. But such touching loyalty moved even the iron heart of Dionysius; +accordingly he ordered both to be spared, and asked to be allowed to make +a third partner in such a noble friendship. It is a grander thing to be +nobly remembered than to be nobly born. + +When Attila, flushed with conquest, appeared with his barbarian horde +before the gates of Rome in 452, Pope Leo alone of all the people dared +go forth and try to turn his wrath aside. A single magistrate followed +him. The Huns were awed by the fearless majesty of the unarmed old man, +and led him before their chief, whose respect was so great that he agreed +not to enter the city, provided a tribute should be paid to him. + +Blackie thinks there is no kind of a sermon so effective as the example +of a great man, where we see the thing done before us,--actually +done,--the thing of which we were not even dreaming. + +It was said that when Washington led the American forces as commanding +officer, it "doubled the strength of the army." + +When General Lee was in conversation with one of his officers in regard +to a movement of his army, a plain farmer's boy overheard the general's +remark that he had decided to march upon Gettysburg instead of +Harrisburg. The boy telegraphed this fact to Governor Curtin. A special +engine was sent for the boy. "I would give my right hand," said the +governor, "to know if this boy tells the truth." A corporal replied, +"Governor, I know that boy; it is impossible for him to lie; there is not +a drop of false blood in his veins." In fifteen minutes the Union troops +were marching to Gettysburg, where they gained a victory. Character is +power. The great thing is to be a man, to have a high purpose, a noble +aim, to be dead in earnest, to yearn for the good and the true. + +"Your lordships," said Wellington in Parliament, "must all feel the high +and honorable character of the late Sir Robert Peel. I was long +connected with him in public life. We were both in the councils of our +sovereign together, and I had long the honor to enjoy his private +friendship. In all the course of my acquaintance with him, I never knew +a man in whose truth and justice I had greater confidence, or in whom I +saw a more invariable desire to promote the public service. In the whole +course of my communication with him, I never knew an instance in which he +did not show the strongest attachment to truth; and I never saw in the +whole course of my life the smallest reason for suspecting that he stated +anything which he did not firmly believe to be the fact." + +"The Secretary stood alone," said Grattan of the elder Pitt. "Modern +degeneracy had not reached him. Original and unaccommodating, the +features of his character had the hardihood of antiquity. His august +mind overawed majesty; and one of his sovereigns thought royalty so +impaired in his presence, that he conspired to remove him, in order to be +relieved from his superiority. No state chicanery, no narrow system of +vicious politics, sunk him to the level of the vulgar great; but, +overbearing, persuasive, and impracticable, his object was England, his +ambition, fame. A character so exalted, so unsullied, so various, so +authoritative, astonished a corrupt age, and the Treasury trembled at the +name of Pitt through all the classes of venality. Corruption imagined, +indeed, that she had found defects in this statesman, and talked much of +the inconsistency of his policy, and much of the ruin of his victories; +but the history of his country and the calamities of the enemy answered +and refuted her. Upon the whole, there was in this man something that +could create, subvert, or reform; an understanding, a spirit, and an +eloquence to summon mankind to united exertion, or to break the bonds of +slavery asunder, and to rule the wilderness of free minds with unbounded +authority; something that could establish or overwhelm an empire, and +strike a blow in the world that would resound through the universe." + +Pitt was Paymaster-General for George II. When a subsidy was voted a +foreign office, it was customary for the office to claim one half per +cent. for honorarium. Pitt astonished the King of Sardinia by sending +him the sum without any deduction, and further astonished him by refusing +a present as a compliment to his integrity. He was a poor man. + +Washington would take no pay as commander-in-chief of the Continental +armies. He would keep a strict account of his expenses; and these, he +doubted not, would be discharged. + +Remember, the main business of life is not to do, but to become; an +action itself has its finest and most enduring fruit in character. + +In 1837, after George Peabody moved to London, there came a commercial +crisis in the United States. Many banks suspended specie payments. Many +mercantile houses went to the wall, and thousands more were in great +distress. Edward Everett said, "The great sympathetic nerve of the +commercial world, credit, as far as the United States were concerned, was +for the time paralyzed." Probably not a half dozen men in Europe would +have been listened to for a moment in the Bank of England upon the +subject of American securities, but George Peabody was one of them. His +name was already a tower of strength in the commercial world. In those +dark days his integrity stood four-square in every business panic. +Peabody retrieved the credit of the State of Maryland, and, it might +almost be said, of the United States. His character was the magic wand +which in many a case changed almost worthless paper into gold. Merchants +on both sides of the Atlantic procured large advances from him, even +before the goods consigned to him had been sold. + +Thackeray says, "Nature has written a letter of credit upon some men's +faces which is honored wherever presented. You cannot help trusting such +men; their very presence gives confidence. There is a 'promise to pay' +in their very faces which gives confidence, and you prefer it to another +man's indorsement." _Character is credit._ + +With most people, as with most nations, "things are worth what they will +sell for," and the dollar is mightier than the sword. As good as gold +has become a proverb--as though it were the highest standard of +comparison. + +Themistocles, having conceived the design of transferring the government +of Greece from the hands of the Lacedaemonians into those of the +Athenians, kept his thoughts continually fixed on this great project. +Being at no time very nice or scrupulous in the choice of his measures, +he thought anything which could tend to the accomplishment of the end he +had in view just and lawful. Accordingly in an assembly of the people +one day, he intimated that he had a very important design to propose; but +he could not communicate it to the public at large, because the greatest +secrecy was necessary to its success, and he therefore desired that they +would appoint a person to whom he might explain himself on the subject. +Aristides was unanimously selected by the assembly, which deferred +entirely to his opinion. Themistocles, taking him aside, told him that +the design he had conceived was to burn the fleet belonging to the rest +of the Grecian states, which then lay in a neighboring port, when Athens +would assuredly become mistress of all Greece. Aristides returned to the +assembly, and declared to them that nothing could be more advantageous to +the commonwealth than the project of Themistocles, but that, at the same +time, nothing in the world could be more unfair. The assembly +unanimously declared that, since such was the case, Themistocles should +wholly abandon his project. + +A tragedy by Aeschylus was once represented before the Athenians, in +which it was said of one of the characters, "that he cared not more to be +just than to appear so." At these words all eyes were instantly turned +upon Aristides as the man who, of all the Greeks, most merited that +distinguished reputation. Ever after he received, by universal consent, +the surname of the Just,--a title, says Plutarch, truly royal, or rather +truly divine. This remarkable distinction roused envy, and envy +prevailed so far as to procure his banishment for years, upon the unjust +suspicion that his influence with the people was dangerous to their +freedom. When the sentence was passed by his countrymen, Aristides +himself was present in the midst of them, and a stranger who stood near, +and could not write, applied to him to write for him on his shell-ballot. +"What name?" asked the philosopher. "Aristides," replied the stranger. + +"Do you know him, then?" said Aristides, "or has he in any way injured +you?" "Neither," said the other, "but it is for this very thing I would +he were condemned. I can go nowhere but I hear of Aristides the Just." +Aristides inquired no further, but took the shell, and wrote his name on +it as desired. The absence of Aristides soon dissipated the +apprehensions which his countrymen had so idly indulged. He was in a +short time recalled, and for many years after took a leading part in the +affairs of the republic, without showing the least resentment against his +enemies, or seeking any other gratification than that of serving his +countrymen with fidelity and honor. The virtues of Aristides did not +pass without reward. He had two daughters, who were educated at the +expense of the state, and to whom portions were allotted from the public +treasury. + +The strongest proof, however, of the justice and integrity of Aristides +is, that notwithstanding he had possessed the highest employments in the +republic, and had the absolute disposal of its treasures, yet he died so +poor as not to leave money enough to defray the expenses of his funeral. + +Men of character are the conscience of the society to which they belong; +they, and not the police, guarantee the execution of the laws. Their +influence is the bulwark of good government. + +It was said of the first Emperor Alexander of Russia, that his personal +character was equivalent to a constitution. Of Montaigne, it was said +that his high reputation for integrity was a better protection for him +than a regiment of horse would have been, he being the only man among the +French gentry who, during the wars of the Fronde, kept his castle gates +unbarred. There are men, fortunately for the world, who would rather be +right than be President. + +Fisher Ames, while in Congress, said of Roger Sherman, of Connecticut: +"If I am absent during a discussion of a subject, and consequently know +not on which side to vote, when I return I always look at Roger Sherman, +for I am sure if I vote with him, I shall vote right." + +Character gravitates upward, as with a celestial gravitation, while mere +genius, without character, gravitates downward. How often we see in +school or college young men, who are apparently dull and even stupid, +rise gradually and surely above others who are without character, merely +because the former have an upward tendency in their lives, a reaching-up +principle, which gradually but surely unfolds, and elevates them to +positions of honor and trust. There is something which everybody admires +in an aspiring soul, one whose tendency is upward and onward, in spite of +hindrances and in defiance of obstacles. + +We may try to stifle the voice of the mysterious angel within, but it +always says "yes" to right actions and "no" to wrong ones. No matter +whether we heed it or not, no power can change its decision one iota. +Through health, through disease, through prosperity and adversity, this +faithful servant stands behind us in the shadow of ourselves, never +intruding, but weighing every act we perform, every word we utter, +pronouncing the verdict "right" or "wrong." + +Francis Horner, of England, was a man of whom Sydney Smith said, that +"the ten commandments were stamped upon his forehead." The valuable and +peculiar light in which Horner's history is calculated to inspire every +right-minded youth is this: he died at the age of thirty-eight, possessed +of greater influence than any other private man, and admired, beloved, +trusted, and deplored by all except the heartless and the base. No +greater homage was ever paid in Parliament to any deceased member. How +was this attained? By rank? He was the son of an Edinburgh merchant. +By wealth? Neither he nor any of his relatives ever had a superfluous +sixpence. By office? He held but one, and that for only a few years, of +no influence, and with very little pay. By talents? His were not +splendid, and he had no genius. Cautious and slow, his only ambition was +to be right. By eloquence? He spoke in calm, good taste, without any of +the oratory that either terrifies or seduces. By any fascination of +manner? His was only correct and agreeable. By what was it, then? +Merely by sense, industry, good principles and a good heart, qualities +which no well constituted mind need ever despair of attaining. It was +the force of his character that raised him; and this character was not +impressed on him by nature, but formed, out of no peculiarly fine +elements, by himself. There were many in the House of Commons of far +greater ability and eloquence. But no one surpassed him in the +combination of an adequate portion of these with moral worth. Horner was +born to show what moderate powers, unaided by anything whatever except +culture and goodness, may achieve, even when these powers are displayed +amidst the competition and jealousies of public life. + +"When it was reported in Paris that the great Napoleon was dead, I passed +the Palais Royal," says a French writer, "where a public crier called, +'Here's your account of the death of Bonaparte.' This cry which once +would have appalled all Europe fell perfectly flat. I entered," he adds, +"several cafés, and found the same indifference,--coldness everywhere; no +one seemed interested or troubled. This man, who had conquered Europe +and awed the world, had inspired neither the love nor the admiration of +even his own countrymen. He had impressed the world with his +marvelousness, and had inspired astonishment but not love." + +Emerson says that Napoleon did all that in him lay to live and thrive +without moral principle. It was the nature of things, the eternal law of +man and of the world, which balked and ruined him; and the result, in a +million attempts of this kind, will be the same. His was an experiment, +under the most favorable conditions, to test the powers of intellect +without conscience. Never elsewhere was such a leader so endowed, and so +weaponed; never has another leader found such aids and followers. And +what was the result of this vast talent and power, of these immense +armies, burned cities, squandered treasures, immolated millions of men, +of this demoralized Europe? He left France smaller, poorer, feebler than +he found her. + +A hundred years hence what difference will it make whether you were rich +or poor, a peer or a peasant? But what difference may it not make +whether you did what was right or what was wrong? + +"The 'Vicar of Wakefield,'" said George William Curtis, "was sold, +through Dr. Johnson's mediation, for sixty pounds; and ten years after, +the author died. With what love do we hang over its pages! What springs +of feeling it has opened! Goldsmith's books are influences and friends +forever, yet the five thousandth copy was never announced, and Oliver +Goldsmith, M. D., often wanted a dinner! Horace Walpole, the coxcomb of +literature, smiled at him contemptuously from his gilded carriage. +Goldsmith struggled cheerfully with his adverse fate, and died. But then +sad mourners, whom he had aided in their affliction, gathered around his +bed, and a lady of distinction, whom he had only dared to admire at a +distance, came and cut a lock of his hair for remembrance. When I see +Goldsmith, thus carrying his heart in his hand like a palm branch, I look +on him as a successful man, whom adversity could not bring down from the +level of his lofty nature." + +Dr. Maudsley tells us that the aims which chiefly predominate--riches, +position, power, applause of men--are such as inevitably breed and foster +many bad passions in the eager competition to attain them. Hence, in +fact, come disappointed ambition, jealousy, grief from loss of fortune, +all the torments of wounded self-love, and a thousand other mental +sufferings,--the commonly enumerated moral causes of insanity. They are +griefs of a kind to which a rightly developed nature should not fall a +prey. There need be no envy nor jealousy, if a man were to consider that +it mattered not whether he did a great thing or some one else did it, +Nature's only concern being that it should be done; no grief from loss of +fortune, if he were to estimate at its true value that which fortune can +bring him, and that which fortune can never bring him; no wounded +self-love, if he had learned well the eternal lesson of +life,--self-renunciation. + +Soon after his establishment in Philadelphia Franklin was offered a piece +for publication in his newspaper. Being very busy, he begged the +gentleman would leave it for consideration. The next day the author +called and asked his opinion of it. "Well, sir," replied Franklin, "I am +sorry to say I think it highly scurrilous and defamatory. But being at a +loss on account of my poverty whether to reject it or not, I thought I +would put it to this issue: At night, when my work was done, I bought a +two-penny loaf, on which I supped heartily, and then, wrapping myself in +my great coat, slept very soundly on the floor till morning, when another +loaf and mug of water afforded a pleasant breakfast. Now, sir, since I +can live very comfortably in this manner, why should I prostitute my +press to personal hatred or party passion for a more luxurious living?" + +One cannot read this anecdote of our American sage without thinking of +Socrates' reply to King Archelaus, who had pressed him to give up +preaching in the dirty streets of Athens, and come and live with him in +his splendid courts: "Meal, please your Majesty, is a half-penny a peck +at Athens, and water I get for nothing!" + +During Alexander's march into Africa he found a people dwelling in peace, +who knew neither war nor conquest. While he was interviewing the chief +two of his subjects brought a case before him for judgment. The dispute +was this: the one had bought of the other a piece of ground, which, after +the purchase, was found to contain a treasure, for which he felt bound to +pay. The other refused to receive anything, stating that when he sold +the ground he sold it with all the advantages apparent or concealed which +it might be found to afford. The king said, "One of you has a daughter +and the other a son; let them be married and the treasure given to them +as a dowry." Alexander was surprised, and said, "If this case had been +in our country it would have been dismissed, and the king would have kept +the treasure." The chief said, "Does the sun shine on your country, and +the rain fall, and the grass grow?" Alexander replied, "Certainly." The +chief then asked, "Are there any cattle?" "Certainly," was the reply. +The chief replied, "Then it is for these innocent cattle that the Great +Being permits the rain to fall and the grass to grow." + +A good character is a precious thing, above rubies, gold, crowns, or +kingdoms, and the work of making it is the noblest labor on earth. + +Professor Blackie of the University of Edinburgh said to a class of young +men: "Money is not needful; power is not needful; liberty is not needful; +even health is not the one thing needful; but character alone is that +which can truly save us, and if we are not saved in this sense, we +certainly must be damned." It has been said that "when poverty is your +inheritance, virtue must be your capital." + +During the American Revolution, while General Reed was President of +Congress, the British Commissioners offered him a bribe of ten thousand +guineas to desert the cause of his country. His reply was, "Gentlemen, I +am poor, very poor; but your king is not rich enough to buy me." + +"When Le Père Bourdaloue preached at Rouen," said Père Arrius, "the +tradesmen forsook their shops, lawyers their clients, physicians their +sick, and tavern-keepers their bars; but when I preached the following +year I set all things to rights,--every man minded his own business." + +"I fear John Knox's prayers more than an army of ten thousand men," said +Mary, Queen of Scotland. + +When Pope Paul IV. heard of the death of Calvin he exclaimed with a sigh, +"Ah, the strength of that proud heretic lay in--riches? No. Honors? +No. But nothing could move him from his course. Holy Virgin! With two +such servants, our church would soon be mistress of both worlds." + +Garibaldi's power over his men amounted to fascination. Soldiers and +officers were ready to die for him. His will power seemed to enslave +them. In Rome he called for forty volunteers to go where half of them +would be sure to be killed and the others probably wounded. The whole +battalion rushed forward; and they had to draw lots, so eager were all to +obey. + +What power of magic lies in a great name! There was not a throne in +Europe that could stand against Washington's character, and in comparison +with it the millions of the Croesuses would look ridiculous. What are +the works of avarice compared with the names of Lincoln, Grant, or +Garfield? A few names have ever been the leaven which has preserved many +a nation from premature decay. + + "But strew his ashes to the wind + Whose sword or voice has served mankind-- + And is he dead, whose glorious mind + Lifts thine on high?-- + To live in hearts we leave behind + Is not to die." + + +Mr. Gladstone gave in Parliament, when announcing the death of Princess +Alice, a touching story of sick-room ministration. The Princess' little +boy was ill with diphtheria, the physician had cautioned her not to +inhale the poisoned breath; the child was tossing in the delirium of +fever. The mother took the little one in her lap and stroked his fevered +brow; the boy threw his arms around her neck, and whispered, "Kiss me, +mamma;" the mother's instinct was stronger than the physician's caution; +she pressed her lips to the child's, but lost her life. + +At a large dinner-party given by Lord Stratford after the Crimean War, it +was proposed that every one should write on a slip of paper the name +which appeared most likely to descend to posterity with renown. When the +papers were opened every one of them contained the name of Florence +Nightingale. + +Leckey says that the first hospital ever established was opened by that +noble Christian woman, Fabiola, in the fourth century. The two foremost +names in modern philanthropy are those of John Howard and Florence +Nightingale. Not a general of the Crimean War on either side can be +named by one person in ten. The one name that rises instantly, when that +carnival of pestilence and blood is suggested, is that of a young woman +just recovering from a serious illness, Florence Nightingale. A soldier +said, "Before she came there was such cussin' and swearin'; and after +that it was as holy as a church." She robbed war of half its terrors. +Since her time the hospital systems of all the nations during war have +been changed. No soldier was braver and no patriot truer than Clara +Barton, and wherever that noble company of Protestant women known as the +Red Cross Society,--the cross, I suppose, pointing to Calvary, and the +red to the blood of the Redeemer,--wherever those consecrated workers +seek to alleviate the condition of those who suffer from plagues, +cholera, fevers, flood, famine, there this tireless angel moves on her +pathway of blessing. And of all heroes, what nobler ones than these, +whose names shine from the pages of our missionary history? I never read +of Mrs. Judson, Mrs. Snow, Miss Brittain, Miss West, without feeling that +the heroic age of our race has just begun, the age which opens to woman +the privilege of following her benevolent inspirations wheresoever she +will, without thinking that our Christianity needs no other evidence. + +"Duty is the cement without which all power, goodness, intellect, truth, +happiness, and love itself can have no permanence, but all the fabric of +existence crumbles away from under us and leaves us at last sitting in +the midst of a ruin, astonished at our own desolation." A constant, +abiding sense of duty is the last reason of culture. + + "I slept and dreamed that life is beauty; + I woke and found that life is duty." + + +We have no more right to refuse to perform a duty than to refuse to pay a +debt. Moral insolvency is certain to him who neglects and disregards his +duty to his fellow-men. Nor can we hire another to perform our duty. +The mere accident of having money does not release you from your duty to +the world. Nay, it increases it, for it enables you to do a larger and +nobler duty. + +If your money is not clean, if there is a dirty dollar in your millions, +you have not succeeded. If there is the blood of the poor and +unfortunate, of orphans and widows, on your bank account, you have not +succeeded. If your wealth has made others poorer, your life is a +failure. If you have gained it in an occupation that kills, that +shortens the lives of others, that poisons their blood, or engenders +disease, if you have taken a day from a human life, if you have gained +your money by that which has debauched other lives, you have failed. + +Remember that a question will be asked you some time which you cannot +evade, the right answer to which will fix your destiny forever: "How did +you get that fortune?" Are other men's lives in it; are others' hope and +happiness buried in it; are others' comforts sacrificed to it; are +others' rights buried in it; are others' opportunities smothered in it; +others' chances strangled by it; has their growth been stunted by it; +their characters stained by it; have others a smaller loaf, a meaner +home? If so, you have failed; all your millions cannot save you from the +curse, "thou hast been weighed in the balance and found wanting." + +When Walter Scott's publisher and printer failed and $600,000 of debt +stared them in the face, friends came forward and offered to raise money +enough to allow him to arrange with his creditors. "No," said he +proudly, "this right hand shall work it all off; if we lose everything +else, we will at least keep our honor unblemished." What a grand picture +of manliness, of integrity in this noble man, working like a dray-horse +to cancel that great debt, throwing off at white heat the "Life of +Napoleon," "Woodstock," "The Tales of a Grandfather," articles for the +"Quarterly," and so on, all written in the midst of great sorrow, pain, +and ruin. "I could not have slept soundly," he writes, "as I now can +under the comfortable impression of receiving the thanks of my creditors, +and the conscious feeling of discharging my duty as a man of honesty. I +see before me a long, tedious, and dark path, but it leads to stainless +reputation. If I die in the harness, as is very likely, I shall die with +honor." + +One of the last things he uttered was, "I have been, perhaps, the most +voluminous author of my day, and it is a comfort to me to think that I +have tried to unsettle no man's faith, to corrupt no man's principles, +and that I have written nothing which, on my deathbed, I would wish +blotted out." + +Although Agassiz refused to lecture even for a large sum of money, yet he +left a greater legacy to the world, and left even more money to Harvard +University ($300,000) than he would have left if he had taken the time to +lecture for money. + +Faraday had to choose between a fortune of nearly a million and a life of +almost certain poverty if he pursued science. He chose poverty and +science, and earned a name never to be erased from the book of fame. + +Beecher says that we are all building a soul-house for eternity; yet with +what differing architecture and what various care! + +What if a man should see his neighbor getting workmen and building +materials together, and should say to him, "What are you building?" and +he should answer, "I don't exactly know. I am waiting to see what will +come of it." And so walls are reared, and room is added to room, while +the man looks idly on, and all the bystanders exclaim, "What a fool he +is!" Yet this is the way many men are building their characters for +eternity, adding room to room, without plan or aim, and thoughtlessly +waiting to see what the effect will be. Such builders will never dwell +in "the house of God, not made with hands, eternal in the heavens." + +Some people build as cathedrals are built, the part nearest the ground +finished; but that part which soars towards heaven, the turrets and the +spires, forever incomplete. + +Many men are mere warehouses full of merchandise--the head and heart are +stuffed with goods. Like those houses in the lower streets of cities +which were once family dwellings, but are now used for commercial +purposes, there are apartments in their souls which were once tenanted by +taste, and love, and joy, and worship; but they are all deserted now, and +the rooms are filled with material things. + + + + +CHAPTER XII. + +WEALTH IN ECONOMY. + +Economy is half the battle of life.--SPURGEON. + +Economy is the parent of integrity, of liberty and ease, and the +beauteous sister of temperance, of cheerfulness and health.--DR. JOHNSON. + +Can anything be so elegant as to have few wants and to serve them one's +self? + +As much wisdom can be expended on a private economy as on an +empire.--EMERSON. + +Riches amassed in haste will diminish; but those collected by hand and +little by little will multiply.--GOETHE. + +No gain is so certain as that which proceeds from the economical use of +what you have.--LATIN PROVERB. + +Beware of little extravagances: a small leak will sink a big +ship.--FRANKLIN. + +Better go to bed supperless than rise with debts.--GERMAN PROVERB. + +Debt is like any other trap, easy enough to get into, but hard enough to +get out of.--H. W. SHAW. + +Sense can support herself handsomely in most countries on some eighteen +pence a day; but for phantasy, planets and solar systems will not +suffice.--MACAULAY. + +Economy, the poor man's mint.--TUPPER. + +I can get no remedy against this consumption of the purse; borrowing only +lingers and lingers it out; but the disease is incurable.--SHAKESPEARE. + +Whatever be your talents, whatever be your prospects, never speculate +away on the chance of a palace that which you may need as a provision +against the workhouse.--BULWER. + + Not for to hide it in a hedge, + Nor for a train attendant, + But for the glorious privilege + Of being independent. + BURNS. + + +"We shan't get much here," whispered a lady to her companion, as John +Murray blew out one of the two candles by whose light he had been writing +when they asked him to contribute to some benevolent object. He listened +to their story and gave one hundred dollars. "Mr. Murray, I am very +agreeably surprised," said the lady quoted; "I did not expect to get a +cent from you." The old Quaker asked the reason for her opinion; and, +when told, said, "That, ladies, is the reason I am able to let you have +the hundred dollars. It is by practicing economy that I save up money +with which to do charitable actions. One candle is enough to talk by." + + * * * * * * + +[Illustration: ALEXANDER HAMILTON] + +"The Moses of Colonial Finance." + +"Poverty is a condition which no man should accept, unless it is forced +upon him as an inexorable necessity or as the alternative of dishonor." + +"Comfort and independence abide with those who can postpone their +desires." + + * * * * * * + +Emerson relates the following anecdote: "An opulent merchant in Boston +was called on by a friend in behalf of a charity. At that time he was +admonishing his clerk for using whole wafers instead of halves; his +friend thought the circumstance unpropitious; but to his surprise, on +listening to the appeal, the merchant subscribed five hundred dollars. +The applicant expressed his astonishment that any person who was so +particular about half a wafer should present five hundred dollars to a +charity; but the merchant said, "It is by saving half wafers, and +attending to such little things, that I have now something to give." + +"How did you acquire your great fortune?" asked a friend of Lampis, the +shipowner. "My great fortune, easily," was the reply, "my small one, by +dint of exertion." + +Four years from the time Marshall Field left the rocky New England farm +to seek his fortune in Chicago he was admitted as a partner in the firm +of Coaley, Farwell & Co. The only reason the modest young man gave, to +explain his promotion when he had neither backing, wealth, nor influence, +was that he saved his money. + +If a man will begin at the age of twenty and lay by twenty-six cents +every working day, investing at seven per cent. compound interest, he +will have thirty-two thousand dollars when he is seventy years old. +Twenty cents a day is no unusual expenditure for beer or cigars, yet in +fifty years it would easily amount to twenty thousand dollars. Even a +saving of one dollar a week from the date of one's majority would give +him one thousand dollars for each of the last ten of the allotted years +of life. "What maintains one vice would bring up two children." + +Such rigid economy, such high courage, enables one to surprise the world +with gifts even if he is poor. In fact, the poor and the middle classes +give most in the aggregate to missions and hospitals and to the poor. +Only frugality enables them to outdo the rich on their own ground. + +But miserliness or avariciousness is a different thing from economy. The +miserly is the miserable man, who hoards money from a love of it. A +miser who spends a cent upon himself where another would spend a quarter +does it from parsimony, which is a subordinate characteristic of avarice. +Of this the following is an illustration: "True, I should like some soup, +but I have no appetite for the meat," said the dying Ostervalde; "what is +to become of that? It will be a sad waste." And so the rich Paris +banker would not let his servant buy meat for broth. + +A writer on political economy tells of the mishaps resulting from a +broken latch on a farmyard gate. Every one going through would shut the +gate, but as the latch would not hold it, it would swing open with every +breeze. One day a pig ran out into the woods. Every one on the farm +went to help get him back. A gardener jumped over a ditch to stop the +pig, and sprained his ankle so badly as to be confined to his bed for two +weeks. When the cook returned, she found that her linen, left to dry at +the fire, was all badly scorched. The dairymaid in her excitement left +the cows untied, and one of them broke the leg of a colt. The gardener +lost several hours of valuable time. Yet a new latch would not have cost +five cents. + +Guy, the London bookseller, and afterward the founder of the great +hospital, was a great miser, living in the back part of his shop, eating +upon an old bench, and using his counter for a table, with a newspaper +for a cloth. He did not marry. One day he was visited by "Vulture" +Hopkins, another well-known miser. "What is your business?" asked Guy, +lighting a candle. "To discuss your methods of saving money," was the +reply, alluding to the niggardly economy for which Guy was famous. On +learning Hopkins's business he blew out the light, saying, "We can do +that in the dark." "Sir, you are my master in the art," said the +"Vulture;" "I need ask no further. I see where your secret lies." + +Yet that kind of economy which verges on the niggardly is better than the +extravagance that laughs at it. Either, when carried to excess, is not +only apt to cause misery, but to ruin the character. + +"Lay by something for a rainy day," said a gentleman to an Irishman in +his service. Not long afterwards he asked Patrick how much he had added +to his store. "Faith, nothing at all," was the reply; "I did as you bid +me, but it rained very hard yesterday, and it all went--in drink." + + "Wealth, a monster gorged + 'Mid starving populations." + + +But nowhere and at no period were these contrasts more startling than in +Imperial Rome. There a whole population might be trembling lest they +should be starved by the delay of an Alexandrian corn-ship, while the +upper classes were squandering fortunes at a single banquet, drinking out +of myrrhine and jeweled vases worth hundreds of pounds, and feasting on +the brains of peacocks and the tongues of nightingales. As a +consequence, disease was rife, men were short-lived. At this time the +dress of Roman ladies displayed an unheard-of splendor. The elder Pliny +tells us that he himself saw Lollia Paulina dressed for a betrothal feast +in a robe entirely covered with pearls and emeralds, which had cost +40,000,000 sesterces, and which was known to be less costly than some of +her other dresses. Gluttony, caprice, extravagance, ostentation, +impurity, rioted in the heart of a society which knew of no other means +by which to break the monotony of its weariness or alleviate the anguish +of its despair. + +The expense ridiculously bestowed on the Roman feasts passes all belief. +Suetonius mentions a supper given to Vitellius by his brother, in which, +among other articles, there were two thousand of the choicest fishes, +seven thousand of the most delicate birds, and one dish, from its size +and capacity, named the aegis or shield of Minerva. It was filled +chiefly with the liver of the scari, a delicate species of fish, the +brains of pheasants and peacocks, and the tongues of parrots, considered +desirable chiefly because of their great cost. + +"I hope that there will not be another sale," exclaimed Horace Walpole, +"for I have not an inch of room nor a farthing left." A woman once +bought an old door-plate with "Thompson" on it because she thought it +might come in handy some time. The habit of buying what you don't need +because it is cheap encourages extravagance. "Many have been ruined by +buying good pennyworths." + +"Where there is no prudence," said Dr. Johnson, "there is no virtue." + +The eccentric John Randolph once sprang from his seat in the House of +Representatives, and exclaimed in his piercing voice, "Mr. Speaker, I +have found it." And then, in the stillness which followed this strange +outburst, he added, "I have found the Philosopher's Stone: it is _Pay as +you go_." + +Many a young man seems to think that when he sees his name on a sign he +is on the highway to fortune, and he begins to live on a scale as though +there was no possible chance of failure; as though he were already beyond +the danger point. Unfortunately Congress can pass no law that will +remedy the vice of living beyond one's means. + +"The prosperity of fools shall destroy them." "However easy it may be to +make money," said Barnum, "it is the most difficult thing in the world to +keep it." Money often makes the mare--run away with you. + +Very few men know how to use money properly. They can earn it, lavish +it, hoard it, waste it, but to deal with it _wisely_, as a means to an +end, is an education difficult of acquirement. + +After a large stained-glass window had been constructed an artist picked +up the discarded fragments and made one of the most exquisite windows in +Europe for another cathedral. So one boy will pick up a splendid +education out of the odds and ends of time which others carelessly throw +away, or gain a fortune by saving what others waste. + +It has become a part of the new political economy to argue that a debt on +a church or a house or a firm is a desirable thing to develop character. +When the young man starts out in life with the old-fashioned idea strong +in his mind that debt is bondage and a disgrace, that a mortgage is to be +shunned like the cholera, and that to owe a dollar that you cannot pay, +unless overtaken by misfortune, is nothing more or less than stealing, +then he is bound in so much at least to succeed, and save his old age +from being a burden upon his friends or the state. + +To do your best you must own every bit of yourself. If you are in debt, +part of you belongs to your creditors. Nothing but actual sin is so +paralyzing to a young man's energies as debt. + +The "loose change" which many young men throw away carelessly, or worse, +would often form the basis of a fortune and independence. The earnings +of the people of the United States, rich and poor, old and young, male +and female, amount to an average of less than fifty cents a day. But it +is by economizing such savings that one must get his start in business. +The man without a penny is practically helpless, from a business point of +view, except so far as he can immediately utilize his powers of body and +mind. Besides, when a man or woman is driven to the wall, the chance of +goodness surviving self-respect and the loss of public esteem is +frightfully diminished. + +"Money goes as it comes." "A child and a fool imagine that twenty years +and twenty shillings can never be spent." + +Live between extravagance and meanness. Don't save money and starve your +mind. "The very secret and essence of thrift consists in getting things +into higher values. Spend upward, that is, for the higher faculties. +Spend for the mind rather than for the body, for culture rather than for +amusement. Some young men are too stingy to buy the daily papers, and +are very ignorant and narrow." "There is that withholdeth more than is +meet, but it tendeth to poverty." "Don't squeeze out of your life and +comfort and family what you save." + +Liberal, not lavish, is Nature's hand. Even God, it is said, cannot +afford to be extravagant. When He increased the loaves and fishes, He +commanded to gather up the fragments, that nothing be lost. + +"Nature uses a grinding economy," says Emerson, "working up all that is +wasted to-day into to-morrow's creation; not a superfluous grain of sand +for all the ostentation she makes of expense and public works. She flung +us out in her plenty, but we cannot shed a hair or a paring of a nail but +instantly she snatches at the shred and appropriates it to her general +stock." Last summer's flowers and foliage decayed in autumn only to +enrich the earth this year for other forms of beauty. Nature will not +even wait for our friends to see us, unless we die at home. The moment +the breath has left the body she begins to take us to pieces, that the +parts may be used again for other creations. Mark the following +contrast:-- + + 1772. 1822. + Man, to the plow; Man, tally-ho; + Wife, to the cow; Wife, piano; + Girl, to the sow; Miss, silk and satin; + Boy, to the mow; Boy, Greek and Latin; + And your rents will be netted. And you'll all be gazetted. + _Hone's Works._ _The Times._ + + +More than a lifetime has elapsed since the above was published, but +instead of returning to the style of 1772, our farmers have out-Heroded +Herod in the direction of the fashion, of 1822, and many a farmhouse, +like the home of Artemas [Transcriber's note: Artemus?] Ward, may be +known by the cupola and the mortgage with which it is decorated. + +It is by the mysterious power of economy, it has been said, that the loaf +is multiplied, that using does not waste, that little becomes much, that +scattered fragments grow to unity, and that out of nothing or next to +nothing comes the miracle of something. It is not merely saving, still +less, parsimony. It is foresight and arrangement, insight and +combination, causing inert things to labor, useless things to serve our +necessities, perishing things to renew their vigor, and all things to +exert themselves for human comfort. + +English working men and women work very hard, seldom take a holiday, and +though they get nearly double the wages of the same classes in France, +yet save very little. The millions earned by them slip out of their +hands almost as soon as obtained to satisfy the pleasures of the moment. +In France every housekeeper is taught the art of making much out of +little. "I am simply astonished," writes an American lady stopping in +France, "at the number of good wholesome dishes which my friend here +makes for her table from things, which at home, I always throw away. +Dainty little dishes from scraps of cold meat, from hard crusts of bread, +delicately prepared and seasoned, from almost everything and nothing. +And yet there is no feeling of stinginess or want." + +"I wish I could write all across the sky, in letters of gold," says Rev. +William Marsh, "the one word, savings-bank." + +Boston savings-banks have $130,000,000 on deposit, mostly saved in +driblets. Josiah Quincy used to say that the servant girls built most of +the palaces on Beacon Street. + +"So apportion your wants that your means may exceed them," says Bulwer. +"With one hundred pounds a year I may need no man's help; I may at least +have 'my crust of bread and liberty.' But with five thousand pounds a +year I may dread a ring at my bell; I may have my tyrannical master in +servants whose wages I cannot pay; my exile may be at the fiat of the +first long-suffering man who enters a judgment against me; for the flesh +that lies nearest my heart some Shylock may be dusting his scales and +whetting his knife. Every man is needy who spends more than he has; no +man is needy who spends less. I may so ill manage, that with five +thousand pounds a year I purchase the worst evils of poverty,--terror and +shame; I may so well manage my money, that with one hundred pounds a year +I purchase the best blessings of wealth,--safety and respect." + +Edmund Burke, speaking on Economic Reform, quoted from Cicero: "Magnum +vectigal est parsimonia," accenting the second word on the first +syllable. Lord North whispered a correction, when Burke turned the +mistake to advantage. "The noble lord hints that I have erred in the +quantity of a principal word in my quotation; I rejoice at it, sir, +because it gives me an opportunity of repeating the inestimable +adage,--'Magnum vectigal est parsimonia.'" The sentiment, meaning +"Thrift is a good income," is well worthy of emphatic repetition by us +all. + +Washington examined the minutest expenditures of his family, even when +President of the United States. He understood that without economy none +can be rich, and with it none need be poor. + +"I make a point of paying my own bills," said Wellington. + +John Jacob Astor said that the first thousand dollars cost him more +effort than all of his millions. Boys who are careless with their dimes +and quarters, just because they have so few, never get this first +thousand, and without it no fortune is possible. + +To find out uses for the persons or things which are now wasted in life +is to be the glorious work of the men of the next generation, and that +which will contribute most to their enrichment. + +Economizing "in spots" or by freaks is no economy at all. It must be +done by management. + +Learn early in life to say "I can't afford it." It is an indication of +power and courage and manliness. Dr. Franklin said, "It is not our own +eyes, but other people's, that ruin us." "Fashion wears out more apparel +than the man," says Shakespeare. + +"Of what a hideous progeny of ill is debt the father," said Douglas +Jerrold. "What meanness, what invasions of self-respect, what cares, +what double-dealing! How in due season it will carve the frank, open +face into wrinkles; how like a knife it will stab the honest heart. And +then its transformations,--how it has been known to change a goodly face +into a mask of brass; how with the evil custom of debt has the true man +become a callous trickster! A freedom from debt, and what nourishing +sweetness may be found in cold water; what toothsomeness in a dry crust; +what ambrosial nourishment in a hard egg! Be sure of it, he who dines +out of debt, though his meal be a biscuit and an onion, dines in 'The +Apollo.' And then, for raiment, what warmth in a threadbare coat, if the +tailor's receipt be in your pocket! What Tyrian purple in the faded +waistcoat, the vest not owed for; how glossy the well-worn hat, if it +covers not the aching head of a debtor! Next, the home sweets, the +outdoor recreation of the free man. The street door falls not a knell in +his heart, the foot on the staircase, though he lives on the third pair, +sends no spasm through his anatomy; at the rap of his door he can crow +'come in,' and his pulse still beats healthfully. See him abroad! How +he returns look for look with any passenger. Poverty is a bitter +draught, yet may, and sometimes can with advantage, be gulped down. +Though the drinker makes wry faces, there may, after all, be a wholesome +goodness in the cup. But debt, however courteously it may be offered, is +the Cup of Siren; and the wine, spiced and delicious though it be, is +poison. My son, if poor, see Hyson in the running spring; see thy mouth +water at a last week's roll; think a threadbare coat the only wear; and +acknowledge a whitewashed garret the fittest housing-place for a +gentleman; do this, and flee debt. So shall thy heart be at rest, and +the sheriff confounded." + +"Whoever has sixpence is sovereign over all men to the extent of that +sixpence," says Carlyle; "commands cooks to feed him, philosophers to +teach him, kings to mount guard over him,--to the extent of that +sixpence." + +If a man owes you a dollar, he is almost sure to owe you a grudge, too. +If you owe another money, you will be apt to regard him with uncharitable +eyes. Why not economize before getting into debt instead of pinching +afterwards? + +Communities which live wholly from hand to mouth never make much progress +in the useful arts. Savings mean power. _Comfort and independence abide +with those who can postpone their desires._ + +"Hunger, rags, cold, hard work, contempt, suspicion, unjust reproach, are +disagreeable," says Horace Greeley, "but debt is infinitely worse than +them all." + +Many a ruined man dates his downfall from the day when he began borrowing +money. Debt demoralized Daniel Webster, and Theodore Hook, and Sheridan, +and Fox, and Pitt. Mirabeau's life was made wretched by duns. + +"Annual income," says Micawber, "twenty pounds; annual expenditure, +nineteen six, result--happiness. Annual income, twenty pounds; annual +expenditure, twenty pounds ought and six, result--misery." + +"We are ruined," says Colton, "not by what we really want, but by what we +think we do. Therefore never go abroad in search of your wants; if they +be real wants, they will come home in search of you; for he that buys +what he does not want will soon want what he cannot buy." + +The honorable course is to give every man his due. It is better to +starve than not to do this. It is better to do a small business on a +cash basis than a large one on credit. _Owe no man anything_, wrote St. +Paul. It is a good motto to place in every purse, in every +counting-room, in every church, in every home. + +Economy is of itself a great revenue.--CICERO. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII. + +RICH WITHOUT MONEY. + +Let others plead for pensions; I can be rich without money, by +endeavoring to be superior to everything poor. I would have my +services to my country unstained by any interested motive.--LORD +COLLINGWOOD. + + Ill fares the land, to hastening ills a prey, + Where wealth accumulates and men decay. + GOLDSMITH. + +Pennilessness is not poverty, and ownership is not possession; to be +without is not always to lack, and to reach is not to attain; sunlight +is for all eyes that look up, and color for those who choose.--HELEN +HUNT. + +I ought not to allow any man, because he has broad lands, to feel that +he is rich in my presence. I ought to make him feel that I can do +without his riches, that I cannot be bought,--neither by comfort, +neither by pride,--and although I be utterly penniless, and receiving +bread from him, that he is the poor man beside me.--EMERSON. + +To be content with what we possess is the greatest and most secure of +riches.--CICERO. + +There is no riches above a sound body and no joy above the joy of the +heart.--ECCLESIASTES. + + Where, thy true treasure? Gold says, "Not in me;" + And "Not in me," the Diamond. Gold is poor; + India's insolvent: seek it in thyself. + YOUNG. + +He is richest who is content with the least, for content is the wealth +of nature.--SOCRATES. + +A great heart in a little house is of all things here below that which +has ever touched me most.--LACORDAIRE. + + My crown is in my heart, not on my head, + Nor decked with diamonds and Indian stones, + Nor to be seen: my crown is called content; + A crown it is, that seldom kings enjoy. + SHAKESPEAKE. + + +Many a man is rich without money. Thousands of men with nothing in +their pockets, and thousands without even a pocket, are rich. + + * * * * * * + +[Illustration: RALPH WALDO EMERSON] + +"The Sage of Concord." + +"I revere the person who is riches: so I cannot think of him as alone, +or poor, or exiled, or unhappy." + + * * * * * * + +A man born with a good, sound constitution, a good stomach, a good +heart and good limbs, and a pretty good headpiece, is rich. + +Good bones are better than gold, tough muscles than silver, and nerves +that carry energy to every function are better than houses and land. + +"Heart-life, soul-life, hope, joy, and love, are true riches," said +Beecher. + +Why should I scramble and struggle to get possession of a little +portion of this earth? This is my world now; why should I envy others +its mere legal possession? It belongs to him who can see it, enjoy it. +I need not envy the so-called owners of estates in Boston and New York. +They are merely taking care of my property and keeping it in excellent +condition for me. For a few pennies for railroad fare whenever I wish +I can see and possess the best of it all. It has cost me no effort, it +gives me no care; yet the green grass, the shrubbery, and the statues +on the lawns, the finer sculptures and the paintings within, are always +ready for me whenever I feel a desire to look upon them. I do not wish +to carry them home with me, for I could not give them half the care +they now receive; besides, it would take too much of my valuable time, +and I should be worrying continually lest they be spoiled or stolen. I +have much of the wealth of the world now. It is all prepared for me +without any pains on my part. All around me are working hard to get +things that will please me, and competing to see who can give them the +cheapest. The little I pay for the use of libraries, railroads, +galleries, parks, is less than it would cost to care for the least of +all I use. Life and landscape are mine, the stars and flowers, the sea +and air, the birds and trees. What more do I want? All the ages have +been working for me; all mankind are my servants. I am only required +to feed and clothe myself, an easy task in this land of opportunity. + +A millionaire pays thousands of pounds for a gallery of paintings, and +some poor boy or girl comes in, with open mind and poetic fancy, and +carries away a treasure of beauty which the owner never saw. A +collector bought at public auction in London, for one hundred and +fifty-seven guineas, an autograph of Shakespeare; but for nothing a +schoolboy can read and absorb the riches of "Hamlet." + +Why should I waste my abilities pursuing this will-o'-the-wisp +"Enough," which is ever a little more than one has, and which none of +the panting millions ever yet overtook in his mad chase? Is there no +desirable thing left in this world but gold, luxury, and ease? + +"Want is a growing giant whom the coat of Have was never large enough +to cover." "A man may as soon fill a chest with grace, or a vessel +with virtue," says Phillips Brooks, "as a heart with wealth." + +Shall we seek happiness through the sense of taste or of touch? Shall +we idolize our stomachs and our backs? Have we no higher missions, no +nobler destinies? Shall we "disgrace the fair day by a pusillanimous +preference of our bread to our freedom"? + +In the three great "Banquets" of Plato, Xenophon, and Plutarch the food +is not even mentioned. + +What does your money say to you: what message does it bring to you? +Does it say to you, "Eat, drink, and be merry, for to-morrow we die"? +Does it bring a message of comfort, of education, of culture, of +travel, of books, of an opportunity to help your fellow-man, or is the +message "More land, more thousands and millions"? What message does it +bring you? Clothes for the naked, bread for the starving, schools for +the ignorant, hospitals for the sick, asylums for the orphans, or of +more for yourself and none for others? Is it a message of generosity +or of meanness, breadth or narrowness? Does it speak to you of +character? Does it mean a broader manhood, a larger aim, a nobler +ambition, or does it cry "More, more, more"? + +Are you an animal loaded with ingots, or a man filled with a purpose? +He is rich whose mind is rich, whose thought enriches the intellect of +the world. It is a sad sight to see a soul which thirsts not for truth +or beauty or the good. + +A sailor on a sinking vessel in the Caribbean Sea eagerly filled his +pockets with Spanish dollars from a barrel on board while his +companions, about to leave in the only boat, begged him to seek safety +with them. But he could not leave the bright metal which he had so +longed for and idolized, and was prevented from reaching shore by his +very riches, when the vessel went down. + +"Who is the richest of men," asked Socrates? "He who is content with +the least, for contentment is nature's riches." + +In More's "Utopia" gold was despised. Criminals were forced to wear +heavy chains of it, and to have rings of it in their ears; it was put +to the vilest uses to keep up the scorn of it. Bad characters were +compelled to wear gold head-bands. Diamonds and pearls were used to +decorate infants, so that the youth would discard and despise them. + +"Ah, if the rich were as rich as the poor fancy riches!" exclaims +Emerson. + +Many a rich man has died in the poorhouse. + +In excavating Pompeii a skeleton was found with the fingers clenched +round a quantity of gold. A man of business in the town of Hull, +England, when dying, pulled a bag of money from under his pillow, which +he held between his clenched fingers with a grasp so firm as scarcely +to relax under the agonies of death. + + Oh! blind and wanting wit to choose, + Who house the chaff and burn the grain; + Who hug the wealth ye cannot use, + And lack the riches all may gain. + WILLIAM WATSON. + + +Poverty is the want of much, avarice the want of everything. + +A poor man was met by a stranger while scoffing at the wealthy for not +enjoying themselves. The stranger gave him a purse, in which he was +always to find a ducat. As fast as he took one out another was to drop +in, but he was not to begin to spend his fortune until he had thrown +away the purse. He takes ducat after ducat out, but continually +procrastinates and puts off the hour of enjoyment until he has got "a +little more," and dies at last counting his millions. + +A beggar was once met by Fortune, who promised to fill his wallet with +gold, as much as he might please, on condition that whatever touched +the ground should turn at once to dust. The beggar opens his wallet, +asks for more and yet more, until the bag bursts. The gold falls to +the ground, and all is lost. + +When the steamer Central America was about to sink, the stewardess, +having collected all the gold she could from the staterooms, and tied +it in her apron, jumped for the last boat leaving the steamer. She +missed her aim and fell into the water, the gold carrying her down head +first. + +In the year 1843 a rich miser lived in Padua, who was so mean and +sordid that he would never give a cent to any person or object, and he +was so afraid of the banks that he would not deposit with them, but +would sit up nights with sword and pistol by him to guard his idol +hoard. When his health gave way from anxiety and watching he built an +underground treasure-chamber, so arranged that if any burglar ever +entered, he would step upon a spring which would precipitate him into a +subterranean river, where he could neither escape nor be heard. One +night the miser went to his chest to see that all was right, when his +foot touched the spring of the trap, and he was hurled into the deep, +hidden stream. + +"One would think," said Boswell, "that the proprietor of all this +(Keddlestone, the seat of Lord Scarsfield) must be happy." "Nay, sir," +said Johnson, "all this excludes but one evil, poverty." + +John Duncan, the illegitimate child of a Scottish weaver, was ignorant, +near-sighted, bent, a miserable apology for a human being, and at last +a pauper. If he went upon the street he would sometimes be stoned by +other boys. The farmer, for whom he watched cattle, was cruel to him, +and after a rainy day would send him cold and wet to sleep on a +miserable bed in a dark outhouse. Here he would empty the water from +his shoes, and wring out his wet clothes and sleep as best he might. +But the boy had a desire to learn to read, and when, a little later, he +was put to weaving, he persuaded a schoolgirl, twelve years old, to +teach him. He was sixteen when he learned the alphabet, after which +his progress was quite rapid. He was very fond of plants, and worked +overtime for several months to earn five shillings to buy a book on +botany. He became a good botanist, and such was his interest in the +study that at the age of eighty he walked twelve miles to obtain a new +specimen. A man whom he met became interested at finding such a +well-stored mind in such a miserable body, poorly clad, and published +an account of his career. Many readers sent him money, but he saved +it, and left it in his will to found eight scholarships and offer +prizes for the encouragement of the study of natural science by the +poor. His small but valuable library was left for a similar use. + +Franklin said money never made a man happy yet; there is nothing in its +nature to produce happiness. The more a man has, the more he wants. +Instead of filling a vacuum, it makes one. A great bank account can +never make a man rich. It is the mind that makes the body rich. No +man is rich, however much money or land he may possess, who has a poor +heart. If that is poor, he is poor indeed, though he own and rule +kingdoms. He is rich or poor according to what he is, not according to +what he has. + +Who would not choose to be a millionaire of deeds with a Lincoln, a +Grant, a Florence Nightingale, a Childs; a millionaire of ideas with +Emerson, with Lowell, with Shakespeare, with Wordsworth; a millionaire +of statesmanship with a Gladstone, a Bright, a Sumner, a Washington? + +Some men are rich in health, in constant cheerfulness, in a mercurial +temperament which floats them over troubles and trials enough to sink a +shipload of ordinary men. Others are rich in disposition, family, and +friends. There are some men so amiable that everybody loves them; some +so cheerful that they carry an atmosphere of jollity about them. Some +are rich in integrity and character. + +One of the first great lessons of life is to learn the true estimate of +values. As the youth starts out in his career, all sorts of wares will +be imposed upon him, and all kinds of temptations will be used to +induce him to buy. His success will depend very largely upon his +ability to estimate properly, not the apparent but the real value of +everything presented to him. Vulgar Wealth will flaunt her banner +before his eyes, and claim supremacy over everything else. A thousand +different schemes will be thrust into his face with their claims for +superiority. Every occupation and vocation will present its charms in +turn, and offer its inducements. The youth who would succeed must not +allow himself to be deceived by appearances, but must place the +emphasis of life where it belongs. + +No man, it is said, can read the works of John Ruskin without learning +that his sources of pleasure are well-nigh infinite. There is not a +flower, nor a cloud, nor a tree, nor a mountain, nor a star; not a bird +that fans the air, nor a creature that walks the earth; not a glimpse +of sea or sky or meadow-greenery; not a work of worthy art in the +domains of painting, sculpture, poetry, and architecture; not a thought +of God as the Great Spirit presiding over and informing all things, +that is not to him a source of the sweetest pleasure. The whole world +of matter and of spirit and the long record of human art are open to +him as the never-failing fountains of his delight. In these pure +realms he seeks his daily food and has his daily life. + +There is now and then a man who sees beauty and true riches everywhere, +and "worships the splendor of God which he sees bursting through each +chink and cranny." + +Phillips Brooks, Thoreau, Garrison, Emerson, Beecher, Agassiz, were +rich without money. They saw the splendor in the flower, the glory in +the grass, books in the running brooks, sermons in stones, and good in +everything. They knew that the man who owns the landscape is seldom +the one who pays the taxes on it. They sucked in power and wealth at +first hands from the meadows, fields, and flowers, birds, brooks, +mountains, and forest, as the bee sucks honey from the flowers. Every +natural object seemed to bring them a special message from the great +Author of the beautiful. To these rare souls every natural object was +touched with power and beauty; and their thirsty souls drank it in as a +traveler on a desert drinks in the god-sent water of the oasis. To +extract power and real wealth from men and things seemed to be their +mission, and to pour it out again in refreshing showers upon a thirsty +humanity. They believed that man's most important food does not enter +by the mouth. They knew that man could not live by estates, dollars, +and bread alone, and that if he could he would only be an animal. They +believed that the higher life demands a higher food. They believed in +man's unlimited power of expansion, and that this growth demands a more +highly organized food product than that which merely sustains animal +life. They saw a finer nutriment in the landscape, in the meadows, +than could be ground into flour, and which escaped the loaf. They felt +a sentiment in natural objects which pointed upward, ever upward to the +Author, and which was capable of feeding and expanding the higher life +until it should grow into a finer sympathy and fellowship with the +Author of the beautiful. They believed that the Creation thunders the +ten commandments, and that all Nature is tugging at the terms of every +contract to make it just. They could feel this finer sentiment, this +soul lifter, this man inspirer, in the growing grain, in the waving +corn, in the golden harvest. They saw it reflected in every brook, in +every star, in every flower, in every dewdrop. They believed that +Nature together with human nature were man's great schoolmasters, that +if rightly used they would carve his rough life into beauty and touch +his rude manner with grace. + +"More servants wait on man than he'll take notice of." But if he would +enjoy Nature he must come to it from a higher level than the yardstick. +He must bring a spirit as grand and sublime as that by which the thing +itself exists. + +We all live on far lower levels than we need to do. We linger in the +misty and oppressive valleys, when we might be climbing the sunlit +hills. God puts into our hands the Book of Life, bright on every page +with open secrets, and we suffer it to drop out of our hands unread. +Emerson says, "We have come into a world which is a living poem. +Everything is as I am." Nature provides for us a perpetual festival; +she is bright to the bright, comforting to those who will accept +comfort. We cannot conceive how a universe could possibly be created +which could devise more efficient methods or greater opportunities for +the delight, the happiness, and the real wealth of human beings than +the one we live in. + +The human body is packed full of marvelous devices, of wonderful +contrivances, of infinite possibilities for the happiness and riches of +the individual. No physiologist nor scientist has ever yet been able +to point out a single improvement, even in the minutest detail, in the +structure of the human body. No inventor has ever yet been able to +suggest an improvement in this human mechanism. No chemist has ever +been able to suggest a superior combination in any one of the elements +which make up the human structure. One of the first things to do in +life is to learn the natural wealth of our surroundings, instead of +bemoaning our lot, for, no matter where we are placed, there is +infinitely more about us than we can ever understand, than we can ever +exhaust the meaning of. + +"Thank Heaven there are still some Matthew Arnolds who prefer the +heavenly sweetness of light to the Eden of riches." Arnold left only a +few thousand dollars, but yet was he not one of the richest of men? +What the world wants is young men who will amass golden thoughts, +golden wisdom, golden deeds, not mere golden dollars; young men who +prefer to have thought-capital, character-capital, to cash-capital. He +who estimates his money the highest values himself the least. "I +revere the person," says Emerson, "who is riches; so that I cannot +think of him as alone, or poor, or exiled, or unhappy." + +Raphael was rich without money. All doors opened to him, and he was +more than welcome everywhere. His sweet spirit radiated sunshine +wherever he went. + +Henry Wilson was rich without money. So scrupulous had he been not to +make his exalted position a means of worldly gain, that when this +Natick cobbler, the sworn friend of the oppressed, whose one question +as to measures or acts was ever "Is it right; will it do good?" came to +be inaugurated as Vice-President of the country, he was obliged to +borrow of his fellow-senator, Charles Sumner, one hundred dollars to +meet the necessary expenses of the occasion. + +Mozart, the great composer of the "Requiem," left barely enough money +to bury him, but he has made the world richer. + +A rich mind and noble spirit will cast a radiance of beauty over the +humblest home, which the upholsterer and decorator can never approach. +Who would not prefer to be a millionaire of character, of contentment, +rather than possess nothing but the vulgar coins of a Croesus? Whoever +uplifts civilization is rich though he die penniless, and future +generations will erect his monument. + +Are we tender, loving, self-denying, and honest, trying to fashion our +frail life after that of the model man of Nazareth? Then, though our +pockets are often empty, we have an inheritance which is as +overwhelmingly precious as it is eternally incorruptible. + +An Asiatic traveler tells us that one day he found the bodies of two +men laid upon the desert sand beside the carcass of a camel. They had +evidently died from thirst, and yet around the waist of each was a +large store of jewels of different kinds, which they had doubtless been +crossing the desert to sell in the markets of Persia. + +The man who has no money is poor, but one who has nothing but money is +poorer than he. He only is rich who can enjoy without owning; he who +is covetous is poor though he have millions. There are riches of +intellect, and no man with an intellectual taste can be called poor. +He who has so little knowledge of human nature as to seek happiness by +changing anything but his own disposition will waste his life in +fruitless efforts, and multiply the griefs which he purposes to remove. +He is rich as well as brave who can face poverty and misfortune with +cheerfulness and courage. + +We can so educate the will power that it will focus the thoughts upon +the bright side of things, and upon objects which elevate the soul, +thus forming a habit of happiness and goodness which will make us rich. +The habit of making the best of everything and of always looking on the +bright side of everything is a fortune in itself. + +He is rich who values a good name above gold. Among the ancient Greeks +and Romans honor was more sought after than wealth. Rome was imperial +Rome no more when the imperial purple became an article of traffic. + +This is the evil of trade, as well as of partisan politics. As Emerson +remarks, it would put everything into market,--talent, beauty, virtue, +and man himself. + +Diogenes was captured by pirates and sold as a slave. His purchaser +released him, and gave him charge of his household and of the education +of his children. He despised wealth and affectation, and lived in a +tub. "Do you want anything?" asked Alexander the Great, forcibly +impressed by the abounding cheerfulness of the philosopher under such +circumstances. "Yes," replied Diogenes, "I want you to stand out of my +sunshine and not to take from me what you cannot give me." "Were I not +Alexander," exclaimed the great conqueror, "I would be Diogenes." + +Brave and honest men do not work for gold. They work for love, for +honor, for character. When Socrates suffered death rather than abandon +his views of right morality, when Las Casas endeavored to mitigate the +tortures of the poor Indians, they had no thought of money or country. +They worked for the elevation of all that thought, and for the relief +of all that suffered. + +"I don't want such things," said Epictetus to the rich Roman orator who +was making light of his contempt for money-wealth; "and besides," said +the stoic, "you are poorer than I am, after all. You have silver +vessels, but earthenware reasons, principles, appetites. My mind to me +a kingdom is, and it furnishes me with abundant and happy occupation in +lieu of your restless idleness. All your possessions seem small to +you; mine seem great to me. Your desire is insatiate, mine is +satisfied." + +"Do you know, sir," said a devotee of Mammon to John Bright, "that I am +worth a million sterling?" "Yes," said the irritated but calm-spirited +respondent, "I do; and I know that it is all you are worth." + +A bankrupt merchant, returning home one night, said to his noble wife, +"My dear, I am ruined; everything we have is in the hands of the +sheriff." After a few moments of silence the wife looked into his face +and asked, "Will the sheriff sell you?" "Oh, no." "Will the sheriff +sell me?" "Oh, no." "Then do not say we have lost everything. All +that is most valuable remains to us,--manhood, womanhood, childhood. +We have lost but the results of our skill and industry. We can make +another fortune if our hearts and hands are left us." + +What power can poverty have over a home where loving hearts are beating +with a consciousness of untold riches of head and heart? + +Paul was never so great as when he occupied a prison cell; and Jesus +Christ reached the height of his success when, smitten, spat upon, +tormented, and crucified, He cried in agony, and yet with triumphant +satisfaction, "It is finished." + +"Character before wealth," was the motto of Amos Lawrence, who had +inscribed on his pocket-book, "What shall it profit a man, if he shall +gain the whole world and lose his own soul?" + +If you make a fortune let every dollar of it be clean. You do not want +to see in it drunkards reel, orphans weep, widows moan. Your riches +must not make others poorer and more wretched. + +Alexander the Great wandered to the gates of Paradise, and knocked for +entrance. "Who knocks?" demanded the guardian angel. "Alexander." +"Who is Alexander?" "Alexander,--the Alexander,--Alexander the +Great,--the conqueror of the world." "We know him not," replied the +angel; "this is the Lord's gate; only the righteous enter here." + +Don't start out in life with a false standard; a truly great man makes +official position and money and houses and estates look so tawdry, so +mean and poor, that we feel like sinking out of sight with our cheap +laurels and gold. _Millions look trifling beside character_. + +A friend of Professor Agassiz, an eminent practical man, once expressed +his wonder that a man of such abilities should remain contented with +such a moderate income as he received. "I have enough," was Agassiz's +reply. "I have no time to waste in making money. Life is not +sufficiently long to enable a man to get rich and do his duty to his +fellow-men at the same time." + +How were the thousands of business men who lost every dollar they had +in the Chicago fire enabled to go into business at once, some into +wholesale business, without money? Their record was their bank +account. The commercial agencies said they were square men; that they +had always paid one hundred cents on a dollar; that they had paid +promptly, and that they were industrious and dealt honorably with all +men. This record was as good as a bank account. _They drew on their +character_. Character was the coin which enabled penniless men to buy +thousands of dollars' worth of goods. Their integrity did not burn up +with their stores. The best part of them was beyond the reach of fire +and could not be burned. + +What are the toil-sweated productions of wealth piled up in vast +profusion around a Girard, or a Rothschild, when weighed against the +stores of wisdom, the treasures of knowledge, and the strength, beauty, +and glory with which victorious virtue has enriched and adorned a great +multitude of minds during the march of a hundred generations? + +"Lord, how many things are in the world of which Diogenes hath no +need!" exclaimed the stoic, as he wandered among the miscellaneous +articles at a country fair. + +"There are treasures laid up in the heart--treasures of charity, piety, +temperance, and soberness. These treasures a man takes with him beyond +death when he leaves this world." (Buddhist Scriptures.) + +Is it any wonder that our children start out with wrong ideals of life, +with wrong ideas of what constitutes success? The child is "urged to +get on," to "rise in the world," to "make money." The youth is +constantly told that nothing succeeds like success. False standards +are everywhere set up for him, and then the boy is blamed if he makes a +failure. + +It is all very well to urge youth on to success, but the great mass of +mankind can never reach or even approximate the goal constantly +preached to them, nor can we all be rich. One of the great lessons to +teach in this century of sharp competition and the survival of the +fittest is how to be rich without money, and to learn how to do without +success, according to the popular standard. + +Gold cannot make the miser rich, nor can the want of it make the beggar +poor. + +In the poem, "The Changed Cross," a weary woman is represented as +dreaming that she was led to a place where many crosses lay, crosses of +divers shapes and sizes. The most beautiful one was set in jewels of +gold. It was so tiny and exquisite that she changed her own plain +cross for it, thinking she was fortunate in finding one so much lighter +and lovelier. But soon her back began to ache under the glittering +burden, and she changed it for another cross very beautiful and +entwined with flowers. But she soon found that underneath the flowers +were piercing thorns which tore her flesh. At last she came to a very +plain cross without jewels, without carving, and with only the word, +"Love," inscribed upon it. She took this one up and it proved the +easiest and best of all. She was amazed, however, to find that it was +her old cross which she had discarded. It is easy to see the jewels +and the flowers in other people's crosses, but the thorns and heavy +weight are known only to the bearers. How easy other people's burdens +seem to us compared with our own. We do not appreciate the secret +burdens which almost crush the heart, nor the years of weary waiting +for delayed success--the aching hearts longing for sympathy, the hidden +poverty, the suppressed emotion in other lives. + +William Pitt, the great Commoner, considered money as dirt beneath his +feet compared with the public interest and public esteem. His hands +were clean. + +The object for which we strive tells the story of our lives. Men and +women should be judged by the happiness they create in those around +them. Noble deeds always enrich, but millions of mere money may +impoverish. _Character is perpetual wealth_, and by the side of him +who possesses it the millionaire who has it not seems a pauper. +Compared with it, what are houses and lands, stocks and bonds? "It is +better that great souls should live in small habitations than that +abject slaves should burrow in great houses." Plain living, rich +thought, and grand effort are real riches. + +Invest in yourself, and you will never be poor. Floods cannot carry +your wealth away, fire cannot burn it, rust cannot consume it. + +"If a man empties his purse into his head," says Franklin, "no man can +take it from him. An investment in knowledge always pays the best +interest." + +"There is a cunning juggle in riches. I observe," says Emerson, "that +they take somewhat for everything they give. I look bigger, but I am +less, I have more clothes, but am not so warm; more armor, but less +courage; more books, but less wit." + + Howe'er it be, it seems to me, + 'T is only noble to be good. + Kind hearts are more than coronets, + And simple faith than Norman blood. + TENNYSON. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV. + +OPPORTUNITIES WHERE YOU ARE. + + To each man's life there comes a time supreme; + One day, one night, one morning, or one noon, + One freighted hour, one moment opportune, + One rift through which sublime fulfillments gleam, + One space when fate goes tiding with the stream, + One Once, in balance 'twixt Too Late, Too Soon, + And ready for the passing instant's boon + To tip in favor the uncertain beam. + Ah, happy he who, knowing how to wait, + Knows also how to watch and work and stand + On Life's broad deck alert, and at the prow + To seize the passing moment, big with fate, + From opportunity's extended hand, + When the great clock of destiny strikes Now! + MARY A. TOWNSEND. + + Once to every man and nation comes the moment to decide, + In the strife of Truth with Falsehood, for the good or evil side. + LOWELL. + +What is opportunity to a man who can't use it? An unfecundated egg, +which the waves of time wash away into nonentity.--GEORGE ELIOT. + + A thousand years a poor man watched + Before the gate of Paradise: + But while one little nap he snatched, + It oped and shut. Ah! was he wise? + W. B. ALGER. + +Our grand business is, not to see what lies dimly at a distance, but to +do what lies clearly at hand.--CARLYLE. + + A man's best things are nearest him, + Lie close about his feet. + R. M. MILNES. + +The secret of success in life is for a man _to be ready for his +opportunity_ when it comes.--DISRAELI. + + +"There are no longer any good chances for young men," complained a law +student to Daniel Webster. "There is always room at the top," replied +the great lawyer. + + * * * * * * + +[Illustration: THOMAS JEFFERSON] + +"The world is all gates, all opportunities to him who can use them.' + + "'T is never offered twice, seize then the hour + When fortune smiles and duty points the way." + + * * * * * * + +No chance, no opportunities, in a land where many poor boys become rich +men, where newsboys go to Congress, and where those born in the lowest +stations attain the highest positions? The world is all gates, all +opportunities to him who will use them. But, like Bunyan's Pilgrim in +the dungeon of Giant Despair's castle, who had the key of deliverance +all the time with him but had forgotten it, we fail to rely wholly upon +the ability to advance all that is good for us which has been given to +the weakest as well as the strongest. We depend too much upon outside +assistance. + + "We look too high + For things close by." + + +A Baltimore lady lost a valuable diamond bracelet at a ball, and +supposed that it was stolen from the pocket of her cloak. Years +afterward she washed the steps of the Peabody Institute, pondering how +to get money to buy food. She cut up an old, worn-out, ragged cloak to +make a hood, when lo! in the lining of the cloak she discovered the +diamond bracelet. During all her poverty she was worth $3500, but did +not know it. + +Many of us who think we are poor are rich in opportunities, if we could +only see them, in possibilities all about us, in faculties worth more +than diamond bracelets. In our large Eastern cities it has been found +that at least ninety-four out of every hundred found their first +fortune at home, or near at hand, and in meeting common every-day +wants. It is a sorry day for a young man who cannot see any +opportunities where he is, but thinks he can do better somewhere else. +Some Brazilian shepherds organized a party to go to California to dig +gold, and took along a handful of translucent pebbles to play checkers +with on the voyage. After arriving in San Francisco, and after they +had thrown most of the pebbles away, they discovered that they were +diamonds. They hastened back to Brazil, only to find that the mines +from which the pebbles had been gathered had been taken up by others +and sold to the government. + +The richest gold and silver mine in Nevada was sold for $42 by the +owner to get money to pay his passage to other mines, where he thought +he could get rich. Professor Agassiz told the Harvard students of a +farmer who owned a farm of hundreds of acres of unprofitable woods and +rocks, and concluded to sell out and get into a more profitable +business. He decided to go into the coal-oil business; he studied coal +measures and coal-oil deposits, and experimented for a long time. He +sold his farm for $200, and engaged in his new business two hundred +miles away. Only a short time after the man who bought his farm +discovered upon it a great flood of coal-oil, which the farmer had +previously ignorantly tried to drain off. + +Hundreds of years ago there lived near the shore of the river Indus a +Persian by the name of Ali Hafed. He lived in a cottage on the river +bank, from which he could get a grand view of the beautiful country +stretching away to the sea. He had a wife and children, an extensive +farm, fields of grain, gardens of flowers, orchards of fruit, and miles +of forest. He had a plenty of money and everything that heart could +wish. He was contented and happy. One evening a priest of Buddha +visited him, and, sitting before the fire, explained to him how the +world was made, and how the first beams of sunlight condensed on the +earth's surface into diamonds. The old priest told that a drop of +sunlight the size of his thumb was worth more than large mines of +copper, silver, or gold; that with one of them he could buy many farms +like his; that with a handful he could buy a province, and with a mine +of diamonds he could purchase a kingdom. Ali Hafed listened, and was +no longer a rich man. He had been touched with discontent, and with +that all wealth vanishes. Early the next morning he woke the priest +who had been the cause of his unhappiness, and anxiously asked him +where he could find a mine of diamonds. "What do you want of +diamonds?" asked the astonished priest. "I want to be rich and place +my children on thrones." "All you have to do is to go and search until +you find them," said the priest. "But where shall I go?" asked the +poor farmer. "Go anywhere, north, south, east, or west." "How shall I +know when I have found the place?" "When you find a river running over +white sands between high mountain ranges, in those white sands you will +find diamonds," answered the priest. + +The discontented man sold the farm for what he could get, left his +family with a neighbor, took the money he had at interest, and went to +search for the coveted treasure. Over the mountains of Arabia, through +Palestine and Egypt, he wandered for years, but found no diamonds. +When his money was all gone and starvation stared him in the face, +ashamed of his folly and of his rags, poor Ali Hafed threw himself into +the tide and was drowned. The man who bought his farm was a contented +man, who made the most of his surroundings, and did not believe in +going away from home to hunt for diamonds or success. While his camel +was drinking in the garden one day, he noticed a flash of light from +the white sands of the brook. He picked up a pebble, and pleased with +its brilliant hues took it into the house, put it on the shelf near the +fireplace, and forgot all about it. The old priest of Buddha who had +filled Ali Hafed with the fatal discontent called one day upon the new +owner of the farm. He had no sooner entered the room than his eye +caught that flash of light from the stone. "Here's a diamond! here's a +diamond!" the old priest shouted in great excitement. "Has Ali Hafed +returned?" said the priest. "No," said the farmer, "nor is that a +diamond. That is but a stone." They went into the garden and stirred +up the white sand with their fingers, and behold, other diamonds more +beautiful than the first gleamed out of it. So the famous diamond beds +of Golconda were discovered. Had Ali Hafed been content to remain at +home, had he dug in his own garden, instead of going abroad in search +for wealth, and reaping poverty, hardships, starvation, and death, he +would have been one of the richest men in the world, for the entire +farm abounded in the richest of gems. + +You have your own special place and work. Find it, fill it. Scarcely +a boy or girl will read these lines but has much better opportunity to +win success than Garfield, Wilson, Franklin, Lincoln, Harriet Beecher +Stowe, Frances Willard, and thousands of others. But to succeed you +must be prepared to seize and improve the opportunity when it comes. +Remember that four things come not back: the spoken word, the sped +arrow, the past life, and the neglected opportunity. + +It is one of the paradoxes of civilization that the more opportunities +are utilized, the more new ones are thereby created. New openings are +as easy to fill as ever to those who do their best; although it is not +so easy as formerly to obtain distinction in the old lines, because the +standard has advanced so much and competition has so greatly increased. +"The world is no longer clay," said Emerson, "but rather iron in the +hands of its workers, and men have got to hammer out a place for +themselves by steady and rugged blows." + +Thousands of men have made fortunes out of trifles which others pass +by. As the bee gets honey from the same flower from which the spider +gets poison, so some men will get a fortune out of the commonest and +meanest things, as scraps of leather, cotton waste, slag, iron filings, +from which others get only poverty and failure. There is scarcely a +thing which contributes to the welfare and comfort of humanity, not an +article of household furniture, a kitchen utensil, an article of +clothing or of food, that is not capable of an improvement in which +there may be a fortune. + +Opportunities? They are all around us. Edison found them in a baggage +car. Forces of nature plead to be used in the service of man, as +lightning for ages tried to attract his attention to the great force of +electricity, which would do his drudgery and leave him to develop the +God-given powers within him. There is power lying latent everywhere +waiting for the observant eye to discover it. + +First find out what the world needs and then supply that want. An +invention to make smoke go the wrong way in a chimney might be a very +ingenious thing, but it would be of no use to humanity. The patent +office at Washington is full of wonderful devices of ingenious +mechanism, but not one in hundreds is of use to the inventor or to the +world. And yet how many families have been impoverished, and have +struggled for years amid want and woe, while the father has been +working on useless inventions. A. T. Stewart, as a boy, lost +eighty-seven cents when his capital was one dollar and a half in buying +buttons and thread which shoppers did not call for. After that he made +it a rule never to buy anything which the public did not want, and so +prospered. + +It is estimated that five out of every seven of the millionaire +manufacturers began by making with their own hands the articles which +made their fortunes. One of the greatest hindrances to advancement in +life is the lack of observation and of the inclination to take pains. +An observing man, the eyelets of whose shoes pulled out, but who could +not afford to get another pair, said to himself, "I will make a +metallic lacing hook, which can be riveted into the leather;" he was so +poor that he had to borrow a sickle to cut the grass in front of his +hired tenement. Now he is a very rich man. + +An observing barber in Newark, N. J., thought he could make an +improvement in shears for cutting hair, invented clippers, and became +rich. A Maine man was called in from the hayfield to wash clothes for +his invalid wife. He had never realized what it was to wash before. +Finding the method slow and laborious, he invented the washing-machine, +and made a fortune. A man who was suffering terribly with toothache +said to himself, there must be some way of filling teeth which will +prevent their aching. So he invented the principle of gold filling for +teeth. + +The great things of the world have not been done by men of large means. +Ericsson began the construction of the screw propellers in a bathroom. +The cotton-gin was first manufactured in a log cabin. John Harrison, +the great inventor of the marine chronometer, began his career in the +loft of an old barn. Parts of the first steamboat ever run in America +were set up in the vestry of a church in Philadelphia by Fitch. +McCormick began to make his famous reaper in a gristmill. The first +model dry dock was made in an attic. Clark, the founder of Clark +University of Worcester, Mass., began his great fortune by making toy +wagons in a horse shed. Farquhar made umbrellas in his sitting-room, +with his daughter's help, until he sold enough to hire a loft. Edison +began his experiments in a baggage car on the Grand Trunk Railroad when +a newsboy. + +As soon as the weather would permit, the Jamestown colonists began to +stroll about the country digging for gold. In a bank of sand some +glittering particles were found, and the whole settlement was in a +state of excitement. Fourteen weeks of the precious springtime, which +ought to have been given to plowing and planting, were consumed in this +stupid nonsense. Even the Indians ridiculed the madness of the men +who, for imaginary grains of gold, were wasting their chances for a +crop of corn. + +Michael Angelo found a piece of discarded Carrara marble among waste +rubbish beside a street in Florence, which some unskillful workman had +cut, hacked, spoiled, and thrown away. No doubt many artists had +noticed the fine quality of the marble, and regretted that it should +have been spoiled. But Michael Angelo still saw an angel in the ruin, +and with his chisel and mallet he called out from it one of the finest +pieces of statuary in Italy, the young David. + +The lonely island of Nantucket would not be considered a very favorable +place to win success and fame. But Maria Mitchell, on seventy-five +dollars a year, as librarian of the Nantucket Athenaeum, found time and +opportunity to become a celebrated astronomer. Lucretia Mott, one of +America's foremost philanthropists and reformers, who made herself felt +over a whole continent, gained much of her reputation as a preacher on +Nantucket Island. + +"Why does not America have fine sculptors?" asked a romping girl, of +Watertown, Mass., in 1842. Her father, a physician, answered that he +supposed "an American could be a stone-cutter, but that is a very +different thing from being a sculptor." "I think," said the plucky +maiden, "that if no other American tries it I will." She began her +studies in Boston, and walked seven miles to and fro daily between her +home and the city. The medical schools in Boston would not admit her +to study anatomy, so she had to go to St. Louis. Subsequently she went +to Rome, and there, during a long residence, and afterward, modeled and +carved very beautiful statuary which made the name of Harriet G. Hosmer +famous. Begin where you are; work where you are; the hour which you +are now wasting, dreaming of some far-off success, may be crowded with +grand possibilities. + +Patrick Henry was called a lazy boy, a good-for-nothing farmer, and he +failed as a merchant. He was always dreaming of some far-off +greatness, and never thought he could be a hero among the corn and +tobacco and saddlebags of Virginia. He studied law six weeks, when he +put out his shingle. People thought he would fail, but in his first +case he showed that he had a wonderful power of oratory. It then first +dawned upon him that he could be a hero in Virginia. From the time the +Stamp Act was passed and Henry was elected to the Virginia House of +Burgesses, and he had introduced his famous resolution against the +unjust taxation of the American colonies, he rose steadily until he +became one of the brilliant orators of America. In one of his first +speeches upon this resolution he uttered these words, which were +prophetic of his power and courage: "Caesar had his Brutus, Charles the +First his Cromwell, and George the Third--may profit by their example. +If this be treason, make the most of it." + +The great natural philosopher, Faraday, who was the son of a +blacksmith, wrote, when a young man, to Humphry Davy, asking for +employment at the Royal Institution. Davy consulted a friend on the +matter. "Here is a letter from a young man named Faraday, he has been +attending my lectures, and wants me to give him employment at the Royal +Institution--what can I do?" "Do? put him to washing bottles; if he is +good for anything he will do it directly; if he refuses he is good for +nothing." But the boy who could experiment in the attic of an +apothecary shop with an old pan and glass vials during every moment he +could snatch from his work saw an opportunity in washing bottles, which +led to a professorship at the Royal Academy at Woolwich. Tyndall said +of this boy with no chance, "He is the greatest experimental +philosopher the world has ever seen." He became the wonder of his age +in science. + +There is a legend of an artist who long sought for a piece of +sandal-wood, out of which to carve a Madonna. He was about to give up +in despair, leaving the vision of his life unrealized, when in a dream +he was bidden to carve his Madonna from a block of oak wood which was +destined for the fire. He obeyed, and produced a masterpiece from a +log of common firewood. Many of us lose great opportunities in life by +waiting to find sandal-wood for our carvings, when they really lie +hidden in the common logs that we burn. One man goes through life +without seeing chances for doing anything great, while another close +beside him snatches from the same circumstances and privileges +opportunities for achieving grand results. + +Anna Dickinson began life as a school-teacher. Adelaide Neilson was a +child's nurse. Charlotte Cushman's parents were poor. The renowned +Jeanne d'Arc fed swine. Christine Nilsson was a poor Swedish peasant, +and ran barefoot in childhood. Edmonia Lewis, the colored sculptor, +overcame the prejudice against her sex and color, and pursued her +profession in Italy. Maria Mitchell, the astronomer, was the daughter +of a poor man who taught school at two dollars per week. These are but +a few of the many who have struggled with fate and risen to distinction +through their own personal efforts. + +Opportunities? They are everywhere. "America is another name for +opportunities. Our whole history appears like a last effort of divine +Providence in behalf of the human race." Never before were there such +grand openings, such chances, such opportunities. Especially is this +true for girls and young women. A new era is dawning for them. +Hundreds of occupations and professions, which were closed to them only +a few years ago, are now inviting them to enter. + +When I hear of a young woman entering the medical profession, or +beginning the study of law, or entering school with a view to teaching, +I feel like congratulating her for thus asserting her individuality. + +We cannot all of us perhaps make great discoveries like Newton, +Faraday, Edison, and Thompson. We cannot all of us paint immortal +pictures like an Angelo or a Raphael. But we can all of us make our +lives sublime, by _seizing common occasions and making them great_. +What chance had the young girl, Grace Darling, to distinguish herself, +living on those barren lighthouse rocks alone with her aged parents? +But while her brothers and sisters, who moved to the cities to win +wealth and fame, are not known to the world, she became more famous +than a princess. This poor girl did not need to go to London to see +the nobility; they came to the lighthouse to see her. Right at home +this young girl had won fame which the regal heirs might envy, and a +name which will never perish from the earth. She did not wander away +into dreamy distance for fame and fortune, but did her best where duty +had placed her. + +If you want to get rich, study yourself and your own wants. You will +find that millions have the same wants. The safest business is always +connected with man's prime necessities. He must have clothing and a +dwelling; he must eat. He wants comforts, facilities of all kinds for +pleasure, luxuries, education, and culture. Any man who can supply a +great want of humanity, improve any methods which men use, supply any +demand of comfort, or contribute in any way to their well-being, can +make a fortune. + +"We cannot doubt," said Edward Everett, "that truths now unknown are in +reserve to reward the patience and the labors of future lovers of +truth, which will go as far beyond the brilliant discoveries of the +last generation as these do beyond all that was known to the ancient +world." + + The golden opportunity + Is never offered twice; seize then the hour + When fortune smiles and duty points the way; + Nor shrink aside to 'scape the spectre fear, + Nor pause, though pleasure beckon from her bower; + But bravely bear thee onward to the goal. + ANON. + + For the distant still thou yearnest, + And behold the good so near; + If to use the good thou learnest, + Thou wilt surely find it here. + GOETHE. + + Do not, then, stand idly waiting + For some greater work to do; + Fortune is a lazy goddess-- + She will never come to you. + Go and toil in any vineyard, + Do not fear to do or dare; + If you want a field of labor, + You can find it anywhere. + ELLEN H. GATES. + + Why thus longing, thus forever sighing, + For the far-off, unattained and dim, + While the beautiful, all around thee lying + Offers up its low, perpetual hymn? + HARRIET WINSLOW. + + Work for the good that is nighest; + Dream not of greatness afar: + That glory is ever the highest + Which shines upon men as they are. + W. MORLEY PUNSHON. + + + + +CHAPTER XV. + +THE MIGHT OF LITTLE THINGS. + +Little strokes fell great oaks.--FRANKLIN. + + Think naught a trifle, though it small appear; + Small sands the mountain, moments make the year, + And trifles, life. + YOUNG. + + "Scorn not the slightest word or deed, + Nor deem it void of power; + There's fruit in each wind-wafted seed, + That waits its natal hour." + +It is but the littleness of man that seeth no greatness in +trifles.--WENDELL PHILLIPS. + +He that despiseth small things shall fall by little and +little.--ECCLESIASTICUS. + +Often from our weakness our strongest principles of conduct are born; +and from the acorn, which a breeze has wafted, springs the oak which +defies the storm.--BULWER. + +The creation of a thousand forests is in one acorn.--EMERSON. + +Men are led by trifles.--NAPOLEON I. + + "A pebble on the streamlet scant + Has turned the course of many a river; + A dewdrop on the baby plant + Has warped the giant oak forever." + +The mother of mischief is no bigger than a midge's wing.--SCOTCH +PROVERB. + +"The bad thing about a little sin is that it won't stay little." + + "A little bit of patience often makes the sunshine come, + And a little bit of love makes a very happy home; + A little bit of hope makes a rainy day look gay, + And a little bit of charity makes glad a weary way." + + +"Arletta's pretty feet, glistening in the brook, made her the mother of +William the Conqueror," says Palgrave's "History of Normandy and +England." "Had she not thus fascinated Duke Robert the Liberal, of +Normandy, Harold would not have fallen at Hastings, no Anglo-Norman +dynasty could have arisen, no British Empire." + + * * * * * * + +[Illustration: AGASSIZ] + +Small things become great when a great soul sees them. Trifles light +as air sometimes suggest to the thinking mind ideas which revolutionize +the world. + + * * * * * * + +We may tell which way the wind blew before the Deluge by marking the +ripple and cupping of the rain in the petrified sand now preserved +forever. We tell the very path by which gigantic creatures, whom man +never saw, walked to the river's edge to find their food. + +The tears of Veturia and Volumnia saved Rome from the Volscians when +nothing else could move the vengeful heart of Coriolanus. + +It was little Greece that rolled back the overflowing tide of Asiatic +luxury and despotism, giving instead to Europe and America models of +the highest political freedom yet attained, and germs of limitless +mental growth. A different result at Plataea had delayed the progress +of the human race more than ten centuries. + +Among the lofty Alps, it is said, the guides sometimes demand absolute +silence, lest the vibration of the voice bring down an avalanche. + +The power of observation in the American Indian would put many an +educated man to shame. Returning home, an Indian discovered that his +venison, which had been hanging up to dry, had been stolen. After +careful observation he started to track the thief through the woods. +Meeting a man on the route, he asked him if he had seen a little, old, +white man, with a short gun, and with a small bob-tailed dog. The man +told him he had met such a man, but was surprised to find that the +Indian had not even seen the one he described. He asked the Indian how +he could give such a minute description of the man whom he had never +seen. "I knew the thief was a little man," said the Indian, "because +he rolled up a stone to stand on in order to reach the venison; I knew +he was an old man by his short steps; I knew he was a white man by his +turning out his toes in walking, which an Indian never does; I knew he +had a short gun by the mark it left on the tree where he had stood it +up; I knew the dog was small by his tracks and short steps, and that he +had a bob-tail by the mark it left in the dust where he sat." + +Two drops of rain, falling side by side, were separated a few inches by +a gentle breeze. Striking on opposite sides of the roof of a +court-house in Wisconsin, one rolled southward through the Rock River +and the Mississippi to the Gulf of Mexico; while the other entered +successively the Fox River, Green Bay, Lake Michigan, the Straits of +Mackinaw, Lake Huron, St. Clair River, Lake St. Clair, Detroit River, +Lake Erie, Niagara River, Lake Ontario, the St. Lawrence River, and +finally reached the Gulf of St. Lawrence. How slight the influence of +the breeze, yet such was the formation of the continent that a trifling +cause was multiplied almost beyond the power of figures to express its +momentous effect upon the destinies of these companion raindrops. Who +can calculate the future of the smallest trifle when a mud crack swells +to an Amazon, and the stealing of a penny may end on the scaffold? Who +does not know that the act of a moment may cause a life's regret? A +trigger may be pulled in an instant, but the soul returns never. + +A spark falling upon some combustibles led to the invention of +gunpowder. Irritable tempers have marred the reputation of many a +great man, as in the case of Edmund Burke and of Thomas Carlyle. A few +bits of seaweed and driftwood, floating on the waves, enabled Columbus +to stay a mutiny of his sailors which threatened to prevent the +discovery of a new world. There are moments in history which balance +years of ordinary life. Dana could interest a class for hours on a +grain of sand; and from a single bone, such as no one had ever seen +before, Agassiz could deduce the entire structure and habits of an +animal so accurately that subsequent discoveries of complete skeletons +have not changed one of his conclusions. + +A cricket once saved a military expedition from destruction. The +commanding officer and hundreds of his men were going to South America +on a great ship, and, through the carelessness of the watch, they would +have been dashed upon a ledge of rock had it not been for a cricket +which a soldier had brought on board. When the little insect scented +the land, it broke its long silence by a shrill note, and this warned +them of their danger. + +"Strange that a little thing like that should cause a man so much +pain!" exclaimed a giant, as he rolled in his hand and examined with +eager curiosity the acorn which his friend the dwarf had obligingly +taken from the huge eye into which it had fallen just as the colossus +was on the point of shooting a bird perched in the branches of an oak. + +Sometimes a conversation, or a sentence in a letter, or a paragraph in +an article, will help us to reproduce the whole character of the +author; as a single bone, a fish scale, a fin, or a tooth, will enable +the scientist and anatomist to reproduce the fish or the animal, +although extinct for ages. + +By gnawing through a dike, even a rat may drown a nation. A little boy +in Holland saw water trickling from a small hole near the bottom of a +dike. He realized that the leak would rapidly become larger if the +water was not checked, so he held his hand over the hole for hours on a +dark and dismal night until he could attract the attention of +passers-by. His name is still held in grateful remembrance in Holland. + +The beetling chalk cliffs of England were built by rhizopods, too small +to be clearly seen without the aid of a magnifying-glass. + +What was so unlikely as that throwing an empty wine-flask in the fire +should furnish the first notion of a locomotive, or that the sickness +of an Italian chemist's wife and her absurd craving for reptiles for +food should begin the electric telegraph? + +Madame Galvani noticed the contraction of the muscles of a skinned frog +which was accidentally touched at the moment her husband took a spark +from an electrical machine. She gave the hint which led to the +discovery of galvanic electricity, now so useful in the arts and in +transmitting vocal or written language. + +M. Louis Pasteur was usher in the Lyceum. Thursdays he took the boys +to walk. A student took his microscope to examine insects, and allowed +Pasteur to look through it. This was the starting of the boy on the +microscopic career which has made men wonder. He was almost wild with +enthusiasm at the new world which the microscope revealed. + +A stamp act to raise 60,000 pounds produced the American Revolution, a +war that cost 100,000,000 pounds. What mighty contests rise from +trivial things! + +Congress met near a livery stable to discuss the Declaration of +Independence. The members, in knee breeches and silk stockings, were +so annoyed by flies, which they could not keep away with their +handkerchiefs, that it has been said they cut short the debate, and +hastened to affix their signatures to the greatest document in history. + +"The fate of a nation," says Gladstone, "has often depended upon the +good or bad digestion of a fine dinner." + +A young man once went to India to seek his fortune, but, finding no +opening, he went to his room, loaded his pistol, put the muzzle to his +head, and pulled the trigger. But it did not go off. He went to the +window to point it in another direction and try it again, resolved that +if the weapon went off he would regard it as a Providence that he was +spared. He pulled the trigger and it went off the first time. +Trembling with excitement he resolved to hold his life sacred, to make +the most of it, and never again to cheapen it. This young man became +General Robert Clive, who, with but a handful of European soldiers, +secured to the East India Company and afterwards to Great Britain a +great and rich country with two hundred millions of people. + +The cackling of a goose aroused the sentinels and saved Rome from the +Gauls, and the pain from a thistle warned a Scottish army of the +approach of the Danes. "Had Acre fallen," said Napoleon, "I should +have changed the face of the world." + +Henry Ward Beecher came within one vote of being elected superintendent +of a railway. If he had had that vote America would probably have lost +its greatest preacher. What a little thing fixes destiny! + +In the earliest days of cotton spinning, the small fibres would stick +to the bobbins, and make it necessary to stop and clear the machinery. +Although this loss of time reduced the earnings of the operatives, the +father of Robert Peel noticed that one of his spinners always drew full +pay, as his machine never stopped. "How is this, Dick?" asked Mr. Peel +one day; "the on-looker tells me your bobbins are always clean." "Ay, +that they be," replied Dick Ferguson. "How do you manage it, Dick?" +"Why, you see, Meester Peel," said the workman, "it is sort o' secret! +If I tow'd ye, yo'd be as wise as I am." "That's so," said Mr. Peel, +smiling; "but I'd give you something to know. Could you make all the +looms work as smoothly as yours?" "Ivery one of 'em, meester," replied +Dick. "Well, what shall I give you for your secret?" asked Mr. Peel, +and Dick replied, "Gi' me a quart of ale every day as I'm in the mills, +and I'll tell thee all about it." "Agreed," said Mr. Peel, and Dick +whispered very cautiously in his ear, "Chalk your bobbins!" That was +the whole secret, and Mr. Peel soon shot ahead of all his competitors, +for he made machines that would chalk their own bobbins. Dick was +handsomely rewarded with money instead of beer. His little idea has +saved the world millions of dollars. + +Trifles light as air often suggest to the thinking mind ideas which +have revolutionized the world. + +A poor English boy was compelled by his employer to deposit something +on board a ship about to start for Algiers, in accordance with the +merchant's custom of interesting employees by making them put something +at risk in his business and so share in the gain or loss of each common +venture. The boy had only a cat, which he had bought for a penny to +catch mice in the garret where he slept. In tears, he carried her on +board the vessel. On arriving at Algiers, the captain learned that the +Dey was greatly annoyed by rats, and loaned him the cat. The rats +disappeared so rapidly that the Dey wished to buy the cat, but the +captain would not sell until a very high price was offered. With the +purchase-money was sent a present of valuable pearls for the owner of +Tabby. When the ship returned the sailors were greatly astonished to +find that the boy owned most of the cargo, for it was part of the +bargain that he was to bring back the value of his cat in goods. The +London merchant took the boy into partnership; the latter became very +wealthy, and in the course of business loaned money to the Dey who had +bought the cat. As Lord Mayor of London, our cat merchant was +knighted, and became the second man in the city,--Sir Richard +Whittington. + +When John Williams, the martyr missionary of Erromanga, went to the +South Sea Islands, he took with him a single banana-tree from an +English nobleman's conservatory; and now, from that single banana-tree, +bananas are to be found throughout whole groups of islands. Before the +negro slaves in the West Indies were emancipated a regiment of British +soldiers was stationed near one of the plantations. A soldier offered +to teach a slave to read on condition that he would teach a second, and +that second a third, and so on. This the slave faithfully carried out, +though severely flogged by the master of the plantation. Being sent to +another plantation, he repeated the same thing there, and when at +length liberty was proclaimed throughout the island, and the Bible +Society offered a New Testament to every negro who could read, the +number taught through this slave's instrumentality was found to be no +less than six hundred. + +A famous ruby was offered to the English government. The report of the +crown jeweler was that it was the finest he had ever seen or heard of, +but that one of the "facets" was slightly fractured. That invisible +fracture reduced its value thousands of dollars, and it was rejected +from the regalia of England. + +It was a little thing for the janitor to leave a lamp swinging in the +cathedral at Pisa, but in that steady swaying motion the boy Galileo +saw the pendulum, and conceived the idea of thus measuring time. + +"I was singing to the mouthpiece of a telephone," said Edison, "when +the vibrations of my voice caused a fine steel point to pierce one of +my fingers held just behind it. That set me to thinking. If I could +record the motions of the point and send it over the same surface +afterward, I saw no reason why the thing would not talk. I determined +to make a machine that would work accurately, and gave my assistants +the necessary instructions, telling them what I had discovered. That's +the whole story. The phonograph is the result of the pricking of a +finger." + +It was a little thing for a cow to kick over a lantern left in a +shanty, but it laid Chicago in ashes, and rendered homeless a hundred +thousand people. + +You turned a cold shoulder but once, you made but one stinging remark, +yet it lost you a friend forever. + +Some little weakness, some self-indulgence, a quick temper, want of +decision, are little things, you say, when placed beside great +abilities, but they have wrecked many a career. The Parliament of +Great Britain, the Congress of the United States, and representative +governments all over the world have come from King John signing the +Magna Charta. + +Bentham says, "The turn of a sentence has decided many a friendship, +and, for aught we know, the fate of many a kingdom." + +The sight of a stranded cuttlefish led Cuvier to an investigation which +made him one of the greatest natural historians in the world. The web +of a spider suggested to Captain Brown the idea of a suspension bridge. +A man, looking for a lost horse, picked up a stone in the Idaho +mountains which led to the discovery of a rich gold mine. + +An officer apologized to General O. M. Mitchel, the astronomer, for a +brief delay, saying he was only a few moments late. "I have been in +the habit of calculating the value of the thousandth part of a second," +was Mitchel's reply. + +A missing marriage certificate kept the hod-carrier of Hugh Miller from +establishing his claim to the Earldom of Crawford. The masons would +call out, "John, Yearl of Crawford, bring us anither hod o' lime." + +Not long ago the great steamship Umbria was stopped in mid-Atlantic by +a flaw in her engine shaft. + +The absence of a comma in a bill which passed through Congress several +years ago cost our government a million dollars. A single misspelled +word prevented a deserving young man from obtaining a situation as +instructor in a New England college. A cinder on the eyeball will +conquer a Napoleon. Some little weakness, as lack of courtesy, want of +decision, a bad temper, may nullify the labor of years. + +"I cannot see that you have made any progress since my last visit," +said a gentleman to Michael Angelo. "But," said the sculptor, "I have +retouched this part, polished that, softened that feature, brought out +that muscle, given some expression to this lip, more energy to that +limb, etc." "But they are trifles!" exclaimed the visitor. "It may be +so," replied the great artist, "but trifles make perfection, and +perfection is no trifle." + +That infinite patience which made Michael Angelo spend a week in +bringing out a muscle in a statue with more vital fidelity to truth, or +Gerhard Dow a day in giving the right effect to a dewdrop on a cabbage +leaf, makes all the difference between success and failure. + +By scattering it upon a sloping field of grain so as to form, in +letters of great size, "Effects of Gypsum," Franklin brought this +fertilizer into general use in America. By means of a kite he +established principles in the science of electricity of such broad +significance that they underlie nearly all the modern applications of +that science, with probably boundless possibilities of development in +the future. + +More than four hundred and fifty years have passed since Laurens Coster +amused his children by cutting their names in the bark of trees, in the +land of windmills, and the monks have laid aside forever their old +trade of copying books. From that day monarchies have crumbled, and +Liberty, lifting up her head for the first time among the nations of +the earth, has ever since kept pace with the march of her sister, +Knowledge, up through the centuries. Yet how simple was the thought +which has borne such a rich harvest of benefit to mankind. + +As he carved the names of his prattling children it occurred to him +that if the letters were made in separate blocks, and wet with ink, +they would make clear printed impressions better and more rapidly than +would the pen. So he made blocks, tied them together with strings, and +printed a pamphlet with the aid of a hired man, John Gutenberg. People +bought the pamphlets at a slight reduction from the price charged by +the monks, supposing that the work was done in the old way. Coster +died soon afterward, but young Gutenberg kept the secret, and +experimented with metals until he had invented the metal type. In an +obscure chamber in Strasburg he printed his first book. + +At about this time a traveler called upon Charles VII. of France, who +was so afraid somebody would poison him that he dared eat but little, +and made his servants taste of every dish of food before he ate any. +He looked with suspicion upon the stranger; but when the latter offered +a beautiful copy of the Bible for only seven hundred and fifty crowns, +the monarch bought it at once. Charles showed his Bible to the +archbishop, telling him that it was the finest copy in the world, +without a blot or mistake, and that it must have taken the copyist a +lifetime to write it. "Why!" exclaimed the archbishop in surprise, "I +bought one exactly like it a few days ago." It was soon learned that +other rich people in Paris had bought similar copies. The king traced +the book to John Faust, of Strasburg, who had furnished Gutenberg money +to experiment with. The people said that Faust must have sold himself +to the devil, and he only escaped burning at the stake by divulging the +secret. + +William Caxton, a London merchant who went to Holland to purchase +cloth, bought a few books and some type, and established a +printing-office in Westminster Chapel, where he issued, in 1474, "The +Game of Chess," the first book printed in England. + +The cry of the infant Moses attracted the attention of Pharaoh's +daughter, and gave the Jews a lawgiver. A bird alighting on the bough +of a tree at the mouth of the cave where Mahomet lay hid turned aside +his pursuers, and gave a prophet to many nations. A flight of birds +probably prevented Columbus from discovering this continent, for when +he was growing anxious, Martin Alonzo Pinzon persuaded him to follow a +flight of parrots toward the southwest; for to the Spanish seamen of +that day it was good luck to follow in the wake of a flock of birds +when on a voyage of discovery. But for his change of course Columbus +would have reached the coast of Florida. "Never," wrote Humboldt, "had +the flight of birds more important consequences." + +The children of a spectacle-maker placed two or more pairs of the +spectacles before each other in play, and told their father that +distant objects looked larger. From this hint came the telescope. + +"Of what use is it?" people asked with a sneer, when Franklin told of +his discovery that lightning and electricity are identical. "What is +the use of a child?" replied Franklin; "it may become a man." + +"He who waits to do a great deal of good at once," said Dr. Johnson, +"will never do any." Do good with what thou hast, or it will do thee +no good. + +Every day is a little life; and our whole life but a day repeated. +Those that dare lose a day are dangerously prodigal, those that dare +misspend it, desperate. What is the happiness of your life made up of? +Little courtesies, little kindnesses, pleasant words, genial smiles, a +friendly letter, good wishes, and good deeds. One in a million--once +in a lifetime--may do a heroic action. The atomic theory is the true +one. Many think common fractions vulgar, but they are the components +of millions. + +He is a great man who sees great things where others see little things, +who sees the extraordinary in the ordinary. Ruskin sees a poem in the +rose or the lily, while the hod-carrier would perhaps not go a rod out +of his way to see a sunset which Ruskin would feed upon for a year. + +Napoleon was a master of trifles. To details which his inferior +officers thought too microscopic for their notice he gave the most +exhaustive attention. Nothing was too small for his attention. He +must know all about the provisions, the horse fodder, the biscuits, the +camp kettles, the shoes. When the bugle sounded for the march to +battle, every officer had his orders as to the exact route which he +should follow, the exact day he was to arrive at a certain station, and +the exact hour he was to leave, and they were all to reach the point of +destination at a precise moment. It is said that nothing could be more +perfectly planned than his memorable march which led to the victory of +Austerlitz, and which sealed the fate of Europe for many years. He +would often charge his absent officers to send him perfectly accurate +returns, even to the smallest detail. "When they are sent to me, I +give up every occupation in order to read them in detail, and to +observe the difference between one monthly return and another. No +young girl enjoys her novel as much as I do these returns." The +captain who conveyed Napoleon to Elba was astonished with his +familiarity with all the minute details connected with the ship. +Napoleon left nothing to chance, nothing to contingency, so far as he +could possibly avoid it. Everything was planned to a nicety before he +attempted to execute it. + +Wellington too was "great in little things." He knew no such things as +trifles. While other generals trusted to subordinates, he gave his +personal attention to the minutest detail. The history of many a +failure could be written in three words, "Lack of detail." How many a +lawyer has failed from the lack of details in deeds and important +papers, the lack of little words which seemed like surplusage, and +which involved his clients in litigation, and often great losses! How +many wills are contested from the carelessness of lawyers in the +omission or shading of words, or ambiguous use of language! + +Physicians often fail to make a reputation through their habitual +blundering, carelessness in writing prescriptions, failure to give +minute instruction. The world is full of blunderers; business men fail +from a disregard of trifles; they go to the bank to pay a note the day +after it has gone to protest; they do not pay their bills promptly; do +not answer their letters promptly or file them away accurately; their +books do not quite balance; they do not know exactly how they stand, +they have a contempt for details. + +"My rule of conduct has been that whatever is worth doing at all is +worth doing well," said Nicolas Poussin, the great French painter. +When asked the reason why he had become so eminent in a land of famous +artists he replied, "Because I have neglected nothing." + +Not even Helen of Troy, it is said, was beautiful enough to spare the +tip of her nose; and if Cleopatra's had been an inch shorter Mark +Antony would never have become infatuated with her wonderful charms, +and the blemish would have changed the history of the world. Anne +Boleyn's fascinating smile split the great Church of Rome in twain, and +gave a nation an altered destiny. Napoleon, who feared not to attack +the proudest monarchs in their capitols, shrank from the political +influence of one independent woman in private life, Madame de Staël. +Had not Scott sprained his foot his life would probably have taken a +different direction. + +Cromwell was about to sail for America when a law was passed +prohibiting emigration. At that time he was a profligate, having +squandered all his property. But when he found that he could not leave +England he reformed his life. Had he not been detained who can tell +what the history of Great Britain would have been? + +When one of his friends asked Scopas the Thessalian for something that +could be of little use to him, he answered, "It is in these useless and +superfluous things that I am rich and happy." + +It was the little foxes that spoiled the vines in Solomon's day. Mites +play mischief now with our meal and cheese, moths with our woolens and +furs, and mice in our pantries. More than half our diseases are +produced by infinitesimal creatures called microbes. + +Most people call fretting a minor fault, a foible, and not a vice. +There is no vice except drunkenness which can so utterly destroy the +peace, the happiness, of a home. + +"We call the large majority of human lives obscure," says Bulwer, +"presumptuous that we are! How know we what lives a single thought +retained from the dust of nameless graves may have lighted to renown?" + +The theft of a diamond necklace from a French queen convulsed Europe. +From the careful and persistent accumulation of innumerable facts, each +trivial in itself, but in the aggregate forming a mass of evidence, a +Darwin extracts his law of evolution, and Linnaeus constructs the +science of botany. A pan of water and two thermometers were the tools +by which Dr. Black discovered latent heat, and a prism, a lens, and a +sheet of pasteboard enabled Newton to unfold the composition of light +and the origin of colors. An eminent foreign savant called on Dr. +Wollaston, and asked to be shown over those laboratories of his in +which science had been enriched by so many great discoveries, when the +doctor took him into a little study, and, pointing to an old tea tray +on the table, on which stood a few watch glasses, test papers, a small +balance, and a blow-pipe, said, "There is my laboratory." A burnt +stick and a barn door served Wilkie in lieu of pencil and paper. A +single potato, carried to England by Sir Walter Raleigh in the +sixteenth century, has multiplied into food for millions, driving +famine from Ireland again and again. + +It seemed a small thing to drive William Brewster, John Robinson, and +the poor people of Austerfield and Scrooby into perpetual exile, but as +Pilgrims they became the founders of a mighty people. A cloud may hide +the sun which it cannot extinguish. + +"Behold how great a matter a little fire kindleth." "A look of +vexation or a word coldly spoken, or a little help thoughtlessly +withheld, may produce long issues of regret." + +It was but a little dispute, a little flash of temper, the trigger was +pulled in an instant, but the soul returned never. + +A few immortal sentences from Garrison and Phillips, a few poems from +Lowell and Whittier, and the leaven is at work which will not cease its +action until the whipping-post and bodily servitude are abolished +forever. + + "For want of a nail the shoe was lost, + For want of a shoe the horse was lost; + For want of a horse the rider was lost, and all," + +says Poor Richard, "for want of a horse-shoe nail." + +A single remark dropped by an unknown person in the street led to the +successful story of "The Bread-winners." A hymn chanted by the +barefooted friars in the temple of Jupiter at Rome led to the famous +"Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire." + +"Do little things now," says a Persian proverb; "so shall big things +come to thee by and by asking to be done." God will take care of the +great things if we do not neglect the little ones. + +"Words are things," says Byron, "and a small drop of ink, falling like +dew upon a thought, produces that which makes thousands, perhaps +millions think." + +"I give these books for the founding of a college in this colony;" such +were the words of ten ministers who in the year 1700 assembled at the +village of Branford a few miles east of New Haven. Each of the worthy +fathers deposited a few books upon the table around which they were +sitting; such was the founding of Yale College. + +"He that has a spirit of detail," says Webster, "will do better in life +than many who figured beyond him in the university." + +The pyramid of knowledge is made up of little grains of information, +little observations picked up from everywhere. + +For a thousand years Asia monopolized the secret of silk culture, and +at Rome the product was sold for its weight in gold. During the sixth +century, at the request of Justinian, two Persian monks brought a few +eggs from China to Europe in a hollow cane. The eggs were hatched by +means of heat, and Asia no longer held the monopoly of the silk +business. + +In comparison with Ferdinand, preparing to lead forth his magnificent +army in Europe's supreme contest with the Moors, how insignificant +seemed the visionary expedition of Columbus, about to start in three +small shallops across the unknown ocean. But grand as was the triumph +of Ferdinand, it now seems hardly worthy of mention in comparison with +the wonderful achievement of the poor Genoese navigator. + +Only one hundred and ninety-two Athenians perished in the battle of +Marathon, but Europe was saved from a host which is said to have drunk +rivers dry, and to have shaken the solid earth as they marched. + +Great men are noted for their attention to trifles. Goethe once asked +a monarch to excuse him, during an interview, while he went to an +adjoining room to jot down a stray thought. Hogarth would make +sketches of rare faces and characteristics upon his finger-nails upon +the streets. Indeed, to a truly great mind there are no little things. +"The eye of the understanding is like the eye of the sense; for as you +may see objects through small crannies or holes, so you may see great +axioms of nature through small and contemptible instances," said Bacon. +Trifles light as air suggest to the keen observer the solution of +mighty problems. Bits of glass arranged to amuse children led to the +discovery of the kaleidoscope. Goodyear discovered how to vulcanize +rubber by forgetting, until it became red hot, a skillet containing a +compound which he had before considered worthless. Confined in the +house by typhoid fever, Helmholtz, with a little money which he had +saved by great economy, bought a microscope which led him into the +field of science where he became so famous. A ship-worm boring a piece +of wood suggested to Sir Isambard Brunei the idea of a tunnel under the +Thames at London. Tracks of extinct animals in the old red sandstone +led Hugh Miller on and on until he became the greatest geologist of his +time. Sir Walter Scott once saw a shepherd boy plodding sturdily +along, and asked him to ride. This boy was George Kemp, who became so +enthusiastic in his study of sculpture that he walked fifty miles and +back to see a beautiful statue. He did not forget the kindness of Sir +Walter, and, when the latter died, threw his soul into the design of +the magnificent monument erected in Edinburgh to the memory of the +author of "Waverley." + +A poor boy applied for a situation at a bank in Paris, but was refused. +As he left the door, he picked up a pin. The bank president saw this, +called the boy back, and gave him a situation from which he rose until +he became the greatest banker of Paris,--Laffitte. + +It was the turning point in Theodore Parker's life when he picked up a +stone to throw at a turtle. Something within him said, "Don't do it," +and he didn't. He went home and asked his mother what it was in him +that said "Don't;" and she taught him the purpose of that inward +monitor which he ever after chose as his guide. It is said that David +Hume became a deist by being appointed in a debating society to take +the side of infidelity. Voltaire could not erase from his mind the +impression of a poem on infidelity committed at the age of five. The +"Arabian Nights" aroused the genius of Coleridge. A Massachusetts +soldier in the Civil War observed a bird hulling rice, and shot it; +taking its bill for a model, he invented a hulling machine which has +revolutionized the rice business. A war between France and England, +costing more than a hundred thousand lives, grew out of a quarrel as to +which of two vessels should first be served with water. The quarrel of +two Indian boys over a grasshopper led to the "Grasshopper War." +George IV. of England fell in a fit, and a village apothecary bled him, +restoring him to consciousness. The king made him his physician, a +position of great honor and profit. + +Many a noble ship has stranded because of one defective timber, when +all other parts were strong. Guard the weak point. + +No object the eye ever beheld, no sound however slight caught by the +ear, or anything once passing the turnstile of any of the senses, is +ever let go. The eye is a perpetual camera imprinting upon the +sensitive mental plates, and packing away in the brain for future use +every face, every tree, every plant, flower, hill, stream, mountain, +every scene upon the street, in fact, everything which comes within its +range. There is a phonograph in our natures which catches, however +thoughtless and transient, every syllable we utter, and registers +forever the slightest enunciation, and renders it immortal. These +notes may appear a thousand years hence, reproduced in our descendants, +in all their beautiful or terrible detail. + +All the ages that have been are rounded up into the small space we call +"To-day." Every life spans all that precedes it. To-day is a book +which contains everything that has transpired in the world up to the +present moment. The millions of the past whose ashes have mingled with +the dust for centuries still live in their destinies through the laws +of heredity. + +Nothing has ever been lost. All the infinitesimals of the past are +amassed into the present. + +The first acorn had wrapped up in it all the oak forests on the globe. + +"Least of all seeds, greatest of all harvests," seems to be one of the +great laws of nature. All life comes from microscopic beginnings. In +nature there is nothing small. The microscope reveals as great a world +below as the telescope above. All of nature's laws govern the smallest +atoms, and a single drop of water is a miniature ocean. + +The strength of a chain lies in its weakest link, however large and +strong all the others may be. We are all inclined to be proud of our +strong points, while we are sensitive and neglectful of our weaknesses. +Yet it is our greatest weakness which measures our real strength. A +soldier who escapes the bullets of a thousand battles may die from the +scratch of a pin, and many a ship has survived the shocks of icebergs +and the storms of ocean only to founder in a smooth sea from holes made +by tiny insects. Drop by drop is instilled into the mind the poison +which blasts many a precious life. + +How often do we hear people say, "Oh, it's only ten minutes, or twenty +minutes, till dinner time; there's no use doing anything," or use other +expressions of a like effect? Why, it is just in these little spare +bits of time, these odd moments, which most people throw away, that men +who have risen have gained their education, written their books, and +made themselves immortal. + +_Small things become great when a great soul sees them_. The noble or +heroic act of one man has sometimes elevated a nation. Many an +honorable career has resulted from a kind word spoken in season or the +warm grasp of a friendly hand. + + It is the little rift within the lute, + That by and by will make the music mute, + And, ever widening, slowly silence all. + TENNYSON. + + "It was only a glad 'good-morning,' + As she passed along the way, + But it spread the morning's glory + Over the livelong day." + + "Only a thought in passing--a smile, or encouraging word, + Has lifted many a burden no other gift could have stirred. + Only!--But then the onlys + Make up the mighty all." + + + + +CHAPTER XVI. + +SELF-MASTERY. + + Give me that man + That is not passion's slave, and I will wear him + In my heart's core, ay, in my heart of heart. + SHAKESPEARE. + +Strength of character consists of two things,--power of will and power +of self-restraint. It requires two things, therefore, for its +existence,--strong feelings and strong command over them.--F. W. +ROBERTSON. + + "Self-reverence, self-knowledge, self-control, + These three alone lead life to sovereign power." + + The bravest trophy ever man obtained + Is that which o'er himself himself hath gained. + EARL OF STIRLING. + +Real glory springs from the conquest of ourselves; and without that the +conqueror is naught but the veriest slave.--THOMSON. + +Whatever day makes man a slave takes half his worth away.--ODYSSEY. + +Chain up the unruly legion of thy breast. Lead thine own captivity +captive, and be Caesar within thyself.--THOMAS BROWNE. + +He who reigns within himself, and rules passions, desires, and fears, +is more than a king.--MILTON. + +He that is slow to anger is better than the mighty: and he that ruleth +his spirit than he that taketh a city.--BIBLE. + +Self-trust is of the essence of heroism.--EMERSON. + + Man who man would be + Must rule the empire of himself. + P. B. SHELLEY. + + +"Ah! Diamond, you little know the mischief you have wrought," said Sir +Isaac Newton, returning from supper to find that his dog had upset a +lighted taper upon the laborious calculations of years, which lay in +ashes before him. Then he went calmly to work to reproduce them. The +man who thus excelled in self-mastery surpassed all his predecessors +and contemporaries in mastering the laws of nature. + + * * * * * * + +[Illustration: JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL] + + "We rise by the things that are under our feet; + By what we have mastered of good or gain: + By the pride deposed and the passion slain, + And the vanquished ills that we hourly meet." + + * * * * * * + +The sun was high in the heavens when a man called at the house of +Pericles to abuse him. The man's anger knew no bounds. He vented his +spite in violent language until he paused from sheer exhaustion, and +saw that it was quite dark without. He turned to go home, when +Pericles calmly called a servant, and said, "Bring a lamp and attend +this man home." Is any argument needed to show the superiority of +Pericles? + +The gladiators who were trained to tight in the Coliseum were compelled +to practice the most graceful postures of falling and the finest +attitudes to assume in dying, in case they were vanquished. They were +obliged to eat food which would make the blood thick in order that they +should not die quickly when wounded, thus giving the spectators +prolonged gratification by the spectacle of their agonies. Each had to +take this oath: "We swear that we will suffer ourselves to be bound, +scourged, burned, or killed by the sword, or whatever Eumolpus ordains, +and thus, like freeborn gladiators, we religiously devote both our +souls and our bodies to our master." They were trained to exercise +sublime self-control even when dying a cruel death. + +The American Minister at St. Petersburg was summoned one morning to +save a young, dissolute, reckless American youth, Poe, from the +penalties incurred in a drunken debauch. By the Minister's aid young +Poe returned to the United States. Not long after this the author of +the best story and poem competed for in the "Baltimore Visitor" was +sent for, and behold, the youth who had taken both prizes was that same +dissolute, reckless, penniless, orphan youth, who had been arrested in +St. Petersburg,--pale, ragged, with no stockings, and with his +threadbare but well brushed coat buttoned to the chin to conceal the +lack of a shirt. Young Poe took fresh courage and resolution, and for +a while showed that he was superior to the appetite which was striving +to drag him down. But, alas, that fatal bottle! his mind was stored +with riches, yet he died in moral poverty. This was a soldier's +epitaph:-- + + "Here lies a soldier whom all must applaud, + Who fought many battles at home and abroad! + But the hottest engagement he ever was in, + Was the conquest of self, in the battle of sin." + + +In 1860, when a committee visited Abraham Lincoln at his home in +Springfield, Ill., to notify him of his nomination as President, he +ordered a pitcher of water and glasses, "that they might drink each +other's health in the best beverage God ever gave to man." "Let us," +he continued, "make it as unfashionable to withhold our names from the +temperance pledge as for husbands to wear their wives' bonnets in +church, and instances will be as rare in one case as the other." + +Burns exercised no control over his appetites, but gave them the rein:-- + + "Thus thoughtless follies laid him low + And stained his name." + + +"The first and best of victories," says Plato, "is for a man to conquer +himself; to be conquered by himself is, of all things, the most +shameful and vile." + +Self-control is at the root of all the virtues. Let a man yield to his +impulses and passions, and from that moment he gives up his moral +freedom. + +"Teach self-denial and make its practice pleasurable," says Walter +Scott, "and you create for the world a destiny more sublime than ever +issued from the brain of the wildest dreamer." + +Stonewall Jackson, early in life, determined to conquer every weakness +he had, physical, mental, and moral. He held all of his powers with a +firm hand. To his great self-discipline and self-mastery he owed his +success. So determined was he to harden himself to the weather that he +could not be induced to wear an overcoat in winter. "I will not give +in to the cold," he said. For a year, on account of dyspepsia, he +lived on buttermilk and stale bread, and wore a wet shirt next his body +because his doctor advised it, although everybody else ridiculed the +idea. This was while he was professor at the Virginia Military +Institute. His doctor advised him to retire at nine o'clock; and, no +matter where he was, or who was present, he always sought his bed on +the minute. He adhered rigidly through life to this stern system of +discipline. Such self-training, such self-conquest, gives one great +power over others. It is equal to genius itself. + +It is a good plan to form the habit of ranking our various qualities, +marking our strongest point one hundred and all the others in +proportion, in order to make the lowest mark more apparent, and +enabling us to try to raise or strengthen it. A man's industry, for +example, may be his strongest point, one hundred, his physical courage +may be fifty; his moral courage, seventy-five; his temper, twenty-five; +with but ten for self-control,--which, if he has strong appetites and +passions, will be likely to be the rock on which he will split. He +should strive in every way to raise it from one of the weakest +qualities to one of the strongest. It would take but two or three +minutes a day to rank ourselves in such a table by noting the exercise +of each faculty for the day. If you have worked hard and faithfully, +mark industry one hundred. If you have lost your temper, and, in +consequence, lost your self-control, and made a fool of yourself, +indicate it by a low mark. This will be an incentive to try to raise +it the next day. If you have been irritable, indicate it by a +corresponding mark, and redeem yourself on the morrow. If you have +been cowardly where you should have been brave, hesitating where you +should have shown decision, false where you should have been true, +foolish where you should have been wise, tardy where you should have +been prompt; if you have prevaricated where you should have told the +exact truth; if you have taken the advantage where you should have been +fair, have been unjust where you should have been just, impatient where +you should have been patient, cross where you should have been +cheerful, so indicate by your marks. You will find this a great aid to +character building. + +It is a subtle and profound remark of Hegel's that the riddle which the +Sphinx, the Egyptian symbol of the mysteriousness of Nature, propounds +to Oedipus is only another way of expressing the command of the Delphic +oracle, "Know thyself." And when the answer is given the Sphinx casts +herself down from her rock. When man knows himself, the mysteriousness +of Nature and her terrors vanish. + +The command by the ancient oracle at Delphos is of eternal +significance. Add to it its natural complement--Help thyself--and the +path to success is open to those who obey. + +_Guard your weak point_. Moral contagion borrows fully half its +strength from the weakness of its victims. Have you a hot, passionate +temper? If so, a moment's outbreak, like a rat-hole in a dam, may +flood all the work of years. One angry word sometimes raises a storm +that time itself cannot allay. A single angry word has lost many a +friend. + +A Quaker was asked by a merchant whom he had conquered by his patience +how he had been able to bear the other's abuse, and replied: "Friend, I +will tell thee. I was naturally as hot and violent as thou art. I +observed that men in a passion always speak loud, and I thought if I +could control my voice I should repress my passion. I have therefore +made it a rule never to let my voice rise above a certain key, and by a +careful observance of this rule, I have, by the blessing of God, +entirely mastered my natural tongue." Mr. Christmas of the Bank of +England explains that the secret of his self-control under very trying +circumstances was due to a rule learned from the great Pitt, never to +lose his temper during banking hours from nine to three. + +When Socrates found in himself any disposition to anger, he would check +it by speaking low, in opposition to the motions of his displeasure. +If you are conscious of being in a passion, keep your mouth shut, lest +you increase it. Many a person has dropped dead in a rage. Fits of +anger bring fits of disease. "Whom the gods would destroy they first +make mad." "Keep cool," says Webster, "anger is not argument." "Be +calm in arguing," says George Herbert, "for fierceness makes error a +fault, and truth discourtesy." + +To be angry with a weak man is to prove that you are not strong +yourself. "Anger," says Pythagoras, "begins with folly and ends with +repentance." You must measure the strength of a man by the power of +the feelings he subdues, not by the power of those which subdue him. + +De Leon, a distinguished Spanish poet, after lying years in dungeons of +the Inquisition, dreary, and alone, without light, for translating part +of the Scriptures into his native tongue, was released and restored to +his professorship. A great crowd thronged to hear his first lecture, +out of curiosity to learn what he might say about his imprisonment. +But the great man merely resumed the lecture which had been so cruelly +broken off five years before, just where he left it, with the words +"Heri discebamus" (Yesterday we were teaching). What a lesson in this +remarkable example of self-control for those who allow their tongues to +jabber whatever happens to be uppermost in their minds! + +Did you ever see a man receive a flagrant insult, and only grow a +little pale, bite his quivering lip, and then reply quietly? Did you +ever see a man in anguish stand as if carved out of solid rock, +mastering himself? Have you not seen one bearing a hopeless daily +trial remain silent and never tell the world what cankered his home +peace? That is strength. "He who, with strong passions, remains +chaste; he who, keenly sensitive, with manly power of indignation in +him, can be provoked, and yet restrain himself and forgive,--these are +strong men, the spiritual heroes." + +"You will be remembered only as the man who broke my nose," said young +Michael Angelo to the man Torrigiano, who struck him in anger. What +sublime self-control for a quick-tempered man! + +"You ask whether it would not be manly to resent a great injury," said +Eardley Wilmot: "I answer that it would be manly to resent it, but it +would be Godlike to forgive it." + +That man has conquered his tongue who can allow the ribald jest or +scurrilous word to die unspoken on his lips, and maintain an indignant +silence amid reproaches and accusations and sneers and scoffs. "He is +a fool who cannot be angry," says English, "but he is a wise man who +will not." + +Peter the Great made a law in 1722 that a nobleman who should beat his +slave should be regarded as insane, and a guardian appointed to look +after his property and person. This great monarch once struck his +gardener, who took to his bed and died. Peter, hearing of this, +exclaimed with tears in his eyes, "Alas! I have civilized my own +subjects; I have conquered other nations; yet have I not been able to +civilize or conquer myself." The same monarch, when drunk, rushed upon +Admiral Le Fort with a sword. Le Fort, with great self-possession, +bared his breast to receive the stroke. This sobered Peter, and +afterwards he asked the pardon of Le Fort. Peter said, "I am trying to +reform my country, and I am not yet able to reform myself." +Self-conquest is man's last and greatest victory. + +A medical authority of highest repute affirms that excessive labor, +exposure to wet and cold, deprivation of sufficient quantities of +necessary and wholesome food, habitual bad lodging, sloth and +intemperance, are all deadly enemies to human life, but they are none +of them so bad as violent and ungoverned passion,--that men and women +have frequently lived to an advanced age in spite of these, but that +instances are very rare where people of irascible tempers live to +extreme old age. + +It was the self-discipline of a man who had never looked upon war until +he was forty that enabled Oliver Cromwell to create an army which never +fought without annihilating, yet which retired into the ranks of +industry as soon as the government was established, each soldier being +distinguished from his neighbors only by his superior diligence, +sobriety, and regularity in the pursuits of peace. + +How sweet the serenity of habitual self-command! When does a man feel +more a master of himself than when he has passed through a sudden and +severe provocation in silence or in undisturbed good humor? + +Whether teaching the rules of an exact morality, answering his corrupt +judges, receiving sentence of death, or swallowing the poison, Socrates +was still calm, quiet, undisturbed, intrepid. + +It is a great thing to have brains, but it is vastly greater to be able +to command them. The Duke of Wellington had great power over himself, +although his natural temper was extremely irritable. He remained at +the Duchess of Richmond's ball till about three o'clock on the morning +of the 16th of June, 1815, "showing himself very cheerful," although he +knew that a desperate battle was awaiting him. On the field of +Waterloo he gave his orders at the most critical moments without the +slightest excitement. + +Napoleon, having made his arrangements for the terrible conflict of the +next day (Jena and Auerstadt), retired to his tent about midnight, and +calmly sat down to draw up a plan of study and discipline for Madame +Campan's female school. "Keep cool, and you command everybody," says +St. Just. + + "He that would govern others first should be + The master of himself," + +says Massinger. + +He who has mastered himself, who is his own Caesar, will be stronger +than his passion, superior to circumstances, higher than his calling, +greater than his speech. Self-control is the generalship which turns a +mob of raw recruits into a disciplined army. The rough man has become +the polished and dignified soldier, in other words, the man has got +control of himself, and knows how to use himself. The human race is +under constant drill. Our occupations, difficulties, obstacles, +disappointments, if used aright, are the great schoolmasters which help +us to possess ourselves. The man who is master of himself will not be +a slave to drudgery, but will keep in advance of his work. He will not +rob his family of that which is worth more than money or position; he +will not be the slave of his occupation, not at the mercy of +circumstances. His methods and system will enable him to accomplish +wonders, and yet give him leisure for self-culture. The man who +controls himself works to live rather than lives for work. + +The man of great self-control, the man who thinks a great deal and says +little, who is self-centred, well balanced, carries a thousand times +more weight than the man of weak will, always wavering and undecided. + +If a man lacks self-control he seems to lack everything. Without it he +can have no patience, no power to govern himself, he can have no +self-reliance, for he will always be at the mercy of his strongest +passion. If he lacks self-control, the very backbone, pith, and nerve +of character are lacking also. + +The discipline which is the main end in education is simply control +acquired over one's mental faculties; without this discipline no man is +a strong and accurate thinker. "Prove to me," says Mrs. Oliphant, +"that you can control yourself, and I'll say you're an educated man; +and, without this, all other education is good for next to nothing." + +The wife of Socrates, Xanthippe, was a woman of a most fantastical and +furious spirit. At one time, having vented all the reproaches upon +Socrates her fury could suggest, he went out and sat before the door. +His calm and unconcerned behavior but irritated her so much the more; +and, in the excess of her rage, she ran upstairs and emptied a vessel +upon his head, at which he only laughed and said that "so much thunder +must needs produce a shower." Alcibiades his friend, talking with him +about his wife, told him he wondered how he could bear such an +everlasting scold in the same house with him. He replied, "I have so +accustomed myself to expect it, that it now offends me no more than the +noise of carriages in the street." + +How many men have in their chain of character one weak link. They may +be weak in the link of truthfulness, politeness, trustworthiness, +temper, chastity, temperance, courage, industry, or may have some other +weakness which wrecks their success and thwarts a life's endeavor. He +who would succeed must hold all his faculties under perfect control; +they must be disciplined, drilled, until they obey the will. + +Think of a young man just starting out in life to conquer the world +being at the mercy of his own appetites and passions! He cannot stand +up and look the world in the face when he is the slave of what should +be his own servants. He cannot lead who is led. There is nothing +which gives certainty and direction to the life of a man who is not his +own master. If he has mastered all but one appetite, passion, or +weakness, he is still a slave; it is the weakest point that measures +the strength of character. + +Seneca, one of the greatest of the ancient philosophers, said that "we +should every night call ourselves to account. What infirmity have I +mastered to-day? what passion opposed? what temptation resisted? what +virtue acquired?" and then he follows with the profound truth that "our +vices will abate of themselves if they be brought every day to the +shrift." If you cannot at first control your anger, learn to control +your tongue, which, like fire, is a good servant, but a hard master. + +Five words cost Zacharias forty weeks' silence. There is many a man +whose tongue might govern multitudes if he could only govern his +tongue. Anger, like too much wine, hides us from ourselves, but +exposes us to others. + +General von Moltke, perhaps the greatest strategist of this century, +had, as a foundation for his other talents, the power to "hold his +tongue in seven languages." A young man went to Socrates to learn +oratory. On being introduced, he talked so incessantly that Socrates +asked for double fees. "Why charge me double?" asked the young fellow. +"Because," said the orator, "I must teach you two sciences: the one how +to hold your tongue, the other how to speak." The first is the more +difficult. + +Half the actual trouble of life would be saved if people would remember +that silence is golden, when they are irritated, vexed, or annoyed. + +To feel provoked or exasperated at a trifle, when the nerves are +exhausted, is, perhaps, natural to us in our imperfect state. But why +put into the shape of speech the annoyance which, once uttered, is +remembered; which may burn like a blistering wound, or rankle like a +poisoned arrow? If a child be crying or a friend capricious, or a +servant unreasonable, be careful what you say. Do not speak while you +feel the impulse of anger, for you will be almost certain to say too +much, to say more than your cooler judgment will approve, and to speak +in a way that you will regret. Be silent until the "sweet by and by," +when you will be calm, rested, and self-controlled. + +"Seest thou a man that is hasty in his words? There is more hope of a +fool than of him." + +"Silence," says Zimmerman, "is the safest response for all the +contradiction that arises from impertinence, vulgarity, or envy." + +In rhetoric, as Emerson truly says, this art of omission is the chief +secret of power. "Everything tells in favor of the man who talks but +little. The presumption is that he is a superior man; and if, in point +of fact, he is not a sheer blockhead, the presumption then is that he +is very superior indeed." Grant was master of the science of silence. + +The self-controlled are self-possessed. "Sir, the house is on fire!" +shrieked a frightened servant, running into Dr. Lawson's study. "Go +and tell your mistress," said the preoccupied professor, without +looking up from the book he was reading; "you know I have no charge of +household matters." A woman whose house was on fire threw a +looking-glass out of the window, and carried a pair of andirons several +rods to a safe place beside a stone wall. "Presence of mind and +courage in distress are more than armies to procure success." + +Xenophon tells us that at one time the Persian princes had for their +teachers the four best men in the kingdom. (1) The wisest man to teach +wisdom. (2) The bravest to teach courage. (3) The most just to train +the moral nature. (4) The most temperate to teach self-control. We +have them all in the Bible, and in Christ our teacher, an example. "If +it is a small sacrifice to discontinue the use of wine," said Samuel J. +May, "do it for the sake of others; if it is a great sacrifice, do it +for your own sake." How many of nature's noblemen, who might be kings +if they could control themselves, drink away their honor, reputation, +and money in glasses of "wet damnation," more costly than the vinegar +in which Cleopatra dissolved her pearls. + +Experience shows that, quicker than almost any other physical agency, +alcohol breaks down a man's power of self-control. But the physical +evils of intemperance, great as they are, are slight, compared with the +moral injury it produces. It is not simply that vices and crimes +almost inevitably follow the loss of rational self-direction, which is +the invariable accompaniment of intoxication; manhood is lowered and +finally lost by the sensual tyranny of appetite. The drunken man has +given up the reins of his nature to a fool or a fiend, and he is driven +fast to base or unutterably foolish ends. + +With almost palsied hand, at a temperance meeting, John B. Gough signed +the pledge. For six days and nights in a wretched garret, without a +mouthful of food, with scarcely a moment's sleep, he fought the fearful +battle with appetite. Weak, famished, almost dying, he crawled into +the sunlight; but he had conquered the demon, which had almost killed +him. Gough used to describe the struggles of a man who tried to leave +off using tobacco. He threw away what he had, and said that was the +end of it; but no, it was only the beginning of it. He would chew +camomile, gentian, toothpicks, but it was of no use. He bought another +plug of tobacco and put it in his pocket. He wanted a chew awfully, +but he looked at it and said, "You are a weed, and I am a _man_. I'll +master you if I die for it;" and he did, while carrying it in his +pocket daily. + +Natural appetites, if given rein, will not only grow monstrous and +despotic, but artificial appetites will be created which, like a +ghastly Frankenstein, develop a kind of independent life and force, and +then turn on their creator to torment him without pity, and will mock +his efforts to free himself from this slavery. The victim of strong +drink is one of the most pitiable creatures on earth, he becomes half +beast, or half demon. Oh, the silent, suffering tongues that whisper +"Don't," but the will lies prostrate, and the debauch goes on. What a +mute confession of degradation there is in the very appearance of a +confirmed sot. Behold a man no longer in possession of himself; the +flesh is master; the spiritual nature is sunk in the mire of +sensuality, and the mental faculties are a mere mob of enfeebled powers +under bondage to a bestial or mad tyrant. As Challis says:-- + + "Once the demon enters, + Stands within the door; + Peace and hope and gladness + Dwell there nevermore." + + +Many persons are intemperate in their feelings; they are emotionally +prodigal. Passion is intemperance; so is caprice. There is an +intemperance even in melancholy and mirth. The temperate man is not +mastered by his moods; he will not be driven or enticed into excess; +his steadfast will conquers despondency, and is not unbalanced by +transient exhilarations, for ecstasy is as fatal as despair. Temper is +subjected to reason and conscience. How many people excuse themselves +for doing wrong or foolish acts by the plea that they have a quick +temper. But he who is king of himself rules his temper, turning its +very heat and passion into energy that works good instead of evil. +Stephen Girard, when he heard of a clerk with a strong temper, was glad +to employ him. He believed that such persons, taught self-control, +were the best workers. Controlled temper is an element of strength; +wisely regulated, it expends itself as energy in work, just as heat in +an engine is transmuted into force that drives the wheels of industry. +Cromwell, William the Silent, Wordsworth, Faraday, Washington, and +Wellington were men of prodigious tempers, but they were also men whose +self-control was nearly perfect. + +George Washington's faculties were so well balanced and combined that +his constitution was tempered evenly with all the elements of activity, +and his mind resembled a well organized commonwealth. His passions, +which had the intensest vigor, owed allegiance to reason; and with all +the fiery quickness of his spirit, his impetuous and massive will was +held in check by consummate judgment. He had in his composition a calm +which was a balance-wheel, and which gave him in moments of highest +excitement the power of self-control, and enabled him to excel in +patience, even when he had most cause for disgust. + +It was said by an enemy of William the Silent that an arrogant or +indiscreet word never fell from his lips. + +How brilliantly could Carlyle write of heroism, courage, self-control, +and yet fly into a rage at a rooster crowing in a neighbor's yard. + +A self-controlled mind is a free mind, and freedom is power. + +"I call that mind free," says Channing, "which jealously guards its +intellectual rights and powers, which calls no man master, which does +not content itself with a passive or hereditary faith, which opens +itself to light whencesoever it may come, which receives new truth as +an angel from heaven, which, whilst consulting others, inquires still +more of the oracle within itself, and uses instructions from abroad, +not to supersede, but to quicken and exalt its own energies. I call +that mind free which is not passively framed by outward circumstances, +which is not swept away by the torrent of events, which is not the +creature of accidental impulse, but which bends events to its own +improvement, and acts from an inward spring, from immutable principles +which it has deliberately espoused. I call that mind free which +protects itself against the usurpations of society, which does not +cower to human opinion, which feels itself accountable to a higher +tribunal than man's, which respects a higher law than fashion, which +respects itself too much to be the slave or tool of the many or the +few. I call that mind free which through confidence in God and in the +power of virtue has cast off all fear but that of wrong-doing, which no +menace or peril can enthrall, which is calm in the midst of tumults, +and possesses itself though all else be lost. I call that mind free +which resists the bondage of habit, which does not mechanically repeat +itself and copy the past, which does not live on its old virtues, which +does not enslave itself to precise rules, but which forgets what is +behind, listens for new and higher monitions of conscience, and +rejoices to pour itself forth in fresh and higher exertions. I call +that mind free which is jealous of its own freedom, which guards itself +from being merged in others, which guards its empire over itself as +nobler than the empire of the world." + + Be free--not chiefly from the iron chain + But from the one which passion forges--be + The master of thyself. If lost, regain + The rule o'er chance, sense, circumstance. Be free. + EPHRAIM PEABODY. + + +"It is not enough to have great qualities," says La Rochefoucauld; "we +should also have the management of them." No man can call himself +educated until every voluntary muscle obeys his will. + +Every human being is conscious of two natures. One is ever reaching up +after the good, the true, and the noble,--is aspiring after all that +uplifts, elevates, and purifies. It is the God-side of man, the image +of the Creator, the immortal side, the spiritual side. It is the +gravitation of the soul faculties toward their Maker. The other is the +bestial side which gravitates downward. It does not aspire, it +grovels; it wallows in the mire of sensualism. Like the beast, it +knows but one law, and is led by only one motive, self-indulgence, +self-gratification. When neither hungry nor thirsty, or when gorged +and sated by over-indulgence, it lies quiet and peaceful as a lamb, and +we sometimes think it subdued. But when its imperious passion +accumulates, it clamors for satisfaction. You cannot reason with it, +for it has no reason, only an imperious instinct for gratification. +You cannot appeal to its self-respect, for it has none. It cares +nothing for character, for manliness, for the spiritual. + +These two natures are ever at war, one pulling heavenward, the other, +earthward. Nor do they ever become reconciled. Either may conquer, +but the vanquished never submits. The higher nature may be compelled +to grovel, to wallow in the mire of sensual indulgence, but it always +rebels and enters its protest. It can never forget that it bears the +image of its Maker, even when dragged through the slough of sensualism. +The still small voice which bids man look up is never quite hushed. If +the victim of the lower nature could only forget that he was born to +look upward, if he could only erase the image of his Maker, if he could +only hush the voice which haunts him and condemns him when he is bound +in slavery, if he could only enjoy his indulgences without the mockery +of remorse, he thinks he would be content to remain a brute. But the +ghost of his better self rises as he is about to partake of his +delight, and robs him of the expected pleasure. He has sold his better +self for pleasure which is poison, and he cannot lose the consciousness +of the fearful sacrifice he has made. The banquet may be ready, but +the hand on the wall is writing his doom. + + Give me that soul, superior power, + That conquest over fate, + Which sways the weakness of the hour, + Rules little things as great: + That lulls the human waves of strife + With words and feelings kind, + And makes the trials of our life + The triumphs of our mind. + CHARLES SWAIN. + + Reader, attend--whether thy soul + Soars fancy's flights above the pole, + Or darkly grubs this earthly hole, + In low pursuits: + Know prudent, cautious self-control + Is wisdom's root. + BURNS. + +The king is the man who can.--CARLYLE. + +I have only one counsel for you--Be master.--NAPOLEON. + + Ah, silly man, who dream'st thy honor stands + In ruling others, not thyself. Thy slaves + Serve thee, and thou thy slave: in iron bands + Thy servile spirit, pressed with wild passions, raves. + Wouldst thou live honored?--clip ambition's wing: + To reason's yoke thy furious passions bring: + Thrice noble is the man who of himself is king. + PHINEAS FLETCHER. + + "Not in the clamor of the crowded street, + Not in the shouts and plaudits of the throng, + But in ourselves are triumph and defeat." + + + + + + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Architects of Fate, by Orison Swett Marden + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ARCHITECTS OF FATE *** + +***** This file should be named 21622-8.txt or 21622-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/1/6/2/21622/ + +Produced by Al Haines + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Architects of Fate + or, Steps to Success and Power + +Author: Orison Swett Marden + +Release Date: May 27, 2007 [EBook #21622] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ARCHITECTS OF FATE *** + + + + +Produced by Al Haines + + + + + +</pre> + + + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<A NAME="img-front"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG CLASS="imgcenter" SRC="images/img-front.jpg" ALT="Phillips Brooks" BORDER="2" WIDTH="360" HEIGHT="526"> +<H3 CLASS="h3center" STYLE="width: 360px"> +Phillips Brooks +</H3> +</CENTER> + +<P CLASS="caption" ALIGN="center"> +"The best-loved man in New England." +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +"The ideal life, the life full of completion, haunts +us all. We feel the thing we +ought to be beating beneath the thing we are." +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +"<I>First, be a man.</I>" +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<BR><BR> + +<H1 ALIGN="center"> +ARCHITECTS OF FATE +</H1> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +OR, STEPS TO SUCCESS AND POWER +</H2> + +<BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +A BOOK DESIGNED TO INSPIRE YOUTH TO<BR> +CHARACTER BUILDING, SELF-CULTURE<BR> +AND NOBLE ACHIEVEMENT<BR> +</H3> + +<BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +BY +</H3> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +ORISON SWETT MARDEN +</H2> + +<BR><BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +AUTHOR OF "PUSHING TO THE FRONT<BR> +OR, SUCCESS UNDER DIFFICULTIES"<BR> +</H4> + +<BR><BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +<I>ILLUSTRATED WITH SIXTEEN FINE<BR> +PORTRAITS OF EMINENT PERSONS</I><BR> +</H4> + +<BR><BR> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"All are architects of fate<BR> +Working in these walls of time."<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Our to-days and yesterdays<BR> +Are the blocks with which we build."<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Let thy great deed be thy prayer to thy God."<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +TORONTO +<BR> +WILLIAM BRIGGS +<BR> +WESLEY BUILDINGS +<BR> +MONTREAL: C. W. COATES +<BR> +HALIFAX: S. F. HUESTIS +<BR> +1897 +</H4> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H5 ALIGN="center"> +Copyright, 1895, +<BR> +BY ORISON SWETT MARDEN. +<BR><BR> +<I>All rights reserved.</I> +</H5> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +PREFACE. +</H3> + +<P> +The demand for more than a dozen editions of "Pushing to the Front" +during its first year and its universally favorable reception, both at +home and abroad, have encouraged the author to publish this companion +volume of somewhat similar scope and purpose. The two books were +prepared simultaneously, and the story of the first, given in its +preface, applies equally well to this. +</P> + +<P> +Inspiration to character-building and worthy achievement is the keynote +of the present volume, its object, to arouse to honorable exertion +youth who are drifting without aim, to awaken dormant ambitions in +those who have grown discouraged in the struggle for success, to +encourage and stimulate to higher resolve those who are setting out to +make their own way, with perhaps neither friendship nor capital other +than a determination to get on in the world. +</P> + +<P> +Nothing is so fascinating to a youth with high purpose, life, and +energy throbbing in his young blood as stories of men and women who +have brought great things to pass. Though these themes are as old as +the human race, yet they are ever new, and more interesting to the +young than any fiction. The cry of youth is for life! more life! No +didactic or dogmatic teaching, however brilliant, will capture a +twentieth-century boy, keyed up to the highest pitch by the pressure of +an intense civilization. The romance of achievement under +difficulties, of obscure beginnings and triumphant ends; the story of +how great men started, their struggles, their long waitings, amid want +and woe, the obstacles overcome, the final triumphs; examples, which +explode excuses, of men who have seized common situations and made them +great, of those of average capacity who have succeeded by the use of +ordinary means, by dint of indomitable will and inflexible purpose: +these will most inspire the ambitious youth. The author teaches that +there are bread and success for every youth under the American flag who +has the grit to seize his chance and work his way to his own loaf; that +the barriers are not yet erected which declare to aspiring talent, +"Thus far and no farther"; that the most forbidding circumstances +cannot repress a longing for knowledge, a yearning for growth; that +poverty, humble birth, loss of limbs or even eyesight, have not been +able to bar the progress of men with grit; that poverty has rocked the +cradle of the giants who have wrung civilization from barbarism, and +have led the world up from savagery to the Gladstones, the Lincolns, +and the Grants. +</P> + +<P> +The book shows that it is the man with one unwavering aim who cuts his +way through opposition and forges to the front; that in this electric +age, where everything is pusher or pushed, he who would succeed must +hold his ground and push hard; that what are stumbling-blocks and +defeats to the weak and vacillating, are but stepping-stones and +victories to the strong and determined. The author teaches that every +germ of goodness will at last struggle into bloom and fruitage, and +that true success follows every right step. He has tried to touch the +higher springs of the youth's aspiration; to lead him to high ideals; +to teach him that there is something nobler in an occupation than +merely living-getting or money-getting; that a man may make millions +and be a failure still; to caution youth not to allow the maxims of a +low prudence, dinned daily into his ears in this money-getting age, to +repress the longings for a higher life; that the hand can never safely +reach higher than does the heart. +</P> + +<P> +The author's aim has been largely through concrete illustrations which +have pith, point, and purpose, to be more suggestive than dogmatic, in +a style more practical than elegant, more helpful than ornate, more +pertinent than novel. +</P> + +<P> +The author wishes to acknowledge valuable assistance from Mr. Arthur W. +Brown, of W. Kingston, R. I. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +O. S. M. +<BR> +43 BOWDOIN ST., BOSTON, MASS. +<BR> +December 2, 1896. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +CONTENTS. +</H2> + +<BR> + +<TABLE ALIGN="center" WIDTH="100%"> +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="15%">CHAPTER</TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="85%"> </TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">I.</TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap01">WANTED—A MAN</A> +<BR> +God after a <I>man</I>. Wealth is nothing, fame is nothing. <I>Manhood is +everything</I>. +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">II. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap02">DARE</A> +<BR> +Dare to live thy creed. Conquer your place in the world. All things +serve a brave soul. +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">III. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap03">THE WILL AND THE WAY</A> +<BR> +Find a way or make one. Everything is either pusher or pushed. The +world always listens to a man with a will in him. +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">IV. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap04">SUCCESS UNDER DIFFICULTIES</A> +<BR> +There is scarcely a great truth or doctrine but has had to fight its +way to recognition through detraction, calumny, and persecution. +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">V. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap05">USES OR OBSTACLES</A> +<BR> +The Great Sculptor cares little for the human block as such; it is the +statue He is after; and He will blast, hammer, and chisel with poverty, +hardships, anything to get out the man. +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap06">ONE UNWAVERING AIM</A> +<BR> +Find your purpose and fling your life out to it. Try to be somebody +with all your might. +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap07">SOWING AND REAPING</A> +<BR> +What is put into the first of life is put into the whole of life. +<I>Start right</I>. +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VIII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap08">SELF-HELP</A> +<BR> +Self-made or never made. The greatest men have risen from the ranks. +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">IX. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap09">WORK AND WAIT</A> +<BR> +Don't risk a life's superstructure upon a day's foundation. +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">X. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap10">CLEAR GRIT</A> +<BR> +The goddess of fame or of fortune has been won by many a poor boy who +had no friends, no backing, or anything but pure grit and invincible +purpose to commend him. +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap11">THE GRANDEST THING IN THE WORLD</A> +<BR> +Manhood is above all riches and overtops all titles; character is +greater than any career. +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap12">WEALTH IN ECONOMY</A> +<BR> +"Hunger, rags, cold, hard work, contempt, suspicion, unjust reproach, +are disagreeable; but debt is infinitely worse than all." +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XIII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap13">RICH WITHOUT MONEY</A> +<BR> +To have nothing is not poverty. Whoever uplifts civilization is rich +though he die penniless, and future generations will erect his monument. +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XIV. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap14">OPPORTUNITIES WHERE YOU ARE</A> +<BR> +"How speaks the present hour? <I>Act</I>." Don't wait for great +opportunities. <I>Seize common occasions and make them great</I>. +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XV. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap15">THE MIGHT OF LITTLE THINGS</A> +<BR> +There is nothing small in a world where a mud-crack swells to an +Amazon, and the stealing of a penny may end on the scaffold. +</TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XVI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap16">SELF-MASTERY</A> +<BR> +Guard your weak point. Be lord over yourself. +</TD> +</TR> + +</TABLE> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +LIST OF PORTRAITS. +</H2> + +<BR> + +<TABLE ALIGN="center" WIDTH="80%"> +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="10%">CHAP.</TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="80%"> </TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="10%"> </TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> I. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#img-front">Phillips Brooks </A> +</TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"><I>Frontispiece</I></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> II. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#img-010">Oliver Hazard Perry</A> +</TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> </TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> III. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#img-038">Walter Scott</A> +</TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> </TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> IV. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#img-060">William Hickling Prescott</A> +</TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> </TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> V. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#img-086">John Bunyan</A> +</TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> </TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> VI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#img-112">Richard Arkwright</A> +</TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> </TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> VII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#img-124">Victor Hugo</A> +</TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> </TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> VIII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +James A. Garfield (missing from book) +</TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> </TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> IX. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#img-166">Thomas Alva Edison</A> +</TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> </TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> X. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#img-186">Andrew Jackson</A> +</TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> </TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> XI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +John Greenleaf Whittier (missing from book) +</TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> </TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> XII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#img-226">Alexander Hamilton</A> +</TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> </TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> XIII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#img-238">Ralph Waldo Emerson</A> +</TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> </TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> XIV. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#img-256">Thomas Jefferson</A> +</TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> </TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> XV. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#img-268">Louis Agassiz</A> +</TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> </TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> XVI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#img-288">James Russell Lowell</A> +</TD> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> </TD> +</TR> + +</TABLE> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap01"></A> + +<H1 ALIGN="center"> +ARCHITECTS OF FATE. +</H1> + +<BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER I. +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +WANTED—A MAN. +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Wanted; men:<BR> +Not systems fit and wise,<BR> +Not faiths with rigid eyes,<BR> +Not wealth in mountain piles,<BR> +Not power with gracious smiles,<BR> +Not even the potent pen:<BR> +Wanted; men."<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Run ye to and fro through the streets of Jerusalem, and see now, and +know, and seek in the broad places thereof, if ye can find a +man.—JEREMIAH. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +All the world cries, Where is the man who will save us? We want a man! +Don't look so far for this man. You have him at hand. This man,—it +is you, it is I, it is each one of us!… How to constitute one's +self a man? Nothing harder, if one knows not how to will it; nothing +easier, if one wills it.—ALEXANDRE DUMAS. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"'Tis life, not death for which we pant!<BR> +'Tis life, whereof our nerves are scant:<BR> +More life and fuller, that we want."<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +I do not wish in attempting to paint a man to describe an air-fed, +unimpassioned, impossible ghost. My eyes and ears are revolted by any +neglect of the physical facts, the limitations of man.—EMERSON. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +But nature, with a matchless hand, sends forth her nobly born,<BR> +And laughs the paltry attributes of wealth and rank to scorn;<BR> +She moulds with care a spirit rare, half human, half divine,<BR> +And cries exulting, "Who can make a gentleman like mine?"<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">ELIZA COOK.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"In a thousand cups of life," says Emerson, "only one is the right +mixture. The fine adjustment of the existing elements, where the +well-mixed man is born with eyes not too dull, nor too good, with fire +enough and earth enough, capable of receiving impressions from all +things, and not too susceptible, then no gift need be bestowed on him. +He brings his fortune with him." +</P> + +<P> +Diogenes sought with a lantern at noontide in ancient Athens for a +perfectly honest man, and sought in vain. In the market place he once +cried aloud, "Hear me, O men;" and, when a crowd collected around him, +he said scornfully: "I called for men, not pygmies." +</P> + +<P> +The world has a standing advertisement over the door of every +profession, every occupation, every calling; "Wanted—A Man." +</P> + +<P> +Wanted, a man who will not lose his individuality in a crowd, a man who +has the courage of his convictions, who is not afraid to say "No," +though all the world say "Yes." +</P> + +<P> +Wanted, a man who, though he is dominated by a mighty purpose, will not +permit one great faculty to dwarf, cripple, warp, or mutilate his +manhood; who will not allow the over-development of one facility to +stunt or paralyze his other faculties. +</P> + +<P> +Wanted, a man who is larger than his calling, who considers it a low +estimate of his occupation to value it merely as a means of getting a +living. Wanted, a man who sees self-development, education and +culture, discipline and drill, character and manhood, in his occupation. +</P> + +<P> +A thousand pulpits vacant in a single religious denomination, a +thousand preachers standing idle in the market place, while a thousand +church committees scour the land for men to fill those same vacant +pulpits, and scour in vain, is a sufficient indication, in one +direction at least, of the largeness of the opportunities of the age, +and also of the crying need of good men. +</P> + +<P> +Wanted, a man who is well balanced, who is not cursed with some little +defect or weakness which cripples his usefulness and neutralizes his +powers. Wanted, a man of courage, who is not a coward in any part of +his nature. +</P> + +<P> +Wanted, a man who is symmetrical, and not one-sided in his development, +who has not sent all the energies of his being into one narrow +specialty, and allowed all the other branches of his life to wither and +die. Wanted, a man who is broad, who does not take half views of +things. Wanted, a man who mixes common sense with his theories, who +does not let a college education spoil him for practical, every-day +life; a man who prefers substance to show, who regards his good name as +a priceless treasure. +</P> + +<P> +Wanted, a man "who, no stunted ascetic, is full of life and fire, but +whose passions are trained to heed a strong will, the servant of a +tender conscience; who has learned to love all beauty, whether of +nature or of art, to hate all vileness, and to respect others as +himself." +</P> + +<P> +God calls a man to be upright and pure and generous, but he also calls +him to be intelligent and skillful and strong and brave. +</P> + +<P> +The world wants a man who is educated all over; whose nerves are +brought to their acutest sensibility, whose brain is cultured, keen, +incisive, penetrating, broad, liberal, deep; whose hands are deft; +whose eyes are alert, sensitive, microscopic, whose heart is tender, +broad, magnanimous, true. +</P> + +<P> +The whole world is looking for such a man. Although there are millions +out of employment, yet it is almost impossible to find just the right +man in almost any department of life. Every profession and every +occupation has a standing advertisement all over the world: "Wanted—A +Man." +</P> + +<P> +Rousseau, in his celebrated essay on education, says: "According to the +order of nature, men being equal, their common vocation is the +profession of humanity; and whoever is well educated to discharge the +duty of a man cannot be badly prepared to fill any of those offices +that have a relation to him. It matters little to me whether my pupil +be designed for the army, the pulpit, or the bar. Nature has destined +us to the offices of human life antecedent to our destination +concerning society. To live is the profession I would teach him. When +I have done with him, it is true he will be neither a soldier, a +lawyer, nor a divine. <I>Let him first be a man</I>; Fortune may remove him +from one rank to another as she pleases, he will be always found in his +place." +</P> + +<P> +A little, short doctor of divinity in a large Baptist convention stood +on a step and said he thanked God he was a Baptist. The audience could +not hear and called "Louder." "Get up higher," some one said. "I +can't," he replied. "To be a Baptist is as high as one can get." But +there is something higher than being a Baptist, and that is being a +<I>man</I>. +</P> + +<P> +As Emerson says, Talleyrand's question is ever the main one; not, is he +rich? is he committed? is he well-meaning? has he this or that faculty? +is he of the movement? is he of the establishment? but is he anybody? +does he stand for something? He must be good of his kind. That is all +that Talleyrand, all that State Street, all that the common sense of +mankind asks. +</P> + +<P> +When Garfield was asked as a young boy, "what he meant to be," he +answered: "First of all, I must make myself a man, if I do not succeed +in that, I can succeed in nothing." +</P> + +<P> +Montaigne says our work is not to train a soul by itself alone, nor a +body by itself alone, but to train a man. +</P> + +<P> +One great need of the world to-day is for men and women who are good +animals. To endure the strain of our concentrated civilization, the +coming man and woman must have an excess of animal spirits. They must +have a robustness of health. Mere absence of disease is not health. +It is the overflowing fountain, not the one half full, that gives life +and beauty to the valley below. Only he is healthy who exults in mere +animal existence; whose very life is a luxury; who feels a bounding +pulse throughout his body, who feels life in every limb, as dogs do +when scouring over the field, or as boys do when gliding over fields of +ice. +</P> + +<P> +Pope, the poet, was with Sir Godfrey Kneller, the artist, one day, when +the latter's nephew, a Guinea slave-trader, came into the room. +"Nephew," said Sir Godfrey, "you have the honor of seeing the two +greatest men in the world." "I don't know how great men you may be," +said the Guinea man, "but I don't like your looks. I have often bought +a much better man than either of you, all muscles and bones, for ten +guineas." +</P> + +<P> +Sydney Smith said, "I am convinced that digestion is the great secret +of life, and that character, virtue and talents, and qualities are +powerfully affected by beef, mutton, pie crust, and rich soups. I have +often thought I could feed or starve men into virtues or vices, and +affect them more powerfully with my instruments of torture than +Timotheus could do formerly with his lyre." +</P> + +<P> +What more glorious than a magnificent manhood, animated with the +bounding spirits of overflowing health? +</P> + +<P> +It is a sad sight to see thousands of students graduated every year +from our grand institutions, whose object is to make stalwart, +independent, self-supporting men, turned out into the world saplings +instead of stalwart oaks, "memory-glands" instead of brainy men, +helpless instead of self-supporting, sickly instead of robust, weak +instead of strong, leaning instead of erect. "So many promising +youths, and never a finished man!" +</P> + +<P> +The character sympathizes with and unconsciously takes on the nature of +the body. A peevish, snarling, ailing man cannot develop the vigor and +strength of character which is possible to a healthy, robust, jolly +man. There is an inherent love in the human mind for wholeness, a +demand that man shall come up to the highest standard; and there is an +inherent protest or contempt for preventable deficiency. Nature too +demands that man be ever at the top of his condition. The giant's +strength with the imbecile's brain will not be characteristic of the +coming man. +</P> + +<P> +Man has been a dwarf of himself, but a higher type of manhood stands at +the door of this age knocking for admission. +</P> + +<P> +As we stand upon the seashore while the tide is coming in, one wave +reaches up the beach far higher than any previous one, then recedes, +and for some time none that follows comes up to its mark, but after a +while the whole sea is there and beyond it, so now and then there comes +a man head and shoulders above his fellow-men, showing that Nature has +not lost her ideal, and after a while even the average man will overtop +the highest wave of manhood yet given to the world. +</P> + +<P> +Apelles hunted over Greece for many years, studying the fairest points +of beautiful women, getting here an eye, there a forehead and there a +nose, here a grace and there a turn of beauty, for his famous portrait +of a perfect woman which enchanted the world. So the coming man will +be a composite, many in one. He will absorb into himself not the +weakness, not the follies, but the strength and the virtues of other +types of men. He will be a man raised to the highest power. He will +be self-centred, equipoised, and ever master of himself. His +sensibility will not be deadened or blunted by violation of nature's +laws. His whole character will be impressible, and will respond to the +most delicate touches of nature. +</P> + +<P> +What a piece of work—this coming man! "How noble in reason. How +infinite in faculties. In form and motion how express and admirable, +in action how like an angel, in apprehension how like a god. The +beauty of the world. The paragon of animals." +</P> + +<P> +The first requisite of all education and discipline should be +man-timber. Tough timber must come from well grown, sturdy trees. +Such wood can be turned into a mast, can be fashioned into a piano or +an exquisite carving. But it must become timber first. Time and +patience develop the sapling into the tree. So through discipline, +education, experience, the sapling child is developed into hardy +mental, moral, physical timber. +</P> + +<P> +What an aid to character building would be the determination of the +young man in starting out in life to consider himself his own bank; +that his notes will be accepted as good or bad, and will pass current +everywhere or be worthless, according to his individual reputation for +honor and veracity; that if he lets a note go to protest, his bank of +character will be suspected; if he lets two or three go to protest, +public confidence will be seriously shaken; that if they continue to go +to protest, his reputation will be lost and confidence in him ruined. +</P> + +<P> +If the youth should start out with the fixed determination that every +statement he makes shall be the exact truth; that every promise he +makes shall be redeemed to the letter; that every appointment shall be +kept with the strictest faithfulness and with full regard for other +men's time, if he should hold his reputation as a priceless treasure, +feel that the eyes of the world are upon him, that he must not deviate +a hair's breadth from the truth and right; if he should take such a +stand at the outset, he would, like George Peabody, come to have almost +unlimited credit and the confidence of all, and would have developed +into noble man-timber. +</P> + +<P> +What are palaces and equipages; what though a man could cover a +continent with his title-deeds, or an ocean with his commerce, compared +with conscious rectitude, with a face that never turns pale at the +accuser's voice, with a bosom that never throbs with the fear of +exposure, with a heart that might be turned inside out and disclose no +stain of dishonor? To have done no man a wrong; to have put your +signature to no paper to which the purest angel in heaven might not +have been an attesting witness; to walk and live, unseduced, within +arm's length of what is not your own, with nothing between your desire +and its gratification but the invisible law of rectitude;—<I>this is to +be a man</I>. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"He that of such a height hath built his mind,<BR> +And reared the dwelling of his thought so strong<BR> +As neither fear nor hope can shake the frame<BR> +Of his resolved powers; nor all the wind<BR> +Of vanity or malice pierce to wrong<BR> +His settled peace, or to disturb the same;<BR> +What a fair seat hath he; from whence he may<BR> +The boundless wastes and wilds of man survey."<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">[<I>Lines found in one of the books of Beecher's Library.</I>]</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P> +A man is never so happy as when he is <I>totus in se</I>; as when he +suffices to himself, and can walk without crutches or a guide. Said +Jean Paul Richter: "I have made as much out of myself as could be made +of the stuff, and no man should require more." +</P> + +<P> +Man is the only great thing in the universe. All the ages have been +trying to produce a perfect model. Only one complete man has yet been +evolved. The best of us are but prophecies of what is to come. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">What constitutes a state?</SPAN><BR> +Not high-raised battlement or labored mound,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Thick wall or moated gate;</SPAN><BR> +Not cities proud with spires and turrets crowned;<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Not bays and broad-armed ports,</SPAN><BR> +Where, laughing at the storm, rich navies ride;<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Not starred and spangled courts,</SPAN><BR> +Where low-browed baseness wafts perfume to pride.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">No: men, high-minded men,</SPAN><BR> +With powers as far above dull brutes endued<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">In forest, brake, or den,</SPAN><BR> +As beasts excel cold rocks and brambles rude,—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Men who their duties know,</SPAN><BR> +But know their rights, and knowing, dare maintain,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Prevent the long-aimed blow,</SPAN><BR> +And crush the tyrant while they rend the chain.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">WILLIAM JONES.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +God give us men. A time like this demands<BR> +Strong minds, great hearts, true faith and ready hands:<BR> +Men whom the lust of office does not kill;<BR> +Men whom the spoils of office cannot buy;<BR> +Men who possess opinions and a will;<BR> +Men who have honor—men who will not lie;<BR> +Men who can stand before a demagogue<BR> +And scorn his treacherous flatteries without winking;<BR> +Tall men sun-crowned, who live above the fog<BR> +In public duty, and in private thinking.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">ANON.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Open thy bosom, set thy wishes wide,<BR> +And let in manhood—let in happiness;<BR> +Admit the boundless theatre of thought<BR> +From nothing up to God… which makes a man!<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">YOUNG.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"The wisest man could ask no more of fate<BR> +Than to be simple, modest, manly, true."<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +In speech right gentle, yet so wise; princely of mien,<BR> +Yet softly mannered; modest, deferent,<BR> +And tender-hearted, though of fearless blood.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">EDWIN ARNOLD.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap02"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER II. +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +DARE. +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +The Spartans did not inquire how many the enemy are, but where they +are.—AGIS II. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +What's brave, what's noble, let's do it after the high Roman fashion, +and make death proud to take us.—SHAKESPEARE. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Better, like Hector, in the field to die,<BR> +Than, like a perfumed Paris, turn and fly.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">LONGFELLOW.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Let me die facing the enemy.—BAYARD. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Who conquers me, shall find a stubborn foe.—BYRON. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Courage in danger is half the battle.—PLAUTUS. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +No great deed is done<BR> +By falterers who ask for certainty.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">GEORGE ELIOT.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Fortune befriends the bold.—DRYDEN. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Tender handed stroke a nettle,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And it stings you for your pains;</SPAN><BR> +Grasp it like a man of mettle,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And it soft as silk remains.</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">AARON HILL.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +We make way for the man who boldly pushes past us.—BOVÉE. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Man should dare all things that he knows is right,<BR> +And fear to do nothing save what is wrong.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">PHEBE CARY.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Soft-heartedness, in times like these,<BR> +Shows softness in the upper story.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">LOWELL.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +O friend, never strike sail to fear. Come into port grandly, or sail +with God the seas.—EMERSON. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +To stand with a smile upon your face against a stake from which you +cannot get away—that, no doubt, is heroic. But the true glory is +resignation to the inevitable. To stand unchained, with perfect +liberty to go away, held only by the higher claims of duty, and let the +fire creep up to the heart,—this is heroism.—F. W. ROBERTSON. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"Steady, men! Every man must die where he stands!" said Colin Campbell +to the Ninety-third Highlanders at Balaklava, as an overwhelming force +of Russian cavalry came sweeping down. "Ay, ay, Sir Colin! we'll do +that!" was the cordial response from men many of whom had to keep their +word by thus obeying. +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<A NAME="img-010"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG CLASS="imgcenter" SRC="images/img-010.jpg" ALT="COMMODORE PERRY" BORDER="2" WIDTH="362" HEIGHT="540"> +<H3 CLASS="h3center" STYLE="width: 362px"> +COMMODORE PERRY +</H3> +</CENTER> + +<P CLASS="caption" ALIGN="center"> +"We have met the enemy and they are ours." +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"He either fears his fate too much<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Or his deserts too small,</SPAN><BR> +That dares not put it to the touch,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">To gain or lose it all."</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<P> +"Bring back the colors," shouted a captain at the battle of the Alma, +when an ensign maintained his ground in front, although the men were +retreating. "No," cried the ensign, "bring up the men to the colors." +"To dare, and again to dare, and without end to dare," was Danton's +noble defiance to the enemies of France. +</P> + +<P> +"The Commons of France have resolved to deliberate," said Mirabeau to +De Breze, who brought an order from the king for them to disperse, June +23, 1789. "We have heard the intentions that have been attributed to +the king; and you, sir, who cannot be recognized as his organ in the +National Assembly,—you, who have neither place, voice, nor right to +speak,—you are not the person to bring to us a message of his. Go, +say to those who sent you that we are here by the power of the people, +and that we will not be driven hence, save by the power of the bayonet." +</P> + +<P> +When the assembled senate of Rome begged Regulus not to return to +Carthage to fulfill an illegal promise, he calmly replied: "Have you +resolved to dishonor me? Torture and death are awaiting me, but what +are these to the shame of an infamous act, or the wounds of a guilty +mind? Slave as I am to Carthage, I still have the spirit of a Roman. +I have sworn to return. It is my duty. Let the gods take care of the +rest." +</P> + +<P> +The courage which Cranmer had shown since the accession of Mary gave +way the moment his final doom was announced. The moral cowardice which +had displayed itself in his miserable compliance with the lust and +despotism of Henry displayed itself again in six successive +recantations by which he hoped to purchase pardon. But pardon was +impossible; and Cranmer's strangely mingled nature found a power in its +very weakness when he was brought into the church of St. Mary at Oxford +on the 21st of March, to repeat his recantation on the way to the +stake. "Now," ended his address to the hushed congregation before +him,—"now I come to the great thing that troubleth my conscience more +than any other thing that ever I said or did in my life, and that is +the setting abroad of writings contrary to the truth; which here I now +renounce and refuse as things written by a hand contrary to the truth +which I thought in my heart, and written for fear of death to save my +life, if it might be. And, forasmuch as my hand offended in writing +contrary to my heart, my hand therefore shall be the first punished; +for if I come to the fire it shall be the first burned." "This was the +hand that wrote it," he again exclaimed at the stake, "therefore it +shall suffer first punishment;" and holding it steadily in the flame, +"he never stirred nor cried till life was gone." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, if I were only a man!" exclaimed Rebecca Bates, a girl of +fourteen, as she looked from the window of a lighthouse at Scituate, +Mass., during the War of 1812, and saw a British warship anchor in the +harbor. "What could you do?" asked Sarah Winsor, a young visitor. +"See what a lot of them the boats contain, and look at their guns!" and +she pointed to five large boats, filled with soldiers in scarlet +uniforms, who were coming to burn the vessels in the harbor and destroy +the town. "I don't care, I'd fight," said Rebecca. "I'd use father's +old shotgun—anything. Think of uncle's new boat and the sloop! And +how hard it is to sit here and see it all, and not lift a finger to +help. Father and uncle are in the village and will do all they can. +How still it is in the town! There is not a man to be seen." "Oh, +they are hiding till the soldiers get nearer," said Sarah, "then we'll +hear the shots and the drum." "The drum!" exclaimed Rebecca, "how can +they use it? It is here. Father brought it home last night to mend. +See! the first boat has reached the sloop. Oh! they are going to burn +her. Where is that drum? I've a great mind to go down and beat it. +We could hide behind the sandhills and bushes." As flames began to +rise from the sloop the ardor of the girls increased. They found the +drum and an old fife, and, slipping out of doors unnoticed by Mrs. +Bates, soon stood behind a row of sandhills. "Rub-a-dub-dub, +rub-a-dub-dub," went the drum, and "squeak, squeak, squeak," went the +fife. The Americans in the town thought that help had come from +Boston, and rushed into boats to attack the redcoats. The British +paused in their work of destruction; and, when the fife began to play +"Yankee Doodle," they scrambled into their boats and rowed in haste to +the warship, which weighed anchor and sailed away as fast as the wind +would carry her. +</P> + +<P> +A woman's piercing shriek suddenly startled a party of surveyors at +dinner in a forest of northern Virginia on a calm, sunny day in 1750. +The cries were repeated in quick succession, and the men sprang through +the undergrowth to learn their cause. "Oh, sir," exclaimed the woman +as she caught sight of a youth of eighteen, but a man in stature and +bearing; "you will surely do something for me! Make these friends +release me. My boy,—my poor boy is drowning, and they will not let me +go!" "It would be madness; she will jump into the river," said one of +the men who was holding her; "and the rapids would dash her to pieces +in a moment!" Throwing on his coat, the youth sprang to the edge of +the bank, scanned for a moment the rocks and whirling currents, and +then, at sight of part of the boy's dress, plunged into the roaring +rapids. "Thank God, he will save my child!" cried the mother, and all +rushed to the brink of the precipice; "there he is! Oh, my boy, my +darling boy! How could I leave you?" +</P> + +<P> +But all eyes were bent upon the youth struggling with strong heart and +hope amid the dizzy sweep of the whirling currents far below. Now it +seemed as if he would be dashed against a projecting rock, over which +the water flew in foam, and anon a whirlpool would drag him in, from +whose grasp escape would seem impossible. Twice the boy went out of +sight, but he had reappeared the second time, although frightfully near +the most dangerous part of the river. The rush of waters here was +tremendous, and no one had ever dared to approach it, even in a canoe, +lest he should be dashed to pieces. The youth redoubled his exertions. +Three times he was about to grasp the child, when some stronger eddy +would toss it from him. One final effort he makes; the child is held +aloft by his strong right arm, but a cry of horror bursts from the lips +of every spectator as boy and man shoot over the falls and vanish in +the seething waters below. +</P> + +<P> +"There they are!" shouted the mother a moment later, in a delirium of +joy. "See! they are safe! Great God, I thank Thee!" And sure enough +they emerged unharmed from the boiling vortex, and in a few minutes +reached a low place in the bank and were drawn up by their friends, the +boy senseless, but still alive, and the youth almost exhausted. "God +will give you a reward," solemnly spoke the grateful woman. "He will +do great things for you in return for this day's work, and the +blessings of thousands besides mine will attend you." +</P> + +<P> +The youth was George Washington. +</P> + +<P> +"Your Grace has not the organ of animal courage largely developed," +said a phrenologist, who was examining Wellington's head. "You are +right," replied the Iron Duke, "and but for my sense of duty I should +have retreated in my first fight." That first fight, on an Indian +field, was one of the most terrible on record. +</P> + +<P> +In the reverses which followed Napoleon, he met the allies at Arcis. A +live shell having fallen in front of one of his young battalions, which +recoiled and wavered in expectation of an explosion, Napoleon, to +reassure them, spurred his charger toward the instrument of +destruction, made him smell the burning match, waited unshaken for the +explosion, and was blown up. Rolling in the dust with his mutilated +steed, and rising without a wound amid the plaudits of his soldiers, he +calmly called for another horse, and continued to brave the grape-shot, +and to fly into the thickest of the battle. +</P> + +<P> +When General Jackson was a judge and was holding court in a small +settlement, a border ruffian, a murderer and desperado, came into the +court-room with brutal violence and interrupted the court. The judge +ordered him to be arrested. The officer did not dare to approach him. +"Call a posse," said the judge, "and arrest him." But they also shrank +in fear from the ruffian. "Call me, then," said Jackson; "this court +is adjourned for five minutes." He left the bench, walked straight up +to the man, and with his eagle eye actually cowed the ruffian, who +dropped his weapons, afterwards saying, "There was something in his eye +I could not resist." +</P> + +<P> +One of the last official acts of the late President Carnot, of France, +was the sending of a medal of the French Legion of Honor to a little +American girl, who lives in Indiana. While a train on the Pan Handle +Railroad, having on board several distinguished Frenchmen, was bound to +Chicago and the World's Fair, Jennie Carey, who was then ten years old, +discovered that a trestle was on fire, and that if the train, which was +nearly due, entered it a dreadful wreck would take place. Thereupon +she ran out upon the track to a place where she could be seen from some +little distance. Then she took off her red flannel skirt and, when the +train came in view, waved it back and forth across the track. It was +seen, and the train stopped. On board of it were seven hundred people, +many of whom must have suffered death but for Jennie's courage and +presence of mind. When they returned to France, the Frenchmen brought +the occurrence to the notice of President Carnot, and the result was +the sending of the medal of this famous French society, the purpose of +which is the honoring of bravery and merit, wherever they may be found. +</P> + +<P> +After the battle of Fort Donelson, the wounded were hauled down the +hill in rough board wagons, and most of them died before they reached +St. Louis. One blue-eyed boy of nineteen, with both arms and both legs +shattered, had lain a long time and was neglected. He said, "Why, you +see they couldn't stop to bother with us because they had to take the +fort. When they took it we all forgot our sufferings and shouted for +joy, even to the dying." +</P> + +<P> +Louis IX. of France was captured by the Turks at the battle of +Mansoora, during the Seventh Crusade, and his wife Marguerite, with a +babe at the breast, was in Damietta, many miles away. The Infidels +surrounded the city, and pressed the garrison so hard that it was +decided to capitulate. The queen summoned the knights, and told them +that she at least would die in armor upon the ramparts before the enemy +should become masters of Damietta. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Before her words they thrilled like leaves<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">When winds are in the wood;</SPAN><BR> +And a deepening murmur told of men<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Roused to a loftier mood."</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Grasping lance and shield, they vowed to defend their queen and the +cross to the last. Damietta was saved. +</P> + +<P> +Pyrrhus marched to Sparta to reinstate the deposed Cleonymus, and +quietly pitched his tents before Laconia, not anticipating resistance. +In consternation, the Spartans in council decided to send their women +to Crete for safety. But the women met and asked Queen Archidamia to +remonstrate. She went to the council, sword in hand, and told the men +that their wives did not care to live after Sparta was destroyed. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"We are brave men's mothers, and brave men's wives;<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">We are ready to do and dare;</SPAN><BR> +We are ready to man your walls with our lives,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And string your bows with our hair."</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +They hurried to the walls and worked all night, aiding the men in +digging trenches. When Pyrrhus attacked the city next day, his repulse +was so emphatic that he withdrew from Laconia. +</P> + +<P> +Charles V. of Spain passed through Thuringia in 1547, on his return to +Swabia after the battle of Muehlburg. He wrote to Catherine, Countess +Dowager of Schwartzburg, promising that her subjects should not be +molested in their persons or property if they would supply the Spanish +soldiers with provisions at a reasonable price. On approaching +Eudolstadt, General Alva and Prince Henry of Brunswick, with his sons, +invited themselves, by a messenger sent forward, to breakfast with the +Countess, who had no choice but to ratify so delicate a request from +the commander of an army. Just as the guests were seated at a generous +repast, the Countess was called from the hall and told that the +Spaniards were using violence and driving away the cattle of the +peasants. +</P> + +<P> +Quietly arming all her retinue, she bolted and barred all the gates and +doors of the castle, and returned to the banquet to complain of the +breach of faith. General Alva told her that such was the custom of +war, adding that such trifling disorders were not to be heeded. "That +we shall presently see," said Catharine; "my poor subjects must have +their own again, or, as God lives, prince's blood for oxen's blood!" +The doors were opened, and armed men took the places of the waiters +behind the chairs of the guests. Henry changed color; then, as the +best way out of a bad scrape, laughed loudly, and ended by praising the +splendid acting of his hostess, and promising that Alva should order +the cattle restored at once. Not until a courier returned, saying that +the order had been obeyed, and all damages settled satisfactorily, did +the armed waiters leave. The Countess then thanked her guests for the +honor they had done her castle, and they retired with protestations of +their distinguished consideration. +</P> + +<P> +It was the heroic devotion of an Indian girl that saved the life of +Captain John Smith, when the powerful King Powhatan had decreed his +death. Ill could the struggling colony spare him at that time. +</P> + +<P> +When the consul shouted that the bridge was tottering, Lartius and +Herminius sought safety in flight. But Horatius strode still nearer +the foe, the single champion of his country and liberty, and dared the +ninety thousand to come on. Dead stillness fell upon the Tuscans, so +astonished were they at the audacity of the Roman. He first broke the +awful silence, so deep that his clear, strong voice could be heard by +thousands in both armies, between which rolled the Tiber, as he +denounced the baseness and perfidy of the invaders. Not until his +words were drowned by the loud crash of fiercely disrupturing timbers, +and the sullen splash of the dark river, did his enemies hurl their +showers of arrows and javelins. Then, dexterously warding off the +missiles with his shield, he plunged into the Tiber. Although stabbed +in the hip by a Tuscan spear which lamed him for life, he swam in +safety to Rome. +</P> + +<P> +"It is a bad omen," said Eric the Red, when his horse slipped and fell +on the way to his ship, moored on the coast of Greenland, in readiness +for a voyage of discovery. "Ill-fortune would be mine should I dare +venture now upon the sea." So he returned to his house, but his young +son Leif decided to go, and, with a crew of thirty-five men, sailed +southward in search of the unknown shore upon which Captain Biarni had +been driven by a storm, while sailing in another Viking ship two or +three years before. The first land that they saw was probably +Labrador, a barren, rugged plain. Leif called this country Heluland, +or the land of flat stones. Sailing onward many days, he came to a +low, level coast thickly covered with woods, on account of which he +called the country Markland, probably the modern Nova Scotia. Sailing +onward, they came to an island which they named Vinland on account of +the abundance of delicious wild grapes in the woods. This was in the +year 1000. Here where the city of Newport, R. I., stands, they spent +many months, and then returned to Greenland with their vessel loaded +with grapes and strange kinds of wood. The voyage was successful, and +no doubt Eric was sorry he had been frightened by the bad omen. +</P> + +<P> +May 10, 1796, Napoleon carried the bridge at Lodi, in the face of the +Austrian batteries. Fourteen cannon—some accounts say thirty—were +trained upon the French end of the structure. Behind them were six +thousand troops. Napoleon massed four thousand grenadiers at the head +of the bridge, with a battalion of three hundred carbineers in front. +At the tap of the drum the foremost assailants wheeled from the cover +of the street wall under a terrible hail of grape and canister, and +attempted to pass the gateway to the bridge. The front ranks went down +like stalks of grain before a reaper; the column staggered and reeled +backward, and the valiant grenadiers were appalled by the task before +them. Without a word or a look of reproach, Napoleon placed himself at +their head, and his aids and generals rushed to his side. Forward +again, this time over heaps of dead that choked the passage, and a +quick run, counted by seconds only, carried the column across two +hundred yards of clear space, scarcely a shot from the Austrians taking +effect beyond the point where the platoons wheeled for the first leap. +So sudden and so miraculous was it all that the Austrian artillerists +abandoned their guns instantly, and their supports fled in a panic +instead of rushing to the front and meeting the French onslaught. This +Napoleon had counted on in making the bold attack. The contrast +between Napoleon's slight figure and the massive grenadiers suggested +the nickname "Little Corporal." +</P> + +<P> +The great secret of the success of Joan of Arc was the boldness of her +attacks. +</P> + +<P> +When Stephen of Colonna fell into the hands of base assailants, and +they asked him in derision, "Where is now your fortress?" "Here," was +his bold reply, placing his hand upon his heart. +</P> + +<P> +It was after the Mexican War when General McClellan was employed as a +topographical engineer in surveying the Pacific coast. From his +headquarters at Vancouver he had gone south to the Columbia River with +two companions, a soldier and a servant. One evening he received word +that the chiefs of the Columbia River tribes desired to confer with +him. From the messenger's manner he suspected that the Indians meant +mischief. He warned his companions that they must be ready to leave +camp at a moment's notice. Mounting his horse, he rode boldly into the +Indian village. About thirty chiefs were holding council. McClellan +was led into the circle, and placed at the right hand of Saltese. He +was familiar with the Chinook jargon, and could understand every word +spoken in the council. Saltese made known the grievance of the tribes. +Two Indians had been captured by a party of white pioneers and hanged +for theft. Retaliation for this outrage seemed indispensable. The +chiefs pondered long, but had little to say. McClellan had been on +friendly terms with them, and was not responsible for the forest +executions. Still, he was a white man, and the chiefs had vowed +vengeance against the race. The council was prolonged for hours before +sentence was passed, and then Saltese, in the name of the head men of +the tribes, decreed that McClellan should immediately be put to death +in retaliation for the hanging of the two Indian thieves. +</P> + +<P> +McClellan had said nothing. He had known that argument and pleas for +justice or mercy would be of no avail. He had sat motionless, +apparently indifferent to his fate. By his listlessness he had thrown +his captors off their guard. When the sentence was passed he acted +like a flash. Flinging his left arm around the neck of Saltese, he +whipped out his revolver and held it close to the chief's temple. +"Revoke that sentence, or I shall kill you this instant!" he cried, +with his fingers clicking the trigger. "I revoke it!" exclaimed +Saltese, fairly livid from fear. "I must have your word that I can +leave this council in safety." "You have the word of Saltese," was the +quick response. McClellan knew how sacred was the pledge which he had +received. The revolver was lowered. Saltese was released from the +embrace of the strong arm. McClellan strode out of the tent with his +revolver in his hand. Not a hand was raised against him. He mounted +his horse and rode to his camp, where his two followers were ready to +spring into the saddle and to escape from the villages. He owed his +life to his quickness of perception, and to his accurate knowledge of +Indian character. +</P> + +<P> +In 1866, Rufus Choate spoke to an audience of nearly five thousand in +Lowell in favor of the candidacy of James Buchanan for the presidency. +The floor of the great hall began to sink, settling more and more as he +proceeded with his address, until a sound of cracking timber below +would have precipitated a stampede with fatal results but for the +coolness of B. F. Butler, who presided. Telling the people to remain +quiet, he said that he would see if there were any cause for alarm. He +found the supports of the floor in so bad a condition that the +slightest applause would be likely to bury the audience in the ruins of +the building. Returning rather leisurely to the platform, he whispered +to Choate as he passed, "We shall all be in —— in five minutes," then +he told the crowd that there was no immediate danger if they would +slowly disperse, although he thought it prudent to adjourn to a place +where there would be no risk whatever. The post of danger, he added, +was on the platform, which was most weakly supported, therefore he and +those with him would be the last to leave. No doubt many lives were +saved by his coolness. +</P> + +<P> +Many distinguished foreign and American statesmen were present at a +fashionable dinner party where wine was freely poured, but Schuyler +Colfax, then vice-president of the United States, declined to drink +from a proffered cup. "Colfax dares not drink," sneered a Senator who +had already taken too much. "You are right," said the Vice-President, +"I dare not." +</P> + +<P> +When Grant was in Houston several years ago, he was given a rousing +reception. Naturally hospitable, and naturally inclined to like a man +of Grant's make-up, the Houstonites determined to go beyond any other +Southern city in the way of a banquet and other manifestations of their +good-will and hospitality. They made great preparations for the +dinner, the committee taking great pains to have the finest wines that +could be procured for the table that night. When the time came to +serve the wine, the head-waiter went first to Grant. Without a word +the general quietly turned down all the glasses at his plate. This +movement was a great surprise to the Texans, but they were equal to the +occasion. Without a single word being spoken, every man along the line +of the long tables turned his glasses down, and there was not a drop of +wine taken that night. +</P> + +<P> +A deep sewer at Noyon, France, had been opened for repairs, and +carelessly left at night without covering or lights to warn people of +danger. Late at night four men stumbled in, and lay some time before +their situation was known in the town. No one dared go to the aid of +the men, then unconscious from breathing noxious gases, except +Catherine Vassen, a servant girl of eighteen. She insisted on being +lowered at once. Fastening a rope around two of the men, she aided in +raising them and restoring them to consciousness. Descending again, +she had just tied a rope around a third man, when she felt her breath +failing. Tying another rope to her long, curly hair, she swooned, but +was drawn up with the man, to be quickly revived by fresh air and +stimulants. The fourth man was dead when his body was pulled up, on +account of the delay from the fainting of Catherine. +</P> + +<P> +Two French officers at Waterloo were advancing to charge a greatly +superior force. One, observing that the other showed signs of fear, +said, "Sir, I believe you are frightened." "Yes, I am," was the reply, +"and if you were half as much frightened, you would run away." +</P> + +<P> +"That's a brave man," said Wellington, when he saw a soldier turn pale +as he marched against a battery; "he knows his danger, and faces it." +</P> + +<P> +"There are many cardinals and bishops at Worms," said a friend to +Luther, "and they will burn your body to ashes as they did that of John +Huss." Luther replied: "Although they should make a fire that should +reach from Worms to Wittenberg, and that should flame up to heaven, in +the Lord's name I would pass through it and appear before them." He +said to another: "I would enter Worms though there were as many devils +there as there are tiles upon the roofs of the houses." Another said: +"Duke George will surely arrest you." He replied: "It is my duty to +go, and I will go, though it rain Duke Georges for nine days together." +</P> + +<P> +"Here I stand, I cannot do otherwise, God help me," exclaimed Luther at +the Diet of Worms, facing his foes. +</P> + +<P> +A Western paper recently invited the surviving Union and Confederate +officers to give an account of the bravest act observed by each during +the Civil War. Colonel Thomas W. Higginson said that at a dinner at +Beaufort, S. C., where wine flowed freely and ribald jests were +bandied, Dr. Miner, a slight, boyish fellow who did not drink, was told +that he could not go until he had drunk a toast, told a story, or sung +a song. He replied: "I cannot sing, but I will give a toast, although +I must drink it in water. It is 'Our Mothers.'" The men were so +affected and ashamed that some took him by the hand and thanked him for +displaying courage greater than that required to walk up to the mouth +of a cannon. +</P> + +<P> +It took great courage for the commercial Quaker, John Bright, to +espouse a cause which called down upon his head the derision and scorn +and hatred of the Parliament. For years he rested under a cloud of +obloquy, but Bright was made of stern stuff. It was only his strength +of character and masterly eloquence, which saved him from political +annihilation. To a man who boasted that his ancestors came over with +the Conquerors, he replied, "I never heard that they did anything +else." A Tory lordling said, when Bright was ill, that Providence had +inflicted upon Bright, for the measure of his talents, disease of the +brain. When Bright went back into the Commons he replied: "This may be +so, but it will be some consolation to the friends and family of the +noble lord to know that that disease is one which even Providence +cannot inflict upon him." +</P> + +<P> +"When a resolute young fellow steps up to the great bully, the World, +and takes him boldly by the beard," says Holmes, "he is often surprised +to find it come off in his hand, and that it was only tied on to scare +away timid adventurers." +</P> + +<P> +It takes courage for a young man to stand firmly erect while others are +bowing and fawning for praise and power. It takes courage to wear +threadbare clothes while your comrades dress in broadcloth. It takes +courage to remain in honest poverty when others grow rich by fraud. It +takes courage to say "No" squarely when those around you say "Yes." It +takes courage to do your duty in silence and obscurity while others +prosper and grow famous although neglecting sacred obligations. It +takes courage to unmask your true self, to show your blemishes to a +condemning world, and to pass for what you really are. +</P> + +<P> +It takes courage and pluck to be outvoted, beaten, laughed at, scoffed, +ridiculed, derided, misunderstood, misjudged, to stand alone with all +the world against you, but +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"They are slaves who dare not be<BR> +In the right with two or three."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"There is never wanting a dog to bark at you." +</P> + +<P> +"An honest man is not the worse because a dog barks at him." +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Let any man show the world that he feels<BR> +Afraid of its bark, and 'twill fly at his heels.<BR> +Let him fearlessly face it, 't will leave him alone,<BR> +And 't will fawn at his feet if he fling it a bone."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +We live ridiculously for fear of being thought ridiculous. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"'Tis he is the coward who proves false to his vows,<BR> +To his manhood, his honor, for a laugh or a sneer:<BR> +'Tis he is the hero who stands firm, though alone,<BR> +For the truth and the right without flinching or fear."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +The youth who starts out by being afraid to speak what he thinks will +usually end by being afraid to think what he wishes. +</P> + +<P> +How we shrink from an act of our own. We live as others live. Custom +or fashion dictates, or your doctor or minister, and they in turn dare +not depart from their schools. Dress, living, servants, carriages, +everything must conform, or be ostracized. Who dares conduct his +household or business affairs in his own way, and snap his fingers at +Dame Grundy? +</P> + +<P> +Many a man has marched up to the cannon's mouth in battle who dared not +face public opinion or oppose Mrs. Grundy. +</P> + +<P> +It takes courage for a public man not to bend the knee to popular +prejudice. It takes courage to refuse to follow custom when it is +injurious to his health and morals. To espouse an unpopular cause in +Congress requires more courage than to lead a charge in battle. How +much easier for a politician to prevaricate and dodge an issue than to +stand squarely on his feet like a man. +</P> + +<P> +As a rule, eccentricity is a badge of power, but how many women would +not rather strangle their individuality than be tabooed by Mrs. Grundy? +Yet fear is really the only thing to fear. +</P> + +<P> +"Whoever you may be," said Sainte-Beuve, "great genius, distinguished +talent, artist honorable or amiable, the qualities for which you +deserve to be praised will all be turned against you. Were you a +Virgil, the pious and sensible singer <I>par excellence</I>, there are +people who will call you an effeminate poet. Were you a Horace, there +are people who will reproach you with the very purity and delicacy of +your taste. If you were a Shakespeare, some one will call you a +drunken savage. If you were a Goethe, more than one Pharisee will +proclaim you the most selfish of egotists." +</P> + +<P> +As the strongest man has a weakness somewhere, so the greatest hero is +a coward somewhere. Peter was courageous enough to draw his sword to +defend his master, but he could not stand the ridicule and the finger +of scorn of the maidens in the high priest's hall, and he actually +denied even the acquaintance of the master he had declared he would die +for. +</P> + +<P> +"I will take the responsibility," said Andrew Jackson, on a memorable +occasion, and his words have become proverbial. Not even Congress +dared to oppose the edicts of John Quincy Adams. +</P> + +<P> +If a man would accomplish anything in this world, he must not be afraid +of assuming responsibilities. Of course it takes courage to run the +risk of failure, to be subjected to criticism for an unpopular cause, +to expose one's self to the shafts of everybody's ridicule, but the man +who is not true to himself, who cannot carry out the sealed orders +placed in his hands at his birth, regardless of the world's yes or no, +of its approval or disapproval, the man who has not the courage to +trace the pattern of his own destiny, which no other soul knows but his +own, can never rise to the true dignity of manhood. All the world +loves courage; youth craves it; they want to hear about it, they want +to read about it. The fascination of the "blood and thunder" novels +and of the cheap story papers for youth are based upon this idea of +courage. If the boys cannot get the real article, they will take a +counterfeit. +</P> + +<P> +Don't be like Uriah Heep, begging everybody's pardon for taking the +liberty of being in the world. There is nothing attractive in +timidity, nothing lovable in fear. Both are deformities and are +repulsive. Manly courage is dignified and graceful. The worst manners +in the world are those of persons conscious "of being beneath their +position, and trying to conceal it or make up for it by style." +</P> + +<P> +Bruno, condemned to be burned alive in Rome, said to his judge: "You +are more afraid to pronounce my sentence than I am to receive it." +Anne Askew, racked until her bones were dislocated, never flinched, but +looked her tormentor calmly in the face and refused to abjure her faith. +</P> + +<P> +"We are afraid of truth, afraid of fortune, afraid of death, and afraid +of each other." "Half a man's wisdom goes with his courage," said +Emerson. Physicians used to teach that courage depends on the +circulation of the blood in the arteries, and that during passion, +anger, trials of strength, wrestling or fighting, a large amount of +blood is collected in the arteries, and does not pass to the veins. A +strong pulse is a fortune in itself. +</P> + +<P> +"Rage," said Shaftesbury, "can make a coward forget himself and fight." +</P> + +<P> +"I should have thought fear would have kept you from going so far," +said a relative who found the little boy Nelson wandering a long +distance from home. "Fear?" said the future admiral, "I don't know +him." +</P> + +<P> +"Doubt indulged becomes doubt realized." To determine to do anything +is half the battle. "To think a thing is impossible is to make it so." +<I>Courage is victory, timidity is defeat</I>. +</P> + +<P> +That simple shepherd-lad, David, fresh from his flocks, marching +unattended and unarmed, save with his shepherd's staff and sling, to +confront the colossal Goliath with his massive armor, is the sublimest +audacity the world has ever seen. +</P> + +<P> +"Dent, I wish you would get down, and see what is the matter with that +leg there," said Grant, when he and Colonel Dent were riding through +the thickest of a fire that had become so concentrated and murderous +that his troops had all been driven back. "I guess looking after your +horse's legs can wait," said Dent; "it is simply murder for us to sit +here." "All right," said Grant, "if you don't want to see to it, I +will." He dismounted, untwisted a piece of telegraph wire which had +begun to cut the horse's leg, examined it deliberately, and climbed +into his saddle. "Dent," said he, "when you've got a horse that you +think a great deal of, you should never take any chances with him. If +that wire had been left there for a little time longer he would have +gone dead lame, and would perhaps have been ruined for life." +</P> + +<P> +Wellington said that at Waterloo the hottest of the battle raged round +a farmhouse, with an orchard surrounded by a thick hedge, which was so +important a point in the British position that orders were given to +hold it at any hazard or sacrifice. At last the powder and ball ran +short and the hedges took fire, surrounding the orchard with a wall of +flame. A messenger had been sent for ammunition, and soon two loaded +wagons came galloping toward the farmhouse. "The driver of the first +wagon, with the reckless daring of an English boy, spurred his +struggling and terrified horses through the burning heap; but the +flames rose fiercely round, and caught the powder, which exploded in an +instant, sending wagon, horses, and rider in fragments into the air. +For an instant the driver of the second wagon paused, appalled by his +comrade's fate; the next, observing that the flames, beaten back for +the moment by the explosion, afforded him one desperate chance, sent +his horses at the smouldering breach and, amid the deafening cheers of +the garrison, landed his terrible cargo safely within. Behind him the +flames closed up, and raged more fiercely than ever." +</P> + +<P> +At the battle of Friedland a cannon-ball came over the heads of the +French soldiers, and a young soldier instinctively dodged. Napoleon +looked at him and smilingly said: "My friend, if that ball were +destined for you, though you were to burrow a hundred feet under ground +it would be sure to find you there." +</P> + +<P> +When the mine in front of Petersburg was finished, the fuse was +lighted, and the Union troops were drawn up ready to charge the enemy's +works as soon as the explosion should make a breach. But seconds, +minutes, and tens of minutes passed, without a sound from the mine, and +the suspense became painful. Lieutenant Doughty and Sergeant Kees +volunteered to examine the fuse. Through the long subterranean +galleries they hurried in silence, not knowing but they were advancing +to a horrible death. They found the defect, fired the train anew, and +soon a terrible upheaval of earth gave the signal to march to victory. +</P> + +<P> +At the battle of Copenhagen, as Nelson walked the deck slippery with +blood and covered with the dead, he said: "This is warm work, and this +day may be the last to any of us in a moment. But, mark me, I would +not be elsewhere for thousands." At the battle of Trafalgar, when +Nelson was shot and was being carried below, he covered his face, that +those fighting might not know their chief had fallen. +</P> + +<P> +In a skirmish at Salamanca, while the enemy's guns were pouring shot +into his regiment, Sir William Napier's men became disobedient. He at +once ordered a halt, and flogged four of the ringleaders under fire. +The men yielded at once, and then marched three miles under a heavy +cannonade as coolly as if it were a review. +</P> + +<P> +Execute your resolutions immediately. Thoughts are but dreams till +their effects be tried. Does competition trouble you? work away; what +is your competitor but a man? <I>Conquer your place in the world</I>, for +all things serve a brave soul. Combat difficulty manfully; sustain +misfortune bravely; endure poverty nobly; encounter disappointment +courageously. The influence of the brave man is a magnetism which +creates an epidemic of noble zeal in all about him. Every day sends to +the grave obscure men, who have only remained in obscurity because +their timidity has prevented them from making a first effort; and who, +if they could have been induced to begin, would, in all probability, +have gone great lengths in the career of usefulness and fame. "No +great deed is done," says George Eliot, "by falterers who ask for +certainty." The brave, cheerful man will survive his blighted hopes +and disappointments, take them for just what they are, lessons and +perhaps blessings in disguise, and will march boldly and cheerfully +forward in the battle of life. Or, if necessary, he will bear his ills +with a patience and calm endurance deeper than ever plummet sounded. +He is the true hero. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Then to side with Truth is noble when we share her wretched crust,<BR> +Ere her cause bring fame and profit, and 't is prosperous to be just;<BR> +Then it is the brave man chooses, while the coward stands aside,<BR> +Doubting in his abject spirit, till his Lord is crucified.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">LOWELL.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 5em">Our doubts are traitors,</SPAN><BR> +And make us lose the good we oft might win,<BR> +By fearing to attempt.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">SHAKESPEARE.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +After the great inward struggle was over, and he had determined to +remain loyal to his principles, Thomas More walked cheerfully to the +block. His wife called him a fool for staying in a dark, damp, filthy +prison when he might have his liberty by merely renouncing his +doctrines, as some of the bishops had done. But he preferred death to +dishonor. His daughter allowed the power of love to drive away fear. +She remained true to her father when all others, even her mother, had +forsaken him. After his head had been cut off and exhibited on a pole +on London Bridge, the poor girl begged it of the authorities, and +requested that it be buried in the coffin with her. Her request was +granted, for her death occurred soon. +</P> + +<P> +When Sir Walter Raleigh came to the scaffold he was very faint, and +began his speech to the crowd by saying that during the last two days +he had been visited by two ague fits. "If, therefore, you perceive any +weakness in me, I beseech you ascribe it to my sickness rather than to +myself." He took the axe and kissed the blade, and said to the +sheriff: "'T is a sharp medicine, but a sound cure for all diseases." +</P> + +<P> +Don't waste time dreaming of obstacles you may never encounter, or in +crossing bridges you have not reached. Don't fool with a nettle! +Grasp with firmness if you would rob it of its sting. To half will and +to hang forever in the balance is to lose your grip on life. +</P> + +<P> +Abraham Lincoln's boyhood was one long struggle with poverty, with +little education, and no influential friends. When at last he had +begun the practice of law, it required no little daring to cast his +fortune with the weaker side in politics, and thus imperil what small +reputation he had gained. Only the most sublime moral courage could +have sustained him as President to hold his ground against hostile +criticism and a long train of disaster; to issue the Emancipation +Proclamation; to support Grant and Stanton against the clamor of the +politicians and the press; and through it all to do the right as God +gave him to see the right. +</P> + +<P> +Lincoln never shrank from espousing an unpopular cause when he believed +it to be right. At the time when it almost cost a young lawyer his +bread and butter to defend the fugitive slave, and when other lawyers +had refused, Lincoln would always plead the cause of the unfortunate +whenever an opportunity presented. "Go to Lincoln," people would say, +when these hounded fugitives were seeking protection; "he's not afraid +of any cause, if it's right." +</P> + +<P> +As Salmon P. Chase left the court room after making an impassioned plea +for the runaway slave girl Matilda, a man looked at him in surprise and +said: "There goes a fine young fellow who has just ruined himself." +But in thus ruining himself Chase had taken the first important step in +a career in which he became Governor of Ohio, United States Senator +from Ohio, Secretary of the United States Treasury, and Chief Justice +of the United States Supreme Court. +</P> + +<P> +At the trial of William Penn for having spoken at a Quaker meeting, the +recorder, not satisfied with the first verdict, said to the jury: "We +will have a verdict by the help of God, or you shall starve for it." +"You are Englishmen," said Penn; "mind your privileges, give not away +your right." At last the jury, after two days and two nights without +food, returned a verdict of "Not guilty." The recorder fined them +forty marks apiece for their independence. +</P> + +<P> +What cared Christ for the jeers of the crowd? The palsied hand moved, +the blind saw, the leper was made whole, the dead spake, despite the +ridicule and scoffs of the spectators. +</P> + +<P> +What cared Wendell Phillips for rotten eggs, derisive scorn, and +hisses? In him "at last the scornful world had met its match." Were +Beecher and Gough to be silenced by the rude English mobs that came to +extinguish them? No! they held their ground and compelled unwilling +thousands to hear and to heed. Did Anna Dickinson leave the platform +when the pistol bullets of the Molly Maguires flew about her head? She +silenced those pistols by her courage and her arguments. +</P> + +<P> +"What the world wants is a Knox, who dares to preach on with a musket +leveled at his head, a Garrison, who is not afraid of a jail, or a mob, +or a scaffold erected in front of his door. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Storms may howl around thee,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Foes may hunt and hound thee:</SPAN><BR> +Shall they overpower thee?<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Never, never, never."</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +When General Butler was sent with nine thousand men to quell the New +York riots, he arrived in advance of his troops, and found the streets +thronged with an angry mob, which had already hanged more than one man +to lamp-posts. Without waiting for his men, Butler went to the place +where the crowd was most dense, overturned an ash barrel, stood upon +it, and began: "Delegates from Five Points, fiends from hell, you have +murdered your superiors," and the blood-stained crowd quailed before +the courageous words of a single man in a city which Mayor Fernando +Wood could not restrain with the aid of police and militia. +</P> + +<P> +"Our enemies are before us," exclaimed the Spartans at Thermopylae. +"And we are before them," was the cool reply of Leonidas. "Deliver +your arms," came the message from Xerxes. "Come and take them," was +the answer Leonidas sent back. A Persian soldier said: "You will not +be able to see the sun for flying javelins and arrows." "Then we will +fight in the shade," replied a Lacedemonian. What wonder that a +handful of such men checked the march of the greatest host that ever +trod the earth. +</P> + +<P> +"It is impossible," said a staff officer, when Napoleon gave directions +for a daring plan. "Impossible!" thundered the great commander, +"<I>impossible</I> is the adjective of fools!" Napoleon went to the edge of +his possibility. +</P> + +<P> +Grant never knew when he was beaten. When told that he was surrounded +by the enemy at Belmont, he quietly replied: "Well, then we must cut +our way out." +</P> + +<P> +The courageous man is an example to the intrepid. His influence is +magnetic. He creates an epidemic of nobleness. Men follow him, even +to the death. +</P> + +<P> +The spirit of courage will transform the whole temper of your life. +"The wise and active conquer difficulties by daring to attempt them. +Sloth and folly shiver and sicken at the sight of trial and hazard, and +make the impossibility they fear." +</P> + +<P> +"The hero," says Emerson, "is the man who is immovably centred." +</P> + +<P> +Emin Pasha, the explorer of Africa, was left behind by his exploring +party under circumstances that were thought certainly fatal, and his +death was reported with great assurance. Early the next winter, as his +troop was on its toilsome but exciting way through Central Africa, it +came upon a most wretched sight. A party of natives had been kidnapped +by the slave-hunters, and dragged in chains thus far toward the land of +bondage. But small-pox had set in, and the miserable company had been +abandoned to their fate. Emin sent his men ahead, and stayed behind in +this camp of death to act as physician and nurse. How many lives he +saved is not known, though it is known that he nearly lost his own. +The age of chivalry is not gone by. This is as knightly a deed as poet +ever chronicled. +</P> + +<P> +A mouse that dwelt near the abode of a great magician was kept in such +constant distress by its fear of a cat, that the magician, taking pity +on it, turned it into a cat itself. Immediately it began to suffer +from its fear of a dog, so the magician turned it into a dog. Then it +began to suffer from fear of a tiger. The magician therefore turned it +into a tiger. Then it began to suffer from fear of hunters, and the +magician said in disgust: "Be a mouse again. As you have only the +heart of a mouse, it is impossible to help you by giving you the body +of a nobler animal." +</P> + +<P> +Men who have dared have moved the world, often before reaching the +prime of life. It is astonishing what daring to begin and perseverance +have enabled even youths to achieve. Alexander, who ascended the +throne at twenty, had conquered the known world before dying at +thirty-three. Julius Caesar captured eight hundred cities, conquered +three hundred nations, and defeated three million men, became a great +orator and one of the greatest statesmen known, and still was a young +man. Washington was appointed adjutant-general at nineteen, was sent +at twenty-one as an ambassador to treat with the French, and won his +first battle as a colonel at twenty-two. Lafayette was made general of +the whole French army at twenty. Charlemagne was master of France and +Germany at thirty. Condé was only twenty-two when he conquered at +Rocroi. Galileo was but eighteen when he saw the principle of the +pendulum in the swinging lamp in the cathedral at Pisa. Peel was in +Parliament at twenty-one. Gladstone was in Parliament before he was +twenty-two, and at twenty-four he was Lord of the Treasury. Elizabeth +Barrett Browning was proficient in Greek and Latin at twelve; De +Quincey at eleven. Robert Browning wrote at eleven poetry of no mean +order. Cowley, who sleeps in Westminster Abbey, published a volume of +poems at fifteen. N. P. Willis won lasting fame as a poet before +leaving college. Macaulay was a celebrated author before he was +twenty-three. Luther was but twenty-nine when he nailed his famous +thesis to the door of the bishop and defied the pope. Nelson was a +lieutenant in the British Navy before he was twenty. He was but +forty-seven when he received his death wound at Trafalgar. Charles the +Twelfth was only nineteen when he gained the battle of Narva; at +thirty-six, Cortez was the conqueror of Mexico; at thirty-two, Clive +had established the British power in India. Hannibal, the greatest of +military commanders, was only thirty when, at Cannae, he dealt an +almost annihilating blow at the republic of Rome; and Napoleon was only +twenty-seven when, on the plains of Italy, he outgeneraled and +defeated, one after another, the veteran marshals of Austria. +</P> + +<P> +Equal courage and resolution are often shown by men who have passed the +allotted limit of life. Victor Hugo and Wellington were both in their +prime after they had reached the age of threescore years and ten. +George Bancroft wrote some of his best historical work when he was +eighty-five. Gladstone ruled England with a strong hand at +eighty-four, and was a marvel of literary and scholarly ability. +</P> + +<P> +"Not every vessel that sails from Tarshish will bring back the gold of +Ophir. But shall it therefore rot in the harbor? No! Give its sails +to the wind!" +</P> + +<P> +Shakespeare says: "He is not worthy of the honeycomb that shuns the +hive because the bees have stings." +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"The brave man is not he who feels no fear,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">For that were stupid and irrational;</SPAN><BR> +But he whose noble soul its fear subdues<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And bravely dares the danger nature shrinks from."</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +The inscription on the gates of Busyrane: "Be bold." On the second +gate: "Be bold, be bold, and ever more be bold;" the third gate: "Be +not too bold." +</P> + +<P> +Many a bright youth has accomplished nothing of worth simply because he +did not dare to commence. +</P> + +<P> +Begin! Begin!! Begin!!! +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Whatever people may think of you, do that which you believe to be +right. Be alike indifferent to censure or praise.—PYTHAGORAS. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Fear makes man a slave to others. This is the tyrant's chain. Anxiety +is a form of cowardice embittering life.—CHANNING. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Courage is generosity of the highest order, for the brave are prodigal +of the most precious things. Our blood is nearer and dearer to us than +our money, and our life than our estate. Women are more taken with +courage than with generosity.—COLTON. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Who chooses me must give and hazard all he hath.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2em"><I>Merchant of Venice</I>, Inscription on Leaden Casket.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I dare to do all that may become a man:<BR> +Who dares do more is none.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">SHAKESPEAKE.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +For man's great actions are performed in minor struggles. There are +obstinate and unknown braves who defend themselves inch by inch in the +shadows against the fatal invasion of want and turpitude. There are +noble and mysterious triumphs which no eye sees, no renown rewards, and +no flourish of trumpets salutes. Life, misfortune, isolation, +abandonment, and poverty are battlefields which have their +heroes.—VICTOR HUGO. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Who waits until the wind shall silent keep,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Who never finds the ready hour to sow,</SPAN><BR> +Who watcheth clouds, will have no time to reap.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">HELEN HUNT JACKSON.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Quit yourselves like men.—1 SAMUEL iv. 9. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap03"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER III. +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE WILL AND THE WAY. +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +"The 'way' will be found by a resolute will." +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +"I will find a way or make one." +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Nothing is impossible to the man who can will.—MIRABEAU. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +A politician weakly and amiably in the right is no match for a +politician tenaciously and pugnaciously in the wrong.—E. P. WHIPPLE. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +The iron will of one stout heart shall make a thousand quail;<BR> +A feeble dwarf, dauntlessly resolved, will turn the tide of battle,<BR> +And rally to a nobler strife the giants that had fled.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">TUPPER.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +"Man alone can perform the impossible. They can who think they can. +Character is a perfectly educated will." +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +The education of the will is the object of our existence. For the +resolute and determined there is time and opportunity.—EMERSON. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Invincible determination, and a right nature, are the levers that move +the world.—PRESIDENT PORTER. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +In the lexicon of youth which fate reserves for a bright manhood there +is no such word as fail.—BULWER. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Perpetual pushing and assurance put a difficulty out of countenance and +make a seeming difficulty give way.—JEREMY COLLIER. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +When a firm and decisive spirit is recognized, it is curious to see how +the space clears around a man and leaves him room and freedom.—JOHN +FOSTER. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +The star of the unconquered will,<BR> +He rises in my breast,<BR> +Serene, and resolute and still,<BR> +And calm and self-possessed.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">LONGFELLOW.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"As well can the Prince of Orange pluck the stars from the sky, as +bring the ocean to the wall of Leyden for your relief," was the +derisive shout of the Spanish soldiers when told that the Dutch fleet +would raise that terrible four months' siege of 1574. But from the +parched lips of William, tossing on his bed of fever at Rotterdam, had +issued the command: "<I>Break down the dikes: give Holland back to +ocean:</I>" and the people had replied: "Better a drowned land than a lost +land." They began to demolish dike after dike of the strong lines, +ranged one within another for fifteen miles to their city of the +interior. It was an enormous task; the garrison was starving; and the +besiegers laughed in scorn at the slow progress of the puny insects who +sought to rule the waves of the sea. But ever, as of old, heaven aids +those who help themselves. On the first and second of October a +violent equinoctial gale rolled the ocean inland, and swept the fleet +on the rising waters almost to the camp of the Spaniards. The next +morning the garrison sallied out to attack their enemies, but the +besiegers had fled in terror under cover of the darkness. The next day +the wind changed, and a counter tempest brushed the water, with the +fleet upon it, from the surface of Holland. The outer dikes were +replaced at once, leaving the North Sea within its old bounds. When +the flowers bloomed the following spring, a joyous procession marched +through the streets to found the University of Leyden, in commemoration +of the wonderful deliverance of the city. +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<A NAME="img-038"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG CLASS="imgcenter" SRC="images/img-038.jpg" ALT="WALTER SCOTT" BORDER="2" WIDTH="355" HEIGHT="537"> +<H3 CLASS="h3center" STYLE="width: 355px"> +WALTER SCOTT +</H3> +</CENTER> + +<P CLASS="caption" ALIGN="center"> +"The Wizard of the North." +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"So nigh is grandeur to our dust,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">So near is God to man,</SPAN><BR> +When Duty whispers low, 'Thou must,'<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">The youth replies, 'I can.'"</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<P> +At a dinner party given in 1837, at the residence of Chancellor Kent, +in New York city, some of the most distinguished men in the country +were invited, and among them was a young and rather melancholy and +reticent Frenchman. Professor Morse was one of the guests, and during +the evening he drew the attention of Mr. Gallatin, then a prominent +statesman, to the stranger, observing that his forehead indicated great +intellect. "Yes," replied Mr. Gallatin, touching his own forehead with +his finger, "there is a great deal in that head of his: but he has a +strange fancy. Can you believe it? He has the idea that he will one +day be the Emperor of France. Can you conceive anything more absurd?" +</P> + +<P> +It did seem absurd, for this reserved Frenchman was then a poor +adventurer, an exile from his country, without fortune or powerful +connections, and yet, fourteen years later, his idea became a +fact,—his dream of becoming Napoleon III. was realized. True, before +he accomplished his purpose there were long dreary years of +imprisonment, exile, disaster, and patient labor and hope, but he +gained his ambition at last. He was not scrupulous as to the means +employed to accomplish his ends, yet he is a remarkable example of what +pluck and energy can do. +</P> + +<P> +When it was proposed to unite England and America by steam, Dr. Lardner +delivered a lecture before the Royal Society "proving" that steamers +could never cross the Atlantic, because they could not carry coal +enough to produce steam during the whole voyage. The passage of the +steamship Sirius, which crossed in nineteen days, was fatal to +Lardner's theory. When it was proposed to build a vessel of iron, many +persons said: "Iron sinks—only wood can float:" but experiments proved +that the miracle of the prophet in making iron "swim" could be +repeated, and now not only ships of war, but merchant vessels, are +built of iron or steel. A will found a way to make iron float. +</P> + +<P> +Mr. Ingram, publisher of the "London Illustrated News," who lost his +life on Lake Michigan, walked ten miles to deliver a single paper +rather than disappoint a customer, when he began life as a newsdealer +at Nottingham, England. Does any one wonder that such a youth +succeeded? Once he rose at two o'clock in the morning and walked to +London to get some papers because there was no post to bring them. He +determined that his customers should not be disappointed. This is the +kind of will that finds a way. +</P> + +<P> +There is scarcely anything in all biography grander than the saying of +young Henry Fawcett, Gladstone's last Postmaster-General, to his +grief-stricken father, who had put out both his eyes by bird-shot +during a game hunt: "Never mind, father, blindness shall not interfere +with my success in life." One of the most pathetic sights in London +streets, long afterward, was Henry Fawcett, M. P., led everywhere by a +faithful daughter, who acted as amanuensis as well as guide to her +plucky father. Think of a young man, scarcely on the threshold of +active life, suddenly losing the sight of both eyes and yet, by mere +pluck and almost incomprehensible tenacity of purpose, lifting himself +into eminence, in any direction, to say nothing of becoming one of the +foremost men in a country noted for its great men. Most youth would +have succumbed to such a misfortune, and would never have been heard +from again. But fortunately for the world, there are yet left many +Fawcetts, many Prescotts, Parkmans, Cavanaghs. +</P> + +<P> +The courageous daughter who was eyes to her father was herself a +marvelous example of pluck and determination. For the first time in +the history of Oxford College, which reaches back centuries, she +succeeded in winning the post which had only been gained before by +great men, such as Gladstone,—the post of senior wrangler. This +achievement had had no parallel in history up to that date, and +attracted the attention of the whole civilized world. Not only had no +woman ever held this position before, but with few exceptions it had +only been held by men who in after life became highly distinguished. +Who can deny that where there is a will, as a rule, there's a way? +</P> + +<P> +When Grant was a boy he could not find "can't" in the dictionary. It +is the men who have no "can't" in their dictionaries that make things +move. +</P> + +<P> +"Circumstances," says Milton, "have rarely favored famous men. They +have fought their way to triumph through all sorts of opposing +obstacles." +</P> + +<P> +The true way to conquer circumstances is to be a greater circumstance +yourself. +</P> + +<P> +Yet, while desiring to impress in the most forcible manner possible the +fact that will-power is necessary to success, and that, other things +being equal, the greater the will-power, the grander and more complete +the success, we cannot indorse the preposterous theory that there is +nothing in circumstances or environments, or that any man, simply +because he has an indomitable will, may become a Bonaparte, a Pitt, a +Webster, a Beecher, a Lincoln. We must temper determination with +discretion, and support it with knowledge and common sense, or it will +only lead us to run our heads against posts. We must not expect to +overcome a stubborn fact by a stubborn will. We merely have the right +to assume that we can do anything within the limit of our utmost +faculty, strength, and endurance. Obstacles permanently insurmountable +bar our progress in some directions, but in any direction we may +reasonably hope and attempt to go, we shall find that the obstacles, as +a rule, are either not insurmountable or else not permanent. The +strong-willed, intelligent, persistent man will find or make a way +where, in the nature of things, a way can be found or made. +</P> + +<P> +Every schoolboy knows that circumstances do give clients to lawyers and +patients to physicians; place ordinary clergymen in extraordinary +pulpits; place sons of the rich at the head of immense corporations and +large houses, when they have very ordinary ability and scarcely any +experience, while poor young men with extraordinary abilities, good +education, good character, and large experience, often have to fight +their way for years to obtain even very ordinary situations. Every one +knows that there are thousands of young men, both in the city and in +the country, of superior ability, who seem to be compelled by +circumstances to remain in very ordinary positions for small pay, when +others about them are raised by money or family influence into +desirable places. In other words, we all know that the best men do not +always get the best places: circumstances do have a great deal to do +with our position, our salaries, and our station in life. +</P> + +<P> +Many young men who are nature's noblemen, who are natural leaders, are +working under superintendents, foremen, and managers infinitely their +inferiors, but whom circumstances have placed above them and will keep +there, unless some emergency makes merit indispensable. No, the race +is not always to the swift. +</P> + +<P> +Every one knows that there is not always a way where there is a will, +that labor does not always conquer all things; that there are things +impossible even to him that wills, however strongly; that one cannot +always make anything of himself he chooses; that there are limitations +in our very natures which no amount of will-power or industry can +overcome; that no amount of sun-staring can ever make an eagle out of a +crow. +</P> + +<P> +The simple truth is that a will strong enough to keep a man continually +striving for things not wholly beyond his powers will carry him in time +very far toward his chosen goal. +</P> + +<P> +The greatest thing a man can do in this world is to make the most +possible out of the stuff that has been given to him. This is success, +and there is no other. +</P> + +<P> +While it is true that our circumstances or environments do affect us, +in most things they do not prevent our growth. The corn that is now +ripe, whence comes it, and what is it? Is it not large or small, +stunted wild maize or well-developed ears, according to the conditions +under which it has grown? Yet its environments cannot make wheat of +it. Nor can our circumstances alter our nature. It is part of our +nature, and wholly within our power, greatly to change and to take +advantage of our circumstances, so that, unlike the corn, we can rise +much superior to our natural surroundings simply because we can thus +vary and improve the surroundings. In other words, man can usually +build the very road on which he is to run his race. +</P> + +<P> +It is not a question of what some one else can do or become, which +every youth should ask himself, but what can I do? How can I develop +myself into the grandest possible manhood? +</P> + +<P> +So far, then, from the power of circumstances being a hindrance to men +in trying to build for themselves an imperial highway to fortune, these +circumstances constitute the very quarry out of which they are to get +paving-stones for the road. +</P> + +<P> +While it is true that the will-power cannot perform miracles, yet that +it is almost omnipotent, that it can perform wonders, all history goes +to prove. As Shakespeare says:— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Men at some time are masters of their fates:<BR> +The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars,<BR> +But in ourselves, that we are underlings."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"There is nobody," says a Roman Cardinal, "whom Fortune does not visit +once in his life: but when she finds he is not ready to receive her, +she goes in at the door, and out through the window." Opportunity is +coy. The careless, the slow, the unobservant, the lazy fail to see it, +or clutch at it when it has gone. The sharp fellows detect it +instantly, and catch it when on the wing. +</P> + +<P> +Show me a man who is, according to popular prejudice, a victim of bad +luck, and I will show you one who has some unfortunate crooked twist of +temperament that invites disaster. He is ill-tempered, or conceited, +or trifling; lacks character, enthusiasm, or some other requisite for +success. +</P> + +<P> +Disraeli says that man is not the creature of circumstances, but that +circumstances are the creatures of men. +</P> + +<P> +What has chance ever done in the world? Has it built any cities? Has +it invented any telephones, any telegraphs? Has it built any +steamships, established any universities, any asylums, any hospitals? +Was there any chance in Caesar's crossing the Rubicon? What had chance +to do with Napoleon's career, with Wellington's, or Grant's, or Von +Moltke's? Every battle was won before it was begun. What had luck to +do with Thermopylae, Trafalgar, Gettysburg? Our successes we ascribe +to ourselves; our failures to destiny. +</P> + +<P> +Man is not a helpless atom in this vast creation, with a fixed +position, and naught to do but obey his own polarity. +</P> + +<P> +Believe in the power of will, which annihilates the sickly, sentimental +doctrine of fatalism,—you must but can't, you ought but it is +impossible. +</P> + +<P> +Give me the man +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Who breaks his birth's invidious bar,<BR> +And grasps the skirts of happy chance,<BR> +And breasts the blows of circumstance,<BR> +And grapples with his evil star."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +It is only the ignorant and superficial who believe in fate. "The +first step into thought lifts this mountain of necessity." "Fate is +unpenetrated causes." "They may well fear fate who have any infirmity +of habit or aim: but he who rests on what he is has a destiny beyond +destiny, and can make mouths at fortune." +</P> + +<P> +The indomitable will, the inflexible purpose, will find a way or make +one. There is always room for a man of force. +</P> + +<P> +"He who has a firm will," says Goethe, "moulds the world to himself." +"People do not lack strength," says Victor Hugo, "they lack will." +</P> + +<P> +"He who resolves upon any great end, by that very resolution has scaled +the great barriers to it, and he who seizes the grand idea of +self-cultivation, and solemnly resolves upon it, will find that idea, +that resolution, burning like fire within him, and ever putting him +upon his own improvement. He will find it removing difficulties, +searching out, or making means; giving courage for despondency, and +strength for weakness." +</P> + +<P> +Nearly all great men, those who have towered high above their fellows, +have been remarkable above all things else for their energy of will. +Of Julius Caesar it was said by a contemporary that it was his activity +and giant determination, rather than his military skill, that won his +victories. The youth who starts out in life determined to make the +most of his eyes and let nothing escape him which he can possibly use +for his own advancement; who keeps his ears open for every sound that +can help him on his way, who keeps his hands open that he may clutch +every opportunity, who is ever on the alert for everything which can +help him to get on in the world, who seizes every experience in life +and grinds it up into paint for his great life's picture, who keeps his +heart open that he may catch every noble impulse, and everything which +may inspire him,—that youth will be sure to make his life successful; +there are no "ifs" or "ands" about it. If he has his health, nothing +can keep him from final success. +</P> + +<P> +No tyranny of circumstances can permanently imprison a determined will. +</P> + +<P> +The world always stands aside for the determined man. Will makes a +way, even through seeming impossibilities. "It is the half a neck +nearer that shows the blood and wins the race; the one march more that +wins the campaign: the five minutes more of unyielding courage that +wins the fight." Again and again had the irrepressible Carter Harrison +been consigned to oblivion by the educated and moral element of +Chicago. Nothing could keep him down. He was invincible. A son of +Chicago, he had partaken of that nineteenth century miracle, that +phoenix-like nature of the city which, though she was burned, caused +her to rise from her ashes and become a greater and a grander Chicago, +a wonder of the world. Carter Harrison would not down. He entered the +Democratic Convention and, with an audacity rarely equaled, in spite of +their protest, boldly declared himself their candidate. Every +newspaper in Chicago, save the "Times," his own paper, bitterly opposed +his election: but notwithstanding all opposition, he was elected by +twenty thousand majority. The aristocrats hated him, the moral element +feared him, but the poor people believed in him: he pandered to them, +flattered them, till they elected him. While we would not by any means +hold Carter Harrison up to youth as a model, yet there is a great +lesson in his will-power and wonderful tenacity of purpose. +</P> + +<P> +"The general of a large army may be defeated," said Confucius, "but you +cannot defeat the determined mind of a peasant." +</P> + +<P> +The poor, deaf pauper, Kitto, who made shoes in the almshouse, and who +became the greatest of Biblical scholars, wrote in his journal, on the +threshold of manhood: "I am not myself a believer in impossibilities: I +think that all the fine stories about natural ability, etc., are mere +rigmarole, and that every man may, according to his opportunities and +industry, render himself almost anything he wishes to become." +</P> + +<P> +Years ago, a young mechanic took a bath in the river Clyde. While +swimming from shore to shore he discerned a beautiful bank, +uncultivated, and he then and there resolved to be the owner of it, and +to adorn it, and to build upon it the finest mansion in all the +borough, and name it in honor of the maiden to whom he was espoused. +"Last summer," says a well-known American, "I had the pleasure of +dining in that princely mansion, and receiving this fact from the lips +of the great shipbuilder of the Clyde." That one purpose was made the +ruling passion of his life, and all the energies of his soul were put +in requisition for its accomplishment. +</P> + +<P> +Lincoln is probably the most remarkable example on the pages of +history, showing the possibilities of our country. From the poverty in +which he was born, through the rowdyism of a frontier town, the +rudeness of frontier society, the discouragement of early bankruptcy, +and the fluctuations of popular politics, he rose to the championship +of union and freedom. +</P> + +<P> +Lincoln's will made his way. When his friends nominated him as a +candidate for the legislature, his enemies made fun of him. When +making his campaign speeches he wore a mixed jean coat so short that he +could not sit down on it, flax and tow-linen trousers, straw hat, and +pot-metal boots. He had nothing in the world but character and friends. +</P> + +<P> +When his friends suggested law to him, he laughed at the idea of his +being a lawyer. He said he hadn't brains enough. He read law barefoot +under the trees, his neighbors said, and he sometimes slept on the +counter in the store where he worked. He had to borrow money to buy a +suit of clothes to make a respectable appearance in the legislature, +and walked to take his seat at Vandalia,—one hundred miles. While he +was in the legislature, John F. Stuart, an eminent lawyer of +Springfield, told him how Clay had even inferior chances to his, had +got all of the education he had in a log schoolhouse without windows or +doors; and finally induced Lincoln to study law. +</P> + +<P> +See Thurlow Weed, defying poverty and wading through the snow two +miles, with rags for shoes, to borrow a book to read before the +sap-bush fire. See Locke, living on bread and water in a Dutch garret. +See Heyne, sleeping many a night on a barn floor with only a book for +his pillow. See Samuel Drew, tightening his apron strings "in lieu of +a dinner." See young Lord Eldon, before daylight copying Coke on +Littleton over and over again. History is full of such examples. He +who will pay the price for victory needs never fear final defeat. Why +were the Roman legionaries victorious? +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"For Romans, in Rome's quarrels,<BR> +Spared neither land nor gold,<BR> +Nor son, nor wife, nor limb nor life,<BR> +In the brave days of old."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Fowell Buxton, writing to one of his sons, says: "I am sure that a +young man may be very much what he pleases." +</P> + +<P> +Dr. Mathews has well said that "there is hardly a word in the whole +human vocabulary which is more cruelly abused than the word 'luck.' To +all the faults and failures of men, their positive sins and their less +culpable shortcomings, it is made to stand a godfather and sponsor. Go +talk with the bankrupt man of business, who has swamped his fortune by +wild speculation, extravagance of living, or lack of energy, and you +will find that he vindicates his wonderful self-love by confounding the +steps which he took indiscreetly with those to which he was forced by +'circumstances,' and complacently regarding himself as the victim of +ill-luck. Go visit the incarcerated criminal, who has imbued his hands +in the blood of his fellow-man, or who is guilty of less heinous +crimes, and you will find that, joining the temptations which were easy +to avoid with those which were comparatively irresistible, he has +hurriedly patched up a treaty with conscience, and stifles its +compunctious visitings by persuading himself that, from first to last, +he was the victim of circumstances. Go talk with the mediocre in +talents and attainments, the weak-spirited man who, from lack of energy +and application, has made but little headway in the world, being +outstripped in the race of life by those whom he had despised as his +inferiors, and you will find that he, too, acknowledges the all-potent +power of luck, and soothes his humbled pride by deeming himself the +victim of ill-fortune. In short, from the most venial offense to the +most flagrant, there is hardly any wrong act or neglect to which this +too fatally convenient word is not applied as a palliation." +</P> + +<P> +Paris was in the hands of a mob, the authorities were panic-stricken, +for they did not dare to trust their underlings. In came a man who +said, "I know a young officer who has the courage and ability to quell +this mob." "Send for him; send for him; send for him," said they. +Napoleon was sent for, came, subjugated the mob, subjugated the +authorities, ruled France, then conquered Europe. +</P> + +<P> +What a lesson is Napoleon's life for the sickly, wishy-washy, dwarfed, +sentimental "dudes," hanging about our cities, country, and +universities, complaining of their hard lot, dreaming of success, and +wondering why they are left in the rear in the great race of life. +</P> + +<P> +Success in life is dependent largely upon the willpower, and whatever +weakens or impairs it diminishes success. The will can be educated. +That which most easily becomes a habit in us is the will. Learn, then, +to will decisively and strongly; thus fix your floating life, and leave +it no longer to be carried hither and thither, like a withered leaf, by +every wind that blows. "It is not talent that men lack, it is the will +to labor; it is the purpose, not the power to produce." +</P> + +<P> +It was this insatiable thirst for knowledge which held to his task, +through poverty and discouragement, John Leyden, a Scotch shepherd's +son. Barefoot and alone, he walked six or eight miles daily to learn +to read, which was all the schooling he had. His desire for an +education defied the extremest poverty, and no obstacle could turn him +from his purpose. He was rich when he discovered a little bookstore, +and his thirsty soul would drink in the precious treasures from its +priceless volumes for hours, perfectly oblivious of the scanty meal of +bread and water which awaited him at his lowly lodging. Nothing could +discourage him from trying to improve himself by study. It seemed to +him that an opportunity to get at books and lectures was all that any +man could need. Before he was nineteen, this poor shepherd boy with no +chance had astonished the professors of Edinburgh by his knowledge of +Greek and Latin. +</P> + +<P> +Hearing that a surgeon's assistant in the Civil Service was wanted, +although he knew nothing whatever of medicine, he determined to apply +for it. There were only six months before the place was to be filled, +but nothing could daunt him, and in six months' time he actually took +his degree with honor. Walter Scott, who thought this one of the most +remarkable illustrations of perseverance, helped to fit him out, and he +sailed for India. +</P> + +<P> +Webster was very poor even after he entered Dartmouth College. A +friend sent him a recipe for greasing his boots. Webster wrote and +thanked him, and added: "But my boots need other doctoring, for they +not only admit water, but even peas and gravel-stones." Yet he became +one of the greatest men in the world. Sydney Smith said: "Webster was +a living lie, because no man on earth could be as great as he looked." +Carlyle said of him: "One would incline at sight to back him against +the world." +</P> + +<P> +What seemed to be luck followed Stephen Girard all his life. No matter +what he did, it always seemed to others to turn to his account. His +coming to Philadelphia seemed a lucky accident. A sloop was seen one +morning off the mouth of Delaware Bay floating the flag of France and a +signal of distress. Young Girard was captain of this sloop, and was on +his way to a Canadian port with freight from New Orleans. An American +skipper, seeing his distress, went to his aid, but told him the +American war had broken out, and that the British cruisers were all +along the American coast, and would seize his vessel. He told him his +only chance was to make a push for Philadelphia. Girard did not know +the way, and had no money. The skipper loaned him five dollars to get +the service of a pilot who demanded his money in advance. +</P> + +<P> +His sloop passed into the Delaware just in time to avoid capture by a +British war vessel. He sold the sloop and cargo in Philadelphia, and +began business on the capital. Being a foreigner, unable to speak +English, short, stout, and with a repulsive face, blind in one eye, it +was hard for him to get a start. But he was not the man to give up. +He had begun as a cabin boy at thirteen, and for nine years sailed +between Bordeaux and the French West Indies. He improved every leisure +minute at sea, mastering the art of navigation. +</P> + +<P> +At the age of eight he first discovered that he was blind in one eye. +His father, evidently thinking that he would never amount to anything, +would not help him to an education beyond that of mere reading and +writing, but sent his younger brothers to college. The discovery of +his blindness, the neglect of his father, and the chagrin of his +brothers' advancement, soured his whole life. +</P> + +<P> +When he began business for himself in Philadelphia, there seemed to be +nothing he would not do for money. He bought and sold anything, from +groceries to old junk. He bottled wine and cider, from which he made a +good profit. Everything he touched prospered. In 1780, he resumed the +New Orleans and St. Domingo trade, in which he had been engaged at the +breaking out of the Revolution. Here great success again attended him. +He had two vessels lying in one of the St. Domingo ports when the great +insurrection on that island broke out. A number of the rich planters +fled to his vessels with their valuables, which they left for safe +keeping while they went back to their estates to secure more. They +probably fell victims to the cruel negroes, for they never returned, +and Girard was the lucky possessor of $50,000 which the goods brought +in Philadephia. +</P> + +<P> +Everybody, especially his jealous brother merchants, attributed his +great success to his luck. While undoubtedly he was fortunate in +happening to be at the right place at the right time, yet he was +precision, method, accuracy, energy itself. He left nothing to chance. +His plans and schemes were worked out with mathematical care. His +letters, written to his captains in foreign ports, laying out their +routes and giving detailed instruction from which they were never +allowed to deviate under any circumstances, are models of foresight and +systematic planning. He never left anything of importance to others. +He was rigidly accurate in his instructions, and would not allow the +slightest departure from them. He used to say that while his captains +might save him money by deviating from instructions once, yet they +would cause loss in ninety-nine other cases. Once, when a captain +returned and had saved him several thousand dollars by buying his cargo +of cheese in another port than that in which he had been instructed to +buy, Girard was so enraged, although he was several thousand dollars +richer, that he discharged the captain on the spot, notwithstanding the +latter had been faithful in his service for many years, and thought he +was saving his employer a great deal of money by deviating from his +instructions. +</P> + +<P> +Girard lived in a dingy little house, poorer than that occupied by many +of his employees. He married a servant girl of great beauty, but she +proved totally unfitted for him, and died at last in the insane asylum. +</P> + +<P> +Girard never lost a ship, and many times what brought financial ruin to +many others, as the War of 1812, only increased his wealth. What +seemed luck with him was only good judgment and promptness in seizing +opportunities, and the greatest care and zeal in improving them to +their utmost possibilities. +</P> + +<P> +Luck is not God's price for success: that is altogether too cheap, nor +does he dicker with men. +</P> + +<P> +The mathematician tells you that if you throw the dice, there are +thirty chances to one against your turning up a particular number, and +a hundred to one against your repeating the same throw three times in +succession: and so on in an augmenting ratio. What is luck? Is it, as +has been suggested, a blind man's buff among the laws? a ruse among the +elements? a trick of Dame Nature? Has any scholar defined luck? any +philosopher explained its nature? any chemist shown its composition? +Is luck that strange, nondescript fairy, that does all things among men +that they cannot account for? If so, why does not luck make a fool +speak words of wisdom; an ignoramus utter lectures on philosophy? +</P> + +<P> +Many a young man who has read the story of John Wanamaker's romantic +career has gained very little inspiration or help from it toward his +own elevation and advancement, for he looks upon it as the result of +good luck, chance, or fate. "What a lucky fellow," he says to himself +as he reads; "what a bonanza he fell into." But a careful analysis of +Wanamaker's life only enforces the same lesson taught by the analysis +of most great lives, namely, that a good mother, a good constitution, +the habit of hard work, indomitable energy, a determination which knows +no defeat, a decision which never wavers, a concentration which never +scatters its forces, courage which never falters, a self-mastery which +can say No, and stick to it, an "ignominious love of detail," strict +integrity and downright honesty, a cheerful disposition, unbounded +enthusiasm in one's calling, and a high aim and noble purpose insure a +very large measure of success. +</P> + +<P> +Youth should be taught that there is something in circumstances; that +there is such a thing as a poor pedestrian happening to find no +obstruction in his way, and reaching the goal when a better walker +finds the drawbridge up, the street blockaded, and so fails to win the +race; that wealth often does place unworthy sons in high positions, +that family influence does gain a lawyer clients, a physician patients, +an ordinary scholar a good professorship; but that, on the other hand, +position, clients, patients, professorships, manager's and +superintendent's positions do not necessarily constitute success. He +should be taught that in the long run, as a rule, <I>the best man does +win the best place</I>, and that persistent merit does succeed. +</P> + +<P> +There is about as much chance of idleness and incapacity winning real +success, or a high position in life, as there would be in producing a +Paradise Lost by shaking up promiscuously the separate words of +Webster's Dictionary, and letting them fall at random on the floor. +Fortune smiles upon those who roll up their sleeves and put their +shoulders to the wheel; upon men who are not afraid of dreary, dry, +irksome drudgery, men of nerve and grit who do not turn aside for dirt +and detail. +</P> + +<P> +The youth should be taught that "he alone is great, who, by a life +heroic, conquers fate;" that "diligence is the mother of good luck;" +that, nine times out of ten, what we call luck or fate is but a mere +bugbear of the indolent, the languid, the purposeless, the careless, +the indifferent; that the man who fails, as a rule, does not see or +seize his opportunity. Opportunity is coy, is swift, is gone, before +the slow, the unobservant, the indolent, or the careless can seize +her:— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"In idle wishes fools supinely stay:<BR> +Be there a will and wisdom finds a way."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +It has been well said that the very reputation of being strong willed, +plucky, and indefatigable is of priceless value. It often cows enemies +and dispels at the start opposition to one's undertakings which would +otherwise be formidable. +</P> + +<P> +"If Eric's in robust health, and has slept well, and is at the top of +his condition, and thirty years old at his departure from Greenland," +says Emerson, "he will steer west and his ships will reach +Newfoundland. But take Eric out and put in a stronger and bolder man, +and the ships will sail six hundred, one thousand, fifteen hundred +miles further, and reach Labrador and New England. There is no chance +in results." Obstacles tower before the living man like mountain +chains, stopping his path and hindering his progress. He surmounts +them by his energy. He makes a new path over them. He climbs upon +them to mountain heights. They cannot stop him. They do not much +delay him. He transmutes difficulties into power, and makes temporary +failures into stepping-stones to ultimate success. +</P> + +<P> +How many might have been giants who are only dwarfs. How many a one +has died "with all his music in him." +</P> + +<P> +It is astonishing what men who have come to their senses late in life +have accomplished by a sudden resolution. +</P> + +<P> +Arkwright was fifty years of age when he began to learn English grammar +and improve his writing and spelling. Benjamin Franklin was past fifty +before he began the study of science and philosophy. Milton, in his +blindness, was past the age of fifty when he sat down to complete his +world-known epic, and Scott at fifty-five took up his pen to redeem an +enormous liability. "Yet I am learning," said Michael Angelo, when +threescore years and ten were past, and he had long attained the +highest triumphs of his art. +</P> + +<P> +Even brains are second in importance to will. The vacillating man is +always pushed aside in the race of life. It is only the weak and +vacillating who halt before adverse circumstances and obstacles. A man +with an iron will, with a determination that nothing shall check his +career, if he has perseverance and grit, is sure to succeed. We may +not find time for what we would like, but what we long for and strive +for with all our strength, we usually approximate if we do not fully +reach. Hunger breaks through stone walls; stern necessity will find a +way or make one. +</P> + +<P> +Success is also a great physical as well as mental tonic, and tends to +strengthen the will-power. Dr. Johnson says: "Resolutions and success +reciprocally produce each other." Strong-willed men, as a rule, are +successful men, and great success is almost impossible without it. +</P> + +<P> +A man who can resolve vigorously upon a course of action, and turns +neither to the right nor the left, though a paradise tempt him, who +keeps his eyes upon the goal, whatever distracts him, is sure of +success. We could almost classify successes and failures by their +various degrees of will-power. Men like Sir James Mackintosh, +Coleridge, La Harpe, and many others who have dazzled the world with +their brilliancy, but who never accomplished a tithe of what they +attempted, who were always raising our expectations that they were +about to perform wonderful deeds, but who accomplished nothing worthy +of their abilities, have been deficient in will-power. One talent with +a will behind it will accomplish more than ten without it. The great +linguist of Bologna mastered a hundred languages by taking them singly, +as the lion fought the bulls. +</P> + +<P> +I wish it were possible to show the youth of America the great part +that the will might play in their success in life and in their +happiness also. The achievements of will-power are simply beyond +computation. Scarcely anything in reason seems impossible to the man +who can will strong enough and long enough. +</P> + +<P> +How often we see this illustrated in the case of a young woman who +suddenly becomes conscious that she is plain and unattractive; who, by +prodigious exercise of her will and untiring industry, resolves to +redeem herself from obscurity and commonness; and who not only makes up +for her deficiencies, but elevates herself into a prominence and +importance which mere personal attractions could never have given her. +Charlotte Cushman, without a charm of form or face, climbed to the very +top of her profession. How many young men, stung by consciousness of +physical deformity or mental deficiencies, have, by a strong persistent +exercise of will-power, raised themselves from mediocrity and placed +themselves high above those who scorned them. +</P> + +<P> +History is full of examples of men and women who have redeemed +themselves from disgrace, poverty, and misfortune, by the firm +resolution of an iron will. The consciousness of being looked upon as +inferior, as incapable of accomplishing what others accomplish; the +sensitiveness at being considered a dunce in school, has stung many a +youth into a determination which has elevated him far above those who +laughed at him, as in the case of Newton, of Adam Clark, of Sheridan, +Wellington, Goldsmith, Dr. Chalmers, Curran, Disraeli, and hundreds of +others. "Whatever you wish, that you are; for such is the force of the +human will, joined to the Divine, that whatever we wish to be +seriously, and with a true intention, that we become." While this is +not strictly true, yet there is a deal of truth in it. +</P> + +<P> +It is men like Mirabeau, who "trample upon impossibilities;" like +Napoleon, who do not wait for opportunities, but make them; like Grant, +who has only "unconditional surrender" for the enemy, who change the +very front of the world. "We have but what we make, and every good is +locked by nature in a granite hand, sheer labor must unclench." +</P> + +<P> +What cares Henry L. Bulwer for the suffocating cough, even though he +can scarcely speak above a whisper? In the House of Commons he makes +his immortal speech on the Irish Church just the same. +</P> + +<P> +"I can't, it is impossible," said a foiled lieutenant, to Alexander. +"Be gone," shouted the conquering Macedonian, "there is nothing +impossible to him who will try." +</P> + +<P> +Were I called upon to express in a word the secret of so many failures +among those who started out in life with high hopes, I should say +unhesitatingly, they lacked will-power. They could not half will. +What is a man without a will? He is like an engine without steam, a +mere sport of chance, to be tossed about hither and thither, always at +the mercy of those who have wills. I should call the strength of will +the test of a young man's possibilities. Can he will strong enough, +and hold whatever he undertakes with an iron grip? It is the iron grip +that takes the strong hold on life. What chance is there in this +crowding, pushing, selfish, greedy world, where everything is pusher or +pushed, for a young man with no will, no grip on life? "The truest +wisdom," said Napoleon, "is a resolute determination." An iron will +without principle might produce a Napoleon; but with character it would +make a Wellington or a Grant, untarnished by ambition or avarice. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">"The undivided will</SPAN><BR> +'T is that compels the elements and wrings<BR> +A human music from the indifferent air."<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap04"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER IV. +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +SUCCESS UNDER DIFFICULTIES. +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Victories that are easy are cheap. Those only are worth having which +come as the result of hard fighting.—BEECHER. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Man owes his growth chiefly to that active striving of the will, that +encounter with difficulty, which we call effort; and it is astonishing +to find how often results that seemed impracticable are thus made +possible.—EPES SARGENT. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +I know no such unquestionable badge and ensign of a sovereign mind as +that tenacity of purpose which, through all change of companions, or +parties, or fortunes, changes never, bates no jot of heart or hope, but +wearies out opposition and arrives at its port.—EMERSON. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Yes, to this thought I hold with firm persistence;<BR> +The last result of wisdom stamps it true;<BR> +He only earns his freedom and existence<BR> +Who daily conquers them anew.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">GOETHE.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Little minds are tamed and subdued by misfortunes; but great minds rise +above them.—WASHINGTON IRVING. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"I have here three teams that I want to get over to Staten Island," +said a boy of twelve one day in 1806 to the innkeeper at South Amboy, +N. J. "If you will put us across, I'll leave with you one of my horses +in pawn, and if I don't send you back six dollars within forty-eight +hours you may keep the horse." +</P> + +<P> +The innkeeper asked the reason for this novel proposition, and learned +that the lad's father had contracted to get the cargo of a vessel +stranded near Sandy Hook, and take it to New York in lighters. The boy +had been sent with three wagons, six horses, and three men, to carry +the cargo across a sand-spit to the lighters. The work accomplished, +he had started with only six dollars to travel a long distance home +over the Jersey sands, and reached South Amboy penniless. "I'll do +it," said the innkeeper, as he looked into the bright honest eyes of +the boy. The horse was soon redeemed. +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<A NAME="img-060"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG CLASS="imgcenter" SRC="images/img-060.jpg" ALT="WILLIAM HICKLING PRESCOTT" BORDER="2" WIDTH="368" HEIGHT="520"> +<H3 CLASS="h3center" STYLE="width: 368px"> +WILLIAM HICKLING PRESCOTT +</H3> +</CENTER> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +How can you keep a determined man from success: Place stumbling-blocks +in his way, and he uses them for stepping-stones. Imprison him, and he +produces the "Pilgrim's Progress." Deprive him of eyesight, and he +writes the "Conquest of Mexico." +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<P> +"My son," said this same boy's mother, on the first of May, 1810, when +he asked her to lend him one hundred dollars to buy a boat, having +imbibed a strong liking for the sea; "on the twenty-seventh of this +month you will be sixteen years old. If, by that time, you will plow, +harrow, and plant with corn the eight-acre lot, I will advance you the +money." The field was rough and stony, but the work was done in time, +and well done. From this small beginning Cornelius Vanderbilt laid the +foundation of a colossal fortune. He would often work all night; and, +as he was never absent from his post by day, he soon had the best +business in New York harbor. +</P> + +<P> +In 1813, when it was expected that New York would be attacked by +British ships, all the boatmen except Cornelius put in bids to convey +provisions to the military posts around New York, naming extremely low +rates, as the contractor would be exempted from military duty. "Why +don't you send in a bid?" asked his father. "Of what use?" replied +young Vanderbilt; "they are offering to do the work at half price. It +can't be done at such rates." "Well," said his father, "it can do no +harm to try for it." So, to please his father, but with no hope of +success, Cornelius made an offer fair to both sides, but did not go to +hear the award. When his companions had all returned with long faces, +he went to the commissary's office and asked if the contract had been +given. "Oh, yes," was the reply; "that business is settled. Cornelius +Vanderbilt is the man. What?" he asked, seeing that the youth was +apparently thunderstruck, "is it you?" "My name is Cornelius +Vanderbilt," said the boatman. "Well," said the commissary, "don't you +know why we have given the contract to you?" "No." "Why, it is +because we want this business <I>done</I>, and we know you'll do it." +Character gives confidence. +</P> + +<P> +In 1818 he owned two or three of the finest coasting schooners in New +York harbor, and had a capital of nine thousand dollars. Seeing that +steam-vessels would soon win supremacy over those carrying sails only, +he gave up his fine business to become the captain of a steamboat at +one thousand dollars a year. For twelve years he ran between New York +city and New Brunswick, N. J. In 1829 he began business as a steamboat +owner, in the face of opposition so bitter that he lost his last +dollar. But the tide turned, and he prospered so rapidly that he at +length owned over one hundred steamboats. He early identified himself +with the growing railroad interests of the country, and became the +richest man of his day in America. +</P> + +<P> +Barnum began the race of business life barefoot, for at the age of +fifteen he was obliged to buy on credit the shoes he wore at his +father's funeral. He was a remarkable example of success under +difficulties. There was no keeping him down; no opposition daunted +him, no obstacles were too great for him to overcome. Think of a man +being ruined at fifty years of age; yes, worse than ruined, for he was +heavily in debt besides. Yet on the very day of his downfall he begins +to rise again, wringing victory from defeat by his indomitable +persistence. +</P> + +<P> +"Eloquence must have been born with you," said a friend to J. P. +Curran. "Indeed, my dear sir, it was not," replied the orator, "it was +born some three and twenty years and some months after me." Speaking +of his first attempt at a debating club, he said: "I stood up, +trembling through every fibre, but remembering that in this I was but +imitating Tully, I took courage and had actually proceeded almost as +far as 'Mr. Chairman,' when, to my astonishment and terror, I perceived +that every eye was turned on me. There were only six or seven present, +and the room could not have contained as many more; yet was it, to my +panic-stricken imagination, as if I were the central object in nature, +and assembled millions were gazing upon me in breathless expectation. +I became dismayed and dumb. My friends cried, 'Hear him!' but there +was nothing to hear." He was nicknamed "Orator Mum," and well did he +deserve the title until he ventured to stare in astonishment at a +speaker who was "culminating chronology by the most preposterous +anachronisms." "I doubt not," said the annoyed speaker, "that 'Orator +Mum' possesses wonderful talents for eloquence, but I would recommend +him to show it in future by some more popular method than his silence." +Stung by the taunt, Curran rose and gave the man a "piece of his mind," +speaking quite fluently in his anger. Encouraged by this success, he +took great pains to become a good speaker. He corrected his habit of +stuttering by reading favorite passages aloud every day slowly and +distinctly, and spoke at every opportunity. +</P> + +<P> +Bunyan wrote his "Pilgrim's Progress" on the untwisted papers used to +cork the bottles of milk brought for his meals. Gifford wrote his +first copy of a mathematical work, when a cobbler's apprentice, on +small scraps of leather; and Rittenhouse, the astronomer, first +calculated eclipses on his plow handle. +</P> + +<P> +A poor Irish lad, so pitted by smallpox that boys made sport of him, +earned his living by writing little ballads for street musicians. +Eight cents a day was often all he could earn. He traveled through +France and Italy, begging his way by singing and playing the flute at +the cottages of the peasantry. At twenty-eight he was penniless in +London, and lived in the beggars' quarters in Axe Lane. In his +poverty, he set up as a doctor in the suburbs of London. He wore a +second-hand coat of rusty velvet, with a patch on the left breast which +he adroitly covered with his three-cornered hat during his visits; and +we have an amusing anecdote of his contest of courtesy with a patient +who persisted in endeavoring to relieve him of his hat, which only made +him press it more devoutly to his heart. He often had to pawn his +clothes to keep from starving. He sold his "Life of Voltaire" for +twenty dollars. After great hardship he managed to publish his "Polite +Learning in Europe," and this brought him to public notice. Next came +"The Traveller," and the wretched man in a Fleet Street garret found +himself famous. His landlady once arrested him for rent, but Dr. +Johnson came to his relief, took from his desk the manuscript of the +"Vicar of Wakefield," and sold it for three hundred dollars. He spent +two years revising "The Deserted Village" after it was first written. +Generous to a fault, vain and improvident, imposed on by others, he was +continually in debt; although for his "History of the Earth and +Animated Nature" he received four thousand dollars, and some of his +works, as, for instance, "She Stoops to Conquer," had a large sale. +But in spite of fortune's frown and his own weakness, he won success +and fame. The world, which so often comes too late with its assistance +and laurels, gave to the weak, gentle, loving author of "The Vicar of +Wakefield" a monument in the Poets' Corner of Westminster Abbey. +</P> + +<P> +The poor, scrofulous, and almost blind boy, Samuel Johnson, was taken +by his mother to receive the touch of Queen Anne, which was supposed to +heal the "King's Evil." He entered Oxford as a servant, copying +lectures from a student's notebooks, while the boys made sport of the +bare feet showing through great holes in his shoes. Some one left a +pair of new shoes at his door, but he was too proud to be helped, and +threw them out of the window. He was so poor that he was obliged to +leave college, and at twenty-six married a widow of forty-eight. He +started a private school with his wife's money; but, getting only three +pupils, was obliged to close it. He went to London, where he lived on +nine cents a day. In his distress he wrote a poem in which appeared in +capital letters the line, "Slow rises worth by poverty depressed," +which attracted wide attention. He suffered greatly in London for +thirteen years, being arrested once for a debt of thirteen dollars. At +forty he published "The Vanity of Human Wishes," in which were these +lines:— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Then mark what ills the scholar's life assail;<BR> +Toil, envy, want, the patron and the jail."<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +When asked how he felt about his failures, he replied: +</P> + +<P> +"Like a monument,"—that is, steadfast, immovable. He was an +indefatigable worker. In the evenings of a single week he wrote +"Rasselas," a beautiful little story of the search for happiness, to +get money to pay the funeral expenses of his mother. With six +assistants he worked seven years on his Dictionary, which made his +fortune. His name was then in everybody's mouth, and when he no longer +needed help, assistance, as usual, came from every quarter. The great +universities hastened to bestow their degrees, and King George invited +him to the palace. +</P> + +<P> +Lord Mansfield raised himself by indefatigable industry from oatmeal +porridge and poverty to affluence and the Lord Chief Justice's Bench. +</P> + +<P> +Of five thousand articles sent every year to "Lippincott's Magazine," +only two hundred were accepted. How much do you think Homer got for +his Iliad? or Dante for his Paradise? Only bitter bread and salt, and +going up and down other people's stairs. In science, the man who +discovered the telescope, and first saw heaven, was paid with a +dungeon: the man who invented the microscope, and first saw earth, died +from starvation, driven from his home. It is very clear indeed that +God means all good work and talk to be done for nothing. Shakespeare's +"Hamlet" was sold for about twenty-five dollars; but his autograph has +sold for five thousand dollars. +</P> + +<P> +During the ten years in which he made his greatest discoveries, Isaac +Newton could hardly pay two shillings a week to the Royal Society of +which he was a member. Some of his friends wanted to get him excused +from this payment, but he would not allow them to act. +</P> + +<P> +There are no more interesting pages in biography than those which +record how Emerson, as a child, was unable to read the second volume of +a certain book, because his widowed mother could not afford the amount +(five cents) necessary to obtain it from the circulating library. +</P> + +<P> +Linnaeus was so poor when getting his education, that he had to mend +his shoes with folded paper, and often had to beg his meals of his +friends. +</P> + +<P> +Who in the days of the First Empire cared to recall the fact that +Napoleon, Emperor and King, was once forced to borrow a louis from +Talma, when he lived in a garret on the Quai Conti? +</P> + +<P> +David Livingstone at ten years of age was put into a cotton factory +near Glasgow. Out of his first week's wages he bought a Latin Grammar, +and studied in the night schools for years. He would sit up and study +till midnight unless his mother drove him to bed, notwithstanding he +had to be at the factory at six in the morning. He mastered Virgil and +Horace in this way, and read extensively, besides studying botany. So +eager and thirsty for knowledge was he, that he would place his book +before him on the spinning-jenny, and amid the deafening roar of +machinery would pore over its pages. +</P> + +<P> +George Eliot said of the years of close work upon her "Romola," "I +began it a young woman, I finished it an old woman." One of Emerson's +biographers says, referring to his method of rewriting, revising, +correcting, and eliminating: "His apples were sorted over and over +again, until only the very rarest, the most perfect, were left. It did +not matter that those thrown away were very good and helped to make +clear the possibilities of the orchard, they were unmercifully cast +aside." Carlyle's books were literally wrung out of him. The pains he +took to satisfy himself of a relatively insignificant fact were +incredible. Before writing his essay on Diderot, he read twenty-five +volumes at the rate of one per day. He tells Edward Fitzgerald that +for the twentieth time he is going over the confused records of the +battle of Naseby, that he may be quite sure of the topography. +</P> + +<P> +"All the performances of human art, at which we look with praise and +wonder," says Johnson, "are instances of the resistless force of +perseverance: it is by this that the quarry becomes a pyramid, and that +distant countries are united with canals. If a man was to compare the +effect of a single stroke of the pickaxe, or of one impression of the +spade, with the general design and last result, he would be overwhelmed +by the sense of their disproportion; yet those petty operations, +incessantly continued, in time surmount the greatest difficulties, and +mountains are leveled, and oceans bounded, by the slender force of +human beings." +</P> + +<P> +The Rev. Eliphalet Nott, a pulpit orator, was especially noted for a +sermon on the death of Alexander Hamilton, the great statesman, who was +shot in a duel by Aaron Burr. Although Nott had managed in some way to +get his degree at Brown University, he was at one time so poor after he +entered the ministry that he could not buy an overcoat. His wife +sheared their only cosset sheep in January, wrapped it in burlap +blankets to keep it from freezing, carded and spun and wove the wool, +and made it into an overcoat for him. +</P> + +<P> +Great men never wait for opportunities; they make them. Nor do they +wait for facilities or favoring circumstances; they seize upon whatever +is at hand, work out their problem, and master the situation. A young +man determined and willing will find a way or make one. A Franklin +does not require elaborate apparatus; he can bring electricity from the +clouds with a common kite. A Watt can make a model of the condensing +steam-engine out of an old syringe used to inject the arteries of dead +bodies previous to dissection. A Dr. Black can discover latent heat +with a pan of water and two thermometers. A Newton can unfold the +composition of light and the origin of colors with a prism, a lens, and +a piece of pasteboard. A Humphry Davy can experiment with kitchen pots +and pans, and a Faraday can experiment on electricity by means of old +bottles, in his spare minutes while a book-binder. When science was in +its cradle the Marquis of Worcester, an English nobleman, imprisoned in +the Tower of London, was certainly not in a very good position to do +anything for the world, but would not waste his time. The cover of a +vessel of hot water blown on before his eyes led to a series of +observations, which he published later in a book called "Century of +Inventions." These observations were a sort of text-book on the power +of steam, which resulted in Newcomen's steam-engine, which Watt +afterward perfected. A Ferguson maps out the heavenly bodies, lying on +his back, by means of threads with beads stretched between himself and +the stars. +</P> + +<P> +Not in his day of bodily strength and political power, but blind, +decrepit, and defeated with his party, Milton composed "Paradise Lost." +</P> + +<P> +Great men have found no royal road to their triumph. It is always the +old route, by way of industry and perseverance. +</P> + +<P> +The farmer boy, Elihu B. Washburn, taught school at ten dollars per +month, and early learned the lesson that it takes one hundred cents to +make a dollar. In after years he fought "steals" in Congress, until he +was called the "Watchdog of the Treasury." From his long membership he +became known as the "Father of the House." He administered the oath to +Schuyler Colfax as Speaker three times. He recommended Grant as +colonel of a regiment of volunteers. The latter, when President, +appointed him Secretary of State, and, later, Minister to France. +During the reign of the Commune, the representatives of nearly all +other foreign nations fled in dismay, but Washburn remained at his +post. Shells exploded close to his office, and fell all around it, but +he did not leave even when Paris was in flames. For a time he was +really the minister of all foreign countries, in Paris; and represented +Prussia for almost a year. The Emperor William conferred upon him the +Order of the Red Eagle, and gave him a jeweled star of great value. +</P> + +<P> +How could the poor boy, Elihu Burritt, working nearly all the daylight +in a blacksmith's shop, get an education? He had but one book in his +library, and carried that in his hat. But this boy with no chance +became one of America's wonders. +</P> + +<P> +When teaching school, Garfield was very poor. He tore his only blue +jean trousers, but concealed the rents by pins until night, when he +retired early that his boarding mistress might mend his clothes. "When +you get to be a United States Senator," said she, "no one will ask what +kind of clothes you wore when teaching school." +</P> + +<P> +Although Michael Angelo made himself immortal in three different +occupations, his fame might well rest upon his dome of St. Peter as an +architect, upon his "Moses" as a sculptor, and upon his "Last Judgment" +as a painter; yet we find by his correspondence now in the British +Museum, that when he was at work on his colossal bronze statue of Pope +Julius II., he was so poor that he could not have his younger brother +come to visit him at Bologna, because he had but one bed in which he +and three of his assistants slept together. +</P> + +<P> +"I was always at the bottom of my purse," said Zola, in describing the +struggles of his early years of authorship. "Very often I had not a +sou left, and not knowing, either, where to get one. I rose generally +at four in the morning, and began to study after a breakfast consisting +of one raw egg. But no matter, those were good times. After taking a +walk along the quays, I entered my garret, and joyfully partaking of a +dinner of three apples, I sat down to work. I wrote, and I was happy. +In winter I would allow myself no fire; wood was too expensive—only on +fête days was I able to afford it. But I had several pipes of tobacco +and a candle for three sous. A three-sous candle, only think of it! +It meant a whole night of literature to me." +</P> + +<P> +James Brooks, once the editor and proprietor of the "New York Daily +Express," and later an eminent congressman, began life as a clerk in a +store in Maine, and when twenty-one received for his pay a hogshead of +New England rum. He was so eager to go to college that he started for +Waterville with his trunk on his back, and when he was graduated he was +so poor and plucky that he carried his trunk on his back to the station +when he went home. +</P> + +<P> +When Elias Howe, harassed by want and woe, was in London completing his +first sewing-machine, he had frequently to borrow money to live on. He +bought beans and cooked them himself. He also borrowed money to send +his wife back to America. He sold his first machine for five pounds, +although it was worth fifty, and then he pawned his letters patent to +pay his expenses home. +</P> + +<P> +The boy Arkwright begins barbering in a cellar, but dies worth a +million and a half. The world treated his novelties just as it treats +everybody's novelties—made infinite objection, mustered all the +impediments, but he snapped his fingers at their objections, and lived +to become honored and wealthy. +</P> + +<P> +There is scarcely a great truth or doctrine but has had to fight its +way to public recognition in the face of detraction, calumny, and +persecution. "Everywhere," says Heine, "that a great soul gives +utterance to its thoughts, there also is a Golgotha." +</P> + +<P> +Nearly every great discovery or invention that has blessed mankind has +had to fight its way to recognition, even against the opposition of the +most progressive men. +</P> + +<P> +Even Sir Charles Napier fiercely opposed the introduction of steam +power into the Royal Navy. In the House of Commons, he exclaimed, "Mr. +Speaker, when we enter Her Majesty's naval service and face the chances +of war, we go prepared to be hacked in pieces, to be riddled by +bullets, or to be blown to bits by shot and shell; but Mr. Speaker, we +do not go prepared to be boiled alive." He said this with tremendous +emphasis. +</P> + +<P> +"Will any one explain how there can be a light without a wick?" asked a +member of Parliament, when William Murdock, toward the close of the +eighteenth century, said that coal gas would give a good light, and +could be conveyed into buildings in pipes. "Do you intend taking the +dome of St. Paul's for a gasometer?" was the sneering question of even +the great scientist, Humphry Davy. Walter Scott ridiculed the idea of +lighting London by "smoke," but he soon used it at Abbotsford, and Davy +achieved one of his greatest triumphs by experimenting with gas until +he had invented his safety lamp. +</P> + +<P> +Titian used to crush the flowers to get their color, and painted the +white walls of his father's cottage in Tyrol with all sorts of +pictures, at which the mountaineers gazed in wonder. +</P> + +<P> +"That boy will beat me one day," said an old painter as he watched a +little fellow named Michael Angelo making drawings of pot and brushes, +easel and stool, and other articles in the studio. The barefoot boy +did persevere until he had overcome every difficulty and become a +master of his art. +</P> + +<P> +William H. Prescott was a remarkable example of what a boy with "no +chance" can do. While at college, he lost one eye by a hard piece of +bread thrown during a "biscuit battle," then so common after meals; +and, from sympathy, the other eye became almost useless. But the boy +had pluck and determination, and would not lead a useless life. He set +his heart upon being a historian, and turned all his energies in that +direction. By the aid of others' eyes, he spent ten years studying +before he even decided upon a particular theme for his first book. +Then he spent ten years more, poring over old archives and manuscripts, +before he published his "Ferdinand and Isabella." What a lesson in his +life for young men! What a rebuke to those who have thrown away their +opportunities and wasted their lives! +</P> + +<P> +"Galileo with an opera-glass," said Emerson, "discovered a more +splendid series of celestial phenomena than any one since with the +great telescopes. Columbus found the new world in an undecked boat." +</P> + +<P> +Surroundings which men call unfavorable cannot prevent the unfolding of +your powers. From the plain fields and lowlands of Avon came the +Shakespearean genius which has charmed the world. From among the +rock-ribbed hills of New Hampshire sprang the greatest of American +orators and statesmen, Daniel Webster. From the crowded ranks of toil, +and homes to which luxury is a stranger, have often come the leaders +and benefactors of our race. Indeed, when Christ came upon earth, His +early abode was a place so poor and so much despised that men thought +He could not be the Christ, asking, in utter astonishment, "Can any +good thing come out of Nazareth?" +</P> + +<P> +"I once knew a little colored boy," said Frederick Douglass, "whose +mother and father died when he was but six years old. He was a slave, +and had no one to care for him. He slept on a dirt floor in a hovel, +and in cold weather would crawl into a meal-bag head foremost, and +leave his feet in the ashes to keep them warm. Often he would roast an +ear of corn and eat it to satisfy his hunger, and many times has he +crawled under the barn or stable and secured eggs, which he would roast +in the fire and eat. That boy did not wear pantaloons, as you do, but +a tow-linen shirt. Schools were unknown to him, and he learned to +spell from an old Webster's spelling-book, and to read and write from +posters on cellar and barn doors, while boys and men would help him. +He would then preach and speak, and soon became well known. He became +presidential elector, United States marshal, United States recorder, +United States diplomat, and accumulated some wealth. He wore +broadcloth, and didn't have to divide crumbs with the dogs under the +table. That boy was Frederick Douglass. What was possible for me is +possible for you. Don't think because you are colored you can't +accomplish anything. Strive earnestly to add to your knowledge. So +long as you remain in ignorance, so long will you fail to command the +respect of your fellow-men." +</P> + +<P> +Where shall we find an illustration more impressive than in Abraham +Lincoln, whose life, career, and death might be chanted by a Greek +chorus as at once the prelude and the epilogue of the most imperial +theme of modern times? Born as lowly as the Son of God, in a hovel; of +what real parentage we know not, reared in penury, squalor, with no +gleam of light, nor fair surrounding; a young manhood vexed by weird +dreams and visions; with scarcely a natural grace; singularly awkward, +ungainly even among the uncouth about him: it was reserved for this +remarkable character, late in life, to be snatched from obscurity, +raised to supreme command at a supreme moment, and intrusted with the +destiny of a nation. The great leaders of his party were made to stand +aside; the most experienced and accomplished men of the day, men like +Seward, and Chase, and Sumner, statesmen famous and trained, were sent +to the rear, while this strange figure was brought by unseen hands to +the front, and given the reins of power. +</P> + +<P> +The story is told of a man in London deprived of both legs and arms, +who managed to write with his mouth and perform other things so +remarkable as to enable him to earn a fair living. He would lay +certain sheets of paper together, pinning them at the corner to make +them hold. Then he would take a pen and write some verses; after which +he would proceed to embellish the lines by many skillful flourishes. +Dropping the pen from his mouth, he would next take up a needle and +thread, also with his mouth, thread the needle, and make several +stitches. He also painted with a brush, and was in many other ways a +wonderful man. Instead of being a burden to his family he was the most +important contributor to their welfare. +</P> + +<P> +Arthur Cavanagh, M. P., was born without arms or legs, yet it is said +that he was a good shot, a skillful fisherman and sailor, and one of +the best cross country riders in Ireland. He was a good +conversationalist, and an able member of Parliament. He ate with his +fork attached to his stump of an arm, and wrote holding his pen in his +teeth. In riding he held the bridle in his mouth, his body being +strapped to the saddle. He once lost his means of support in India, +but went to work with his accustomed energy, and obtained employment as +a carrier of dispatches. +</P> + +<P> +People thought it strange that Gladstone should appoint blind Henry +Fawcett Postmaster-General of Great Britain; but never before did any +one fill the office so well. +</P> + +<P> +John B. Herreshoff, of Bristol, R. I., although blind since he was +fifteen years old, is the founder and head of one of the most noted +shipbuilding establishments in the world. He has superintended the +construction of some of the swiftest torpedo boats and steam and +sailing yachts afloat. He frequently takes his turn at the wheel in +sailing his vessels on trial trips. He is aided greatly by his younger +brother Nathaniel, but can plan vessels and conduct business without +him. After examining a vessel's hull or a good model of it, he will +give detailed instructions for building another just like it, and will +make a more accurate duplicate than can most boat-builders whose sight +is perfect. +</P> + +<P> +The Rev. William H. Milburn, who lost his sight when a child, studied +for the ministry, and was ordained before he attained his majority. In +ten years he traveled about 200,000 miles in missionary work. He has +written half a dozen books, among them a very careful history of the +Mississippi Valley. He has long been chaplain of the lower house of +Congress. +</P> + +<P> +Blind Fanny Crosby, of New York, was a teacher of the blind for many +years. She has written nearly three thousand hymns, among which are +"Pass Me not, O Gentle Saviour," "Rescue the Perishing," "Saviour more +than Life to Me," and "Jesus keep Me near the Cross." +</P> + +<P> +Nor are these by any means the only examples of blind people now doing +their full share of the world's work. In the United States alone there +are engaged in musical occupation one hundred and fifty blind piano +tuners, one hundred and fifty blind teachers of music in schools for +the blind, five hundred blind private teachers, one hundred blind +church organists, fifteen or more blind composers and publishers of +music, and several blind dealers in musical instruments. +</P> + +<P> +<I>There is no open door to the temple of success</I>. Every one who enters +makes his own door, which closes behind him to all others, not even +permitting his own children to pass. +</P> + +<P> +Nearly forty years ago, on a rainy, dreary day in November, a young +widow in Philadelphia sat wondering how she could feed and clothe three +little ones left dependent by the death of her husband, a naval +officer. Happening to think of a box of which her husband had spoken, +she opened it, and found therein an envelope containing directions for +a code of colored light signals to be used at night on the ocean. The +system was not complete, but she perfected it, went to Washington, and +induced the Secretary of the Navy to give it a trial. An admiral soon +wrote that the signals were good for nothing, although the idea was +valuable. For months and years she worked, succeeding at last in +producing brilliant lights of different colors. She was paid $20,000 +for the right to manufacture them in our navy. Nearly all the blockade +runners captured in the Civil War were taken by the aid of the Coston +signals, which are also considered invaluable in the Life Saving +Service. Mrs. Coston introduced them into several European navies, and +became wealthy. +</P> + +<P> +A modern writer says that it is one of the mysteries of our life that +genius, that noblest gift of God to man, is nourished by poverty. Its +greatest works have been achieved by the sorrowing ones of the world in +tears and despair. Not in the brilliant salon, not in the tapestried +library, not in ease and competence, is genius usually born and +nurtured; but often in adversity and destitution, amidst the harassing +cares of a straitened household, in bare and fireless garrets, with the +noise of squalid children, in the turbulence of domestic contentions, +and in the deep gloom of uncheered despair. This is its most frequent +birthplace, and amid scenes like these unpropitious, repulsive, +wretched surroundings, have men labored, studied, and trained +themselves, until they have at last emanated from the gloom of that +obscurity the shining lights of their times; have become the companions +of kings, the guides and teachers of their kind, and exercised an +influence upon the thought of the world amounting to a species of +intellectual legislation. +</P> + +<P> +Chauncey Jerome's education was limited to three months in the district +school each year until he was ten, when his father took him into his +blacksmith shop at Plymouth, Conn., to make nails. Money was a scarce +article with young Chauncey. He once chopped a load of wood for one +cent, and often chopped by moonlight for neighbors at less than a dime +a load. His father died when he was eleven, and his mother was forced +to send Chauncey out, with tears in his eyes and a little bundle of +clothes in his hand, to earn a living on a farm. His new employer kept +him at work early and late chopping down trees all day, his shoes +sometimes full of snow, for he had no boots until he was nearly +twenty-one. At fourteen he was apprenticed for seven years to a +carpenter, who gave him only board and clothes. Several times during +his apprenticeship he carried his tools thirty miles on his back to his +work at different places. After he had learned his trade he frequently +walked thirty miles to a job with his kit upon his back. One day he +heard people talking of Eli Terry, of Plymouth, who had undertaken to +make two hundred clocks in one lot. "He'll never live long enough to +finish them," said one. "If he should," said another, "he could not +possibly sell so many. The very idea is ridiculous." Chauncey +pondered long over this rumor, for it had long been his dream to become +a great clock-maker. He tried his hand at the first opportunity, and +soon learned to make a wooden clock. When he got an order to make +twelve at twelve dollars apiece he thought his fortune was made. One +night he happened to think that a cheap clock could be made of brass as +well as of wood, and would not shrink, swell, or warp appreciably in +any climate. He acted on the idea, and became the first great +manufacturer of brass clocks. He made millions at the rate of six +hundred a day, exporting them to all parts of the globe. +</P> + +<P> +"The History of the English People" was written while J. R. Green was +struggling against a mortal illness. He had collected a vast store of +materials, and had begun to write, when his disease made a sudden and +startling progress, and his physicians said they could do nothing to +arrest it. In the extremity of ruin and defeat he applied himself with +greater fidelity to his work. The time that might still be left to him +for work must henceforth be wrested, day by day, from the grasp of +death. The writing occupied five months, while from hour to hour and +day to day his life was prolonged, his doctors said, by the sheer force +of his own will and his inflexible determination to finish the "Making +of England." He lay, too weak to lift a book, or to hold a pen, +dictating every word, sometimes through hours of intense suffering. +Yet so conscientious was he that, driven by death as he was, the +greater part of the book was rewritten five times. When it was done he +began the "Conquest of England," wrote it, reviewed it, and then, +dissatisfied with it, rejected it all and began again. As death laid +its cold fingers on his heart, he said: "I still have some work to do +that I know is good. I will try to win but one week more to write it +down." It was not until he was actually dying that he said, "I can +work no more." +</P> + +<P> +"What does he know," said a sage, "who has not suffered?" Schiller +produced his greatest tragedies in the midst of physical suffering +almost amounting to torture. Handel was never greater than when, +warned by palsy of the approach of death, and struggling with distress +and suffering, he sat down to compose the great works which have made +his name immortal in music. Mozart composed his great operas, and last +of all his "Requiem," when oppressed by debt and struggling with a +fatal disease. Beethoven produced his greatest works amidst gloomy +sorrow, when oppressed by almost total deafness. +</P> + +<P> +Perhaps no one ever battled harder to overcome obstacles which would +have disheartened most men than Demosthenes. He had such a weak voice, +and such an impediment in his speech, and was so short of breath, that +he could scarcely get through a single sentence without stopping to +rest. All his first attempts were nearly drowned by the hisses, jeers, +and scoffs of his audiences. His first effort that met with success +was against his guardian, who had defrauded him, and whom he compelled +to refund a part of his fortune. He was so discouraged by his defeats +that he determined to give up forever all attempts at oratory. One of +his auditors, however, believed the young man had something in him, and +encouraged him to persevere. He accordingly appeared again in public, +but was hissed down as before. As he withdrew, hanging his head in +great confusion, a noted actor, Satyrus, encouraged him still further +to try to overcome his impediment. He stammered so much that he could +not pronounce some of the letters at all, and his breath would give out +before he could get through a sentence. Finally, he determined to be +an orator cost what it might. He went to the seashore and practiced +amid the roar of the breakers with small pebbles in his mouth, in order +to overcome his stammering, and at the same time accustom himself to +the hisses and tumults of his audience. He overcame his short breath +by practicing speaking while running up steep and difficult places on +the shore. His awkward gestures were also corrected by long and +determined drill before a mirror. +</P> + +<P> +Disheartened by the expense of removing the troublesome seeds, Southern +planters were seriously considering the abandonment of cotton culture. +To clean a pound of cotton required the labor of a slave for a day. +Eli Whitney, a young man from New England, teaching school in Georgia, +saw the state of affairs, and determined to invent a machine to do the +work. He worked in secret for many months in a cellar, and at last +made a machine which cleaned the cotton perfectly and rapidly. Just as +success crowned his long labor thieves broke into the cellar and stole +his model. He recovered the model, but the principle was stolen, and +other machines were made without his consent. In vain he tried to +protect his right in the courts, for Southern juries would almost +invariably decide against him. He had started the South in a great +industry, and added millions to her wealth, yet the courts united with +the men who had infringed his patents to rob him of the reward of his +ingenuity and industry. At last he abandoned the whole thing in +disgust, and turned his attention to making improvements in firearms, +and with such success that he accumulated a fortune. +</P> + +<P> +Robert Collyer, who brought his bride in the steerage when he came to +America at the age of twenty-seven, worked at the anvil nine years in +Pennsylvania, and then became a preacher, soon winning national renown. +</P> + +<P> +A shrewd observer says of John Chinaman: "No sooner does he put his +foot among strangers than he begins to work. No office is too menial +or too laborious for him. He has come to make money, and he will make +it. His frugality requires but little: he barely lives, but he saves +what he gets; commences trade in the smallest possible way, and is +continually adding to his store. The native scorns such drudgery, and +remains poor; the Chinaman toils patiently on, and grows rich. A few +years pass by, and he has warehouses; becomes a contractor for produce; +buys foreign goods by the cargo; and employs his newly imported +countrymen, who have come to seek their fortune as he did. He is not +particularly scrupulous in matters of opinion. He never meddles with +politics, for they are dangerous and not profitable; but he will adopt +any creed, and carefully follow any observances, if, by so doing, he +can confirm or improve his position. He thrives with the Spaniard, and +works while the latter sleeps. He is too quick for the Dutchman, and +can smoke and bargain at the same time. He has harder work with the +Englishman, but still he is too much for him, and succeeds. Climate +has no effect on him: it cannot stop his hands, unless it kills him; +and if it does, he dies in harness, battling for money till his last +breath. Whoever he may be, and in whatever position, whether in his +own or a foreign country, he is diligent, temperate, and uncomplaining. +He keeps the word he pledges, pays his debts, and is capable of noble +and generous actions. It has been customary to speak lightly of him, +and to judge a whole people by a few vagabonds in a provincial seaport, +whose morals and manners have not been improved by foreign society." +</P> + +<P> +Columbus was dismissed as a fool from court after court, but he pushed +his suit against an incredulous and ridiculing world. Rebuffed by +kings, scorned by queens, he did not swerve a hair's breadth from the +overmastering purpose which dominated his soul. The words "New World" +were graven upon his heart; and reputation, ease, pleasure, position, +life itself if need be, must be sacrificed. Threats, ridicule, +ostracism, storms, leaky vessels, mutiny of sailors, could not shake +his mighty purpose. +</P> + +<P> +You cannot keep a determined man from success. Place stumbling-blocks +in his way and he takes them for stepping-stones, and on them will +climb to greatness. Take away his money, and he makes spurs of his +poverty to urge him on. Cripple him, and he writes the Waverley +Novels. Lock him up in a dungeon, and he composes the immortal +"Pilgrim's Progress." Put him in a cradle in a log cabin in the +wilderness of America, and in a few years you will find him in the +Capitol at the head of the greatest nation on the globe. +</P> + +<P> +Would it were possible to convince the struggling youth of to-day that +all that is great and noble and true in the history of the world is the +result of infinite pains-taking, perpetual plodding, of common +every-day industry! +</P> + +<P> +When Lavoisier the chemist asked that his execution might be postponed +for a few days in order to ascertain the results of the experiments he +was conducting in prison, the communists refused to grant the request, +saying: "The Republic has no need of philosophers." Dr. Priestley's +house was burned and his chemical library destroyed by a mob shouting: +"No philosophers," and he was forced to flee from his country. Bruno +was burned in Rome for revealing the heavens, and Versalius +[Transcriber's note: Vesalius?] was condemned for dissecting the human +body; but their names shall live as long as time shall last. Kossuth +was two years in prison at Buda, but he kept on working, undaunted. +John Hunter said: "The few things I have been enabled to do have been +accomplished under the greatest difficulties, and have encountered the +greatest opposition." +</P> + +<P> +Roger Bacon, one of the profoundest thinkers the world has produced, +was terribly persecuted for his studies in natural philosophy, yet he +persevered and won success. He was accused of dealing in magic, his +books were burned in public, and he was kept in prison for ten years. +Even our own revered Washington was mobbed in the streets because he +would not pander to the clamor of the people and reject the treaty +which Mr. Jay had arranged with Great Britain. But he remained firm, +and the people adopted his opinion. The Duke of Wellington was mobbed +in the streets of London and his windows were broken while his wife lay +dead in the house; but the "Iron Duke" never faltered in his course, or +swerved a hair's breadth from his purpose. +</P> + +<P> +William Phips, when a young man, heard some sailors on the street, in +Boston, talking about a Spanish ship, wrecked off the Bahama Islands, +which was supposed to have money on board. Young Phips determined to +find it. He set out at once, and, after many hardships, discovered the +lost treasure. He then heard of another ship, wrecked off Port De La +Plata many years before. He set sail for England and importuned +Charles II. for aid. To his delight the king fitted up the ship Rose +Algier for him. He searched and searched for a long time in vain. He +had to return to England to repair his vessel. James II. was then on +the throne, and he had to wait for four years before he could raise +money to return. His crew mutinied and threatened to throw him +overboard, but he turned the ship's guns on them. One day an Indian +diver went down for a curious sea plant and saw several cannon lying on +the bottom. They proved to belong to the wreck for which he was +looking, sunk fifty years before. He had nothing but dim traditions to +guide him, but he returned to England with $1,500,000. The King made +him High Sheriff of New England, and he was afterward made Governor of +Massachusetts Bay Colony. +</P> + +<P> +Ben Jonson, when following his trade of a mason, worked on Lincoln's +Inn in London with trowel in hand and a book in his pocket. Joseph +Hunter was a carpenter in youth, Robert Burns a plowman, Keats a +druggist, Thomas Carlyle and Hugh Miller masons. Dante and Descartes +were soldiers. Andrew Johnson was a tailor. Cardinal Wolsey, Defoe, +and Kirke White were butchers' sons. Faraday was the son of a +blacksmith, and his teacher, Humphry Davy, was an apprentice to an +apothecary. Kepler was a waiter boy in a German hotel, Bunyan a +tinker, Copernicus the son of a Polish baker. The boy Herschel played +the oboe for his meals. Marshal Ney, the "bravest of the brave," rose +from the ranks. His great industry gained for him the name of "The +Indefatigable." Soult served fourteen years before he was made a +sergeant. When made Foreign Minister of France he knew very little of +geography, even. Richard Cobden was a boy in a London warehouse. His +first speech in Parliament was a complete failure; but he was not +afraid of defeat, and soon became one of the greatest orators of his +day. Seven shoemakers sat in Congress during the first century of our +government: Roger Sherman, Henry Wilson, Gideon Lee, William Graham, +John Halley, H. P. Baldwin, and Daniel Sheffey. +</P> + +<P> +A constant struggle, a ceaseless battle to bring success from +inhospitable surroundings, is the price of all great achievements. +</P> + +<P> +The man who has not fought his way up to his own loaf, and does not +bear the scar of desperate conflict, does not know the highest meaning +of success. +</P> + +<P> +The money acquired by those who have thus struggled upward to success +is not their only, or indeed their chief reward. When, after years of +toil, of opposition, of ridicule, of repeated failure, Cyrus W. Field +placed his hand upon the telegraph instrument ticking a message under +the sea, think you that the electric thrill passed no further than the +tips of his fingers? When Thomas A. Edison demonstrated in Menlo Park +that the electric light had at last been developed into a commercial +success, do you suppose those bright rays failed to illuminate the +inmost recesses of his soul? Edward Everett said: "There are occasions +in life in which a great mind lives years of enjoyment in a single +moment. I can fancy the emotion of Galileo when, first raising the +newly constructed telescope to the heavens, he saw fulfilled the grand +prophecy of Copernicus, and beheld the planet Venus crescent like the +moon. It was such another moment as that when the immortal printers of +Mentz and Strasburg received the first copy of the Bible into their +hands, the work of their divine art; like that when Columbus, through +the gray dawn of the 12th of October, 1492, beheld the shores of San +Salvador; like that when the law of gravitation first revealed itself +to the intellect of Newton; like that when Franklin saw, by the +stiffening fibres of the hemp cord of his kite, that he held the +lightning in his grasp, like that when Leverrier received back from +Berlin the tidings that the predicted planet was found." +</P> + +<P> +"Observe yon tree in your neighbor's garden," says Zanoni to Viola in +Bulwer's novel. "Look how it grows up, crooked and distorted. Some +wind scattered the germ, from which it sprung, in the clefts of the +rock. Choked up and walled round by crags and buildings, by nature and +man, its life has been one struggle for the light. You see how it has +writhed and twisted,—how, meeting the barrier in one spot, it has +labored and worked, stem and branch, towards the clear skies at last. +What has preserved it through each disfavor of birth and +circumstances—why are its leaves as green and fair as those of the +vine behind you, which, with all its arms, can embrace the open +sunshine? My child, because of the very instinct that impelled the +struggle,—because the labor for the light won to the light at length. +So with a gallant heart, through every adverse accident of sorrow, and +of fate, to turn to the sun, to strive for the heaven; this it is that +gives knowledge to the strong and happiness to the weak." +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 4em">"Each petty hand</SPAN><BR> +Can steer a ship becalmed; but he that will<BR> +Govern her and carry her to her ends, must know<BR> +His tides, his currents; how to shift his sails;<BR> +What she will bear in foul, what in fair weathers;<BR> +What her springs are, her leaks, and how to stop them;<BR> +What strands, what shelves, what rocks to threaten her;<BR> +The forces and the natures of all winds,<BR> +Gusts, storms, and tempests; when her keel plows hell,<BR> +And deck knocks heaven; then to manage her<BR> +Becomes the name and office of a pilot."<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap05"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER V. +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +USES OF OBSTACLES. +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Nature, when she adds difficulties, adds brains.—EMERSON. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Many men owe the grandeur of their lives to their tremendous +difficulties.—SPURGEON. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +The good are better made by ill,<BR> +As odors crushed are sweeter still.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">ROGERS.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Aromatic plants bestow<BR> +No spicy fragrance while they grow;<BR> +But crushed or trodden to the ground,<BR> +Diffuse their balmy sweets around.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">GOLDSMITH.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +As night to stars, woe lustre gives to man.—YOUNG. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +There is no possible success without some opposition as a fulcrum: +force is always aggressive and crowds something.—HOLMES. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +The more difficulties one has to encounter, within and without, the +more significant and the higher in inspiration his life will +be.—HORACE BUSHMILL. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Adversity has the effect of eliciting talents which in prosperous +circumstances would have lain dormant.—HORACE. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +For gold is tried in the fire and acceptable men in the furnace of +adversity.—SIRACH. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Though losses and crosses be lessons right severe,<BR> +There's wit there ye'll get there, ye'll find no other where.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">BURNS.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Possession pampers the mind; privation trains and strengthens +it.—HAZLITT. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +"Adversity is the prosperity of the great." +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +No man ever worked his way in a dead calm.—JOHN NEAL. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +"Kites rise against, not with, the wind." +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"Many and many a time since," said Harriet Martineau, referring to her +father's failure in business, "have we said that, but for that loss of +money, we might have lived on in the ordinary provincial method of +ladies with small means, sewing and economizing and growing narrower +every year; whereas, by being thrown, while it was yet time, on our own +resources, we have worked hard and usefully, won friends, reputation, +and independence, seen the world abundantly, abroad and at home; in +short, have truly lived instead of vegetating." +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<A NAME="img-086"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG CLASS="imgcenter" SRC="images/img-086.jpg" ALT="JOHN BUNYAN" BORDER="2" WIDTH="364" HEIGHT="518"> +<H3 CLASS="h3center" STYLE="width: 364px"> +JOHN BUNYAN +</H3> +</CENTER> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Sculptor of souls, I lift to Thee<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Encumbered heart and hands;</SPAN><BR> +Spare not the chisel, set me free,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">However dear the bands.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<P> +"I do believe God wanted a grand poem of that man," said George +Macdonald of Milton, "and so blinded him that he might be able to write +it." +</P> + +<P> +Two of the three greatest epic poets of the world were blind,—Homer +and Milton; while the third, Dante, was in his later years nearly, if +not altogether, blind. It almost seems as though some great characters +had been physically crippled in certain respects so that they would not +dissipate their energy, but concentrate it all in one direction. +</P> + +<P> +"I have been beaten, but not cast down," said Thiers, after making a +complete failure of his first speech in the Chamber of Deputies. "I am +making my first essay in arms. In the tribune, as under fire, a defeat +is as useful as a victory." +</P> + +<P> +A distinguished investigator in science said that when he encountered +an apparently insuperable obstacle, he usually found himself upon the +brink of some discovery. +</P> + +<P> +"Returned with thanks" has made many an author. Failure often leads a +man to success by arousing his latent energy, by firing a dormant +purpose, by awakening powers which were sleeping. Men of mettle turn +disappointments into helps as the oyster turns into pearl the sand +which annoys it. +</P> + +<P> +"Let the adverse breath of criticism be to you only what the blast of +the storm wind is to the eagle,—a force against him that lifts him +higher." +</P> + +<P> +A kite would not fly unless it had a string tying it down. It is just +so in life. The man who is tied down by half a dozen blooming +responsibilities and their mother will make a higher and stronger +flight than the bachelor who, having nothing to keep him steady, is +always floundering in the mud. If you want to ascend in the world tie +yourself to somebody. +</P> + +<P> +"It was the severe preparation for the subsequent harvest," said +Pemberton Leigh, the eminent English lawyer, speaking of his early +poverty and hard work. "I learned to consider indefatigable labor as +the indispensable condition of success, pecuniary independence as +essential alike to virtue and happiness, and no sacrifice too great to +avoid the misery of debt." +</P> + +<P> +When Napoleon's companions made sport of him on account of his humble +origin and poverty he devoted himself entirely to books, and soon +rising above them in scholarship, commanded their respect. Soon he was +regarded as the brightest ornament of the class. +</P> + +<P> +"To make his way at the bar," said an eminent jurist, "a young man must +live like a hermit and work like a horse. There is nothing that does a +young lawyer so much good as to be half starved." +</P> + +<P> +Thousands of men of great native ability have been lost to the world +because they have not had to wrestle with obstacles, and to struggle +under difficulties sufficient to stimulate into activity their dormant +powers. No effort is too dear which helps us along the line of our +proper career. +</P> + +<P> +Poverty and obscurity of origin may impede our progress, but it is only +like the obstruction of ice or debris in the river temporarily forcing +the water into eddies, where it accumulates strength and a mighty +reserve which ultimately sweeps the obstruction impetuously to the sea. +Poverty and obscurity are not insurmountable obstacles, but they often +act as a stimulus to the naturally indolent, and develop a firmer fibre +of mind, a stronger muscle and stamina of body. If the germ of the +seed has to struggle to push its way up through the stones and hard +sod, to fight its way up to sunlight and air, and then to wrestle with +storm and tempest, with snow and frost, the fibre of its timber will be +all the tougher and stronger. +</P> + +<P> +"Do you wish to live without a trial?" asks a modern teacher. "Then +you wish to die but half a man. Without trial you cannot guess at your +own strength. Men do not learn to swim on a table. They must go into +deep water and buffet the waves. Hardship is the native soil of +manhood and self-reliance. Trials are rough teachers, but rugged +schoolmasters make rugged pupils. A man who goes through life +prosperous, and comes to his grave without a wrinkle, is not half a +man. Difficulties are God's errands. And when we are sent upon them +we should esteem it a proof of God's confidence. We should reach after +the highest good." +</P> + +<P> +"If you wish to rise," said Talleyrand, "make enemies." +</P> + +<P> +There is good philosophy in the injunction to love our enemies, for +they are often our best friends in disguise. They tell us the truth +when friends flatter. Their biting sarcasm and scathing rebuke are +often mirrors which reveal us to ourselves. These unkind stings and +thrusts are spurs which urge us on to grander success and nobler +endeavor. Friends cover our faults and rarely rebuke; enemies drag out +to the light all our weaknesses without mercy. We dread these thrusts +and exposures as we do the surgeon's knife, but are the better for +them. They reach depths before untouched, and we are led to resolve to +redeem ourselves from scorn and inferiority. +</P> + +<P> +We are the victors of our opponents. They have developed in us the +very power by which we overcome them. Without their opposition we +could never have braced and anchored and fortified ourselves, as the +oak is braced and anchored for its thousand battles with the tempests. +Our trials, our sorrows, and our griefs develop us in a similar way. +</P> + +<P> +The man who has triumphed over difficulties bears the signs of victory +in his face. An air of triumph is seen in every movement. +</P> + +<P> +John Calvin, who made a theology for the seventeenth and eighteenth +centuries, was tortured with disease for many years, and so was Robert +Hall. The great men who have lifted the world to a higher level were +not developed in easy circumstances, but were rocked in the cradle of +difficulties and pillowed on hardships. +</P> + +<P> +"The gods look on no grander sight than an honest man struggling with +adversity." +</P> + +<P> +"Then I must learn to sing better," said Anaximander, when told that +the very boys laughed at his singing. Strong characters, like the +palm-tree, seem to thrive best when most abused. Men who have stood up +bravely under great misfortune for years are often unable to bear +prosperity. Their good fortune takes the spring out of their energy, +as the torrid zone enervates races accustomed to a vigorous climate. +Some people never come to themselves until baffled, rebuffed, thwarted, +defeated, crushed, in the opinion of those around them. Trials unlock +their virtues; defeat is the threshold of their victory. +</P> + +<P> +It is defeat that turns bone to flint; it is defeat that turns gristle +to muscle; it is defeat that makes men invincible; it is defeat that +has made those heroic natures that are now in the ascendency, and that +has given the sweet law of liberty instead of the bitter law of +oppression. +</P> + +<P> +Difficulties call out great qualities, and make greatness possible. +How many centuries of peace would have developed a Grant? Few knew +Lincoln until the great weight of the war showed his character. A +century of peace would never have produced a Bismarck. Perhaps +Phillips and Garrison would never have been known to history had it not +been for slavery. +</P> + +<P> +"Will he not make a great painter?" was asked in regard to an artist +fresh from his Italian tour. "No, never," replied Northcote. "Why +not?" "Because he has an income of six thousand pounds a year." In +the sunshine of wealth a man is, as a rule, warped too much to become +an artist of high merit. A drenching shower of adversity would +straighten his fibres out again. He should have some great thwarting +difficulty to struggle against. +</P> + +<P> +The best tools receive their temper from fire, their edge from +grinding; the noblest characters are developed in a similar way. The +harder the diamond, the more brilliant the lustre, and the greater the +friction necessary to bring it out. Only its own dust is hard enough +to make this most precious stone reveal its full beauty. +</P> + +<P> +The spark in the flint would sleep forever but for friction; the fire +in man would never blaze but for antagonism. The friction which +retards a train upon the track, robbing the engine of a fourth of its +power, is the very secret of locomotion. Oil the track, remove the +friction, and the train will not move an inch. The moment man is +relieved of opposition or friction, and the track of his life is oiled +with inherited wealth or other aids, that moment he often ceases to +struggle and therefore ceases to grow. +</P> + +<P> +"It is this scantiness of means, this continual deficiency, this +constant hitch, this perpetual struggle to keep the head above water +and the wolf from the door, that keeps society from falling to pieces. +Let every man have a few more dollars than he wants, and anarchy would +follow." +</P> + +<P> +Suddenly, with much jarring and jolting, an electric car came to a +standstill just in front of a heavy truck that was headed in an +opposite direction. The huge truck wheels were sliding uselessly round +on the car tracks that were wet and slippery from rain. All the urging +of the teamster and the straining of the horses in vain,—until the +motorman quietly tossed a shovelful of sand on the track under the +heavy wheels, then the truck lumbered on its way. "Friction is a very +good thing," remarked a passenger. +</P> + +<P> +The philosopher Kant observes that a dove, inasmuch as the only +obstacle it has to overcome is the resistance of the air, might suppose +that if only the air were out of the way it could fly with greater +rapidity and ease. Yet if the air were withdrawn, and the bird should +try to fly in a vacuum, it would fall instantly to the ground unable to +fly at all. The very element that offers the opposition to flying is +at the same time the condition of any flight whatever. +</P> + +<P> +Rough seas and storms make sailors. Emergencies make giant men. But +for our Civil War the names of its grand heroes would not be written +among the greatest of our time. +</P> + +<P> +The effort or struggle to climb to a higher place in life has strength +and dignity in it, and cannot fail to leave us stronger for the +struggle, even though we miss the prize. +</P> + +<P> +From an aimless, idle, and useless brain, emergencies often call out +powers and virtues before unknown and suspected. How often we see a +young man develop astounding ability and energy after the death of a +parent, or the loss of a fortune, or after some other calamity has +knocked the props and crutches from under him. The prison has roused +the slumbering fire in many a noble mind. "Robinson Crusoe" was +written in prison. The "Pilgrim's Progress" appeared in Bedford Jail. +The "Life and Times" of Baxter, Eliot's "Monarchia of Man," and Penn's +"No Cross, No Crown," were written by prisoners. Sir Walter Raleigh +wrote "The History of the World" during his imprisonment of thirteen +years. Luther translated the Bible while confined in the Castle of +Wartburg. For twenty years Dante worked in exile, and even under +sentence of death. His works were burned in public after his death; +but genius will not burn. +</P> + +<P> +Take two acorns from the same tree, as nearly alike as possible; plant +one on a hill by itself, and the other in the dense forest, and watch +them grow. The oak standing alone is exposed to every storm. Its +roots reach out in every direction, clutching the rocks and piercing +deep into the earth. Every rootlet lends itself to steady the growing +giant, as if in anticipation of fierce conflict with the elements. +Sometimes its upward growth seems checked for years, but all the while +it has been expending its energy in pushing a root across a large rock +to gain a firmer anchorage. Then it shoots proudly aloft again, +prepared to defy the hurricane. The gales which sport so rudely with +its wide branches find more than their match, and only serve still +further to toughen every minutest fibre from pith to bark. +</P> + +<P> +The acorn planted in the deep forest shoots up a weak, slender sapling. +Shielded by its neighbors, it feels no need of spreading its roots far +and wide for support. +</P> + +<P> +Take two boys, as nearly alike as possible. Place one in the country +away from the hothouse culture and refinements of the city, with only +the district school, the Sunday-school, and a few books. Remove wealth +and props of every kind; and, if he has the right kind of material in +him, he will thrive. Every obstacle overcome lends him strength for +the next conflict. If he falls, he rises with more determination than +before. Like a rubber ball, the harder the obstacle he meets the +higher he rebounds. Obstacles and opposition are but apparatus of the +gymnasium in which the fibres of his manhood are developed. He compels +respect and recognition from those who have ridiculed his poverty. Put +the other boy in a Vanderbilt family. Give him French and German +nurses; gratify every wish. Place him under the tutelage of great +masters and send him to Harvard. Give him thousands a year for +spending money, and let him travel extensively. +</P> + +<P> +The two meet. The city lad is ashamed of his country brother. The +plain, threadbare clothes, hard hands, tawny face, and awkward manner +of the country boy make sorry contrast with the genteel appearance of +the other. The poor boy bemoans his hard lot, regrets that he has "no +chance in life," and envies the city youth. He thinks that it is a +cruel Providence that places such a wide gulf between them. They meet +again as men, but how changed! It is as easy to distinguish the +sturdy, self-made man from the one who has been propped up all his life +by wealth, position, and family influence, as it is for the shipbuilder +to tell the difference between the plank from the rugged mountain oak +and one from the sapling of the forest. If you think there is no +difference, place each plank in the bottom of a ship, and test them in +a hurricane at sea. +</P> + +<P> +When God wants to educate a man, he does not send him to school to the +Graces, but to the Necessities. Through the pit and the dungeon Joseph +came to a throne. We are not conscious of the mighty cravings of our +half divine humanity; we are not aware of the god within us until some +chasm yawns which must be filled, or till the rending asunder of our +affections forces us to become conscious of a need. Paul in his Roman +cell; John Huss led to the stake at Constance; Tyndale dying in his +prison at Amsterdam; Milton, amid the incipient earthquake throes of +revolution, teaching two little boys in Aldgate Street; David +Livingstone, worn to a shadow, dying in a negro hut in Central Africa, +alone,—what failures they might all to themselves have seemed to be, +yet what mighty purposes was God working out by their apparent +humiliations! +</P> + +<P> +Two highwaymen chancing once to pass a gibbet, one of them exclaimed: +"What a fine profession ours would be if there were no gibbets!" "Tut, +you blockhead," replied the other, "gibbets are the making of us; for, +if there were no gibbets, every one would be a highwayman." Just so +with every art, trade, or pursuit; it is the difficulties that scare +and keep out unworthy competitors. +</P> + +<P> +"Success grows out of struggles to overcome difficulties," says Smiles. +"If there were no difficulties, there would be no success. In this +necessity for exertion we find the chief source of human +advancement,—the advancement of individuals as of nations. It has led +to most of the mechanical inventions and improvements of the age." +</P> + +<P> +"Stick your claws into me," said Mendelssohn to his critics when +entering the Birmingham orchestra. "Don't tell me what you like but +what you don't like." +</P> + +<P> +John Hunter said that the art of surgery would never advance until +professional men had the courage to publish their failures as well as +their successes. +</P> + +<P> +"Young men need to be taught not to expect a perfectly smooth and easy +way to the objects of their endeavor or ambition," says Dr. Peabody. +"Seldom does one reach a position with which he has reason to be +satisfied without encountering difficulties and what might seem +discouragements. But if they are properly met, they are not what they +seem, and may prove to be helps, not hindrances. There is no more +helpful and profiting exercise than surmounting obstacles." +</P> + +<P> +It is said that but for the disappointments of Dante, Florence would +have had another prosperous Lord Mayor; and the ten dumb centuries +continued voiceless, and the ten other listening centuries (for there +will be ten of them, and more) would have had no "Divina Commedia" to +hear! +</P> + +<P> +It was in the Madrid jail that Cervantes wrote "Don Quixote." He was +so poor that he could not even get paper during the last of his +writing, and had to write on scraps of leather. A rich Spaniard was +asked to help him, but the rich man replied: "Heaven forbid that his +necessities should be relieved, it is his poverty that makes the world +rich." +</P> + +<P> +"A constant struggle, a ceaseless battle to bring success from +inhospitable surroundings, is the price of all great achievements." +</P> + +<P> +"She sings well," said a great musician of a promising but passionless +cantatrice, "but she wants something, and in that something, +everything. If I were single, I would court her, I would marry her; I +would maltreat her; I would break her heart, and in six months she +would be the greatest singer in Europe." +</P> + +<P> +"He has the stuff in him to make a good musician," said Beethoven of +Rossini, "if he had only been well flogged when a boy; but he is +spoiled by the ease with which he composes." +</P> + +<P> +We do our best while fighting desperately to attain what the heart +covets. Martin Luther did his greatest work, and built up his best +character, while engaged in sharp controversy with the Pope. Later in +life his wife asks, "Doctor, how is it that whilst subject to Papacy we +prayed so often and with such fervor, whilst now we pray with the +utmost coldness and very seldom?" +</P> + +<P> +When Lord Eldon was poor, Lord Thurlow withheld a promised +commissionership of bankruptcy, saying that it was a favor not to give +it then. "What he meant was," said Eldon, "that he had learned I was +by nature very indolent, and it was only want that could make me very +industrious." +</P> + +<P> +Waters says that the struggle to obtain knowledge and to advance one's +self in the world strengthens the mind, disciplines the faculties, +matures the judgment, promotes self-reliance, and gives one +independence of thought and force of character. +</P> + +<P> +"The gods in bounty work up storms about us," says Addison, "that give +mankind occasion to exert their hidden strength, and throw out into +practice virtues that shun the day, and lie concealed in the smooth +seasons and the calms of life." +</P> + +<P> +The hothouse plant may tempt a pampered appetite or shed a languid +odor, but the working world gets its food from fields of grain and +orchards waving in the sun and free air, from cattle that wrestle on +the plains, from fishes that struggle with currents of river or ocean; +its choicest perfumes from flowers that bloom unheeded, and in +wind-tossed forests finds its timber for temples and for ships. +</P> + +<P> +"I do not see," says Emerson, "how any man can afford, for the sake of +his nerves and his nap, to spare any action in which he can partake. +It is pearls and rubies to his discourse. Drudgery, calamity, +exasperation, want, are instructors in eloquence and wisdom. The true +scholar grudges every opportunity of action passed by as a loss of +power." +</P> + +<P> +Kossuth called himself "a tempest-tossed soul, whose eyes have been +sharpened by affliction." +</P> + +<P> +Benjamin Franklin ran away, and George Law was turned out of doors. +Thrown upon their own resources, they early acquired the energy and +skill to overcome difficulties. +</P> + +<P> +As soon as young eagles can fly the old birds tumble them out and tear +the down and feathers from their nest. The rude and rough experience +of the eaglet fits him to become the bold king of birds, fierce and +expert in pursuing his prey. +</P> + +<P> +Boys who are bound out, crowded out, kicked out, usually "turn out," +while those who do not have these disadvantages frequently fail to +"come out." +</P> + +<P> +"It was not the victories but the defeats of my life which have +strengthened me," said the aged Sidenham Poyntz. +</P> + +<P> +Almost from the dawn of history, oppression has been the lot of the +Hebrews, yet they have given the world its noblest songs, its wisest +proverbs, its sweetest music. With them persecution seems to bring +prosperity. They thrive where others would starve. They hold the +purse-strings of many nations. To them hardship has been "like spring +mornings, frosty but kindly, the cold of which will kill the vermin, +but will let the plant live." +</P> + +<P> +In one of the battles of the Crimea a cannon-ball struck inside the +fort, crashing through a beautiful garden. But from the ugly chasm +there burst forth a spring of water which ever afterward flowed a +living fountain. From the ugly gashes which misfortunes and sorrows +make in our hearts, perennial fountains of rich experience and new joys +often spring. +</P> + +<P> +Don't lament and grieve over lost wealth. The Creator may see +something grand and mighty which even He cannot bring out as long as +your wealth stands in the way. You must throw away the crutches of +riches and stand upon your own feet, and develop the long unused +muscles of manhood. God may see a rough diamond in you which only the +hard hits of poverty can polish. +</P> + +<P> +God knows where the richest melodies of our lives are, and what drill +and what discipline are necessary to bring them out. The frost, the +snows, the tempests, the lightnings, are the rough teachers that bring +the tiny acorn to the sturdy oak. Fierce winters are as necessary to +it as long summers. It is its half-century's struggle with the +elements for existence, wrestling with the storm, fighting for its life +from the moment that it leaves the acorn until it goes into the ship, +that gives it value. Without this struggle it would have been +character-less, stamina-less, nerve-less, and its grain would have +never been susceptible of high polish. The most beautiful as well as +the strongest woods are found not in tropical climates, but in the +severe climates, where they have to fight the frosts and the winter's +cold. +</P> + +<P> +Many a man has never found himself until he has lost his all. +Adversity stripped him only to discover him. Obstacles, hardships are +the chisel and mallet which shape the strong life into beauty. The +rough ledge on the hillside complains of the drill, of the blasting +powder which disturbs its peace of centuries: it is not pleasant to be +rent with powder, to be hammered and squared by the quarryman. But +look again: behold the magnificent statue, the monument, chiseled into +grace and beauty, telling its grand story of valor in the public square +for centuries. +</P> + +<P> +The statue would have slept in the marble forever but for the blasting, +the chiseling, and the polishing. The angel of our higher and nobler +selves would remain forever unknown in the rough quarries of our lives +but for the blastings of affliction, the chiseling of obstacles, and +the sand-papering of a thousand annoyances. +</P> + +<P> +Who has not observed the patience, the calm endurance, the sweet +loveliness chiseled out of some rough life by the reversal of fortune +or by some terrible affliction. +</P> + +<P> +How many business men have made their greatest strides toward manhood, +have developed their greatest virtues, when the reverses of fortune +have swept away everything they had in the world; when disease had +robbed them of all they held dear in life. Often we cannot see the +angel in the quarry of our lives, the statue of manhood, until the +blasts of misfortune have rent the ledge, and difficulties and +obstacles have squared and chiseled the granite blocks into grace and +beauty. +</P> + +<P> +Many a man has been ruined into salvation. The lightning which smote +his dearest hopes opened up a new rift in his dark life, and gave him +glimpses of himself which, until then, he had never seen. +</P> + +<P> +The grave buried his dearest hopes, but uncovered possibilities in his +nature of patience, endurance, and hope which he never dreamed he +possessed before. +</P> + +<P> +"Adversity is a severe instructor," says Edmund Burke, "set over us by +one who knows us better than we do ourselves, as he loves us better +too. He that wrestles with us strengthens our nerves and sharpens our +skill. Our antagonist is our helper. This conflict with difficulty +makes us acquainted with our object, and compels us to consider it in +all its relations. It will not suffer us to be superficial." +</P> + +<P> +Men who have the right kind of material in them will assert their +personality, and rise in spite of a thousand adverse circumstances. +You cannot keep them down. Every obstacle seems only to add to their +ability to get on. +</P> + +<P> +"Under different circumstances," says Castelar, "Savonarola would +undoubtedly have been a good husband, a tender father, a man unknown to +history, utterly powerless to print upon the sands of time and upon the +human soul the deep trace which he has left, but misfortune came to +visit him, to crush his heart, and to impart that marked melancholy +which characterizes a soul in grief, and the grief that circled his +brows with a crown of thorns was also that which wreathed them with the +splendor of immortality. His hopes were centred in the woman he loved, +his life was set upon the possession of her, and when her family +finally rejected him, partly on account of his profession, and partly +on account of his person, he believed that it was death that had come +upon him, when in truth it was immortality." +</P> + +<P> +The greatest men will ever be those who have risen from the ranks. It +is said that there are ten thousand chances to one that genius, talent, +and virtue shall issue from a farmhouse rather than from a palace. +</P> + +<P> +The youth Opie earned his bread by sawing wood, but he reached a +professorship in the Royal Academy. When but ten years old he showed +the material he was made of by a beautiful drawing on a shingle. +Antonio Canova was the son of a day laborer. Thorwaldsen's parents +were poor, but, like hundreds of others, they did with their might what +their hands found to do, and ennobled their work. They rose by being +greater than their calling, as Arkwright rose above mere barbering, +Bunyan above tinkering, Wilson above shoemaking, Lincoln above +rail-splitting, and Grant above tanning. By being first-class barbers, +tinkers, shoemakers, rail-splitters, tanners, they acquired the power +which enabled them to become great inventors, authors, statesmen, +generals. +</P> + +<P> +Adversity exasperates fools, dejects cowards, draws out the faculties +of the wise and industrious, puts the modest to the necessity of trying +their skill, awes the opulent, and makes the idle industrious. Neither +do uninterrupted success and prosperity qualify men for usefulness and +happiness. The storms of adversity, like those of the ocean, rouse the +faculties, and excite the invention, prudence, skill, and fortitude of +the voyager. The martyrs of ancient times, in bracing their minds to +outward calamities, acquired a loftiness of purpose and a moral heroism +worth a lifetime of softness and security. A man upon whom continuous +sunshine falls is like the earth in August: he becomes parched and dry +and hard and close-grained. Men have drawn from adversity the elements +of greatness. If you have the blues, go and see the poorest and +sickest families within your knowledge. The darker the setting, the +brighter the diamond. Don't run about and tell acquaintances that you +have been unfortunate; people do not like to have unfortunate men for +acquaintances. +</P> + +<P> +Beethoven was almost totally deaf and burdened with sorrow when he +produced his greatest works. Schiller wrote his best books in great +bodily suffering. He was not free from pain for fifteen years. Milton +wrote his leading productions when blind, poor, and sick. "Who best +can suffer," said he, "best can do." Bunyan said that, if it were +lawful, he could even pray for greater trouble, for the greater +comfort's sake. +</P> + +<P> +"Do you know what God puts us on our backs for?" asked Dr. Payson, +smiling, as he lay sick in bed. "No," replied the visitor. "In order +that we may look upward." "I am not come to condole but to rejoice +with you," said the friend, "for it seems to me that this is no time +for mourning." "Well, I am glad to hear that," said Dr. Payson, "it is +not often I am addressed in such a way. The fact is I never had less +need of condolence, and yet everybody persists in offering it; whereas, +when I was prosperous and well, and a successful preacher, and really +needed condolence, they flattered and congratulated me." +</P> + +<P> +A German knight undertook to make an immense Aeolian harp by stretching +wires from tower to tower of his castle. When he finished the harp it +was silent; but when the breezes began to blow he heard faint strains +like the murmuring of distant music. At last a tempest arose and swept +with fury over his castle, and then rich and grand music came from the +wires. Ordinary experiences do not seem to touch some lives—to bring +out any poetry, any higher manhood. +</P> + +<P> +Not until the breath of the plague had blasted a hundred thousand +lives, and the great fire had licked up cheap, shabby, wicked London, +did she arise, phoenix-like, from her ashes and ruin, a grand and +mighty city. +</P> + +<P> +True salamanders live best in the furnace of persecution. +</P> + +<P> +"Every man who makes a fortune has been more than once a bankrupt, if +the truth were known," said Albion Tourgée. "Grant's failure as a +subaltern made him commander-in-chief, and for myself, my failure to +accomplish what I set out to do led me to what I never had aspired to." +</P> + +<P> +The appeal for volunteers in the great battle of life, in exterminating +ignorance and error, and planting high on an everlasting foundation the +banner of intelligence and right, is directed to <I>you</I>. Burst the +trammels that impede your progress, and cling to hope. Place high thy +standard, and with a firm tread and fearless eye press steadily onward. +</P> + +<P> +Not ease, but effort, not facility, but difficulty, makes men. +Toilsome culture is the price of great success, and the slow growth of +a great character is one of its special necessities. Many of our best +poets +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Are cradled into poetry by wrong,<BR> +And learn in suffering what they teach in song."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Byron was stung into a determination to go to the top by a scathing +criticism of his first book, "Hours of Idleness," published when he was +but nineteen years of age. Macaulay said, "There is scarce an instance +in history of so sudden a rise to so dizzy an eminence as Byron +reached." In a few years he stood by the side of such men as Scott, +Southey, and Campbell, and died at thirty-seven, that age so fatal to +genius. Many an orator like "stuttering Jack Curran," or "Orator Mum," +as he was once called, has been spurred into eloquence by ridicule and +abuse. +</P> + +<P> +This is the crutch age. "Helps" and "aids" are advertised everywhere. +We have institutes, colleges, universities, teachers, books, libraries, +newspapers, magazines. Our thinking is done for us. Our problems are +all worked out in "explanations" and "keys." Our boys are too often +tutored through college with very little study. "Short roads" and +"abridged methods" are characteristic of the century. Ingenious +methods are used everywhere to get the drudgery out of the college +course. Newspapers give us our politics, and preachers our religion. +Self-help and self-reliance are getting old fashioned. Nature, as if +conscious of delayed blessings, has rushed to man's relief with her +wondrous forces, and undertakes to do the world's drudgery and +emancipate him from Eden's curse. +</P> + +<P> +But do not misinterpret her edict. She emancipates from the lower only +to call to the higher. She does not bid the world go and play while +she does the work. She emancipates the muscles only to employ the +brain and heart. +</P> + +<P> +The most beautiful as well as the strongest characters are not +developed in warm climates, where man finds his bread ready made on +trees, and where exertion is a great effort, but rather in a trying +climate and on a stubborn soil. It is no chance that returns to the +Hindoo ryot a penny and to the American laborer a dollar for his daily +toil; that makes Mexico with its mineral wealth poor, and New England +with its granite and ice rich. It is rugged necessity, it is the +struggle to obtain, it is poverty the priceless spur, that develops the +stamina of manhood, and calls the race out of barbarism. Labor found +the world a wilderness and has made it a garden. +</P> + +<P> +As the sculptor thinks only of the angel imprisoned in the marble +block, so Nature cares only for the man or woman shut up in the human +being. The sculptor cares nothing for the block as such; Nature has +little regard for the mere lump of breathing clay. The sculptor will +chip off all unnecessary material to set free the angel. Nature will +chip and pound us remorselessly to bring out our possibilities. She +will strip us of wealth, humble our pride, humiliate our ambition, let +us down from the ladder of fame, will discipline us in a thousand ways, +if she can develop a little character. Everything must give way to +that. Wealth is nothing, position is nothing, fame is nothing, +<I>manhood is everything</I>. +</P> + +<P> +Not ease, not pleasure, not happiness, but a <I>man</I>, Nature is after. +In every great painting of the masters there is one idea or figure +which stands out boldly beyond everything else. Every other idea or +figure on the canvas is subordinate to it, but pointing to the central +idea, finds its true expression there. So in the vast universe of God, +every object of creation is but a guideboard with an index-finger +pointing to the central figure of the created universe—Man. Nature +writes this thought upon every leaf, she thunders it in every creation. +It is exhaled from every flower; it twinkles in every star. +</P> + +<P> +Oh, what price will Nature not pay for a man! Ages and aeons were +nothing for her to spend in preparing for his coming, or to make his +existence possible. She has rifled the centuries for his development, +and placed the universe at his disposal. The world is but his +kindergarten, and every created thing but an object-lesson from the +unseen universe. Nature resorts to a thousand expedients to develop a +perfect type of her grandest creation. To do this she must induce him +to fight his way up to his own loaf. She never allows him once to lose +sight of the fact that it is the struggle to attain that develops the +man. The moment we put our hand upon that which looks so attractive at +a distance, and which we struggled so hard to reach, Nature robs it of +its charm by holding up before us another prize still more attractive. +</P> + +<P> +"Life," says a philosopher, "refuses to be so adjusted as to eliminate +from it all strife and conflict and pain. There are a thousand tasks +that, in larger interests than ours, must be done, whether we want them +or no. The world refuses to walk upon tiptoe, so that we may be able +to sleep. It gets up very early and stays up very late, and all the +while there is the conflict of myriads of hammers and saws and axes +with the stubborn material that in no other way can be made to serve +its use and do its work for man. And then, too, these hammers and axes +are not wielded without strain or pang, but swung by the millions of +toilers who labor with their cries and groans and tears. Nay, our +temple-building, whether it be for God or man, exacts its bitter toll, +and fills life with cries and blows. The thousand rivalries of our +daily business, the fiercer animosities when we are beaten, the even +fiercer exultation when we have beaten, the crashing blows of disaster, +the piercing scream of defeat,—these things we have not yet gotten rid +of, nor in this life ever will. Why should we wish to get rid of them? +We are here, my brother, to be hewed and hammered and planed in God's +quarry and on God's anvil for a nobler life to come." Only the muscle +that is used is developed. +</P> + +<P> +The constantly cheerful man, who survives his blighted hopes and +disappointments, who takes them just for what they are, lessons, and +perhaps blessings in disguise, is the true hero. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +There is a strength<BR> +Deep bedded in our hearts of which we reck<BR> +But little, till the shafts of heaven have pierced<BR> +Its fragile dwelling. Must not earth be rent<BR> +Before her gems are found?<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">MRS. HEMANS.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"If what shone afar so grand<BR> +Turns to ashes in the hand,<BR> +On again, the virtue lies<BR> +In the struggle, not the prize."<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"The hero is not fed on sweets,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Daily his own heart he eats;</SPAN><BR> +Chambers of the great are jails,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And head-winds right for royal sails."</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 4em">"So many great</SPAN><BR> +Illustrious spirits have conversed with woe,<BR> +Have in her school been taught, as are enough<BR> +To consecrate distress, and make ambition<BR> +Even wish the frown beyond the smile of fortune."<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Then welcome each rebuff,<BR> +That turns earth's smoothness rough,<BR> +Each sting, that bids not sit nor stand but go.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">BROWNING.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap06"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER VI. +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +ONE UNWAVERING AIM. +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Life is an arrow—therefore you must know<BR> +What mark to aim at, how to use the bow—<BR> +Then draw it to the head and let it go.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">HENRY VAN DYKE.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +The important thing in life is to have a great aim, and to possess the +aptitude and perseverance to attain it.—GOETHE. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Concentration alone conquers.—C. BUXTON. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +"He who follows two hares is sure to catch neither." +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +"A double-minded man is unstable in all his ways." +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Let every one ascertain his special business and calling, and then +stick to it if he would be successful.—FRANKLIN. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +"Digression is as dangerous as stagnation in the career of a young man +in business." +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Every man who observes vigilantly and resolves steadfastly grows +unconsciously into genius.—BULWER. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Genius is intensity.—BALZAC. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"Why do you lead such a solitary life?" asked a friend of Michael +Angelo. "Art is a jealous mistress," replied the artist; "she requires +the whole man." During his labors at the Sistine Chapel, according to +Disraeli, he refused to meet any one, even at his own house. +</P> + +<P> +"That day we sailed westward, which was our course," were the simple +but grand words which Columbus wrote in his journal day after day. +Hope might rise and fall, terror and dismay might seize upon the crew +at the mysterious variations of the compass, but Columbus, unappalled, +pushed due west and nightly added to his record the above words. +</P> + +<P> +"Cut an inch deeper," said a member of the Old Guard to the surgeon +probing his wound, "and you will find the Emperor,"—meaning his heart. +By the marvelous power of concentrated purpose Napoleon had left his +name on the very stones of the capital, had burned it indelibly into +the heart of every Frenchman, and had left it written in living letters +all over Europe. France to-day has not shaken off the spell of that +name. In the fair city on the Seine the mystic "N" confronts you +everywhere. +</P> + +<P> +Oh, the power of a great purpose to work miracles! It has changed the +face of the world. Napoleon knew that there were plenty of great men +in France, but they did not know the might of the unwavering aim by +which he was changing the destinies of Europe. He saw that what was +called the "balance of power" was only an idle dream; that, unless some +master-mind could be found which was a match for events, the millions +would rule in anarchy. His iron will grasped the situation; and like +William Pitt, he did not loiter around balancing the probabilities of +failure or success, or dally with his purpose. There was no turning to +the right nor to the left; no dreaming away time, nor building +air-castles; but one look and purpose, forward, upward and onward, +straight to his goal. He always hit the bull's-eye. His great success +in war was due largely to his definiteness of aim. He was like a great +burning-glass, concentrating the rays of the sun upon a single spot; he +burned a hole wherever he went. The secret of his power lay in his +ability to concentrate his forces upon a single point. After finding +the weak place in the enemy's ranks, he would mass his men and hurl +them like an avalanche upon the critical point, crowding volley upon +volley, charge upon charge, till he made a breach. What a lesson of +the power of concentration there is in this man's life! He was able to +focus all his faculties upon the smallest detail, as well as upon an +empire. But, alas! Napoleon was himself defeated by violation of his +own tactics,—the constantly repeated crushing force of heavy +battalions upon one point. +</P> + +<P> +To succeed to-day a man must concentrate all the faculties of his mind +upon one unwavering aim, and have a tenacity of purpose which means +death or victory. Every other inclination which tempts him from his +aim must be suppressed. +</P> + +<P> +New Jersey has many ports, but they are so shallow and narrow that the +shipping of the entire state amounts to but little. On the other hand, +New York has but one ocean port, and yet it is so broad, deep, and +grand, that it leads America in its enormous shipping trade. She sends +her vessels into every port of the world, while the ships of her +neighbor are restricted to local voyages. +</P> + +<P> +A man may starve on a dozen half-learned trades or occupations; he may +grow rich and famous upon one trade thoroughly mastered, even though it +be the humblest. +</P> + +<P> +Even Gladstone, with his ponderous yet active brain, says he cannot do +two things at once; he throws his entire strength upon whatever he +does. The intensest energy characterizes everything he undertakes, +even his recreation. If such concentration of energy is necessary for +the success of a Gladstone, what can we common mortals hope to +accomplish by "scatteration?" +</P> + +<P> +All great men have been noted for their power of concentration which +makes them oblivious of everything outside their aim. Victor Hugo +wrote his "Notre Dame" during the revolution of 1830, while the bullets +were whistling across his garden. He shut himself up in one room, +locking his clothes up, lest they should tempt him to go out into the +street, and spent most of that winter wrapped in a big gray comforter, +pouring his very life into his work. +</P> + +<P> +Genius is intensity. Abraham Lincoln possessed such power of +concentration that he could repeat quite correctly a sermon to which he +had listened in his boyhood. Dr. O. W. Holmes, when an Andover +student, riveted his eyes on the book he was studying as though he were +reading a will that made him heir to a million. +</P> + +<P> +A New York sportsman, in answer to an advertisement, sent twenty-five +cents for a sure receipt to prevent a shotgun from scattering, and +received the following; "Dear Sir: To keep a gun from scattering put in +but a single shot." +</P> + +<P> +It is the men who do one thing in this world who come to the front. +Who is the favorite actor? It is a Jefferson, who devotes a lifetime +to a "Rip Van Winkle," a Booth, an Irving, a Kean, who plays one +character until he can play it better than any other man living, and +not the shallow players who impersonate all parts. It is the man who +never steps outside of his specialty or dissipates his individuality. +It is an Edison, a Morse, a Bell, a Howe, a Stephenson, a Watt. It is +Adam Smith, spending ten years on the "Wealth of Nations." It is +Gibbon, giving twenty years to his "Decline and Fall of the Roman +Empire." It is a Hume, writing thirteen hours a day on his "History of +England." It is a Webster, spending thirty-six years on his +dictionary. It is a Bancroft, working twenty-six years on his "History +of the United States." It is a Field, crossing the ocean fifty times +to lay a cable, while the world ridicules. It is a Newton, writing his +"Chronology of Ancient Nations" sixteen times. It is a Grant, who +proposes to "fight it out on this line if it takes all summer." These +are the men who have written their names prominently in the history of +the world. +</P> + +<P> +A one-talent man who decides upon a definite object accomplishes more +than the ten-talent man who scatters his energies and never knows +exactly what he will do. The weakest living creature, by concentrating +his powers upon one thing, can accomplish something; the strongest, by +dispersing his over many, may fail to accomplish anything. Drop after +drop, continually falling, wears a passage through the hardest rock. +The hasty tempest, as Carlyle points out, rushes over it with hideous +uproar and leaves no trace behind. +</P> + +<P> +A great purpose is cumulative; and, like a great magnet, it attracts +all that is kindred along the stream of life. +</P> + +<P> +A Yankee can splice a rope in many different ways; an English sailor +only knows one way, but that is the best one. It is the one-sided man, +the sharp-edged man, the man of single and intense purpose, the man of +one idea, who turns neither to the right nor to the left, though a +paradise tempt him, who cuts his way through obstacles and forges to +the front. The time has gone forever when a Bacon can span universal +knowledge; or when, absorbing all the knowledge of the times, a Dante +can sustain arguments against fourteen disputants in the University of +Paris, and conquer in them all. The day when a man can successfully +drive a dozen callings abreast is a thing of the past. Concentration +is the keynote of the century. +</P> + +<P> +Scientists estimate that there is energy enough in less than fifty +acres of sunshine to run all the machinery in the world, if it could be +concentrated. But the sun might blaze out upon the earth forever +without setting anything on fire; although these rays focused by a +burning-glass would melt solid granite, or even change a diamond into +vapor. There are plenty of men who have ability enough; the rays of +their faculties, taken separately, are all right, but they are +powerless to collect them, to bring them all to bear upon a single +spot. Versatile men, universal geniuses, are usually weak, because +they have no power to concentrate their talents upon one point, and +this makes all the difference between success and failure. +</P> + +<P> +Chiseled upon the tomb of a disappointed, heart-broken king, Joseph II. +of Austria, in the Royal Cemetery at Vienna, a traveler tells us, is +this epitaph: "Here lies a monarch who, with the best of intentions, +never carried out a single plan." +</P> + +<P> +Sir James Mackintosh was a man of remarkable ability. He excited in +every one who knew him the greatest expectations. Many watched his +career with much interest, expecting that he would dazzle the world. +But there was no purpose in his life. He had intermittent attacks of +enthusiasm for doing great things, but his zeal all evaporated before +he could decide what to do. This fatal defect in his character kept +him balancing between conflicting motives; and his whole life was +almost thrown away. He lacked power to choose one object and persevere +with a single aim, sacrificing every interfering inclination. He +vacillated for weeks trying to determine whether to use "usefulness" or +"utility" in a composition. +</P> + +<P> +One talent utilized in a single direction will do infinitely more than +ten talents scattered. A thimbleful of powder behind a ball in a rifle +will do more execution than a carload of powder unconfined. The +rifle-barrel is the purpose that gives direct aim to the powder, which +otherwise, no matter how good it might be, would be powerless. The +poorest scholar in school or college often, in practical life, far +outstrips the class leader or senior wrangler, simply because what +little ability he has he employs for a definite object, while the +other, depending upon his general ability and brilliant prospects, +never concentrates his powers. +</P> + +<P> +"A sublime self-confidence," says E. P. Whipple, "springing not from +self-conceit, but from an intense identification of the man with his +object, lifts him altogether above the fear of danger and death, and +communicates an almost superhuman audacity to his will." +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<A NAME="img-112"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG CLASS="imgcenter" SRC="images/img-112.jpg" ALT="RICHARD ARKWRIGHT" BORDER="2" WIDTH="360" HEIGHT="514"> +<H3 CLASS="h3center" STYLE="width: 360px"> +RICHARD ARKWRIGHT +</H3> +</CENTER> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +What a sublime spectacle is that of a man going straight to his goal, +cutting his way through difficulties, and surmounting obstacles which +dishearten others, as though they were stepping-stones. +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<P> +It is fashionable to ridicule the man of one idea, but the men who have +changed the front of the world have been men of a single aim. No man +can make his mark on this age of specialties who is not a man of one +idea, one supreme aim, one master passion. The man who would make +himself felt on this bustling planet, who would make a breach in the +compact conservatism of our civilization, must play all his guns on one +point. A wavering aim, a faltering purpose, has no place in the +nineteenth century. "Mental shiftlessness" is the cause of many a +failure. The world is full of unsuccessful men who spend their lives +letting empty buckets down into empty wells. +</P> + +<P> +"Mr. A. often laughs at me," said a young American chemist, "because I +have but one idea. He talks about everything, aims to excel in many +things; but I have learned that, if I ever wish to make a breach, I +must play my guns continually upon one point." This great chemist, +when an obscure schoolmaster, used to study by the light of a pine knot +in a log cabin. Not many years later he was performing experiments in +electro-magnetism before English earls, and subsequently he was at the +head of one of the largest scientific institutes of this country. This +man was the late Professor Henry, of the Smithsonian Institution, +Washington. +</P> + +<P> +Douglas Jerrold once knew a man who was familiar with twenty-four +languages but could not express a thought in one of them. +</P> + +<P> +We should guard against a talent which we cannot hope to practice in +perfection, says Goethe. Improve it as we may, we shall always, in the +end, when the merit of the matter has become apparent to us, painfully +lament the loss of time and strength devoted to such botching. An old +proverb says: "The master of one trade will support a wife and seven +children, and the master of seven will not support himself." +</P> + +<P> +<I>It is the single aim that wins</I>. Men with monopolizing ambitions +rarely live in history. They do not focus their powers long enough to +burn their names indelibly into the roll of honor. Edward Everett, +even with his magnificent powers, disappointed the expectations of his +friends. He spread himself over the whole field of knowledge and +elegant culture; but the mention of the name of Everett does not call +up any one great achievement as does that of names like Garrison and +Phillips. Voltaire called the Frenchman La Harpe an oven which was +always heating, but which never cooked anything. Hartley Coleridge was +splendidly endowed with talent, like Sir James Mackintosh, but there +was one fatal lack in his character—he had no definite purpose, and +his life was a failure. Unstable as water, he could not excel. +Southey, his uncle, says: +</P> + +<P> +"Coleridge has two left hands." He was so morbidly shy from living +alone in his dreamland that he could not open a letter without +trembling. He would often rally from his purposeless life, and resolve +to redeem himself from the oblivion he saw staring him in the face; +but, like Mackintosh, he remained a man of promise merely to the end of +his life. +</P> + +<P> +The world always makes way for the man with a purpose in him, like +Bismarck or Grant. Look at Rufus Choate, concentrating all his +attention first on one juryman, then on another, going back over the +whole line again and again, until he has burned his arguments into +their souls; until he has hypnotized them with his purpose; until they +see with his eyes, think his thoughts, feel his sensations. He never +stopped until he had projected his mind into theirs, and permeated +their lives with his individuality. There was no escape from his +concentration of purpose, his persuasive rhetoric, his convincing +logic. "Carry the jury at all hazards," he used to say to young +lawyers; "move heaven and earth to carry the jury, and then fight it +out with the judge on the law questions as best you can." +</P> + +<P> +The man who succeeds has a programme. He fixes his course and adheres +to it. He lays his plans and executes them. He goes straight to his +goal. He is not pushed this way and that every time a difficulty is +thrown in his path; if he can't get over it he goes through it. +Constant and steady use of the faculties under a central purpose gives +strength and power, while the use of faculties without an aim or end +only weakens them. The mind must be focused on a definite end, or, +like machinery without a balance-wheel, it will rack itself to pieces. +</P> + +<P> +This age of concentration calls, not for educated men merely, not for +talented men, not for geniuses, not for jacks-of-all-trades, but for +men who are trained to do one thing as well as it can be done. +Napoleon could go through the drill of his soldiers better than any one +of his men. +</P> + +<P> +<I>Stick to your aim</I>. The constant changing of one's occupation is +fatal to all success. After a young man has spent five or six years in +a dry goods store, he concludes that he would rather sell groceries, +thereby throwing away five years of valuable experience which will be +of very little use to him in the grocery business; and so he spends a +large part of his life drifting around from one kind of employment to +another, learning part of each, but all of none, forgetting that +experience is worth more to him than money, and that the years devoted +to learning his trade or occupation are the most valuable. +Half-learned trades, no matter if a man has twenty, will never give him +a good living, much less a competency, while wealth is absolutely out +of the question. +</P> + +<P> +How many young men fail to reach the point of efficiency in one line of +work before they get discouraged and venture into something else. How +easy to see the thorns in one's own profession or vocation, and only +the roses in that of another. A young man in business, for instance, +seeing a physician riding about town in his carriage, visiting his +patients, imagines that a doctor must have an easy, ideal life, and +wonders that he himself should have embarked in an occupation so full +of disagreeable drudgery and hardships. He does not know of the years +of dry, tedious study which the physician has consumed, the months and +perhaps years of waiting for patients, the dry detail of anatomy, the +endless names of drugs and technical terms. +</P> + +<P> +Scientists tell us that there is nothing in nature so ugly and +disagreeable but intense light will make it beautiful. The complete +mastery of one profession will render even the driest details +interesting. The consciousness of thorough knowledge, the habit of +doing everything to a finish, gives a feeling of strength, of +superiority, which takes the drudgery out of an occupation. The more +completely we master a vocation the more thoroughly we enjoy it. In +fact, the man who has found his place and become master in it could +scarcely be induced, even though he be a farmer, or a carpenter, or +grocer, to exchange places with a governor or congressman. To be +successful is to <I>find your sphere and fill it, to get into your place +and master it</I>. +</P> + +<P> +There is a sense of great power in a vocation after a man has reached +the point of efficiency in it, the point of productiveness, the point +where his skill begins to tell and bring in returns. Up to this point +of efficiency, while he is learning his trade, the time seems to have +been almost thrown away. But he has been storing up a vast reserve of +knowledge of detail, laying foundations, forming his acquaintances, +gaining his reputation for truthfulness, trustworthiness, and +integrity, and in establishing his credit. When he reaches this point +of efficiency, all the knowledge and skill, character, influence, and +credit thus gained come to his aid, and he soon finds that in what +seemed almost thrown away lies the secret of his prosperity. The +credit he established as a clerk, the confidence, the integrity, the +friendships formed, he finds equal to a large capital when he starts +out for himself and takes the highway to fortune; while the young man +who half learned several trades, and got discouraged and stopped just +short of the point of efficiency, just this side of success, is a +failure because he didn't go far enough; he did not press on to the +point at which his acquisition would have been profitable. +</P> + +<P> +In spite of the fact that nearly all very successful men have made a +life work of one thing, we see on every hand hundreds of young men and +women flitting about from occupation to occupation, trade to trade, in +one thing to-day and another to-morrow,—just as though they could go +from one thing to another by turning a switch, as if they could run as +well on another track as on the one they have left, regardless of the +fact that no two careers have the same gauge, that every man builds his +own road upon which another's engine cannot run either with speed or +safety. This fickleness, this disposition to shift about from one +occupation to another, seems to be peculiar to American life, so much +so that, when a young man meets a friend whom he has not seen for some +time, the commonest question to ask is, "What are you doing now?" +showing the improbability or uncertainty that he is doing to-day what +he was doing when they last met. +</P> + +<P> +Some people think that if they "keep everlastingly at it" they will +succeed, but this is not so. Working without a plan is as foolish as +going to sea without a compass. A ship which has broken its rudder in +mid-ocean may "keep everlastingly at it," may keep on a full head of +steam, driving about all the time, but it never arrives anywhere, it +never reaches any port unless by accident, and if it does find a haven, +its cargo may not be suited to the people, the climate, or conditions +among which it has accidentally drifted. The ship must be directed to +a definite port, for which its cargo is adapted, and where there is a +demand for it, and it must aim steadily for that port through sunshine +and storm, through tempest and fog. So a man who would succeed must +not drift about rudderless on the ocean of life. He must not only +steer straight toward his destined port when the ocean is smooth, when +the currents and winds serve, but he must keep his course in the very +teeth of the wind and the tempest, and even when enveloped in the fogs +of disappointment and mists of opposition. The Cunarders do not stop +for fogs or storms; they plow straight through the rough seas with only +one thing in view, their destined port, and no matter what the weather +is, no matter what obstacles they encounter, their arrival in port can +be predicted to within a few hours. It is practically certain, too, +that the ship destined for Boston will not turn up at Fort Sumter or at +Sandy Hook. +</P> + +<P> +On the prairies of South America there grows a flower that always +inclines in the same direction. If a traveler loses his way and has +neither compass nor chart, by turning to this flower he will find a +guide on which he can implicitly rely; for no matter how the rains +descend or the winds blow, its leaves point to the north. So there are +many men whose purposes are so well known, whose aims are so constant, +that no matter what difficulties they may encounter, or what opposition +they may meet, you can tell almost to a certainty where they will come +out. They may be delayed by head winds and counter currents, but they +will <I>always head for the port</I> and will steer straight towards the +harbor. You know to a certainty that whatever else they may lose, they +will not lose their compass or rudder. +</P> + +<P> +Whatever may happen to a man of this stamp, even though his sails may +be swept away and his mast stripped to the deck, though he may be +wrecked by the storms of life, the needle of his compass will still +point to the North Star of his hope. Whatever comes, his life will not +be purposeless. Even a wreck that makes its port is a greater success +than a full-rigged ship with all its sails flying, with every mast and +rope intact; which merely drifts into an accidental harbor. +</P> + +<P> +To fix a wandering life and give it direction is not an easy task, but +a life which has no definite aim is sure to be frittered away in empty +and purposeless dreams. "Listless triflers," "busy idlers," +"purposeless busybodies," are seen everywhere. A healthy, definite +purpose is a remedy for a thousand ills which attend aimless lives. +Discontent, dissatisfaction, flee before a definite purpose. An aim +takes the drudgery out of life, scatters doubts to the winds, and +clears up the gloomiest creeds. What we do without a purpose +begrudgingly, with a purpose becomes a delight, and no work is well +done nor healthily done which is not enthusiastically done. It is just +that added element which makes work immortal. +</P> + +<P> +Mere energy is not enough, it must be concentrated on some steady, +unwavering aim. What is more common than "unsuccessful geniuses," or +failures with "commanding talents"? Indeed, "unrewarded genius" has +become a proverb. Every town has unsuccessful educated and talented +men. But education is of no value, talent is worthless, unless it can +do something, achieve something. Men who can do something at +everything, and a very little at anything, are not wanted in this age. +In Paris, a certain Monsieur Kenard announced himself as a "public +scribe, who digests accounts, explains the language of flowers, and +sells fried potatoes." Jacks-at-all-trades are at war with the genius +of the times. +</P> + +<P> +What this age wants is young men and women who can do one thing without +losing their identity or individuality, or becoming narrow, cramped, or +dwarfed. Nothing can take the place of an all-absorbing purpose; +education will not, genius will not, talent will not, industry will +not, will-power will not. The purposeless life must ever be a failure. +What good are powers, faculties, unless we can use them for a purpose? +What good would a chest of tools do a carpenter unless he could use +them? A college education, a head full of knowledge, are worth little +to the men who cannot use them to some definite end. +</P> + +<P> +The man without a purpose never leaves his mark upon the world. He has +no individuality; he is absorbed in the mass, lost in the crowd, weak, +wavering, incompetent. His outlines of individuality and angles of +character have been worn off, planed down to suit the common thought +until he has, as a man, been lost in the throng of humanity. +</P> + +<P> +"He who would do some great thing in this short life must apply himself +to the work with such a concentration of his forces as, to idle +spectators, who live only to amuse themselves, looks like insanity." +</P> + +<P> +What a great directness of purpose may be traced in the career of Pitt, +who lived—ay, and died—for the sake of political supremacy. From a +child, the idea was drilled into him that he must accomplish a public +career worthy of his illustrious father. Even from boyhood he bent all +his energy to this one great purpose. He went straight from college to +the House of Commons. In one year he was Chancellor of the Exchequer; +two years later he was Prime Minister of England, and reigned virtually +king for a quarter of a century. He was utterly oblivious of +everything outside his aim; insensible to the claims of love, art, +literature, living and steadily working for the sole purpose of +wielding the governing power of the nation. His whole soul was +absorbed in the overmastering passion for political power. +</P> + +<P> +"Consider, my lord," said Rowland Hill to the Prime Minister of +England, "that a letter to Ireland and the answer back would cost +thousands upon thousands of my affectionate countrymen more than a +fifth of their week's wages. If you shut the post office to them, +which you do now, you shut out warm hearts and generous affections from +home, kindred, and friends." The lad learned that it cost to carry a +letter from London to Edinburgh, four hundred and four miles, one +eighteenth of a cent, while the government charged for a simple folded +sheet of paper twenty-eight cents, and twice as much if there was the +smallest inclosure. Against the opposition and contempt of the +post-office department he at length carried his point, and on January +10, 1840, penny postage was established throughout Great Britain. Mr. +Hill was chosen to introduce the system, at a salary of fifteen hundred +pounds a year. His success was most encouraging, but at the end of two +years a Tory minister dismissed him without paying for his services, as +agreed. The public was indignant, and at once contributed sixty-five +thousand dollars; and, at the request of Queen Victoria, Parliament +voted him one hundred thousand dollars and ten thousand dollars a year +for life. +</P> + +<P> +Christ knew that one affection rules in man's life when he said, "No +man can serve two masters." One affection, one object, will be supreme +in us. Everything else will be neglected and done with half a heart. +One may have subordinate plans, but he can have but one supreme aim, +and from this aim all others will take their character. +</P> + +<P> +It is a great purpose which gives meaning to life, it unifies all our +powers, binds them together in one cable; makes strong and united what +was weak, separated, scattered. +</P> + +<P> +"Painting is my wife and my works are my children," replied Michael +Angelo when asked why he did not marry. +</P> + +<P> +"Smatterers" are weak and superficial. Of what use is a man who knows +a little of everything and not much of anything? It is the momentum of +constantly repeated acts that tells the story. "Let thine eyes look +straight before thee. Ponder the path of thy feet and let all thy ways +be established. Turn not to the right hand nor to the left." One +great secret of St. Paul's power lay in his strong purpose. Nothing +could daunt him, nothing intimidate. The Roman Emperor could not +muzzle him, the dungeon could not appall him, no prison suppress him, +obstacles could not discourage him. "This one thing I do" was written +all over his work. The quenchless zeal of his mighty purpose burned +its way down through the centuries, and its contagion will never cease +to fire the hearts of men. +</P> + +<P> +"Try and come home somebody," said the fond mother to Gambetta as she +sent him off to Paris to school. Poverty pinched this lad hard in his +little garret study and his clothes were shabby, but what of that? He +had made up his mind to get on in the world. For years this youth was +chained to his desk and worked like a hero. At last his opportunity +came. Jules Favre was to plead a great cause on a certain day; but, +being ill, he chose this young man, absolutely unknown, rough and +uncouth, to take his place. For many years Gambetta had been preparing +for such an opportunity, and he was equal to it, for he made one of the +greatest speeches that up to that time had ever been made in France. +That night all the papers in Paris were sounding the praises of this +ragged, uncouth Bohemian, and soon all France recognized him as the +Republican leader. This sudden rise was not due to luck or accident. +He had been steadfastly working and fighting his way up against +opposition and poverty for just such an occasion. Had he not been +equal to it, it would only have made him ridiculous. What a stride; +yesterday, poor and unknown, living in a garret, to-day, deputy elect, +in the city of Marseilles, and the great Republican leader! The +gossipers of France had never heard his name before. He had been +expelled from the priest-making seminary as totally unfit for a priest +and an utterly undisciplinable character. In two weeks, this ragged +son of an Italian grocer arose in the Chamber, and moved that the +Napoleon dynasty be disposed of and the Republic be declared +established. +</P> + +<P> +When Louis Napoleon had been defeated at Sedan and had delivered his +sword to William of Prussia, and when the Prussian army was marching on +Paris, the brave Gambetta went out of the besieged city in a balloon +barely grazed by the Prussian guns, landed in Amiens, and by almost +superhuman skill raised three armies of 800,000 men, provided for their +maintenance, and directed their military operations. A German officer +said, "This colossal energy is the most remarkable event of modern +history, and will carry down Gambetta's name to remote posterity." +This youth who was poring over his books in an attic while other youths +were promenading the Champs Élysées, although but thirty-two years old, +was now virtually dictator of France, and the greatest orator in the +Republic. What a striking example of the great reserve of personal +power, which, even in dissolute lives, is sometimes called out by a +great emergency or sudden sorrow, and ever after leads the life to +victory! When Gambetta found that his first speech had electrified all +France, his great reserve rushed to the front, he was suddenly weaned +from dissipation, and resolved to make his mark in the world. Nor did +he lose his head in his quick leap into fame. He still lived in the +upper room in the musty Latin quarter, and remained a poor man, without +stain of dishonor, though he might easily have made himself a +millionaire. When Gambetta died the "Figaro" said, "The Republic has +lost its greatest man." American boys should study this great man, for +he loved our country, and made our Republic the pattern for France. +</P> + +<P> +There is no grander sight in the world than that of a young man fired +with a great purpose, dominated by one unwavering aim. He is bound to +win; the world stands one side and lets him pass; it always makes way +for the man with a will in him. He does not have one half the +opposition to overcome that the undecided, purposeless man has who, +like driftwood, runs against all sorts of snags to which he must yield, +because he has no momentum to force them out of his way. What a +sublime spectacle it is to see a youth going straight to his goal, +cutting his way through difficulties, and surmounting obstacles, which +dishearten others, as though they were but stepping-stones! Defeat, +like a gymnasium, only gives him new power; opposition only doubles his +exertions, dangers only increase his courage. No matter what comes to +him, sickness, poverty, disaster, he never turns his eye from his goal. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +"Duos qui sequitur lepores, neutrum capit." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap07"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER VII. +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +SOWING AND REAPING. +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that +shall he also reap.—GALATIANS. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Sow an act, and you reap a habit; sow a habit, and you reap a +character; sow a character, and you reap a destiny.—G. D. BOARDMAN. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Just as the twig is bent the tree's inclined.—POPE. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +How use doth breed a habit in a man.—SHAKESPEARE. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +All habits gather, by unseen degrees,<BR> +As brooks make rivers, rivers run to seas.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">DRYDEN.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Infinite good comes from good habits which must result from the common +influence of example, intercourse, knowledge, and actual +experience—morality taught by good morals.—PLATO. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +The chains of habit are generally too small to be felt till they are +too strong to be broken.—SAMUEL JOHNSON. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Man is first startled by sin; then it becomes pleasing, then easy, then +delightful, then frequent, then habitual, then confirmed. Then man is +impenitent, then obstinate, then he is damned.—JEREMY TAYLOR. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +"Rogues differ little. Each began as a disobedient son." +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +In the great majority of things, habit is a greater plague than ever +afflicted Egypt.—JOHN FOSTER. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +You cannot in any given case, by any sudden and single effort, will to +be true if the habit of your life has been insincere.—F. W. ROBERTSON. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +The tissue of the life to be,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">We weave with colors all our own;</SPAN><BR> +And in the field of destiny,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">We reap as we have sown.</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">WHITTIER.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"Gentlemen of the jury, you will now consider your verdict," said the +great lawyer, Lord Tenterden, as he roused from his lethargy a moment, +and then closed his eyes forever. "Tête d'armée" (head of the army), +murmured Napoleon faintly; and then, "on the wings of a tempest that +raged with unwonted fury, up to the throne of the only power that +controlled him while he lived, went the fiery soul of that wonderful +warrior." "Give Dayrolles a chair," said the dying Chesterfield with +his old-time courtesy, and the next moment his spirit spread its wings. +"Young man, keep your record clean," thrilled from the lips of John B. +Gough as he sank to rise no more. What power over the mind of man is +exercised by the dominant idea of his life "that parts not quite with +parting breath!" It has shaped his purpose throughout his earthly +career, and he passes into the Great Unknown, moving in the direction +of his ideal; impelled still, amid the utter retrocession of the vital +force, by all the momentum resulting from his weight of character and +singleness of aim. +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<A NAME="img-124"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG CLASS="imgcenter" SRC="images/img-124.jpg" ALT="VICTOR HUGO" BORDER="2" WIDTH="367" HEIGHT="512"> +<H3 CLASS="h3center" STYLE="width: 367px"> +VICTOR HUGO +</H3> +</CENTER> + +<P CLASS="caption" ALIGN="center"> +"Every one is the son of his own works." +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +"Cast forth thy act, thy word, into the ever-living, ever-working +universe: it is seed-grain that cannot die." +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<P> +It is a beautiful arrangement in the mental and<BR> +moral economy of our nature, that that which is performed as a duty +may, by frequent repetitions, become a habit, and the habit of stern +virtue, so repulsive to others, may hang around the neck like a wreath +of flowers." +</P> + +<P> +Cholera appeared mysteriously in Toulon, and, after a careful +examination, the medical inspectors learned that the first victims were +two sailors on the Montebello, a government transport, long out of +service, anchored at the entrance to the port. For many years the +vessel had been used for storing old, disused military equipments. +Some of these had belonged to French soldiers who had died before +Sebastopol. The doctors learned that the two poor sailors were seized, +suddenly and mortally, a few days after displacing a pile of equipments +stored deep in the hold of the Montebello. The cholera of Toulon came +in a direct line from the hospital of Varna. It went to sleep, +apparently gorged, on a heap of the cast-off garments of its victims, +to awaken thirty years later to victorious and venomous life. +</P> + +<P> +Professor Bonelli, of Turin, punctured an animal with the tooth of a +rattlesnake. The head of this serpent had lain in a dry state for +sixteen years exposed to the air and dust, and, moreover, had +previously been preserved more than thirty years in spirits of wine. +To his great astonishment an hour afterward the animal died. So +habits, good or bad, that have been lost sight of for years will spring +into a new life to aid or injure us at some critical moment, as kernels +of wheat which had been clasped in a mummy's hand four thousand years +sprang into life when planted. They only awaited moisture, heat, +sunlight, and air to develop them. +</P> + +<P> +In Jefferson's play, Rip Van Winkle, after he had "sworn off," at every +invitation to drink said, "Well, this time don't count." True, as +Professor James says, he may not have counted it, as thousands of +others have not counted it, and a kind heaven may not count it, but it +is being counted none the less. Down among his nerve cells and fibres +the molecules are counting it, registering and storing it up to be used +against him when the next temptation comes. Nothing we ever do is in +strict scientific literalness wiped out. There is a tendency in the +nervous system to repeat the same mode of action at regularly recurring +intervals. Dr. Combe says that all nervous diseases have a marked +tendency to observe regular periods. "If we repeat any kind of mental +effort at the same hour daily, we at length find ourselves entering +upon it without premeditation when the time approaches." +</P> + +<P> +"The great thing in all education is to make our nervous system our +ally instead of our enemy. It is to fund and capitalize our +acquisition, and live at ease upon the interest of the fund. For this +we must make automatic and habitual, as soon as possible, as many +useful actions as we can, and guard against the growing into ways that +are likely to be disadvantageous to us, as we would guard against the +plague." +</P> + +<P> +The nervous system is a living phonograph, infinitely more marvelous +than that of Edison. No sound, however feeble, however slight, can +escape being recorded in its wonderful mechanism. Although the +molecules of this living machine may all be entirely changed many times +during a lifetime, yet these impressions are never erased or lost. +They become forever fixed in the character. Like Rip Van Winkle, the +youth may say to himself, I will do this just once "just to see what it +is like," no one will ever know it, and "I won't count this time." The +country youth says it when he goes to the city. The young man says it +when he drinks "just to be social." Americans, who are good church +people at home, say it when in Paris and Vienna. Yes, "just to see +what it is like" has ruined many a noble life. Many a man has lost his +balance and fallen over the precipice into the sink of iniquity while +just attempting "to see what it was like." "If you have been pilot on +these waters twenty-five years," said a young man to the captain of a +steamer, "you must know every rock and sandbank in the river." "No, I +don't, but I know where the deep water is." +</P> + +<P> +Just one little lie to help me out of this difficulty; "I won't count +this." Just one little embezzlement; no one will know it, and I can +return the money before it will be needed. Just one little indulgence; +I won't count it, and a good night's sleep will make me all right +again. Just one small part of my work slighted; it won't make any +great difference, and, besides, I am usually so careful that a little +thing like this ought not to be counted. +</P> + +<P> +But, my young friend, it will be counted, whether you will or not; the +deed has been recorded with an iron pen, even to the smallest detail. +The Recording Angel is no myth; it is found in ourselves. Its name is +Memory, and it holds everything. We think we have forgotten thousands +of things until mortal danger, fever, or some other great stimulus +reproduces them to the consciousness with all the fidelity of +photographs. Sometimes all one's past life will seem to pass before +him in an instant; but at all times it is really, although +unconsciously, passing before him in the sentiments he feels, in the +thoughts he thinks, in the impulses that move him apparently without +cause. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Our acts our angels are, or good or ill,<BR> +Our fatal shadows that walk by us still."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +In a fable one of the Fates spun filaments so fine that they were +invisible, and she became a victim of her cunning, for she was bound to +the spot by these very threads. +</P> + +<P> +Father Schoenmaker, missionary to the Indians, tried for years to +implant civilization among the wild tribes. After fifteen years' labor +he induced a chief to lay aside his blanket, the token of savagery; but +he goes on to say, "It took fifteen years to get it off, and just +fifteen minutes to get it on him again." +</P> + +<P> +Physiologists say that dark-colored stripes similar to those on the +zebra reappear, after a hundred or a thousand generations, on the legs +and shoulders of horses, asses, and mules. Large birds on sea islands +where there are no beasts to molest them lose the power of flight. +</P> + +<P> +After a criminal's head had been cut off his breast was irritated, and +he raised his hands several times as if to brush away the exciting +cause. It was said that the cheek of Charlotte Corday blushed on being +struck by a rude soldier after the head had been severed from the body. +</P> + +<P> +Humboldt found in South America a parrot which was the only living +creature that could speak a word of the language of a lost tribe. The +bird retained the habit of speech after his teachers had died. +</P> + +<P> +Caspar Hauser was confined, probably from birth, in a dungeon where no +light or sound from the outer world, could reach him. At seventeen he +was still a mental infant, crying and chattering without much apparent +intelligence. When released, the light was disagreeable to his eyes; +and, after the babbling youth had been taught to speak a few words, he +begged to be taken back to the dungeon. Only cold and dismal silence +seemed to satisfy him. All that gave pleasure to others gave his +perverted senses only pain. The sweetest music was a source of anguish +to him, and he could eat only his black crust without violent vomiting. +</P> + +<P> +Deep in the very nature of animate existence is that principle of +facility and inclination, acquired by repetition, which we call habit. +Man becomes a slave to his constantly repeated acts. In spite of the +protests of his weakened will the trained nerves continue to repeat the +acts even when the doer abhors them. What he at first chooses, at last +compels. Man is as irrevocably chained to his deeds as the atoms are +chained by gravitation. You can as easily snatch a pebble from +gravitation's grasp as you can separate the minutest act of life from +its inevitable effect upon character and destiny. "Children may be +strangled," says George Eliot, "but deeds never, they have an +indestructible life." The smirched youth becomes the tainted man. +</P> + +<P> +Practically all the achievements of the human race are but the +accomplishments of habit. We speak of the power of Gladstone to +accomplish so much in a day as something marvelous; but when we analyze +that power we find it composed very largely of the results of habit. +His mighty momentum has been rendered possible only by the law of the +power of habit. He is now a great bundle of habits, which all his life +have been forming. His habit of industry no doubt was irksome and +tedious at first, but, practiced so conscientiously and persistently, +it has gained such momentum as to astonish the world. His habit of +thinking, close, persistent, and strong, has made him a power. He +formed the habit of accurate, keen observation, allowing nothing to +escape his attention, until he could observe more in half a day in +London than a score of men who have eyes but see not. Thus he has +multiplied himself many times. By this habit of accuracy he has +avoided many a repetition; and so, during his lifetime, he has saved +years of precious time, which many others, who marvel at his +achievements, have thrown away. +</P> + +<P> +Gladstone early formed the habit of cheerfulness, of looking on the +bright side of things, which, Sydney Smith says, "is worth a thousand +pounds a year." This again has saved him enormous waste of energy, as +he tells us he has never yet been kept awake a single hour by any +debate or business in Parliament. This loss of energy has wasted years +of many a useful life, which might have been saved by forming the +economizing habit of cheerfulness. +</P> + +<P> +The habit of happy thought would transform the commonest life into +harmony and beauty. The will is almost omnipotent to determine habits +which virtually are omnipotent. The habit of directing a firm and +steady will upon those things which tend to produce harmony of thought +would produce happiness and contentment even in the most lowly +occupations. The will, rightly drilled, can drive out all discordant +thoughts, and produce a reign of perpetual harmony. Our trouble is +that we do not half will. After a man's habits are well set, about all +he can do is to sit by and observe which way he is going. Regret it as +he may, how helpless is a weak man bound by the mighty cable of habit, +twisted from the tiny threads of single acts which he thought were +absolutely within his control! +</P> + +<P> +Drop a stone down a precipice. By the law of gravitation it sinks with +rapidly increasing momentum. If it falls sixteen feet the first +second, it will fall forty-eight feet the next second, and eighty feet +the third second, and one hundred and forty-four feet the fifth second, +and if it falls for ten seconds it will in the last second rush through +three hundred and four feet till earth stops it. Habit is cumulative. +After each act of our lives we are not the same person as before, but +quite another, better or worse, but not the same. There has been +something added to, or deducted from, our weight of character. +</P> + +<P> +"There is no fault nor folly of my life," said Ruskin; "that does not +rise against me and take away my joy, and shorten my power of +possession, of sight, of understanding; and every past effort of my +life, every gleam of righteousness or good in it, is with me now to +help me in my grasp of this hour and its vision." +</P> + +<P> +"Many men of genius have written worse scrawls than I do," said a boy +at Rugby when his teacher remonstrated with him for his bad penmanship; +"it is not worth while to worry about so trivial a fault." Ten years +later, when he had become an officer in the Crimea, his illegible copy +of an order caused the loss of many brave men. +</P> + +<P> +"Resist beginning" was an ancient motto which is needed in our day. +The folly of the child becomes the vice of the youth, and then the +crime of the man. +</P> + +<P> +In 1880 one hundred and forty-seven of the eight hundred and +ninety-seven inmates of Auburn State Prison were there on a second +visit. What brings the prisoner back the second, third, or fourth +time? It is habit which drives him on to commit the deed which his +heart abhors and which his very soul loathes. It is the momentum made +up from a thousand deviations from the truth and right, for there is a +great difference between going just right and a little wrong. It is +the result of that mysterious power which the repeated act has of +getting itself repeated again and again. +</P> + +<P> +When a woman was dying from the effects of her husband's cruelty and +debauchery from drink she asked him to come to her bedside, and pleaded +with him again for the sake of their children to drink no more. +Grasping his hand with her thin, long fingers, she made him promise +her: "Mary, I will drink no more till I take it out of this hand which +I hold in mine." That very night he poured out a tumbler of brandy, +stole into the room where she lay cold in her coffin, put the tumbler +into her withered hand, and then took it out and drained it to the +bottom. John B. Gough told this as a true story. How powerless a man +is in the presence of a mighty habit, which has robbed him of +will-power, of self-respect, of everything manly, until he becomes its +slave! +</P> + +<P> +Walpole tells of a gambler who fell at the table in a fit of apoplexy, +and his companions began to bet upon his chances of recovery. When the +physician came they refused to let him bleed the man because they said +it would affect the bet. When President Garfield was hanging between +life and death men bet heavily upon the issue, and even sold pools. +</P> + +<P> +No disease causes greater horror or dread than cholera; yet when it is +once fastened upon a victim he is perfectly indifferent, and wonders at +the solicitude of his friends. His tears are dried; he cannot weep if +he would. His body is cold and clammy and feels like dead flesh, yet +he tells you he is warm, and calls for ice water. Have you never seen +similar insensibility to danger in those whose habits are already +dragging them to everlasting death? +</P> + +<P> +Etherized by the fascinations of pleasure, we are often unconscious of +pain while the devil amputates the fingers, the feet and hands, or even +the arms and legs of our character. But oh, the anguish that visits +the sad heart when the lethe passes away, and the soul becomes +conscious of virtue sacrificed, of manhood lost. +</P> + +<P> +The leper is often the last to suspect his danger, for the disease is +painless in its early stages. A leading lawyer and public official in +the Sandwich Islands once overturned a lighted lamp on his hand, and +was surprised to find that it caused no pain. At last it dawned upon +his mind that he was a leper. He resigned his offices and went to the +leper's island, where he died. So sin in its early stages is not only +painless but often even pleasant. +</P> + +<P> +The hardening, deadening power of depraving habits and customs was +strikingly illustrated by the Romans. +</P> + +<P> +Under Nero, the taste of the people had become so debauched and morbid +that no mere representation of tragedy would satisfy them. Their +cold-blooded selfishness, the hideous realism of "a refined, delicate, +aesthetic age," demanded that the heroes should actually be killed on +the stage. The debauched and sanguinary Romans reckoned life worthless +without the most thrilling experiences of horror or delight. Tragedy +must be genuine bloodshed, comedy, actual shame. When "The +Conflagration" was represented on the stage they demanded that a house +be actually burned and the furniture plundered. When "Laureolus" was +played they demanded that the actor be really crucified and mangled by +a bear, and he had to fling himself down and deluge the stage with his +own blood. Prometheus must be really chained to his rock, and Dirce in +very fact be tossed and gored by the wild bull, and Orpheus be torn to +pieces by a real bear, and Icarus was compelled to fly, even though it +was known he would be dashed to death. When the heroism of "Mucius +Scaevola" was represented, a real criminal was compelled to thrust his +hand into the flame without a murmur, and stand motionless while it was +being burned. Hercules was compelled to ascend the funeral pyre, and +there be burned alive. The poor slaves and criminals were compelled to +play their parts heroically until the flames enveloped them. +</P> + +<P> +The pirate Gibbs, who was executed in New York, said that when he +robbed the first vessel his conscience made a hell in his bosom; but +after he had sailed for years under the black flag, he could rob a +vessel and murder all the crew, and lie down and sleep soundly. A man +may so accustom himself to error as to become its most devoted slave, +and be led to commit the most fearful crimes in order to defend it, or +to propagate it. +</P> + +<P> +When Gordon, the celebrated California stage-driver, was dying, he put +his foot out of the bed and swung it to and fro. When asked why he did +so, he replied, "I am on the down grade and cannot get my foot on the +brake." +</P> + +<P> +In our great museums you see stone slabs with the marks of rain that +fell hundreds of years before Adam lived, and the footprint of some +wild bird that passed across the beach in those olden times. The +passing shower and the light foot left their prints on the soft +sediment; then ages went on, and the sediment hardened into stone; and +there the prints remain, and will remain forever. So the child, so +soft, so susceptible to all impressions, so joyous to receive new +ideas, treasures them all up, gathers them all into itself, and retains +them forever. +</P> + +<P> +A tribe of Indians attacked a white settlement and murdered the few +inhabitants. A woman of the tribe, however, carried away a very young +infant, and reared it as her own. The child grew up with the Indian +children, different in complexion, but like them in everything else. +To scalp the greatest possible number of enemies was, in his view, the +most glorious thing in the world. While he was still a youth he was +seen by some white traders, and by them conducted back to civilized +life. He showed great relish for his new life, and especially a strong +desire for knowledge and a sense of reverence which took the direction +of religion, so that he desired to become a clergyman. He went through +his college course with credit, and was ordained. He fulfilled his +function well, and appeared happy and satisfied. After a few years he +went to serve in a settlement somewhere near the seat of war which was +then going on between Britain and the United States, and before long +there was fighting not far off. He went forth in his usual +dress—black coat and neat white shirt and neckcloth. When he returned +he was met by a gentleman of his acquaintance, who was immediately +struck by an extraordinary change in the expression of his face and the +flush on his cheek, and also by his unusually shy and hurried manner. +After asking news of the battle the gentleman observed, "But you are +wounded?" "No." "Not wounded! Why, there is blood upon the bosom of +your shirt!" The young man quickly crossed his hands firmly upon his +breast; and his friend, supposing that he wished to conceal a wound +which ought to be looked to, pulled open his shirt, and saw—what made +the young man let fall his hands in despair. From between his shirt +and his breast the friend took out—a bloody scalp! "I could not help +it," said the poor victim of early habits, in an agonized voice. He +turned and ran, too swiftly to be overtaken, betook himself to the +Indians, and never more appeared among the whites. +</P> + +<P> +An Indian once brought up a young lion, and finding him weak and +harmless, did not attempt to control him. Every day the lion gained in +strength and became more unmanageable, until at last, when excited by +rage, he fell upon his master and tore him to pieces. So what seemed +to be an "innocent" sin has grown until it strangled him who was once +its easy master. +</P> + +<P> +Beware of looking at sin, for at each view it is apt to become better +looking. +</P> + +<P> +Habit is practically, for a middle-aged person, fate; for is it not +practically certain that what I have done for twenty years I shall +repeat to-day? What are the chances for a man who has been lazy and +indolent all his life starting in to-morrow morning to be industrious; +or a spendthrift, frugal; a libertine, virtuous; a profane, +foul-mouthed man, clean and chaste? +</P> + +<P> +A Grecian flute-player charged double fees for pupils who had been +taught by inferior masters, on the ground that it was much harder to +undo than to form habits. +</P> + +<P> +Habit tends to make us permanently what we are for the moment. We +cannot possibly hear, see, feel, or experience anything which is not +woven in the web of character. What we are this minute and what we do +this minute, what we think this minute, will be read in the future +character as plainly as words spoken into the phonograph can be +reproduced in the future. +</P> + +<P> +"The air itself," says Babbage, "is one vast library on whose pages are +written forever all that man has ever said, whispered, or done." Every +sin you ever committed becomes your boon companion. It rushes to your +lips every time you speak, and drags its hideous form into your +imagination every time you think. It throws its shadow across your +path whichever way you turn. Like Banquo's ghost, it will not down. +You are fastened to it for life, and it will cling to you in the vast +forever. Do you think yourself free? You are a slave to every sin you +ever committed. They follow your pen and work their own character into +every word you write. +</P> + +<P> +Rectitude is only the confirmed habit of doing what is right. Some men +cannot tell a lie: the habit of truth telling is fixed, it has become +incorporated with their nature. Their characters bear the indelible +stamp of veracity. You and I know men whose slightest word is +unimpeachable; nothing could shake our confidence in them. There are +other men who cannot speak the truth: their habitual insincerity has +made a twist in their characters, and this twist appears in their +speech. +</P> + +<P> +"I never in my life committed more than one act of folly," said +Rulhière one day in the presence of Talleyrand. "But where will it +end?" inquired the latter. It was lifelong. One mistake too many +makes all the difference between safety and destruction. +</P> + +<P> +How many men would like to go to sleep beggars and wake up Rothschilds +or Astors? How many would fain go to bed dunces and wake up Solomons? +You reap what you have sown. Those who have sown dunce-seed, +vice-seed, laziness-seed, always get a crop. They that sow the wind +shall reap the whirlwind. +</P> + +<P> +Habit, like a child, repeats whatever is done before it. Oh, the power +of a repeated act to get itself repeated again and again! But, like +the wind, it is a power which we can use to force our way in its very +teeth as does the ship, and thus multiply our strength, or we can drift +with it without exertion upon the rocks and shoals of destruction. +</P> + +<P> +What a great thing it is to "start right" in life. Every young man can +see that the first steps lead to the last, with all except his own. +No, his little prevarications and dodgings will not make him a liar, +but he can see that they surely will in John Smith's case. He can see +that others are idle and on the road to ruin, but cannot see it in his +own case. +</P> + +<P> +There is a wonderful relation between bad habits. They all belong to +the same family. If you take in one, no matter how small or +insignificant it may seem, you will soon have the whole. A man who has +formed the habit of laziness or idleness will soon be late at his +engagements; a man who does not meet his engagements will dodge, +apologize, prevaricate, and lie. I have rarely known a perfectly +truthful man who was always behind time. +</P> + +<P> +You have seen a ship out in the bay swinging with the tide and the +waves; the sails are all up, and you wonder why it does not move, but +it cannot, for down beneath the water it is anchored. So we often see +a young man apparently well equipped, well educated, and we wonder that +he does not advance toward manhood and character. But, alas! we find +that he is anchored to some secret vice, and he can never advance until +he cuts loose. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"The first crime past compels us into more,<BR> +And guilt grows <I>fate</I> that was but <I>choice</I> before."<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Small habits, well pursued betimes,<BR> +May reach the dignity of crimes."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Thousands can sympathize with David when he cried, "My sins have taken +such hold upon me that I am not able to look up; my heart faileth me." +Like the damned spot of blood on Lady Macbeth's hand, these foul spots +on the imagination will not out. What a penalty nature exacts for +physical sins. The gods are just, and "of our pleasant vices make +instruments to plague us." +</P> + +<P> +Plato wrote over his door, "Let no one ignorant of geometry enter +here." The greatest value of the study of the classics and mathematics +comes from the habits of accurate and concise thought which it induces. +The habit-forming portion of life is the dangerous period, and we need +the discipline of close application to hold us outside of our studies. +</P> + +<P> +Washington at thirteen wrote one hundred and ten maxims of civility and +good behavior, and was most careful in the formation of all habits. +Franklin, too, devised a plan of self-improvement and character +building. No doubt the noble characters of these two men, almost +superhuman in their excellence, are the natural result of their early +care and earnest striving towards perfection. +</P> + +<P> +Fielding, describing a game of cards between Jonathan Wild, of +pilfering propensities, and a professional gambler, says: "Such was the +power of habit over the minds of these illustrious persons, that Mr. +Wild could not keep his hands out of the count's pockets, though he +knew they were empty; nor could the count abstain from palming a card, +though he was well aware Mr. Wild had no money to pay him." +</P> + +<P> +"Habit," says Montaigne, "is a violent and treacherous schoolmistress. +She, by little and little, slyly and unperceived, slips in the foot of +her authority, but having by this gentle and humble beginning, with the +aid of time, fixed and established it, she then unmasks a furious and +tyrannic countenance against which we have no more the courage nor the +power so much as to lift up our eyes." It led a New York man actually +to cut off his hand with a cleaver under a test of what he would resort +to, to get a glass of whiskey. It has led thousands of nature's +noblemen to drunkards' and libertines' graves. +</P> + +<P> +Gough's life is a startling illustration of the power of habit, and of +the ability of one apparently a hopeless slave to break his fetters and +walk a free man in the sunlight of heaven. He came to America when +nine years old. Possessed of great powers of song, of mimicry, and of +acting, and exceedingly social in his tastes, a thousand temptations +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Widened and strewed with flowers the way<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">Down to eternal ruin."</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"I would give this right hand to redeem those terrible seven years of +dissipation and death," he would often say in after years when, with +his soul still scarred and battered from his conflict with blighting +passion, he tearfully urged young men to free themselves from the +chains of bestial habits. +</P> + +<P> +In the laboratory of Faraday a workman one day knocked into a jar of +acid a silver cup; it disappeared, was eaten up by the acid, and could +not be found. The question came up whether it could ever be found. +The great chemist came in and put certain chemicals into the jar, and +every particle of the silver was precipitated to the bottom. The mass +was then sent to a silversmith, and the cup restored. So a precious +youth who has fallen into the sink of iniquity, lost, dissolved in sin, +can only be restored by the Great Chemist. +</P> + +<P> +What is put into the first of life is put into the whole of life. "Out +of a church of twenty-seven hundred members, I have never had to +exclude a single one who was received while a child," said Spurgeon. +It is the earliest sin that exercises the most influence for evil. +</P> + +<P> +Benedict Arnold was the only general in the Revolution that disgraced +his country. He had great military talent, wonderful energy, and a +courage equal to any emergency. But Arnold <I>did not start right</I>. +Even when a boy he was despised for his cruelty and his selfishness. +He delighted in torturing insects and birds that he might watch their +sufferings. He scattered pieces of glass and sharp tacks on the floor +of the shop he was tending, to cut the feet of the barefooted boys. +Even in the army, in spite of his bravery, the soldiers hated him, and +the officers dared not trust him. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Let no man trust the first false step<BR> +Of guilt; it hangs upon a precipice,<BR> +Whose steep descent in last perdition ends.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">YOUNG</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Years ago there was a district lying near Westminster Abbey, London, +called the "Devil's Acre,"—a school for vicious habits, where +depravity was universal; where professional beggars were fitted with +all the appliances of imposture; where there was an agency for the hire +of children to be carried about by forlorn widows and deserted wives, +to move the compassion of street-giving benevolence; where young +pickpockets were trained in the art and mystery which was to conduct +them in due course to an expensive voyage for the good of their country +to Botany Bay. +</P> + +<P> +Victor Hugo describes a strange association of men in the seventeenth +century who bought children and distorted and made monstrosities of +them to amuse the nobility with; and in cultured Boston there is an +association of so-called "respectable men," who have opened thousands +of "places of business" for deforming men, women, and children's souls. +But we deform ourselves with agencies so pleasant that we think we are +having a good time, until we become so changed and enslaved that we +scarcely recognize ourselves. Vice, the pleasant guest which we first +invited into our heart's parlor, becomes vulgarly familiar, and +intrenches herself deep in our very being. We ask her to leave, but +she simply laughs at us from the hideous wrinkles she has made in our +faces, and refuses to go. Our secret sins defy us from the hideous +furrows they have cut in our cheeks. Each impure thought has chiseled +its autograph deep into the forehead, too deep for erasure, and the +glassy, bleary eye adds its testimony to our ruined character. +</P> + +<P> +The devil does not apply his match to the hard coal; but he first +lights the shavings of "innocent sins," and the shavings the wood, and +the wood the coal. Sin is gradual. It does not break out on a man +until it has long circulated through his system. Murder, adultery, +theft, are not committed in deed until they have been committed in +thought again and again. +</P> + +<P> +"Don't write there," said a man to a boy who was writing with a diamond +pin on a pane of glass in the window of a hotel. "Why not?" inquired +the boy. "Because you can't rub it out." Yet the glass might have +been broken and all trace of the writing lost, but things written upon +the human soul can never be removed, for the tablet is immortal. +</P> + +<P> +"In all the wide range of accepted British maxims," said Thomas Hughes, +"there is none, take it all in all, more thoroughly abominable than +this one, as to the sowing of wild oats. Look at it on what side you +will, and I defy you to make anything but a devil's maxim of it. What +man, be he young, old, or middle-aged, sows, that, and nothing else, +shall he reap. The only thing to do with wild oats is to put them +carefully into the hottest part of the fire, and get them burnt to +dust, every seed of them. If you sow them, no matter in what ground, +up they will come with long, tough roots and luxuriant stalks and +leaves, as sure as there is a sun in heaven. The devil, too, whose +special crop they are, will see that they thrive, and you, and nobody +else, will have to reap them." +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +We scatter seeds with careless hand,<BR> +And dream we ne'er shall see them more;<BR> +But for a thousand years<BR> +Their fruit appears,<BR> +In weeds that mar the land.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">JOHN KEBLE.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Theodora boasted that she could draw Socrates' disciples away from him. +"That may be," said the philosopher, "for you lead them down an easy +descent whereas I am forcing them to mount to virtue—an arduous ascent +and unknown to most men." +</P> + +<P> +"When I am told of a sickly student," said Daniel Wise, "that he is +'studying himself to death,' or of a feeble young mechanic, or clerk, +that his hard work is destroying him, I study his countenance, and +there, too often, read the real, melancholy truth in his dull, averted, +sunken eye, discolored skin, and timid manner. These signs proclaim +that the young man is in some way violating the laws of his physical +nature. He is secretly destroying himself. Yet, say his unconscious +and admiring friends, 'He is falling a victim to his own diligence!' +Most lame and impotent conclusion! He is sapping the very source of +life, and erelong will be a mind in ruins or a heap of dust. Young +man, beware of his example! 'Keep thyself pure;' observe the laws of +your physical nature, and the most unrelaxing industry will never rob +you of a month's health, nor shorten the thread of your life; for +industry and health are companions, and long life is the heritage of +diligence." +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"How shall I a habit break?"<BR> +As you did that habit make.<BR> +As you gathered, you must lose;<BR> +As you yielded, now refuse.<BR> +Thread by thread the strands we twist<BR> +Till they bind us neck and wrist.<BR> +Thread by thread the patient hand<BR> +Must untwine ere free we stand.<BR> +As we builded, stone by stone,<BR> +We must toil, unhelped, alone,<BR> +Till the wall is overthrown.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +But remember, as we try,<BR> +Lighter every test goes by;<BR> +Wading in, the stream grows deep<BR> +Toward the centre's downward sweep;<BR> +Backward turn, each step ashore<BR> +Shallower is than that before.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Ah, the precious years we waste<BR> +Leveling what we raised in haste;<BR> +Doing what must be undone,<BR> +Ere content or love be won!<BR> +First across the gulf we cast<BR> +Kite-borne threads till lines are passed,<BR> +And habit builds the bridge at last.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">JOHN BOYLE O'REILLY.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap08"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER VIII. +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +SELF-HELP. +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +I learned that no man in God's wide earth is either willing or able to +help any other man.—PESTALOZZI. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +What I am I have made myself.—HUMPHRY DAVY. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Be sure, my son, and remember that the best men always make +themselves.—PATRICK HENRY. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Hereditary bondsmen, know ye not<BR> +Who would be free themselves must strike the blow?<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">BYRON.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +God gives every bird its food, but he does not throw it into the +nest.—J. G. HOLLAND. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Never forget that others will depend upon you, and that you cannot +depend upon them.—DUMAS, FILS. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Our remedies oft in ourselves do lie, which we ascribe to +Heaven.—SHAKESPEARE. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +The best education in the world is that got by struggling to obtain a +living.—WENDELL PHILLIPS. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Every person has two educations, one which he receives from others, and +one, more important, which he gives himself.—GIBBON. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +What the superior man seeks is in himself: what the small man seeks is +in others.—CONFUCIUS. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Who waits to have his task marked out,<BR> +Shall die and leave his errand unfulfilled.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">LOWELL.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +In battle or business, whatever the game,<BR> +In law, or in love, it's ever the same:<BR> +In the struggle for power, or scramble for pelf,<BR> +Let this be your motto, "Rely on yourself."<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">SAXE.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Let every eye negotiate for itself,<BR> +And trust no agent.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">SHAKESPEARE.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"Colonel Crockett makes room for himself!" exclaimed a backwoods +congressman in answer to the exclamation of the White House usher to +"Make room for Colonel Crockett!" This remarkable man was not afraid +to oppose the head of a great nation. He preferred being right to +being president. Though rough, uncultured, and uncouth, Crockett was a +man of great courage and determination. +</P> + +<P> +Garfield was the youngest member of the House of Representatives when +he entered, but he had not been in his seat sixty days before his +ability was recognized and his place conceded. He stepped to the front +with the confidence of one who belonged there. He succeeded because +all the world in concert could not have kept him in the background, and +because when once in the front he played his part with an intrepidity +and a commanding ease that were but the outward evidences of the +immense reserves of energy on which it was in his power to draw. +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<H3> +[Illustration: James A. Garfield (missing from book)] +</H3> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<P> +"Take the place and attitude which belong to you," says Emerson, "and +all men acquiesce. The world must be just. It leaves every man with +profound unconcern to set his own rate." +</P> + +<P> +Grant was no book soldier. Some of his victories were contrary to all +instructions in military works. He did not dare to disclose his plan +to invest Vicksburg, and he even cut off all communication on the +Mississippi River for seven days that no orders could reach him from +General Halleck, his superior officer; for he knew that Halleck went by +books, and he was proceeding contrary to all military theories. He was +making a greater military history than had ever been written up to that +time. He was greater than all books of tactics. The consciousness of +power is everything. That man is strongest who owes most to himself. +</P> + +<P> +"Man, it is within yourself," says Pestalozzi, "it is in the inner +sense of your power that resides nature's instrument for your +development." +</P> + +<P> +Richard Arkwright, the thirteenth child, in a hovel, with no education, +no chance, gave his spinning model to the world, and put a sceptre in +England's right hand such as the queen never wielded. +</P> + +<P> +"A person under the firm persuasion that he can command resources +virtually has them," says Livy. +</P> + +<P> +Solario, a wandering gypsy tinker, fell deeply in love with the +daughter of the painter Coll' Antonio del Fiore, but was told that no +one but a painter as good as the father should wed the maiden. "Will +you give me ten years to learn to paint, and so entitle myself to the +hand of your daughter?" Consent was given, Coll' Antonio thinking that +he would never be troubled further by the gypsy. About the time that +the ten years were to end the king's sister showed Coll' Antonio a +Madonna and Child, which the painter extolled in terms of the highest +praise. Judge of his surprise on learning that Solario was the artist. +But later, his son-in-law surprised him even more by his rare skill. +</P> + +<P> +Louis Philippe said he was the only sovereign in Europe fit to govern, +for he could black his own boots. +</P> + +<P> +When asked to name his family coat-of-arms, a self-made President of +the United States replied, "A pair of shirtsleeves." +</P> + +<P> +"Poverty is uncomfortable, as I can testify," said James A. Garfield; +"but nine times out of ten the best thing that can happen to a young +man is to be tossed overboard and compelled to sink or swim for +himself. In all my acquaintance I have never known a man to be drowned +who was worth the saving." +</P> + +<P> +It is not the men who have inherited most, except it be in nobility of +soul and purpose, who have risen highest; but rather the men with no +"start" who have won fortunes, and have made adverse circumstances a +spur to goad them up the steep mount, where +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Fame's proud temple shines afar."<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +To such men, every possible goal is accessible, and honest ambition has +no height that genius or talent may tread, which has not felt the +impress of their feet. +</P> + +<P> +You may leave your millions to your son, but have you really given him +anything? You cannot transfer the discipline, the experience, the +power which the acquisition has given you; you cannot transfer the +delight of achieving, the joy felt only in growth, the pride of +acquisition, the character which trained habits of accuracy, method, +promptness, patience, dispatch, honesty of dealing, politeness of +manner have developed. You cannot transfer the skill, sagacity, +prudence, foresight, which lie concealed in your wealth. It meant a +great deal for you, but means nothing to your heir. In climbing to +your fortune, you developed the muscle, stamina, and strength which +enabled you to maintain your lofty position, to keep your millions +intact. You had the power which comes only from experience, and which +alone enables you to stand firm on your dizzy height. Your fortune was +experience to you, joy, growth, discipline, and character; to him it +will be a temptation, an anxiety, which will probably dwarf him. It +was wings to you, it will be a dead weight to him; it was education to +you and expansion of your highest powers; to him it may mean inaction, +lethargy, indolence, weakness, ignorance. You have taken the priceless +spur—necessity—away from him, the spur which has goaded man to nearly +all the great achievements in the history of the world. +</P> + +<P> +You thought it a kindness to deprive yourself in order that your son +might begin where you left off. You thought to spare him the drudgery, +the hardships, the deprivations, the lack of opportunities, the meagre +education, which you had on the old farm. But you have put a crutch +into his hand instead of a staff; you have taken away from him the +incentive to self-development, to self-elevation, to self-discipline +and self-help, without which no real success, no real happiness, no +great character is ever possible. His enthusiasm will evaporate, his +energy will be dissipated, his ambition, not being stimulated by the +struggle for self-elevation, will gradually die away. If you do +everything for your son and fight his battles for him, you will have a +weakling on your hands at twenty-one. +</P> + +<P> +"My life is a wreck," said the dying Cyrus W. Field, "my fortune gone, +my home dishonored. Oh, I was so unkind to Edward when I thought I was +being kind. If I had only had firmness enough to compel my boys to +earn their living, then they would have known the meaning of money." +His table was covered with medals and certificates of honor from many +nations, in recognition of his great work for civilization in mooring +two continents side by side in thought, of the fame he had won and +could never lose. But grief shook the sands of life as he thought only +of the son who had brought disgrace upon a name before unsullied, the +wounds were sharper than those of a serpent's tooth. +</P> + +<P> +During the great financial crisis of 1857 Maria Mitchell, who was +visiting England, asked an English lady what became of daughters when +no property was left them. "They live on their brothers," was the +reply. "But what becomes of the American daughters," asked the English +lady, "when there is no money left?" "They earn it," was the reply. +</P> + +<P> +Men who have been bolstered up all their lives are seldom good for +anything in a crisis. When misfortune comes, they look around for +somebody to lean upon. If the prop is not there down they go. Once +down, they are as helpless as capsized turtles, or unhorsed men in +armor. Many a frontier boy has succeeded beyond all his expectations +simply because all props were knocked out from under him and he was +obliged to stand upon his own feet. +</P> + +<P> +"A man's best friends are his ten fingers," said Robert Collyer, who +brought his wife to America in the steerage. Young men who are always +looking for something to lean upon never amount to anything. +</P> + +<P> +There is no manhood mill which takes in boys and turns out men. What +you call "no chance" may be your "only chance." Don't wait for your +place to be made for you; make it yourself. Don't wait for somebody to +give you a lift; lift yourself. Henry Ward Beecher did not wait for a +call to a big church with a large salary. He accepted the first +pastorate offered him, in a little town near Cincinnati. He became +literally the light of the church, for he trimmed the lamps, kindled +the fires, swept the rooms, and rang the bell. His salary was only +about $200 a year,—but he knew that a fine church and great salary +cannot make a great man. It was work and opportunity that he wanted. +He felt that if there was anything in him work would bring it out. +</P> + +<P> +"Physiologists tell us," says Waters, "that it takes twenty-eight years +for the brain to attain its full development. If this is so, why +should not one be able, by his own efforts, to give this long-growing +organ a particular bent, a peculiar character? Why should the will not +be brought to bear upon the formation of the brain as well as of the +backbone?" The will is merely our steam power, and we may put it to +any work we please. It will do our bidding, whether it be building up +a character, or tearing it down. It may be applied to building up a +habit of truthfulness and honesty, or of falsehood and dishonor. It +will help build up a man or a brute, a hero or a coward. It will brace +up resolution until one may almost perform miracles, or it may be +dissipated in irresolution and inaction until life is a wreck. It will +hold you to your task until you have formed a powerful habit of +industry and application, until idleness and inaction are painful, or +it will lead you into indolence and listlessness until every effort +will be disagreeable and success impossible. +</P> + +<P> +"The first thing I have to impress upon you is," says J. T. Davidson, +"that a good name must be the fruit of one's own exertion. You cannot +possess it by patrimony; you cannot purchase it with money; you will +not light on it by chance; it is independent of birth, station, +talents, and wealth; it must be the outcome of your own endeavor, and +the reward of good principles and honorable conduct. Of all the +elements of success in life none is more vital than self-reliance,—a +determination to be, under God, the creator of your own reputation and +advancement. If difficulties stand in the way, if exceptional +disadvantages oppose you, all the better, as long as you have pluck to +fight through them. I want each young man here (you will not +misunderstand me) to have faith in himself and, scorning props and +buttresses, crutches and life-preservers, to take earnest hold of life. +Many a lad has good stuff in him that never comes to anything because +he slips too easily into some groove of life; it is commonly those who +have a tough battle to begin with that make their mark upon their age." +</P> + +<P> +When Beethoven was examining the work of Moscheles, he found written at +the end "Finis, with God's help." He wrote under it "Man, help +yourself." +</P> + +<P> +A young man stood listlessly watching some anglers on a bridge. He was +poor and dejected. At length, approaching a basket filled with fish, +he sighed, "If now I had these I would be happy. I could sell them and +buy food and lodgings." "I will give you just as many and just as +good," said the owner, who chanced to overhear his words, "if you will +do me a trifling favor." "And what is that?" asked the other. "Only +to tend this line till I come back; I wish to go on a short errand." +The proposal was gladly accepted. The old man was gone so long that +the young man began to get impatient. Meanwhile the fish snapped +greedily at the hook, and he lost all his depression in the excitement +of pulling them in. When the owner returned he had caught a large +number. Counting out from them as many as were in the basket, and +presenting them to the youth, the old fisherman said, "I fulfill my +promise from the fish you have caught, to teach you whenever you see +others earning what you need to waste no time in foolish wishing, but +cast a line for yourself." +</P> + +<P> +A white squall caught a party of tourists on a lake in Scotland, and +threatened to capsize the boat. When it seemed that the crisis was +really come the largest and strongest man in the party, in a state of +intense fear, said, "Let us pray." "No, no, my man," shouted the bluff +old boatman; "<I>let the little man pray. You take an oar.</I>" The +greatest curse that can befall a young man is to lean. +</P> + +<P> +The grandest fortunes ever accumulated or possessed on earth were and +are the fruit of endeavor that had no capital to begin with save +energy, intellect, and the will. From Croesus down to Rockefeller the +story is the same, not only in the getting of wealth, but also in the +acquirement of eminence; those men have won most who relied most upon +themselves. +</P> + +<P> +It has been said that one of the most disgusting sights in this world +is that of a young man with healthy blood, broad shoulders, presentable +calves, and a hundred and fifty pounds, more or less, of good bone and +muscle, standing with his hands in his pockets longing for help. +</P> + +<P> +"The male inhabitants in the Township of Loaferdom, in the County of +Hatework," says a printer's squib, "found themselves laboring under +great inconvenience for want of an easily traveled road between Poverty +and Independence. They therefore petitioned the Powers that be to levy +a tax upon the property of the entire county for the purpose of laying +out a macadamized highway, broad and smooth, and all the way down hill +to the latter place." +</P> + +<P> +"It is interesting to notice how some minds seem almost to create +themselves," says Irving, "springing up under every disadvantage, and +working their solitary but irresistible way through a thousand +obstacles." +</P> + +<P> +"Every one is the artificer of his own fortune," says Sallust. +</P> + +<P> +Man is not merely the architect of his own fortune, but he must lay the +bricks himself. Bayard Taylor, at twenty-three, wrote: "I will become +the sculptor of my own mind's statue." His biography shows how often +the chisel and hammer were in his hands to shape himself into his +ideal. "I have seen none, known none, of the celebrities of my time," +said Samuel Cox. "All my energy was directed upon one end, to improve +myself." +</P> + +<P> +"Man exists for culture," says Goethe; "not for what he can accomplish, +but for what can be accomplished in him." +</P> + +<P> +When young Professor Tyndall was in the government service, he had no +definite aim in life until one day a government official asked him how +he employed his leisure time. "You have five hours a day at your +disposal," said he, "and this ought to be devoted to systematic study. +Had I at your age some one to advise me as I now advise you, instead of +being in a subordinate position, I might have been at the head of my +department." The very next day young Tyndall began a regular course of +study, and went to the University of Marburg, where he became noted for +his indomitable industry. He was so poor that he bought a cask, and +cut it open for a bathtub. He often rose before daylight to study, +while the world was slumbering about him. +</P> + +<P> +Labor is the only legal tender in the world to true success. The gods +sell everything for that, nothing without it. You will never find +success "marked down." The door to the temple of success is never left +open. Every one who enters makes his own door which closes behind him +to all others. +</P> + +<P> +Circumstances have rarely favored great men. They have fought their +way to triumph over the road of difficulty and through all sorts of +opposition. A lowly beginning and a humble origin are no bar to a +great career. The farmers' boys fill many of the greatest places in +legislatures, in syndicates, at the bar, in pulpits, in Congress, +to-day. Boys of lowly origin have made many of the greatest +discoveries, are presidents of our banks, of our colleges, of our +universities. Our poor boys and girls have written many of our +greatest books, and have filled the highest places as teachers and +journalists. Ask almost any great man in our large cities where he was +born, and he will tell you it was on a farm or in a small country +village. Nearly all of the great capitalists of the city came from the +country. "'T is better to be lowly born." +</P> + +<P> +The founder of Boston University left Cape Cod for Boston to make his +way with a capital of only four dollars. Like Horace Greeley, he could +find no opening for a boy; but what of that? He made an opening. He +found a board, and made it into an oyster stand on the street corner. +He borrowed a wheelbarrow, and went three miles to an oyster smack, +bought three bushels of oysters, and wheeled them to his stand. Soon +his little savings amounted to $130, and then he bought a horse and +cart. This poor boy with no chance kept right on till he became the +millionaire Isaac Rich. +</P> + +<P> +Chauncey Jerome, the inventor of machine-made clocks, started with two +others on a tour through New Jersey, they to sell the clocks, and he to +make cases for them. On his way to New York he went through New Haven +in a lumber wagon, eating bread and cheese. He afterward lived in a +fine mansion in New Haven. +</P> + +<P> +Self-help has accomplished about all the great things of the world. +How many young men falter, faint, and dally with their purpose because +they have no capital to start with, and wait and wait for some good +luck to give them a lift. But success is the child of drudgery and +perseverance. It cannot be coaxed or bribed; pay the price and it is +yours. Where is the boy to-day who has less chance to rise in the +world than Elihu Burritt, apprenticed to a blacksmith, in whose shop he +had to work at the forge all the daylight, and often by candle-light? +Yet, he managed, by studying with a book before him at his meals, +carrying it in his pocket that he might utilize every spare moment, and +studying nights and holidays, to pick up an excellent education in the +odds and ends of time which most boys throw away. While the rich boy +and the idler were yawning and stretching and getting their eyes open, +young Burritt had seized the opportunity and improved it. At thirty +years of age he was master of every important language in Europe and +was studying those of Asia. +</P> + +<P> +What chance had such a boy for distinction? Probably not a single +youth will read this book who has not a better opportunity for success. +Yet he had a thirst for knowledge, and a desire for self-improvement, +which overcame every obstacle in his pathway. A wealthy gentleman +offered to pay his expenses at Harvard; but no, he said he could get +his education himself, even though he had to work twelve or fourteen +hours a day at the forge. Here was a determined boy. He snatched +every spare moment at the anvil and forge as though it were gold. He +believed, with Gladstone, that thrift of time would repay him in after +years with usury, and that waste of it would make him dwindle. Think +of a boy working nearly all the daylight in a blacksmith's shop, and +yet finding time to study seven languages in a single year! +</P> + +<P> +If the youth of America who are struggling against cruel circumstances, +to do something and be somebody in the world, could only understand +that ninety per cent. of what is called genius is merely the result of +persistent, determined industry, is in most cases downright hard work, +that it is the slavery to a single idea which has given to many a +mediocre talent the reputation of being a genius, they would be +inspired with new hope. It is interesting to note that the men who +talk most about genius are the men who like to work the least. The +lazier the man, the more he will have to say about great things being +done by genius. +</P> + +<P> +The greatest geniuses have been the greatest workers. Sheridan was +considered a genius, but it was found that the "brilliants" and +"off-hand sayings" with which he used to dazzle the House of Commons +were elaborated, polished and repolished, and put down in his +memorandum book ready for any emergency. +</P> + +<P> +Genius has been well defined as the infinite capacity for taking pains. +If men who have done great things could only reveal to the struggling +youth of to-day how much of their reputations was due to downright hard +digging and plodding, what an uplift of inspiration and encouragement +they would give. How often I have wished that the discouraged, +struggling youth could know of the heart-aches, the head-aches, the +nerve-aches, the disheartening trials, the discouraged hours, the fears +and despair involved in works which have gained the admiration of the +world, but which have taxed the utmost powers of their authors. You +can read in a few minutes or a few hours a poem or a book with only +pleasure and delight, but the days and months of weary plodding over +details and dreary drudgery often required to produce it would stagger +belief. +</P> + +<P> +The greatest works in literature have been elaborated and elaborated, +line by line, paragraph by paragraph, often rewritten a dozen times. +The drudgery which literary men have put into the productions which +have stood the test of time is almost incredible. Lucretius worked +nearly a lifetime on one poem. It completely absorbed his life. It is +said that Bryant rewrote "Thanatopsis" a hundred times, and even then +was not satisfied with it. John Foster would sometimes linger a week +over a single sentence. He would hack, split, prune, pull up by the +roots, or practice any other severity on whatever he wrote, till it +gained his consent to exist. Chalmers was once asked what Foster was +about in London. "Hard at it," he replied, "at the rate of a line a +week." Dickens, one of the greatest writers of modern fiction, was so +worn down by hard work that he looked as "haggard as a murderer." Even +Lord Bacon, one of the greatest geniuses that ever lived, left large +numbers of MSS. filled with "sudden thoughts set down for use." Hume +toiled thirteen hours a day on his "History of England." Lord Eldon +astonished the world with his great legal learning, but when he was a +student too poor to buy books, he had actually borrowed and copied many +hundreds of pages of large law books, such as Coke upon Littleton, thus +saturating his mind with legal principles which afterward blossomed out +into what the world called remarkable genius. Matthew Hale for years +studied law sixteen hours a day. Speaking of Fox, some one declared +that he wrote "drop by drop." Rousseau says of the labor involved in +his smooth and lively style: "My manuscripts, blotted, scratched, +interlined, and scarcely legible, attest the trouble they cost me. +There is not one of them which I have not been obliged to transcribe +four or five times before it went to press.… Some of my periods I +have turned or returned in my head for five or six nights before they +were fit to be put to paper." +</P> + +<P> +It is said that Waller spent a whole summer over ten lines in one of +his poems. Beethoven probably surpassed all other musicians in his +painstaking fidelity and persistent application. There is scarcely a +bar in his music that was not written and rewritten at least a dozen +times. His favorite maxim was, "The barriers are not yet erected which +can say to aspiring talent and industry 'thus far and no further.'" +Gibbon wrote his autobiography nine times, and was in his study every +morning, summer and winter, at six o'clock; and yet youth who waste +their evenings wonder at the genius which can produce "The Decline and +Fall of the Roman Empire," upon which Gibbon worked twenty years. Even +Plato, one of the greatest writers that ever lived, wrote the first +sentence in his "Republic" nine different ways before he was satisfied +with it. Burke's famous "Letter to a Noble Lord," one of the finest +things in the English language, was so completely blotted over with +alterations when the proof was returned to the printing-office that the +compositors refused to correct it as it was, and entirely reset it. +Burke wrote the conclusion of his speech at the trial of Hastings +sixteen times, and Butler wrote his famous "Analogy" twenty times. It +took Virgil seven years to write his Georgics, and twelve years to +write the Aeneid. He was so displeased with the latter that he +attempted to rise from his deathbed to commit it to the flames. +</P> + +<P> +Haydn was very poor; his father was a coachman and he, friendless and +lonely, married a servant girl. He was sent away from home to act as +errand boy for a music teacher. He absorbed a great deal of +information, but he had a hard life of persecution until he became a +barber in Vienna. Here he blacked boots for an influential man, who +became a friend to him. In 1798 this poor boy's oratorio, "The +Creation," came upon the musical world like the rising of a new sun +which never set. He was courted by princes and dined with kings and +queens; his reputation was made; there was no more barbering, no more +poverty. But of his eight hundred compositions, "The Creation" +eclipsed them all. He died while Napoleon's guns were bombarding +Vienna, some of the shot falling in his garden. The greatest creations +of musicians were written with an effort, to fill the "aching void" in +the human heart. +</P> + +<P> +Frederick Douglass, America's most representative colored man, born a +slave, was reared in bondage, liberated by his own exertions, educated +and advanced by sheer pluck and perseverance to distinguished positions +in the service of his country, and to a high place in the respect and +esteem of the whole world. +</P> + +<P> +When a man like Lord Cavanagh, without arms or legs, manages to put +himself into Parliament, when a man like Francis Joseph Campbell, a +blind man, becomes a distinguished mathematician, a musician, and a +great philanthropist, we get a hint as to what it means to make the +most possible out of ourselves and opportunities. Perhaps ninety-nine +out of a hundred under such unfortunate circumstances would be content +to remain helpless objects of charity for life. If it is your call to +acquire money power instead of brain power, to acquire business power +instead of professional power, double your talent just the same, no +matter what it may be. +</P> + +<P> +A glover's apprentice of Glasgow, Scotland, who was too poor to afford +even a candle or a fire, and who studied by the light of the shop +windows in the streets, and when the shops were closed climbed the +lamp-post, holding his book in one hand, and clinging to the lamp-post +with the other,—this poor boy, with less chance than almost any boy in +America, became the most eminent scholar of Scotland. +</P> + +<P> +Francis Parkman, half blind, became one of America's greatest +historians in spite of everything, because he made himself such. +Personal value is a coin of one's own minting; one is taken at the +worth he has put into himself. Franklin was but a poor printer's boy, +whose highest luxury at one time was only a penny roll, eaten in the +streets of Philadelphia. Richard Arkwright, a barber all his earlier +life, as he rose from poverty to wealth and fame, felt the need of +correcting the defects of his early education. After his fiftieth year +he devoted two hours a day, snatched from his sleep, to improving +himself in orthography, grammar, and writing. +</P> + +<P> +Michael Faraday was a poor boy, son of a blacksmith, who apprenticed +him at the age of thirteen to a bookbinder in London. Michael laid the +foundations of his future greatness by making himself familiar with the +contents of the books he bound. He remained at night, after others had +gone, to read and study the precious volumes. Lord Tenterden was proud +to point out to his son the shop where his father had shaved for a +penny. A French doctor once taunted Fléchier, Bishop of Nismes, who +had been a tallow-chandler in his youth, with the meanness of his +origin, to which he replied, "If you had been born in the same +condition that I was, you would still have been but a maker of candles." +</P> + +<P> +The Duke of Argyle, walking in his garden, saw a Latin copy of Newton's +"Principia" on the grass, and supposing that it had been taken from his +library, called for some one to carry it back. Edmund Stone, however, +the son of the duke's gardener, claimed it. "Yours?" asked the +surprised nobleman. "Do you understand geometry, Latin, and Newton?" +"I know a little of them," replied Edmund. "But how," asked the duke, +"came you by the knowledge of all these things?" "A servant taught me +to read ten years since," answered Stone. "Does one need to know +anything more than the twenty-four letters, in order to learn +everything else that one wishes?" The duke was astonished. "I first +learned to read," said the lad; "the masons were then at work upon your +house. I approached them one day and observed that the architect used +a rule and compasses, and that he made calculations. I inquired what +might be the meaning and use of these things, and I was informed that +there was a science called arithmetic. I purchased a book of +arithmetic and learned it. I was told that there was another science +called geometry; I bought the necessary books and learned geometry. By +reading I found that there were good books on these sciences in Latin, +so I bought a dictionary and learned Latin. I understood, also, that +there were good books of the same kind in French; I bought a +dictionary, and learned French. This, my lord, is what I have done; it +seems to me that we may learn everything when we know the twenty-four +letters of the alphabet." +</P> + +<P> +Edwin Chadwick, in his report to the British Parliament, stated that +children, working on half time, that is, studying three hours a day and +working the rest of their time out of doors, really made the greatest +intellectual progress during the year. Business men have often +accomplished wonders during the busiest lives by simply devoting one, +two, three, or four hours daily to study or other literary work. +</P> + +<P> +James Watt received only the rudiments of an education at school, for +his attendance was irregular on account of delicate health. He more +than made up for all deficiencies, however, by the diligence with which +he pursued his studies at home. Alexander V. was a beggar; he was +"born mud, and died marble." William Herschel, placed at the age of +fourteen as a musician in the band of the Hanoverian Guards, devoted +all his leisure to philosophical studies. He acquired a large fund of +general knowledge, and in astronomy, a science in which he was wholly +self-instructed, his discoveries entitle him to rank with the greatest +astronomers of all time. +</P> + +<P> +George Washington was the son of a widow, born under the roof of a +Westmoreland farmer; almost from infancy his lot had been the lot of an +orphan. No academy had welcomed him to its shade, no college crowned +him with its honors; to read, to write, to cipher, these had been his +degrees in knowledge. Shakespeare learned little more than reading and +writing at school, but by self-culture he made himself the great master +among literary men. Burns, too, enjoyed few advantages of education, +and his youth was passed in almost abject poverty. +</P> + +<P> +James Ferguson, the son of a half-starved peasant, learned to read by +listening to the recitations of one of his elder brothers. While a +mere boy he discovered several mechanical principles, made models of +mills and spinning-wheels, and by means of beads on strings worked out +an excellent map of the heavens. Ferguson made remarkable things with +a common penknife. How many great men have mounted the hill of +knowledge by out-of-the-way paths. Gifford worked his intricate +problems with a shoemaker's awl on a bit of leather. Rittenhouse first +calculated eclipses on his plow-handle. <I>A will finds a way</I>. +</P> + +<P> +Julius Caesar, who has been unduly honored for those great military +achievements in which he appears as the scourge of his race, is far +more deserving of respect for those wonderful Commentaries, in which +his military exploits are recorded. He attained distinction by his +writings on astronomy, grammar, history, and several other subjects. +He was one of the most learned men and one of the greatest orators of +his time. Yet his life was spent amid the turmoil of a camp or the +fierce struggle of politics. If he found abundant time for study, who +may not? Frederick the Great, too, was busy in camp the greater part +of his life, yet whenever a leisure moment came, it was sure to be +devoted to study. He wrote to a friend, "I become every day more +covetous of my time, I render an account of it to myself, and I lose +none of it but with great regret." +</P> + +<P> +Columbus, while leading the life of a sailor, managed to become the +most accomplished geographer and astronomer of his time. +</P> + +<P> +When Peter the Great, a boy of seventeen, became the absolute ruler of +Russia, his subjects were little better than savages, and in himself, +even, the passions and propensities of barbarism were so strong that +they were frequently exhibited during his whole career. But he +determined to transform himself and the Russians into civilized people. +He instituted reforms with great energy, and at the age of twenty-six +started on a visit to the other countries of Europe for the purpose of +learning about their arts and institutions. At Saardam, Holland, he +was so impressed with the sights of the great East India dockyard, that +he apprenticed himself to a shipbuilder, and helped build the St. +Peter, which he promptly purchased. Continuing his travels, after he +had learned his trade, he worked in England in paper-mills, saw-mills, +rope-yards, watchmaker's shops, and other manufactories, doing the work +and receiving the treatment of a common laborer. +</P> + +<P> +While traveling, his constant habit was to obtain as much information +as he could beforehand with regard to every place he was to visit, and +he would demand, "Let me see all." When setting out on his +investigations, on such occasions, he carried his tablets in his hand, +and whatever he deemed worthy of remembrance was carefully noted down. +He would often leave his carriage, if he saw the country people at work +by the wayside as he passed along, and not only enter into conversation +with them, on agricultural affairs, but accompany them to their houses, +examine their furniture, and take drawings of their implements of +husbandry. Thus he obtained much minute and correct knowledge, which +he would scarcely have acquired by other means, and which he afterward +turned to admirable account in the improvement of his own country. +</P> + +<P> +The ancients said, "Know thyself;" the nineteenth century says, "Help +thyself." Self-culture gives a second birth to the soul. A liberal +education is a true regeneration. When a man is once liberally +educated, he will generally remain a man, not shrink to a manikin, nor +dwindle to a brute. But if he is not properly educated, if he has +merely been crammed and stuffed through college, if he has merely a +broken-down memory from trying to hold crammed facts enough to pass the +examination, he will continue to shrink and shrivel and dwindle, often +below his original proportions, for he will lose both his confidence +and self-respect, as his crammed facts, which never became a part of +himself, evaporate from his distended memory. Many a youth has made +his greatest effort in his graduating essay. But, alas! the beautiful +flowers of rhetoric blossomed only to exhaust the parent stock, which +blossoms no more forever. +</P> + +<P> +In Strasburg geese are crammed with food several times a day by opening +their mouths and forcing the pabulum down the throat with the finger. +The geese are shut up in boxes just large enough to hold them, and are +not allowed to take any exercise. This is done in order to increase +enormously the liver for <I>pâté de fois gras</I>. So are our youth +sometimes stuffed with education. What are the chances for success of +students who "cut" recitations or lectures, and gad, lounge about, and +dissipate in the cities at night until the last two or three weeks, +sometimes the last few days, before examination, when they employ +tutors at exorbitant prices with the money often earned by hard-working +parents, to stuff their idle brains with the pabulum of knowledge; not +to increase their grasp or power of brain, not to discipline it, not +for assimilation into the mental tissue to develop personal power, but +to fatten the memory, the liver of the brain; to fatten it with crammed +facts until it is sufficiently expanded to insure fifty per cent. in +the examination. +</P> + +<P> +True teaching will create a thirst for knowledge, and the desire to +quench this thirst will lead the eager student to the Pierian spring. +"Man might be so educated that all his prepossessions would be truth, +and all his feelings virtues." +</P> + +<P> +Every bit of education or culture is of great advantage in the struggle +for existence. The microscope does not create anything new, but it +reveals marvels. To educate the eye adds to its magnifying power until +it sees beauty where before it saw only ugliness. It reveals a world +we never suspected, and finds the greatest beauty even in the commonest +things. The eye of an Agassiz could see worlds which the uneducated +eye never dreamed of. The cultured hand can do a thousand things the +uneducated hand cannot do. It becomes graceful, steady of nerve, +strong, skillful, indeed it almost seems to think, so animated is it +with intelligence. The cultured will can seize, grasp, and hold the +possessor, with irresistible power and nerve, to almost superhuman +effort. The educated touch can almost perform miracles. The educated +taste can achieve wonders almost past belief. What a contrast this, +between the cultured, logical, profound, masterly reason of a Gladstone +and that of the hod-carrier who has never developed or educated his +reason beyond what is necessary to enable him to mix mortar and carry +brick. +</P> + +<P> +"Culture comes from the constant choice of the best within our reach," +says Bulwer. "Continue to cultivate the mind, to sharpen by exercise +the genius, to attempt to delight or instruct your race; and, even +supposing you fall short of every model you set before you, supposing +your name moulder with your dust, still you will have passed life more +nobly than the unlaborious herd. Grant that you win not that glorious +accident, 'a name below,' how can you tell but that you may have fitted +yourself for high destiny and employ, not in the world of men, but of +spirits? The powers of the mind cannot be less immortal than the mere +sense of identity; their acquisitions accompany us through the Eternal +Progress, and we may obtain a lower or a higher grade hereafter, in +proportion as we are more or less fitted by the exercise of our +intellect to comprehend and execute the solemn agencies of God." +</P> + +<P> +But be careful to avoid that over-intellectual culture which is +purchased at the expense of moral vigor. An observant professor of one +of our colleges has remarked that "the mind may be so rounded and +polished by education, so well balanced, as not to be energetic in any +one faculty. In other men not thus trained, the sense of deficiency +and of the sharp, jagged corners of their knowledge leads to efforts to +fill up the chasms, rendering them at last far better educated men than +the polished, easy-going graduate who has just knowledge enough to +prevent consciousness of his ignorance. While all the faculties of the +mind should be cultivated, it is yet desirable that it should have two +or three rough-hewn features of massive strength. Young men are too +apt to forget the great end of life which is to be and do, not to read +and brood over what other men have been and done." +</P> + +<P> +In a gymnasium you tug, you expand your chest, you push, pull, strike, +run, in order to develop your physical self; so you can develop your +moral and intellectual nature only by continued effort. +</P> + +<P> +"I repeat that my object is not to give him knowledge but to teach him +how to acquire it at need," said Rousseau. +</P> + +<P> +All learning is self-teaching. It is upon the working of the pupil's +own mind that his progress in knowledge depends. The great business of +the master is to teach the pupil to teach himself. +</P> + +<P> +"Thinking, not growth, makes manhood," says Isaac Taylor. "Accustom +yourself, therefore, to thinking. Set yourself to understand whatever +you see or read. To join thinking with reading is one of the first +maxims, and one of the easiest operations." +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"How few think justly of the thinking few:<BR> +How many never think who think they do."<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap09"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER IX. +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +WORK AND WAIT. +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +What we do upon some great occasion will probably depend on what we +already are; and what we are will be the result of previous years of +self-discipline.—H. P. LIDDON. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +In all matters, before beginning, a diligent preparation should be +made.—CICERO. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +I consider a human soul without education like marble in a quarry which +shows none of its inherent beauties until the skill of the polisher +sketches out the colors, makes the surface shine, and discovers every +ornamental cloud, spot, and vein that runs throughout the body of +it.—ADDISON. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Many a genius has been slow of growth. Oaks that flourish for a +thousand years do not spring up into beauty like a reed.—GEORGE HENRY +LEWES. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Use your gifts faithfully, and they shall be enlarged; practice what +you know, and you shall attain to higher knowledge.—ARNOLD. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +All good abides with him who waiteth wisely.—THOREAU. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +The more haste, ever the worse speed.—CHURCHILL. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Haste trips up its own heels, fetters and stops itself.—SENECA. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +"Wisely and slow; they stumble that run fast." +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +How can we expect a harvest of thought who have not had the seed-time +of character?—THOREAU. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +I call a complete and generous education that which fits a man to +perform justly, skillfully, and magnanimously, all the offices, both +public and private, of peace and war.—MILTON. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +The safe path to excellence and success, in every calling, is that of +appropriate preliminary education, diligent application to learn the +art and assiduity in practicing it.—EDWARD EVERETT. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +The more you know, the more you can save yourself and that which +belongs to you, and do more work with less effort.—CHARLES KINGSLEY. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"I was a mere cipher in that vast sea of human enterprise," said Henry +Bessemer, speaking of his arrival in London in 1831. Although but +eighteen years old, and without an acquaintance in the city, he soon +made work for himself by inventing a process of copying bas-reliefs on +cardboard. His method was so simple that one could learn in ten +minutes how to make a die from an embossed stamp for a penny. Having +ascertained later that in this way the raised stamps on all official +papers in England could easily be forged, he set to work and invented a +perforated stamp which could not be forged nor removed from a document. +At the public stamp office he was told by the chief that the government +was losing 100,000 pounds a year through the custom of removing stamps +from old parchments and using them again. The chief also appreciated +the new danger of easy counterfeiting. So he offered Bessemer a +definite sum for his process of perforation, or an office for life at +eight hundred pounds a year. Bessemer chose the office, and hastened +to tell the good news to a young woman with whom he had agreed to share +his fortune. In explaining his invention, he told how it would prevent +any one from taking a valuable stamp from a document a hundred years +old and using it a second time. +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<A NAME="img-166"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG CLASS="imgcenter" SRC="images/img-166.jpg" ALT="THOMAS ALVA EDISON" BORDER="2" WIDTH="371" HEIGHT="540"> +<H3 CLASS="h3center" STYLE="width: 371px"> +THOMAS ALVA EDISON +</H3> +</CENTER> + +<P CLASS="caption" ALIGN="center"> +"The Wizard of Menlo Park." +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +"What the world wants is men who have the nerve and the grit to work +and wait, whether the world applaud or hiss." +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<P> +"Yes," said his betrothed, "I understand that; but, surely, if all +stamps had a date put upon them they could not at a future time be used +without detection." +</P> + +<P> +This was a very short speech, and of no special importance if we omit a +single word of four letters; but, like the schoolboy's pins which saved +the lives of thousands of people annually by not getting swallowed, +that little word, by keeping out of the ponderous minds of the British +revenue officers, had for a long period saved the government the burden +of caring for an additional income of 100,000 pounds a year. And the +same little word, if published in its connection, would render Henry's +perforation device of far less value than a last year's bird's nest. +Henry felt proud of the young woman's ingenuity, and suggested the +improvement at the stamp office. As a result his system of perforation +was abandoned and he was deprived of his promised office, the +government coolly making use from that day to this, without +compensation, of the idea conveyed by that little insignificant word. +</P> + +<P> +So Bessemer's financial prospects were not very encouraging; but, +realizing that the best capital a young man can have is a capital wife, +he at once entered into a partnership which placed at his command the +combined ideas of two very level heads. The result, after years of +thought and experiment, was the Bessemer process of making steel +cheaply, which has revolutionized the iron industry throughout the +world. His method consists simply in forcing hot air from below into +several tons of melted pig-iron, so as to produce intense combustion; +and then adding enough spiegel-eisen (looking-glass iron), an ore rich +in carbon, to change the whole mass to steel. He discovered this +simple process only after trying in vain much more difficult and +expensive methods. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"All things come round to him who will but wait."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +The great lack of the age is want of thoroughness. How seldom you find +a young man or woman who is willing to take time to prepare for his +life work. A little education is all they want, a little smattering of +books, and then they are ready for business. +</P> + +<P> +"Can't wait" is characteristic of the century, and is written on +everything; on commerce, on schools, on society, on churches. Can't +wait for a high school, seminary, or college. The boy can't wait to +become a youth, nor the youth a man. Youth rush into business with no +great reserve of education or drill; of course they do poor, feverish +work, and break down in middle life, and many die of old age in the +forties. Everybody is in a hurry. Buildings are rushed up so quickly +that they will not stand, and everything is made "to sell." +</P> + +<P> +Not long ago a professor in one of our universities had a letter from a +young woman in the West, asking him if he did not think she could teach +elocution if she could come to the university and take twelve lessons. +Our young people of to-day want something, and want it quickly. They +are not willing to lay broad, deep foundations. The weary years in +preparatory school and college dishearten them. They only want a +"smattering" of an education. But as Pope says,— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"A little learning is a dangerous thing;<BR> +Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring:<BR> +There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain,<BR> +And drinking largely sobers us again."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +The shifts to cover up ignorance, and "the constant trembling lest some +blunder should expose one's emptiness," are pitiable. Short cuts and +abridged methods are the demand of the hour. But the way to shorten +the road to success is to take plenty of time to lay in your reserve +power. You can't stop to forage your provender as the army advances; +if you do the enemy will get there first. Hard work, a definite aim, +and faithfulness, will shorten the way. Don't risk a life's +superstructure upon a day's foundation. +</P> + +<P> +Unless you have prepared yourself to profit by your chance, the +opportunity will only make you ridiculous. A great occasion is +valuable to you just in proportion as you have educated yourself to +make use of it. Beware of that fatal facility of thoughtless speech +and superficial action which has misled many a young man into the +belief that he could make a glib tongue or a deft hand take the place +of deep study or hard work. +</P> + +<P> +Patience is nature's motto. She works ages to bring a flower to +perfection. What will she not do for the greatest of her creation? +Ages and aeons are nothing to her, out of them she has been carving her +great statue, a perfect man. +</P> + +<P> +Johnson said a man must turn over half a library to write one book. +When an authoress told Wordsworth she had spent six hours on a poem, he +replied that he would have spent six weeks. Think of Bishop Hall +spending thirty years on one of his works. Owens was working on the +"Commentary to the Epistle to the Hebrews" for twenty years. Moore +spent several weeks on one of his musical stanzas which reads as if it +were a dash of genius. Carlyle wrote with the utmost difficulty, and +never executed a page of his great histories till he had consulted +every known authority, so that every sentence is the quintessence of +many books, the product of many hours of drudging research in the great +libraries. To-day, "Sartor Resartus" is everywhere. You can get it +for a mere trifle at almost any bookseller's, and hundreds of thousands +of copies are scattered over the world. But when Carlyle brought it to +London in 1851, it was refused almost contemptuously by three prominent +publishers. At last he managed to get it into "Fraser's Magazine," the +editor of which conveyed to the author the pleasing information that +his work had been received with "unqualified disapprobation." Henry +Ward Beecher sent a half dozen articles to the publisher of a religious +paper to pay for his subscription, but they were respectfully declined. +The publishers of the "Atlantic Monthly" returned Miss Alcott's +manuscript, suggesting that she had better stick to teaching. One of +the leading magazines ridiculed Tennyson's first poems, and consigned +the young poet to oblivion. Only one of Ralph Waldo Emerson's books +had a remunerative sale. Washington Irving was nearly seventy years +old before the income from his books paid the expenses of his household. +</P> + +<P> +In some respects it is very unfortunate that the old system of binding +boys out to a trade has been abandoned. To-day very few boys learn any +trade. They pick up what they know, as they go along, just as a +student crams for a particular examination, just to "get through," +without any effort to see how much he may learn on any subject. +</P> + +<P> +Think of an American youth spending twelve years with Michael Angelo, +studying anatomy that he might create the masterpiece of all art; or +with Da Vinci devoting ten years to the model of an equestrian statue +that he might master the anatomy of the horse. Most young American +artists would expect, in a quarter of that time, to sculpture an Apollo +Belvidere. While Michael Angelo was painting the Sistine Chapel he +would not allow himself time for meals or to dress or undress; but he +kept bread within reach that he might eat when hunger impelled, and he +slept in his clothes. +</P> + +<P> +A rich man asked Howard Burnett to do a little thing for his album. +Burnett complied and charged a thousand francs. "But it took you only +five minutes," objected the rich man. "Yes, but it took me thirty +years to learn how to do it in five minutes." +</P> + +<P> +"I prepared that sermon," said a young sprig of divinity, "in half an +hour, and preached it at once, and thought nothing of it." "In that," +said an older minister, "your hearers are at one with you, for they +also thought nothing of it." +</P> + +<P> +What the age wants is men who have the nerve and the grit to work and +wait, whether the world applaud or hiss. It wants a Bancroft, who can +spend twenty-six years on the "History of the United States;" a Noah +Webster, who can devote thirty-six years to a dictionary; a Gibbon, who +can plod for twenty years on the "Decline and Fall of the Roman +Empire;" a Mirabeau, who can struggle on for forty years before he has +a chance to show his vast reserve, destined to shake an empire; a +Farragut, a Von Moltke, who have the persistence to work and wait for +half a century for their first great opportunities; a Garfield, burning +his lamp fifteen minutes later than a rival student in his academy; a +Grant, fighting on in heroic silence, when denounced by his brother +generals and politicians everywhere; a Field's untiring perseverance, +spending years and a fortune laying a cable when all the world called +him a fool; a Michael Angelo, working seven long years decorating the +Sistine Chapel with his matchless "Creation" and the "Last Judgment," +refusing all remuneration therefor, lest his pencil might catch the +taint of avarice; a Titian, spending seven years on the "Last Supper;" +a Stephenson, working fifteen years on a locomotive; a Watt, twenty +years on a condensing engine; a Lady Franklin, working incessantly for +twelve long years to rescue her husband from the polar seas; a Thurlow +Weed, walking two miles through the snow with rags tied around his feet +for shoes, to borrow the history of the French Revolution, and eagerly +devouring it before the sap-bush fire; a Milton, elaborating "Paradise +Lost" in a world he could not see, and then selling it for fifteen +pounds; a Thackeray, struggling on cheerfully after his "Vanity Fair" +was refused by a dozen publishers; a Balzac, toiling and waiting in a +lonely garret, whom neither poverty, debt, nor hunger could discourage +or intimidate; not daunted by privations, not hindered by +discouragements. It wants men who can work and wait. +</P> + +<P> +When a young lawyer Daniel Webster once looked in vain through all the +law libraries near him, and then ordered at an expense of fifty dollars +the necessary books, to obtain authorities and precedents in a case in +which his client was a poor blacksmith. He won his cause, but, on +account of the poverty of his client, only charged fifteen dollars, +thus losing heavily on the books bought, to say nothing of his time. +Years after, as he was passing through New York city, he was consulted +by Aaron Burr on an important but puzzling case then pending before the +Supreme Court. He saw in a moment that it was just like the +blacksmith's case, an intricate question of title, which he had solved +so thoroughly that it was to him now as simple as the multiplication +table. Going back to the time of Charles II. he gave the law and +precedents involved with such readiness and accuracy of sequence that +Burr asked in great surprise if he had been consulted before in the +case. "Most certainly not," he replied, "I never heard of your case +till this evening." "Very well," said Burr, "proceed," and, when he +had finished, Webster received a fee that paid him liberally for all +the time and trouble he had spent for his early client. +</P> + +<P> +Albert Bierstadt first crossed the Rocky Mountains with a band of +pioneers in 1859, making sketches for the paintings of western scenes +for which he had become famous. As he followed the trail to Pike's +Peak, he gazed in wonder upon the enormous herds of buffaloes which +dotted the plains as far as the eye could reach, and thought of the +time when they would have disappeared before the march of civilization. +The thought haunted him and found its final embodiment in "The Last of +the Buffaloes" in 1890. To perfect this great work he had spent twenty +years. +</P> + +<P> +Everything which endures, which will stand the test of time, must have +a deep, solid foundation. In Rome the foundation is often the most +expensive part of an edifice, so deep must they dig to build on the +living rock. +</P> + +<P> +Fifty feet of Bunker Hill Monument is under ground; unseen and +unappreciated by those who tread about that historic shaft, but it is +this foundation, apparently thrown away, which enables it to stand +upright, true to the plumb-line through all the tempests that lash its +granite sides. A large part of every successful life must be spent in +laying foundation stones under ground. Success is the child of +drudgery and perseverance and depends upon "knowing how long it takes +to succeed." Havelock joined the army at twenty-eight, and for +thirty-four years worked and waited for his opportunity; conscious of +his power, "fretting as a subaltern while he saw drunkards and fools +put above his head." +</P> + +<P> +But during all these years he was fitting himself to lead that +marvelous march to Lucknow. +</P> + +<P> +It was many years of drudgery and reading a thousand volumes that +enabled George Eliot to get fifty thousand dollars for "Daniel +Deronda." How came writers to be famous? By writing for years without +any pay at all; by writing hundreds of pages for mere practice work; by +working like galley-slaves at literature for half a lifetime. It was +working and waiting many long and weary years that put one hundred and +twenty-five thousand dollars into "The Angelus." Millet's first +attempts were mere daubs, the later were worth fortunes. Schiller +"never could get done." Dante sees himself "growing lean over his +Divine Comedy." It is working and waiting that gives perfection. +</P> + +<P> +"I do not remember," said Beecher, "a book in all the depths of +learning, nor a scrap in literature, nor a work in all the schools of +art, from which its author has derived a permanent renown, that is not +known to have been long and patiently elaborated." +</P> + +<P> +Endurance is a much better test of character than any one act of +heroism, however noble. +</P> + +<P> +The pianist Thalberg said he never ventured to perform one of his +celebrated pieces in public until he had played it at least fifteen +hundred times. He laid no claim whatever to genius; he said it was all +a question of hard work. The accomplishments of such industry, such +perseverance, would put to shame many a man who claims genius. +</P> + +<P> +Before Edmund Kean would consent to appear in that character which he +acted with such consummate skill, The Gentleman Villain, he practiced +constantly before a glass, studying expression for a year and a half. +When he appeared upon the stage, Byron, who went to see him with Moore, +said he never looked upon so fearful and wicked a face. As the great +actor went on to delineate the terrible consequences of sin, Byron +fainted. +</P> + +<P> +"For years I was in my place of business by sunrise," said a wealthy +banker who had begun without a dollar, "and often I did not leave it +for fifteen or eighteen hours." +</P> + +<P> +<I>Festina lente</I>—hasten slowly—is a good Latin motto. Patience, it is +said, changes the mulberry leaf to satin. The giant oak on the +hillside was detained months or years in its upward growth while its +roots took a great turn around some rock, in order to gain a hold by +which the tree was anchored to withstand the storms of centuries. Da +Vinci spent four years on the head of Mona Lisa, perhaps the most +beautiful ever painted, but he left therein, an artistic thought for +all time. +</P> + +<P> +Said Captain Bingham: "You can have no idea of the wonderful machine +that the German army is and how well it is prepared for war. A chart +is made out which shows just what must be done in the case of wars with +the different nations. And every officer's place in the scheme is laid +out beforehand. There is a schedule of trains which will supersede all +other schedules the moment war is declared, and this is so arranged +that the commander of the army here could telegraph to any officer to +take such a train and go to such a place at a moment's notice. When +the Franco-Prussian war was declared, Von Moltke was awakened at +midnight and told of the fact. He said coolly to the official who +aroused him, 'Go to pigeonhole No. —— in my safe and take a paper +from it and telegraph as there directed to the different troops of the +empire.' He then turned over and went to sleep and awoke at his usual +hour in the morning. Every one else in Berlin was excited about the +war, but Von Moltke took his morning walk as usual, and a friend who +met him said, 'General, you seem to be taking it very easy. Aren't you +afraid of the situation? I should think you would be busy.' 'Ah,' +replied Von Moltke, 'all of my work for this time has been done long +beforehand and everything that can be done now has been done.'" +</P> + +<P> +That is done soon enough which is done well. Soon ripe, soon rotten. +He that would enjoy the fruit must not gather the flower. He who is +impatient to become his own master is more likely to become his own +slave. Better believe yourself a dunce and work away than a genius and +be idle. One year of trained thinking is worth more than a whole +college course of mental absorption of a vast series of undigested +facts. The facility with which the world swallows up the ordinary +college graduate who thought he was going to dazzle mankind should bid +you pause and reflect. But just as certainly as man was created not to +crawl on all fours in the depths of primeval forests, but to develop +his mental and moral faculties, just so certainly he needs education, +and only by means of it will he become what he ought to become,—man, +in the highest sense of the word. Ignorance is not simply the negation +of knowledge, it is the misdirection of the mind. "One step in +knowledge," says Bulwer, "is one step from sin; one step from sin is +one step nearer to Heaven." +</P> + +<P> +A learned clergyman was thus accosted by an illiterate preacher who +despised education: "Sir, you have been to college, I presume?" "Yes, +sir," was the reply. "I am thankful," said the former, "that the Lord +opened my mouth without any learning." "A similar event," retorted the +clergyman, "happened in Balaam's time." +</P> + +<P> +"If a cloth were drawn around the eyes of Praxiteles' statue of Love," +says Bulwer, "the face looked grave and sad; but as the bandage was +removed, a beautiful smile would overspread the countenance. Even so +does the removal of the veil of ignorance from the eyes of the mind +bring radiant happiness to the heart of man." +</P> + +<P> +A young man just graduated told the President of Trinity College that +he had completed his education, and had come to say good-by. "Indeed," +said the President, "I have just begun my education." +</P> + +<P> +Many an extraordinary man has been made out of a very ordinary boy; but +in order to accomplish this we must begin with him while he is young. +It is simply astonishing what training will do for a rough, uncouth, +and even dull lad, if he has good material in him, and comes under the +tutelage of a skilled educator before his habits have become confirmed. +Even a few weeks' or months' drill of the rawest and roughest recruits +in the late Civil War so straightened and dignified stooping and +uncouth soldiers, and made them so manly, erect, and courteous in their +bearing, that their own friends scarcely knew them. If this change is +so marked in the youth who has grown to maturity, what a miracle is +possible in the lad who is taken early and put under a course of drill +and systematic training, both physical, mental, and moral. How many a +man who is now in the penitentiary, in the poorhouse, or among the +tramps, or living out a miserable existence in the slums of our cities, +bent over, uncouth, rough, slovenly, has possibilities slumbering +within the rags, which would have developed him into a magnificent man, +an ornament to the human race instead of a foul blot and scar, had he +only been fortunate enough early in life to have come under efficient +and systematic training. +</P> + +<P> +Laziness begins in cobwebs and ends in iron chains. The more business +a man has, the more he can do, for be learns to economize his time. +</P> + +<P> +The industry that acquired riches, according to a wise teacher, the +patience that is required in obtaining them, the reserved self-control, +the measuring of values, the sympathy felt for fellow-toilers, the +knowledge of what a dollar costs to the average man, the memory of +it—all these things are preservative. But woe to the young farmer who +hates farming; does not like sowing and reaping; is impatient with the +dilatory and slow path to a small though secure fortune in the +neighborhood where he was born, and comes to the city, hoping to become +suddenly rich, thinking that he can break into the palace of wealth and +rob it of its golden treasures! +</P> + +<P> +Edison described his repeated efforts to make the phonograph reproduce +an aspirated sound, and added: "From eighteen to twenty hours a day for +the last seven months I have worked on this single word 'specia.' I +said into the phonograph 'specia, specia, specia,' but the instrument +responded 'pecia, pecia, pecia.' It was enough to drive one mad. But +I held firm, and I have succeeded." +</P> + +<P> +The road to distinction must be paved with years of self-denial and +hard work. +</P> + +<P> +Horace Mann, the great author of the common school system of +Massachusetts, was a remarkable example of that pluck and patience +which can work and wait. His only inheritance was poverty and hard +work. But he had an unquenchable thirst for knowledge and a +determination to get on in the world. He braided straw to get money to +buy books which his soul thirsted for. +</P> + +<P> +To Jonas Chickering there were no trifles in the manufacture of a +piano. Others might work for salaries, but he was working for fame and +fortune. Neither time nor pains were of any account to him compared +with accuracy and knowledge. He could afford to work and wait, for +quality, not quantity, was his aim. Fifty years ago the piano was a +miserable, instrument compared with the perfect mechanism of to-day. +Chickering was determined to make a piano which would yield the +fullest, richest volume of melody with the least exertion to the +player, and one which would withstand atmospheric changes and preserve +its purity and truthfulness of tone. And he strove patiently and +persistently till he succeeded. +</P> + +<P> +"Thy life, wert thou the pitifullest of all the sons of earth, is no +idle dream, but a solemn reality," said Carlyle. "It is thy own. It +is all thou hast to comfort eternity with. Work then like a star, +unhasting, yet unresting." +</P> + +<P> +Gladstone was bound to win; although he had spent many years of +preparation for his life work, in spite of the consciousness of +marvelous natural endowments which would have been deemed sufficient by +many young men, and notwithstanding he had gained the coveted prize of +a seat in Parliament, yet he decided to make himself master of the +situation; and amid all his public and private duties, he not only +spent eleven terms more in the study of the law, but he studied Greek +constantly and read every well written book or paper he could obtain, +so determined was he that his life should be rounded out to its fullest +measure, and that his mind should have broad and liberal culture. +</P> + +<P> +Emperor William I. was not a genius, but the secret of his power lay in +tireless perseverance. A friend says of him, "When I passed the palace +at Berlin night after night, however late, I always saw that grand +imperial figure standing beside the green lamp, and I used to say to +myself, 'That is how the imperial crown of Germany was won.'" +</P> + +<P> +Ole Bull said, "If I practice one day, I can see the result. If I +practice two days my friends can see it; if I practice three days the +great public can see it." +</P> + +<P> +The habit of seizing every bit of knowledge, no matter how +insignificant it may seem at the time, every opportunity, every +occasion, and grinding them all up into experience, cannot be +overestimated. You will find use for all of it. Webster once repeated +an anecdote with effect which he heard fourteen years before, and which +he had not thought of in the mean time. It exactly fitted the +occasion. "It is an ill mason that rejects any stone." +</P> + +<P> +Webster was once urged to speak on a subject of great importance, but +refused, saying he was very busy and had no time to master the subject. +"But," replied his friend, "a very few words from you would do much to +awaken public attention to it." Webster replied, "If there be so much +weight in my words, it is because I do not allow myself to speak on any +subject until my mind is imbued with it." On one occasion Webster made +a remarkable speech before the Phi Beta Kappa Society at Harvard, when +a book was presented to him, but after he had gone, his "impromptu" +speech, carefully written out, was found in the book which he had +forgotten to take away. +</P> + +<P> +Demosthenes was once urged to speak on a great and sudden emergency, +but replied, "I am not prepared." In fact, it was thought by many that +Demosthenes did not possess any genius whatever, because he never +allowed himself to speak on any subject without thorough preparation. +In any meeting or assembly, when called upon, he would never rise, even +to make remarks, it was said, without previously preparing himself. +</P> + +<P> +Alexander Hamilton said, "Men give me credit for genius. All the +genius I have lies just in this: when I have a subject in hand I study +it profoundly. Day and night it is before me. I explore it in all its +bearings. My mind becomes pervaded with it. Then the effort which I +make the people are pleased to call the fruit of genius; it is the +fruit of labor and thought." The law of labor is equally binding on +genius and mediocrity. +</P> + +<P> +Are the results so distant that you delay the preparation in the hope +that fortuitous good luck may make it unnecessary? As well might the +husbandman delay sowing his seed until the spring and summer are past +and the ground hardened by the frosts of a rigorous winter. As well +might one who is desirous of enjoying firm health inoculate his system +with the seeds of disease, and expect at such time as he may see fit to +recover from its effects, and banish the malady. Nelaton, the great +surgeon, said that if he had four minutes in which to perform an +operation, on which a life depended, he would take one minute to +consider how best to do it. +</P> + +<P> +"Many men," says Longfellow, "do not allow their principles to take +root, but pull them up every now and then, as children do flowers they +have planted, to see if they are growing." We must not only work, but +wait. +</P> + +<P> +"The spruce young spark," says Sizer, "who thinks chiefly of his +mustache and boots and shiny hat, of getting along nicely and easily +during the day, and talking about the theatre, the opera, or a fast +horse, ridiculing the faithful young fellow who came to learn the +business and make a man of himself, because he will not join in wasting +his time in dissipation, will see the day, if his useless life is not +earlier blasted by vicious indulgences, when he will be glad to accept +a situation from his fellow-clerk whom he now ridicules and affects to +despise, when the latter shall stand in the firm, dispensing benefits +and acquiring fortune." +</P> + +<P> +"I have been watching the careers of young men by the thousand in this +busy city of New York for over thirty years," said Dr. Cuyler, "and I +find that the chief difference between the successful and the failures +lies in the single element of staying power. Permanent success is +oftener won by holding on than by sudden dash, however brilliant. The +easily discouraged, who are pushed back by a straw, are all the time +dropping to the rear—to perish or to be carried along on the stretcher +of charity. They who understand and practice Abraham Lincoln's homely +maxim of 'pegging away' have achieved the solidest success." +</P> + +<P> +"When a man has done his work," says Ruskin, "and nothing can any way +be materially altered in his fate, let him forget his toil, and jest +with his fate if he will, but what excuse can you find for willfulness +of thought at the very lime when every crisis of fortune hangs on your +decisions? A youth thoughtless, when all the happiness of his home +forever depends on the chances or the passions of the hour! A youth +thoughtless, when the career of all his days depends on the opportunity +of a moment! A youth thoughtless, when his every action is a +foundation-stone of future conduct, and every imagination a foundation +of life or death! Be thoughtless in any after years, rather than +now—though, indeed, there is only one place where a man may be nobly +thoughtless, his deathbed. Nothing should ever be left to be done +there." +</P> + +<P> +The Duke of Wellington became so discouraged because he did not advance +in the army that he applied for a much inferior position in the customs +department, but was refused. Napoleon had applied for every vacant +position for seven years before he was recognized, but meanwhile he +studied with all his might, supplementing what was considered a +thorough military education by researches and reflections which in +later years enabled him easily to teach the art of war to veterans who +had never dreamed of his novel combinations. +</P> + +<P> +Reserves which carry us through great emergencies are the result of +long working and long waiting. Collyer declares that reserves mean to +a man also achievement,—"the power to do the grandest thing possible +to your nature when you feel you must, or some precious thing will be +lost,—to do well always, but best in the crisis on which all things +turn; to stand the strain of a long fight, and still find you have +something left, and so to never know you are beaten, because you never +are beaten." Every defeat is a Waterloo to him who has no reserves. +</P> + +<P> +He only is independent in action who has been earnest and thorough in +preparation and self-culture. "Not for school, but for life, we +learn;" and our habits—of promptness, earnestness, and thoroughness, +or of tardiness, fickleness, and superficiality—are the things +acquired most readily and longest retained. +</P> + +<P> +"One who reads the chronicles of discoveries is struck with the +prominent part that accident has played in such annals. For some of +the most useful processes and machinery the world is indebted to +apparently chance occurrences. Inventors in search of one object have +failed in their quest, but have stumbled on something more valuable +than that for which they were looking. Saul is not the only man who +has gone in search of asses and found a kingdom. Astrologers sought to +read from the heavens the fate of men and the fortune of nations, and +they led to a knowledge of astronomy. Alchemists were seeking for the +philosopher's stone, and from their efforts sprung the science of +chemistry. Men explored the heavens for something to explain +irregularities in the movements of the planets, and discovered a star +other than the one for which they were looking. A careless glance at +such facts might encourage the delusion that aimless straying in +bypaths is quite as likely to be rewarded as is the steady pressing +forward, with fixed purpose, towards some definite goal. +</P> + +<P> +"But it is to be remembered that the men who made the accidental +discoveries were men who were looking for something. The unexpected +achievement was but the return for the toil after what was attained. +Others might have encountered the same facts, but only the eye made +eager by the strain of long watching would be quick to note the +meaning. If vain search for hidden treasure has no other recompense, +it at least gives ability to detect the first gleam of the true metal. +Men may wake at times surprised to find themselves famous, but it was +the work they did before going to sleep, and not the slumber, that gave +the eminence. When the ledge has been drilled and loaded and the +proper connections have been made, a child's touch on the electric key +may be enough to annihilate the obstacle, but without the long +preparation the pressure of a giant's hand would be without effect. +</P> + +<P> +"In the search for truth and the shaping of character the principle +remains the same as in science and literature. Trivial causes are +followed by wonderful results, but it is only the merchantman who is on +the watch for goodly pearls who is represented as finding the pearl of +great price." +</P> + +<P> +To vary the language of another, the three great essentials to success +in mental and physical labor are Practice, Patience, and Perseverance, +but the greatest of these is Perseverance. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Let us, then, be up and doing,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">With a heart for any fate;</SPAN><BR> +Still achieving, still pursuing,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Learn to labor and to wait.</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">LONGFELLOW.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap10"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER X. +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CLEAR GRIT. +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I shall show the cinders of my spirits<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Through the ashes of my chance.</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">SHAKESPEARE.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +What though ten thousand faint,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Desert, or yield, or in weak terror flee!</SPAN><BR> +Heed not the panic of the multitude;<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Thine be the captain's watchword,—Victory!</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">HORATIUS BONAR.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2em">Better to stem with heart and hand</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">The roaring tide of life, than lie,</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2em">Unmindful, on its flowery strand,</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Of God's occasions drifting by!</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2em">Better with naked nerve to hear</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">The needles of this goading air,</SPAN><BR> +Than in the lap of sensual ease forego<BR> +The godlike power to do, the godlike aim to know.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">WHITTIER.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Let fortune empty her whole quiver on me,<BR> +I have a soul that, like an ample shield,<BR> +Can take in all, and verge enough for more.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">DRYDEN.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +There's a brave fellow! There's a man of pluck!<BR> +A man who's not afraid to say his say,<BR> +Though a whole town's against him.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">LONGFELLOW.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in rising every time we +fall.—GOLDSMITH. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Attempt the end and never stand to doubt;<BR> +Nothing's so hard but search will find it out.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">HERRICK.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +The barriers are not yet erected which shall say to aspiring talent, +"Thus far and no farther."—BEETHOVEN. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"Friends and comrades," said Pizarro, as he turned toward the south, +after tracing with his sword upon the sand a line from east to west, +"on that side are toil, hunger, nakedness, the drenching storm, +desertion, and death; on this side, ease and pleasure. There lies Peru +with its riches; here, Panama and its poverty. Choose, each man, what +best becomes a brave Castilian. For my part, I go to the south." So +saying, he crossed the line and was followed by thirteen Spaniards in +armor. Thus, on the little island of Gallo in the Pacific, when his +men were clamoring to return to Panama, did Pizarro and his few +volunteers resolve to stake their lives upon the success of a desperate +crusade against the powerful empire of the Incas. At the time they had +not even a vessel to transport them to the country they wished to +conquer. Is it necessary to add that all difficulties yielded at last +to such resolute determination? +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<A NAME="img-186"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG CLASS="imgcenter" SRC="images/img-186.jpg" ALT="ANDREW JACKSON" BORDER="2" WIDTH="361" HEIGHT="553"> +<H3 CLASS="h3center" STYLE="width: 361px"> +ANDREW JACKSON +</H3> +</CENTER> + +<P CLASS="caption" ALIGN="center"> +"Old Hickory." +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Stick to your aim: the mongrel's hold will slip,<BR> +But only crowbars loose the bull-dog's grip."<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +"The nerve that never relaxes, the eye that never blenches, the thought +that never wanders,—these are the masters of victory." +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Perseverance is a Roman virtue,<BR> +That wins each godlike act, and plucks success<BR> +E'en from the spear-proof crest of rugged danger."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +At a time when abolitionists were dangerously unpopular, a crowd of +brawny Cape Cod fishermen had made such riotous demonstrations that all +the speakers announced, except Stephen Foster and Lucy Stone, had fled +from an open-air platform. "You had better run, Stephen," said she, +"they are coming." "But who will take care of you?" asked Foster. +"This gentleman will take care of me," she replied, calmly laying her +hand within the arm of a burly rioter with a club, who had just sprung +upon the platform. "Wh—what did you say?" stammered the astonished +rowdy, as he looked at the little woman; "yes, I'll take care of you, +and no one shall touch a hair of your head." With this he forced a way +for her through the crowd, and, at her earnest request, placed her upon +a stump and stood guard with his club while she delivered an address so +effective that the audience offered no further violence, and even took +up a collection of twenty dollars to repay Mr. Foster for the damage +his clothes had received when the riot was at its height. +</P> + +<P> +"When you get into a tight place and everything goes against you, till +it seems as if you could not hold on a minute longer," said Harriet +Beecher Stowe, "never give up then, for that's just the place and time +that the tide'll turn." +</P> + +<P> +Charles Sumner said, "Three things are necessary: first, backbone; +second, backbone; third, backbone." +</P> + +<P> +While digging among the ruins of Pompeii, which was buried by the dust +and ashes from an eruption of Vesuvius, A. D. 79, the workmen found the +skeleton of a Roman soldier in the sentry-box at one of the city's +gates. He might have found safety under sheltering rocks close by; +but, in the face of certain death, he had remained at his post, a mute +witness to the thorough discipline, the ceaseless vigilance and +fidelity which made the Roman legionaries masters of the known world. +Bulwer, describing the flight of a party amid the dust, and ashes, and +streams of boiling water, and huge hurtling fragments of scoria, and +gusty winds, and lurid lightnings, continues: "The air was now still +for a few minutes; the lamp from the gate streamed out far and clear; +the fugitives hurried on. They gained the gate. They passed by the +Roman sentry. The lightning flashed over his livid face and polished +helmet, but his stern features were composed even in their awe! He +remained erect and motionless at his post. That hour itself had not +animated the machine of the ruthless majesty of Rome into the reasoning +and self-acting man. There he stood amidst the crashing elements; he +had not received the permission to desert his station and escape." +</P> + +<P> +The world admires the man who never flinches from unexpected +difficulties, who calmly, patiently, and courageously grapples with his +fate, who dies, if need be, at his post. +</P> + +<P> +"Clear grit" always commands respect. It is that quality which +achieves, and everybody admires achievement. In the strife of parties +and principles, backbone without brains will carry against brains +without backbone. "A politician weakly and amiably in the right is no +match for a politician tenaciously and pugnaciously in the wrong." You +cannot, by tying an opinion to a man's tongue, make him the +representative of that opinion; at the close of any battle for +principles, his name will be found neither among the dead nor among the +wounded, but among the missing. +</P> + +<P> +The "London Times" was an insignificant sheet published by Mr. Walter +and was steadily losing money. John Walter, Jr., then only +twenty-seven years old, begged his father to give him full control of +the paper. After many misgivings, the father finally consented. The +young journalist began to remodel the establishment and to introduce +new ideas everywhere. The paper had not attempted to mould public +opinion, and had no individuality or character of its own. The +audacious young editor boldly attacked every wrong, even the +government, when he thought it corrupt. Thereupon the public customs, +printing, and the government advertisements were withdrawn. The father +was in utter dismay. The son he was sure would ruin the paper and +himself. But no remonstrance could swerve him from his purpose, to +give the world a great journal which should have weight, character, +individuality, and independence. +</P> + +<P> +The public soon saw that a new power stood behind the "Times"; that its +articles meant business; that new life and new blood and new ideas had +been infused into the insignificant sheet; that a man with brains and +push and tenacity of purpose stood at the helm,—a man who could make a +way when he could not find one. Among other new features foreign +dispatches were introduced, and they appeared in the "Times" several +days before their appearance in the government organs. The "leading +article" also was introduced to stay. But the aggressive editor +antagonized the government, and his foreign dispatches were all stopped +at the outpost, while those of the ministerial journalists were allowed +to proceed. But nothing could daunt this resolute young spirit. At +enormous expense he employed special couriers. Every obstacle put in +his way, and all opposition from the government, only added to his +determination to succeed. Enterprise, push, grit were behind the +"Times," and nothing could stay its progress. Walter was the soul of +the paper, and his personality pervaded every detail. In those days +only three hundred copies of the "Times" could be struck off in an hour +by the best presses, and Walter had duplicate and even triplicate types +set. Then he set his brain to work, and finally the Walter Press, +throwing off 17,000 copies, both sides printed, per hour, was the +result. It was the 29th of November, 1814, that the first steam +printed paper was given to the world. Walter's tenacity of purpose was +remarkable. He shrank from no undertaking, and neglected no detail. +</P> + +<P> +"Mean natures always feel a sort of terror before great natures, and +many a base thought has been unuttered, many a sneaking vote withheld, +through the fear inspired by the rebuking presence of one noble man." +As a rule, pure grit, character, has the right of way. In the presence +of men permeated with grit and sound in character, meanness and +baseness slink out of sight. Mean men are uncomfortable, dishonesty +trembles, hypocrisy is uncertain. +</P> + +<P> +Lincoln, being asked by an anxious visitor what he would do after three +or four years if the rebellion was not subdued, replied: "Oh, there is +no alternative but to keep pegging away." +</P> + +<P> +"It is in me and it shall come out," said Sheridan, when told that he +would never make an orator, as he had failed in his first speech in +Parliament. He became known as one of the foremost orators of his day. +</P> + +<P> +When a boy Henry Clay was very bashful and diffident, and scarcely +dared recite before his class at school, but he determined to become an +orator. So he committed speeches and recited them in the cornfields, +or in the barn with the horse and cows for an audience. +</P> + +<P> +Look at Garrison reading this advertisement in a Southern paper: "Five +thousand dollars will be paid for the head of W. L. Garrison by the +Governor of Georgia." Behold him again; a broadcloth mob is leading +him through the streets of Boston by a rope. He is hurried to jail. +See him return calmly and unflinchingly to his work, beginning at the +point at which he was interrupted. Note this heading in the +"Liberator," the type of which he set himself in an attic on State +Street, in Boston: "I am in earnest, I will not equivocate, I will not +excuse, I will not retreat a single inch, and I will be heard." Was +Garrison heard? Ask a race set free largely by his efforts. Even the +gallows erected in front of his own door did not daunt him. He held +the ear of an unwilling world with that burning word "freedom," which +was destined never to cease its vibrations until it had breathed its +sweet secret to the last slave. +</P> + +<P> +If impossibilities ever exist, popularly speaking, they ought to have +been found somewhere between the birth and the death of Kitto, that +deaf pauper and master of Oriental learning. But Kitto did not find +them there. In the presence of his decision and imperial energy they +melted away. Kitto begged his father to take him out of the poorhouse, +even if he had to subsist like the Hottentots. He told him that he +would sell his books and pawn his handkerchief, by which he thought he +could raise about twelve shillings. He said he could live upon +blackberries, nuts, and field turnips, and was willing to sleep on a +hayrick. Here was real grit. What were impossibilities to such a +resolute will? Patrick Henry voiced that decision which characterized +the great men of the Revolution when he said, "Is life so dear, or +peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? +Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but +as for me, give me liberty or give me death!" +</P> + +<P> +Grit is a permanent, solid quality, which enters into the very +structure, the very tissues of the constitution. A weak man, a +wavering, irresolute man, may be "spunky" upon occasion, he may be +"plucky" in an emergency; but pure "grit" is a part of the very +character of strong men alone. Lord Erskine was a plucky man; he even +had flashes of heroism, and when he was with weaker men, he was thought +to have nerve and even grit; but when he entered the House of Commons, +although a hero at the bar, the imperiousness, the audacious scorn, and +the intellectual supremacy of Pitt disturbed his equanimity and exposed +the weak places in his armor. In Pitt's commanding presence he lost +his equilibrium. His individuality seemed off its centre; he felt +fluttered, weak, and uneasy. +</P> + +<P> +Many of our generals in the late war exhibited heroism. They were +"plucky," and often displayed great determination, but Grant had pure +"grit" in the most concentrated form. He could not be moved from his +base; he was self-centred, immovable. "If you try to wheedle out of +him his plans for a campaign, he stolidly smokes; if you call him an +imbecile and a blunderer, he blandly lights another cigar; if you +praise him as the greatest general living, he placidly returns the puff +from his regalia; and if you tell him he should run for the presidency, +it does not disturb the equanimity with which he inhales and exhales +the unsubstantial vapor which typifies the politician's promises. +While you are wondering what kind of creature this man without a tongue +is, you are suddenly electrified with the news of some splendid +victory, proving that behind the cigar, and behind the face discharged +of all tell-tale expression, is the best brain to plan and the +strongest heart to dare among the generals of the Republic." +</P> + +<P> +Demosthenes was a man who could rise to sublime heights of heroism, but +his bravery was not his normal condition and depended upon his genius +being aroused. +</P> + +<P> +He had "pluck" and "spunk" on occasions, but Lincoln had pure "grit." +When the illustrated papers everywhere were caricaturing him, when no +epithet seemed too harsh to heap upon him, when his methods were +criticised by his own party, and the generals in the war were +denouncing his "foolish" confidence in Grant, and delegations were +waiting upon him to ask for that general's removal, the great President +sat with crossed legs, and was reminded of a story. +</P> + +<P> +Lincoln and Grant both had that rare nerve which cares not for +ridicule, is not swerved by public clamor, can bear abuse and hatred. +There is a mighty force in truth and in the sublime conviction and +supreme self-confidence behind it, in the knowledge that truth is +mighty and the conviction and confidence that it will prevail. +</P> + +<P> +Pure grit is that element of character which enables a man to clutch +his aim with an iron grip, and keep the needle of his purpose pointing +to the star of his hope. Through sunshine and storm, through hurricane +and tempest, through sleet and rain, with a leaky ship, with a crew in +mutiny, it perseveres; in fact, nothing but death can subdue it, and it +dies still struggling. +</P> + +<P> +The man of grit carries in his very presence a power which controls and +commands. He is spared the necessity of declaring himself, for his +grit speaks in his every act. It does not come by fits and starts, it +is a part of his very life. It inspires a sublime audacity and a +heroic courage. Many of the failures of life are due to the want of +grit or business nerve. It is unfortunate for a young man to start out +in business life with a weak, yielding disposition, with no resolution +or backbone to mark his own course and stick to it, with no ability to +say "No" with an emphasis, obliging this man by investing in hopeless +speculation, and rather than offend a friend, indorsing a questionable +note. +</P> + +<P> +A little boy was asked how he learned to skate. "Oh, by getting up +every time I fell down," he replied. +</P> + +<P> +Whipple tells a story of Masséna which illustrates the masterful +purpose that plucks victory out of the jaws of defeat. "After the +defeat at Essling, the success of Napoleon's attempt to withdraw his +beaten army depended on the character of Masséna, to whom the Emperor +dispatched a messenger, telling him to keep his position for two hours +longer at Aspern. This order, couched in the form of a request, +required almost an impossibility; but Napoleon knew the indomitable +tenacity of the man to whom he gave it. The messenger found Masséna +seated on a heap of rubbish, his eyes bloodshot, his frame weakened by +his unparalleled exertions during a contest of forty hours, and his +whole appearance indicating a physical state better befitting the +hospital than the field. But that steadfast soul seemed altogether +unaffected by bodily prostration; half dead as he was with fatigue, he +rose painfully and said, 'Tell the Emperor that I will hold out for two +hours.' And he kept his word." +</P> + +<P> +"Often defeated in battle," said Macaulay of Alexander the Great, "he +was always successful in war." He might have said the same of +Washington, and, with appropriate changes, of all who win great +triumphs of any kind. +</P> + +<P> +In the battle of Marengo, the Austrians considered the day won. The +French army was inferior in numbers, and had given way. The Austrian +army extended its wings on the right and on the left, to follow up the +French. Then, though the French themselves thought the battle lost, +and the Austrians were confident it was won, Napoleon gave the command +to charge; and, the trumpet's blast being given, the Old Guard charged +down into the weakened centre of the enemy, cut it in two, rolled the +two wings up on either side, and the battle was won for France. +</P> + +<P> +"Never despair," says Burke, "but if you do, work on in despair." +</P> + +<P> +Once when Marshal Ney was going into battle, looking down at his knees +which were smiting together, he said, "You may well shake; you would +shake worse yet if you knew where I am going to take you." +</P> + +<P> +It is victory after victory with the soldier, lesson after lesson with +the scholar, blow after blow with the laborer, crop after crop with the +farmer, picture after picture with the painter, and mile after mile +with the traveler, that secures what all so much desire—SUCCESS. +</P> + +<P> +A promising Harvard student was stricken with paralysis of both legs. +Physicians said there was no hope for him. The lad determined to +continue his college studies. The examiners heard him at his bedside, +and in four years he took his degree. He resolved to make a critical +study of Dante, to do which he had to learn Italian and German. He +persevered in spite of repeated attacks of illness and partial loss of +sight. He was competing for the university prize. Think of the +paralytic lad, helpless in bed, competing for a prize, fighting death +inch by inch. What a lesson! Before his book was published or the +prize awarded, the brave student died, but the book was successful. He +meant that his life should not be a burden or a failure, and he was not +only graduated from the best college in America, but competed +successfully for the university prize, and made a valuable contribution +to literature. +</P> + +<P> +Professor L. T. Townsend, the famous author of "Credo," is another +triumph of grit over environment. He had a hard struggle as a boy, but +succeeded in working his way through Amherst College, living on +forty-five cents a week. +</P> + +<P> +Orange Judd was a remarkable example of success through grit. He +earned corn by working for farmers, carried it on his back to mill, +brought back the meal to his room, cooked it himself, milked cows for +his pint of milk per day, and lived on mush and milk for months +together. He worked his way through Wesleyan University, and took a +three years' post-graduate course at Yale. +</P> + +<P> +Congressman William W. Crapo, while working his way through college, +being too poor to buy a dictionary, actually copied one, walking from +his home in the village of Dartmouth, Mass., to New Bedford to +replenish his store of words and definitions from the town library. +</P> + +<P> +Oh, the triumphs of this indomitable spirit of the conqueror! This it +was that enabled Franklin to dine on a small loaf in the +printing-office with a book in his hand. It helped Locke to live on +bread and water in a Dutch garret. It enabled Gideon Lee to go +barefoot in the snow, half starved and thinly clad. It sustained +Lincoln and Garfield on their hard journeys from the log cabin to the +White House. +</P> + +<P> +President Chadbourne put grit in place of his lost lung, and worked +thirty-five years after his funeral had been planned. +</P> + +<P> +Lord Cavanagh put grit in the place of arms and legs, and went to +Parliament in spite of his deformity. +</P> + +<P> +Henry Fawcett put grit in place of eyesight, and became the greatest +Postmaster-General England ever had. +</P> + +<P> +Prescott also put grit in place of eyesight, and became one of +America's greatest historians. Francis Parkman put grit in place of +health and eyesight, and became the greatest historian of America in +his line. Thousands of men have put grit in place of health, eyes, +ears, hands, legs, and yet have achieved marvelous success. Indeed, +most of the great things of the world have been accomplished by grit +and pluck. You cannot keep a man down who has these qualities. He +will make stepping-stones out of his stumbling-blocks, and lift himself +to success. +</P> + +<P> +At fifty, Barnum was a ruined man, owing thousands more than he +possessed, yet he resolutely resumed business once more, fairly +wringing success from adverse fortune, and paying his notes at the same +time. Again and again he was ruined, but phoenix-like, he rose +repeatedly from the ashes of his misfortune each time more determined +than before. +</P> + +<P> +It was the last three days of the first voyage of Columbus that told. +All his years of struggle and study would have availed nothing if he +had yielded to the mutiny. It was all in those three days. But what +days! +</P> + +<P> +"It is all very well," said Charles J. Fox, "to tell me that a young +man has distinguished himself by a brilliant first speech. He may go +on, or he may be satisfied with his first triumph; but show me a young +man who has not succeeded at first, and nevertheless has gone on, and I +will back that young man to do better than most of those who have +succeeded at the first trial." +</P> + +<P> +Cobden broke down completely the first time he appeared on a platform +in Manchester, and the chairman apologized for him. But he did not +give up speaking till every poor man in England had a larger, better, +and cheaper loaf. +</P> + +<P> +See young Disraeli, sprung from a hated and persecuted race; without +opportunity, pushing his way up through the middle classes, up through +the upper classes, until he stands self-poised upon the topmost round +of political and social power. Scoffed, ridiculed, rebuffed, hissed +from the House of Commons, he simply says, "The time will come when you +will hear me." The time did come, and the boy with no chance swayed +the sceptre of England for a quarter of a century. +</P> + +<P> +One of the most remarkable examples in history is Disraeli, forcing his +leadership upon that very party whose prejudices were deepest against +his race, and which had an utter contempt for self-made men and +interlopers. Imagine England's surprise when she awoke to find this +insignificant Hebrew actually Chancellor of the Exchequer. He was +easily master of all the tortures supplied by the armory of rhetoric; +he could exhaust the resources of the bitterest invective; he could +sting Gladstone out of his self-control; he was absolute master of +himself and his situation. You can see that this young man intends to +make his way in the world. A determined audacity is in his very face. +He is a gay fop. Handsome, with the hated Hebrew blood in his veins, +after three defeats in parliamentary elections he was not the least +daunted, for he knew his day would come, as it did. Lord Melbourne, +the great Prime Minister, when this gay young fop was introduced to +him, asked him what he wished to be. "Prime Minister of England," was +his audacious reply. +</P> + +<P> +One of the greatest preachers of modern times, Lacordaire, failed again +and again. Everybody said he would never make a preacher, but he was +determined to succeed, and in two years from his humiliating failures +he was preaching in Notre Dame to immense congregations. +</P> + +<P> +The boy Thorwaldsen, whose father died in the poor-house, and whose +education was so scanty that he had to write his letters over many +times before they could be posted, by his indomitable perseverance, +tenacity, and grit, fascinated the world with the genius which neither +his discouraging father, poverty, nor hardship could suppress. +</P> + +<P> +William H. Seward was given a thousand dollars by his father to go to +college with; this was all he was to have. The son returned at the end +of the freshman year with extravagant habits and no money. His father +refused to give him more, and told him he could not stay at home. When +the youth found the props all taken out from under him, and that he +must now sink or swim, he left home moneyless, returned to college, +graduated at the head of his class, studied law, was elected Governor +of New York, and became Lincoln's great Secretary of State during the +Civil War. +</P> + +<P> +Louisa M. Alcott wrote the conclusion to "An Old-Fashioned Girl" with +her left hand in a sling, one foot up, head aching, and no voice. She +proudly writes in her diary, "Twenty years ago I resolved to make the +family independent if I could. At forty, that is done. Debts all +paid, even the outlawed ones, and we have enough to be comfortable. It +has cost me my health, perhaps." She earned two hundred thousand +dollars by her pen. +</P> + +<P> +Mrs. Frank Leslie often refers to the time she lived in her carpetless +attic while striving to pay her husband's obligations. She has fought +her way successfully through nine lawsuits, and has paid the entire +debt. She manages her ten publications entirely herself, signs all +checks and money-orders, makes all contracts, looks over all proofs, +and approves the make-up of everything before it goes to press. She +has developed great business ability, which no one dreamed she +possessed. +</P> + +<P> +Garfield said, "If the power to do hard work is not talent, it is the +best possible substitute for it." The triumph of industry and grit +over low birth and iron fortune in America, this land of opportunity, +ought to be sufficient to put to shame all grumblers over their hard +fortune and those who attempt to excuse aimless, shiftless, successless +men because they have no chance. +</P> + +<P> +The fear of ridicule and the dread of humiliation often hinder one from +taking decisive steps when it is plainly a duty, so that courage is a +very important element of decision. In a New England academy a pupil +who was engaged to assist the teacher was unable to solve a problem in +algebra. The class was approaching the problem, and he was mortified +because, after many trials, he was obliged to take it to the teacher +for solution. The teacher returned it unsolved. What could he do? He +would not confess to the class that he could not solve it, so, after +many futile attempts, he went to a distant town to seek the assistance +of a friend who, he believed, could do the work. But, alas! his friend +had gone away, and would not be back for a week. On his way back he +said to himself, "What a fool! am I unable to perform a problem in +algebra, and shall I go back to my class and confess my ignorance? I +can solve it and I will." He shut himself in his room, determined not +to sleep until he had mastered the problem, and finally he won success. +Underneath the solution he wrote, "Obtained Monday evening, September +2, at half past eleven o'clock, after more than a dozen trials that +have consumed more than twenty hours of time." +</P> + +<P> +During a winter in the war of 1812, General Jackson's troops, +unprovided for and starving, became mutinous and were going home. But +the general set the example of living on acorns; then rode before the +rebellious line and threatened with death the first mutineer that +should try to leave. +</P> + +<P> +The race is not always to the swift, the battle is not always to the +strong. Horses are sometimes weighted or hampered in the race, and +this is taken into account in the result. So in the race of life the +distance alone does not determine the prize. We must take into +consideration the hindrances, the weights we have carried, the +disadvantages of education, of breeding, of training, of surroundings, +of circumstances. How many young men are weighted down with debt, with +poverty, with the support of invalid parents or brothers and sisters, +or friends? How many are fettered with ignorance, hampered by +inhospitable surroundings, with the opposition of parents who do not +understand them? How many a round boy is hindered in the race by being +forced into a square hole? How many are delayed in their course +because nobody believes in them, because nobody encourages them, +because they get no sympathy and are forever tortured for not doing +that against which every fibre of their being protests, and every drop +of their blood rebels? How many have to feel their way to the goal, +through the blindness of ignorance and lack of experience? How many go +bungling along from the lack of early discipline and drill in the +vocation they have chosen? How many have to hobble along on crutches +because they were never taught to help themselves, but to lean upon a +father's wealth or a mother's indulgence? How many are weakened for +the journey of life by self-indulgence, by dissipation, by +"life-sappers;" how many are crippled by disease, by a weak +constitution, by impaired eyesight or hearing? +</P> + +<P> +When the prizes of life shall be awarded by the Supreme Judge, who +knows our weaknesses and frailties, the distance we have run, the +weights we have carried, the handicaps, will all be taken into account. +Not the distance we have run, but the obstacles we have overcome, the +disadvantages under which we have made the race, will decide the +prizes. The poor wretch who has plodded along against unknown +temptations, the poor woman who has buried her sorrows in her silent +heart and sewed her weary way through life, those who have suffered +abuse in silence, and who have been unrecognized or despised by their +fellow-runners, will often receive the greater prize. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"The wise and active conquer difficulties,<BR> +By daring to attempt them: sloth and folly<BR> +Shiver and sink at sight of toil and hazard,<BR> +And make the impossibility they fear."<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Tumble me down, and I will sit<BR> +Upon my ruins, smiling yet:<BR> +Tear me to tatters, yet I'll be<BR> +Patient in my necessity:<BR> +Laugh at my scraps of clothes, and shun<BR> +Me as a fear'd infection:<BR> +Yet scare-crow like I'll walk, as one<BR> +Neglecting thy derision.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">ROBERT HERRICK.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap11"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XI. +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE GRANDEST THING IN THE WORLD. +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +"One ruddy drop of manly blood the surging sea outweighs." +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +"Manhood overtops all titles." +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +The truest test of civilization is not the census, nor the size of +cities, nor the crops; no, but the kind of man the country turns +out.—EMERSON. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Hew the block off, and get out the man.—POPE. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Eternity alone will reveal to the human race its debt of gratitude to the +peerless and immortal name of Washington.—JAMES A. GARFIELD. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Better not be at all<BR> +Than not be noble.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">TENNYSON.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Be noble! and the nobleness that lies<BR> +In other men, sleeping, but never dead,<BR> +Will rise in majesty to meet thine own.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">LOWELL.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Virtue alone out-builds the pyramids:<BR> +Her monuments shall last when Egypt's fall.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">YOUNG.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Were one so tall to touch the pole,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Or grasp creation in his span,</SPAN><BR> +He must be measured by his soul,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">The mind's the measure of the man.</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">WATTS.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +We live in deeds, not years; in thoughts, not breaths;<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">In feelings, not in figures on a dial.</SPAN><BR> +We should count time by heart-throbs. He most lives<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Who thinks most, feels the noblest, acts the best.</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">BAILEY.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Good name in man or woman<BR> +Is the immediate jewel of their souls."<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +But this one thing I know, that these qualities did not now begin to +exist, cannot be sick with my sickness, nor buried in my grave.—EMERSON. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +A Moor was walking in his garden when a Spanish cavalier suddenly fell at +his feet, pleading for concealment from pursuers who sought his life in +revenge for the killing of a Moorish gentleman. The Moor promised aid, +and locked his visitor in a summer-house until night should afford +opportunity for his escape. Not long after the dead body of his son was +brought home, and from the description given he knew the Spaniard was the +murderer. He concealed his horror, however, and at midnight unlocked the +summer-house, saying, "Christian, the youth whom you have murdered was my +only son. Your crime deserves the severest punishment. But I have +solemnly pledged my word not to betray you, and I disdain to violate a +rash engagement even with a cruel enemy." Then, saddling one of his +fleetest mules, he said, "Flee while the darkness of night conceals you. +Your hands are polluted with blood; but God is just; and I humbly thank +Him that my faith is unspotted, and that I have resigned judgment to Him." +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +[Illustration: John Greenleaf Whittier (missing from book)] +</H3> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<P> +Character never dies. As Longfellow says:— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Were a star quenched on high,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">For ages would its light,</SPAN><BR> +Still traveling downward from the sky,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Shine on our mortal sight.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"So when a great man dies,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">For years beyond our ken,</SPAN><BR> +The light he leaves behind him lies<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Upon the paths of men."</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +The character of Socrates was mightier than the hemlock, and banished the +fear and sting of death. +</P> + +<P> +Who can estimate the power of a well-lived life? <I>Character is power</I>. +Hang this motto in every school in the land, in every home, in every +youth's room. Mothers, engrave it on every child's heart. +</P> + +<P> +You cannot destroy one single atom of a Garrison, even though he were +hanged. The mighty force of martyrs to truth lives; the candle burns +more brilliantly than before it was snuffed. "No varnish or veneer of +scholarship, no command of the tricks of logic or rhetoric, can ever make +you a positive force in the world;" but your character can. +</P> + +<P> +When the statue of George Peabody, erected in one of the thoroughfares of +London, was unveiled, the sculptor Story was asked to speak. Twice he +touched the statue with his hand, and said, "That is my speech. That is +my speech." What could be more eloquent? Character needs no +recommendation. It pleads its own cause. +</P> + +<P> +"Show me," said Omar the Caliph to Amru the warrior, "the sword with +which you have fought so many battles and slain so many infidels." "Ah!" +replied Amru, "the sword without the arm of the master is no sharper nor +heavier than the sword of Farezdak the poet." So one hundred and fifty +pounds of flesh and blood without character is of no great value. +</P> + +<P> +Napoleon was so much impressed with the courage and resources of Marshal +Ney, that he said, "I have two hundred millions in my coffers, and I +would give them all for Ney." +</P> + +<P> +In Agra, India, stands the Taj Mahal, the acme of Oriental architecture, +said to be the most beautiful building in the world. It was planned as a +mausoleum for the favorite wife of Shah Jehan. When the latter was +deposed by his son Aurungzebe, his daughter Jahanara chose to share his +captivity and poverty rather than the guilty glory of her brother. On +her tomb in Delhi were cut her dying words: "Let no rich coverlet adorn +my grave; this grass is the best covering for the tomb of the poor in +spirit, the humble, the transitory Jahanara, the disciple of the holy men +of Christ, the daughter of the Emperor Shah Jehan." Travelers who visit +the magnificent Taj linger long by the grass-green sarcophagus in Delhi, +but give only passing notice to the beautiful Jamma Masjid, a mausoleum +afterwards erected in her honor. +</P> + +<P> +Some writer has well said that David of the throne we cannot always +recall with pleasure, but David of the Psalms we never forget. The +strong, sweet faith of the latter streams like sunlight through even the +closed windows of the soul, long after the wearied eye has turned with +disgust from all the gilded pomp and pride of the former. +</P> + +<P> +Robertson says that when you have got to the lowest depths of your heart, +you will find there not the mere desire of happiness, but a craving as +natural to us as the desire for food,—the craving for nobler, higher +life. +</P> + +<P> +"Private Benjamin Owen, —— Regiment, Vermont Volunteers, was found +asleep at his post while on picket duty last night. The court-martial +has sentenced him to be shot in twenty-four hours, as the offense +occurred at a critical time." "I thought when I gave Bennie to his +country," said farmer Owen as he read the above telegram with dimming +eyes, "that no other father in all this broad laud made so precious a +gift. He only slept a minute,—just one little minute,—at his post, I +know that was all, for Bennie never dozed over a duty. How prompt and +trustworthy he was! He was as tall as I, and only eighteen! and now they +shoot him because he was found asleep when doing sentinel duty!" Just +then Bennie's little sister Blossom answered a tap at the door, and +returned with a letter. "It is from him," was all she said. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +DEAR FATHER,—For sleeping on sentinel duty I am to be shot. At first, +it seemed awful to me; but I have thought about it so much now that it +has no terror. They say that they will not bind me, nor blind me; but +that I may meet my death like a man. I thought, father, that it might +have been on the battlefield, for my country, and that, when I fell, it +would be fighting gloriously; but to be shot down like a dog for nearly +betraying it,—to die for neglect of duty! Oh, father, I wonder the very +thought does not kill me! But I shall not disgrace you. I am going to +write you all about it; and when I am gone, you may tell my comrades; I +cannot now. +</P> + +<P> +You know I promised Jemmie Carr's mother I would look after her boy; and, +when he fell sick, I did all I could for him. He was not strong when he +was ordered back into the ranks, and the day before that night I carried +all his baggage, besides my own, on our march. Toward night we went in +on double-quick, and the baggage began to feel very heavy. Everybody was +tired; and as for Jemmie, if I had not lent him an arm now and then, he +would have dropped by the way. I was all tired out when we came into +camp; and then it was Jemmie's turn to be sentry, and I could take his +place; but I was too tired, father. I could not have kept awake if a gun +had been pointed at my head; but I did not know it until,—well, until it +was too late. +</P> + +<P> +They tell me to-day that I have a short reprieve,—given to me by +circumstances,—"time to write to you," our good colonel says. Forgive +him, father, he only does his duty; he would gladly save me if he could; +and do not lay my death up against Jemmie. The poor boy is +broken-hearted, and does nothing but beg and entreat them to let him die +in my stead. I can't bear to think of mother and Blossom. Comfort them, +father! Tell them I die as a brave boy should, and that, when the war is +over, they will not be ashamed of me, as they must be now. God help me: +it is very hard to bear! Good-by, father. To-night, in the early +twilight, I shall see the cows all coming home from pasture, and precious +little Blossom standing on the back stoop, waiting for me,—but I shall +never, never come! God bless you all! +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"God be thanked!" said Mr. Owen reverently; "I knew Bennie was not the +boy to sleep carelessly." +</P> + +<P> +Late that night a little figure glided out of the house and down the +path. Two hours later the conductor of the southward mail lifted her +into a car at Mill Depot. Next morning she was in New York, and the next +she was admitted to the White House at Washington. "Well, my child," +said the President in pleasant, cheerful tones, "what do you want so +bright and early this morning?" "Bennie's life, please, sir," faltered +Blossom. "Bennie? Who is Bennie?" asked Mr. Lincoln. "My brother, sir. +They are going to shoot him for sleeping at his post," said the little +girl. "I remember," said the President; "it was a fatal sleep. You see, +child, it was a time of special danger. Thousands of lives might have +been lost through his culpable negligence." "So my father said; but poor +Bennie was so tired, sir, and Jemmie so weak. He did the work of two, +sir, and it was Jemmie's night, not his; but Jemmie was too tired, and +Bennie never thought about himself,—that he was tired, too." "What is +that you say, child? Come here; I do not understand." He read Bennie's +letter to his father, which Blossom held out, wrote a few lines, rang his +bell, and said to the messenger who appeared, "Send this dispatch at +once." Then, turning to Blossom, he continued: "Go home, my child, and +tell that father of yours, who could approve his country's sentence, even +when it took the life of a child like that, that Abraham Lincoln thinks +the life far too precious to be lost. Go back, or—wait until to-morrow; +Bennie will need a change after he has so bravely faced death, he shall +go with you." "God bless you, sir," said Blossom. <I>Not all the queens +are crowned.</I> +</P> + +<P> +Two days later, when the young soldier came with his sister to thank the +President, Mr. Lincoln fastened the strap of a lieutenant upon his +shoulder, saying, "The soldier that could carry a sick comrade's baggage, +and die for the act without complaining, deserves well of his country." +</P> + +<P> +When telegrams poured in announcing terrible carnage upon battlefields in +our late war, and when President Lincoln's heart-strings were nearly +broken over the cruel treatment of our prisoners at Andersonville, Belle +Isle, and Libby Prison, he never once departed from his famous motto, +"With malice toward none, with charity for all." When it was reported +that among those returned at Baltimore from Southern prisons, not one in +ten could stand alone from hunger and neglect, and many were so eaten and +covered by vermin as to resemble those pitted by smallpox, and so +emaciated that they were living skeletons, not even these reports could +move the great President to retaliate in kind upon the Southern prisoners. +</P> + +<P> +Among the slain on the battlefield at Fredericksburg was the body of a +youth upon which was found next the heart a photograph of Lincoln. Upon +the back of it were these words: "God bless President Lincoln." The +youth had been sentenced to death for sleeping at his post, but had been +pardoned by the President. +</P> + +<P> +David Dudley Field said he considered Lincoln the greatest man of his +day. Webster, Clay, Calhoun, and others were great, each in one way, but +Lincoln was great in many ways. There seemed to be hidden springs of +greatness in this man that would gush forth in the most unexpected way. +The men about him were at a loss to name the order of his genius. Horace +Greeley was almost as many-sided, but was a wonderful combination of +goodness and weakness, while Lincoln seemed strong in every way. After +Lincoln had signed the Emancipation Proclamation he said, "The promise +must now be kept; I shall never recall one word." +</P> + +<P> +Bishop Hamilton, of Salisbury, bears the following testimony to the +influence for good which Gladstone, when a school-fellow at Eton, +exercised upon him. "I was a thoroughly idle boy; but I was saved from +worse things by getting to know Gladstone." At Oxford we are told the +effect of his example was so strong that men who followed him there ten +years later declare "that undergraduates drank less in the forties +because Gladstone had been so courageously abstemious in the thirties." +</P> + +<P> +The Rev. John Newton said, "I see in this world two heaps of human +happiness and misery; now if I can take but the smallest bit from one +heap and add it to the other, I carry a point; if as I go home a child +has dropped a half-penny, and by giving it another I can wipe away its +tears, I feel I have done something." +</P> + +<P> +A holy hermit, who had lived for six years in a cave of the Thebaid, +fasting, praying, and performing severe penances, spending his whole life +in trying to make himself of some account with God, that he might be sure +of a seat in Paradise, prayed to be shown some saint greater than +himself, in order that he might pattern after him to reach still greater +heights of holiness. The same night an angel came to him and said, "If +thou wouldst excel all others in virtue and sanctity, strive to imitate a +certain minstrel who goes begging and singing from door to door." The +hermit, much chagrined, sought the minstrel and asked him how he had +managed to make himself so acceptable to God. The minstrel hung down his +head and replied, "Do not mock me, holy father; I have performed no good +works, and I am not worthy to pray. I only go from door to door to amuse +people with my viol and my flute." The hermit insisted that he must have +done some good deeds. The minstrel replied, "Nay, I know of nothing good +that I have done." "But how hast thou become a beggar? Hast thou spent +thy substance in riotous living?" "Nay, not so," replied the minstrel. +"I met a poor woman running hither and thither, distracted, because her +husband and children had been sold into slavery to pay a debt. I took +her home and protected her from certain sons of Belial, for she was very +beautiful. I gave her all I possessed to redeem her family and returned +her to her husband and children. Is there any man who would not have +done the same?" The hermit shed tears, and said in all his life he had +not done as much as the poor minstrel. +</P> + +<P> +"A good name is rather to be chosen than great riches, and loving favor +than silver or gold." +</P> + +<P> +A gentleman, traveling through West Virginia, went to a house, and +procured food for himself and companion and their horses. He wanted to +make payment, but the woman was ashamed to take pay for a mere act of +kindness. He pressed the money upon her. Finally she said, "If you +don't think I'm mean, I'll take one quarter of a dollar from you, so as +to look at it now and then, for there has been no money in this house for +a year." +</P> + +<P> +Do not take the world's estimate of success. The real height of the +Washington Monument is not measured between the capstone and the earth, +but includes the fifty feet of solid masonry below. Many of the most +successful lives are like the rivers of India which run under ground, +unseen and unheard by the millions who tread above them. But have these +rivers therefore no influence? Ask the rich harvest fields if they feel +the flowing water beneath. The greatest worth is never measured. It is +only the nearest stars whose distances we compute. That life whose +influence can be measured by the world's tape-line of dollars and corn is +not worth the measuring. +</P> + +<P> +All the forces in nature that are the most powerful are the quietest. We +speak of the rolling thunder as powerful; but gravitation, which makes no +noise, yet keeps orbs in their orbits, and the whole system in harmony, +binding every atom in each planet to the great centre of all attraction, +is ten thousand times ten thousand times more powerful. We say the +bright lightning is mighty; so it is when it rends the gnarled oak into +splinters, or splits solid battlements into fragments; but it is not half +so powerful as the gentle light that comes so softly from the skies that +we do not feel it, that travels at an inconceivable speed, strikes and +yet is not felt, but exercises an influence so great that the earth is +clothed with verdure through its influence, and all nature beautified and +blessed by its ceaseless action. The things that make no noise, make no +pretension, may be really the strongest. The most conclusive logic that +a preacher uses in the pulpit will never exercise the influence that the +consistent piety of character will exercise over all the earth. +</P> + +<P> +The old Sicilian story relates how Pythias, condemned to death through +the hasty anger of Dionysius of Syracuse, asked that he might go to his +native Greece, and arrange his affairs, promising to return before the +time appointed for his execution. The tyrant laughed his request to +scorn, saying that when he was once safe out of Sicily no one would +answer for his reappearance. At this juncture, Damon, a friend of the +doomed man, offered to become surety for him, and to die in his stead if +he did not come back in time. Dionysius was surprised, but accepted the +proposition. When the fatal day came, Pythias had not reached Syracuse, +but Damon remained firm in his faith that his friend would not fail him. +At the very last hour Pythias appeared and announced himself ready to +die. But such touching loyalty moved even the iron heart of Dionysius; +accordingly he ordered both to be spared, and asked to be allowed to make +a third partner in such a noble friendship. It is a grander thing to be +nobly remembered than to be nobly born. +</P> + +<P> +When Attila, flushed with conquest, appeared with his barbarian horde +before the gates of Rome in 452, Pope Leo alone of all the people dared +go forth and try to turn his wrath aside. A single magistrate followed +him. The Huns were awed by the fearless majesty of the unarmed old man, +and led him before their chief, whose respect was so great that he agreed +not to enter the city, provided a tribute should be paid to him. +</P> + +<P> +Blackie thinks there is no kind of a sermon so effective as the example +of a great man, where we see the thing done before us,—actually +done,—the thing of which we were not even dreaming. +</P> + +<P> +It was said that when Washington led the American forces as commanding +officer, it "doubled the strength of the army." +</P> + +<P> +When General Lee was in conversation with one of his officers in regard +to a movement of his army, a plain farmer's boy overheard the general's +remark that he had decided to march upon Gettysburg instead of +Harrisburg. The boy telegraphed this fact to Governor Curtin. A special +engine was sent for the boy. "I would give my right hand," said the +governor, "to know if this boy tells the truth." A corporal replied, +"Governor, I know that boy; it is impossible for him to lie; there is not +a drop of false blood in his veins." In fifteen minutes the Union troops +were marching to Gettysburg, where they gained a victory. Character is +power. The great thing is to be a man, to have a high purpose, a noble +aim, to be dead in earnest, to yearn for the good and the true. +</P> + +<P> +"Your lordships," said Wellington in Parliament, "must all feel the high +and honorable character of the late Sir Robert Peel. I was long +connected with him in public life. We were both in the councils of our +sovereign together, and I had long the honor to enjoy his private +friendship. In all the course of my acquaintance with him, I never knew +a man in whose truth and justice I had greater confidence, or in whom I +saw a more invariable desire to promote the public service. In the whole +course of my communication with him, I never knew an instance in which he +did not show the strongest attachment to truth; and I never saw in the +whole course of my life the smallest reason for suspecting that he stated +anything which he did not firmly believe to be the fact." +</P> + +<P> +"The Secretary stood alone," said Grattan of the elder Pitt. "Modern +degeneracy had not reached him. Original and unaccommodating, the +features of his character had the hardihood of antiquity. His august +mind overawed majesty; and one of his sovereigns thought royalty so +impaired in his presence, that he conspired to remove him, in order to be +relieved from his superiority. No state chicanery, no narrow system of +vicious politics, sunk him to the level of the vulgar great; but, +overbearing, persuasive, and impracticable, his object was England, his +ambition, fame. A character so exalted, so unsullied, so various, so +authoritative, astonished a corrupt age, and the Treasury trembled at the +name of Pitt through all the classes of venality. Corruption imagined, +indeed, that she had found defects in this statesman, and talked much of +the inconsistency of his policy, and much of the ruin of his victories; +but the history of his country and the calamities of the enemy answered +and refuted her. Upon the whole, there was in this man something that +could create, subvert, or reform; an understanding, a spirit, and an +eloquence to summon mankind to united exertion, or to break the bonds of +slavery asunder, and to rule the wilderness of free minds with unbounded +authority; something that could establish or overwhelm an empire, and +strike a blow in the world that would resound through the universe." +</P> + +<P> +Pitt was Paymaster-General for George II. When a subsidy was voted a +foreign office, it was customary for the office to claim one half per +cent. for honorarium. Pitt astonished the King of Sardinia by sending +him the sum without any deduction, and further astonished him by refusing +a present as a compliment to his integrity. He was a poor man. +</P> + +<P> +Washington would take no pay as commander-in-chief of the Continental +armies. He would keep a strict account of his expenses; and these, he +doubted not, would be discharged. +</P> + +<P> +Remember, the main business of life is not to do, but to become; an +action itself has its finest and most enduring fruit in character. +</P> + +<P> +In 1837, after George Peabody moved to London, there came a commercial +crisis in the United States. Many banks suspended specie payments. Many +mercantile houses went to the wall, and thousands more were in great +distress. Edward Everett said, "The great sympathetic nerve of the +commercial world, credit, as far as the United States were concerned, was +for the time paralyzed." Probably not a half dozen men in Europe would +have been listened to for a moment in the Bank of England upon the +subject of American securities, but George Peabody was one of them. His +name was already a tower of strength in the commercial world. In those +dark days his integrity stood four-square in every business panic. +Peabody retrieved the credit of the State of Maryland, and, it might +almost be said, of the United States. His character was the magic wand +which in many a case changed almost worthless paper into gold. Merchants +on both sides of the Atlantic procured large advances from him, even +before the goods consigned to him had been sold. +</P> + +<P> +Thackeray says, "Nature has written a letter of credit upon some men's +faces which is honored wherever presented. You cannot help trusting such +men; their very presence gives confidence. There is a 'promise to pay' +in their very faces which gives confidence, and you prefer it to another +man's indorsement." <I>Character is credit.</I> +</P> + +<P> +With most people, as with most nations, "things are worth what they will +sell for," and the dollar is mightier than the sword. As good as gold +has become a proverb—as though it were the highest standard of +comparison. +</P> + +<P> +Themistocles, having conceived the design of transferring the government +of Greece from the hands of the Lacedaemonians into those of the +Athenians, kept his thoughts continually fixed on this great project. +Being at no time very nice or scrupulous in the choice of his measures, +he thought anything which could tend to the accomplishment of the end he +had in view just and lawful. Accordingly in an assembly of the people +one day, he intimated that he had a very important design to propose; but +he could not communicate it to the public at large, because the greatest +secrecy was necessary to its success, and he therefore desired that they +would appoint a person to whom he might explain himself on the subject. +Aristides was unanimously selected by the assembly, which deferred +entirely to his opinion. Themistocles, taking him aside, told him that +the design he had conceived was to burn the fleet belonging to the rest +of the Grecian states, which then lay in a neighboring port, when Athens +would assuredly become mistress of all Greece. Aristides returned to the +assembly, and declared to them that nothing could be more advantageous to +the commonwealth than the project of Themistocles, but that, at the same +time, nothing in the world could be more unfair. The assembly +unanimously declared that, since such was the case, Themistocles should +wholly abandon his project. +</P> + +<P> +A tragedy by Aeschylus was once represented before the Athenians, in +which it was said of one of the characters, "that he cared not more to be +just than to appear so." At these words all eyes were instantly turned +upon Aristides as the man who, of all the Greeks, most merited that +distinguished reputation. Ever after he received, by universal consent, +the surname of the Just,—a title, says Plutarch, truly royal, or rather +truly divine. This remarkable distinction roused envy, and envy +prevailed so far as to procure his banishment for years, upon the unjust +suspicion that his influence with the people was dangerous to their +freedom. When the sentence was passed by his countrymen, Aristides +himself was present in the midst of them, and a stranger who stood near, +and could not write, applied to him to write for him on his shell-ballot. +"What name?" asked the philosopher. "Aristides," replied the stranger. +</P> + +<P> +"Do you know him, then?" said Aristides, "or has he in any way injured +you?" "Neither," said the other, "but it is for this very thing I would +he were condemned. I can go nowhere but I hear of Aristides the Just." +Aristides inquired no further, but took the shell, and wrote his name on +it as desired. The absence of Aristides soon dissipated the +apprehensions which his countrymen had so idly indulged. He was in a +short time recalled, and for many years after took a leading part in the +affairs of the republic, without showing the least resentment against his +enemies, or seeking any other gratification than that of serving his +countrymen with fidelity and honor. The virtues of Aristides did not +pass without reward. He had two daughters, who were educated at the +expense of the state, and to whom portions were allotted from the public +treasury. +</P> + +<P> +The strongest proof, however, of the justice and integrity of Aristides +is, that notwithstanding he had possessed the highest employments in the +republic, and had the absolute disposal of its treasures, yet he died so +poor as not to leave money enough to defray the expenses of his funeral. +</P> + +<P> +Men of character are the conscience of the society to which they belong; +they, and not the police, guarantee the execution of the laws. Their +influence is the bulwark of good government. +</P> + +<P> +It was said of the first Emperor Alexander of Russia, that his personal +character was equivalent to a constitution. Of Montaigne, it was said +that his high reputation for integrity was a better protection for him +than a regiment of horse would have been, he being the only man among the +French gentry who, during the wars of the Fronde, kept his castle gates +unbarred. There are men, fortunately for the world, who would rather be +right than be President. +</P> + +<P> +Fisher Ames, while in Congress, said of Roger Sherman, of Connecticut: +"If I am absent during a discussion of a subject, and consequently know +not on which side to vote, when I return I always look at Roger Sherman, +for I am sure if I vote with him, I shall vote right." +</P> + +<P> +Character gravitates upward, as with a celestial gravitation, while mere +genius, without character, gravitates downward. How often we see in +school or college young men, who are apparently dull and even stupid, +rise gradually and surely above others who are without character, merely +because the former have an upward tendency in their lives, a reaching-up +principle, which gradually but surely unfolds, and elevates them to +positions of honor and trust. There is something which everybody admires +in an aspiring soul, one whose tendency is upward and onward, in spite of +hindrances and in defiance of obstacles. +</P> + +<P> +We may try to stifle the voice of the mysterious angel within, but it +always says "yes" to right actions and "no" to wrong ones. No matter +whether we heed it or not, no power can change its decision one iota. +Through health, through disease, through prosperity and adversity, this +faithful servant stands behind us in the shadow of ourselves, never +intruding, but weighing every act we perform, every word we utter, +pronouncing the verdict "right" or "wrong." +</P> + +<P> +Francis Horner, of England, was a man of whom Sydney Smith said, that +"the ten commandments were stamped upon his forehead." The valuable and +peculiar light in which Horner's history is calculated to inspire every +right-minded youth is this: he died at the age of thirty-eight, possessed +of greater influence than any other private man, and admired, beloved, +trusted, and deplored by all except the heartless and the base. No +greater homage was ever paid in Parliament to any deceased member. How +was this attained? By rank? He was the son of an Edinburgh merchant. +By wealth? Neither he nor any of his relatives ever had a superfluous +sixpence. By office? He held but one, and that for only a few years, of +no influence, and with very little pay. By talents? His were not +splendid, and he had no genius. Cautious and slow, his only ambition was +to be right. By eloquence? He spoke in calm, good taste, without any of +the oratory that either terrifies or seduces. By any fascination of +manner? His was only correct and agreeable. By what was it, then? +Merely by sense, industry, good principles and a good heart, qualities +which no well constituted mind need ever despair of attaining. It was +the force of his character that raised him; and this character was not +impressed on him by nature, but formed, out of no peculiarly fine +elements, by himself. There were many in the House of Commons of far +greater ability and eloquence. But no one surpassed him in the +combination of an adequate portion of these with moral worth. Horner was +born to show what moderate powers, unaided by anything whatever except +culture and goodness, may achieve, even when these powers are displayed +amidst the competition and jealousies of public life. +</P> + +<P> +"When it was reported in Paris that the great Napoleon was dead, I passed +the Palais Royal," says a French writer, "where a public crier called, +'Here's your account of the death of Bonaparte.' This cry which once +would have appalled all Europe fell perfectly flat. I entered," he adds, +"several cafés, and found the same indifference,—coldness everywhere; no +one seemed interested or troubled. This man, who had conquered Europe +and awed the world, had inspired neither the love nor the admiration of +even his own countrymen. He had impressed the world with his +marvelousness, and had inspired astonishment but not love." +</P> + +<P> +Emerson says that Napoleon did all that in him lay to live and thrive +without moral principle. It was the nature of things, the eternal law of +man and of the world, which balked and ruined him; and the result, in a +million attempts of this kind, will be the same. His was an experiment, +under the most favorable conditions, to test the powers of intellect +without conscience. Never elsewhere was such a leader so endowed, and so +weaponed; never has another leader found such aids and followers. And +what was the result of this vast talent and power, of these immense +armies, burned cities, squandered treasures, immolated millions of men, +of this demoralized Europe? He left France smaller, poorer, feebler than +he found her. +</P> + +<P> +A hundred years hence what difference will it make whether you were rich +or poor, a peer or a peasant? But what difference may it not make +whether you did what was right or what was wrong? +</P> + +<P> +"The 'Vicar of Wakefield,'" said George William Curtis, "was sold, +through Dr. Johnson's mediation, for sixty pounds; and ten years after, +the author died. With what love do we hang over its pages! What springs +of feeling it has opened! Goldsmith's books are influences and friends +forever, yet the five thousandth copy was never announced, and Oliver +Goldsmith, M. D., often wanted a dinner! Horace Walpole, the coxcomb of +literature, smiled at him contemptuously from his gilded carriage. +Goldsmith struggled cheerfully with his adverse fate, and died. But then +sad mourners, whom he had aided in their affliction, gathered around his +bed, and a lady of distinction, whom he had only dared to admire at a +distance, came and cut a lock of his hair for remembrance. When I see +Goldsmith, thus carrying his heart in his hand like a palm branch, I look +on him as a successful man, whom adversity could not bring down from the +level of his lofty nature." +</P> + +<P> +Dr. Maudsley tells us that the aims which chiefly predominate—riches, +position, power, applause of men—are such as inevitably breed and foster +many bad passions in the eager competition to attain them. Hence, in +fact, come disappointed ambition, jealousy, grief from loss of fortune, +all the torments of wounded self-love, and a thousand other mental +sufferings,—the commonly enumerated moral causes of insanity. They are +griefs of a kind to which a rightly developed nature should not fall a +prey. There need be no envy nor jealousy, if a man were to consider that +it mattered not whether he did a great thing or some one else did it, +Nature's only concern being that it should be done; no grief from loss of +fortune, if he were to estimate at its true value that which fortune can +bring him, and that which fortune can never bring him; no wounded +self-love, if he had learned well the eternal lesson of +life,—self-renunciation. +</P> + +<P> +Soon after his establishment in Philadelphia Franklin was offered a piece +for publication in his newspaper. Being very busy, he begged the +gentleman would leave it for consideration. The next day the author +called and asked his opinion of it. "Well, sir," replied Franklin, "I am +sorry to say I think it highly scurrilous and defamatory. But being at a +loss on account of my poverty whether to reject it or not, I thought I +would put it to this issue: At night, when my work was done, I bought a +two-penny loaf, on which I supped heartily, and then, wrapping myself in +my great coat, slept very soundly on the floor till morning, when another +loaf and mug of water afforded a pleasant breakfast. Now, sir, since I +can live very comfortably in this manner, why should I prostitute my +press to personal hatred or party passion for a more luxurious living?" +</P> + +<P> +One cannot read this anecdote of our American sage without thinking of +Socrates' reply to King Archelaus, who had pressed him to give up +preaching in the dirty streets of Athens, and come and live with him in +his splendid courts: "Meal, please your Majesty, is a half-penny a peck +at Athens, and water I get for nothing!" +</P> + +<P> +During Alexander's march into Africa he found a people dwelling in peace, +who knew neither war nor conquest. While he was interviewing the chief +two of his subjects brought a case before him for judgment. The dispute +was this: the one had bought of the other a piece of ground, which, after +the purchase, was found to contain a treasure, for which he felt bound to +pay. The other refused to receive anything, stating that when he sold +the ground he sold it with all the advantages apparent or concealed which +it might be found to afford. The king said, "One of you has a daughter +and the other a son; let them be married and the treasure given to them +as a dowry." Alexander was surprised, and said, "If this case had been +in our country it would have been dismissed, and the king would have kept +the treasure." The chief said, "Does the sun shine on your country, and +the rain fall, and the grass grow?" Alexander replied, "Certainly." The +chief then asked, "Are there any cattle?" "Certainly," was the reply. +The chief replied, "Then it is for these innocent cattle that the Great +Being permits the rain to fall and the grass to grow." +</P> + +<P> +A good character is a precious thing, above rubies, gold, crowns, or +kingdoms, and the work of making it is the noblest labor on earth. +</P> + +<P> +Professor Blackie of the University of Edinburgh said to a class of young +men: "Money is not needful; power is not needful; liberty is not needful; +even health is not the one thing needful; but character alone is that +which can truly save us, and if we are not saved in this sense, we +certainly must be damned." It has been said that "when poverty is your +inheritance, virtue must be your capital." +</P> + +<P> +During the American Revolution, while General Reed was President of +Congress, the British Commissioners offered him a bribe of ten thousand +guineas to desert the cause of his country. His reply was, "Gentlemen, I +am poor, very poor; but your king is not rich enough to buy me." +</P> + +<P> +"When Le Père Bourdaloue preached at Rouen," said Père Arrius, "the +tradesmen forsook their shops, lawyers their clients, physicians their +sick, and tavern-keepers their bars; but when I preached the following +year I set all things to rights,—every man minded his own business." +</P> + +<P> +"I fear John Knox's prayers more than an army of ten thousand men," said +Mary, Queen of Scotland. +</P> + +<P> +When Pope Paul IV. heard of the death of Calvin he exclaimed with a sigh, +"Ah, the strength of that proud heretic lay in—riches? No. Honors? +No. But nothing could move him from his course. Holy Virgin! With two +such servants, our church would soon be mistress of both worlds." +</P> + +<P> +Garibaldi's power over his men amounted to fascination. Soldiers and +officers were ready to die for him. His will power seemed to enslave +them. In Rome he called for forty volunteers to go where half of them +would be sure to be killed and the others probably wounded. The whole +battalion rushed forward; and they had to draw lots, so eager were all to +obey. +</P> + +<P> +What power of magic lies in a great name! There was not a throne in +Europe that could stand against Washington's character, and in comparison +with it the millions of the Croesuses would look ridiculous. What are +the works of avarice compared with the names of Lincoln, Grant, or +Garfield? A few names have ever been the leaven which has preserved many +a nation from premature decay. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"But strew his ashes to the wind<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Whose sword or voice has served mankind—</SPAN><BR> +And is he dead, whose glorious mind<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Lifts thine on high?—</SPAN><BR> +To live in hearts we leave behind<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Is not to die."</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Mr. Gladstone gave in Parliament, when announcing the death of Princess +Alice, a touching story of sick-room ministration. The Princess' little +boy was ill with diphtheria, the physician had cautioned her not to +inhale the poisoned breath; the child was tossing in the delirium of +fever. The mother took the little one in her lap and stroked his fevered +brow; the boy threw his arms around her neck, and whispered, "Kiss me, +mamma;" the mother's instinct was stronger than the physician's caution; +she pressed her lips to the child's, but lost her life. +</P> + +<P> +At a large dinner-party given by Lord Stratford after the Crimean War, it +was proposed that every one should write on a slip of paper the name +which appeared most likely to descend to posterity with renown. When the +papers were opened every one of them contained the name of Florence +Nightingale. +</P> + +<P> +Leckey says that the first hospital ever established was opened by that +noble Christian woman, Fabiola, in the fourth century. The two foremost +names in modern philanthropy are those of John Howard and Florence +Nightingale. Not a general of the Crimean War on either side can be +named by one person in ten. The one name that rises instantly, when that +carnival of pestilence and blood is suggested, is that of a young woman +just recovering from a serious illness, Florence Nightingale. A soldier +said, "Before she came there was such cussin' and swearin'; and after +that it was as holy as a church." She robbed war of half its terrors. +Since her time the hospital systems of all the nations during war have +been changed. No soldier was braver and no patriot truer than Clara +Barton, and wherever that noble company of Protestant women known as the +Red Cross Society,—the cross, I suppose, pointing to Calvary, and the +red to the blood of the Redeemer,—wherever those consecrated workers +seek to alleviate the condition of those who suffer from plagues, +cholera, fevers, flood, famine, there this tireless angel moves on her +pathway of blessing. And of all heroes, what nobler ones than these, +whose names shine from the pages of our missionary history? I never read +of Mrs. Judson, Mrs. Snow, Miss Brittain, Miss West, without feeling that +the heroic age of our race has just begun, the age which opens to woman +the privilege of following her benevolent inspirations wheresoever she +will, without thinking that our Christianity needs no other evidence. +</P> + +<P> +"Duty is the cement without which all power, goodness, intellect, truth, +happiness, and love itself can have no permanence, but all the fabric of +existence crumbles away from under us and leaves us at last sitting in +the midst of a ruin, astonished at our own desolation." A constant, +abiding sense of duty is the last reason of culture. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"I slept and dreamed that life is beauty;<BR> +I woke and found that life is duty."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +We have no more right to refuse to perform a duty than to refuse to pay a +debt. Moral insolvency is certain to him who neglects and disregards his +duty to his fellow-men. Nor can we hire another to perform our duty. +The mere accident of having money does not release you from your duty to +the world. Nay, it increases it, for it enables you to do a larger and +nobler duty. +</P> + +<P> +If your money is not clean, if there is a dirty dollar in your millions, +you have not succeeded. If there is the blood of the poor and +unfortunate, of orphans and widows, on your bank account, you have not +succeeded. If your wealth has made others poorer, your life is a +failure. If you have gained it in an occupation that kills, that +shortens the lives of others, that poisons their blood, or engenders +disease, if you have taken a day from a human life, if you have gained +your money by that which has debauched other lives, you have failed. +</P> + +<P> +Remember that a question will be asked you some time which you cannot +evade, the right answer to which will fix your destiny forever: "How did +you get that fortune?" Are other men's lives in it; are others' hope and +happiness buried in it; are others' comforts sacrificed to it; are +others' rights buried in it; are others' opportunities smothered in it; +others' chances strangled by it; has their growth been stunted by it; +their characters stained by it; have others a smaller loaf, a meaner +home? If so, you have failed; all your millions cannot save you from the +curse, "thou hast been weighed in the balance and found wanting." +</P> + +<P> +When Walter Scott's publisher and printer failed and $600,000 of debt +stared them in the face, friends came forward and offered to raise money +enough to allow him to arrange with his creditors. "No," said he +proudly, "this right hand shall work it all off; if we lose everything +else, we will at least keep our honor unblemished." What a grand picture +of manliness, of integrity in this noble man, working like a dray-horse +to cancel that great debt, throwing off at white heat the "Life of +Napoleon," "Woodstock," "The Tales of a Grandfather," articles for the +"Quarterly," and so on, all written in the midst of great sorrow, pain, +and ruin. "I could not have slept soundly," he writes, "as I now can +under the comfortable impression of receiving the thanks of my creditors, +and the conscious feeling of discharging my duty as a man of honesty. I +see before me a long, tedious, and dark path, but it leads to stainless +reputation. If I die in the harness, as is very likely, I shall die with +honor." +</P> + +<P> +One of the last things he uttered was, "I have been, perhaps, the most +voluminous author of my day, and it is a comfort to me to think that I +have tried to unsettle no man's faith, to corrupt no man's principles, +and that I have written nothing which, on my deathbed, I would wish +blotted out." +</P> + +<P> +Although Agassiz refused to lecture even for a large sum of money, yet he +left a greater legacy to the world, and left even more money to Harvard +University ($300,000) than he would have left if he had taken the time to +lecture for money. +</P> + +<P> +Faraday had to choose between a fortune of nearly a million and a life of +almost certain poverty if he pursued science. He chose poverty and +science, and earned a name never to be erased from the book of fame. +</P> + +<P> +Beecher says that we are all building a soul-house for eternity; yet with +what differing architecture and what various care! +</P> + +<P> +What if a man should see his neighbor getting workmen and building +materials together, and should say to him, "What are you building?" and +he should answer, "I don't exactly know. I am waiting to see what will +come of it." And so walls are reared, and room is added to room, while +the man looks idly on, and all the bystanders exclaim, "What a fool he +is!" Yet this is the way many men are building their characters for +eternity, adding room to room, without plan or aim, and thoughtlessly +waiting to see what the effect will be. Such builders will never dwell +in "the house of God, not made with hands, eternal in the heavens." +</P> + +<P> +Some people build as cathedrals are built, the part nearest the ground +finished; but that part which soars towards heaven, the turrets and the +spires, forever incomplete. +</P> + +<P> +Many men are mere warehouses full of merchandise—the head and heart are +stuffed with goods. Like those houses in the lower streets of cities +which were once family dwellings, but are now used for commercial +purposes, there are apartments in their souls which were once tenanted by +taste, and love, and joy, and worship; but they are all deserted now, and +the rooms are filled with material things. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap12"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XII. +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +WEALTH IN ECONOMY. +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Economy is half the battle of life.—SPURGEON. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Economy is the parent of integrity, of liberty and ease, and the +beauteous sister of temperance, of cheerfulness and health.—DR. +JOHNSON. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Can anything be so elegant as to have few wants and to serve them one's +self? +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +As much wisdom can be expended on a private economy as on an +empire.—EMERSON. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Riches amassed in haste will diminish; but those collected by hand and +little by little will multiply.—GOETHE. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +No gain is so certain as that which proceeds from the economical use of +what you have.—LATIN PROVERB. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Beware of little extravagances: a small leak will sink a big +ship.—FRANKLIN. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Better go to bed supperless than rise with debts.—GERMAN PROVERB. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Debt is like any other trap, easy enough to get into, but hard enough +to get out of.—H. W. SHAW. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Sense can support herself handsomely in most countries on some eighteen +pence a day; but for phantasy, planets and solar systems will not +suffice.—MACAULAY. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Economy, the poor man's mint.—TUPPER. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +I can get no remedy against this consumption of the purse; borrowing +only lingers and lingers it out; but the disease is +incurable.—SHAKESPEARE. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Whatever be your talents, whatever be your prospects, never speculate +away on the chance of a palace that which you may need as a provision +against the workhouse.—BULWER. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Not for to hide it in a hedge,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Nor for a train attendant,</SPAN><BR> +But for the glorious privilege<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Of being independent.</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">BURNS.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"We shan't get much here," whispered a lady to her companion, as John +Murray blew out one of the two candles by whose light he had been +writing when they asked him to contribute to some benevolent object. +He listened to their story and gave one hundred dollars. "Mr. Murray, +I am very agreeably surprised," said the lady quoted; "I did not expect +to get a cent from you." The old Quaker asked the reason for her +opinion; and, when told, said, "That, ladies, is the reason I am able +to let you have the hundred dollars. It is by practicing economy that +I save up money with which to do charitable actions. One candle is +enough to talk by." +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<A NAME="img-226"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG CLASS="imgcenter" SRC="images/img-226.jpg" ALT="ALEXANDER HAMILTON" BORDER="2" WIDTH="375" HEIGHT="531"> +<H3 CLASS="h3center" STYLE="width: 375px"> +ALEXANDER HAMILTON +</H3> +</CENTER> + +<P CLASS="caption" ALIGN="center"> +"The Moses of Colonial Finance." +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +"Poverty is a condition which no man should accept, unless it is forced +upon him as an inexorable necessity or as the alternative of dishonor." +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +"Comfort and independence abide with those who can postpone their +desires." +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<P> +Emerson relates the following anecdote: "An opulent merchant in Boston +was called on by a friend in behalf of a charity. At that time he was +admonishing his clerk for using whole wafers instead of halves; his +friend thought the circumstance unpropitious; but to his surprise, on +listening to the appeal, the merchant subscribed five hundred dollars. +The applicant expressed his astonishment that any person who was so +particular about half a wafer should present five hundred dollars to a +charity; but the merchant said, "It is by saving half wafers, and +attending to such little things, that I have now something to give." +</P> + +<P> +"How did you acquire your great fortune?" asked a friend of Lampis, the +shipowner. "My great fortune, easily," was the reply, "my small one, +by dint of exertion." +</P> + +<P> +Four years from the time Marshall Field left the rocky New England farm +to seek his fortune in Chicago he was admitted as a partner in the firm +of Coaley, Farwell & Co. The only reason the modest young man gave, to +explain his promotion when he had neither backing, wealth, nor +influence, was that he saved his money. +</P> + +<P> +If a man will begin at the age of twenty and lay by twenty-six cents +every working day, investing at seven per cent. compound interest, he +will have thirty-two thousand dollars when he is seventy years old. +Twenty cents a day is no unusual expenditure for beer or cigars, yet in +fifty years it would easily amount to twenty thousand dollars. Even a +saving of one dollar a week from the date of one's majority would give +him one thousand dollars for each of the last ten of the allotted years +of life. "What maintains one vice would bring up two children." +</P> + +<P> +Such rigid economy, such high courage, enables one to surprise the +world with gifts even if he is poor. In fact, the poor and the middle +classes give most in the aggregate to missions and hospitals and to the +poor. Only frugality enables them to outdo the rich on their own +ground. +</P> + +<P> +But miserliness or avariciousness is a different thing from economy. +The miserly is the miserable man, who hoards money from a love of it. +A miser who spends a cent upon himself where another would spend a +quarter does it from parsimony, which is a subordinate characteristic +of avarice. Of this the following is an illustration: "True, I should +like some soup, but I have no appetite for the meat," said the dying +Ostervalde; "what is to become of that? It will be a sad waste." And +so the rich Paris banker would not let his servant buy meat for broth. +</P> + +<P> +A writer on political economy tells of the mishaps resulting from a +broken latch on a farmyard gate. Every one going through would shut +the gate, but as the latch would not hold it, it would swing open with +every breeze. One day a pig ran out into the woods. Every one on the +farm went to help get him back. A gardener jumped over a ditch to stop +the pig, and sprained his ankle so badly as to be confined to his bed +for two weeks. When the cook returned, she found that her linen, left +to dry at the fire, was all badly scorched. The dairymaid in her +excitement left the cows untied, and one of them broke the leg of a +colt. The gardener lost several hours of valuable time. Yet a new +latch would not have cost five cents. +</P> + +<P> +Guy, the London bookseller, and afterward the founder of the great +hospital, was a great miser, living in the back part of his shop, +eating upon an old bench, and using his counter for a table, with a +newspaper for a cloth. He did not marry. One day he was visited by +"Vulture" Hopkins, another well-known miser. "What is your business?" +asked Guy, lighting a candle. "To discuss your methods of saving +money," was the reply, alluding to the niggardly economy for which Guy +was famous. On learning Hopkins's business he blew out the light, +saying, "We can do that in the dark." "Sir, you are my master in the +art," said the "Vulture;" "I need ask no further. I see where your +secret lies." +</P> + +<P> +Yet that kind of economy which verges on the niggardly is better than +the extravagance that laughs at it. Either, when carried to excess, is +not only apt to cause misery, but to ruin the character. +</P> + +<P> +"Lay by something for a rainy day," said a gentleman to an Irishman in +his service. Not long afterwards he asked Patrick how much he had +added to his store. "Faith, nothing at all," was the reply; "I did as +you bid me, but it rained very hard yesterday, and it all went—in +drink." +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Wealth, a monster gorged<BR> +'Mid starving populations."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +But nowhere and at no period were these contrasts more startling than +in Imperial Rome. There a whole population might be trembling lest +they should be starved by the delay of an Alexandrian corn-ship, while +the upper classes were squandering fortunes at a single banquet, +drinking out of myrrhine and jeweled vases worth hundreds of pounds, +and feasting on the brains of peacocks and the tongues of nightingales. +As a consequence, disease was rife, men were short-lived. At this time +the dress of Roman ladies displayed an unheard-of splendor. The elder +Pliny tells us that he himself saw Lollia Paulina dressed for a +betrothal feast in a robe entirely covered with pearls and emeralds, +which had cost 40,000,000 sesterces, and which was known to be less +costly than some of her other dresses. Gluttony, caprice, +extravagance, ostentation, impurity, rioted in the heart of a society +which knew of no other means by which to break the monotony of its +weariness or alleviate the anguish of its despair. +</P> + +<P> +The expense ridiculously bestowed on the Roman feasts passes all +belief. Suetonius mentions a supper given to Vitellius by his brother, +in which, among other articles, there were two thousand of the choicest +fishes, seven thousand of the most delicate birds, and one dish, from +its size and capacity, named the aegis or shield of Minerva. It was +filled chiefly with the liver of the scari, a delicate species of fish, +the brains of pheasants and peacocks, and the tongues of parrots, +considered desirable chiefly because of their great cost. +</P> + +<P> +"I hope that there will not be another sale," exclaimed Horace Walpole, +"for I have not an inch of room nor a farthing left." A woman once +bought an old door-plate with "Thompson" on it because she thought it +might come in handy some time. The habit of buying what you don't need +because it is cheap encourages extravagance. "Many have been ruined by +buying good pennyworths." +</P> + +<P> +"Where there is no prudence," said Dr. Johnson, "there is no virtue." +</P> + +<P> +The eccentric John Randolph once sprang from his seat in the House of +Representatives, and exclaimed in his piercing voice, "Mr. Speaker, I +have found it." And then, in the stillness which followed this strange +outburst, he added, "I have found the Philosopher's Stone: it is <I>Pay +as you go</I>." +</P> + +<P> +Many a young man seems to think that when he sees his name on a sign he +is on the highway to fortune, and he begins to live on a scale as +though there was no possible chance of failure; as though he were +already beyond the danger point. Unfortunately Congress can pass no +law that will remedy the vice of living beyond one's means. +</P> + +<P> +"The prosperity of fools shall destroy them." "However easy it may be +to make money," said Barnum, "it is the most difficult thing in the +world to keep it." Money often makes the mare—run away with you. +</P> + +<P> +Very few men know how to use money properly. They can earn it, lavish +it, hoard it, waste it, but to deal with it <I>wisely</I>, as a means to an +end, is an education difficult of acquirement. +</P> + +<P> +After a large stained-glass window had been constructed an artist +picked up the discarded fragments and made one of the most exquisite +windows in Europe for another cathedral. So one boy will pick up a +splendid education out of the odds and ends of time which others +carelessly throw away, or gain a fortune by saving what others waste. +</P> + +<P> +It has become a part of the new political economy to argue that a debt +on a church or a house or a firm is a desirable thing to develop +character. When the young man starts out in life with the +old-fashioned idea strong in his mind that debt is bondage and a +disgrace, that a mortgage is to be shunned like the cholera, and that +to owe a dollar that you cannot pay, unless overtaken by misfortune, is +nothing more or less than stealing, then he is bound in so much at +least to succeed, and save his old age from being a burden upon his +friends or the state. +</P> + +<P> +To do your best you must own every bit of yourself. If you are in +debt, part of you belongs to your creditors. Nothing but actual sin is +so paralyzing to a young man's energies as debt. +</P> + +<P> +The "loose change" which many young men throw away carelessly, or +worse, would often form the basis of a fortune and independence. The +earnings of the people of the United States, rich and poor, old and +young, male and female, amount to an average of less than fifty cents a +day. But it is by economizing such savings that one must get his start +in business. The man without a penny is practically helpless, from a +business point of view, except so far as he can immediately utilize his +powers of body and mind. Besides, when a man or woman is driven to the +wall, the chance of goodness surviving self-respect and the loss of +public esteem is frightfully diminished. +</P> + +<P> +"Money goes as it comes." "A child and a fool imagine that twenty +years and twenty shillings can never be spent." +</P> + +<P> +Live between extravagance and meanness. Don't save money and starve +your mind. "The very secret and essence of thrift consists in getting +things into higher values. Spend upward, that is, for the higher +faculties. Spend for the mind rather than for the body, for culture +rather than for amusement. Some young men are too stingy to buy the +daily papers, and are very ignorant and narrow." "There is that +withholdeth more than is meet, but it tendeth to poverty." "Don't +squeeze out of your life and comfort and family what you save." +</P> + +<P> +Liberal, not lavish, is Nature's hand. Even God, it is said, cannot +afford to be extravagant. When He increased the loaves and fishes, He +commanded to gather up the fragments, that nothing be lost. +</P> + +<P> +"Nature uses a grinding economy," says Emerson, "working up all that is +wasted to-day into to-morrow's creation; not a superfluous grain of +sand for all the ostentation she makes of expense and public works. +She flung us out in her plenty, but we cannot shed a hair or a paring +of a nail but instantly she snatches at the shred and appropriates it +to her general stock." Last summer's flowers and foliage decayed in +autumn only to enrich the earth this year for other forms of beauty. +Nature will not even wait for our friends to see us, unless we die at +home. The moment the breath has left the body she begins to take us to +pieces, that the parts may be used again for other creations. Mark the +following contrast:— +</P> + +<PRE STYLE="font-family: Courier New; font-size: 10pt"> +1772. 1822. +Man, to the plow; Man, tally-ho; +Wife, to the cow; Wife, piano; +Girl, to the sow; Miss, silk and satin; +Boy, to the mow; Boy, Greek and Latin; +And your rents will be netted. And you'll all be gazetted. + <I>Hone's Works.</I> <I>The Times.</I> +</PRE> + +<BR> + +<P> +More than a lifetime has elapsed since the above was published, but +instead of returning to the style of 1772, our farmers have out-Heroded +Herod in the direction of the fashion, of 1822, and many a farmhouse, +like the home of Artemas [Transcriber's note: Artemus?] Ward, may be +known by the cupola and the mortgage with which it is decorated. +</P> + +<P> +It is by the mysterious power of economy, it has been said, that the +loaf is multiplied, that using does not waste, that little becomes +much, that scattered fragments grow to unity, and that out of nothing +or next to nothing comes the miracle of something. It is not merely +saving, still less, parsimony. It is foresight and arrangement, +insight and combination, causing inert things to labor, useless things +to serve our necessities, perishing things to renew their vigor, and +all things to exert themselves for human comfort. +</P> + +<P> +English working men and women work very hard, seldom take a holiday, +and though they get nearly double the wages of the same classes in +France, yet save very little. The millions earned by them slip out of +their hands almost as soon as obtained to satisfy the pleasures of the +moment. In France every housekeeper is taught the art of making much +out of little. "I am simply astonished," writes an American lady +stopping in France, "at the number of good wholesome dishes which my +friend here makes for her table from things, which at home, I always +throw away. Dainty little dishes from scraps of cold meat, from hard +crusts of bread, delicately prepared and seasoned, from almost +everything and nothing. And yet there is no feeling of stinginess or +want." +</P> + +<P> +"I wish I could write all across the sky, in letters of gold," says +Rev. William Marsh, "the one word, savings-bank." +</P> + +<P> +Boston savings-banks have $130,000,000 on deposit, mostly saved in +driblets. Josiah Quincy used to say that the servant girls built most +of the palaces on Beacon Street. +</P> + +<P> +"So apportion your wants that your means may exceed them," says Bulwer. +"With one hundred pounds a year I may need no man's help; I may at +least have 'my crust of bread and liberty.' But with five thousand +pounds a year I may dread a ring at my bell; I may have my tyrannical +master in servants whose wages I cannot pay; my exile may be at the +fiat of the first long-suffering man who enters a judgment against me; +for the flesh that lies nearest my heart some Shylock may be dusting +his scales and whetting his knife. Every man is needy who spends more +than he has; no man is needy who spends less. I may so ill manage, +that with five thousand pounds a year I purchase the worst evils of +poverty,—terror and shame; I may so well manage my money, that with +one hundred pounds a year I purchase the best blessings of +wealth,—safety and respect." +</P> + +<P> +Edmund Burke, speaking on Economic Reform, quoted from Cicero: "Magnum +vectigal est parsimonia," accenting the second word on the first +syllable. Lord North whispered a correction, when Burke turned the +mistake to advantage. "The noble lord hints that I have erred in the +quantity of a principal word in my quotation; I rejoice at it, sir, +because it gives me an opportunity of repeating the inestimable +adage,—'Magnum vectigal est parsimonia.'" The sentiment, meaning +"Thrift is a good income," is well worthy of emphatic repetition by us +all. +</P> + +<P> +Washington examined the minutest expenditures of his family, even when +President of the United States. He understood that without economy +none can be rich, and with it none need be poor. +</P> + +<P> +"I make a point of paying my own bills," said Wellington. +</P> + +<P> +John Jacob Astor said that the first thousand dollars cost him more +effort than all of his millions. Boys who are careless with their +dimes and quarters, just because they have so few, never get this first +thousand, and without it no fortune is possible. +</P> + +<P> +To find out uses for the persons or things which are now wasted in life +is to be the glorious work of the men of the next generation, and that +which will contribute most to their enrichment. +</P> + +<P> +Economizing "in spots" or by freaks is no economy at all. It must be +done by management. +</P> + +<P> +Learn early in life to say "I can't afford it." It is an indication of +power and courage and manliness. Dr. Franklin said, "It is not our own +eyes, but other people's, that ruin us." "Fashion wears out more +apparel than the man," says Shakespeare. +</P> + +<P> +"Of what a hideous progeny of ill is debt the father," said Douglas +Jerrold. "What meanness, what invasions of self-respect, what cares, +what double-dealing! How in due season it will carve the frank, open +face into wrinkles; how like a knife it will stab the honest heart. +And then its transformations,—how it has been known to change a goodly +face into a mask of brass; how with the evil custom of debt has the +true man become a callous trickster! A freedom from debt, and what +nourishing sweetness may be found in cold water; what toothsomeness in +a dry crust; what ambrosial nourishment in a hard egg! Be sure of it, +he who dines out of debt, though his meal be a biscuit and an onion, +dines in 'The Apollo.' And then, for raiment, what warmth in a +threadbare coat, if the tailor's receipt be in your pocket! What +Tyrian purple in the faded waistcoat, the vest not owed for; how glossy +the well-worn hat, if it covers not the aching head of a debtor! Next, +the home sweets, the outdoor recreation of the free man. The street +door falls not a knell in his heart, the foot on the staircase, though +he lives on the third pair, sends no spasm through his anatomy; at the +rap of his door he can crow 'come in,' and his pulse still beats +healthfully. See him abroad! How he returns look for look with any +passenger. Poverty is a bitter draught, yet may, and sometimes can +with advantage, be gulped down. Though the drinker makes wry faces, +there may, after all, be a wholesome goodness in the cup. But debt, +however courteously it may be offered, is the Cup of Siren; and the +wine, spiced and delicious though it be, is poison. My son, if poor, +see Hyson in the running spring; see thy mouth water at a last week's +roll; think a threadbare coat the only wear; and acknowledge a +whitewashed garret the fittest housing-place for a gentleman; do this, +and flee debt. So shall thy heart be at rest, and the sheriff +confounded." +</P> + +<P> +"Whoever has sixpence is sovereign over all men to the extent of that +sixpence," says Carlyle; "commands cooks to feed him, philosophers to +teach him, kings to mount guard over him,—to the extent of that +sixpence." +</P> + +<P> +If a man owes you a dollar, he is almost sure to owe you a grudge, too. +If you owe another money, you will be apt to regard him with +uncharitable eyes. Why not economize before getting into debt instead +of pinching afterwards? +</P> + +<P> +Communities which live wholly from hand to mouth never make much +progress in the useful arts. Savings mean power. <I>Comfort and +independence abide with those who can postpone their desires.</I> +</P> + +<P> +"Hunger, rags, cold, hard work, contempt, suspicion, unjust reproach, +are disagreeable," says Horace Greeley, "but debt is infinitely worse +than them all." +</P> + +<P> +Many a ruined man dates his downfall from the day when he began +borrowing money. Debt demoralized Daniel Webster, and Theodore Hook, +and Sheridan, and Fox, and Pitt. Mirabeau's life was made wretched by +duns. +</P> + +<P> +"Annual income," says Micawber, "twenty pounds; annual expenditure, +nineteen six, result—happiness. Annual income, twenty pounds; annual +expenditure, twenty pounds ought and six, result—misery." +</P> + +<P> +"We are ruined," says Colton, "not by what we really want, but by what +we think we do. Therefore never go abroad in search of your wants; if +they be real wants, they will come home in search of you; for he that +buys what he does not want will soon want what he cannot buy." +</P> + +<P> +The honorable course is to give every man his due. It is better to +starve than not to do this. It is better to do a small business on a +cash basis than a large one on credit. <I>Owe no man anything</I>, wrote +St. Paul. It is a good motto to place in every purse, in every +counting-room, in every church, in every home. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Economy is of itself a great revenue.—CICERO. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap13"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XIII. +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +RICH WITHOUT MONEY. +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Let others plead for pensions; I can be rich without money, by +endeavoring to be superior to everything poor. I would have my +services to my country unstained by any interested motive.—LORD +COLLINGWOOD. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Ill fares the land, to hastening ills a prey,<BR> +Where wealth accumulates and men decay.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">GOLDSMITH.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Pennilessness is not poverty, and ownership is not possession; to be +without is not always to lack, and to reach is not to attain; sunlight +is for all eyes that look up, and color for those who choose.—HELEN +HUNT. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +I ought not to allow any man, because he has broad lands, to feel that +he is rich in my presence. I ought to make him feel that I can do +without his riches, that I cannot be bought,—neither by comfort, +neither by pride,—and although I be utterly penniless, and receiving +bread from him, that he is the poor man beside me.—EMERSON. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +To be content with what we possess is the greatest and most secure of +riches.—CICERO. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +There is no riches above a sound body and no joy above the joy of the +heart.—ECCLESIASTES. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Where, thy true treasure? Gold says, "Not in me;"<BR> +And "Not in me," the Diamond. Gold is poor;<BR> +India's insolvent: seek it in thyself.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">YOUNG.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +He is richest who is content with the least, for content is the wealth +of nature.—SOCRATES. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +A great heart in a little house is of all things here below that which +has ever touched me most.—LACORDAIRE. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +My crown is in my heart, not on my head,<BR> +Nor decked with diamonds and Indian stones,<BR> +Nor to be seen: my crown is called content;<BR> +A crown it is, that seldom kings enjoy.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">SHAKESPEAKE.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Many a man is rich without money. Thousands of men with nothing in +their pockets, and thousands without even a pocket, are rich. +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<A NAME="img-238"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG CLASS="imgcenter" SRC="images/img-238.jpg" ALT="RALPH WALDO EMERSON" BORDER="2" WIDTH="363" HEIGHT="522"> +<H3 CLASS="h3center" STYLE="width: 363px"> +RALPH WALDO EMERSON +</H3> +</CENTER> + +<P CLASS="caption" ALIGN="center"> +"The Sage of Concord." +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +"I revere the person who is riches: so I cannot think of him as alone, +or poor, or exiled, or unhappy." +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<P> +A man born with a good, sound constitution, a good stomach, a good +heart and good limbs, and a pretty good headpiece, is rich. +</P> + +<P> +Good bones are better than gold, tough muscles than silver, and nerves +that carry energy to every function are better than houses and land. +</P> + +<P> +"Heart-life, soul-life, hope, joy, and love, are true riches," said +Beecher. +</P> + +<P> +Why should I scramble and struggle to get possession of a little +portion of this earth? This is my world now; why should I envy others +its mere legal possession? It belongs to him who can see it, enjoy it. +I need not envy the so-called owners of estates in Boston and New York. +They are merely taking care of my property and keeping it in excellent +condition for me. For a few pennies for railroad fare whenever I wish +I can see and possess the best of it all. It has cost me no effort, it +gives me no care; yet the green grass, the shrubbery, and the statues +on the lawns, the finer sculptures and the paintings within, are always +ready for me whenever I feel a desire to look upon them. I do not wish +to carry them home with me, for I could not give them half the care +they now receive; besides, it would take too much of my valuable time, +and I should be worrying continually lest they be spoiled or stolen. I +have much of the wealth of the world now. It is all prepared for me +without any pains on my part. All around me are working hard to get +things that will please me, and competing to see who can give them the +cheapest. The little I pay for the use of libraries, railroads, +galleries, parks, is less than it would cost to care for the least of +all I use. Life and landscape are mine, the stars and flowers, the sea +and air, the birds and trees. What more do I want? All the ages have +been working for me; all mankind are my servants. I am only required +to feed and clothe myself, an easy task in this land of opportunity. +</P> + +<P> +A millionaire pays thousands of pounds for a gallery of paintings, and +some poor boy or girl comes in, with open mind and poetic fancy, and +carries away a treasure of beauty which the owner never saw. A +collector bought at public auction in London, for one hundred and +fifty-seven guineas, an autograph of Shakespeare; but for nothing a +schoolboy can read and absorb the riches of "Hamlet." +</P> + +<P> +Why should I waste my abilities pursuing this will-o'-the-wisp +"Enough," which is ever a little more than one has, and which none of +the panting millions ever yet overtook in his mad chase? Is there no +desirable thing left in this world but gold, luxury, and ease? +</P> + +<P> +"Want is a growing giant whom the coat of Have was never large enough +to cover." "A man may as soon fill a chest with grace, or a vessel +with virtue," says Phillips Brooks, "as a heart with wealth." +</P> + +<P> +Shall we seek happiness through the sense of taste or of touch? Shall +we idolize our stomachs and our backs? Have we no higher missions, no +nobler destinies? Shall we "disgrace the fair day by a pusillanimous +preference of our bread to our freedom"? +</P> + +<P> +In the three great "Banquets" of Plato, Xenophon, and Plutarch the food +is not even mentioned. +</P> + +<P> +What does your money say to you: what message does it bring to you? +Does it say to you, "Eat, drink, and be merry, for to-morrow we die"? +Does it bring a message of comfort, of education, of culture, of +travel, of books, of an opportunity to help your fellow-man, or is the +message "More land, more thousands and millions"? What message does it +bring you? Clothes for the naked, bread for the starving, schools for +the ignorant, hospitals for the sick, asylums for the orphans, or of +more for yourself and none for others? Is it a message of generosity +or of meanness, breadth or narrowness? Does it speak to you of +character? Does it mean a broader manhood, a larger aim, a nobler +ambition, or does it cry "More, more, more"? +</P> + +<P> +Are you an animal loaded with ingots, or a man filled with a purpose? +He is rich whose mind is rich, whose thought enriches the intellect of +the world. It is a sad sight to see a soul which thirsts not for truth +or beauty or the good. +</P> + +<P> +A sailor on a sinking vessel in the Caribbean Sea eagerly filled his +pockets with Spanish dollars from a barrel on board while his +companions, about to leave in the only boat, begged him to seek safety +with them. But he could not leave the bright metal which he had so +longed for and idolized, and was prevented from reaching shore by his +very riches, when the vessel went down. +</P> + +<P> +"Who is the richest of men," asked Socrates? "He who is content with +the least, for contentment is nature's riches." +</P> + +<P> +In More's "Utopia" gold was despised. Criminals were forced to wear +heavy chains of it, and to have rings of it in their ears; it was put +to the vilest uses to keep up the scorn of it. Bad characters were +compelled to wear gold head-bands. Diamonds and pearls were used to +decorate infants, so that the youth would discard and despise them. +</P> + +<P> +"Ah, if the rich were as rich as the poor fancy riches!" exclaims +Emerson. +</P> + +<P> +Many a rich man has died in the poorhouse. +</P> + +<P> +In excavating Pompeii a skeleton was found with the fingers clenched +round a quantity of gold. A man of business in the town of Hull, +England, when dying, pulled a bag of money from under his pillow, which +he held between his clenched fingers with a grasp so firm as scarcely +to relax under the agonies of death. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Oh! blind and wanting wit to choose,<BR> +Who house the chaff and burn the grain;<BR> +Who hug the wealth ye cannot use,<BR> +And lack the riches all may gain.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">WILLIAM WATSON.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Poverty is the want of much, avarice the want of everything. +</P> + +<P> +A poor man was met by a stranger while scoffing at the wealthy for not +enjoying themselves. The stranger gave him a purse, in which he was +always to find a ducat. As fast as he took one out another was to drop +in, but he was not to begin to spend his fortune until he had thrown +away the purse. He takes ducat after ducat out, but continually +procrastinates and puts off the hour of enjoyment until he has got "a +little more," and dies at last counting his millions. +</P> + +<P> +A beggar was once met by Fortune, who promised to fill his wallet with +gold, as much as he might please, on condition that whatever touched +the ground should turn at once to dust. The beggar opens his wallet, +asks for more and yet more, until the bag bursts. The gold falls to +the ground, and all is lost. +</P> + +<P> +When the steamer Central America was about to sink, the stewardess, +having collected all the gold she could from the staterooms, and tied +it in her apron, jumped for the last boat leaving the steamer. She +missed her aim and fell into the water, the gold carrying her down head +first. +</P> + +<P> +In the year 1843 a rich miser lived in Padua, who was so mean and +sordid that he would never give a cent to any person or object, and he +was so afraid of the banks that he would not deposit with them, but +would sit up nights with sword and pistol by him to guard his idol +hoard. When his health gave way from anxiety and watching he built an +underground treasure-chamber, so arranged that if any burglar ever +entered, he would step upon a spring which would precipitate him into a +subterranean river, where he could neither escape nor be heard. One +night the miser went to his chest to see that all was right, when his +foot touched the spring of the trap, and he was hurled into the deep, +hidden stream. +</P> + +<P> +"One would think," said Boswell, "that the proprietor of all this +(Keddlestone, the seat of Lord Scarsfield) must be happy." "Nay, sir," +said Johnson, "all this excludes but one evil, poverty." +</P> + +<P> +John Duncan, the illegitimate child of a Scottish weaver, was ignorant, +near-sighted, bent, a miserable apology for a human being, and at last +a pauper. If he went upon the street he would sometimes be stoned by +other boys. The farmer, for whom he watched cattle, was cruel to him, +and after a rainy day would send him cold and wet to sleep on a +miserable bed in a dark outhouse. Here he would empty the water from +his shoes, and wring out his wet clothes and sleep as best he might. +But the boy had a desire to learn to read, and when, a little later, he +was put to weaving, he persuaded a schoolgirl, twelve years old, to +teach him. He was sixteen when he learned the alphabet, after which +his progress was quite rapid. He was very fond of plants, and worked +overtime for several months to earn five shillings to buy a book on +botany. He became a good botanist, and such was his interest in the +study that at the age of eighty he walked twelve miles to obtain a new +specimen. A man whom he met became interested at finding such a +well-stored mind in such a miserable body, poorly clad, and published +an account of his career. Many readers sent him money, but he saved +it, and left it in his will to found eight scholarships and offer +prizes for the encouragement of the study of natural science by the +poor. His small but valuable library was left for a similar use. +</P> + +<P> +Franklin said money never made a man happy yet; there is nothing in its +nature to produce happiness. The more a man has, the more he wants. +Instead of filling a vacuum, it makes one. A great bank account can +never make a man rich. It is the mind that makes the body rich. No +man is rich, however much money or land he may possess, who has a poor +heart. If that is poor, he is poor indeed, though he own and rule +kingdoms. He is rich or poor according to what he is, not according to +what he has. +</P> + +<P> +Who would not choose to be a millionaire of deeds with a Lincoln, a +Grant, a Florence Nightingale, a Childs; a millionaire of ideas with +Emerson, with Lowell, with Shakespeare, with Wordsworth; a millionaire +of statesmanship with a Gladstone, a Bright, a Sumner, a Washington? +</P> + +<P> +Some men are rich in health, in constant cheerfulness, in a mercurial +temperament which floats them over troubles and trials enough to sink a +shipload of ordinary men. Others are rich in disposition, family, and +friends. There are some men so amiable that everybody loves them; some +so cheerful that they carry an atmosphere of jollity about them. Some +are rich in integrity and character. +</P> + +<P> +One of the first great lessons of life is to learn the true estimate of +values. As the youth starts out in his career, all sorts of wares will +be imposed upon him, and all kinds of temptations will be used to +induce him to buy. His success will depend very largely upon his +ability to estimate properly, not the apparent but the real value of +everything presented to him. Vulgar Wealth will flaunt her banner +before his eyes, and claim supremacy over everything else. A thousand +different schemes will be thrust into his face with their claims for +superiority. Every occupation and vocation will present its charms in +turn, and offer its inducements. The youth who would succeed must not +allow himself to be deceived by appearances, but must place the +emphasis of life where it belongs. +</P> + +<P> +No man, it is said, can read the works of John Ruskin without learning +that his sources of pleasure are well-nigh infinite. There is not a +flower, nor a cloud, nor a tree, nor a mountain, nor a star; not a bird +that fans the air, nor a creature that walks the earth; not a glimpse +of sea or sky or meadow-greenery; not a work of worthy art in the +domains of painting, sculpture, poetry, and architecture; not a thought +of God as the Great Spirit presiding over and informing all things, +that is not to him a source of the sweetest pleasure. The whole world +of matter and of spirit and the long record of human art are open to +him as the never-failing fountains of his delight. In these pure +realms he seeks his daily food and has his daily life. +</P> + +<P> +There is now and then a man who sees beauty and true riches everywhere, +and "worships the splendor of God which he sees bursting through each +chink and cranny." +</P> + +<P> +Phillips Brooks, Thoreau, Garrison, Emerson, Beecher, Agassiz, were +rich without money. They saw the splendor in the flower, the glory in +the grass, books in the running brooks, sermons in stones, and good in +everything. They knew that the man who owns the landscape is seldom +the one who pays the taxes on it. They sucked in power and wealth at +first hands from the meadows, fields, and flowers, birds, brooks, +mountains, and forest, as the bee sucks honey from the flowers. Every +natural object seemed to bring them a special message from the great +Author of the beautiful. To these rare souls every natural object was +touched with power and beauty; and their thirsty souls drank it in as a +traveler on a desert drinks in the god-sent water of the oasis. To +extract power and real wealth from men and things seemed to be their +mission, and to pour it out again in refreshing showers upon a thirsty +humanity. They believed that man's most important food does not enter +by the mouth. They knew that man could not live by estates, dollars, +and bread alone, and that if he could he would only be an animal. They +believed that the higher life demands a higher food. They believed in +man's unlimited power of expansion, and that this growth demands a more +highly organized food product than that which merely sustains animal +life. They saw a finer nutriment in the landscape, in the meadows, +than could be ground into flour, and which escaped the loaf. They felt +a sentiment in natural objects which pointed upward, ever upward to the +Author, and which was capable of feeding and expanding the higher life +until it should grow into a finer sympathy and fellowship with the +Author of the beautiful. They believed that the Creation thunders the +ten commandments, and that all Nature is tugging at the terms of every +contract to make it just. They could feel this finer sentiment, this +soul lifter, this man inspirer, in the growing grain, in the waving +corn, in the golden harvest. They saw it reflected in every brook, in +every star, in every flower, in every dewdrop. They believed that +Nature together with human nature were man's great schoolmasters, that +if rightly used they would carve his rough life into beauty and touch +his rude manner with grace. +</P> + +<P> +"More servants wait on man than he'll take notice of." But if he would +enjoy Nature he must come to it from a higher level than the yardstick. +He must bring a spirit as grand and sublime as that by which the thing +itself exists. +</P> + +<P> +We all live on far lower levels than we need to do. We linger in the +misty and oppressive valleys, when we might be climbing the sunlit +hills. God puts into our hands the Book of Life, bright on every page +with open secrets, and we suffer it to drop out of our hands unread. +Emerson says, "We have come into a world which is a living poem. +Everything is as I am." Nature provides for us a perpetual festival; +she is bright to the bright, comforting to those who will accept +comfort. We cannot conceive how a universe could possibly be created +which could devise more efficient methods or greater opportunities for +the delight, the happiness, and the real wealth of human beings than +the one we live in. +</P> + +<P> +The human body is packed full of marvelous devices, of wonderful +contrivances, of infinite possibilities for the happiness and riches of +the individual. No physiologist nor scientist has ever yet been able +to point out a single improvement, even in the minutest detail, in the +structure of the human body. No inventor has ever yet been able to +suggest an improvement in this human mechanism. No chemist has ever +been able to suggest a superior combination in any one of the elements +which make up the human structure. One of the first things to do in +life is to learn the natural wealth of our surroundings, instead of +bemoaning our lot, for, no matter where we are placed, there is +infinitely more about us than we can ever understand, than we can ever +exhaust the meaning of. +</P> + +<P> +"Thank Heaven there are still some Matthew Arnolds who prefer the +heavenly sweetness of light to the Eden of riches." Arnold left only a +few thousand dollars, but yet was he not one of the richest of men? +What the world wants is young men who will amass golden thoughts, +golden wisdom, golden deeds, not mere golden dollars; young men who +prefer to have thought-capital, character-capital, to cash-capital. He +who estimates his money the highest values himself the least. "I +revere the person," says Emerson, "who is riches; so that I cannot +think of him as alone, or poor, or exiled, or unhappy." +</P> + +<P> +Raphael was rich without money. All doors opened to him, and he was +more than welcome everywhere. His sweet spirit radiated sunshine +wherever he went. +</P> + +<P> +Henry Wilson was rich without money. So scrupulous had he been not to +make his exalted position a means of worldly gain, that when this +Natick cobbler, the sworn friend of the oppressed, whose one question +as to measures or acts was ever "Is it right; will it do good?" came to +be inaugurated as Vice-President of the country, he was obliged to +borrow of his fellow-senator, Charles Sumner, one hundred dollars to +meet the necessary expenses of the occasion. +</P> + +<P> +Mozart, the great composer of the "Requiem," left barely enough money +to bury him, but he has made the world richer. +</P> + +<P> +A rich mind and noble spirit will cast a radiance of beauty over the +humblest home, which the upholsterer and decorator can never approach. +Who would not prefer to be a millionaire of character, of contentment, +rather than possess nothing but the vulgar coins of a Croesus? Whoever +uplifts civilization is rich though he die penniless, and future +generations will erect his monument. +</P> + +<P> +Are we tender, loving, self-denying, and honest, trying to fashion our +frail life after that of the model man of Nazareth? Then, though our +pockets are often empty, we have an inheritance which is as +overwhelmingly precious as it is eternally incorruptible. +</P> + +<P> +An Asiatic traveler tells us that one day he found the bodies of two +men laid upon the desert sand beside the carcass of a camel. They had +evidently died from thirst, and yet around the waist of each was a +large store of jewels of different kinds, which they had doubtless been +crossing the desert to sell in the markets of Persia. +</P> + +<P> +The man who has no money is poor, but one who has nothing but money is +poorer than he. He only is rich who can enjoy without owning; he who +is covetous is poor though he have millions. There are riches of +intellect, and no man with an intellectual taste can be called poor. +He who has so little knowledge of human nature as to seek happiness by +changing anything but his own disposition will waste his life in +fruitless efforts, and multiply the griefs which he purposes to remove. +He is rich as well as brave who can face poverty and misfortune with +cheerfulness and courage. +</P> + +<P> +We can so educate the will power that it will focus the thoughts upon +the bright side of things, and upon objects which elevate the soul, +thus forming a habit of happiness and goodness which will make us rich. +The habit of making the best of everything and of always looking on the +bright side of everything is a fortune in itself. +</P> + +<P> +He is rich who values a good name above gold. Among the ancient Greeks +and Romans honor was more sought after than wealth. Rome was imperial +Rome no more when the imperial purple became an article of traffic. +</P> + +<P> +This is the evil of trade, as well as of partisan politics. As Emerson +remarks, it would put everything into market,—talent, beauty, virtue, +and man himself. +</P> + +<P> +Diogenes was captured by pirates and sold as a slave. His purchaser +released him, and gave him charge of his household and of the education +of his children. He despised wealth and affectation, and lived in a +tub. "Do you want anything?" asked Alexander the Great, forcibly +impressed by the abounding cheerfulness of the philosopher under such +circumstances. "Yes," replied Diogenes, "I want you to stand out of my +sunshine and not to take from me what you cannot give me." "Were I not +Alexander," exclaimed the great conqueror, "I would be Diogenes." +</P> + +<P> +Brave and honest men do not work for gold. They work for love, for +honor, for character. When Socrates suffered death rather than abandon +his views of right morality, when Las Casas endeavored to mitigate the +tortures of the poor Indians, they had no thought of money or country. +They worked for the elevation of all that thought, and for the relief +of all that suffered. +</P> + +<P> +"I don't want such things," said Epictetus to the rich Roman orator who +was making light of his contempt for money-wealth; "and besides," said +the stoic, "you are poorer than I am, after all. You have silver +vessels, but earthenware reasons, principles, appetites. My mind to me +a kingdom is, and it furnishes me with abundant and happy occupation in +lieu of your restless idleness. All your possessions seem small to +you; mine seem great to me. Your desire is insatiate, mine is +satisfied." +</P> + +<P> +"Do you know, sir," said a devotee of Mammon to John Bright, "that I am +worth a million sterling?" "Yes," said the irritated but calm-spirited +respondent, "I do; and I know that it is all you are worth." +</P> + +<P> +A bankrupt merchant, returning home one night, said to his noble wife, +"My dear, I am ruined; everything we have is in the hands of the +sheriff." After a few moments of silence the wife looked into his face +and asked, "Will the sheriff sell you?" "Oh, no." "Will the sheriff +sell me?" "Oh, no." "Then do not say we have lost everything. All +that is most valuable remains to us,—manhood, womanhood, childhood. +We have lost but the results of our skill and industry. We can make +another fortune if our hearts and hands are left us." +</P> + +<P> +What power can poverty have over a home where loving hearts are beating +with a consciousness of untold riches of head and heart? +</P> + +<P> +Paul was never so great as when he occupied a prison cell; and Jesus +Christ reached the height of his success when, smitten, spat upon, +tormented, and crucified, He cried in agony, and yet with triumphant +satisfaction, "It is finished." +</P> + +<P> +"Character before wealth," was the motto of Amos Lawrence, who had +inscribed on his pocket-book, "What shall it profit a man, if he shall +gain the whole world and lose his own soul?" +</P> + +<P> +If you make a fortune let every dollar of it be clean. You do not want +to see in it drunkards reel, orphans weep, widows moan. Your riches +must not make others poorer and more wretched. +</P> + +<P> +Alexander the Great wandered to the gates of Paradise, and knocked for +entrance. "Who knocks?" demanded the guardian angel. "Alexander." +"Who is Alexander?" "Alexander,—the Alexander,—Alexander the +Great,—the conqueror of the world." "We know him not," replied the +angel; "this is the Lord's gate; only the righteous enter here." +</P> + +<P> +Don't start out in life with a false standard; a truly great man makes +official position and money and houses and estates look so tawdry, so +mean and poor, that we feel like sinking out of sight with our cheap +laurels and gold. <I>Millions look trifling beside character</I>. +</P> + +<P> +A friend of Professor Agassiz, an eminent practical man, once expressed +his wonder that a man of such abilities should remain contented with +such a moderate income as he received. "I have enough," was Agassiz's +reply. "I have no time to waste in making money. Life is not +sufficiently long to enable a man to get rich and do his duty to his +fellow-men at the same time." +</P> + +<P> +How were the thousands of business men who lost every dollar they had +in the Chicago fire enabled to go into business at once, some into +wholesale business, without money? Their record was their bank +account. The commercial agencies said they were square men; that they +had always paid one hundred cents on a dollar; that they had paid +promptly, and that they were industrious and dealt honorably with all +men. This record was as good as a bank account. <I>They drew on their +character</I>. Character was the coin which enabled penniless men to buy +thousands of dollars' worth of goods. Their integrity did not burn up +with their stores. The best part of them was beyond the reach of fire +and could not be burned. +</P> + +<P> +What are the toil-sweated productions of wealth piled up in vast +profusion around a Girard, or a Rothschild, when weighed against the +stores of wisdom, the treasures of knowledge, and the strength, beauty, +and glory with which victorious virtue has enriched and adorned a great +multitude of minds during the march of a hundred generations? +</P> + +<P> +"Lord, how many things are in the world of which Diogenes hath no +need!" exclaimed the stoic, as he wandered among the miscellaneous +articles at a country fair. +</P> + +<P> +"There are treasures laid up in the heart—treasures of charity, piety, +temperance, and soberness. These treasures a man takes with him beyond +death when he leaves this world." (Buddhist Scriptures.) +</P> + +<P> +Is it any wonder that our children start out with wrong ideals of life, +with wrong ideas of what constitutes success? The child is "urged to +get on," to "rise in the world," to "make money." The youth is +constantly told that nothing succeeds like success. False standards +are everywhere set up for him, and then the boy is blamed if he makes a +failure. +</P> + +<P> +It is all very well to urge youth on to success, but the great mass of +mankind can never reach or even approximate the goal constantly +preached to them, nor can we all be rich. One of the great lessons to +teach in this century of sharp competition and the survival of the +fittest is how to be rich without money, and to learn how to do without +success, according to the popular standard. +</P> + +<P> +Gold cannot make the miser rich, nor can the want of it make the beggar +poor. +</P> + +<P> +In the poem, "The Changed Cross," a weary woman is represented as +dreaming that she was led to a place where many crosses lay, crosses of +divers shapes and sizes. The most beautiful one was set in jewels of +gold. It was so tiny and exquisite that she changed her own plain +cross for it, thinking she was fortunate in finding one so much lighter +and lovelier. But soon her back began to ache under the glittering +burden, and she changed it for another cross very beautiful and +entwined with flowers. But she soon found that underneath the flowers +were piercing thorns which tore her flesh. At last she came to a very +plain cross without jewels, without carving, and with only the word, +"Love," inscribed upon it. She took this one up and it proved the +easiest and best of all. She was amazed, however, to find that it was +her old cross which she had discarded. It is easy to see the jewels +and the flowers in other people's crosses, but the thorns and heavy +weight are known only to the bearers. How easy other people's burdens +seem to us compared with our own. We do not appreciate the secret +burdens which almost crush the heart, nor the years of weary waiting +for delayed success—the aching hearts longing for sympathy, the hidden +poverty, the suppressed emotion in other lives. +</P> + +<P> +William Pitt, the great Commoner, considered money as dirt beneath his +feet compared with the public interest and public esteem. His hands +were clean. +</P> + +<P> +The object for which we strive tells the story of our lives. Men and +women should be judged by the happiness they create in those around +them. Noble deeds always enrich, but millions of mere money may +impoverish. <I>Character is perpetual wealth</I>, and by the side of him +who possesses it the millionaire who has it not seems a pauper. +Compared with it, what are houses and lands, stocks and bonds? "It is +better that great souls should live in small habitations than that +abject slaves should burrow in great houses." Plain living, rich +thought, and grand effort are real riches. +</P> + +<P> +Invest in yourself, and you will never be poor. Floods cannot carry +your wealth away, fire cannot burn it, rust cannot consume it. +</P> + +<P> +"If a man empties his purse into his head," says Franklin, "no man can +take it from him. An investment in knowledge always pays the best +interest." +</P> + +<P> +"There is a cunning juggle in riches. I observe," says Emerson, "that +they take somewhat for everything they give. I look bigger, but I am +less, I have more clothes, but am not so warm; more armor, but less +courage; more books, but less wit." +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Howe'er it be, it seems to me,<BR> +'T is only noble to be good.<BR> +Kind hearts are more than coronets,<BR> +And simple faith than Norman blood.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">TENNYSON.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap14"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XIV. +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +OPPORTUNITIES WHERE YOU ARE. +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +To each man's life there comes a time supreme;<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">One day, one night, one morning, or one noon,</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">One freighted hour, one moment opportune,</SPAN><BR> +One rift through which sublime fulfillments gleam,<BR> +One space when fate goes tiding with the stream,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">One Once, in balance 'twixt Too Late, Too Soon,</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And ready for the passing instant's boon</SPAN><BR> +To tip in favor the uncertain beam.<BR> +Ah, happy he who, knowing how to wait,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Knows also how to watch and work and stand</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">On Life's broad deck alert, and at the prow</SPAN><BR> +To seize the passing moment, big with fate,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">From opportunity's extended hand,</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">When the great clock of destiny strikes Now!</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">MARY A. TOWNSEND.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Once to every man and nation comes the moment to decide,<BR> +In the strife of Truth with Falsehood, for the good or evil side.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">LOWELL.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +What is opportunity to a man who can't use it? An unfecundated egg, +which the waves of time wash away into nonentity.—GEORGE ELIOT. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +A thousand years a poor man watched<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Before the gate of Paradise:</SPAN><BR> +But while one little nap he snatched,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">It oped and shut. Ah! was he wise?</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">W. B. ALGER.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Our grand business is, not to see what lies dimly at a distance, but to +do what lies clearly at hand.—CARLYLE. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +A man's best things are nearest him,<BR> +Lie close about his feet.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">R. M. MILNES.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +The secret of success in life is for a man <I>to be ready for his +opportunity</I> when it comes.—DISRAELI. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"There are no longer any good chances for young men," complained a law +student to Daniel Webster. "There is always room at the top," replied +the great lawyer. +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<A NAME="img-256"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG CLASS="imgcenter" SRC="images/img-256.jpg" ALT="THOMAS JEFFERSON" BORDER="2" WIDTH="361" HEIGHT="515"> +<H3 CLASS="h3center" STYLE="width: 361px"> +THOMAS JEFFERSON +</H3> +</CENTER> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +"The world is all gates, all opportunities to him who can use them.' +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"'T is never offered twice, seize then the hour<BR> +When fortune smiles and duty points the way."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<P> +No chance, no opportunities, in a land where many poor boys become rich +men, where newsboys go to Congress, and where those born in the lowest +stations attain the highest positions? The world is all gates, all +opportunities to him who will use them. But, like Bunyan's Pilgrim in +the dungeon of Giant Despair's castle, who had the key of deliverance +all the time with him but had forgotten it, we fail to rely wholly upon +the ability to advance all that is good for us which has been given to +the weakest as well as the strongest. We depend too much upon outside +assistance. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"We look too high<BR> +For things close by."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +A Baltimore lady lost a valuable diamond bracelet at a ball, and +supposed that it was stolen from the pocket of her cloak. Years +afterward she washed the steps of the Peabody Institute, pondering how +to get money to buy food. She cut up an old, worn-out, ragged cloak to +make a hood, when lo! in the lining of the cloak she discovered the +diamond bracelet. During all her poverty she was worth $3500, but did +not know it. +</P> + +<P> +Many of us who think we are poor are rich in opportunities, if we could +only see them, in possibilities all about us, in faculties worth more +than diamond bracelets. In our large Eastern cities it has been found +that at least ninety-four out of every hundred found their first +fortune at home, or near at hand, and in meeting common every-day +wants. It is a sorry day for a young man who cannot see any +opportunities where he is, but thinks he can do better somewhere else. +Some Brazilian shepherds organized a party to go to California to dig +gold, and took along a handful of translucent pebbles to play checkers +with on the voyage. After arriving in San Francisco, and after they +had thrown most of the pebbles away, they discovered that they were +diamonds. They hastened back to Brazil, only to find that the mines +from which the pebbles had been gathered had been taken up by others +and sold to the government. +</P> + +<P> +The richest gold and silver mine in Nevada was sold for $42 by the +owner to get money to pay his passage to other mines, where he thought +he could get rich. Professor Agassiz told the Harvard students of a +farmer who owned a farm of hundreds of acres of unprofitable woods and +rocks, and concluded to sell out and get into a more profitable +business. He decided to go into the coal-oil business; he studied coal +measures and coal-oil deposits, and experimented for a long time. He +sold his farm for $200, and engaged in his new business two hundred +miles away. Only a short time after the man who bought his farm +discovered upon it a great flood of coal-oil, which the farmer had +previously ignorantly tried to drain off. +</P> + +<P> +Hundreds of years ago there lived near the shore of the river Indus a +Persian by the name of Ali Hafed. He lived in a cottage on the river +bank, from which he could get a grand view of the beautiful country +stretching away to the sea. He had a wife and children, an extensive +farm, fields of grain, gardens of flowers, orchards of fruit, and miles +of forest. He had a plenty of money and everything that heart could +wish. He was contented and happy. One evening a priest of Buddha +visited him, and, sitting before the fire, explained to him how the +world was made, and how the first beams of sunlight condensed on the +earth's surface into diamonds. The old priest told that a drop of +sunlight the size of his thumb was worth more than large mines of +copper, silver, or gold; that with one of them he could buy many farms +like his; that with a handful he could buy a province, and with a mine +of diamonds he could purchase a kingdom. Ali Hafed listened, and was +no longer a rich man. He had been touched with discontent, and with +that all wealth vanishes. Early the next morning he woke the priest +who had been the cause of his unhappiness, and anxiously asked him +where he could find a mine of diamonds. "What do you want of +diamonds?" asked the astonished priest. "I want to be rich and place +my children on thrones." "All you have to do is to go and search until +you find them," said the priest. "But where shall I go?" asked the +poor farmer. "Go anywhere, north, south, east, or west." "How shall I +know when I have found the place?" "When you find a river running over +white sands between high mountain ranges, in those white sands you will +find diamonds," answered the priest. +</P> + +<P> +The discontented man sold the farm for what he could get, left his +family with a neighbor, took the money he had at interest, and went to +search for the coveted treasure. Over the mountains of Arabia, through +Palestine and Egypt, he wandered for years, but found no diamonds. +When his money was all gone and starvation stared him in the face, +ashamed of his folly and of his rags, poor Ali Hafed threw himself into +the tide and was drowned. The man who bought his farm was a contented +man, who made the most of his surroundings, and did not believe in +going away from home to hunt for diamonds or success. While his camel +was drinking in the garden one day, he noticed a flash of light from +the white sands of the brook. He picked up a pebble, and pleased with +its brilliant hues took it into the house, put it on the shelf near the +fireplace, and forgot all about it. The old priest of Buddha who had +filled Ali Hafed with the fatal discontent called one day upon the new +owner of the farm. He had no sooner entered the room than his eye +caught that flash of light from the stone. "Here's a diamond! here's a +diamond!" the old priest shouted in great excitement. "Has Ali Hafed +returned?" said the priest. "No," said the farmer, "nor is that a +diamond. That is but a stone." They went into the garden and stirred +up the white sand with their fingers, and behold, other diamonds more +beautiful than the first gleamed out of it. So the famous diamond beds +of Golconda were discovered. Had Ali Hafed been content to remain at +home, had he dug in his own garden, instead of going abroad in search +for wealth, and reaping poverty, hardships, starvation, and death, he +would have been one of the richest men in the world, for the entire +farm abounded in the richest of gems. +</P> + +<P> +You have your own special place and work. Find it, fill it. Scarcely +a boy or girl will read these lines but has much better opportunity to +win success than Garfield, Wilson, Franklin, Lincoln, Harriet Beecher +Stowe, Frances Willard, and thousands of others. But to succeed you +must be prepared to seize and improve the opportunity when it comes. +Remember that four things come not back: the spoken word, the sped +arrow, the past life, and the neglected opportunity. +</P> + +<P> +It is one of the paradoxes of civilization that the more opportunities +are utilized, the more new ones are thereby created. New openings are +as easy to fill as ever to those who do their best; although it is not +so easy as formerly to obtain distinction in the old lines, because the +standard has advanced so much and competition has so greatly increased. +"The world is no longer clay," said Emerson, "but rather iron in the +hands of its workers, and men have got to hammer out a place for +themselves by steady and rugged blows." +</P> + +<P> +Thousands of men have made fortunes out of trifles which others pass +by. As the bee gets honey from the same flower from which the spider +gets poison, so some men will get a fortune out of the commonest and +meanest things, as scraps of leather, cotton waste, slag, iron filings, +from which others get only poverty and failure. There is scarcely a +thing which contributes to the welfare and comfort of humanity, not an +article of household furniture, a kitchen utensil, an article of +clothing or of food, that is not capable of an improvement in which +there may be a fortune. +</P> + +<P> +Opportunities? They are all around us. Edison found them in a baggage +car. Forces of nature plead to be used in the service of man, as +lightning for ages tried to attract his attention to the great force of +electricity, which would do his drudgery and leave him to develop the +God-given powers within him. There is power lying latent everywhere +waiting for the observant eye to discover it. +</P> + +<P> +First find out what the world needs and then supply that want. An +invention to make smoke go the wrong way in a chimney might be a very +ingenious thing, but it would be of no use to humanity. The patent +office at Washington is full of wonderful devices of ingenious +mechanism, but not one in hundreds is of use to the inventor or to the +world. And yet how many families have been impoverished, and have +struggled for years amid want and woe, while the father has been +working on useless inventions. A. T. Stewart, as a boy, lost +eighty-seven cents when his capital was one dollar and a half in buying +buttons and thread which shoppers did not call for. After that he made +it a rule never to buy anything which the public did not want, and so +prospered. +</P> + +<P> +It is estimated that five out of every seven of the millionaire +manufacturers began by making with their own hands the articles which +made their fortunes. One of the greatest hindrances to advancement in +life is the lack of observation and of the inclination to take pains. +An observing man, the eyelets of whose shoes pulled out, but who could +not afford to get another pair, said to himself, "I will make a +metallic lacing hook, which can be riveted into the leather;" he was so +poor that he had to borrow a sickle to cut the grass in front of his +hired tenement. Now he is a very rich man. +</P> + +<P> +An observing barber in Newark, N. J., thought he could make an +improvement in shears for cutting hair, invented clippers, and became +rich. A Maine man was called in from the hayfield to wash clothes for +his invalid wife. He had never realized what it was to wash before. +Finding the method slow and laborious, he invented the washing-machine, +and made a fortune. A man who was suffering terribly with toothache +said to himself, there must be some way of filling teeth which will +prevent their aching. So he invented the principle of gold filling for +teeth. +</P> + +<P> +The great things of the world have not been done by men of large means. +Ericsson began the construction of the screw propellers in a bathroom. +The cotton-gin was first manufactured in a log cabin. John Harrison, +the great inventor of the marine chronometer, began his career in the +loft of an old barn. Parts of the first steamboat ever run in America +were set up in the vestry of a church in Philadelphia by Fitch. +McCormick began to make his famous reaper in a gristmill. The first +model dry dock was made in an attic. Clark, the founder of Clark +University of Worcester, Mass., began his great fortune by making toy +wagons in a horse shed. Farquhar made umbrellas in his sitting-room, +with his daughter's help, until he sold enough to hire a loft. Edison +began his experiments in a baggage car on the Grand Trunk Railroad when +a newsboy. +</P> + +<P> +As soon as the weather would permit, the Jamestown colonists began to +stroll about the country digging for gold. In a bank of sand some +glittering particles were found, and the whole settlement was in a +state of excitement. Fourteen weeks of the precious springtime, which +ought to have been given to plowing and planting, were consumed in this +stupid nonsense. Even the Indians ridiculed the madness of the men +who, for imaginary grains of gold, were wasting their chances for a +crop of corn. +</P> + +<P> +Michael Angelo found a piece of discarded Carrara marble among waste +rubbish beside a street in Florence, which some unskillful workman had +cut, hacked, spoiled, and thrown away. No doubt many artists had +noticed the fine quality of the marble, and regretted that it should +have been spoiled. But Michael Angelo still saw an angel in the ruin, +and with his chisel and mallet he called out from it one of the finest +pieces of statuary in Italy, the young David. +</P> + +<P> +The lonely island of Nantucket would not be considered a very favorable +place to win success and fame. But Maria Mitchell, on seventy-five +dollars a year, as librarian of the Nantucket Athenaeum, found time and +opportunity to become a celebrated astronomer. Lucretia Mott, one of +America's foremost philanthropists and reformers, who made herself felt +over a whole continent, gained much of her reputation as a preacher on +Nantucket Island. +</P> + +<P> +"Why does not America have fine sculptors?" asked a romping girl, of +Watertown, Mass., in 1842. Her father, a physician, answered that he +supposed "an American could be a stone-cutter, but that is a very +different thing from being a sculptor." "I think," said the plucky +maiden, "that if no other American tries it I will." She began her +studies in Boston, and walked seven miles to and fro daily between her +home and the city. The medical schools in Boston would not admit her +to study anatomy, so she had to go to St. Louis. Subsequently she went +to Rome, and there, during a long residence, and afterward, modeled and +carved very beautiful statuary which made the name of Harriet G. Hosmer +famous. Begin where you are; work where you are; the hour which you +are now wasting, dreaming of some far-off success, may be crowded with +grand possibilities. +</P> + +<P> +Patrick Henry was called a lazy boy, a good-for-nothing farmer, and he +failed as a merchant. He was always dreaming of some far-off +greatness, and never thought he could be a hero among the corn and +tobacco and saddlebags of Virginia. He studied law six weeks, when he +put out his shingle. People thought he would fail, but in his first +case he showed that he had a wonderful power of oratory. It then first +dawned upon him that he could be a hero in Virginia. From the time the +Stamp Act was passed and Henry was elected to the Virginia House of +Burgesses, and he had introduced his famous resolution against the +unjust taxation of the American colonies, he rose steadily until he +became one of the brilliant orators of America. In one of his first +speeches upon this resolution he uttered these words, which were +prophetic of his power and courage: "Caesar had his Brutus, Charles the +First his Cromwell, and George the Third—may profit by their example. +If this be treason, make the most of it." +</P> + +<P> +The great natural philosopher, Faraday, who was the son of a +blacksmith, wrote, when a young man, to Humphry Davy, asking for +employment at the Royal Institution. Davy consulted a friend on the +matter. "Here is a letter from a young man named Faraday, he has been +attending my lectures, and wants me to give him employment at the Royal +Institution—what can I do?" "Do? put him to washing bottles; if he is +good for anything he will do it directly; if he refuses he is good for +nothing." But the boy who could experiment in the attic of an +apothecary shop with an old pan and glass vials during every moment he +could snatch from his work saw an opportunity in washing bottles, which +led to a professorship at the Royal Academy at Woolwich. Tyndall said +of this boy with no chance, "He is the greatest experimental +philosopher the world has ever seen." He became the wonder of his age +in science. +</P> + +<P> +There is a legend of an artist who long sought for a piece of +sandal-wood, out of which to carve a Madonna. He was about to give up +in despair, leaving the vision of his life unrealized, when in a dream +he was bidden to carve his Madonna from a block of oak wood which was +destined for the fire. He obeyed, and produced a masterpiece from a +log of common firewood. Many of us lose great opportunities in life by +waiting to find sandal-wood for our carvings, when they really lie +hidden in the common logs that we burn. One man goes through life +without seeing chances for doing anything great, while another close +beside him snatches from the same circumstances and privileges +opportunities for achieving grand results. +</P> + +<P> +Anna Dickinson began life as a school-teacher. Adelaide Neilson was a +child's nurse. Charlotte Cushman's parents were poor. The renowned +Jeanne d'Arc fed swine. Christine Nilsson was a poor Swedish peasant, +and ran barefoot in childhood. Edmonia Lewis, the colored sculptor, +overcame the prejudice against her sex and color, and pursued her +profession in Italy. Maria Mitchell, the astronomer, was the daughter +of a poor man who taught school at two dollars per week. These are but +a few of the many who have struggled with fate and risen to distinction +through their own personal efforts. +</P> + +<P> +Opportunities? They are everywhere. "America is another name for +opportunities. Our whole history appears like a last effort of divine +Providence in behalf of the human race." Never before were there such +grand openings, such chances, such opportunities. Especially is this +true for girls and young women. A new era is dawning for them. +Hundreds of occupations and professions, which were closed to them only +a few years ago, are now inviting them to enter. +</P> + +<P> +When I hear of a young woman entering the medical profession, or +beginning the study of law, or entering school with a view to teaching, +I feel like congratulating her for thus asserting her individuality. +</P> + +<P> +We cannot all of us perhaps make great discoveries like Newton, +Faraday, Edison, and Thompson. We cannot all of us paint immortal +pictures like an Angelo or a Raphael. But we can all of us make our +lives sublime, by <I>seizing common occasions and making them great</I>. +What chance had the young girl, Grace Darling, to distinguish herself, +living on those barren lighthouse rocks alone with her aged parents? +But while her brothers and sisters, who moved to the cities to win +wealth and fame, are not known to the world, she became more famous +than a princess. This poor girl did not need to go to London to see +the nobility; they came to the lighthouse to see her. Right at home +this young girl had won fame which the regal heirs might envy, and a +name which will never perish from the earth. She did not wander away +into dreamy distance for fame and fortune, but did her best where duty +had placed her. +</P> + +<P> +If you want to get rich, study yourself and your own wants. You will +find that millions have the same wants. The safest business is always +connected with man's prime necessities. He must have clothing and a +dwelling; he must eat. He wants comforts, facilities of all kinds for +pleasure, luxuries, education, and culture. Any man who can supply a +great want of humanity, improve any methods which men use, supply any +demand of comfort, or contribute in any way to their well-being, can +make a fortune. +</P> + +<P> +"We cannot doubt," said Edward Everett, "that truths now unknown are in +reserve to reward the patience and the labors of future lovers of +truth, which will go as far beyond the brilliant discoveries of the +last generation as these do beyond all that was known to the ancient +world." +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 4em">The golden opportunity</SPAN><BR> +Is never offered twice; seize then the hour<BR> +When fortune smiles and duty points the way;<BR> +Nor shrink aside to 'scape the spectre fear,<BR> +Nor pause, though pleasure beckon from her bower;<BR> +But bravely bear thee onward to the goal.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">ANON.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +For the distant still thou yearnest,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And behold the good so near;</SPAN><BR> +If to use the good thou learnest,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Thou wilt surely find it here.</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">GOETHE.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Do not, then, stand idly waiting<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">For some greater work to do;</SPAN><BR> +Fortune is a lazy goddess—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">She will never come to you.</SPAN><BR> +Go and toil in any vineyard,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Do not fear to do or dare;</SPAN><BR> +If you want a field of labor,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">You can find it anywhere.</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">ELLEN H. GATES.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Why thus longing, thus forever sighing,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">For the far-off, unattained and dim,</SPAN><BR> +While the beautiful, all around thee lying<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Offers up its low, perpetual hymn?</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">HARRIET WINSLOW.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Work for the good that is nighest;<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Dream not of greatness afar:</SPAN><BR> +That glory is ever the highest<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Which shines upon men as they are.</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">W. MORLEY PUNSHON.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap15"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XV. +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE MIGHT OF LITTLE THINGS. +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Little strokes fell great oaks.—FRANKLIN. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Think naught a trifle, though it small appear;<BR> +Small sands the mountain, moments make the year,<BR> +And trifles, life.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">YOUNG.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Scorn not the slightest word or deed,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Nor deem it void of power;</SPAN><BR> +There's fruit in each wind-wafted seed,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">That waits its natal hour."</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +It is but the littleness of man that seeth no greatness in +trifles.—WENDELL PHILLIPS. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +He that despiseth small things shall fall by little and +little.—ECCLESIASTICUS. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Often from our weakness our strongest principles of conduct are born; +and from the acorn, which a breeze has wafted, springs the oak which +defies the storm.—BULWER. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +The creation of a thousand forests is in one acorn.—EMERSON. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Men are led by trifles.—NAPOLEON I. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"A pebble on the streamlet scant<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Has turned the course of many a river;</SPAN><BR> +A dewdrop on the baby plant<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Has warped the giant oak forever."</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +The mother of mischief is no bigger than a midge's wing.—SCOTCH +PROVERB. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +"The bad thing about a little sin is that it won't stay little." +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"A little bit of patience often makes the sunshine come,<BR> +And a little bit of love makes a very happy home;<BR> +A little bit of hope makes a rainy day look gay,<BR> +And a little bit of charity makes glad a weary way."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"Arletta's pretty feet, glistening in the brook, made her the mother of +William the Conqueror," says Palgrave's "History of Normandy and +England." "Had she not thus fascinated Duke Robert the Liberal, of +Normandy, Harold would not have fallen at Hastings, no Anglo-Norman +dynasty could have arisen, no British Empire." +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<A NAME="img-268"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG CLASS="imgcenter" SRC="images/img-268.jpg" ALT="AGASSIZ" BORDER="2" WIDTH="366" HEIGHT="510"> +<H3 CLASS="h3center" STYLE="width: 366px"> +AGASSIZ +</H3> +</CENTER> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Small things become great when a great soul sees them. Trifles light +as air sometimes suggest to the thinking mind ideas which revolutionize +the world. +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<P> +We may tell which way the wind blew before the Deluge by marking the +ripple and cupping of the rain in the petrified sand now preserved +forever. We tell the very path by which gigantic creatures, whom man +never saw, walked to the river's edge to find their food. +</P> + +<P> +The tears of Veturia and Volumnia saved Rome from the Volscians when +nothing else could move the vengeful heart of Coriolanus. +</P> + +<P> +It was little Greece that rolled back the overflowing tide of Asiatic +luxury and despotism, giving instead to Europe and America models of +the highest political freedom yet attained, and germs of limitless +mental growth. A different result at Plataea had delayed the progress +of the human race more than ten centuries. +</P> + +<P> +Among the lofty Alps, it is said, the guides sometimes demand absolute +silence, lest the vibration of the voice bring down an avalanche. +</P> + +<P> +The power of observation in the American Indian would put many an +educated man to shame. Returning home, an Indian discovered that his +venison, which had been hanging up to dry, had been stolen. After +careful observation he started to track the thief through the woods. +Meeting a man on the route, he asked him if he had seen a little, old, +white man, with a short gun, and with a small bob-tailed dog. The man +told him he had met such a man, but was surprised to find that the +Indian had not even seen the one he described. He asked the Indian how +he could give such a minute description of the man whom he had never +seen. "I knew the thief was a little man," said the Indian, "because +he rolled up a stone to stand on in order to reach the venison; I knew +he was an old man by his short steps; I knew he was a white man by his +turning out his toes in walking, which an Indian never does; I knew he +had a short gun by the mark it left on the tree where he had stood it +up; I knew the dog was small by his tracks and short steps, and that he +had a bob-tail by the mark it left in the dust where he sat." +</P> + +<P> +Two drops of rain, falling side by side, were separated a few inches by +a gentle breeze. Striking on opposite sides of the roof of a +court-house in Wisconsin, one rolled southward through the Rock River +and the Mississippi to the Gulf of Mexico; while the other entered +successively the Fox River, Green Bay, Lake Michigan, the Straits of +Mackinaw, Lake Huron, St. Clair River, Lake St. Clair, Detroit River, +Lake Erie, Niagara River, Lake Ontario, the St. Lawrence River, and +finally reached the Gulf of St. Lawrence. How slight the influence of +the breeze, yet such was the formation of the continent that a trifling +cause was multiplied almost beyond the power of figures to express its +momentous effect upon the destinies of these companion raindrops. Who +can calculate the future of the smallest trifle when a mud crack swells +to an Amazon, and the stealing of a penny may end on the scaffold? Who +does not know that the act of a moment may cause a life's regret? A +trigger may be pulled in an instant, but the soul returns never. +</P> + +<P> +A spark falling upon some combustibles led to the invention of +gunpowder. Irritable tempers have marred the reputation of many a +great man, as in the case of Edmund Burke and of Thomas Carlyle. A few +bits of seaweed and driftwood, floating on the waves, enabled Columbus +to stay a mutiny of his sailors which threatened to prevent the +discovery of a new world. There are moments in history which balance +years of ordinary life. Dana could interest a class for hours on a +grain of sand; and from a single bone, such as no one had ever seen +before, Agassiz could deduce the entire structure and habits of an +animal so accurately that subsequent discoveries of complete skeletons +have not changed one of his conclusions. +</P> + +<P> +A cricket once saved a military expedition from destruction. The +commanding officer and hundreds of his men were going to South America +on a great ship, and, through the carelessness of the watch, they would +have been dashed upon a ledge of rock had it not been for a cricket +which a soldier had brought on board. When the little insect scented +the land, it broke its long silence by a shrill note, and this warned +them of their danger. +</P> + +<P> +"Strange that a little thing like that should cause a man so much +pain!" exclaimed a giant, as he rolled in his hand and examined with +eager curiosity the acorn which his friend the dwarf had obligingly +taken from the huge eye into which it had fallen just as the colossus +was on the point of shooting a bird perched in the branches of an oak. +</P> + +<P> +Sometimes a conversation, or a sentence in a letter, or a paragraph in +an article, will help us to reproduce the whole character of the +author; as a single bone, a fish scale, a fin, or a tooth, will enable +the scientist and anatomist to reproduce the fish or the animal, +although extinct for ages. +</P> + +<P> +By gnawing through a dike, even a rat may drown a nation. A little boy +in Holland saw water trickling from a small hole near the bottom of a +dike. He realized that the leak would rapidly become larger if the +water was not checked, so he held his hand over the hole for hours on a +dark and dismal night until he could attract the attention of +passers-by. His name is still held in grateful remembrance in Holland. +</P> + +<P> +The beetling chalk cliffs of England were built by rhizopods, too small +to be clearly seen without the aid of a magnifying-glass. +</P> + +<P> +What was so unlikely as that throwing an empty wine-flask in the fire +should furnish the first notion of a locomotive, or that the sickness +of an Italian chemist's wife and her absurd craving for reptiles for +food should begin the electric telegraph? +</P> + +<P> +Madame Galvani noticed the contraction of the muscles of a skinned frog +which was accidentally touched at the moment her husband took a spark +from an electrical machine. She gave the hint which led to the +discovery of galvanic electricity, now so useful in the arts and in +transmitting vocal or written language. +</P> + +<P> +M. Louis Pasteur was usher in the Lyceum. Thursdays he took the boys +to walk. A student took his microscope to examine insects, and allowed +Pasteur to look through it. This was the starting of the boy on the +microscopic career which has made men wonder. He was almost wild with +enthusiasm at the new world which the microscope revealed. +</P> + +<P> +A stamp act to raise 60,000 pounds produced the American Revolution, a +war that cost 100,000,000 pounds. What mighty contests rise from +trivial things! +</P> + +<P> +Congress met near a livery stable to discuss the Declaration of +Independence. The members, in knee breeches and silk stockings, were +so annoyed by flies, which they could not keep away with their +handkerchiefs, that it has been said they cut short the debate, and +hastened to affix their signatures to the greatest document in history. +</P> + +<P> +"The fate of a nation," says Gladstone, "has often depended upon the +good or bad digestion of a fine dinner." +</P> + +<P> +A young man once went to India to seek his fortune, but, finding no +opening, he went to his room, loaded his pistol, put the muzzle to his +head, and pulled the trigger. But it did not go off. He went to the +window to point it in another direction and try it again, resolved that +if the weapon went off he would regard it as a Providence that he was +spared. He pulled the trigger and it went off the first time. +Trembling with excitement he resolved to hold his life sacred, to make +the most of it, and never again to cheapen it. This young man became +General Robert Clive, who, with but a handful of European soldiers, +secured to the East India Company and afterwards to Great Britain a +great and rich country with two hundred millions of people. +</P> + +<P> +The cackling of a goose aroused the sentinels and saved Rome from the +Gauls, and the pain from a thistle warned a Scottish army of the +approach of the Danes. "Had Acre fallen," said Napoleon, "I should +have changed the face of the world." +</P> + +<P> +Henry Ward Beecher came within one vote of being elected superintendent +of a railway. If he had had that vote America would probably have lost +its greatest preacher. What a little thing fixes destiny! +</P> + +<P> +In the earliest days of cotton spinning, the small fibres would stick +to the bobbins, and make it necessary to stop and clear the machinery. +Although this loss of time reduced the earnings of the operatives, the +father of Robert Peel noticed that one of his spinners always drew full +pay, as his machine never stopped. "How is this, Dick?" asked Mr. Peel +one day; "the on-looker tells me your bobbins are always clean." "Ay, +that they be," replied Dick Ferguson. "How do you manage it, Dick?" +"Why, you see, Meester Peel," said the workman, "it is sort o' secret! +If I tow'd ye, yo'd be as wise as I am." "That's so," said Mr. Peel, +smiling; "but I'd give you something to know. Could you make all the +looms work as smoothly as yours?" "Ivery one of 'em, meester," replied +Dick. "Well, what shall I give you for your secret?" asked Mr. Peel, +and Dick replied, "Gi' me a quart of ale every day as I'm in the mills, +and I'll tell thee all about it." "Agreed," said Mr. Peel, and Dick +whispered very cautiously in his ear, "Chalk your bobbins!" That was +the whole secret, and Mr. Peel soon shot ahead of all his competitors, +for he made machines that would chalk their own bobbins. Dick was +handsomely rewarded with money instead of beer. His little idea has +saved the world millions of dollars. +</P> + +<P> +Trifles light as air often suggest to the thinking mind ideas which +have revolutionized the world. +</P> + +<P> +A poor English boy was compelled by his employer to deposit something +on board a ship about to start for Algiers, in accordance with the +merchant's custom of interesting employees by making them put something +at risk in his business and so share in the gain or loss of each common +venture. The boy had only a cat, which he had bought for a penny to +catch mice in the garret where he slept. In tears, he carried her on +board the vessel. On arriving at Algiers, the captain learned that the +Dey was greatly annoyed by rats, and loaned him the cat. The rats +disappeared so rapidly that the Dey wished to buy the cat, but the +captain would not sell until a very high price was offered. With the +purchase-money was sent a present of valuable pearls for the owner of +Tabby. When the ship returned the sailors were greatly astonished to +find that the boy owned most of the cargo, for it was part of the +bargain that he was to bring back the value of his cat in goods. The +London merchant took the boy into partnership; the latter became very +wealthy, and in the course of business loaned money to the Dey who had +bought the cat. As Lord Mayor of London, our cat merchant was +knighted, and became the second man in the city,—Sir Richard +Whittington. +</P> + +<P> +When John Williams, the martyr missionary of Erromanga, went to the +South Sea Islands, he took with him a single banana-tree from an +English nobleman's conservatory; and now, from that single banana-tree, +bananas are to be found throughout whole groups of islands. Before the +negro slaves in the West Indies were emancipated a regiment of British +soldiers was stationed near one of the plantations. A soldier offered +to teach a slave to read on condition that he would teach a second, and +that second a third, and so on. This the slave faithfully carried out, +though severely flogged by the master of the plantation. Being sent to +another plantation, he repeated the same thing there, and when at +length liberty was proclaimed throughout the island, and the Bible +Society offered a New Testament to every negro who could read, the +number taught through this slave's instrumentality was found to be no +less than six hundred. +</P> + +<P> +A famous ruby was offered to the English government. The report of the +crown jeweler was that it was the finest he had ever seen or heard of, +but that one of the "facets" was slightly fractured. That invisible +fracture reduced its value thousands of dollars, and it was rejected +from the regalia of England. +</P> + +<P> +It was a little thing for the janitor to leave a lamp swinging in the +cathedral at Pisa, but in that steady swaying motion the boy Galileo +saw the pendulum, and conceived the idea of thus measuring time. +</P> + +<P> +"I was singing to the mouthpiece of a telephone," said Edison, "when +the vibrations of my voice caused a fine steel point to pierce one of +my fingers held just behind it. That set me to thinking. If I could +record the motions of the point and send it over the same surface +afterward, I saw no reason why the thing would not talk. I determined +to make a machine that would work accurately, and gave my assistants +the necessary instructions, telling them what I had discovered. That's +the whole story. The phonograph is the result of the pricking of a +finger." +</P> + +<P> +It was a little thing for a cow to kick over a lantern left in a +shanty, but it laid Chicago in ashes, and rendered homeless a hundred +thousand people. +</P> + +<P> +You turned a cold shoulder but once, you made but one stinging remark, +yet it lost you a friend forever. +</P> + +<P> +Some little weakness, some self-indulgence, a quick temper, want of +decision, are little things, you say, when placed beside great +abilities, but they have wrecked many a career. The Parliament of +Great Britain, the Congress of the United States, and representative +governments all over the world have come from King John signing the +Magna Charta. +</P> + +<P> +Bentham says, "The turn of a sentence has decided many a friendship, +and, for aught we know, the fate of many a kingdom." +</P> + +<P> +The sight of a stranded cuttlefish led Cuvier to an investigation which +made him one of the greatest natural historians in the world. The web +of a spider suggested to Captain Brown the idea of a suspension bridge. +A man, looking for a lost horse, picked up a stone in the Idaho +mountains which led to the discovery of a rich gold mine. +</P> + +<P> +An officer apologized to General O. M. Mitchel, the astronomer, for a +brief delay, saying he was only a few moments late. "I have been in +the habit of calculating the value of the thousandth part of a second," +was Mitchel's reply. +</P> + +<P> +A missing marriage certificate kept the hod-carrier of Hugh Miller from +establishing his claim to the Earldom of Crawford. The masons would +call out, "John, Yearl of Crawford, bring us anither hod o' lime." +</P> + +<P> +Not long ago the great steamship Umbria was stopped in mid-Atlantic by +a flaw in her engine shaft. +</P> + +<P> +The absence of a comma in a bill which passed through Congress several +years ago cost our government a million dollars. A single misspelled +word prevented a deserving young man from obtaining a situation as +instructor in a New England college. A cinder on the eyeball will +conquer a Napoleon. Some little weakness, as lack of courtesy, want of +decision, a bad temper, may nullify the labor of years. +</P> + +<P> +"I cannot see that you have made any progress since my last visit," +said a gentleman to Michael Angelo. "But," said the sculptor, "I have +retouched this part, polished that, softened that feature, brought out +that muscle, given some expression to this lip, more energy to that +limb, etc." "But they are trifles!" exclaimed the visitor. "It may be +so," replied the great artist, "but trifles make perfection, and +perfection is no trifle." +</P> + +<P> +That infinite patience which made Michael Angelo spend a week in +bringing out a muscle in a statue with more vital fidelity to truth, or +Gerhard Dow a day in giving the right effect to a dewdrop on a cabbage +leaf, makes all the difference between success and failure. +</P> + +<P> +By scattering it upon a sloping field of grain so as to form, in +letters of great size, "Effects of Gypsum," Franklin brought this +fertilizer into general use in America. By means of a kite he +established principles in the science of electricity of such broad +significance that they underlie nearly all the modern applications of +that science, with probably boundless possibilities of development in +the future. +</P> + +<P> +More than four hundred and fifty years have passed since Laurens Coster +amused his children by cutting their names in the bark of trees, in the +land of windmills, and the monks have laid aside forever their old +trade of copying books. From that day monarchies have crumbled, and +Liberty, lifting up her head for the first time among the nations of +the earth, has ever since kept pace with the march of her sister, +Knowledge, up through the centuries. Yet how simple was the thought +which has borne such a rich harvest of benefit to mankind. +</P> + +<P> +As he carved the names of his prattling children it occurred to him +that if the letters were made in separate blocks, and wet with ink, +they would make clear printed impressions better and more rapidly than +would the pen. So he made blocks, tied them together with strings, and +printed a pamphlet with the aid of a hired man, John Gutenberg. People +bought the pamphlets at a slight reduction from the price charged by +the monks, supposing that the work was done in the old way. Coster +died soon afterward, but young Gutenberg kept the secret, and +experimented with metals until he had invented the metal type. In an +obscure chamber in Strasburg he printed his first book. +</P> + +<P> +At about this time a traveler called upon Charles VII. of France, who +was so afraid somebody would poison him that he dared eat but little, +and made his servants taste of every dish of food before he ate any. +He looked with suspicion upon the stranger; but when the latter offered +a beautiful copy of the Bible for only seven hundred and fifty crowns, +the monarch bought it at once. Charles showed his Bible to the +archbishop, telling him that it was the finest copy in the world, +without a blot or mistake, and that it must have taken the copyist a +lifetime to write it. "Why!" exclaimed the archbishop in surprise, "I +bought one exactly like it a few days ago." It was soon learned that +other rich people in Paris had bought similar copies. The king traced +the book to John Faust, of Strasburg, who had furnished Gutenberg money +to experiment with. The people said that Faust must have sold himself +to the devil, and he only escaped burning at the stake by divulging the +secret. +</P> + +<P> +William Caxton, a London merchant who went to Holland to purchase +cloth, bought a few books and some type, and established a +printing-office in Westminster Chapel, where he issued, in 1474, "The +Game of Chess," the first book printed in England. +</P> + +<P> +The cry of the infant Moses attracted the attention of Pharaoh's +daughter, and gave the Jews a lawgiver. A bird alighting on the bough +of a tree at the mouth of the cave where Mahomet lay hid turned aside +his pursuers, and gave a prophet to many nations. A flight of birds +probably prevented Columbus from discovering this continent, for when +he was growing anxious, Martin Alonzo Pinzon persuaded him to follow a +flight of parrots toward the southwest; for to the Spanish seamen of +that day it was good luck to follow in the wake of a flock of birds +when on a voyage of discovery. But for his change of course Columbus +would have reached the coast of Florida. "Never," wrote Humboldt, "had +the flight of birds more important consequences." +</P> + +<P> +The children of a spectacle-maker placed two or more pairs of the +spectacles before each other in play, and told their father that +distant objects looked larger. From this hint came the telescope. +</P> + +<P> +"Of what use is it?" people asked with a sneer, when Franklin told of +his discovery that lightning and electricity are identical. "What is +the use of a child?" replied Franklin; "it may become a man." +</P> + +<P> +"He who waits to do a great deal of good at once," said Dr. Johnson, +"will never do any." Do good with what thou hast, or it will do thee +no good. +</P> + +<P> +Every day is a little life; and our whole life but a day repeated. +Those that dare lose a day are dangerously prodigal, those that dare +misspend it, desperate. What is the happiness of your life made up of? +Little courtesies, little kindnesses, pleasant words, genial smiles, a +friendly letter, good wishes, and good deeds. One in a million—once +in a lifetime—may do a heroic action. The atomic theory is the true +one. Many think common fractions vulgar, but they are the components +of millions. +</P> + +<P> +He is a great man who sees great things where others see little things, +who sees the extraordinary in the ordinary. Ruskin sees a poem in the +rose or the lily, while the hod-carrier would perhaps not go a rod out +of his way to see a sunset which Ruskin would feed upon for a year. +</P> + +<P> +Napoleon was a master of trifles. To details which his inferior +officers thought too microscopic for their notice he gave the most +exhaustive attention. Nothing was too small for his attention. He +must know all about the provisions, the horse fodder, the biscuits, the +camp kettles, the shoes. When the bugle sounded for the march to +battle, every officer had his orders as to the exact route which he +should follow, the exact day he was to arrive at a certain station, and +the exact hour he was to leave, and they were all to reach the point of +destination at a precise moment. It is said that nothing could be more +perfectly planned than his memorable march which led to the victory of +Austerlitz, and which sealed the fate of Europe for many years. He +would often charge his absent officers to send him perfectly accurate +returns, even to the smallest detail. "When they are sent to me, I +give up every occupation in order to read them in detail, and to +observe the difference between one monthly return and another. No +young girl enjoys her novel as much as I do these returns." The +captain who conveyed Napoleon to Elba was astonished with his +familiarity with all the minute details connected with the ship. +Napoleon left nothing to chance, nothing to contingency, so far as he +could possibly avoid it. Everything was planned to a nicety before he +attempted to execute it. +</P> + +<P> +Wellington too was "great in little things." He knew no such things as +trifles. While other generals trusted to subordinates, he gave his +personal attention to the minutest detail. The history of many a +failure could be written in three words, "Lack of detail." How many a +lawyer has failed from the lack of details in deeds and important +papers, the lack of little words which seemed like surplusage, and +which involved his clients in litigation, and often great losses! How +many wills are contested from the carelessness of lawyers in the +omission or shading of words, or ambiguous use of language! +</P> + +<P> +Physicians often fail to make a reputation through their habitual +blundering, carelessness in writing prescriptions, failure to give +minute instruction. The world is full of blunderers; business men fail +from a disregard of trifles; they go to the bank to pay a note the day +after it has gone to protest; they do not pay their bills promptly; do +not answer their letters promptly or file them away accurately; their +books do not quite balance; they do not know exactly how they stand, +they have a contempt for details. +</P> + +<P> +"My rule of conduct has been that whatever is worth doing at all is +worth doing well," said Nicolas Poussin, the great French painter. +When asked the reason why he had become so eminent in a land of famous +artists he replied, "Because I have neglected nothing." +</P> + +<P> +Not even Helen of Troy, it is said, was beautiful enough to spare the +tip of her nose; and if Cleopatra's had been an inch shorter Mark +Antony would never have become infatuated with her wonderful charms, +and the blemish would have changed the history of the world. Anne +Boleyn's fascinating smile split the great Church of Rome in twain, and +gave a nation an altered destiny. Napoleon, who feared not to attack +the proudest monarchs in their capitols, shrank from the political +influence of one independent woman in private life, Madame de Staël. +Had not Scott sprained his foot his life would probably have taken a +different direction. +</P> + +<P> +Cromwell was about to sail for America when a law was passed +prohibiting emigration. At that time he was a profligate, having +squandered all his property. But when he found that he could not leave +England he reformed his life. Had he not been detained who can tell +what the history of Great Britain would have been? +</P> + +<P> +When one of his friends asked Scopas the Thessalian for something that +could be of little use to him, he answered, "It is in these useless and +superfluous things that I am rich and happy." +</P> + +<P> +It was the little foxes that spoiled the vines in Solomon's day. Mites +play mischief now with our meal and cheese, moths with our woolens and +furs, and mice in our pantries. More than half our diseases are +produced by infinitesimal creatures called microbes. +</P> + +<P> +Most people call fretting a minor fault, a foible, and not a vice. +There is no vice except drunkenness which can so utterly destroy the +peace, the happiness, of a home. +</P> + +<P> +"We call the large majority of human lives obscure," says Bulwer, +"presumptuous that we are! How know we what lives a single thought +retained from the dust of nameless graves may have lighted to renown?" +</P> + +<P> +The theft of a diamond necklace from a French queen convulsed Europe. +From the careful and persistent accumulation of innumerable facts, each +trivial in itself, but in the aggregate forming a mass of evidence, a +Darwin extracts his law of evolution, and Linnaeus constructs the +science of botany. A pan of water and two thermometers were the tools +by which Dr. Black discovered latent heat, and a prism, a lens, and a +sheet of pasteboard enabled Newton to unfold the composition of light +and the origin of colors. An eminent foreign savant called on Dr. +Wollaston, and asked to be shown over those laboratories of his in +which science had been enriched by so many great discoveries, when the +doctor took him into a little study, and, pointing to an old tea tray +on the table, on which stood a few watch glasses, test papers, a small +balance, and a blow-pipe, said, "There is my laboratory." A burnt +stick and a barn door served Wilkie in lieu of pencil and paper. A +single potato, carried to England by Sir Walter Raleigh in the +sixteenth century, has multiplied into food for millions, driving +famine from Ireland again and again. +</P> + +<P> +It seemed a small thing to drive William Brewster, John Robinson, and +the poor people of Austerfield and Scrooby into perpetual exile, but as +Pilgrims they became the founders of a mighty people. A cloud may hide +the sun which it cannot extinguish. +</P> + +<P> +"Behold how great a matter a little fire kindleth." "A look of +vexation or a word coldly spoken, or a little help thoughtlessly +withheld, may produce long issues of regret." +</P> + +<P> +It was but a little dispute, a little flash of temper, the trigger was +pulled in an instant, but the soul returned never. +</P> + +<P> +A few immortal sentences from Garrison and Phillips, a few poems from +Lowell and Whittier, and the leaven is at work which will not cease its +action until the whipping-post and bodily servitude are abolished +forever. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"For want of a nail the shoe was lost,<BR> +For want of a shoe the horse was lost;<BR> +For want of a horse the rider was lost, and all,"<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +says Poor Richard, "for want of a horse-shoe nail." +</P> + +<P> +A single remark dropped by an unknown person in the street led to the +successful story of "The Bread-winners." A hymn chanted by the +barefooted friars in the temple of Jupiter at Rome led to the famous +"Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire." +</P> + +<P> +"Do little things now," says a Persian proverb; "so shall big things +come to thee by and by asking to be done." God will take care of the +great things if we do not neglect the little ones. +</P> + +<P> +"Words are things," says Byron, "and a small drop of ink, falling like +dew upon a thought, produces that which makes thousands, perhaps +millions think." +</P> + +<P> +"I give these books for the founding of a college in this colony;" such +were the words of ten ministers who in the year 1700 assembled at the +village of Branford a few miles east of New Haven. Each of the worthy +fathers deposited a few books upon the table around which they were +sitting; such was the founding of Yale College. +</P> + +<P> +"He that has a spirit of detail," says Webster, "will do better in life +than many who figured beyond him in the university." +</P> + +<P> +The pyramid of knowledge is made up of little grains of information, +little observations picked up from everywhere. +</P> + +<P> +For a thousand years Asia monopolized the secret of silk culture, and +at Rome the product was sold for its weight in gold. During the sixth +century, at the request of Justinian, two Persian monks brought a few +eggs from China to Europe in a hollow cane. The eggs were hatched by +means of heat, and Asia no longer held the monopoly of the silk +business. +</P> + +<P> +In comparison with Ferdinand, preparing to lead forth his magnificent +army in Europe's supreme contest with the Moors, how insignificant +seemed the visionary expedition of Columbus, about to start in three +small shallops across the unknown ocean. But grand as was the triumph +of Ferdinand, it now seems hardly worthy of mention in comparison with +the wonderful achievement of the poor Genoese navigator. +</P> + +<P> +Only one hundred and ninety-two Athenians perished in the battle of +Marathon, but Europe was saved from a host which is said to have drunk +rivers dry, and to have shaken the solid earth as they marched. +</P> + +<P> +Great men are noted for their attention to trifles. Goethe once asked +a monarch to excuse him, during an interview, while he went to an +adjoining room to jot down a stray thought. Hogarth would make +sketches of rare faces and characteristics upon his finger-nails upon +the streets. Indeed, to a truly great mind there are no little things. +"The eye of the understanding is like the eye of the sense; for as you +may see objects through small crannies or holes, so you may see great +axioms of nature through small and contemptible instances," said Bacon. +Trifles light as air suggest to the keen observer the solution of +mighty problems. Bits of glass arranged to amuse children led to the +discovery of the kaleidoscope. Goodyear discovered how to vulcanize +rubber by forgetting, until it became red hot, a skillet containing a +compound which he had before considered worthless. Confined in the +house by typhoid fever, Helmholtz, with a little money which he had +saved by great economy, bought a microscope which led him into the +field of science where he became so famous. A ship-worm boring a piece +of wood suggested to Sir Isambard Brunei the idea of a tunnel under the +Thames at London. Tracks of extinct animals in the old red sandstone +led Hugh Miller on and on until he became the greatest geologist of his +time. Sir Walter Scott once saw a shepherd boy plodding sturdily +along, and asked him to ride. This boy was George Kemp, who became so +enthusiastic in his study of sculpture that he walked fifty miles and +back to see a beautiful statue. He did not forget the kindness of Sir +Walter, and, when the latter died, threw his soul into the design of +the magnificent monument erected in Edinburgh to the memory of the +author of "Waverley." +</P> + +<P> +A poor boy applied for a situation at a bank in Paris, but was refused. +As he left the door, he picked up a pin. The bank president saw this, +called the boy back, and gave him a situation from which he rose until +he became the greatest banker of Paris,—Laffitte. +</P> + +<P> +It was the turning point in Theodore Parker's life when he picked up a +stone to throw at a turtle. Something within him said, "Don't do it," +and he didn't. He went home and asked his mother what it was in him +that said "Don't;" and she taught him the purpose of that inward +monitor which he ever after chose as his guide. It is said that David +Hume became a deist by being appointed in a debating society to take +the side of infidelity. Voltaire could not erase from his mind the +impression of a poem on infidelity committed at the age of five. The +"Arabian Nights" aroused the genius of Coleridge. A Massachusetts +soldier in the Civil War observed a bird hulling rice, and shot it; +taking its bill for a model, he invented a hulling machine which has +revolutionized the rice business. A war between France and England, +costing more than a hundred thousand lives, grew out of a quarrel as to +which of two vessels should first be served with water. The quarrel of +two Indian boys over a grasshopper led to the "Grasshopper War." +George IV. of England fell in a fit, and a village apothecary bled him, +restoring him to consciousness. The king made him his physician, a +position of great honor and profit. +</P> + +<P> +Many a noble ship has stranded because of one defective timber, when +all other parts were strong. Guard the weak point. +</P> + +<P> +No object the eye ever beheld, no sound however slight caught by the +ear, or anything once passing the turnstile of any of the senses, is +ever let go. The eye is a perpetual camera imprinting upon the +sensitive mental plates, and packing away in the brain for future use +every face, every tree, every plant, flower, hill, stream, mountain, +every scene upon the street, in fact, everything which comes within its +range. There is a phonograph in our natures which catches, however +thoughtless and transient, every syllable we utter, and registers +forever the slightest enunciation, and renders it immortal. These +notes may appear a thousand years hence, reproduced in our descendants, +in all their beautiful or terrible detail. +</P> + +<P> +All the ages that have been are rounded up into the small space we call +"To-day." Every life spans all that precedes it. To-day is a book +which contains everything that has transpired in the world up to the +present moment. The millions of the past whose ashes have mingled with +the dust for centuries still live in their destinies through the laws +of heredity. +</P> + +<P> +Nothing has ever been lost. All the infinitesimals of the past are +amassed into the present. +</P> + +<P> +The first acorn had wrapped up in it all the oak forests on the globe. +</P> + +<P> +"Least of all seeds, greatest of all harvests," seems to be one of the +great laws of nature. All life comes from microscopic beginnings. In +nature there is nothing small. The microscope reveals as great a world +below as the telescope above. All of nature's laws govern the smallest +atoms, and a single drop of water is a miniature ocean. +</P> + +<P> +The strength of a chain lies in its weakest link, however large and +strong all the others may be. We are all inclined to be proud of our +strong points, while we are sensitive and neglectful of our weaknesses. +Yet it is our greatest weakness which measures our real strength. A +soldier who escapes the bullets of a thousand battles may die from the +scratch of a pin, and many a ship has survived the shocks of icebergs +and the storms of ocean only to founder in a smooth sea from holes made +by tiny insects. Drop by drop is instilled into the mind the poison +which blasts many a precious life. +</P> + +<P> +How often do we hear people say, "Oh, it's only ten minutes, or twenty +minutes, till dinner time; there's no use doing anything," or use other +expressions of a like effect? Why, it is just in these little spare +bits of time, these odd moments, which most people throw away, that men +who have risen have gained their education, written their books, and +made themselves immortal. +</P> + +<P> +<I>Small things become great when a great soul sees them</I>. The noble or +heroic act of one man has sometimes elevated a nation. Many an +honorable career has resulted from a kind word spoken in season or the +warm grasp of a friendly hand. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +It is the little rift within the lute,<BR> +That by and by will make the music mute,<BR> +And, ever widening, slowly silence all.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">TENNYSON.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"It was only a glad 'good-morning,'<BR> +As she passed along the way,<BR> +But it spread the morning's glory<BR> +Over the livelong day."<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Only a thought in passing—a smile, or encouraging word,<BR> +Has lifted many a burden no other gift could have stirred.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 4em">Only!—But then the onlys</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 4em">Make up the mighty all."</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap16"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XVI. +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +SELF-MASTERY. +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 4em">Give me that man</SPAN><BR> +That is not passion's slave, and I will wear him<BR> +In my heart's core, ay, in my heart of heart.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">SHAKESPEARE.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Strength of character consists of two things,—power of will and power +of self-restraint. It requires two things, therefore, for its +existence,—strong feelings and strong command over them.—F. W. +ROBERTSON. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Self-reverence, self-knowledge, self-control,<BR> +These three alone lead life to sovereign power."<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +The bravest trophy ever man obtained<BR> +Is that which o'er himself himself hath gained.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">EARL OF STIRLING.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Real glory springs from the conquest of ourselves; and without that the +conqueror is naught but the veriest slave.—THOMSON. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Whatever day makes man a slave takes half his worth away.—ODYSSEY. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Chain up the unruly legion of thy breast. Lead thine own captivity +captive, and be Caesar within thyself.—THOMAS BROWNE. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +He who reigns within himself, and rules passions, desires, and fears, +is more than a king.—MILTON. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +He that is slow to anger is better than the mighty: and he that ruleth +his spirit than he that taketh a city.—BIBLE. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Self-trust is of the essence of heroism.—EMERSON. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Man who man would be<BR> +Must rule the empire of himself.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">P. B. SHELLEY.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"Ah! Diamond, you little know the mischief you have wrought," said Sir +Isaac Newton, returning from supper to find that his dog had upset a +lighted taper upon the laborious calculations of years, which lay in +ashes before him. Then he went calmly to work to reproduce them. The +man who thus excelled in self-mastery surpassed all his predecessors +and contemporaries in mastering the laws of nature. +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<A NAME="img-288"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG CLASS="imgcenter" SRC="images/img-288.jpg" ALT="JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL" BORDER="2" WIDTH="365" HEIGHT="529"> +<H3 CLASS="h3center" STYLE="width: 365px"> +JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL +</H3> +</CENTER> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"We rise by the things that are under our feet;<BR> +By what we have mastered of good or gain:<BR> +By the pride deposed and the passion slain,<BR> +And the vanquished ills that we hourly meet."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> +<HR WIDTH="100%" ALIGN="center"> +<BR> + +<P> +The sun was high in the heavens when a man called at the house of +Pericles to abuse him. The man's anger knew no bounds. He vented his +spite in violent language until he paused from sheer exhaustion, and +saw that it was quite dark without. He turned to go home, when +Pericles calmly called a servant, and said, "Bring a lamp and attend +this man home." Is any argument needed to show the superiority of +Pericles? +</P> + +<P> +The gladiators who were trained to tight in the Coliseum were compelled +to practice the most graceful postures of falling and the finest +attitudes to assume in dying, in case they were vanquished. They were +obliged to eat food which would make the blood thick in order that they +should not die quickly when wounded, thus giving the spectators +prolonged gratification by the spectacle of their agonies. Each had to +take this oath: "We swear that we will suffer ourselves to be bound, +scourged, burned, or killed by the sword, or whatever Eumolpus ordains, +and thus, like freeborn gladiators, we religiously devote both our +souls and our bodies to our master." They were trained to exercise +sublime self-control even when dying a cruel death. +</P> + +<P> +The American Minister at St. Petersburg was summoned one morning to +save a young, dissolute, reckless American youth, Poe, from the +penalties incurred in a drunken debauch. By the Minister's aid young +Poe returned to the United States. Not long after this the author of +the best story and poem competed for in the "Baltimore Visitor" was +sent for, and behold, the youth who had taken both prizes was that same +dissolute, reckless, penniless, orphan youth, who had been arrested in +St. Petersburg,—pale, ragged, with no stockings, and with his +threadbare but well brushed coat buttoned to the chin to conceal the +lack of a shirt. Young Poe took fresh courage and resolution, and for +a while showed that he was superior to the appetite which was striving +to drag him down. But, alas, that fatal bottle! his mind was stored +with riches, yet he died in moral poverty. This was a soldier's +epitaph:— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Here lies a soldier whom all must applaud,<BR> +Who fought many battles at home and abroad!<BR> +But the hottest engagement he ever was in,<BR> +Was the conquest of self, in the battle of sin."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +In 1860, when a committee visited Abraham Lincoln at his home in +Springfield, Ill., to notify him of his nomination as President, he +ordered a pitcher of water and glasses, "that they might drink each +other's health in the best beverage God ever gave to man." "Let us," +he continued, "make it as unfashionable to withhold our names from the +temperance pledge as for husbands to wear their wives' bonnets in +church, and instances will be as rare in one case as the other." +</P> + +<P> +Burns exercised no control over his appetites, but gave them the rein:— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Thus thoughtless follies laid him low<BR> +And stained his name."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"The first and best of victories," says Plato, "is for a man to conquer +himself; to be conquered by himself is, of all things, the most +shameful and vile." +</P> + +<P> +Self-control is at the root of all the virtues. Let a man yield to his +impulses and passions, and from that moment he gives up his moral +freedom. +</P> + +<P> +"Teach self-denial and make its practice pleasurable," says Walter +Scott, "and you create for the world a destiny more sublime than ever +issued from the brain of the wildest dreamer." +</P> + +<P> +Stonewall Jackson, early in life, determined to conquer every weakness +he had, physical, mental, and moral. He held all of his powers with a +firm hand. To his great self-discipline and self-mastery he owed his +success. So determined was he to harden himself to the weather that he +could not be induced to wear an overcoat in winter. "I will not give +in to the cold," he said. For a year, on account of dyspepsia, he +lived on buttermilk and stale bread, and wore a wet shirt next his body +because his doctor advised it, although everybody else ridiculed the +idea. This was while he was professor at the Virginia Military +Institute. His doctor advised him to retire at nine o'clock; and, no +matter where he was, or who was present, he always sought his bed on +the minute. He adhered rigidly through life to this stern system of +discipline. Such self-training, such self-conquest, gives one great +power over others. It is equal to genius itself. +</P> + +<P> +It is a good plan to form the habit of ranking our various qualities, +marking our strongest point one hundred and all the others in +proportion, in order to make the lowest mark more apparent, and +enabling us to try to raise or strengthen it. A man's industry, for +example, may be his strongest point, one hundred, his physical courage +may be fifty; his moral courage, seventy-five; his temper, twenty-five; +with but ten for self-control,—which, if he has strong appetites and +passions, will be likely to be the rock on which he will split. He +should strive in every way to raise it from one of the weakest +qualities to one of the strongest. It would take but two or three +minutes a day to rank ourselves in such a table by noting the exercise +of each faculty for the day. If you have worked hard and faithfully, +mark industry one hundred. If you have lost your temper, and, in +consequence, lost your self-control, and made a fool of yourself, +indicate it by a low mark. This will be an incentive to try to raise +it the next day. If you have been irritable, indicate it by a +corresponding mark, and redeem yourself on the morrow. If you have +been cowardly where you should have been brave, hesitating where you +should have shown decision, false where you should have been true, +foolish where you should have been wise, tardy where you should have +been prompt; if you have prevaricated where you should have told the +exact truth; if you have taken the advantage where you should have been +fair, have been unjust where you should have been just, impatient where +you should have been patient, cross where you should have been +cheerful, so indicate by your marks. You will find this a great aid to +character building. +</P> + +<P> +It is a subtle and profound remark of Hegel's that the riddle which the +Sphinx, the Egyptian symbol of the mysteriousness of Nature, propounds +to Oedipus is only another way of expressing the command of the Delphic +oracle, "Know thyself." And when the answer is given the Sphinx casts +herself down from her rock. When man knows himself, the mysteriousness +of Nature and her terrors vanish. +</P> + +<P> +The command by the ancient oracle at Delphos is of eternal +significance. Add to it its natural complement—Help thyself—and the +path to success is open to those who obey. +</P> + +<P> +<I>Guard your weak point</I>. Moral contagion borrows fully half its +strength from the weakness of its victims. Have you a hot, passionate +temper? If so, a moment's outbreak, like a rat-hole in a dam, may +flood all the work of years. One angry word sometimes raises a storm +that time itself cannot allay. A single angry word has lost many a +friend. +</P> + +<P> +A Quaker was asked by a merchant whom he had conquered by his patience +how he had been able to bear the other's abuse, and replied: "Friend, I +will tell thee. I was naturally as hot and violent as thou art. I +observed that men in a passion always speak loud, and I thought if I +could control my voice I should repress my passion. I have therefore +made it a rule never to let my voice rise above a certain key, and by a +careful observance of this rule, I have, by the blessing of God, +entirely mastered my natural tongue." Mr. Christmas of the Bank of +England explains that the secret of his self-control under very trying +circumstances was due to a rule learned from the great Pitt, never to +lose his temper during banking hours from nine to three. +</P> + +<P> +When Socrates found in himself any disposition to anger, he would check +it by speaking low, in opposition to the motions of his displeasure. +If you are conscious of being in a passion, keep your mouth shut, lest +you increase it. Many a person has dropped dead in a rage. Fits of +anger bring fits of disease. "Whom the gods would destroy they first +make mad." "Keep cool," says Webster, "anger is not argument." "Be +calm in arguing," says George Herbert, "for fierceness makes error a +fault, and truth discourtesy." +</P> + +<P> +To be angry with a weak man is to prove that you are not strong +yourself. "Anger," says Pythagoras, "begins with folly and ends with +repentance." You must measure the strength of a man by the power of +the feelings he subdues, not by the power of those which subdue him. +</P> + +<P> +De Leon, a distinguished Spanish poet, after lying years in dungeons of +the Inquisition, dreary, and alone, without light, for translating part +of the Scriptures into his native tongue, was released and restored to +his professorship. A great crowd thronged to hear his first lecture, +out of curiosity to learn what he might say about his imprisonment. +But the great man merely resumed the lecture which had been so cruelly +broken off five years before, just where he left it, with the words +"Heri discebamus" (Yesterday we were teaching). What a lesson in this +remarkable example of self-control for those who allow their tongues to +jabber whatever happens to be uppermost in their minds! +</P> + +<P> +Did you ever see a man receive a flagrant insult, and only grow a +little pale, bite his quivering lip, and then reply quietly? Did you +ever see a man in anguish stand as if carved out of solid rock, +mastering himself? Have you not seen one bearing a hopeless daily +trial remain silent and never tell the world what cankered his home +peace? That is strength. "He who, with strong passions, remains +chaste; he who, keenly sensitive, with manly power of indignation in +him, can be provoked, and yet restrain himself and forgive,—these are +strong men, the spiritual heroes." +</P> + +<P> +"You will be remembered only as the man who broke my nose," said young +Michael Angelo to the man Torrigiano, who struck him in anger. What +sublime self-control for a quick-tempered man! +</P> + +<P> +"You ask whether it would not be manly to resent a great injury," said +Eardley Wilmot: "I answer that it would be manly to resent it, but it +would be Godlike to forgive it." +</P> + +<P> +That man has conquered his tongue who can allow the ribald jest or +scurrilous word to die unspoken on his lips, and maintain an indignant +silence amid reproaches and accusations and sneers and scoffs. "He is +a fool who cannot be angry," says English, "but he is a wise man who +will not." +</P> + +<P> +Peter the Great made a law in 1722 that a nobleman who should beat his +slave should be regarded as insane, and a guardian appointed to look +after his property and person. This great monarch once struck his +gardener, who took to his bed and died. Peter, hearing of this, +exclaimed with tears in his eyes, "Alas! I have civilized my own +subjects; I have conquered other nations; yet have I not been able to +civilize or conquer myself." The same monarch, when drunk, rushed upon +Admiral Le Fort with a sword. Le Fort, with great self-possession, +bared his breast to receive the stroke. This sobered Peter, and +afterwards he asked the pardon of Le Fort. Peter said, "I am trying to +reform my country, and I am not yet able to reform myself." +Self-conquest is man's last and greatest victory. +</P> + +<P> +A medical authority of highest repute affirms that excessive labor, +exposure to wet and cold, deprivation of sufficient quantities of +necessary and wholesome food, habitual bad lodging, sloth and +intemperance, are all deadly enemies to human life, but they are none +of them so bad as violent and ungoverned passion,—that men and women +have frequently lived to an advanced age in spite of these, but that +instances are very rare where people of irascible tempers live to +extreme old age. +</P> + +<P> +It was the self-discipline of a man who had never looked upon war until +he was forty that enabled Oliver Cromwell to create an army which never +fought without annihilating, yet which retired into the ranks of +industry as soon as the government was established, each soldier being +distinguished from his neighbors only by his superior diligence, +sobriety, and regularity in the pursuits of peace. +</P> + +<P> +How sweet the serenity of habitual self-command! When does a man feel +more a master of himself than when he has passed through a sudden and +severe provocation in silence or in undisturbed good humor? +</P> + +<P> +Whether teaching the rules of an exact morality, answering his corrupt +judges, receiving sentence of death, or swallowing the poison, Socrates +was still calm, quiet, undisturbed, intrepid. +</P> + +<P> +It is a great thing to have brains, but it is vastly greater to be able +to command them. The Duke of Wellington had great power over himself, +although his natural temper was extremely irritable. He remained at +the Duchess of Richmond's ball till about three o'clock on the morning +of the 16th of June, 1815, "showing himself very cheerful," although he +knew that a desperate battle was awaiting him. On the field of +Waterloo he gave his orders at the most critical moments without the +slightest excitement. +</P> + +<P> +Napoleon, having made his arrangements for the terrible conflict of the +next day (Jena and Auerstadt), retired to his tent about midnight, and +calmly sat down to draw up a plan of study and discipline for Madame +Campan's female school. "Keep cool, and you command everybody," says +St. Just. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"He that would govern others first should be<BR> +The master of himself,"<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +says Massinger. +</P> + +<P> +He who has mastered himself, who is his own Caesar, will be stronger +than his passion, superior to circumstances, higher than his calling, +greater than his speech. Self-control is the generalship which turns a +mob of raw recruits into a disciplined army. The rough man has become +the polished and dignified soldier, in other words, the man has got +control of himself, and knows how to use himself. The human race is +under constant drill. Our occupations, difficulties, obstacles, +disappointments, if used aright, are the great schoolmasters which help +us to possess ourselves. The man who is master of himself will not be +a slave to drudgery, but will keep in advance of his work. He will not +rob his family of that which is worth more than money or position; he +will not be the slave of his occupation, not at the mercy of +circumstances. His methods and system will enable him to accomplish +wonders, and yet give him leisure for self-culture. The man who +controls himself works to live rather than lives for work. +</P> + +<P> +The man of great self-control, the man who thinks a great deal and says +little, who is self-centred, well balanced, carries a thousand times +more weight than the man of weak will, always wavering and undecided. +</P> + +<P> +If a man lacks self-control he seems to lack everything. Without it he +can have no patience, no power to govern himself, he can have no +self-reliance, for he will always be at the mercy of his strongest +passion. If he lacks self-control, the very backbone, pith, and nerve +of character are lacking also. +</P> + +<P> +The discipline which is the main end in education is simply control +acquired over one's mental faculties; without this discipline no man is +a strong and accurate thinker. "Prove to me," says Mrs. Oliphant, +"that you can control yourself, and I'll say you're an educated man; +and, without this, all other education is good for next to nothing." +</P> + +<P> +The wife of Socrates, Xanthippe, was a woman of a most fantastical and +furious spirit. At one time, having vented all the reproaches upon +Socrates her fury could suggest, he went out and sat before the door. +His calm and unconcerned behavior but irritated her so much the more; +and, in the excess of her rage, she ran upstairs and emptied a vessel +upon his head, at which he only laughed and said that "so much thunder +must needs produce a shower." Alcibiades his friend, talking with him +about his wife, told him he wondered how he could bear such an +everlasting scold in the same house with him. He replied, "I have so +accustomed myself to expect it, that it now offends me no more than the +noise of carriages in the street." +</P> + +<P> +How many men have in their chain of character one weak link. They may +be weak in the link of truthfulness, politeness, trustworthiness, +temper, chastity, temperance, courage, industry, or may have some other +weakness which wrecks their success and thwarts a life's endeavor. He +who would succeed must hold all his faculties under perfect control; +they must be disciplined, drilled, until they obey the will. +</P> + +<P> +Think of a young man just starting out in life to conquer the world +being at the mercy of his own appetites and passions! He cannot stand +up and look the world in the face when he is the slave of what should +be his own servants. He cannot lead who is led. There is nothing +which gives certainty and direction to the life of a man who is not his +own master. If he has mastered all but one appetite, passion, or +weakness, he is still a slave; it is the weakest point that measures +the strength of character. +</P> + +<P> +Seneca, one of the greatest of the ancient philosophers, said that "we +should every night call ourselves to account. What infirmity have I +mastered to-day? what passion opposed? what temptation resisted? what +virtue acquired?" and then he follows with the profound truth that "our +vices will abate of themselves if they be brought every day to the +shrift." If you cannot at first control your anger, learn to control +your tongue, which, like fire, is a good servant, but a hard master. +</P> + +<P> +Five words cost Zacharias forty weeks' silence. There is many a man +whose tongue might govern multitudes if he could only govern his +tongue. Anger, like too much wine, hides us from ourselves, but +exposes us to others. +</P> + +<P> +General von Moltke, perhaps the greatest strategist of this century, +had, as a foundation for his other talents, the power to "hold his +tongue in seven languages." A young man went to Socrates to learn +oratory. On being introduced, he talked so incessantly that Socrates +asked for double fees. "Why charge me double?" asked the young fellow. +"Because," said the orator, "I must teach you two sciences: the one how +to hold your tongue, the other how to speak." The first is the more +difficult. +</P> + +<P> +Half the actual trouble of life would be saved if people would remember +that silence is golden, when they are irritated, vexed, or annoyed. +</P> + +<P> +To feel provoked or exasperated at a trifle, when the nerves are +exhausted, is, perhaps, natural to us in our imperfect state. But why +put into the shape of speech the annoyance which, once uttered, is +remembered; which may burn like a blistering wound, or rankle like a +poisoned arrow? If a child be crying or a friend capricious, or a +servant unreasonable, be careful what you say. Do not speak while you +feel the impulse of anger, for you will be almost certain to say too +much, to say more than your cooler judgment will approve, and to speak +in a way that you will regret. Be silent until the "sweet by and by," +when you will be calm, rested, and self-controlled. +</P> + +<P> +"Seest thou a man that is hasty in his words? There is more hope of a +fool than of him." +</P> + +<P> +"Silence," says Zimmerman, "is the safest response for all the +contradiction that arises from impertinence, vulgarity, or envy." +</P> + +<P> +In rhetoric, as Emerson truly says, this art of omission is the chief +secret of power. "Everything tells in favor of the man who talks but +little. The presumption is that he is a superior man; and if, in point +of fact, he is not a sheer blockhead, the presumption then is that he +is very superior indeed." Grant was master of the science of silence. +</P> + +<P> +The self-controlled are self-possessed. "Sir, the house is on fire!" +shrieked a frightened servant, running into Dr. Lawson's study. "Go +and tell your mistress," said the preoccupied professor, without +looking up from the book he was reading; "you know I have no charge of +household matters." A woman whose house was on fire threw a +looking-glass out of the window, and carried a pair of andirons several +rods to a safe place beside a stone wall. "Presence of mind and +courage in distress are more than armies to procure success." +</P> + +<P> +Xenophon tells us that at one time the Persian princes had for their +teachers the four best men in the kingdom. (1) The wisest man to teach +wisdom. (2) The bravest to teach courage. (3) The most just to train +the moral nature. (4) The most temperate to teach self-control. We +have them all in the Bible, and in Christ our teacher, an example. "If +it is a small sacrifice to discontinue the use of wine," said Samuel J. +May, "do it for the sake of others; if it is a great sacrifice, do it +for your own sake." How many of nature's noblemen, who might be kings +if they could control themselves, drink away their honor, reputation, +and money in glasses of "wet damnation," more costly than the vinegar +in which Cleopatra dissolved her pearls. +</P> + +<P> +Experience shows that, quicker than almost any other physical agency, +alcohol breaks down a man's power of self-control. But the physical +evils of intemperance, great as they are, are slight, compared with the +moral injury it produces. It is not simply that vices and crimes +almost inevitably follow the loss of rational self-direction, which is +the invariable accompaniment of intoxication; manhood is lowered and +finally lost by the sensual tyranny of appetite. The drunken man has +given up the reins of his nature to a fool or a fiend, and he is driven +fast to base or unutterably foolish ends. +</P> + +<P> +With almost palsied hand, at a temperance meeting, John B. Gough signed +the pledge. For six days and nights in a wretched garret, without a +mouthful of food, with scarcely a moment's sleep, he fought the fearful +battle with appetite. Weak, famished, almost dying, he crawled into +the sunlight; but he had conquered the demon, which had almost killed +him. Gough used to describe the struggles of a man who tried to leave +off using tobacco. He threw away what he had, and said that was the +end of it; but no, it was only the beginning of it. He would chew +camomile, gentian, toothpicks, but it was of no use. He bought another +plug of tobacco and put it in his pocket. He wanted a chew awfully, +but he looked at it and said, "You are a weed, and I am a <I>man</I>. I'll +master you if I die for it;" and he did, while carrying it in his +pocket daily. +</P> + +<P> +Natural appetites, if given rein, will not only grow monstrous and +despotic, but artificial appetites will be created which, like a +ghastly Frankenstein, develop a kind of independent life and force, and +then turn on their creator to torment him without pity, and will mock +his efforts to free himself from this slavery. The victim of strong +drink is one of the most pitiable creatures on earth, he becomes half +beast, or half demon. Oh, the silent, suffering tongues that whisper +"Don't," but the will lies prostrate, and the debauch goes on. What a +mute confession of degradation there is in the very appearance of a +confirmed sot. Behold a man no longer in possession of himself; the +flesh is master; the spiritual nature is sunk in the mire of +sensuality, and the mental faculties are a mere mob of enfeebled powers +under bondage to a bestial or mad tyrant. As Challis says:— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Once the demon enters,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Stands within the door;</SPAN><BR> +Peace and hope and gladness<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Dwell there nevermore."</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Many persons are intemperate in their feelings; they are emotionally +prodigal. Passion is intemperance; so is caprice. There is an +intemperance even in melancholy and mirth. The temperate man is not +mastered by his moods; he will not be driven or enticed into excess; +his steadfast will conquers despondency, and is not unbalanced by +transient exhilarations, for ecstasy is as fatal as despair. Temper is +subjected to reason and conscience. How many people excuse themselves +for doing wrong or foolish acts by the plea that they have a quick +temper. But he who is king of himself rules his temper, turning its +very heat and passion into energy that works good instead of evil. +Stephen Girard, when he heard of a clerk with a strong temper, was glad +to employ him. He believed that such persons, taught self-control, +were the best workers. Controlled temper is an element of strength; +wisely regulated, it expends itself as energy in work, just as heat in +an engine is transmuted into force that drives the wheels of industry. +Cromwell, William the Silent, Wordsworth, Faraday, Washington, and +Wellington were men of prodigious tempers, but they were also men whose +self-control was nearly perfect. +</P> + +<P> +George Washington's faculties were so well balanced and combined that +his constitution was tempered evenly with all the elements of activity, +and his mind resembled a well organized commonwealth. His passions, +which had the intensest vigor, owed allegiance to reason; and with all +the fiery quickness of his spirit, his impetuous and massive will was +held in check by consummate judgment. He had in his composition a calm +which was a balance-wheel, and which gave him in moments of highest +excitement the power of self-control, and enabled him to excel in +patience, even when he had most cause for disgust. +</P> + +<P> +It was said by an enemy of William the Silent that an arrogant or +indiscreet word never fell from his lips. +</P> + +<P> +How brilliantly could Carlyle write of heroism, courage, self-control, +and yet fly into a rage at a rooster crowing in a neighbor's yard. +</P> + +<P> +A self-controlled mind is a free mind, and freedom is power. +</P> + +<P> +"I call that mind free," says Channing, "which jealously guards its +intellectual rights and powers, which calls no man master, which does +not content itself with a passive or hereditary faith, which opens +itself to light whencesoever it may come, which receives new truth as +an angel from heaven, which, whilst consulting others, inquires still +more of the oracle within itself, and uses instructions from abroad, +not to supersede, but to quicken and exalt its own energies. I call +that mind free which is not passively framed by outward circumstances, +which is not swept away by the torrent of events, which is not the +creature of accidental impulse, but which bends events to its own +improvement, and acts from an inward spring, from immutable principles +which it has deliberately espoused. I call that mind free which +protects itself against the usurpations of society, which does not +cower to human opinion, which feels itself accountable to a higher +tribunal than man's, which respects a higher law than fashion, which +respects itself too much to be the slave or tool of the many or the +few. I call that mind free which through confidence in God and in the +power of virtue has cast off all fear but that of wrong-doing, which no +menace or peril can enthrall, which is calm in the midst of tumults, +and possesses itself though all else be lost. I call that mind free +which resists the bondage of habit, which does not mechanically repeat +itself and copy the past, which does not live on its old virtues, which +does not enslave itself to precise rules, but which forgets what is +behind, listens for new and higher monitions of conscience, and +rejoices to pour itself forth in fresh and higher exertions. I call +that mind free which is jealous of its own freedom, which guards itself +from being merged in others, which guards its empire over itself as +nobler than the empire of the world." +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Be free—not chiefly from the iron chain<BR> +But from the one which passion forges—be<BR> +The master of thyself. If lost, regain<BR> +The rule o'er chance, sense, circumstance. Be free.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">EPHRAIM PEABODY.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"It is not enough to have great qualities," says La Rochefoucauld; "we +should also have the management of them." No man can call himself +educated until every voluntary muscle obeys his will. +</P> + +<P> +Every human being is conscious of two natures. One is ever reaching up +after the good, the true, and the noble,—is aspiring after all that +uplifts, elevates, and purifies. It is the God-side of man, the image +of the Creator, the immortal side, the spiritual side. It is the +gravitation of the soul faculties toward their Maker. The other is the +bestial side which gravitates downward. It does not aspire, it +grovels; it wallows in the mire of sensualism. Like the beast, it +knows but one law, and is led by only one motive, self-indulgence, +self-gratification. When neither hungry nor thirsty, or when gorged +and sated by over-indulgence, it lies quiet and peaceful as a lamb, and +we sometimes think it subdued. But when its imperious passion +accumulates, it clamors for satisfaction. You cannot reason with it, +for it has no reason, only an imperious instinct for gratification. +You cannot appeal to its self-respect, for it has none. It cares +nothing for character, for manliness, for the spiritual. +</P> + +<P> +These two natures are ever at war, one pulling heavenward, the other, +earthward. Nor do they ever become reconciled. Either may conquer, +but the vanquished never submits. The higher nature may be compelled +to grovel, to wallow in the mire of sensual indulgence, but it always +rebels and enters its protest. It can never forget that it bears the +image of its Maker, even when dragged through the slough of sensualism. +The still small voice which bids man look up is never quite hushed. If +the victim of the lower nature could only forget that he was born to +look upward, if he could only erase the image of his Maker, if he could +only hush the voice which haunts him and condemns him when he is bound +in slavery, if he could only enjoy his indulgences without the mockery +of remorse, he thinks he would be content to remain a brute. But the +ghost of his better self rises as he is about to partake of his +delight, and robs him of the expected pleasure. He has sold his better +self for pleasure which is poison, and he cannot lose the consciousness +of the fearful sacrifice he has made. The banquet may be ready, but +the hand on the wall is writing his doom. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Give me that soul, superior power,<BR> +That conquest over fate,<BR> +Which sways the weakness of the hour,<BR> +Rules little things as great:<BR> +That lulls the human waves of strife<BR> +With words and feelings kind,<BR> +And makes the trials of our life<BR> +The triumphs of our mind.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">CHARLES SWAIN.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Reader, attend—whether thy soul<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Soars fancy's flights above the pole,</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Or darkly grubs this earthly hole,</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 4em">In low pursuits:</SPAN><BR> +Know prudent, cautious self-control<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 4em">Is wisdom's root.</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">BURNS.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +The king is the man who can.—CARLYLE. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +I have only one counsel for you—Be master.—NAPOLEON. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Ah, silly man, who dream'st thy honor stands<BR> +In ruling others, not thyself. Thy slaves<BR> +Serve thee, and thou thy slave: in iron bands<BR> +Thy servile spirit, pressed with wild passions, raves.<BR> +Wouldst thou live honored?—clip ambition's wing:<BR> +To reason's yoke thy furious passions bring:<BR> +Thrice noble is the man who of himself is king.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">PHINEAS FLETCHER.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Not in the clamor of the crowded street,<BR> +Not in the shouts and plaudits of the throng,<BR> +But in ourselves are triumph and defeat."<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR><BR> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Architects of Fate, by Orison Swett Marden + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ARCHITECTS OF FATE *** + +***** This file should be named 21622-h.htm or 21622-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/1/6/2/21622/ + +Produced by Al Haines + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Architects of Fate + or, Steps to Success and Power + +Author: Orison Swett Marden + +Release Date: May 27, 2007 [EBook #21622] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ARCHITECTS OF FATE *** + + + + +Produced by Al Haines + + + + + + + + + + +[Frontispiece: Phillips Brooks] + +"The best-loved man in New England." + +"The ideal life, the life full of completion, haunts us all. We feel +the thing we ought to be beating beneath the thing we are." + +"_First, be a man._" + + + + + + +ARCHITECTS OF FATE + +OR, STEPS TO SUCCESS AND POWER + + + A BOOK DESIGNED TO INSPIRE YOUTH TO + CHARACTER BUILDING, SELF-CULTURE + AND NOBLE ACHIEVEMENT + + +BY + +ORISON SWETT MARDEN + + + +AUTHOR OF "PUSHING TO THE FRONT + OR, SUCCESS UNDER DIFFICULTIES" + + + +_ILLUSTRATED WITH SIXTEEN FINE + PORTRAITS OF EMINENT PERSONS_ + + + + "All are architects of fate + Working in these walls of time." + + "Our to-days and yesterdays + Are the blocks with which we build." + + "Let thy great deed be thy prayer to thy God." + + + + +TORONTO + +WILLIAM BRIGGS + +WESLEY BUILDINGS + +MONTREAL: C. W. COATES + +HALIFAX: S. F. HUESTIS + +1897 + + + + +Copyright, 1895, + +BY ORISON SWETT MARDEN. + + +_All rights reserved._ + + + + +PREFACE. + +The demand for more than a dozen editions of "Pushing to the Front" +during its first year and its universally favorable reception, both at +home and abroad, have encouraged the author to publish this companion +volume of somewhat similar scope and purpose. The two books were +prepared simultaneously, and the story of the first, given in its +preface, applies equally well to this. + +Inspiration to character-building and worthy achievement is the keynote +of the present volume, its object, to arouse to honorable exertion +youth who are drifting without aim, to awaken dormant ambitions in +those who have grown discouraged in the struggle for success, to +encourage and stimulate to higher resolve those who are setting out to +make their own way, with perhaps neither friendship nor capital other +than a determination to get on in the world. + +Nothing is so fascinating to a youth with high purpose, life, and +energy throbbing in his young blood as stories of men and women who +have brought great things to pass. Though these themes are as old as +the human race, yet they are ever new, and more interesting to the +young than any fiction. The cry of youth is for life! more life! No +didactic or dogmatic teaching, however brilliant, will capture a +twentieth-century boy, keyed up to the highest pitch by the pressure of +an intense civilization. The romance of achievement under +difficulties, of obscure beginnings and triumphant ends; the story of +how great men started, their struggles, their long waitings, amid want +and woe, the obstacles overcome, the final triumphs; examples, which +explode excuses, of men who have seized common situations and made them +great, of those of average capacity who have succeeded by the use of +ordinary means, by dint of indomitable will and inflexible purpose: +these will most inspire the ambitious youth. The author teaches that +there are bread and success for every youth under the American flag who +has the grit to seize his chance and work his way to his own loaf; that +the barriers are not yet erected which declare to aspiring talent, +"Thus far and no farther"; that the most forbidding circumstances +cannot repress a longing for knowledge, a yearning for growth; that +poverty, humble birth, loss of limbs or even eyesight, have not been +able to bar the progress of men with grit; that poverty has rocked the +cradle of the giants who have wrung civilization from barbarism, and +have led the world up from savagery to the Gladstones, the Lincolns, +and the Grants. + +The book shows that it is the man with one unwavering aim who cuts his +way through opposition and forges to the front; that in this electric +age, where everything is pusher or pushed, he who would succeed must +hold his ground and push hard; that what are stumbling-blocks and +defeats to the weak and vacillating, are but stepping-stones and +victories to the strong and determined. The author teaches that every +germ of goodness will at last struggle into bloom and fruitage, and +that true success follows every right step. He has tried to touch the +higher springs of the youth's aspiration; to lead him to high ideals; +to teach him that there is something nobler in an occupation than +merely living-getting or money-getting; that a man may make millions +and be a failure still; to caution youth not to allow the maxims of a +low prudence, dinned daily into his ears in this money-getting age, to +repress the longings for a higher life; that the hand can never safely +reach higher than does the heart. + +The author's aim has been largely through concrete illustrations which +have pith, point, and purpose, to be more suggestive than dogmatic, in +a style more practical than elegant, more helpful than ornate, more +pertinent than novel. + +The author wishes to acknowledge valuable assistance from Mr. Arthur W. +Brown, of W. Kingston, R. I. + +O. S. M. + +43 BOWDOIN ST., BOSTON, MASS. + +December 2, 1896. + + + + +CONTENTS. + + +CHAPTER + +I. WANTED--A MAN + +God after a _man_. Wealth is nothing, fame is nothing. _Manhood is +everything_. + +II. DARE + +Dare to live thy creed. Conquer your place in the world. All things +serve a brave soul. + +III. THE WILL AND THE WAY + +Find a way or make one. Everything is either pusher or pushed. The +world always listens to a man with a will in him. + +IV. SUCCESS UNDER DIFFICULTIES + +There is scarcely a great truth or doctrine but has had to fight its +way to recognition through detraction, calumny, and persecution. + +V. USES OR OBSTACLES + +The Great Sculptor cares little for the human block as such; it is the +statue He is after; and He will blast, hammer, and chisel with poverty, +hardships, anything to get out the man. + +VI. ONE UNWAVERING AIM + +Find your purpose and fling your life out to it. Try to be somebody +with all your might. + +VII. SOWING AND REAPING + +What is put into the first of life is put into the whole of life. +_Start right_. + +VIII. SELF-HELP + +Self-made or never made. The greatest men have risen from the ranks. + +IX. WORK AND WAIT + +Don't risk a life's superstructure upon a day's foundation. + +X. CLEAR GRIT + +The goddess of fame or of fortune has been won by many a poor boy who +had no friends, no backing, or anything but pure grit and invincible +purpose to commend him. + +XI. THE GRANDEST THING IN THE WORLD + +Manhood is above all riches and overtops all titles; character is +greater than any career. + +XII. WEALTH IN ECONOMY + +"Hunger, rags, cold, hard work, contempt, suspicion, unjust reproach, +are disagreeable; but debt is infinitely worse than all." + +XIII. RICH WITHOUT MONEY + +To have nothing is not poverty. Whoever uplifts civilization is rich +though he die penniless, and future generations will erect his monument. + +XIV. OPPORTUNITIES WHERE YOU ARE + +"How speaks the present hour? _Act_." Don't wait for great +opportunities. _Seize common occasions and make them great_. + +XV. THE MIGHT OF LITTLE THINGS + +There is nothing small in a world where a mud-crack swells to an +Amazon, and the stealing of a penny may end on the scaffold. + +XVI. SELF-MASTERY + +Guard your weak point. Be lord over yourself. + + + + +LIST OF PORTRAITS. + + +CHAP. + + I. Phillips Brooks . . . . . . . . . _Frontispiece_ + II. Oliver Hazard Perry + III. Walter Scott + IV. William Hickling Prescott + V. John Bunyan + VI. Richard Arkwright + VII. Victor Hugo + VIII. James A. Garfield (missing from book) + IX. Thomas Alva Edison + X. Andrew Jackson + XI. John Greenleaf Whittier (missing from book) + XII. Alexander Hamilton + XIII. Ralph Waldo Emerson + XIV. Thomas Jefferson + XV. Louis Agassiz + XVI. James Russell Lowell + + + + +ARCHITECTS OF FATE. + + +CHAPTER I. + +WANTED--A MAN. + + "Wanted; men: + Not systems fit and wise, + Not faiths with rigid eyes, + Not wealth in mountain piles, + Not power with gracious smiles, + Not even the potent pen: + Wanted; men." + +Run ye to and fro through the streets of Jerusalem, and see now, and +know, and seek in the broad places thereof, if ye can find a +man.--JEREMIAH. + +All the world cries, Where is the man who will save us? We want a man! +Don't look so far for this man. You have him at hand. This man,--it +is you, it is I, it is each one of us! . . . How to constitute one's +self a man? Nothing harder, if one knows not how to will it; nothing +easier, if one wills it.--ALEXANDRE DUMAS. + + "'Tis life, not death for which we pant! + 'Tis life, whereof our nerves are scant: + More life and fuller, that we want." + +I do not wish in attempting to paint a man to describe an air-fed, +unimpassioned, impossible ghost. My eyes and ears are revolted by any +neglect of the physical facts, the limitations of man.--EMERSON. + + But nature, with a matchless hand, sends forth her nobly born, + And laughs the paltry attributes of wealth and rank to scorn; + She moulds with care a spirit rare, half human, half divine, + And cries exulting, "Who can make a gentleman like mine?" + ELIZA COOK. + + +"In a thousand cups of life," says Emerson, "only one is the right +mixture. The fine adjustment of the existing elements, where the +well-mixed man is born with eyes not too dull, nor too good, with fire +enough and earth enough, capable of receiving impressions from all +things, and not too susceptible, then no gift need be bestowed on him. +He brings his fortune with him." + +Diogenes sought with a lantern at noontide in ancient Athens for a +perfectly honest man, and sought in vain. In the market place he once +cried aloud, "Hear me, O men;" and, when a crowd collected around him, +he said scornfully: "I called for men, not pygmies." + +The world has a standing advertisement over the door of every +profession, every occupation, every calling; "Wanted--A Man." + +Wanted, a man who will not lose his individuality in a crowd, a man who +has the courage of his convictions, who is not afraid to say "No," +though all the world say "Yes." + +Wanted, a man who, though he is dominated by a mighty purpose, will not +permit one great faculty to dwarf, cripple, warp, or mutilate his +manhood; who will not allow the over-development of one facility to +stunt or paralyze his other faculties. + +Wanted, a man who is larger than his calling, who considers it a low +estimate of his occupation to value it merely as a means of getting a +living. Wanted, a man who sees self-development, education and +culture, discipline and drill, character and manhood, in his occupation. + +A thousand pulpits vacant in a single religious denomination, a +thousand preachers standing idle in the market place, while a thousand +church committees scour the land for men to fill those same vacant +pulpits, and scour in vain, is a sufficient indication, in one +direction at least, of the largeness of the opportunities of the age, +and also of the crying need of good men. + +Wanted, a man who is well balanced, who is not cursed with some little +defect or weakness which cripples his usefulness and neutralizes his +powers. Wanted, a man of courage, who is not a coward in any part of +his nature. + +Wanted, a man who is symmetrical, and not one-sided in his development, +who has not sent all the energies of his being into one narrow +specialty, and allowed all the other branches of his life to wither and +die. Wanted, a man who is broad, who does not take half views of +things. Wanted, a man who mixes common sense with his theories, who +does not let a college education spoil him for practical, every-day +life; a man who prefers substance to show, who regards his good name as +a priceless treasure. + +Wanted, a man "who, no stunted ascetic, is full of life and fire, but +whose passions are trained to heed a strong will, the servant of a +tender conscience; who has learned to love all beauty, whether of +nature or of art, to hate all vileness, and to respect others as +himself." + +God calls a man to be upright and pure and generous, but he also calls +him to be intelligent and skillful and strong and brave. + +The world wants a man who is educated all over; whose nerves are +brought to their acutest sensibility, whose brain is cultured, keen, +incisive, penetrating, broad, liberal, deep; whose hands are deft; +whose eyes are alert, sensitive, microscopic, whose heart is tender, +broad, magnanimous, true. + +The whole world is looking for such a man. Although there are millions +out of employment, yet it is almost impossible to find just the right +man in almost any department of life. Every profession and every +occupation has a standing advertisement all over the world: "Wanted--A +Man." + +Rousseau, in his celebrated essay on education, says: "According to the +order of nature, men being equal, their common vocation is the +profession of humanity; and whoever is well educated to discharge the +duty of a man cannot be badly prepared to fill any of those offices +that have a relation to him. It matters little to me whether my pupil +be designed for the army, the pulpit, or the bar. Nature has destined +us to the offices of human life antecedent to our destination +concerning society. To live is the profession I would teach him. When +I have done with him, it is true he will be neither a soldier, a +lawyer, nor a divine. _Let him first be a man_; Fortune may remove him +from one rank to another as she pleases, he will be always found in his +place." + +A little, short doctor of divinity in a large Baptist convention stood +on a step and said he thanked God he was a Baptist. The audience could +not hear and called "Louder." "Get up higher," some one said. "I +can't," he replied. "To be a Baptist is as high as one can get." But +there is something higher than being a Baptist, and that is being a +_man_. + +As Emerson says, Talleyrand's question is ever the main one; not, is he +rich? is he committed? is he well-meaning? has he this or that faculty? +is he of the movement? is he of the establishment? but is he anybody? +does he stand for something? He must be good of his kind. That is all +that Talleyrand, all that State Street, all that the common sense of +mankind asks. + +When Garfield was asked as a young boy, "what he meant to be," he +answered: "First of all, I must make myself a man, if I do not succeed +in that, I can succeed in nothing." + +Montaigne says our work is not to train a soul by itself alone, nor a +body by itself alone, but to train a man. + +One great need of the world to-day is for men and women who are good +animals. To endure the strain of our concentrated civilization, the +coming man and woman must have an excess of animal spirits. They must +have a robustness of health. Mere absence of disease is not health. +It is the overflowing fountain, not the one half full, that gives life +and beauty to the valley below. Only he is healthy who exults in mere +animal existence; whose very life is a luxury; who feels a bounding +pulse throughout his body, who feels life in every limb, as dogs do +when scouring over the field, or as boys do when gliding over fields of +ice. + +Pope, the poet, was with Sir Godfrey Kneller, the artist, one day, when +the latter's nephew, a Guinea slave-trader, came into the room. +"Nephew," said Sir Godfrey, "you have the honor of seeing the two +greatest men in the world." "I don't know how great men you may be," +said the Guinea man, "but I don't like your looks. I have often bought +a much better man than either of you, all muscles and bones, for ten +guineas." + +Sydney Smith said, "I am convinced that digestion is the great secret +of life, and that character, virtue and talents, and qualities are +powerfully affected by beef, mutton, pie crust, and rich soups. I have +often thought I could feed or starve men into virtues or vices, and +affect them more powerfully with my instruments of torture than +Timotheus could do formerly with his lyre." + +What more glorious than a magnificent manhood, animated with the +bounding spirits of overflowing health? + +It is a sad sight to see thousands of students graduated every year +from our grand institutions, whose object is to make stalwart, +independent, self-supporting men, turned out into the world saplings +instead of stalwart oaks, "memory-glands" instead of brainy men, +helpless instead of self-supporting, sickly instead of robust, weak +instead of strong, leaning instead of erect. "So many promising +youths, and never a finished man!" + +The character sympathizes with and unconsciously takes on the nature of +the body. A peevish, snarling, ailing man cannot develop the vigor and +strength of character which is possible to a healthy, robust, jolly +man. There is an inherent love in the human mind for wholeness, a +demand that man shall come up to the highest standard; and there is an +inherent protest or contempt for preventable deficiency. Nature too +demands that man be ever at the top of his condition. The giant's +strength with the imbecile's brain will not be characteristic of the +coming man. + +Man has been a dwarf of himself, but a higher type of manhood stands at +the door of this age knocking for admission. + +As we stand upon the seashore while the tide is coming in, one wave +reaches up the beach far higher than any previous one, then recedes, +and for some time none that follows comes up to its mark, but after a +while the whole sea is there and beyond it, so now and then there comes +a man head and shoulders above his fellow-men, showing that Nature has +not lost her ideal, and after a while even the average man will overtop +the highest wave of manhood yet given to the world. + +Apelles hunted over Greece for many years, studying the fairest points +of beautiful women, getting here an eye, there a forehead and there a +nose, here a grace and there a turn of beauty, for his famous portrait +of a perfect woman which enchanted the world. So the coming man will +be a composite, many in one. He will absorb into himself not the +weakness, not the follies, but the strength and the virtues of other +types of men. He will be a man raised to the highest power. He will +be self-centred, equipoised, and ever master of himself. His +sensibility will not be deadened or blunted by violation of nature's +laws. His whole character will be impressible, and will respond to the +most delicate touches of nature. + +What a piece of work--this coming man! "How noble in reason. How +infinite in faculties. In form and motion how express and admirable, +in action how like an angel, in apprehension how like a god. The +beauty of the world. The paragon of animals." + +The first requisite of all education and discipline should be +man-timber. Tough timber must come from well grown, sturdy trees. +Such wood can be turned into a mast, can be fashioned into a piano or +an exquisite carving. But it must become timber first. Time and +patience develop the sapling into the tree. So through discipline, +education, experience, the sapling child is developed into hardy +mental, moral, physical timber. + +What an aid to character building would be the determination of the +young man in starting out in life to consider himself his own bank; +that his notes will be accepted as good or bad, and will pass current +everywhere or be worthless, according to his individual reputation for +honor and veracity; that if he lets a note go to protest, his bank of +character will be suspected; if he lets two or three go to protest, +public confidence will be seriously shaken; that if they continue to go +to protest, his reputation will be lost and confidence in him ruined. + +If the youth should start out with the fixed determination that every +statement he makes shall be the exact truth; that every promise he +makes shall be redeemed to the letter; that every appointment shall be +kept with the strictest faithfulness and with full regard for other +men's time, if he should hold his reputation as a priceless treasure, +feel that the eyes of the world are upon him, that he must not deviate +a hair's breadth from the truth and right; if he should take such a +stand at the outset, he would, like George Peabody, come to have almost +unlimited credit and the confidence of all, and would have developed +into noble man-timber. + +What are palaces and equipages; what though a man could cover a +continent with his title-deeds, or an ocean with his commerce, compared +with conscious rectitude, with a face that never turns pale at the +accuser's voice, with a bosom that never throbs with the fear of +exposure, with a heart that might be turned inside out and disclose no +stain of dishonor? To have done no man a wrong; to have put your +signature to no paper to which the purest angel in heaven might not +have been an attesting witness; to walk and live, unseduced, within +arm's length of what is not your own, with nothing between your desire +and its gratification but the invisible law of rectitude;--_this is to +be a man_. + + "He that of such a height hath built his mind, + And reared the dwelling of his thought so strong + As neither fear nor hope can shake the frame + Of his resolved powers; nor all the wind + Of vanity or malice pierce to wrong + His settled peace, or to disturb the same; + What a fair seat hath he; from whence he may + The boundless wastes and wilds of man survey." + [_Lines found in one of the books of Beecher's Library._] + +A man is never so happy as when he is _totus in se_; as when he +suffices to himself, and can walk without crutches or a guide. Said +Jean Paul Richter: "I have made as much out of myself as could be made +of the stuff, and no man should require more." + +Man is the only great thing in the universe. All the ages have been +trying to produce a perfect model. Only one complete man has yet been +evolved. The best of us are but prophecies of what is to come. + + What constitutes a state? + Not high-raised battlement or labored mound, + Thick wall or moated gate; + Not cities proud with spires and turrets crowned; + Not bays and broad-armed ports, + Where, laughing at the storm, rich navies ride; + Not starred and spangled courts, + Where low-browed baseness wafts perfume to pride. + No: men, high-minded men, + With powers as far above dull brutes endued + In forest, brake, or den, + As beasts excel cold rocks and brambles rude,-- + Men who their duties know, + But know their rights, and knowing, dare maintain, + Prevent the long-aimed blow, + And crush the tyrant while they rend the chain. + WILLIAM JONES. + + God give us men. A time like this demands + Strong minds, great hearts, true faith and ready hands: + Men whom the lust of office does not kill; + Men whom the spoils of office cannot buy; + Men who possess opinions and a will; + Men who have honor--men who will not lie; + Men who can stand before a demagogue + And scorn his treacherous flatteries without winking; + Tall men sun-crowned, who live above the fog + In public duty, and in private thinking. + ANON. + + Open thy bosom, set thy wishes wide, + And let in manhood--let in happiness; + Admit the boundless theatre of thought + From nothing up to God . . . which makes a man! + YOUNG. + + "The wisest man could ask no more of fate + Than to be simple, modest, manly, true." + + In speech right gentle, yet so wise; princely of mien, + Yet softly mannered; modest, deferent, + And tender-hearted, though of fearless blood. + EDWIN ARNOLD. + + + + +CHAPTER II. + +DARE. + +The Spartans did not inquire how many the enemy are, but where they +are.--AGIS II. + +What's brave, what's noble, let's do it after the high Roman fashion, +and make death proud to take us.--SHAKESPEARE. + + Better, like Hector, in the field to die, + Than, like a perfumed Paris, turn and fly. + LONGFELLOW. + +Let me die facing the enemy.--BAYARD. + +Who conquers me, shall find a stubborn foe.--BYRON. + +Courage in danger is half the battle.--PLAUTUS. + + No great deed is done + By falterers who ask for certainty. + GEORGE ELIOT. + +Fortune befriends the bold.--DRYDEN. + + Tender handed stroke a nettle, + And it stings you for your pains; + Grasp it like a man of mettle, + And it soft as silk remains. + AARON HILL. + +We make way for the man who boldly pushes past us.--BOVEE. + + Man should dare all things that he knows is right, + And fear to do nothing save what is wrong. + PHEBE CARY. + + Soft-heartedness, in times like these, + Shows softness in the upper story. + LOWELL. + +O friend, never strike sail to fear. Come into port grandly, or sail +with God the seas.--EMERSON. + +To stand with a smile upon your face against a stake from which you +cannot get away--that, no doubt, is heroic. But the true glory is +resignation to the inevitable. To stand unchained, with perfect +liberty to go away, held only by the higher claims of duty, and let the +fire creep up to the heart,--this is heroism.--F. W. ROBERTSON. + + +"Steady, men! Every man must die where he stands!" said Colin Campbell +to the Ninety-third Highlanders at Balaklava, as an overwhelming force +of Russian cavalry came sweeping down. "Ay, ay, Sir Colin! we'll do +that!" was the cordial response from men many of whom had to keep their +word by thus obeying. + + * * * * * * + +[Illustration: COMMODORE PERRY] + +"We have met the enemy and they are ours." + + "He either fears his fate too much + Or his deserts too small, + That dares not put it to the touch, + To gain or lose it all." + + * * * * * * + +"Bring back the colors," shouted a captain at the battle of the Alma, +when an ensign maintained his ground in front, although the men were +retreating. "No," cried the ensign, "bring up the men to the colors." +"To dare, and again to dare, and without end to dare," was Danton's +noble defiance to the enemies of France. + +"The Commons of France have resolved to deliberate," said Mirabeau to +De Breze, who brought an order from the king for them to disperse, June +23, 1789. "We have heard the intentions that have been attributed to +the king; and you, sir, who cannot be recognized as his organ in the +National Assembly,--you, who have neither place, voice, nor right to +speak,--you are not the person to bring to us a message of his. Go, +say to those who sent you that we are here by the power of the people, +and that we will not be driven hence, save by the power of the bayonet." + +When the assembled senate of Rome begged Regulus not to return to +Carthage to fulfill an illegal promise, he calmly replied: "Have you +resolved to dishonor me? Torture and death are awaiting me, but what +are these to the shame of an infamous act, or the wounds of a guilty +mind? Slave as I am to Carthage, I still have the spirit of a Roman. +I have sworn to return. It is my duty. Let the gods take care of the +rest." + +The courage which Cranmer had shown since the accession of Mary gave +way the moment his final doom was announced. The moral cowardice which +had displayed itself in his miserable compliance with the lust and +despotism of Henry displayed itself again in six successive +recantations by which he hoped to purchase pardon. But pardon was +impossible; and Cranmer's strangely mingled nature found a power in its +very weakness when he was brought into the church of St. Mary at Oxford +on the 21st of March, to repeat his recantation on the way to the +stake. "Now," ended his address to the hushed congregation before +him,--"now I come to the great thing that troubleth my conscience more +than any other thing that ever I said or did in my life, and that is +the setting abroad of writings contrary to the truth; which here I now +renounce and refuse as things written by a hand contrary to the truth +which I thought in my heart, and written for fear of death to save my +life, if it might be. And, forasmuch as my hand offended in writing +contrary to my heart, my hand therefore shall be the first punished; +for if I come to the fire it shall be the first burned." "This was the +hand that wrote it," he again exclaimed at the stake, "therefore it +shall suffer first punishment;" and holding it steadily in the flame, +"he never stirred nor cried till life was gone." + +"Oh, if I were only a man!" exclaimed Rebecca Bates, a girl of +fourteen, as she looked from the window of a lighthouse at Scituate, +Mass., during the War of 1812, and saw a British warship anchor in the +harbor. "What could you do?" asked Sarah Winsor, a young visitor. +"See what a lot of them the boats contain, and look at their guns!" and +she pointed to five large boats, filled with soldiers in scarlet +uniforms, who were coming to burn the vessels in the harbor and destroy +the town. "I don't care, I'd fight," said Rebecca. "I'd use father's +old shotgun--anything. Think of uncle's new boat and the sloop! And +how hard it is to sit here and see it all, and not lift a finger to +help. Father and uncle are in the village and will do all they can. +How still it is in the town! There is not a man to be seen." "Oh, +they are hiding till the soldiers get nearer," said Sarah, "then we'll +hear the shots and the drum." "The drum!" exclaimed Rebecca, "how can +they use it? It is here. Father brought it home last night to mend. +See! the first boat has reached the sloop. Oh! they are going to burn +her. Where is that drum? I've a great mind to go down and beat it. +We could hide behind the sandhills and bushes." As flames began to +rise from the sloop the ardor of the girls increased. They found the +drum and an old fife, and, slipping out of doors unnoticed by Mrs. +Bates, soon stood behind a row of sandhills. "Rub-a-dub-dub, +rub-a-dub-dub," went the drum, and "squeak, squeak, squeak," went the +fife. The Americans in the town thought that help had come from +Boston, and rushed into boats to attack the redcoats. The British +paused in their work of destruction; and, when the fife began to play +"Yankee Doodle," they scrambled into their boats and rowed in haste to +the warship, which weighed anchor and sailed away as fast as the wind +would carry her. + +A woman's piercing shriek suddenly startled a party of surveyors at +dinner in a forest of northern Virginia on a calm, sunny day in 1750. +The cries were repeated in quick succession, and the men sprang through +the undergrowth to learn their cause. "Oh, sir," exclaimed the woman +as she caught sight of a youth of eighteen, but a man in stature and +bearing; "you will surely do something for me! Make these friends +release me. My boy,--my poor boy is drowning, and they will not let me +go!" "It would be madness; she will jump into the river," said one of +the men who was holding her; "and the rapids would dash her to pieces +in a moment!" Throwing on his coat, the youth sprang to the edge of +the bank, scanned for a moment the rocks and whirling currents, and +then, at sight of part of the boy's dress, plunged into the roaring +rapids. "Thank God, he will save my child!" cried the mother, and all +rushed to the brink of the precipice; "there he is! Oh, my boy, my +darling boy! How could I leave you?" + +But all eyes were bent upon the youth struggling with strong heart and +hope amid the dizzy sweep of the whirling currents far below. Now it +seemed as if he would be dashed against a projecting rock, over which +the water flew in foam, and anon a whirlpool would drag him in, from +whose grasp escape would seem impossible. Twice the boy went out of +sight, but he had reappeared the second time, although frightfully near +the most dangerous part of the river. The rush of waters here was +tremendous, and no one had ever dared to approach it, even in a canoe, +lest he should be dashed to pieces. The youth redoubled his exertions. +Three times he was about to grasp the child, when some stronger eddy +would toss it from him. One final effort he makes; the child is held +aloft by his strong right arm, but a cry of horror bursts from the lips +of every spectator as boy and man shoot over the falls and vanish in +the seething waters below. + +"There they are!" shouted the mother a moment later, in a delirium of +joy. "See! they are safe! Great God, I thank Thee!" And sure enough +they emerged unharmed from the boiling vortex, and in a few minutes +reached a low place in the bank and were drawn up by their friends, the +boy senseless, but still alive, and the youth almost exhausted. "God +will give you a reward," solemnly spoke the grateful woman. "He will +do great things for you in return for this day's work, and the +blessings of thousands besides mine will attend you." + +The youth was George Washington. + +"Your Grace has not the organ of animal courage largely developed," +said a phrenologist, who was examining Wellington's head. "You are +right," replied the Iron Duke, "and but for my sense of duty I should +have retreated in my first fight." That first fight, on an Indian +field, was one of the most terrible on record. + +In the reverses which followed Napoleon, he met the allies at Arcis. A +live shell having fallen in front of one of his young battalions, which +recoiled and wavered in expectation of an explosion, Napoleon, to +reassure them, spurred his charger toward the instrument of +destruction, made him smell the burning match, waited unshaken for the +explosion, and was blown up. Rolling in the dust with his mutilated +steed, and rising without a wound amid the plaudits of his soldiers, he +calmly called for another horse, and continued to brave the grape-shot, +and to fly into the thickest of the battle. + +When General Jackson was a judge and was holding court in a small +settlement, a border ruffian, a murderer and desperado, came into the +court-room with brutal violence and interrupted the court. The judge +ordered him to be arrested. The officer did not dare to approach him. +"Call a posse," said the judge, "and arrest him." But they also shrank +in fear from the ruffian. "Call me, then," said Jackson; "this court +is adjourned for five minutes." He left the bench, walked straight up +to the man, and with his eagle eye actually cowed the ruffian, who +dropped his weapons, afterwards saying, "There was something in his eye +I could not resist." + +One of the last official acts of the late President Carnot, of France, +was the sending of a medal of the French Legion of Honor to a little +American girl, who lives in Indiana. While a train on the Pan Handle +Railroad, having on board several distinguished Frenchmen, was bound to +Chicago and the World's Fair, Jennie Carey, who was then ten years old, +discovered that a trestle was on fire, and that if the train, which was +nearly due, entered it a dreadful wreck would take place. Thereupon +she ran out upon the track to a place where she could be seen from some +little distance. Then she took off her red flannel skirt and, when the +train came in view, waved it back and forth across the track. It was +seen, and the train stopped. On board of it were seven hundred people, +many of whom must have suffered death but for Jennie's courage and +presence of mind. When they returned to France, the Frenchmen brought +the occurrence to the notice of President Carnot, and the result was +the sending of the medal of this famous French society, the purpose of +which is the honoring of bravery and merit, wherever they may be found. + +After the battle of Fort Donelson, the wounded were hauled down the +hill in rough board wagons, and most of them died before they reached +St. Louis. One blue-eyed boy of nineteen, with both arms and both legs +shattered, had lain a long time and was neglected. He said, "Why, you +see they couldn't stop to bother with us because they had to take the +fort. When they took it we all forgot our sufferings and shouted for +joy, even to the dying." + +Louis IX. of France was captured by the Turks at the battle of +Mansoora, during the Seventh Crusade, and his wife Marguerite, with a +babe at the breast, was in Damietta, many miles away. The Infidels +surrounded the city, and pressed the garrison so hard that it was +decided to capitulate. The queen summoned the knights, and told them +that she at least would die in armor upon the ramparts before the enemy +should become masters of Damietta. + + "Before her words they thrilled like leaves + When winds are in the wood; + And a deepening murmur told of men + Roused to a loftier mood." + + +Grasping lance and shield, they vowed to defend their queen and the +cross to the last. Damietta was saved. + +Pyrrhus marched to Sparta to reinstate the deposed Cleonymus, and +quietly pitched his tents before Laconia, not anticipating resistance. +In consternation, the Spartans in council decided to send their women +to Crete for safety. But the women met and asked Queen Archidamia to +remonstrate. She went to the council, sword in hand, and told the men +that their wives did not care to live after Sparta was destroyed. + + "We are brave men's mothers, and brave men's wives; + We are ready to do and dare; + We are ready to man your walls with our lives, + And string your bows with our hair." + + +They hurried to the walls and worked all night, aiding the men in +digging trenches. When Pyrrhus attacked the city next day, his repulse +was so emphatic that he withdrew from Laconia. + +Charles V. of Spain passed through Thuringia in 1547, on his return to +Swabia after the battle of Muehlburg. He wrote to Catherine, Countess +Dowager of Schwartzburg, promising that her subjects should not be +molested in their persons or property if they would supply the Spanish +soldiers with provisions at a reasonable price. On approaching +Eudolstadt, General Alva and Prince Henry of Brunswick, with his sons, +invited themselves, by a messenger sent forward, to breakfast with the +Countess, who had no choice but to ratify so delicate a request from +the commander of an army. Just as the guests were seated at a generous +repast, the Countess was called from the hall and told that the +Spaniards were using violence and driving away the cattle of the +peasants. + +Quietly arming all her retinue, she bolted and barred all the gates and +doors of the castle, and returned to the banquet to complain of the +breach of faith. General Alva told her that such was the custom of +war, adding that such trifling disorders were not to be heeded. "That +we shall presently see," said Catharine; "my poor subjects must have +their own again, or, as God lives, prince's blood for oxen's blood!" +The doors were opened, and armed men took the places of the waiters +behind the chairs of the guests. Henry changed color; then, as the +best way out of a bad scrape, laughed loudly, and ended by praising the +splendid acting of his hostess, and promising that Alva should order +the cattle restored at once. Not until a courier returned, saying that +the order had been obeyed, and all damages settled satisfactorily, did +the armed waiters leave. The Countess then thanked her guests for the +honor they had done her castle, and they retired with protestations of +their distinguished consideration. + +It was the heroic devotion of an Indian girl that saved the life of +Captain John Smith, when the powerful King Powhatan had decreed his +death. Ill could the struggling colony spare him at that time. + +When the consul shouted that the bridge was tottering, Lartius and +Herminius sought safety in flight. But Horatius strode still nearer +the foe, the single champion of his country and liberty, and dared the +ninety thousand to come on. Dead stillness fell upon the Tuscans, so +astonished were they at the audacity of the Roman. He first broke the +awful silence, so deep that his clear, strong voice could be heard by +thousands in both armies, between which rolled the Tiber, as he +denounced the baseness and perfidy of the invaders. Not until his +words were drowned by the loud crash of fiercely disrupturing timbers, +and the sullen splash of the dark river, did his enemies hurl their +showers of arrows and javelins. Then, dexterously warding off the +missiles with his shield, he plunged into the Tiber. Although stabbed +in the hip by a Tuscan spear which lamed him for life, he swam in +safety to Rome. + +"It is a bad omen," said Eric the Red, when his horse slipped and fell +on the way to his ship, moored on the coast of Greenland, in readiness +for a voyage of discovery. "Ill-fortune would be mine should I dare +venture now upon the sea." So he returned to his house, but his young +son Leif decided to go, and, with a crew of thirty-five men, sailed +southward in search of the unknown shore upon which Captain Biarni had +been driven by a storm, while sailing in another Viking ship two or +three years before. The first land that they saw was probably +Labrador, a barren, rugged plain. Leif called this country Heluland, +or the land of flat stones. Sailing onward many days, he came to a +low, level coast thickly covered with woods, on account of which he +called the country Markland, probably the modern Nova Scotia. Sailing +onward, they came to an island which they named Vinland on account of +the abundance of delicious wild grapes in the woods. This was in the +year 1000. Here where the city of Newport, R. I., stands, they spent +many months, and then returned to Greenland with their vessel loaded +with grapes and strange kinds of wood. The voyage was successful, and +no doubt Eric was sorry he had been frightened by the bad omen. + +May 10, 1796, Napoleon carried the bridge at Lodi, in the face of the +Austrian batteries. Fourteen cannon--some accounts say thirty--were +trained upon the French end of the structure. Behind them were six +thousand troops. Napoleon massed four thousand grenadiers at the head +of the bridge, with a battalion of three hundred carbineers in front. +At the tap of the drum the foremost assailants wheeled from the cover +of the street wall under a terrible hail of grape and canister, and +attempted to pass the gateway to the bridge. The front ranks went down +like stalks of grain before a reaper; the column staggered and reeled +backward, and the valiant grenadiers were appalled by the task before +them. Without a word or a look of reproach, Napoleon placed himself at +their head, and his aids and generals rushed to his side. Forward +again, this time over heaps of dead that choked the passage, and a +quick run, counted by seconds only, carried the column across two +hundred yards of clear space, scarcely a shot from the Austrians taking +effect beyond the point where the platoons wheeled for the first leap. +So sudden and so miraculous was it all that the Austrian artillerists +abandoned their guns instantly, and their supports fled in a panic +instead of rushing to the front and meeting the French onslaught. This +Napoleon had counted on in making the bold attack. The contrast +between Napoleon's slight figure and the massive grenadiers suggested +the nickname "Little Corporal." + +The great secret of the success of Joan of Arc was the boldness of her +attacks. + +When Stephen of Colonna fell into the hands of base assailants, and +they asked him in derision, "Where is now your fortress?" "Here," was +his bold reply, placing his hand upon his heart. + +It was after the Mexican War when General McClellan was employed as a +topographical engineer in surveying the Pacific coast. From his +headquarters at Vancouver he had gone south to the Columbia River with +two companions, a soldier and a servant. One evening he received word +that the chiefs of the Columbia River tribes desired to confer with +him. From the messenger's manner he suspected that the Indians meant +mischief. He warned his companions that they must be ready to leave +camp at a moment's notice. Mounting his horse, he rode boldly into the +Indian village. About thirty chiefs were holding council. McClellan +was led into the circle, and placed at the right hand of Saltese. He +was familiar with the Chinook jargon, and could understand every word +spoken in the council. Saltese made known the grievance of the tribes. +Two Indians had been captured by a party of white pioneers and hanged +for theft. Retaliation for this outrage seemed indispensable. The +chiefs pondered long, but had little to say. McClellan had been on +friendly terms with them, and was not responsible for the forest +executions. Still, he was a white man, and the chiefs had vowed +vengeance against the race. The council was prolonged for hours before +sentence was passed, and then Saltese, in the name of the head men of +the tribes, decreed that McClellan should immediately be put to death +in retaliation for the hanging of the two Indian thieves. + +McClellan had said nothing. He had known that argument and pleas for +justice or mercy would be of no avail. He had sat motionless, +apparently indifferent to his fate. By his listlessness he had thrown +his captors off their guard. When the sentence was passed he acted +like a flash. Flinging his left arm around the neck of Saltese, he +whipped out his revolver and held it close to the chief's temple. +"Revoke that sentence, or I shall kill you this instant!" he cried, +with his fingers clicking the trigger. "I revoke it!" exclaimed +Saltese, fairly livid from fear. "I must have your word that I can +leave this council in safety." "You have the word of Saltese," was the +quick response. McClellan knew how sacred was the pledge which he had +received. The revolver was lowered. Saltese was released from the +embrace of the strong arm. McClellan strode out of the tent with his +revolver in his hand. Not a hand was raised against him. He mounted +his horse and rode to his camp, where his two followers were ready to +spring into the saddle and to escape from the villages. He owed his +life to his quickness of perception, and to his accurate knowledge of +Indian character. + +In 1866, Rufus Choate spoke to an audience of nearly five thousand in +Lowell in favor of the candidacy of James Buchanan for the presidency. +The floor of the great hall began to sink, settling more and more as he +proceeded with his address, until a sound of cracking timber below +would have precipitated a stampede with fatal results but for the +coolness of B. F. Butler, who presided. Telling the people to remain +quiet, he said that he would see if there were any cause for alarm. He +found the supports of the floor in so bad a condition that the +slightest applause would be likely to bury the audience in the ruins of +the building. Returning rather leisurely to the platform, he whispered +to Choate as he passed, "We shall all be in ---- in five minutes," then +he told the crowd that there was no immediate danger if they would +slowly disperse, although he thought it prudent to adjourn to a place +where there would be no risk whatever. The post of danger, he added, +was on the platform, which was most weakly supported, therefore he and +those with him would be the last to leave. No doubt many lives were +saved by his coolness. + +Many distinguished foreign and American statesmen were present at a +fashionable dinner party where wine was freely poured, but Schuyler +Colfax, then vice-president of the United States, declined to drink +from a proffered cup. "Colfax dares not drink," sneered a Senator who +had already taken too much. "You are right," said the Vice-President, +"I dare not." + +When Grant was in Houston several years ago, he was given a rousing +reception. Naturally hospitable, and naturally inclined to like a man +of Grant's make-up, the Houstonites determined to go beyond any other +Southern city in the way of a banquet and other manifestations of their +good-will and hospitality. They made great preparations for the +dinner, the committee taking great pains to have the finest wines that +could be procured for the table that night. When the time came to +serve the wine, the head-waiter went first to Grant. Without a word +the general quietly turned down all the glasses at his plate. This +movement was a great surprise to the Texans, but they were equal to the +occasion. Without a single word being spoken, every man along the line +of the long tables turned his glasses down, and there was not a drop of +wine taken that night. + +A deep sewer at Noyon, France, had been opened for repairs, and +carelessly left at night without covering or lights to warn people of +danger. Late at night four men stumbled in, and lay some time before +their situation was known in the town. No one dared go to the aid of +the men, then unconscious from breathing noxious gases, except +Catherine Vassen, a servant girl of eighteen. She insisted on being +lowered at once. Fastening a rope around two of the men, she aided in +raising them and restoring them to consciousness. Descending again, +she had just tied a rope around a third man, when she felt her breath +failing. Tying another rope to her long, curly hair, she swooned, but +was drawn up with the man, to be quickly revived by fresh air and +stimulants. The fourth man was dead when his body was pulled up, on +account of the delay from the fainting of Catherine. + +Two French officers at Waterloo were advancing to charge a greatly +superior force. One, observing that the other showed signs of fear, +said, "Sir, I believe you are frightened." "Yes, I am," was the reply, +"and if you were half as much frightened, you would run away." + +"That's a brave man," said Wellington, when he saw a soldier turn pale +as he marched against a battery; "he knows his danger, and faces it." + +"There are many cardinals and bishops at Worms," said a friend to +Luther, "and they will burn your body to ashes as they did that of John +Huss." Luther replied: "Although they should make a fire that should +reach from Worms to Wittenberg, and that should flame up to heaven, in +the Lord's name I would pass through it and appear before them." He +said to another: "I would enter Worms though there were as many devils +there as there are tiles upon the roofs of the houses." Another said: +"Duke George will surely arrest you." He replied: "It is my duty to +go, and I will go, though it rain Duke Georges for nine days together." + +"Here I stand, I cannot do otherwise, God help me," exclaimed Luther at +the Diet of Worms, facing his foes. + +A Western paper recently invited the surviving Union and Confederate +officers to give an account of the bravest act observed by each during +the Civil War. Colonel Thomas W. Higginson said that at a dinner at +Beaufort, S. C., where wine flowed freely and ribald jests were +bandied, Dr. Miner, a slight, boyish fellow who did not drink, was told +that he could not go until he had drunk a toast, told a story, or sung +a song. He replied: "I cannot sing, but I will give a toast, although +I must drink it in water. It is 'Our Mothers.'" The men were so +affected and ashamed that some took him by the hand and thanked him for +displaying courage greater than that required to walk up to the mouth +of a cannon. + +It took great courage for the commercial Quaker, John Bright, to +espouse a cause which called down upon his head the derision and scorn +and hatred of the Parliament. For years he rested under a cloud of +obloquy, but Bright was made of stern stuff. It was only his strength +of character and masterly eloquence, which saved him from political +annihilation. To a man who boasted that his ancestors came over with +the Conquerors, he replied, "I never heard that they did anything +else." A Tory lordling said, when Bright was ill, that Providence had +inflicted upon Bright, for the measure of his talents, disease of the +brain. When Bright went back into the Commons he replied: "This may be +so, but it will be some consolation to the friends and family of the +noble lord to know that that disease is one which even Providence +cannot inflict upon him." + +"When a resolute young fellow steps up to the great bully, the World, +and takes him boldly by the beard," says Holmes, "he is often surprised +to find it come off in his hand, and that it was only tied on to scare +away timid adventurers." + +It takes courage for a young man to stand firmly erect while others are +bowing and fawning for praise and power. It takes courage to wear +threadbare clothes while your comrades dress in broadcloth. It takes +courage to remain in honest poverty when others grow rich by fraud. It +takes courage to say "No" squarely when those around you say "Yes." It +takes courage to do your duty in silence and obscurity while others +prosper and grow famous although neglecting sacred obligations. It +takes courage to unmask your true self, to show your blemishes to a +condemning world, and to pass for what you really are. + +It takes courage and pluck to be outvoted, beaten, laughed at, scoffed, +ridiculed, derided, misunderstood, misjudged, to stand alone with all +the world against you, but + + "They are slaves who dare not be + In the right with two or three." + + +"There is never wanting a dog to bark at you." + +"An honest man is not the worse because a dog barks at him." + + "Let any man show the world that he feels + Afraid of its bark, and 'twill fly at his heels. + Let him fearlessly face it, 't will leave him alone, + And 't will fawn at his feet if he fling it a bone." + + +We live ridiculously for fear of being thought ridiculous. + + "'Tis he is the coward who proves false to his vows, + To his manhood, his honor, for a laugh or a sneer: + 'Tis he is the hero who stands firm, though alone, + For the truth and the right without flinching or fear." + + +The youth who starts out by being afraid to speak what he thinks will +usually end by being afraid to think what he wishes. + +How we shrink from an act of our own. We live as others live. Custom +or fashion dictates, or your doctor or minister, and they in turn dare +not depart from their schools. Dress, living, servants, carriages, +everything must conform, or be ostracized. Who dares conduct his +household or business affairs in his own way, and snap his fingers at +Dame Grundy? + +Many a man has marched up to the cannon's mouth in battle who dared not +face public opinion or oppose Mrs. Grundy. + +It takes courage for a public man not to bend the knee to popular +prejudice. It takes courage to refuse to follow custom when it is +injurious to his health and morals. To espouse an unpopular cause in +Congress requires more courage than to lead a charge in battle. How +much easier for a politician to prevaricate and dodge an issue than to +stand squarely on his feet like a man. + +As a rule, eccentricity is a badge of power, but how many women would +not rather strangle their individuality than be tabooed by Mrs. Grundy? +Yet fear is really the only thing to fear. + +"Whoever you may be," said Sainte-Beuve, "great genius, distinguished +talent, artist honorable or amiable, the qualities for which you +deserve to be praised will all be turned against you. Were you a +Virgil, the pious and sensible singer _par excellence_, there are +people who will call you an effeminate poet. Were you a Horace, there +are people who will reproach you with the very purity and delicacy of +your taste. If you were a Shakespeare, some one will call you a +drunken savage. If you were a Goethe, more than one Pharisee will +proclaim you the most selfish of egotists." + +As the strongest man has a weakness somewhere, so the greatest hero is +a coward somewhere. Peter was courageous enough to draw his sword to +defend his master, but he could not stand the ridicule and the finger +of scorn of the maidens in the high priest's hall, and he actually +denied even the acquaintance of the master he had declared he would die +for. + +"I will take the responsibility," said Andrew Jackson, on a memorable +occasion, and his words have become proverbial. Not even Congress +dared to oppose the edicts of John Quincy Adams. + +If a man would accomplish anything in this world, he must not be afraid +of assuming responsibilities. Of course it takes courage to run the +risk of failure, to be subjected to criticism for an unpopular cause, +to expose one's self to the shafts of everybody's ridicule, but the man +who is not true to himself, who cannot carry out the sealed orders +placed in his hands at his birth, regardless of the world's yes or no, +of its approval or disapproval, the man who has not the courage to +trace the pattern of his own destiny, which no other soul knows but his +own, can never rise to the true dignity of manhood. All the world +loves courage; youth craves it; they want to hear about it, they want +to read about it. The fascination of the "blood and thunder" novels +and of the cheap story papers for youth are based upon this idea of +courage. If the boys cannot get the real article, they will take a +counterfeit. + +Don't be like Uriah Heep, begging everybody's pardon for taking the +liberty of being in the world. There is nothing attractive in +timidity, nothing lovable in fear. Both are deformities and are +repulsive. Manly courage is dignified and graceful. The worst manners +in the world are those of persons conscious "of being beneath their +position, and trying to conceal it or make up for it by style." + +Bruno, condemned to be burned alive in Rome, said to his judge: "You +are more afraid to pronounce my sentence than I am to receive it." +Anne Askew, racked until her bones were dislocated, never flinched, but +looked her tormentor calmly in the face and refused to abjure her faith. + +"We are afraid of truth, afraid of fortune, afraid of death, and afraid +of each other." "Half a man's wisdom goes with his courage," said +Emerson. Physicians used to teach that courage depends on the +circulation of the blood in the arteries, and that during passion, +anger, trials of strength, wrestling or fighting, a large amount of +blood is collected in the arteries, and does not pass to the veins. A +strong pulse is a fortune in itself. + +"Rage," said Shaftesbury, "can make a coward forget himself and fight." + +"I should have thought fear would have kept you from going so far," +said a relative who found the little boy Nelson wandering a long +distance from home. "Fear?" said the future admiral, "I don't know +him." + +"Doubt indulged becomes doubt realized." To determine to do anything +is half the battle. "To think a thing is impossible is to make it so." +_Courage is victory, timidity is defeat_. + +That simple shepherd-lad, David, fresh from his flocks, marching +unattended and unarmed, save with his shepherd's staff and sling, to +confront the colossal Goliath with his massive armor, is the sublimest +audacity the world has ever seen. + +"Dent, I wish you would get down, and see what is the matter with that +leg there," said Grant, when he and Colonel Dent were riding through +the thickest of a fire that had become so concentrated and murderous +that his troops had all been driven back. "I guess looking after your +horse's legs can wait," said Dent; "it is simply murder for us to sit +here." "All right," said Grant, "if you don't want to see to it, I +will." He dismounted, untwisted a piece of telegraph wire which had +begun to cut the horse's leg, examined it deliberately, and climbed +into his saddle. "Dent," said he, "when you've got a horse that you +think a great deal of, you should never take any chances with him. If +that wire had been left there for a little time longer he would have +gone dead lame, and would perhaps have been ruined for life." + +Wellington said that at Waterloo the hottest of the battle raged round +a farmhouse, with an orchard surrounded by a thick hedge, which was so +important a point in the British position that orders were given to +hold it at any hazard or sacrifice. At last the powder and ball ran +short and the hedges took fire, surrounding the orchard with a wall of +flame. A messenger had been sent for ammunition, and soon two loaded +wagons came galloping toward the farmhouse. "The driver of the first +wagon, with the reckless daring of an English boy, spurred his +struggling and terrified horses through the burning heap; but the +flames rose fiercely round, and caught the powder, which exploded in an +instant, sending wagon, horses, and rider in fragments into the air. +For an instant the driver of the second wagon paused, appalled by his +comrade's fate; the next, observing that the flames, beaten back for +the moment by the explosion, afforded him one desperate chance, sent +his horses at the smouldering breach and, amid the deafening cheers of +the garrison, landed his terrible cargo safely within. Behind him the +flames closed up, and raged more fiercely than ever." + +At the battle of Friedland a cannon-ball came over the heads of the +French soldiers, and a young soldier instinctively dodged. Napoleon +looked at him and smilingly said: "My friend, if that ball were +destined for you, though you were to burrow a hundred feet under ground +it would be sure to find you there." + +When the mine in front of Petersburg was finished, the fuse was +lighted, and the Union troops were drawn up ready to charge the enemy's +works as soon as the explosion should make a breach. But seconds, +minutes, and tens of minutes passed, without a sound from the mine, and +the suspense became painful. Lieutenant Doughty and Sergeant Kees +volunteered to examine the fuse. Through the long subterranean +galleries they hurried in silence, not knowing but they were advancing +to a horrible death. They found the defect, fired the train anew, and +soon a terrible upheaval of earth gave the signal to march to victory. + +At the battle of Copenhagen, as Nelson walked the deck slippery with +blood and covered with the dead, he said: "This is warm work, and this +day may be the last to any of us in a moment. But, mark me, I would +not be elsewhere for thousands." At the battle of Trafalgar, when +Nelson was shot and was being carried below, he covered his face, that +those fighting might not know their chief had fallen. + +In a skirmish at Salamanca, while the enemy's guns were pouring shot +into his regiment, Sir William Napier's men became disobedient. He at +once ordered a halt, and flogged four of the ringleaders under fire. +The men yielded at once, and then marched three miles under a heavy +cannonade as coolly as if it were a review. + +Execute your resolutions immediately. Thoughts are but dreams till +their effects be tried. Does competition trouble you? work away; what +is your competitor but a man? _Conquer your place in the world_, for +all things serve a brave soul. Combat difficulty manfully; sustain +misfortune bravely; endure poverty nobly; encounter disappointment +courageously. The influence of the brave man is a magnetism which +creates an epidemic of noble zeal in all about him. Every day sends to +the grave obscure men, who have only remained in obscurity because +their timidity has prevented them from making a first effort; and who, +if they could have been induced to begin, would, in all probability, +have gone great lengths in the career of usefulness and fame. "No +great deed is done," says George Eliot, "by falterers who ask for +certainty." The brave, cheerful man will survive his blighted hopes +and disappointments, take them for just what they are, lessons and +perhaps blessings in disguise, and will march boldly and cheerfully +forward in the battle of life. Or, if necessary, he will bear his ills +with a patience and calm endurance deeper than ever plummet sounded. +He is the true hero. + + Then to side with Truth is noble when we share her wretched crust, + Ere her cause bring fame and profit, and 't is prosperous to be just; + Then it is the brave man chooses, while the coward stands aside, + Doubting in his abject spirit, till his Lord is crucified. + LOWELL. + + Our doubts are traitors, + And make us lose the good we oft might win, + By fearing to attempt. + SHAKESPEARE. + + +After the great inward struggle was over, and he had determined to +remain loyal to his principles, Thomas More walked cheerfully to the +block. His wife called him a fool for staying in a dark, damp, filthy +prison when he might have his liberty by merely renouncing his +doctrines, as some of the bishops had done. But he preferred death to +dishonor. His daughter allowed the power of love to drive away fear. +She remained true to her father when all others, even her mother, had +forsaken him. After his head had been cut off and exhibited on a pole +on London Bridge, the poor girl begged it of the authorities, and +requested that it be buried in the coffin with her. Her request was +granted, for her death occurred soon. + +When Sir Walter Raleigh came to the scaffold he was very faint, and +began his speech to the crowd by saying that during the last two days +he had been visited by two ague fits. "If, therefore, you perceive any +weakness in me, I beseech you ascribe it to my sickness rather than to +myself." He took the axe and kissed the blade, and said to the +sheriff: "'T is a sharp medicine, but a sound cure for all diseases." + +Don't waste time dreaming of obstacles you may never encounter, or in +crossing bridges you have not reached. Don't fool with a nettle! +Grasp with firmness if you would rob it of its sting. To half will and +to hang forever in the balance is to lose your grip on life. + +Abraham Lincoln's boyhood was one long struggle with poverty, with +little education, and no influential friends. When at last he had +begun the practice of law, it required no little daring to cast his +fortune with the weaker side in politics, and thus imperil what small +reputation he had gained. Only the most sublime moral courage could +have sustained him as President to hold his ground against hostile +criticism and a long train of disaster; to issue the Emancipation +Proclamation; to support Grant and Stanton against the clamor of the +politicians and the press; and through it all to do the right as God +gave him to see the right. + +Lincoln never shrank from espousing an unpopular cause when he believed +it to be right. At the time when it almost cost a young lawyer his +bread and butter to defend the fugitive slave, and when other lawyers +had refused, Lincoln would always plead the cause of the unfortunate +whenever an opportunity presented. "Go to Lincoln," people would say, +when these hounded fugitives were seeking protection; "he's not afraid +of any cause, if it's right." + +As Salmon P. Chase left the court room after making an impassioned plea +for the runaway slave girl Matilda, a man looked at him in surprise and +said: "There goes a fine young fellow who has just ruined himself." +But in thus ruining himself Chase had taken the first important step in +a career in which he became Governor of Ohio, United States Senator +from Ohio, Secretary of the United States Treasury, and Chief Justice +of the United States Supreme Court. + +At the trial of William Penn for having spoken at a Quaker meeting, the +recorder, not satisfied with the first verdict, said to the jury: "We +will have a verdict by the help of God, or you shall starve for it." +"You are Englishmen," said Penn; "mind your privileges, give not away +your right." At last the jury, after two days and two nights without +food, returned a verdict of "Not guilty." The recorder fined them +forty marks apiece for their independence. + +What cared Christ for the jeers of the crowd? The palsied hand moved, +the blind saw, the leper was made whole, the dead spake, despite the +ridicule and scoffs of the spectators. + +What cared Wendell Phillips for rotten eggs, derisive scorn, and +hisses? In him "at last the scornful world had met its match." Were +Beecher and Gough to be silenced by the rude English mobs that came to +extinguish them? No! they held their ground and compelled unwilling +thousands to hear and to heed. Did Anna Dickinson leave the platform +when the pistol bullets of the Molly Maguires flew about her head? She +silenced those pistols by her courage and her arguments. + +"What the world wants is a Knox, who dares to preach on with a musket +leveled at his head, a Garrison, who is not afraid of a jail, or a mob, +or a scaffold erected in front of his door. + + "Storms may howl around thee, + Foes may hunt and hound thee: + Shall they overpower thee? + Never, never, never." + + +When General Butler was sent with nine thousand men to quell the New +York riots, he arrived in advance of his troops, and found the streets +thronged with an angry mob, which had already hanged more than one man +to lamp-posts. Without waiting for his men, Butler went to the place +where the crowd was most dense, overturned an ash barrel, stood upon +it, and began: "Delegates from Five Points, fiends from hell, you have +murdered your superiors," and the blood-stained crowd quailed before +the courageous words of a single man in a city which Mayor Fernando +Wood could not restrain with the aid of police and militia. + +"Our enemies are before us," exclaimed the Spartans at Thermopylae. +"And we are before them," was the cool reply of Leonidas. "Deliver +your arms," came the message from Xerxes. "Come and take them," was +the answer Leonidas sent back. A Persian soldier said: "You will not +be able to see the sun for flying javelins and arrows." "Then we will +fight in the shade," replied a Lacedemonian. What wonder that a +handful of such men checked the march of the greatest host that ever +trod the earth. + +"It is impossible," said a staff officer, when Napoleon gave directions +for a daring plan. "Impossible!" thundered the great commander, +"_impossible_ is the adjective of fools!" Napoleon went to the edge of +his possibility. + +Grant never knew when he was beaten. When told that he was surrounded +by the enemy at Belmont, he quietly replied: "Well, then we must cut +our way out." + +The courageous man is an example to the intrepid. His influence is +magnetic. He creates an epidemic of nobleness. Men follow him, even +to the death. + +The spirit of courage will transform the whole temper of your life. +"The wise and active conquer difficulties by daring to attempt them. +Sloth and folly shiver and sicken at the sight of trial and hazard, and +make the impossibility they fear." + +"The hero," says Emerson, "is the man who is immovably centred." + +Emin Pasha, the explorer of Africa, was left behind by his exploring +party under circumstances that were thought certainly fatal, and his +death was reported with great assurance. Early the next winter, as his +troop was on its toilsome but exciting way through Central Africa, it +came upon a most wretched sight. A party of natives had been kidnapped +by the slave-hunters, and dragged in chains thus far toward the land of +bondage. But small-pox had set in, and the miserable company had been +abandoned to their fate. Emin sent his men ahead, and stayed behind in +this camp of death to act as physician and nurse. How many lives he +saved is not known, though it is known that he nearly lost his own. +The age of chivalry is not gone by. This is as knightly a deed as poet +ever chronicled. + +A mouse that dwelt near the abode of a great magician was kept in such +constant distress by its fear of a cat, that the magician, taking pity +on it, turned it into a cat itself. Immediately it began to suffer +from its fear of a dog, so the magician turned it into a dog. Then it +began to suffer from fear of a tiger. The magician therefore turned it +into a tiger. Then it began to suffer from fear of hunters, and the +magician said in disgust: "Be a mouse again. As you have only the +heart of a mouse, it is impossible to help you by giving you the body +of a nobler animal." + +Men who have dared have moved the world, often before reaching the +prime of life. It is astonishing what daring to begin and perseverance +have enabled even youths to achieve. Alexander, who ascended the +throne at twenty, had conquered the known world before dying at +thirty-three. Julius Caesar captured eight hundred cities, conquered +three hundred nations, and defeated three million men, became a great +orator and one of the greatest statesmen known, and still was a young +man. Washington was appointed adjutant-general at nineteen, was sent +at twenty-one as an ambassador to treat with the French, and won his +first battle as a colonel at twenty-two. Lafayette was made general of +the whole French army at twenty. Charlemagne was master of France and +Germany at thirty. Conde was only twenty-two when he conquered at +Rocroi. Galileo was but eighteen when he saw the principle of the +pendulum in the swinging lamp in the cathedral at Pisa. Peel was in +Parliament at twenty-one. Gladstone was in Parliament before he was +twenty-two, and at twenty-four he was Lord of the Treasury. Elizabeth +Barrett Browning was proficient in Greek and Latin at twelve; De +Quincey at eleven. Robert Browning wrote at eleven poetry of no mean +order. Cowley, who sleeps in Westminster Abbey, published a volume of +poems at fifteen. N. P. Willis won lasting fame as a poet before +leaving college. Macaulay was a celebrated author before he was +twenty-three. Luther was but twenty-nine when he nailed his famous +thesis to the door of the bishop and defied the pope. Nelson was a +lieutenant in the British Navy before he was twenty. He was but +forty-seven when he received his death wound at Trafalgar. Charles the +Twelfth was only nineteen when he gained the battle of Narva; at +thirty-six, Cortez was the conqueror of Mexico; at thirty-two, Clive +had established the British power in India. Hannibal, the greatest of +military commanders, was only thirty when, at Cannae, he dealt an +almost annihilating blow at the republic of Rome; and Napoleon was only +twenty-seven when, on the plains of Italy, he outgeneraled and +defeated, one after another, the veteran marshals of Austria. + +Equal courage and resolution are often shown by men who have passed the +allotted limit of life. Victor Hugo and Wellington were both in their +prime after they had reached the age of threescore years and ten. +George Bancroft wrote some of his best historical work when he was +eighty-five. Gladstone ruled England with a strong hand at +eighty-four, and was a marvel of literary and scholarly ability. + +"Not every vessel that sails from Tarshish will bring back the gold of +Ophir. But shall it therefore rot in the harbor? No! Give its sails +to the wind!" + +Shakespeare says: "He is not worthy of the honeycomb that shuns the +hive because the bees have stings." + + "The brave man is not he who feels no fear, + For that were stupid and irrational; + But he whose noble soul its fear subdues + And bravely dares the danger nature shrinks from." + + +The inscription on the gates of Busyrane: "Be bold." On the second +gate: "Be bold, be bold, and ever more be bold;" the third gate: "Be +not too bold." + +Many a bright youth has accomplished nothing of worth simply because he +did not dare to commence. + +Begin! Begin!! Begin!!! + + +Whatever people may think of you, do that which you believe to be +right. Be alike indifferent to censure or praise.--PYTHAGORAS. + +Fear makes man a slave to others. This is the tyrant's chain. Anxiety +is a form of cowardice embittering life.--CHANNING. + +Courage is generosity of the highest order, for the brave are prodigal +of the most precious things. Our blood is nearer and dearer to us than +our money, and our life than our estate. Women are more taken with +courage than with generosity.--COLTON. + + Who chooses me must give and hazard all he hath. + _Merchant of Venice_, Inscription on Leaden Casket. + + I dare to do all that may become a man: + Who dares do more is none. + SHAKESPEAKE. + +For man's great actions are performed in minor struggles. There are +obstinate and unknown braves who defend themselves inch by inch in the +shadows against the fatal invasion of want and turpitude. There are +noble and mysterious triumphs which no eye sees, no renown rewards, and +no flourish of trumpets salutes. Life, misfortune, isolation, +abandonment, and poverty are battlefields which have their +heroes.--VICTOR HUGO. + + Who waits until the wind shall silent keep, + Who never finds the ready hour to sow, + Who watcheth clouds, will have no time to reap. + HELEN HUNT JACKSON. + +Quit yourselves like men.--1 SAMUEL iv. 9. + + + + +CHAPTER III. + +THE WILL AND THE WAY. + +"The 'way' will be found by a resolute will." + +"I will find a way or make one." + +Nothing is impossible to the man who can will.--MIRABEAU. + +A politician weakly and amiably in the right is no match for a +politician tenaciously and pugnaciously in the wrong.--E. P. WHIPPLE. + + The iron will of one stout heart shall make a thousand quail; + A feeble dwarf, dauntlessly resolved, will turn the tide of battle, + And rally to a nobler strife the giants that had fled. + TUPPER. + +"Man alone can perform the impossible. They can who think they can. +Character is a perfectly educated will." + +The education of the will is the object of our existence. For the +resolute and determined there is time and opportunity.--EMERSON. + +Invincible determination, and a right nature, are the levers that move +the world.--PRESIDENT PORTER. + +In the lexicon of youth which fate reserves for a bright manhood there +is no such word as fail.--BULWER. + +Perpetual pushing and assurance put a difficulty out of countenance and +make a seeming difficulty give way.--JEREMY COLLIER. + +When a firm and decisive spirit is recognized, it is curious to see how +the space clears around a man and leaves him room and freedom.--JOHN +FOSTER. + + The star of the unconquered will, + He rises in my breast, + Serene, and resolute and still, + And calm and self-possessed. + LONGFELLOW. + + +"As well can the Prince of Orange pluck the stars from the sky, as +bring the ocean to the wall of Leyden for your relief," was the +derisive shout of the Spanish soldiers when told that the Dutch fleet +would raise that terrible four months' siege of 1574. But from the +parched lips of William, tossing on his bed of fever at Rotterdam, had +issued the command: "_Break down the dikes: give Holland back to +ocean:_" and the people had replied: "Better a drowned land than a lost +land." They began to demolish dike after dike of the strong lines, +ranged one within another for fifteen miles to their city of the +interior. It was an enormous task; the garrison was starving; and the +besiegers laughed in scorn at the slow progress of the puny insects who +sought to rule the waves of the sea. But ever, as of old, heaven aids +those who help themselves. On the first and second of October a +violent equinoctial gale rolled the ocean inland, and swept the fleet +on the rising waters almost to the camp of the Spaniards. The next +morning the garrison sallied out to attack their enemies, but the +besiegers had fled in terror under cover of the darkness. The next day +the wind changed, and a counter tempest brushed the water, with the +fleet upon it, from the surface of Holland. The outer dikes were +replaced at once, leaving the North Sea within its old bounds. When +the flowers bloomed the following spring, a joyous procession marched +through the streets to found the University of Leyden, in commemoration +of the wonderful deliverance of the city. + + * * * * * * + +[Illustration: WALTER SCOTT] + +"The Wizard of the North." + + "So nigh is grandeur to our dust, + So near is God to man, + When Duty whispers low, 'Thou must,' + The youth replies, 'I can.'" + + * * * * * * + +At a dinner party given in 1837, at the residence of Chancellor Kent, +in New York city, some of the most distinguished men in the country +were invited, and among them was a young and rather melancholy and +reticent Frenchman. Professor Morse was one of the guests, and during +the evening he drew the attention of Mr. Gallatin, then a prominent +statesman, to the stranger, observing that his forehead indicated great +intellect. "Yes," replied Mr. Gallatin, touching his own forehead with +his finger, "there is a great deal in that head of his: but he has a +strange fancy. Can you believe it? He has the idea that he will one +day be the Emperor of France. Can you conceive anything more absurd?" + +It did seem absurd, for this reserved Frenchman was then a poor +adventurer, an exile from his country, without fortune or powerful +connections, and yet, fourteen years later, his idea became a +fact,--his dream of becoming Napoleon III. was realized. True, before +he accomplished his purpose there were long dreary years of +imprisonment, exile, disaster, and patient labor and hope, but he +gained his ambition at last. He was not scrupulous as to the means +employed to accomplish his ends, yet he is a remarkable example of what +pluck and energy can do. + +When it was proposed to unite England and America by steam, Dr. Lardner +delivered a lecture before the Royal Society "proving" that steamers +could never cross the Atlantic, because they could not carry coal +enough to produce steam during the whole voyage. The passage of the +steamship Sirius, which crossed in nineteen days, was fatal to +Lardner's theory. When it was proposed to build a vessel of iron, many +persons said: "Iron sinks--only wood can float:" but experiments proved +that the miracle of the prophet in making iron "swim" could be +repeated, and now not only ships of war, but merchant vessels, are +built of iron or steel. A will found a way to make iron float. + +Mr. Ingram, publisher of the "London Illustrated News," who lost his +life on Lake Michigan, walked ten miles to deliver a single paper +rather than disappoint a customer, when he began life as a newsdealer +at Nottingham, England. Does any one wonder that such a youth +succeeded? Once he rose at two o'clock in the morning and walked to +London to get some papers because there was no post to bring them. He +determined that his customers should not be disappointed. This is the +kind of will that finds a way. + +There is scarcely anything in all biography grander than the saying of +young Henry Fawcett, Gladstone's last Postmaster-General, to his +grief-stricken father, who had put out both his eyes by bird-shot +during a game hunt: "Never mind, father, blindness shall not interfere +with my success in life." One of the most pathetic sights in London +streets, long afterward, was Henry Fawcett, M. P., led everywhere by a +faithful daughter, who acted as amanuensis as well as guide to her +plucky father. Think of a young man, scarcely on the threshold of +active life, suddenly losing the sight of both eyes and yet, by mere +pluck and almost incomprehensible tenacity of purpose, lifting himself +into eminence, in any direction, to say nothing of becoming one of the +foremost men in a country noted for its great men. Most youth would +have succumbed to such a misfortune, and would never have been heard +from again. But fortunately for the world, there are yet left many +Fawcetts, many Prescotts, Parkmans, Cavanaghs. + +The courageous daughter who was eyes to her father was herself a +marvelous example of pluck and determination. For the first time in +the history of Oxford College, which reaches back centuries, she +succeeded in winning the post which had only been gained before by +great men, such as Gladstone,--the post of senior wrangler. This +achievement had had no parallel in history up to that date, and +attracted the attention of the whole civilized world. Not only had no +woman ever held this position before, but with few exceptions it had +only been held by men who in after life became highly distinguished. +Who can deny that where there is a will, as a rule, there's a way? + +When Grant was a boy he could not find "can't" in the dictionary. It +is the men who have no "can't" in their dictionaries that make things +move. + +"Circumstances," says Milton, "have rarely favored famous men. They +have fought their way to triumph through all sorts of opposing +obstacles." + +The true way to conquer circumstances is to be a greater circumstance +yourself. + +Yet, while desiring to impress in the most forcible manner possible the +fact that will-power is necessary to success, and that, other things +being equal, the greater the will-power, the grander and more complete +the success, we cannot indorse the preposterous theory that there is +nothing in circumstances or environments, or that any man, simply +because he has an indomitable will, may become a Bonaparte, a Pitt, a +Webster, a Beecher, a Lincoln. We must temper determination with +discretion, and support it with knowledge and common sense, or it will +only lead us to run our heads against posts. We must not expect to +overcome a stubborn fact by a stubborn will. We merely have the right +to assume that we can do anything within the limit of our utmost +faculty, strength, and endurance. Obstacles permanently insurmountable +bar our progress in some directions, but in any direction we may +reasonably hope and attempt to go, we shall find that the obstacles, as +a rule, are either not insurmountable or else not permanent. The +strong-willed, intelligent, persistent man will find or make a way +where, in the nature of things, a way can be found or made. + +Every schoolboy knows that circumstances do give clients to lawyers and +patients to physicians; place ordinary clergymen in extraordinary +pulpits; place sons of the rich at the head of immense corporations and +large houses, when they have very ordinary ability and scarcely any +experience, while poor young men with extraordinary abilities, good +education, good character, and large experience, often have to fight +their way for years to obtain even very ordinary situations. Every one +knows that there are thousands of young men, both in the city and in +the country, of superior ability, who seem to be compelled by +circumstances to remain in very ordinary positions for small pay, when +others about them are raised by money or family influence into +desirable places. In other words, we all know that the best men do not +always get the best places: circumstances do have a great deal to do +with our position, our salaries, and our station in life. + +Many young men who are nature's noblemen, who are natural leaders, are +working under superintendents, foremen, and managers infinitely their +inferiors, but whom circumstances have placed above them and will keep +there, unless some emergency makes merit indispensable. No, the race +is not always to the swift. + +Every one knows that there is not always a way where there is a will, +that labor does not always conquer all things; that there are things +impossible even to him that wills, however strongly; that one cannot +always make anything of himself he chooses; that there are limitations +in our very natures which no amount of will-power or industry can +overcome; that no amount of sun-staring can ever make an eagle out of a +crow. + +The simple truth is that a will strong enough to keep a man continually +striving for things not wholly beyond his powers will carry him in time +very far toward his chosen goal. + +The greatest thing a man can do in this world is to make the most +possible out of the stuff that has been given to him. This is success, +and there is no other. + +While it is true that our circumstances or environments do affect us, +in most things they do not prevent our growth. The corn that is now +ripe, whence comes it, and what is it? Is it not large or small, +stunted wild maize or well-developed ears, according to the conditions +under which it has grown? Yet its environments cannot make wheat of +it. Nor can our circumstances alter our nature. It is part of our +nature, and wholly within our power, greatly to change and to take +advantage of our circumstances, so that, unlike the corn, we can rise +much superior to our natural surroundings simply because we can thus +vary and improve the surroundings. In other words, man can usually +build the very road on which he is to run his race. + +It is not a question of what some one else can do or become, which +every youth should ask himself, but what can I do? How can I develop +myself into the grandest possible manhood? + +So far, then, from the power of circumstances being a hindrance to men +in trying to build for themselves an imperial highway to fortune, these +circumstances constitute the very quarry out of which they are to get +paving-stones for the road. + +While it is true that the will-power cannot perform miracles, yet that +it is almost omnipotent, that it can perform wonders, all history goes +to prove. As Shakespeare says:-- + + "Men at some time are masters of their fates: + The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, + But in ourselves, that we are underlings." + + +"There is nobody," says a Roman Cardinal, "whom Fortune does not visit +once in his life: but when she finds he is not ready to receive her, +she goes in at the door, and out through the window." Opportunity is +coy. The careless, the slow, the unobservant, the lazy fail to see it, +or clutch at it when it has gone. The sharp fellows detect it +instantly, and catch it when on the wing. + +Show me a man who is, according to popular prejudice, a victim of bad +luck, and I will show you one who has some unfortunate crooked twist of +temperament that invites disaster. He is ill-tempered, or conceited, +or trifling; lacks character, enthusiasm, or some other requisite for +success. + +Disraeli says that man is not the creature of circumstances, but that +circumstances are the creatures of men. + +What has chance ever done in the world? Has it built any cities? Has +it invented any telephones, any telegraphs? Has it built any +steamships, established any universities, any asylums, any hospitals? +Was there any chance in Caesar's crossing the Rubicon? What had chance +to do with Napoleon's career, with Wellington's, or Grant's, or Von +Moltke's? Every battle was won before it was begun. What had luck to +do with Thermopylae, Trafalgar, Gettysburg? Our successes we ascribe +to ourselves; our failures to destiny. + +Man is not a helpless atom in this vast creation, with a fixed +position, and naught to do but obey his own polarity. + +Believe in the power of will, which annihilates the sickly, sentimental +doctrine of fatalism,--you must but can't, you ought but it is +impossible. + +Give me the man + + "Who breaks his birth's invidious bar, + And grasps the skirts of happy chance, + And breasts the blows of circumstance, + And grapples with his evil star." + + +It is only the ignorant and superficial who believe in fate. "The +first step into thought lifts this mountain of necessity." "Fate is +unpenetrated causes." "They may well fear fate who have any infirmity +of habit or aim: but he who rests on what he is has a destiny beyond +destiny, and can make mouths at fortune." + +The indomitable will, the inflexible purpose, will find a way or make +one. There is always room for a man of force. + +"He who has a firm will," says Goethe, "moulds the world to himself." +"People do not lack strength," says Victor Hugo, "they lack will." + +"He who resolves upon any great end, by that very resolution has scaled +the great barriers to it, and he who seizes the grand idea of +self-cultivation, and solemnly resolves upon it, will find that idea, +that resolution, burning like fire within him, and ever putting him +upon his own improvement. He will find it removing difficulties, +searching out, or making means; giving courage for despondency, and +strength for weakness." + +Nearly all great men, those who have towered high above their fellows, +have been remarkable above all things else for their energy of will. +Of Julius Caesar it was said by a contemporary that it was his activity +and giant determination, rather than his military skill, that won his +victories. The youth who starts out in life determined to make the +most of his eyes and let nothing escape him which he can possibly use +for his own advancement; who keeps his ears open for every sound that +can help him on his way, who keeps his hands open that he may clutch +every opportunity, who is ever on the alert for everything which can +help him to get on in the world, who seizes every experience in life +and grinds it up into paint for his great life's picture, who keeps his +heart open that he may catch every noble impulse, and everything which +may inspire him,--that youth will be sure to make his life successful; +there are no "ifs" or "ands" about it. If he has his health, nothing +can keep him from final success. + +No tyranny of circumstances can permanently imprison a determined will. + +The world always stands aside for the determined man. Will makes a +way, even through seeming impossibilities. "It is the half a neck +nearer that shows the blood and wins the race; the one march more that +wins the campaign: the five minutes more of unyielding courage that +wins the fight." Again and again had the irrepressible Carter Harrison +been consigned to oblivion by the educated and moral element of +Chicago. Nothing could keep him down. He was invincible. A son of +Chicago, he had partaken of that nineteenth century miracle, that +phoenix-like nature of the city which, though she was burned, caused +her to rise from her ashes and become a greater and a grander Chicago, +a wonder of the world. Carter Harrison would not down. He entered the +Democratic Convention and, with an audacity rarely equaled, in spite of +their protest, boldly declared himself their candidate. Every +newspaper in Chicago, save the "Times," his own paper, bitterly opposed +his election: but notwithstanding all opposition, he was elected by +twenty thousand majority. The aristocrats hated him, the moral element +feared him, but the poor people believed in him: he pandered to them, +flattered them, till they elected him. While we would not by any means +hold Carter Harrison up to youth as a model, yet there is a great +lesson in his will-power and wonderful tenacity of purpose. + +"The general of a large army may be defeated," said Confucius, "but you +cannot defeat the determined mind of a peasant." + +The poor, deaf pauper, Kitto, who made shoes in the almshouse, and who +became the greatest of Biblical scholars, wrote in his journal, on the +threshold of manhood: "I am not myself a believer in impossibilities: I +think that all the fine stories about natural ability, etc., are mere +rigmarole, and that every man may, according to his opportunities and +industry, render himself almost anything he wishes to become." + +Years ago, a young mechanic took a bath in the river Clyde. While +swimming from shore to shore he discerned a beautiful bank, +uncultivated, and he then and there resolved to be the owner of it, and +to adorn it, and to build upon it the finest mansion in all the +borough, and name it in honor of the maiden to whom he was espoused. +"Last summer," says a well-known American, "I had the pleasure of +dining in that princely mansion, and receiving this fact from the lips +of the great shipbuilder of the Clyde." That one purpose was made the +ruling passion of his life, and all the energies of his soul were put +in requisition for its accomplishment. + +Lincoln is probably the most remarkable example on the pages of +history, showing the possibilities of our country. From the poverty in +which he was born, through the rowdyism of a frontier town, the +rudeness of frontier society, the discouragement of early bankruptcy, +and the fluctuations of popular politics, he rose to the championship +of union and freedom. + +Lincoln's will made his way. When his friends nominated him as a +candidate for the legislature, his enemies made fun of him. When +making his campaign speeches he wore a mixed jean coat so short that he +could not sit down on it, flax and tow-linen trousers, straw hat, and +pot-metal boots. He had nothing in the world but character and friends. + +When his friends suggested law to him, he laughed at the idea of his +being a lawyer. He said he hadn't brains enough. He read law barefoot +under the trees, his neighbors said, and he sometimes slept on the +counter in the store where he worked. He had to borrow money to buy a +suit of clothes to make a respectable appearance in the legislature, +and walked to take his seat at Vandalia,--one hundred miles. While he +was in the legislature, John F. Stuart, an eminent lawyer of +Springfield, told him how Clay had even inferior chances to his, had +got all of the education he had in a log schoolhouse without windows or +doors; and finally induced Lincoln to study law. + +See Thurlow Weed, defying poverty and wading through the snow two +miles, with rags for shoes, to borrow a book to read before the +sap-bush fire. See Locke, living on bread and water in a Dutch garret. +See Heyne, sleeping many a night on a barn floor with only a book for +his pillow. See Samuel Drew, tightening his apron strings "in lieu of +a dinner." See young Lord Eldon, before daylight copying Coke on +Littleton over and over again. History is full of such examples. He +who will pay the price for victory needs never fear final defeat. Why +were the Roman legionaries victorious? + + "For Romans, in Rome's quarrels, + Spared neither land nor gold, + Nor son, nor wife, nor limb nor life, + In the brave days of old." + + +Fowell Buxton, writing to one of his sons, says: "I am sure that a +young man may be very much what he pleases." + +Dr. Mathews has well said that "there is hardly a word in the whole +human vocabulary which is more cruelly abused than the word 'luck.' To +all the faults and failures of men, their positive sins and their less +culpable shortcomings, it is made to stand a godfather and sponsor. Go +talk with the bankrupt man of business, who has swamped his fortune by +wild speculation, extravagance of living, or lack of energy, and you +will find that he vindicates his wonderful self-love by confounding the +steps which he took indiscreetly with those to which he was forced by +'circumstances,' and complacently regarding himself as the victim of +ill-luck. Go visit the incarcerated criminal, who has imbued his hands +in the blood of his fellow-man, or who is guilty of less heinous +crimes, and you will find that, joining the temptations which were easy +to avoid with those which were comparatively irresistible, he has +hurriedly patched up a treaty with conscience, and stifles its +compunctious visitings by persuading himself that, from first to last, +he was the victim of circumstances. Go talk with the mediocre in +talents and attainments, the weak-spirited man who, from lack of energy +and application, has made but little headway in the world, being +outstripped in the race of life by those whom he had despised as his +inferiors, and you will find that he, too, acknowledges the all-potent +power of luck, and soothes his humbled pride by deeming himself the +victim of ill-fortune. In short, from the most venial offense to the +most flagrant, there is hardly any wrong act or neglect to which this +too fatally convenient word is not applied as a palliation." + +Paris was in the hands of a mob, the authorities were panic-stricken, +for they did not dare to trust their underlings. In came a man who +said, "I know a young officer who has the courage and ability to quell +this mob." "Send for him; send for him; send for him," said they. +Napoleon was sent for, came, subjugated the mob, subjugated the +authorities, ruled France, then conquered Europe. + +What a lesson is Napoleon's life for the sickly, wishy-washy, dwarfed, +sentimental "dudes," hanging about our cities, country, and +universities, complaining of their hard lot, dreaming of success, and +wondering why they are left in the rear in the great race of life. + +Success in life is dependent largely upon the willpower, and whatever +weakens or impairs it diminishes success. The will can be educated. +That which most easily becomes a habit in us is the will. Learn, then, +to will decisively and strongly; thus fix your floating life, and leave +it no longer to be carried hither and thither, like a withered leaf, by +every wind that blows. "It is not talent that men lack, it is the will +to labor; it is the purpose, not the power to produce." + +It was this insatiable thirst for knowledge which held to his task, +through poverty and discouragement, John Leyden, a Scotch shepherd's +son. Barefoot and alone, he walked six or eight miles daily to learn +to read, which was all the schooling he had. His desire for an +education defied the extremest poverty, and no obstacle could turn him +from his purpose. He was rich when he discovered a little bookstore, +and his thirsty soul would drink in the precious treasures from its +priceless volumes for hours, perfectly oblivious of the scanty meal of +bread and water which awaited him at his lowly lodging. Nothing could +discourage him from trying to improve himself by study. It seemed to +him that an opportunity to get at books and lectures was all that any +man could need. Before he was nineteen, this poor shepherd boy with no +chance had astonished the professors of Edinburgh by his knowledge of +Greek and Latin. + +Hearing that a surgeon's assistant in the Civil Service was wanted, +although he knew nothing whatever of medicine, he determined to apply +for it. There were only six months before the place was to be filled, +but nothing could daunt him, and in six months' time he actually took +his degree with honor. Walter Scott, who thought this one of the most +remarkable illustrations of perseverance, helped to fit him out, and he +sailed for India. + +Webster was very poor even after he entered Dartmouth College. A +friend sent him a recipe for greasing his boots. Webster wrote and +thanked him, and added: "But my boots need other doctoring, for they +not only admit water, but even peas and gravel-stones." Yet he became +one of the greatest men in the world. Sydney Smith said: "Webster was +a living lie, because no man on earth could be as great as he looked." +Carlyle said of him: "One would incline at sight to back him against +the world." + +What seemed to be luck followed Stephen Girard all his life. No matter +what he did, it always seemed to others to turn to his account. His +coming to Philadelphia seemed a lucky accident. A sloop was seen one +morning off the mouth of Delaware Bay floating the flag of France and a +signal of distress. Young Girard was captain of this sloop, and was on +his way to a Canadian port with freight from New Orleans. An American +skipper, seeing his distress, went to his aid, but told him the +American war had broken out, and that the British cruisers were all +along the American coast, and would seize his vessel. He told him his +only chance was to make a push for Philadelphia. Girard did not know +the way, and had no money. The skipper loaned him five dollars to get +the service of a pilot who demanded his money in advance. + +His sloop passed into the Delaware just in time to avoid capture by a +British war vessel. He sold the sloop and cargo in Philadelphia, and +began business on the capital. Being a foreigner, unable to speak +English, short, stout, and with a repulsive face, blind in one eye, it +was hard for him to get a start. But he was not the man to give up. +He had begun as a cabin boy at thirteen, and for nine years sailed +between Bordeaux and the French West Indies. He improved every leisure +minute at sea, mastering the art of navigation. + +At the age of eight he first discovered that he was blind in one eye. +His father, evidently thinking that he would never amount to anything, +would not help him to an education beyond that of mere reading and +writing, but sent his younger brothers to college. The discovery of +his blindness, the neglect of his father, and the chagrin of his +brothers' advancement, soured his whole life. + +When he began business for himself in Philadelphia, there seemed to be +nothing he would not do for money. He bought and sold anything, from +groceries to old junk. He bottled wine and cider, from which he made a +good profit. Everything he touched prospered. In 1780, he resumed the +New Orleans and St. Domingo trade, in which he had been engaged at the +breaking out of the Revolution. Here great success again attended him. +He had two vessels lying in one of the St. Domingo ports when the great +insurrection on that island broke out. A number of the rich planters +fled to his vessels with their valuables, which they left for safe +keeping while they went back to their estates to secure more. They +probably fell victims to the cruel negroes, for they never returned, +and Girard was the lucky possessor of $50,000 which the goods brought +in Philadephia. + +Everybody, especially his jealous brother merchants, attributed his +great success to his luck. While undoubtedly he was fortunate in +happening to be at the right place at the right time, yet he was +precision, method, accuracy, energy itself. He left nothing to chance. +His plans and schemes were worked out with mathematical care. His +letters, written to his captains in foreign ports, laying out their +routes and giving detailed instruction from which they were never +allowed to deviate under any circumstances, are models of foresight and +systematic planning. He never left anything of importance to others. +He was rigidly accurate in his instructions, and would not allow the +slightest departure from them. He used to say that while his captains +might save him money by deviating from instructions once, yet they +would cause loss in ninety-nine other cases. Once, when a captain +returned and had saved him several thousand dollars by buying his cargo +of cheese in another port than that in which he had been instructed to +buy, Girard was so enraged, although he was several thousand dollars +richer, that he discharged the captain on the spot, notwithstanding the +latter had been faithful in his service for many years, and thought he +was saving his employer a great deal of money by deviating from his +instructions. + +Girard lived in a dingy little house, poorer than that occupied by many +of his employees. He married a servant girl of great beauty, but she +proved totally unfitted for him, and died at last in the insane asylum. + +Girard never lost a ship, and many times what brought financial ruin to +many others, as the War of 1812, only increased his wealth. What +seemed luck with him was only good judgment and promptness in seizing +opportunities, and the greatest care and zeal in improving them to +their utmost possibilities. + +Luck is not God's price for success: that is altogether too cheap, nor +does he dicker with men. + +The mathematician tells you that if you throw the dice, there are +thirty chances to one against your turning up a particular number, and +a hundred to one against your repeating the same throw three times in +succession: and so on in an augmenting ratio. What is luck? Is it, as +has been suggested, a blind man's buff among the laws? a ruse among the +elements? a trick of Dame Nature? Has any scholar defined luck? any +philosopher explained its nature? any chemist shown its composition? +Is luck that strange, nondescript fairy, that does all things among men +that they cannot account for? If so, why does not luck make a fool +speak words of wisdom; an ignoramus utter lectures on philosophy? + +Many a young man who has read the story of John Wanamaker's romantic +career has gained very little inspiration or help from it toward his +own elevation and advancement, for he looks upon it as the result of +good luck, chance, or fate. "What a lucky fellow," he says to himself +as he reads; "what a bonanza he fell into." But a careful analysis of +Wanamaker's life only enforces the same lesson taught by the analysis +of most great lives, namely, that a good mother, a good constitution, +the habit of hard work, indomitable energy, a determination which knows +no defeat, a decision which never wavers, a concentration which never +scatters its forces, courage which never falters, a self-mastery which +can say No, and stick to it, an "ignominious love of detail," strict +integrity and downright honesty, a cheerful disposition, unbounded +enthusiasm in one's calling, and a high aim and noble purpose insure a +very large measure of success. + +Youth should be taught that there is something in circumstances; that +there is such a thing as a poor pedestrian happening to find no +obstruction in his way, and reaching the goal when a better walker +finds the drawbridge up, the street blockaded, and so fails to win the +race; that wealth often does place unworthy sons in high positions, +that family influence does gain a lawyer clients, a physician patients, +an ordinary scholar a good professorship; but that, on the other hand, +position, clients, patients, professorships, manager's and +superintendent's positions do not necessarily constitute success. He +should be taught that in the long run, as a rule, _the best man does +win the best place_, and that persistent merit does succeed. + +There is about as much chance of idleness and incapacity winning real +success, or a high position in life, as there would be in producing a +Paradise Lost by shaking up promiscuously the separate words of +Webster's Dictionary, and letting them fall at random on the floor. +Fortune smiles upon those who roll up their sleeves and put their +shoulders to the wheel; upon men who are not afraid of dreary, dry, +irksome drudgery, men of nerve and grit who do not turn aside for dirt +and detail. + +The youth should be taught that "he alone is great, who, by a life +heroic, conquers fate;" that "diligence is the mother of good luck;" +that, nine times out of ten, what we call luck or fate is but a mere +bugbear of the indolent, the languid, the purposeless, the careless, +the indifferent; that the man who fails, as a rule, does not see or +seize his opportunity. Opportunity is coy, is swift, is gone, before +the slow, the unobservant, the indolent, or the careless can seize +her:-- + + "In idle wishes fools supinely stay: + Be there a will and wisdom finds a way." + + +It has been well said that the very reputation of being strong willed, +plucky, and indefatigable is of priceless value. It often cows enemies +and dispels at the start opposition to one's undertakings which would +otherwise be formidable. + +"If Eric's in robust health, and has slept well, and is at the top of +his condition, and thirty years old at his departure from Greenland," +says Emerson, "he will steer west and his ships will reach +Newfoundland. But take Eric out and put in a stronger and bolder man, +and the ships will sail six hundred, one thousand, fifteen hundred +miles further, and reach Labrador and New England. There is no chance +in results." Obstacles tower before the living man like mountain +chains, stopping his path and hindering his progress. He surmounts +them by his energy. He makes a new path over them. He climbs upon +them to mountain heights. They cannot stop him. They do not much +delay him. He transmutes difficulties into power, and makes temporary +failures into stepping-stones to ultimate success. + +How many might have been giants who are only dwarfs. How many a one +has died "with all his music in him." + +It is astonishing what men who have come to their senses late in life +have accomplished by a sudden resolution. + +Arkwright was fifty years of age when he began to learn English grammar +and improve his writing and spelling. Benjamin Franklin was past fifty +before he began the study of science and philosophy. Milton, in his +blindness, was past the age of fifty when he sat down to complete his +world-known epic, and Scott at fifty-five took up his pen to redeem an +enormous liability. "Yet I am learning," said Michael Angelo, when +threescore years and ten were past, and he had long attained the +highest triumphs of his art. + +Even brains are second in importance to will. The vacillating man is +always pushed aside in the race of life. It is only the weak and +vacillating who halt before adverse circumstances and obstacles. A man +with an iron will, with a determination that nothing shall check his +career, if he has perseverance and grit, is sure to succeed. We may +not find time for what we would like, but what we long for and strive +for with all our strength, we usually approximate if we do not fully +reach. Hunger breaks through stone walls; stern necessity will find a +way or make one. + +Success is also a great physical as well as mental tonic, and tends to +strengthen the will-power. Dr. Johnson says: "Resolutions and success +reciprocally produce each other." Strong-willed men, as a rule, are +successful men, and great success is almost impossible without it. + +A man who can resolve vigorously upon a course of action, and turns +neither to the right nor the left, though a paradise tempt him, who +keeps his eyes upon the goal, whatever distracts him, is sure of +success. We could almost classify successes and failures by their +various degrees of will-power. Men like Sir James Mackintosh, +Coleridge, La Harpe, and many others who have dazzled the world with +their brilliancy, but who never accomplished a tithe of what they +attempted, who were always raising our expectations that they were +about to perform wonderful deeds, but who accomplished nothing worthy +of their abilities, have been deficient in will-power. One talent with +a will behind it will accomplish more than ten without it. The great +linguist of Bologna mastered a hundred languages by taking them singly, +as the lion fought the bulls. + +I wish it were possible to show the youth of America the great part +that the will might play in their success in life and in their +happiness also. The achievements of will-power are simply beyond +computation. Scarcely anything in reason seems impossible to the man +who can will strong enough and long enough. + +How often we see this illustrated in the case of a young woman who +suddenly becomes conscious that she is plain and unattractive; who, by +prodigious exercise of her will and untiring industry, resolves to +redeem herself from obscurity and commonness; and who not only makes up +for her deficiencies, but elevates herself into a prominence and +importance which mere personal attractions could never have given her. +Charlotte Cushman, without a charm of form or face, climbed to the very +top of her profession. How many young men, stung by consciousness of +physical deformity or mental deficiencies, have, by a strong persistent +exercise of will-power, raised themselves from mediocrity and placed +themselves high above those who scorned them. + +History is full of examples of men and women who have redeemed +themselves from disgrace, poverty, and misfortune, by the firm +resolution of an iron will. The consciousness of being looked upon as +inferior, as incapable of accomplishing what others accomplish; the +sensitiveness at being considered a dunce in school, has stung many a +youth into a determination which has elevated him far above those who +laughed at him, as in the case of Newton, of Adam Clark, of Sheridan, +Wellington, Goldsmith, Dr. Chalmers, Curran, Disraeli, and hundreds of +others. "Whatever you wish, that you are; for such is the force of the +human will, joined to the Divine, that whatever we wish to be +seriously, and with a true intention, that we become." While this is +not strictly true, yet there is a deal of truth in it. + +It is men like Mirabeau, who "trample upon impossibilities;" like +Napoleon, who do not wait for opportunities, but make them; like Grant, +who has only "unconditional surrender" for the enemy, who change the +very front of the world. "We have but what we make, and every good is +locked by nature in a granite hand, sheer labor must unclench." + +What cares Henry L. Bulwer for the suffocating cough, even though he +can scarcely speak above a whisper? In the House of Commons he makes +his immortal speech on the Irish Church just the same. + +"I can't, it is impossible," said a foiled lieutenant, to Alexander. +"Be gone," shouted the conquering Macedonian, "there is nothing +impossible to him who will try." + +Were I called upon to express in a word the secret of so many failures +among those who started out in life with high hopes, I should say +unhesitatingly, they lacked will-power. They could not half will. +What is a man without a will? He is like an engine without steam, a +mere sport of chance, to be tossed about hither and thither, always at +the mercy of those who have wills. I should call the strength of will +the test of a young man's possibilities. Can he will strong enough, +and hold whatever he undertakes with an iron grip? It is the iron grip +that takes the strong hold on life. What chance is there in this +crowding, pushing, selfish, greedy world, where everything is pusher or +pushed, for a young man with no will, no grip on life? "The truest +wisdom," said Napoleon, "is a resolute determination." An iron will +without principle might produce a Napoleon; but with character it would +make a Wellington or a Grant, untarnished by ambition or avarice. + + "The undivided will + 'T is that compels the elements and wrings + A human music from the indifferent air." + + + + +CHAPTER IV. + +SUCCESS UNDER DIFFICULTIES. + +Victories that are easy are cheap. Those only are worth having which +come as the result of hard fighting.--BEECHER. + +Man owes his growth chiefly to that active striving of the will, that +encounter with difficulty, which we call effort; and it is astonishing +to find how often results that seemed impracticable are thus made +possible.--EPES SARGENT. + +I know no such unquestionable badge and ensign of a sovereign mind as +that tenacity of purpose which, through all change of companions, or +parties, or fortunes, changes never, bates no jot of heart or hope, but +wearies out opposition and arrives at its port.--EMERSON. + + Yes, to this thought I hold with firm persistence; + The last result of wisdom stamps it true; + He only earns his freedom and existence + Who daily conquers them anew. + GOETHE. + +Little minds are tamed and subdued by misfortunes; but great minds rise +above them.--WASHINGTON IRVING. + + +"I have here three teams that I want to get over to Staten Island," +said a boy of twelve one day in 1806 to the innkeeper at South Amboy, +N. J. "If you will put us across, I'll leave with you one of my horses +in pawn, and if I don't send you back six dollars within forty-eight +hours you may keep the horse." + +The innkeeper asked the reason for this novel proposition, and learned +that the lad's father had contracted to get the cargo of a vessel +stranded near Sandy Hook, and take it to New York in lighters. The boy +had been sent with three wagons, six horses, and three men, to carry +the cargo across a sand-spit to the lighters. The work accomplished, +he had started with only six dollars to travel a long distance home +over the Jersey sands, and reached South Amboy penniless. "I'll do +it," said the innkeeper, as he looked into the bright honest eyes of +the boy. The horse was soon redeemed. + + * * * * * * + +[Illustration: WILLIAM HICKLING PRESCOTT] + +How can you keep a determined man from success: Place stumbling-blocks +in his way, and he uses them for stepping-stones. Imprison him, and he +produces the "Pilgrim's Progress." Deprive him of eyesight, and he +writes the "Conquest of Mexico." + + * * * * * * + +"My son," said this same boy's mother, on the first of May, 1810, when +he asked her to lend him one hundred dollars to buy a boat, having +imbibed a strong liking for the sea; "on the twenty-seventh of this +month you will be sixteen years old. If, by that time, you will plow, +harrow, and plant with corn the eight-acre lot, I will advance you the +money." The field was rough and stony, but the work was done in time, +and well done. From this small beginning Cornelius Vanderbilt laid the +foundation of a colossal fortune. He would often work all night; and, +as he was never absent from his post by day, he soon had the best +business in New York harbor. + +In 1813, when it was expected that New York would be attacked by +British ships, all the boatmen except Cornelius put in bids to convey +provisions to the military posts around New York, naming extremely low +rates, as the contractor would be exempted from military duty. "Why +don't you send in a bid?" asked his father. "Of what use?" replied +young Vanderbilt; "they are offering to do the work at half price. It +can't be done at such rates." "Well," said his father, "it can do no +harm to try for it." So, to please his father, but with no hope of +success, Cornelius made an offer fair to both sides, but did not go to +hear the award. When his companions had all returned with long faces, +he went to the commissary's office and asked if the contract had been +given. "Oh, yes," was the reply; "that business is settled. Cornelius +Vanderbilt is the man. What?" he asked, seeing that the youth was +apparently thunderstruck, "is it you?" "My name is Cornelius +Vanderbilt," said the boatman. "Well," said the commissary, "don't you +know why we have given the contract to you?" "No." "Why, it is +because we want this business _done_, and we know you'll do it." +Character gives confidence. + +In 1818 he owned two or three of the finest coasting schooners in New +York harbor, and had a capital of nine thousand dollars. Seeing that +steam-vessels would soon win supremacy over those carrying sails only, +he gave up his fine business to become the captain of a steamboat at +one thousand dollars a year. For twelve years he ran between New York +city and New Brunswick, N. J. In 1829 he began business as a steamboat +owner, in the face of opposition so bitter that he lost his last +dollar. But the tide turned, and he prospered so rapidly that he at +length owned over one hundred steamboats. He early identified himself +with the growing railroad interests of the country, and became the +richest man of his day in America. + +Barnum began the race of business life barefoot, for at the age of +fifteen he was obliged to buy on credit the shoes he wore at his +father's funeral. He was a remarkable example of success under +difficulties. There was no keeping him down; no opposition daunted +him, no obstacles were too great for him to overcome. Think of a man +being ruined at fifty years of age; yes, worse than ruined, for he was +heavily in debt besides. Yet on the very day of his downfall he begins +to rise again, wringing victory from defeat by his indomitable +persistence. + +"Eloquence must have been born with you," said a friend to J. P. +Curran. "Indeed, my dear sir, it was not," replied the orator, "it was +born some three and twenty years and some months after me." Speaking +of his first attempt at a debating club, he said: "I stood up, +trembling through every fibre, but remembering that in this I was but +imitating Tully, I took courage and had actually proceeded almost as +far as 'Mr. Chairman,' when, to my astonishment and terror, I perceived +that every eye was turned on me. There were only six or seven present, +and the room could not have contained as many more; yet was it, to my +panic-stricken imagination, as if I were the central object in nature, +and assembled millions were gazing upon me in breathless expectation. +I became dismayed and dumb. My friends cried, 'Hear him!' but there +was nothing to hear." He was nicknamed "Orator Mum," and well did he +deserve the title until he ventured to stare in astonishment at a +speaker who was "culminating chronology by the most preposterous +anachronisms." "I doubt not," said the annoyed speaker, "that 'Orator +Mum' possesses wonderful talents for eloquence, but I would recommend +him to show it in future by some more popular method than his silence." +Stung by the taunt, Curran rose and gave the man a "piece of his mind," +speaking quite fluently in his anger. Encouraged by this success, he +took great pains to become a good speaker. He corrected his habit of +stuttering by reading favorite passages aloud every day slowly and +distinctly, and spoke at every opportunity. + +Bunyan wrote his "Pilgrim's Progress" on the untwisted papers used to +cork the bottles of milk brought for his meals. Gifford wrote his +first copy of a mathematical work, when a cobbler's apprentice, on +small scraps of leather; and Rittenhouse, the astronomer, first +calculated eclipses on his plow handle. + +A poor Irish lad, so pitted by smallpox that boys made sport of him, +earned his living by writing little ballads for street musicians. +Eight cents a day was often all he could earn. He traveled through +France and Italy, begging his way by singing and playing the flute at +the cottages of the peasantry. At twenty-eight he was penniless in +London, and lived in the beggars' quarters in Axe Lane. In his +poverty, he set up as a doctor in the suburbs of London. He wore a +second-hand coat of rusty velvet, with a patch on the left breast which +he adroitly covered with his three-cornered hat during his visits; and +we have an amusing anecdote of his contest of courtesy with a patient +who persisted in endeavoring to relieve him of his hat, which only made +him press it more devoutly to his heart. He often had to pawn his +clothes to keep from starving. He sold his "Life of Voltaire" for +twenty dollars. After great hardship he managed to publish his "Polite +Learning in Europe," and this brought him to public notice. Next came +"The Traveller," and the wretched man in a Fleet Street garret found +himself famous. His landlady once arrested him for rent, but Dr. +Johnson came to his relief, took from his desk the manuscript of the +"Vicar of Wakefield," and sold it for three hundred dollars. He spent +two years revising "The Deserted Village" after it was first written. +Generous to a fault, vain and improvident, imposed on by others, he was +continually in debt; although for his "History of the Earth and +Animated Nature" he received four thousand dollars, and some of his +works, as, for instance, "She Stoops to Conquer," had a large sale. +But in spite of fortune's frown and his own weakness, he won success +and fame. The world, which so often comes too late with its assistance +and laurels, gave to the weak, gentle, loving author of "The Vicar of +Wakefield" a monument in the Poets' Corner of Westminster Abbey. + +The poor, scrofulous, and almost blind boy, Samuel Johnson, was taken +by his mother to receive the touch of Queen Anne, which was supposed to +heal the "King's Evil." He entered Oxford as a servant, copying +lectures from a student's notebooks, while the boys made sport of the +bare feet showing through great holes in his shoes. Some one left a +pair of new shoes at his door, but he was too proud to be helped, and +threw them out of the window. He was so poor that he was obliged to +leave college, and at twenty-six married a widow of forty-eight. He +started a private school with his wife's money; but, getting only three +pupils, was obliged to close it. He went to London, where he lived on +nine cents a day. In his distress he wrote a poem in which appeared in +capital letters the line, "Slow rises worth by poverty depressed," +which attracted wide attention. He suffered greatly in London for +thirteen years, being arrested once for a debt of thirteen dollars. At +forty he published "The Vanity of Human Wishes," in which were these +lines:-- + + "Then mark what ills the scholar's life assail; + Toil, envy, want, the patron and the jail." + +When asked how he felt about his failures, he replied: + +"Like a monument,"--that is, steadfast, immovable. He was an +indefatigable worker. In the evenings of a single week he wrote +"Rasselas," a beautiful little story of the search for happiness, to +get money to pay the funeral expenses of his mother. With six +assistants he worked seven years on his Dictionary, which made his +fortune. His name was then in everybody's mouth, and when he no longer +needed help, assistance, as usual, came from every quarter. The great +universities hastened to bestow their degrees, and King George invited +him to the palace. + +Lord Mansfield raised himself by indefatigable industry from oatmeal +porridge and poverty to affluence and the Lord Chief Justice's Bench. + +Of five thousand articles sent every year to "Lippincott's Magazine," +only two hundred were accepted. How much do you think Homer got for +his Iliad? or Dante for his Paradise? Only bitter bread and salt, and +going up and down other people's stairs. In science, the man who +discovered the telescope, and first saw heaven, was paid with a +dungeon: the man who invented the microscope, and first saw earth, died +from starvation, driven from his home. It is very clear indeed that +God means all good work and talk to be done for nothing. Shakespeare's +"Hamlet" was sold for about twenty-five dollars; but his autograph has +sold for five thousand dollars. + +During the ten years in which he made his greatest discoveries, Isaac +Newton could hardly pay two shillings a week to the Royal Society of +which he was a member. Some of his friends wanted to get him excused +from this payment, but he would not allow them to act. + +There are no more interesting pages in biography than those which +record how Emerson, as a child, was unable to read the second volume of +a certain book, because his widowed mother could not afford the amount +(five cents) necessary to obtain it from the circulating library. + +Linnaeus was so poor when getting his education, that he had to mend +his shoes with folded paper, and often had to beg his meals of his +friends. + +Who in the days of the First Empire cared to recall the fact that +Napoleon, Emperor and King, was once forced to borrow a louis from +Talma, when he lived in a garret on the Quai Conti? + +David Livingstone at ten years of age was put into a cotton factory +near Glasgow. Out of his first week's wages he bought a Latin Grammar, +and studied in the night schools for years. He would sit up and study +till midnight unless his mother drove him to bed, notwithstanding he +had to be at the factory at six in the morning. He mastered Virgil and +Horace in this way, and read extensively, besides studying botany. So +eager and thirsty for knowledge was he, that he would place his book +before him on the spinning-jenny, and amid the deafening roar of +machinery would pore over its pages. + +George Eliot said of the years of close work upon her "Romola," "I +began it a young woman, I finished it an old woman." One of Emerson's +biographers says, referring to his method of rewriting, revising, +correcting, and eliminating: "His apples were sorted over and over +again, until only the very rarest, the most perfect, were left. It did +not matter that those thrown away were very good and helped to make +clear the possibilities of the orchard, they were unmercifully cast +aside." Carlyle's books were literally wrung out of him. The pains he +took to satisfy himself of a relatively insignificant fact were +incredible. Before writing his essay on Diderot, he read twenty-five +volumes at the rate of one per day. He tells Edward Fitzgerald that +for the twentieth time he is going over the confused records of the +battle of Naseby, that he may be quite sure of the topography. + +"All the performances of human art, at which we look with praise and +wonder," says Johnson, "are instances of the resistless force of +perseverance: it is by this that the quarry becomes a pyramid, and that +distant countries are united with canals. If a man was to compare the +effect of a single stroke of the pickaxe, or of one impression of the +spade, with the general design and last result, he would be overwhelmed +by the sense of their disproportion; yet those petty operations, +incessantly continued, in time surmount the greatest difficulties, and +mountains are leveled, and oceans bounded, by the slender force of +human beings." + +The Rev. Eliphalet Nott, a pulpit orator, was especially noted for a +sermon on the death of Alexander Hamilton, the great statesman, who was +shot in a duel by Aaron Burr. Although Nott had managed in some way to +get his degree at Brown University, he was at one time so poor after he +entered the ministry that he could not buy an overcoat. His wife +sheared their only cosset sheep in January, wrapped it in burlap +blankets to keep it from freezing, carded and spun and wove the wool, +and made it into an overcoat for him. + +Great men never wait for opportunities; they make them. Nor do they +wait for facilities or favoring circumstances; they seize upon whatever +is at hand, work out their problem, and master the situation. A young +man determined and willing will find a way or make one. A Franklin +does not require elaborate apparatus; he can bring electricity from the +clouds with a common kite. A Watt can make a model of the condensing +steam-engine out of an old syringe used to inject the arteries of dead +bodies previous to dissection. A Dr. Black can discover latent heat +with a pan of water and two thermometers. A Newton can unfold the +composition of light and the origin of colors with a prism, a lens, and +a piece of pasteboard. A Humphry Davy can experiment with kitchen pots +and pans, and a Faraday can experiment on electricity by means of old +bottles, in his spare minutes while a book-binder. When science was in +its cradle the Marquis of Worcester, an English nobleman, imprisoned in +the Tower of London, was certainly not in a very good position to do +anything for the world, but would not waste his time. The cover of a +vessel of hot water blown on before his eyes led to a series of +observations, which he published later in a book called "Century of +Inventions." These observations were a sort of text-book on the power +of steam, which resulted in Newcomen's steam-engine, which Watt +afterward perfected. A Ferguson maps out the heavenly bodies, lying on +his back, by means of threads with beads stretched between himself and +the stars. + +Not in his day of bodily strength and political power, but blind, +decrepit, and defeated with his party, Milton composed "Paradise Lost." + +Great men have found no royal road to their triumph. It is always the +old route, by way of industry and perseverance. + +The farmer boy, Elihu B. Washburn, taught school at ten dollars per +month, and early learned the lesson that it takes one hundred cents to +make a dollar. In after years he fought "steals" in Congress, until he +was called the "Watchdog of the Treasury." From his long membership he +became known as the "Father of the House." He administered the oath to +Schuyler Colfax as Speaker three times. He recommended Grant as +colonel of a regiment of volunteers. The latter, when President, +appointed him Secretary of State, and, later, Minister to France. +During the reign of the Commune, the representatives of nearly all +other foreign nations fled in dismay, but Washburn remained at his +post. Shells exploded close to his office, and fell all around it, but +he did not leave even when Paris was in flames. For a time he was +really the minister of all foreign countries, in Paris; and represented +Prussia for almost a year. The Emperor William conferred upon him the +Order of the Red Eagle, and gave him a jeweled star of great value. + +How could the poor boy, Elihu Burritt, working nearly all the daylight +in a blacksmith's shop, get an education? He had but one book in his +library, and carried that in his hat. But this boy with no chance +became one of America's wonders. + +When teaching school, Garfield was very poor. He tore his only blue +jean trousers, but concealed the rents by pins until night, when he +retired early that his boarding mistress might mend his clothes. "When +you get to be a United States Senator," said she, "no one will ask what +kind of clothes you wore when teaching school." + +Although Michael Angelo made himself immortal in three different +occupations, his fame might well rest upon his dome of St. Peter as an +architect, upon his "Moses" as a sculptor, and upon his "Last Judgment" +as a painter; yet we find by his correspondence now in the British +Museum, that when he was at work on his colossal bronze statue of Pope +Julius II., he was so poor that he could not have his younger brother +come to visit him at Bologna, because he had but one bed in which he +and three of his assistants slept together. + +"I was always at the bottom of my purse," said Zola, in describing the +struggles of his early years of authorship. "Very often I had not a +sou left, and not knowing, either, where to get one. I rose generally +at four in the morning, and began to study after a breakfast consisting +of one raw egg. But no matter, those were good times. After taking a +walk along the quays, I entered my garret, and joyfully partaking of a +dinner of three apples, I sat down to work. I wrote, and I was happy. +In winter I would allow myself no fire; wood was too expensive--only on +fete days was I able to afford it. But I had several pipes of tobacco +and a candle for three sous. A three-sous candle, only think of it! +It meant a whole night of literature to me." + +James Brooks, once the editor and proprietor of the "New York Daily +Express," and later an eminent congressman, began life as a clerk in a +store in Maine, and when twenty-one received for his pay a hogshead of +New England rum. He was so eager to go to college that he started for +Waterville with his trunk on his back, and when he was graduated he was +so poor and plucky that he carried his trunk on his back to the station +when he went home. + +When Elias Howe, harassed by want and woe, was in London completing his +first sewing-machine, he had frequently to borrow money to live on. He +bought beans and cooked them himself. He also borrowed money to send +his wife back to America. He sold his first machine for five pounds, +although it was worth fifty, and then he pawned his letters patent to +pay his expenses home. + +The boy Arkwright begins barbering in a cellar, but dies worth a +million and a half. The world treated his novelties just as it treats +everybody's novelties--made infinite objection, mustered all the +impediments, but he snapped his fingers at their objections, and lived +to become honored and wealthy. + +There is scarcely a great truth or doctrine but has had to fight its +way to public recognition in the face of detraction, calumny, and +persecution. "Everywhere," says Heine, "that a great soul gives +utterance to its thoughts, there also is a Golgotha." + +Nearly every great discovery or invention that has blessed mankind has +had to fight its way to recognition, even against the opposition of the +most progressive men. + +Even Sir Charles Napier fiercely opposed the introduction of steam +power into the Royal Navy. In the House of Commons, he exclaimed, "Mr. +Speaker, when we enter Her Majesty's naval service and face the chances +of war, we go prepared to be hacked in pieces, to be riddled by +bullets, or to be blown to bits by shot and shell; but Mr. Speaker, we +do not go prepared to be boiled alive." He said this with tremendous +emphasis. + +"Will any one explain how there can be a light without a wick?" asked a +member of Parliament, when William Murdock, toward the close of the +eighteenth century, said that coal gas would give a good light, and +could be conveyed into buildings in pipes. "Do you intend taking the +dome of St. Paul's for a gasometer?" was the sneering question of even +the great scientist, Humphry Davy. Walter Scott ridiculed the idea of +lighting London by "smoke," but he soon used it at Abbotsford, and Davy +achieved one of his greatest triumphs by experimenting with gas until +he had invented his safety lamp. + +Titian used to crush the flowers to get their color, and painted the +white walls of his father's cottage in Tyrol with all sorts of +pictures, at which the mountaineers gazed in wonder. + +"That boy will beat me one day," said an old painter as he watched a +little fellow named Michael Angelo making drawings of pot and brushes, +easel and stool, and other articles in the studio. The barefoot boy +did persevere until he had overcome every difficulty and become a +master of his art. + +William H. Prescott was a remarkable example of what a boy with "no +chance" can do. While at college, he lost one eye by a hard piece of +bread thrown during a "biscuit battle," then so common after meals; +and, from sympathy, the other eye became almost useless. But the boy +had pluck and determination, and would not lead a useless life. He set +his heart upon being a historian, and turned all his energies in that +direction. By the aid of others' eyes, he spent ten years studying +before he even decided upon a particular theme for his first book. +Then he spent ten years more, poring over old archives and manuscripts, +before he published his "Ferdinand and Isabella." What a lesson in his +life for young men! What a rebuke to those who have thrown away their +opportunities and wasted their lives! + +"Galileo with an opera-glass," said Emerson, "discovered a more +splendid series of celestial phenomena than any one since with the +great telescopes. Columbus found the new world in an undecked boat." + +Surroundings which men call unfavorable cannot prevent the unfolding of +your powers. From the plain fields and lowlands of Avon came the +Shakespearean genius which has charmed the world. From among the +rock-ribbed hills of New Hampshire sprang the greatest of American +orators and statesmen, Daniel Webster. From the crowded ranks of toil, +and homes to which luxury is a stranger, have often come the leaders +and benefactors of our race. Indeed, when Christ came upon earth, His +early abode was a place so poor and so much despised that men thought +He could not be the Christ, asking, in utter astonishment, "Can any +good thing come out of Nazareth?" + +"I once knew a little colored boy," said Frederick Douglass, "whose +mother and father died when he was but six years old. He was a slave, +and had no one to care for him. He slept on a dirt floor in a hovel, +and in cold weather would crawl into a meal-bag head foremost, and +leave his feet in the ashes to keep them warm. Often he would roast an +ear of corn and eat it to satisfy his hunger, and many times has he +crawled under the barn or stable and secured eggs, which he would roast +in the fire and eat. That boy did not wear pantaloons, as you do, but +a tow-linen shirt. Schools were unknown to him, and he learned to +spell from an old Webster's spelling-book, and to read and write from +posters on cellar and barn doors, while boys and men would help him. +He would then preach and speak, and soon became well known. He became +presidential elector, United States marshal, United States recorder, +United States diplomat, and accumulated some wealth. He wore +broadcloth, and didn't have to divide crumbs with the dogs under the +table. That boy was Frederick Douglass. What was possible for me is +possible for you. Don't think because you are colored you can't +accomplish anything. Strive earnestly to add to your knowledge. So +long as you remain in ignorance, so long will you fail to command the +respect of your fellow-men." + +Where shall we find an illustration more impressive than in Abraham +Lincoln, whose life, career, and death might be chanted by a Greek +chorus as at once the prelude and the epilogue of the most imperial +theme of modern times? Born as lowly as the Son of God, in a hovel; of +what real parentage we know not, reared in penury, squalor, with no +gleam of light, nor fair surrounding; a young manhood vexed by weird +dreams and visions; with scarcely a natural grace; singularly awkward, +ungainly even among the uncouth about him: it was reserved for this +remarkable character, late in life, to be snatched from obscurity, +raised to supreme command at a supreme moment, and intrusted with the +destiny of a nation. The great leaders of his party were made to stand +aside; the most experienced and accomplished men of the day, men like +Seward, and Chase, and Sumner, statesmen famous and trained, were sent +to the rear, while this strange figure was brought by unseen hands to +the front, and given the reins of power. + +The story is told of a man in London deprived of both legs and arms, +who managed to write with his mouth and perform other things so +remarkable as to enable him to earn a fair living. He would lay +certain sheets of paper together, pinning them at the corner to make +them hold. Then he would take a pen and write some verses; after which +he would proceed to embellish the lines by many skillful flourishes. +Dropping the pen from his mouth, he would next take up a needle and +thread, also with his mouth, thread the needle, and make several +stitches. He also painted with a brush, and was in many other ways a +wonderful man. Instead of being a burden to his family he was the most +important contributor to their welfare. + +Arthur Cavanagh, M. P., was born without arms or legs, yet it is said +that he was a good shot, a skillful fisherman and sailor, and one of +the best cross country riders in Ireland. He was a good +conversationalist, and an able member of Parliament. He ate with his +fork attached to his stump of an arm, and wrote holding his pen in his +teeth. In riding he held the bridle in his mouth, his body being +strapped to the saddle. He once lost his means of support in India, +but went to work with his accustomed energy, and obtained employment as +a carrier of dispatches. + +People thought it strange that Gladstone should appoint blind Henry +Fawcett Postmaster-General of Great Britain; but never before did any +one fill the office so well. + +John B. Herreshoff, of Bristol, R. I., although blind since he was +fifteen years old, is the founder and head of one of the most noted +shipbuilding establishments in the world. He has superintended the +construction of some of the swiftest torpedo boats and steam and +sailing yachts afloat. He frequently takes his turn at the wheel in +sailing his vessels on trial trips. He is aided greatly by his younger +brother Nathaniel, but can plan vessels and conduct business without +him. After examining a vessel's hull or a good model of it, he will +give detailed instructions for building another just like it, and will +make a more accurate duplicate than can most boat-builders whose sight +is perfect. + +The Rev. William H. Milburn, who lost his sight when a child, studied +for the ministry, and was ordained before he attained his majority. In +ten years he traveled about 200,000 miles in missionary work. He has +written half a dozen books, among them a very careful history of the +Mississippi Valley. He has long been chaplain of the lower house of +Congress. + +Blind Fanny Crosby, of New York, was a teacher of the blind for many +years. She has written nearly three thousand hymns, among which are +"Pass Me not, O Gentle Saviour," "Rescue the Perishing," "Saviour more +than Life to Me," and "Jesus keep Me near the Cross." + +Nor are these by any means the only examples of blind people now doing +their full share of the world's work. In the United States alone there +are engaged in musical occupation one hundred and fifty blind piano +tuners, one hundred and fifty blind teachers of music in schools for +the blind, five hundred blind private teachers, one hundred blind +church organists, fifteen or more blind composers and publishers of +music, and several blind dealers in musical instruments. + +_There is no open door to the temple of success_. Every one who enters +makes his own door, which closes behind him to all others, not even +permitting his own children to pass. + +Nearly forty years ago, on a rainy, dreary day in November, a young +widow in Philadelphia sat wondering how she could feed and clothe three +little ones left dependent by the death of her husband, a naval +officer. Happening to think of a box of which her husband had spoken, +she opened it, and found therein an envelope containing directions for +a code of colored light signals to be used at night on the ocean. The +system was not complete, but she perfected it, went to Washington, and +induced the Secretary of the Navy to give it a trial. An admiral soon +wrote that the signals were good for nothing, although the idea was +valuable. For months and years she worked, succeeding at last in +producing brilliant lights of different colors. She was paid $20,000 +for the right to manufacture them in our navy. Nearly all the blockade +runners captured in the Civil War were taken by the aid of the Coston +signals, which are also considered invaluable in the Life Saving +Service. Mrs. Coston introduced them into several European navies, and +became wealthy. + +A modern writer says that it is one of the mysteries of our life that +genius, that noblest gift of God to man, is nourished by poverty. Its +greatest works have been achieved by the sorrowing ones of the world in +tears and despair. Not in the brilliant salon, not in the tapestried +library, not in ease and competence, is genius usually born and +nurtured; but often in adversity and destitution, amidst the harassing +cares of a straitened household, in bare and fireless garrets, with the +noise of squalid children, in the turbulence of domestic contentions, +and in the deep gloom of uncheered despair. This is its most frequent +birthplace, and amid scenes like these unpropitious, repulsive, +wretched surroundings, have men labored, studied, and trained +themselves, until they have at last emanated from the gloom of that +obscurity the shining lights of their times; have become the companions +of kings, the guides and teachers of their kind, and exercised an +influence upon the thought of the world amounting to a species of +intellectual legislation. + +Chauncey Jerome's education was limited to three months in the district +school each year until he was ten, when his father took him into his +blacksmith shop at Plymouth, Conn., to make nails. Money was a scarce +article with young Chauncey. He once chopped a load of wood for one +cent, and often chopped by moonlight for neighbors at less than a dime +a load. His father died when he was eleven, and his mother was forced +to send Chauncey out, with tears in his eyes and a little bundle of +clothes in his hand, to earn a living on a farm. His new employer kept +him at work early and late chopping down trees all day, his shoes +sometimes full of snow, for he had no boots until he was nearly +twenty-one. At fourteen he was apprenticed for seven years to a +carpenter, who gave him only board and clothes. Several times during +his apprenticeship he carried his tools thirty miles on his back to his +work at different places. After he had learned his trade he frequently +walked thirty miles to a job with his kit upon his back. One day he +heard people talking of Eli Terry, of Plymouth, who had undertaken to +make two hundred clocks in one lot. "He'll never live long enough to +finish them," said one. "If he should," said another, "he could not +possibly sell so many. The very idea is ridiculous." Chauncey +pondered long over this rumor, for it had long been his dream to become +a great clock-maker. He tried his hand at the first opportunity, and +soon learned to make a wooden clock. When he got an order to make +twelve at twelve dollars apiece he thought his fortune was made. One +night he happened to think that a cheap clock could be made of brass as +well as of wood, and would not shrink, swell, or warp appreciably in +any climate. He acted on the idea, and became the first great +manufacturer of brass clocks. He made millions at the rate of six +hundred a day, exporting them to all parts of the globe. + +"The History of the English People" was written while J. R. Green was +struggling against a mortal illness. He had collected a vast store of +materials, and had begun to write, when his disease made a sudden and +startling progress, and his physicians said they could do nothing to +arrest it. In the extremity of ruin and defeat he applied himself with +greater fidelity to his work. The time that might still be left to him +for work must henceforth be wrested, day by day, from the grasp of +death. The writing occupied five months, while from hour to hour and +day to day his life was prolonged, his doctors said, by the sheer force +of his own will and his inflexible determination to finish the "Making +of England." He lay, too weak to lift a book, or to hold a pen, +dictating every word, sometimes through hours of intense suffering. +Yet so conscientious was he that, driven by death as he was, the +greater part of the book was rewritten five times. When it was done he +began the "Conquest of England," wrote it, reviewed it, and then, +dissatisfied with it, rejected it all and began again. As death laid +its cold fingers on his heart, he said: "I still have some work to do +that I know is good. I will try to win but one week more to write it +down." It was not until he was actually dying that he said, "I can +work no more." + +"What does he know," said a sage, "who has not suffered?" Schiller +produced his greatest tragedies in the midst of physical suffering +almost amounting to torture. Handel was never greater than when, +warned by palsy of the approach of death, and struggling with distress +and suffering, he sat down to compose the great works which have made +his name immortal in music. Mozart composed his great operas, and last +of all his "Requiem," when oppressed by debt and struggling with a +fatal disease. Beethoven produced his greatest works amidst gloomy +sorrow, when oppressed by almost total deafness. + +Perhaps no one ever battled harder to overcome obstacles which would +have disheartened most men than Demosthenes. He had such a weak voice, +and such an impediment in his speech, and was so short of breath, that +he could scarcely get through a single sentence without stopping to +rest. All his first attempts were nearly drowned by the hisses, jeers, +and scoffs of his audiences. His first effort that met with success +was against his guardian, who had defrauded him, and whom he compelled +to refund a part of his fortune. He was so discouraged by his defeats +that he determined to give up forever all attempts at oratory. One of +his auditors, however, believed the young man had something in him, and +encouraged him to persevere. He accordingly appeared again in public, +but was hissed down as before. As he withdrew, hanging his head in +great confusion, a noted actor, Satyrus, encouraged him still further +to try to overcome his impediment. He stammered so much that he could +not pronounce some of the letters at all, and his breath would give out +before he could get through a sentence. Finally, he determined to be +an orator cost what it might. He went to the seashore and practiced +amid the roar of the breakers with small pebbles in his mouth, in order +to overcome his stammering, and at the same time accustom himself to +the hisses and tumults of his audience. He overcame his short breath +by practicing speaking while running up steep and difficult places on +the shore. His awkward gestures were also corrected by long and +determined drill before a mirror. + +Disheartened by the expense of removing the troublesome seeds, Southern +planters were seriously considering the abandonment of cotton culture. +To clean a pound of cotton required the labor of a slave for a day. +Eli Whitney, a young man from New England, teaching school in Georgia, +saw the state of affairs, and determined to invent a machine to do the +work. He worked in secret for many months in a cellar, and at last +made a machine which cleaned the cotton perfectly and rapidly. Just as +success crowned his long labor thieves broke into the cellar and stole +his model. He recovered the model, but the principle was stolen, and +other machines were made without his consent. In vain he tried to +protect his right in the courts, for Southern juries would almost +invariably decide against him. He had started the South in a great +industry, and added millions to her wealth, yet the courts united with +the men who had infringed his patents to rob him of the reward of his +ingenuity and industry. At last he abandoned the whole thing in +disgust, and turned his attention to making improvements in firearms, +and with such success that he accumulated a fortune. + +Robert Collyer, who brought his bride in the steerage when he came to +America at the age of twenty-seven, worked at the anvil nine years in +Pennsylvania, and then became a preacher, soon winning national renown. + +A shrewd observer says of John Chinaman: "No sooner does he put his +foot among strangers than he begins to work. No office is too menial +or too laborious for him. He has come to make money, and he will make +it. His frugality requires but little: he barely lives, but he saves +what he gets; commences trade in the smallest possible way, and is +continually adding to his store. The native scorns such drudgery, and +remains poor; the Chinaman toils patiently on, and grows rich. A few +years pass by, and he has warehouses; becomes a contractor for produce; +buys foreign goods by the cargo; and employs his newly imported +countrymen, who have come to seek their fortune as he did. He is not +particularly scrupulous in matters of opinion. He never meddles with +politics, for they are dangerous and not profitable; but he will adopt +any creed, and carefully follow any observances, if, by so doing, he +can confirm or improve his position. He thrives with the Spaniard, and +works while the latter sleeps. He is too quick for the Dutchman, and +can smoke and bargain at the same time. He has harder work with the +Englishman, but still he is too much for him, and succeeds. Climate +has no effect on him: it cannot stop his hands, unless it kills him; +and if it does, he dies in harness, battling for money till his last +breath. Whoever he may be, and in whatever position, whether in his +own or a foreign country, he is diligent, temperate, and uncomplaining. +He keeps the word he pledges, pays his debts, and is capable of noble +and generous actions. It has been customary to speak lightly of him, +and to judge a whole people by a few vagabonds in a provincial seaport, +whose morals and manners have not been improved by foreign society." + +Columbus was dismissed as a fool from court after court, but he pushed +his suit against an incredulous and ridiculing world. Rebuffed by +kings, scorned by queens, he did not swerve a hair's breadth from the +overmastering purpose which dominated his soul. The words "New World" +were graven upon his heart; and reputation, ease, pleasure, position, +life itself if need be, must be sacrificed. Threats, ridicule, +ostracism, storms, leaky vessels, mutiny of sailors, could not shake +his mighty purpose. + +You cannot keep a determined man from success. Place stumbling-blocks +in his way and he takes them for stepping-stones, and on them will +climb to greatness. Take away his money, and he makes spurs of his +poverty to urge him on. Cripple him, and he writes the Waverley +Novels. Lock him up in a dungeon, and he composes the immortal +"Pilgrim's Progress." Put him in a cradle in a log cabin in the +wilderness of America, and in a few years you will find him in the +Capitol at the head of the greatest nation on the globe. + +Would it were possible to convince the struggling youth of to-day that +all that is great and noble and true in the history of the world is the +result of infinite pains-taking, perpetual plodding, of common +every-day industry! + +When Lavoisier the chemist asked that his execution might be postponed +for a few days in order to ascertain the results of the experiments he +was conducting in prison, the communists refused to grant the request, +saying: "The Republic has no need of philosophers." Dr. Priestley's +house was burned and his chemical library destroyed by a mob shouting: +"No philosophers," and he was forced to flee from his country. Bruno +was burned in Rome for revealing the heavens, and Versalius +[Transcriber's note: Vesalius?] was condemned for dissecting the human +body; but their names shall live as long as time shall last. Kossuth +was two years in prison at Buda, but he kept on working, undaunted. +John Hunter said: "The few things I have been enabled to do have been +accomplished under the greatest difficulties, and have encountered the +greatest opposition." + +Roger Bacon, one of the profoundest thinkers the world has produced, +was terribly persecuted for his studies in natural philosophy, yet he +persevered and won success. He was accused of dealing in magic, his +books were burned in public, and he was kept in prison for ten years. +Even our own revered Washington was mobbed in the streets because he +would not pander to the clamor of the people and reject the treaty +which Mr. Jay had arranged with Great Britain. But he remained firm, +and the people adopted his opinion. The Duke of Wellington was mobbed +in the streets of London and his windows were broken while his wife lay +dead in the house; but the "Iron Duke" never faltered in his course, or +swerved a hair's breadth from his purpose. + +William Phips, when a young man, heard some sailors on the street, in +Boston, talking about a Spanish ship, wrecked off the Bahama Islands, +which was supposed to have money on board. Young Phips determined to +find it. He set out at once, and, after many hardships, discovered the +lost treasure. He then heard of another ship, wrecked off Port De La +Plata many years before. He set sail for England and importuned +Charles II. for aid. To his delight the king fitted up the ship Rose +Algier for him. He searched and searched for a long time in vain. He +had to return to England to repair his vessel. James II. was then on +the throne, and he had to wait for four years before he could raise +money to return. His crew mutinied and threatened to throw him +overboard, but he turned the ship's guns on them. One day an Indian +diver went down for a curious sea plant and saw several cannon lying on +the bottom. They proved to belong to the wreck for which he was +looking, sunk fifty years before. He had nothing but dim traditions to +guide him, but he returned to England with $1,500,000. The King made +him High Sheriff of New England, and he was afterward made Governor of +Massachusetts Bay Colony. + +Ben Jonson, when following his trade of a mason, worked on Lincoln's +Inn in London with trowel in hand and a book in his pocket. Joseph +Hunter was a carpenter in youth, Robert Burns a plowman, Keats a +druggist, Thomas Carlyle and Hugh Miller masons. Dante and Descartes +were soldiers. Andrew Johnson was a tailor. Cardinal Wolsey, Defoe, +and Kirke White were butchers' sons. Faraday was the son of a +blacksmith, and his teacher, Humphry Davy, was an apprentice to an +apothecary. Kepler was a waiter boy in a German hotel, Bunyan a +tinker, Copernicus the son of a Polish baker. The boy Herschel played +the oboe for his meals. Marshal Ney, the "bravest of the brave," rose +from the ranks. His great industry gained for him the name of "The +Indefatigable." Soult served fourteen years before he was made a +sergeant. When made Foreign Minister of France he knew very little of +geography, even. Richard Cobden was a boy in a London warehouse. His +first speech in Parliament was a complete failure; but he was not +afraid of defeat, and soon became one of the greatest orators of his +day. Seven shoemakers sat in Congress during the first century of our +government: Roger Sherman, Henry Wilson, Gideon Lee, William Graham, +John Halley, H. P. Baldwin, and Daniel Sheffey. + +A constant struggle, a ceaseless battle to bring success from +inhospitable surroundings, is the price of all great achievements. + +The man who has not fought his way up to his own loaf, and does not +bear the scar of desperate conflict, does not know the highest meaning +of success. + +The money acquired by those who have thus struggled upward to success +is not their only, or indeed their chief reward. When, after years of +toil, of opposition, of ridicule, of repeated failure, Cyrus W. Field +placed his hand upon the telegraph instrument ticking a message under +the sea, think you that the electric thrill passed no further than the +tips of his fingers? When Thomas A. Edison demonstrated in Menlo Park +that the electric light had at last been developed into a commercial +success, do you suppose those bright rays failed to illuminate the +inmost recesses of his soul? Edward Everett said: "There are occasions +in life in which a great mind lives years of enjoyment in a single +moment. I can fancy the emotion of Galileo when, first raising the +newly constructed telescope to the heavens, he saw fulfilled the grand +prophecy of Copernicus, and beheld the planet Venus crescent like the +moon. It was such another moment as that when the immortal printers of +Mentz and Strasburg received the first copy of the Bible into their +hands, the work of their divine art; like that when Columbus, through +the gray dawn of the 12th of October, 1492, beheld the shores of San +Salvador; like that when the law of gravitation first revealed itself +to the intellect of Newton; like that when Franklin saw, by the +stiffening fibres of the hemp cord of his kite, that he held the +lightning in his grasp, like that when Leverrier received back from +Berlin the tidings that the predicted planet was found." + +"Observe yon tree in your neighbor's garden," says Zanoni to Viola in +Bulwer's novel. "Look how it grows up, crooked and distorted. Some +wind scattered the germ, from which it sprung, in the clefts of the +rock. Choked up and walled round by crags and buildings, by nature and +man, its life has been one struggle for the light. You see how it has +writhed and twisted,--how, meeting the barrier in one spot, it has +labored and worked, stem and branch, towards the clear skies at last. +What has preserved it through each disfavor of birth and +circumstances--why are its leaves as green and fair as those of the +vine behind you, which, with all its arms, can embrace the open +sunshine? My child, because of the very instinct that impelled the +struggle,--because the labor for the light won to the light at length. +So with a gallant heart, through every adverse accident of sorrow, and +of fate, to turn to the sun, to strive for the heaven; this it is that +gives knowledge to the strong and happiness to the weak." + + "Each petty hand + Can steer a ship becalmed; but he that will + Govern her and carry her to her ends, must know + His tides, his currents; how to shift his sails; + What she will bear in foul, what in fair weathers; + What her springs are, her leaks, and how to stop them; + What strands, what shelves, what rocks to threaten her; + The forces and the natures of all winds, + Gusts, storms, and tempests; when her keel plows hell, + And deck knocks heaven; then to manage her + Becomes the name and office of a pilot." + + + + +CHAPTER V. + +USES OF OBSTACLES. + +Nature, when she adds difficulties, adds brains.--EMERSON. + +Many men owe the grandeur of their lives to their tremendous +difficulties.--SPURGEON. + + The good are better made by ill, + As odors crushed are sweeter still. + ROGERS. + + Aromatic plants bestow + No spicy fragrance while they grow; + But crushed or trodden to the ground, + Diffuse their balmy sweets around. + GOLDSMITH. + +As night to stars, woe lustre gives to man.--YOUNG. + +There is no possible success without some opposition as a fulcrum: +force is always aggressive and crowds something.--HOLMES. + +The more difficulties one has to encounter, within and without, the +more significant and the higher in inspiration his life will +be.--HORACE BUSHMILL. + +Adversity has the effect of eliciting talents which in prosperous +circumstances would have lain dormant.--HORACE. + +For gold is tried in the fire and acceptable men in the furnace of +adversity.--SIRACH. + + Though losses and crosses be lessons right severe, + There's wit there ye'll get there, ye'll find no other where. + BURNS. + +Possession pampers the mind; privation trains and strengthens +it.--HAZLITT. + +"Adversity is the prosperity of the great." + +No man ever worked his way in a dead calm.--JOHN NEAL. + +"Kites rise against, not with, the wind." + + +"Many and many a time since," said Harriet Martineau, referring to her +father's failure in business, "have we said that, but for that loss of +money, we might have lived on in the ordinary provincial method of +ladies with small means, sewing and economizing and growing narrower +every year; whereas, by being thrown, while it was yet time, on our own +resources, we have worked hard and usefully, won friends, reputation, +and independence, seen the world abundantly, abroad and at home; in +short, have truly lived instead of vegetating." + + * * * * * * + +[Illustration: JOHN BUNYAN] + + "Sculptor of souls, I lift to Thee + Encumbered heart and hands; + Spare not the chisel, set me free, + However dear the bands. + + * * * * * * + +"I do believe God wanted a grand poem of that man," said George +Macdonald of Milton, "and so blinded him that he might be able to write +it." + +Two of the three greatest epic poets of the world were blind,--Homer +and Milton; while the third, Dante, was in his later years nearly, if +not altogether, blind. It almost seems as though some great characters +had been physically crippled in certain respects so that they would not +dissipate their energy, but concentrate it all in one direction. + +"I have been beaten, but not cast down," said Thiers, after making a +complete failure of his first speech in the Chamber of Deputies. "I am +making my first essay in arms. In the tribune, as under fire, a defeat +is as useful as a victory." + +A distinguished investigator in science said that when he encountered +an apparently insuperable obstacle, he usually found himself upon the +brink of some discovery. + +"Returned with thanks" has made many an author. Failure often leads a +man to success by arousing his latent energy, by firing a dormant +purpose, by awakening powers which were sleeping. Men of mettle turn +disappointments into helps as the oyster turns into pearl the sand +which annoys it. + +"Let the adverse breath of criticism be to you only what the blast of +the storm wind is to the eagle,--a force against him that lifts him +higher." + +A kite would not fly unless it had a string tying it down. It is just +so in life. The man who is tied down by half a dozen blooming +responsibilities and their mother will make a higher and stronger +flight than the bachelor who, having nothing to keep him steady, is +always floundering in the mud. If you want to ascend in the world tie +yourself to somebody. + +"It was the severe preparation for the subsequent harvest," said +Pemberton Leigh, the eminent English lawyer, speaking of his early +poverty and hard work. "I learned to consider indefatigable labor as +the indispensable condition of success, pecuniary independence as +essential alike to virtue and happiness, and no sacrifice too great to +avoid the misery of debt." + +When Napoleon's companions made sport of him on account of his humble +origin and poverty he devoted himself entirely to books, and soon +rising above them in scholarship, commanded their respect. Soon he was +regarded as the brightest ornament of the class. + +"To make his way at the bar," said an eminent jurist, "a young man must +live like a hermit and work like a horse. There is nothing that does a +young lawyer so much good as to be half starved." + +Thousands of men of great native ability have been lost to the world +because they have not had to wrestle with obstacles, and to struggle +under difficulties sufficient to stimulate into activity their dormant +powers. No effort is too dear which helps us along the line of our +proper career. + +Poverty and obscurity of origin may impede our progress, but it is only +like the obstruction of ice or debris in the river temporarily forcing +the water into eddies, where it accumulates strength and a mighty +reserve which ultimately sweeps the obstruction impetuously to the sea. +Poverty and obscurity are not insurmountable obstacles, but they often +act as a stimulus to the naturally indolent, and develop a firmer fibre +of mind, a stronger muscle and stamina of body. If the germ of the +seed has to struggle to push its way up through the stones and hard +sod, to fight its way up to sunlight and air, and then to wrestle with +storm and tempest, with snow and frost, the fibre of its timber will be +all the tougher and stronger. + +"Do you wish to live without a trial?" asks a modern teacher. "Then +you wish to die but half a man. Without trial you cannot guess at your +own strength. Men do not learn to swim on a table. They must go into +deep water and buffet the waves. Hardship is the native soil of +manhood and self-reliance. Trials are rough teachers, but rugged +schoolmasters make rugged pupils. A man who goes through life +prosperous, and comes to his grave without a wrinkle, is not half a +man. Difficulties are God's errands. And when we are sent upon them +we should esteem it a proof of God's confidence. We should reach after +the highest good." + +"If you wish to rise," said Talleyrand, "make enemies." + +There is good philosophy in the injunction to love our enemies, for +they are often our best friends in disguise. They tell us the truth +when friends flatter. Their biting sarcasm and scathing rebuke are +often mirrors which reveal us to ourselves. These unkind stings and +thrusts are spurs which urge us on to grander success and nobler +endeavor. Friends cover our faults and rarely rebuke; enemies drag out +to the light all our weaknesses without mercy. We dread these thrusts +and exposures as we do the surgeon's knife, but are the better for +them. They reach depths before untouched, and we are led to resolve to +redeem ourselves from scorn and inferiority. + +We are the victors of our opponents. They have developed in us the +very power by which we overcome them. Without their opposition we +could never have braced and anchored and fortified ourselves, as the +oak is braced and anchored for its thousand battles with the tempests. +Our trials, our sorrows, and our griefs develop us in a similar way. + +The man who has triumphed over difficulties bears the signs of victory +in his face. An air of triumph is seen in every movement. + +John Calvin, who made a theology for the seventeenth and eighteenth +centuries, was tortured with disease for many years, and so was Robert +Hall. The great men who have lifted the world to a higher level were +not developed in easy circumstances, but were rocked in the cradle of +difficulties and pillowed on hardships. + +"The gods look on no grander sight than an honest man struggling with +adversity." + +"Then I must learn to sing better," said Anaximander, when told that +the very boys laughed at his singing. Strong characters, like the +palm-tree, seem to thrive best when most abused. Men who have stood up +bravely under great misfortune for years are often unable to bear +prosperity. Their good fortune takes the spring out of their energy, +as the torrid zone enervates races accustomed to a vigorous climate. +Some people never come to themselves until baffled, rebuffed, thwarted, +defeated, crushed, in the opinion of those around them. Trials unlock +their virtues; defeat is the threshold of their victory. + +It is defeat that turns bone to flint; it is defeat that turns gristle +to muscle; it is defeat that makes men invincible; it is defeat that +has made those heroic natures that are now in the ascendency, and that +has given the sweet law of liberty instead of the bitter law of +oppression. + +Difficulties call out great qualities, and make greatness possible. +How many centuries of peace would have developed a Grant? Few knew +Lincoln until the great weight of the war showed his character. A +century of peace would never have produced a Bismarck. Perhaps +Phillips and Garrison would never have been known to history had it not +been for slavery. + +"Will he not make a great painter?" was asked in regard to an artist +fresh from his Italian tour. "No, never," replied Northcote. "Why +not?" "Because he has an income of six thousand pounds a year." In +the sunshine of wealth a man is, as a rule, warped too much to become +an artist of high merit. A drenching shower of adversity would +straighten his fibres out again. He should have some great thwarting +difficulty to struggle against. + +The best tools receive their temper from fire, their edge from +grinding; the noblest characters are developed in a similar way. The +harder the diamond, the more brilliant the lustre, and the greater the +friction necessary to bring it out. Only its own dust is hard enough +to make this most precious stone reveal its full beauty. + +The spark in the flint would sleep forever but for friction; the fire +in man would never blaze but for antagonism. The friction which +retards a train upon the track, robbing the engine of a fourth of its +power, is the very secret of locomotion. Oil the track, remove the +friction, and the train will not move an inch. The moment man is +relieved of opposition or friction, and the track of his life is oiled +with inherited wealth or other aids, that moment he often ceases to +struggle and therefore ceases to grow. + +"It is this scantiness of means, this continual deficiency, this +constant hitch, this perpetual struggle to keep the head above water +and the wolf from the door, that keeps society from falling to pieces. +Let every man have a few more dollars than he wants, and anarchy would +follow." + +Suddenly, with much jarring and jolting, an electric car came to a +standstill just in front of a heavy truck that was headed in an +opposite direction. The huge truck wheels were sliding uselessly round +on the car tracks that were wet and slippery from rain. All the urging +of the teamster and the straining of the horses in vain,--until the +motorman quietly tossed a shovelful of sand on the track under the +heavy wheels, then the truck lumbered on its way. "Friction is a very +good thing," remarked a passenger. + +The philosopher Kant observes that a dove, inasmuch as the only +obstacle it has to overcome is the resistance of the air, might suppose +that if only the air were out of the way it could fly with greater +rapidity and ease. Yet if the air were withdrawn, and the bird should +try to fly in a vacuum, it would fall instantly to the ground unable to +fly at all. The very element that offers the opposition to flying is +at the same time the condition of any flight whatever. + +Rough seas and storms make sailors. Emergencies make giant men. But +for our Civil War the names of its grand heroes would not be written +among the greatest of our time. + +The effort or struggle to climb to a higher place in life has strength +and dignity in it, and cannot fail to leave us stronger for the +struggle, even though we miss the prize. + +From an aimless, idle, and useless brain, emergencies often call out +powers and virtues before unknown and suspected. How often we see a +young man develop astounding ability and energy after the death of a +parent, or the loss of a fortune, or after some other calamity has +knocked the props and crutches from under him. The prison has roused +the slumbering fire in many a noble mind. "Robinson Crusoe" was +written in prison. The "Pilgrim's Progress" appeared in Bedford Jail. +The "Life and Times" of Baxter, Eliot's "Monarchia of Man," and Penn's +"No Cross, No Crown," were written by prisoners. Sir Walter Raleigh +wrote "The History of the World" during his imprisonment of thirteen +years. Luther translated the Bible while confined in the Castle of +Wartburg. For twenty years Dante worked in exile, and even under +sentence of death. His works were burned in public after his death; +but genius will not burn. + +Take two acorns from the same tree, as nearly alike as possible; plant +one on a hill by itself, and the other in the dense forest, and watch +them grow. The oak standing alone is exposed to every storm. Its +roots reach out in every direction, clutching the rocks and piercing +deep into the earth. Every rootlet lends itself to steady the growing +giant, as if in anticipation of fierce conflict with the elements. +Sometimes its upward growth seems checked for years, but all the while +it has been expending its energy in pushing a root across a large rock +to gain a firmer anchorage. Then it shoots proudly aloft again, +prepared to defy the hurricane. The gales which sport so rudely with +its wide branches find more than their match, and only serve still +further to toughen every minutest fibre from pith to bark. + +The acorn planted in the deep forest shoots up a weak, slender sapling. +Shielded by its neighbors, it feels no need of spreading its roots far +and wide for support. + +Take two boys, as nearly alike as possible. Place one in the country +away from the hothouse culture and refinements of the city, with only +the district school, the Sunday-school, and a few books. Remove wealth +and props of every kind; and, if he has the right kind of material in +him, he will thrive. Every obstacle overcome lends him strength for +the next conflict. If he falls, he rises with more determination than +before. Like a rubber ball, the harder the obstacle he meets the +higher he rebounds. Obstacles and opposition are but apparatus of the +gymnasium in which the fibres of his manhood are developed. He compels +respect and recognition from those who have ridiculed his poverty. Put +the other boy in a Vanderbilt family. Give him French and German +nurses; gratify every wish. Place him under the tutelage of great +masters and send him to Harvard. Give him thousands a year for +spending money, and let him travel extensively. + +The two meet. The city lad is ashamed of his country brother. The +plain, threadbare clothes, hard hands, tawny face, and awkward manner +of the country boy make sorry contrast with the genteel appearance of +the other. The poor boy bemoans his hard lot, regrets that he has "no +chance in life," and envies the city youth. He thinks that it is a +cruel Providence that places such a wide gulf between them. They meet +again as men, but how changed! It is as easy to distinguish the +sturdy, self-made man from the one who has been propped up all his life +by wealth, position, and family influence, as it is for the shipbuilder +to tell the difference between the plank from the rugged mountain oak +and one from the sapling of the forest. If you think there is no +difference, place each plank in the bottom of a ship, and test them in +a hurricane at sea. + +When God wants to educate a man, he does not send him to school to the +Graces, but to the Necessities. Through the pit and the dungeon Joseph +came to a throne. We are not conscious of the mighty cravings of our +half divine humanity; we are not aware of the god within us until some +chasm yawns which must be filled, or till the rending asunder of our +affections forces us to become conscious of a need. Paul in his Roman +cell; John Huss led to the stake at Constance; Tyndale dying in his +prison at Amsterdam; Milton, amid the incipient earthquake throes of +revolution, teaching two little boys in Aldgate Street; David +Livingstone, worn to a shadow, dying in a negro hut in Central Africa, +alone,--what failures they might all to themselves have seemed to be, +yet what mighty purposes was God working out by their apparent +humiliations! + +Two highwaymen chancing once to pass a gibbet, one of them exclaimed: +"What a fine profession ours would be if there were no gibbets!" "Tut, +you blockhead," replied the other, "gibbets are the making of us; for, +if there were no gibbets, every one would be a highwayman." Just so +with every art, trade, or pursuit; it is the difficulties that scare +and keep out unworthy competitors. + +"Success grows out of struggles to overcome difficulties," says Smiles. +"If there were no difficulties, there would be no success. In this +necessity for exertion we find the chief source of human +advancement,--the advancement of individuals as of nations. It has led +to most of the mechanical inventions and improvements of the age." + +"Stick your claws into me," said Mendelssohn to his critics when +entering the Birmingham orchestra. "Don't tell me what you like but +what you don't like." + +John Hunter said that the art of surgery would never advance until +professional men had the courage to publish their failures as well as +their successes. + +"Young men need to be taught not to expect a perfectly smooth and easy +way to the objects of their endeavor or ambition," says Dr. Peabody. +"Seldom does one reach a position with which he has reason to be +satisfied without encountering difficulties and what might seem +discouragements. But if they are properly met, they are not what they +seem, and may prove to be helps, not hindrances. There is no more +helpful and profiting exercise than surmounting obstacles." + +It is said that but for the disappointments of Dante, Florence would +have had another prosperous Lord Mayor; and the ten dumb centuries +continued voiceless, and the ten other listening centuries (for there +will be ten of them, and more) would have had no "Divina Commedia" to +hear! + +It was in the Madrid jail that Cervantes wrote "Don Quixote." He was +so poor that he could not even get paper during the last of his +writing, and had to write on scraps of leather. A rich Spaniard was +asked to help him, but the rich man replied: "Heaven forbid that his +necessities should be relieved, it is his poverty that makes the world +rich." + +"A constant struggle, a ceaseless battle to bring success from +inhospitable surroundings, is the price of all great achievements." + +"She sings well," said a great musician of a promising but passionless +cantatrice, "but she wants something, and in that something, +everything. If I were single, I would court her, I would marry her; I +would maltreat her; I would break her heart, and in six months she +would be the greatest singer in Europe." + +"He has the stuff in him to make a good musician," said Beethoven of +Rossini, "if he had only been well flogged when a boy; but he is +spoiled by the ease with which he composes." + +We do our best while fighting desperately to attain what the heart +covets. Martin Luther did his greatest work, and built up his best +character, while engaged in sharp controversy with the Pope. Later in +life his wife asks, "Doctor, how is it that whilst subject to Papacy we +prayed so often and with such fervor, whilst now we pray with the +utmost coldness and very seldom?" + +When Lord Eldon was poor, Lord Thurlow withheld a promised +commissionership of bankruptcy, saying that it was a favor not to give +it then. "What he meant was," said Eldon, "that he had learned I was +by nature very indolent, and it was only want that could make me very +industrious." + +Waters says that the struggle to obtain knowledge and to advance one's +self in the world strengthens the mind, disciplines the faculties, +matures the judgment, promotes self-reliance, and gives one +independence of thought and force of character. + +"The gods in bounty work up storms about us," says Addison, "that give +mankind occasion to exert their hidden strength, and throw out into +practice virtues that shun the day, and lie concealed in the smooth +seasons and the calms of life." + +The hothouse plant may tempt a pampered appetite or shed a languid +odor, but the working world gets its food from fields of grain and +orchards waving in the sun and free air, from cattle that wrestle on +the plains, from fishes that struggle with currents of river or ocean; +its choicest perfumes from flowers that bloom unheeded, and in +wind-tossed forests finds its timber for temples and for ships. + +"I do not see," says Emerson, "how any man can afford, for the sake of +his nerves and his nap, to spare any action in which he can partake. +It is pearls and rubies to his discourse. Drudgery, calamity, +exasperation, want, are instructors in eloquence and wisdom. The true +scholar grudges every opportunity of action passed by as a loss of +power." + +Kossuth called himself "a tempest-tossed soul, whose eyes have been +sharpened by affliction." + +Benjamin Franklin ran away, and George Law was turned out of doors. +Thrown upon their own resources, they early acquired the energy and +skill to overcome difficulties. + +As soon as young eagles can fly the old birds tumble them out and tear +the down and feathers from their nest. The rude and rough experience +of the eaglet fits him to become the bold king of birds, fierce and +expert in pursuing his prey. + +Boys who are bound out, crowded out, kicked out, usually "turn out," +while those who do not have these disadvantages frequently fail to +"come out." + +"It was not the victories but the defeats of my life which have +strengthened me," said the aged Sidenham Poyntz. + +Almost from the dawn of history, oppression has been the lot of the +Hebrews, yet they have given the world its noblest songs, its wisest +proverbs, its sweetest music. With them persecution seems to bring +prosperity. They thrive where others would starve. They hold the +purse-strings of many nations. To them hardship has been "like spring +mornings, frosty but kindly, the cold of which will kill the vermin, +but will let the plant live." + +In one of the battles of the Crimea a cannon-ball struck inside the +fort, crashing through a beautiful garden. But from the ugly chasm +there burst forth a spring of water which ever afterward flowed a +living fountain. From the ugly gashes which misfortunes and sorrows +make in our hearts, perennial fountains of rich experience and new joys +often spring. + +Don't lament and grieve over lost wealth. The Creator may see +something grand and mighty which even He cannot bring out as long as +your wealth stands in the way. You must throw away the crutches of +riches and stand upon your own feet, and develop the long unused +muscles of manhood. God may see a rough diamond in you which only the +hard hits of poverty can polish. + +God knows where the richest melodies of our lives are, and what drill +and what discipline are necessary to bring them out. The frost, the +snows, the tempests, the lightnings, are the rough teachers that bring +the tiny acorn to the sturdy oak. Fierce winters are as necessary to +it as long summers. It is its half-century's struggle with the +elements for existence, wrestling with the storm, fighting for its life +from the moment that it leaves the acorn until it goes into the ship, +that gives it value. Without this struggle it would have been +character-less, stamina-less, nerve-less, and its grain would have +never been susceptible of high polish. The most beautiful as well as +the strongest woods are found not in tropical climates, but in the +severe climates, where they have to fight the frosts and the winter's +cold. + +Many a man has never found himself until he has lost his all. +Adversity stripped him only to discover him. Obstacles, hardships are +the chisel and mallet which shape the strong life into beauty. The +rough ledge on the hillside complains of the drill, of the blasting +powder which disturbs its peace of centuries: it is not pleasant to be +rent with powder, to be hammered and squared by the quarryman. But +look again: behold the magnificent statue, the monument, chiseled into +grace and beauty, telling its grand story of valor in the public square +for centuries. + +The statue would have slept in the marble forever but for the blasting, +the chiseling, and the polishing. The angel of our higher and nobler +selves would remain forever unknown in the rough quarries of our lives +but for the blastings of affliction, the chiseling of obstacles, and +the sand-papering of a thousand annoyances. + +Who has not observed the patience, the calm endurance, the sweet +loveliness chiseled out of some rough life by the reversal of fortune +or by some terrible affliction. + +How many business men have made their greatest strides toward manhood, +have developed their greatest virtues, when the reverses of fortune +have swept away everything they had in the world; when disease had +robbed them of all they held dear in life. Often we cannot see the +angel in the quarry of our lives, the statue of manhood, until the +blasts of misfortune have rent the ledge, and difficulties and +obstacles have squared and chiseled the granite blocks into grace and +beauty. + +Many a man has been ruined into salvation. The lightning which smote +his dearest hopes opened up a new rift in his dark life, and gave him +glimpses of himself which, until then, he had never seen. + +The grave buried his dearest hopes, but uncovered possibilities in his +nature of patience, endurance, and hope which he never dreamed he +possessed before. + +"Adversity is a severe instructor," says Edmund Burke, "set over us by +one who knows us better than we do ourselves, as he loves us better +too. He that wrestles with us strengthens our nerves and sharpens our +skill. Our antagonist is our helper. This conflict with difficulty +makes us acquainted with our object, and compels us to consider it in +all its relations. It will not suffer us to be superficial." + +Men who have the right kind of material in them will assert their +personality, and rise in spite of a thousand adverse circumstances. +You cannot keep them down. Every obstacle seems only to add to their +ability to get on. + +"Under different circumstances," says Castelar, "Savonarola would +undoubtedly have been a good husband, a tender father, a man unknown to +history, utterly powerless to print upon the sands of time and upon the +human soul the deep trace which he has left, but misfortune came to +visit him, to crush his heart, and to impart that marked melancholy +which characterizes a soul in grief, and the grief that circled his +brows with a crown of thorns was also that which wreathed them with the +splendor of immortality. His hopes were centred in the woman he loved, +his life was set upon the possession of her, and when her family +finally rejected him, partly on account of his profession, and partly +on account of his person, he believed that it was death that had come +upon him, when in truth it was immortality." + +The greatest men will ever be those who have risen from the ranks. It +is said that there are ten thousand chances to one that genius, talent, +and virtue shall issue from a farmhouse rather than from a palace. + +The youth Opie earned his bread by sawing wood, but he reached a +professorship in the Royal Academy. When but ten years old he showed +the material he was made of by a beautiful drawing on a shingle. +Antonio Canova was the son of a day laborer. Thorwaldsen's parents +were poor, but, like hundreds of others, they did with their might what +their hands found to do, and ennobled their work. They rose by being +greater than their calling, as Arkwright rose above mere barbering, +Bunyan above tinkering, Wilson above shoemaking, Lincoln above +rail-splitting, and Grant above tanning. By being first-class barbers, +tinkers, shoemakers, rail-splitters, tanners, they acquired the power +which enabled them to become great inventors, authors, statesmen, +generals. + +Adversity exasperates fools, dejects cowards, draws out the faculties +of the wise and industrious, puts the modest to the necessity of trying +their skill, awes the opulent, and makes the idle industrious. Neither +do uninterrupted success and prosperity qualify men for usefulness and +happiness. The storms of adversity, like those of the ocean, rouse the +faculties, and excite the invention, prudence, skill, and fortitude of +the voyager. The martyrs of ancient times, in bracing their minds to +outward calamities, acquired a loftiness of purpose and a moral heroism +worth a lifetime of softness and security. A man upon whom continuous +sunshine falls is like the earth in August: he becomes parched and dry +and hard and close-grained. Men have drawn from adversity the elements +of greatness. If you have the blues, go and see the poorest and +sickest families within your knowledge. The darker the setting, the +brighter the diamond. Don't run about and tell acquaintances that you +have been unfortunate; people do not like to have unfortunate men for +acquaintances. + +Beethoven was almost totally deaf and burdened with sorrow when he +produced his greatest works. Schiller wrote his best books in great +bodily suffering. He was not free from pain for fifteen years. Milton +wrote his leading productions when blind, poor, and sick. "Who best +can suffer," said he, "best can do." Bunyan said that, if it were +lawful, he could even pray for greater trouble, for the greater +comfort's sake. + +"Do you know what God puts us on our backs for?" asked Dr. Payson, +smiling, as he lay sick in bed. "No," replied the visitor. "In order +that we may look upward." "I am not come to condole but to rejoice +with you," said the friend, "for it seems to me that this is no time +for mourning." "Well, I am glad to hear that," said Dr. Payson, "it is +not often I am addressed in such a way. The fact is I never had less +need of condolence, and yet everybody persists in offering it; whereas, +when I was prosperous and well, and a successful preacher, and really +needed condolence, they flattered and congratulated me." + +A German knight undertook to make an immense Aeolian harp by stretching +wires from tower to tower of his castle. When he finished the harp it +was silent; but when the breezes began to blow he heard faint strains +like the murmuring of distant music. At last a tempest arose and swept +with fury over his castle, and then rich and grand music came from the +wires. Ordinary experiences do not seem to touch some lives--to bring +out any poetry, any higher manhood. + +Not until the breath of the plague had blasted a hundred thousand +lives, and the great fire had licked up cheap, shabby, wicked London, +did she arise, phoenix-like, from her ashes and ruin, a grand and +mighty city. + +True salamanders live best in the furnace of persecution. + +"Every man who makes a fortune has been more than once a bankrupt, if +the truth were known," said Albion Tourgee. "Grant's failure as a +subaltern made him commander-in-chief, and for myself, my failure to +accomplish what I set out to do led me to what I never had aspired to." + +The appeal for volunteers in the great battle of life, in exterminating +ignorance and error, and planting high on an everlasting foundation the +banner of intelligence and right, is directed to _you_. Burst the +trammels that impede your progress, and cling to hope. Place high thy +standard, and with a firm tread and fearless eye press steadily onward. + +Not ease, but effort, not facility, but difficulty, makes men. +Toilsome culture is the price of great success, and the slow growth of +a great character is one of its special necessities. Many of our best +poets + + "Are cradled into poetry by wrong, + And learn in suffering what they teach in song." + + +Byron was stung into a determination to go to the top by a scathing +criticism of his first book, "Hours of Idleness," published when he was +but nineteen years of age. Macaulay said, "There is scarce an instance +in history of so sudden a rise to so dizzy an eminence as Byron +reached." In a few years he stood by the side of such men as Scott, +Southey, and Campbell, and died at thirty-seven, that age so fatal to +genius. Many an orator like "stuttering Jack Curran," or "Orator Mum," +as he was once called, has been spurred into eloquence by ridicule and +abuse. + +This is the crutch age. "Helps" and "aids" are advertised everywhere. +We have institutes, colleges, universities, teachers, books, libraries, +newspapers, magazines. Our thinking is done for us. Our problems are +all worked out in "explanations" and "keys." Our boys are too often +tutored through college with very little study. "Short roads" and +"abridged methods" are characteristic of the century. Ingenious +methods are used everywhere to get the drudgery out of the college +course. Newspapers give us our politics, and preachers our religion. +Self-help and self-reliance are getting old fashioned. Nature, as if +conscious of delayed blessings, has rushed to man's relief with her +wondrous forces, and undertakes to do the world's drudgery and +emancipate him from Eden's curse. + +But do not misinterpret her edict. She emancipates from the lower only +to call to the higher. She does not bid the world go and play while +she does the work. She emancipates the muscles only to employ the +brain and heart. + +The most beautiful as well as the strongest characters are not +developed in warm climates, where man finds his bread ready made on +trees, and where exertion is a great effort, but rather in a trying +climate and on a stubborn soil. It is no chance that returns to the +Hindoo ryot a penny and to the American laborer a dollar for his daily +toil; that makes Mexico with its mineral wealth poor, and New England +with its granite and ice rich. It is rugged necessity, it is the +struggle to obtain, it is poverty the priceless spur, that develops the +stamina of manhood, and calls the race out of barbarism. Labor found +the world a wilderness and has made it a garden. + +As the sculptor thinks only of the angel imprisoned in the marble +block, so Nature cares only for the man or woman shut up in the human +being. The sculptor cares nothing for the block as such; Nature has +little regard for the mere lump of breathing clay. The sculptor will +chip off all unnecessary material to set free the angel. Nature will +chip and pound us remorselessly to bring out our possibilities. She +will strip us of wealth, humble our pride, humiliate our ambition, let +us down from the ladder of fame, will discipline us in a thousand ways, +if she can develop a little character. Everything must give way to +that. Wealth is nothing, position is nothing, fame is nothing, +_manhood is everything_. + +Not ease, not pleasure, not happiness, but a _man_, Nature is after. +In every great painting of the masters there is one idea or figure +which stands out boldly beyond everything else. Every other idea or +figure on the canvas is subordinate to it, but pointing to the central +idea, finds its true expression there. So in the vast universe of God, +every object of creation is but a guideboard with an index-finger +pointing to the central figure of the created universe--Man. Nature +writes this thought upon every leaf, she thunders it in every creation. +It is exhaled from every flower; it twinkles in every star. + +Oh, what price will Nature not pay for a man! Ages and aeons were +nothing for her to spend in preparing for his coming, or to make his +existence possible. She has rifled the centuries for his development, +and placed the universe at his disposal. The world is but his +kindergarten, and every created thing but an object-lesson from the +unseen universe. Nature resorts to a thousand expedients to develop a +perfect type of her grandest creation. To do this she must induce him +to fight his way up to his own loaf. She never allows him once to lose +sight of the fact that it is the struggle to attain that develops the +man. The moment we put our hand upon that which looks so attractive at +a distance, and which we struggled so hard to reach, Nature robs it of +its charm by holding up before us another prize still more attractive. + +"Life," says a philosopher, "refuses to be so adjusted as to eliminate +from it all strife and conflict and pain. There are a thousand tasks +that, in larger interests than ours, must be done, whether we want them +or no. The world refuses to walk upon tiptoe, so that we may be able +to sleep. It gets up very early and stays up very late, and all the +while there is the conflict of myriads of hammers and saws and axes +with the stubborn material that in no other way can be made to serve +its use and do its work for man. And then, too, these hammers and axes +are not wielded without strain or pang, but swung by the millions of +toilers who labor with their cries and groans and tears. Nay, our +temple-building, whether it be for God or man, exacts its bitter toll, +and fills life with cries and blows. The thousand rivalries of our +daily business, the fiercer animosities when we are beaten, the even +fiercer exultation when we have beaten, the crashing blows of disaster, +the piercing scream of defeat,--these things we have not yet gotten rid +of, nor in this life ever will. Why should we wish to get rid of them? +We are here, my brother, to be hewed and hammered and planed in God's +quarry and on God's anvil for a nobler life to come." Only the muscle +that is used is developed. + +The constantly cheerful man, who survives his blighted hopes and +disappointments, who takes them just for what they are, lessons, and +perhaps blessings in disguise, is the true hero. + + There is a strength + Deep bedded in our hearts of which we reck + But little, till the shafts of heaven have pierced + Its fragile dwelling. Must not earth be rent + Before her gems are found? + MRS. HEMANS. + + "If what shone afar so grand + Turns to ashes in the hand, + On again, the virtue lies + In the struggle, not the prize." + + "The hero is not fed on sweets, + Daily his own heart he eats; + Chambers of the great are jails, + And head-winds right for royal sails." + + "So many great + Illustrious spirits have conversed with woe, + Have in her school been taught, as are enough + To consecrate distress, and make ambition + Even wish the frown beyond the smile of fortune." + + Then welcome each rebuff, + That turns earth's smoothness rough, + Each sting, that bids not sit nor stand but go. + BROWNING. + + + + +CHAPTER VI. + +ONE UNWAVERING AIM. + + Life is an arrow--therefore you must know + What mark to aim at, how to use the bow-- + Then draw it to the head and let it go. + HENRY VAN DYKE. + +The important thing in life is to have a great aim, and to possess the +aptitude and perseverance to attain it.--GOETHE. + +Concentration alone conquers.--C. BUXTON. + +"He who follows two hares is sure to catch neither." + +"A double-minded man is unstable in all his ways." + +Let every one ascertain his special business and calling, and then +stick to it if he would be successful.--FRANKLIN. + +"Digression is as dangerous as stagnation in the career of a young man +in business." + +Every man who observes vigilantly and resolves steadfastly grows +unconsciously into genius.--BULWER. + +Genius is intensity.--BALZAC. + + +"Why do you lead such a solitary life?" asked a friend of Michael +Angelo. "Art is a jealous mistress," replied the artist; "she requires +the whole man." During his labors at the Sistine Chapel, according to +Disraeli, he refused to meet any one, even at his own house. + +"That day we sailed westward, which was our course," were the simple +but grand words which Columbus wrote in his journal day after day. +Hope might rise and fall, terror and dismay might seize upon the crew +at the mysterious variations of the compass, but Columbus, unappalled, +pushed due west and nightly added to his record the above words. + +"Cut an inch deeper," said a member of the Old Guard to the surgeon +probing his wound, "and you will find the Emperor,"--meaning his heart. +By the marvelous power of concentrated purpose Napoleon had left his +name on the very stones of the capital, had burned it indelibly into +the heart of every Frenchman, and had left it written in living letters +all over Europe. France to-day has not shaken off the spell of that +name. In the fair city on the Seine the mystic "N" confronts you +everywhere. + +Oh, the power of a great purpose to work miracles! It has changed the +face of the world. Napoleon knew that there were plenty of great men +in France, but they did not know the might of the unwavering aim by +which he was changing the destinies of Europe. He saw that what was +called the "balance of power" was only an idle dream; that, unless some +master-mind could be found which was a match for events, the millions +would rule in anarchy. His iron will grasped the situation; and like +William Pitt, he did not loiter around balancing the probabilities of +failure or success, or dally with his purpose. There was no turning to +the right nor to the left; no dreaming away time, nor building +air-castles; but one look and purpose, forward, upward and onward, +straight to his goal. He always hit the bull's-eye. His great success +in war was due largely to his definiteness of aim. He was like a great +burning-glass, concentrating the rays of the sun upon a single spot; he +burned a hole wherever he went. The secret of his power lay in his +ability to concentrate his forces upon a single point. After finding +the weak place in the enemy's ranks, he would mass his men and hurl +them like an avalanche upon the critical point, crowding volley upon +volley, charge upon charge, till he made a breach. What a lesson of +the power of concentration there is in this man's life! He was able to +focus all his faculties upon the smallest detail, as well as upon an +empire. But, alas! Napoleon was himself defeated by violation of his +own tactics,--the constantly repeated crushing force of heavy +battalions upon one point. + +To succeed to-day a man must concentrate all the faculties of his mind +upon one unwavering aim, and have a tenacity of purpose which means +death or victory. Every other inclination which tempts him from his +aim must be suppressed. + +New Jersey has many ports, but they are so shallow and narrow that the +shipping of the entire state amounts to but little. On the other hand, +New York has but one ocean port, and yet it is so broad, deep, and +grand, that it leads America in its enormous shipping trade. She sends +her vessels into every port of the world, while the ships of her +neighbor are restricted to local voyages. + +A man may starve on a dozen half-learned trades or occupations; he may +grow rich and famous upon one trade thoroughly mastered, even though it +be the humblest. + +Even Gladstone, with his ponderous yet active brain, says he cannot do +two things at once; he throws his entire strength upon whatever he +does. The intensest energy characterizes everything he undertakes, +even his recreation. If such concentration of energy is necessary for +the success of a Gladstone, what can we common mortals hope to +accomplish by "scatteration?" + +All great men have been noted for their power of concentration which +makes them oblivious of everything outside their aim. Victor Hugo +wrote his "Notre Dame" during the revolution of 1830, while the bullets +were whistling across his garden. He shut himself up in one room, +locking his clothes up, lest they should tempt him to go out into the +street, and spent most of that winter wrapped in a big gray comforter, +pouring his very life into his work. + +Genius is intensity. Abraham Lincoln possessed such power of +concentration that he could repeat quite correctly a sermon to which he +had listened in his boyhood. Dr. O. W. Holmes, when an Andover +student, riveted his eyes on the book he was studying as though he were +reading a will that made him heir to a million. + +A New York sportsman, in answer to an advertisement, sent twenty-five +cents for a sure receipt to prevent a shotgun from scattering, and +received the following; "Dear Sir: To keep a gun from scattering put in +but a single shot." + +It is the men who do one thing in this world who come to the front. +Who is the favorite actor? It is a Jefferson, who devotes a lifetime +to a "Rip Van Winkle," a Booth, an Irving, a Kean, who plays one +character until he can play it better than any other man living, and +not the shallow players who impersonate all parts. It is the man who +never steps outside of his specialty or dissipates his individuality. +It is an Edison, a Morse, a Bell, a Howe, a Stephenson, a Watt. It is +Adam Smith, spending ten years on the "Wealth of Nations." It is +Gibbon, giving twenty years to his "Decline and Fall of the Roman +Empire." It is a Hume, writing thirteen hours a day on his "History of +England." It is a Webster, spending thirty-six years on his +dictionary. It is a Bancroft, working twenty-six years on his "History +of the United States." It is a Field, crossing the ocean fifty times +to lay a cable, while the world ridicules. It is a Newton, writing his +"Chronology of Ancient Nations" sixteen times. It is a Grant, who +proposes to "fight it out on this line if it takes all summer." These +are the men who have written their names prominently in the history of +the world. + +A one-talent man who decides upon a definite object accomplishes more +than the ten-talent man who scatters his energies and never knows +exactly what he will do. The weakest living creature, by concentrating +his powers upon one thing, can accomplish something; the strongest, by +dispersing his over many, may fail to accomplish anything. Drop after +drop, continually falling, wears a passage through the hardest rock. +The hasty tempest, as Carlyle points out, rushes over it with hideous +uproar and leaves no trace behind. + +A great purpose is cumulative; and, like a great magnet, it attracts +all that is kindred along the stream of life. + +A Yankee can splice a rope in many different ways; an English sailor +only knows one way, but that is the best one. It is the one-sided man, +the sharp-edged man, the man of single and intense purpose, the man of +one idea, who turns neither to the right nor to the left, though a +paradise tempt him, who cuts his way through obstacles and forges to +the front. The time has gone forever when a Bacon can span universal +knowledge; or when, absorbing all the knowledge of the times, a Dante +can sustain arguments against fourteen disputants in the University of +Paris, and conquer in them all. The day when a man can successfully +drive a dozen callings abreast is a thing of the past. Concentration +is the keynote of the century. + +Scientists estimate that there is energy enough in less than fifty +acres of sunshine to run all the machinery in the world, if it could be +concentrated. But the sun might blaze out upon the earth forever +without setting anything on fire; although these rays focused by a +burning-glass would melt solid granite, or even change a diamond into +vapor. There are plenty of men who have ability enough; the rays of +their faculties, taken separately, are all right, but they are +powerless to collect them, to bring them all to bear upon a single +spot. Versatile men, universal geniuses, are usually weak, because +they have no power to concentrate their talents upon one point, and +this makes all the difference between success and failure. + +Chiseled upon the tomb of a disappointed, heart-broken king, Joseph II. +of Austria, in the Royal Cemetery at Vienna, a traveler tells us, is +this epitaph: "Here lies a monarch who, with the best of intentions, +never carried out a single plan." + +Sir James Mackintosh was a man of remarkable ability. He excited in +every one who knew him the greatest expectations. Many watched his +career with much interest, expecting that he would dazzle the world. +But there was no purpose in his life. He had intermittent attacks of +enthusiasm for doing great things, but his zeal all evaporated before +he could decide what to do. This fatal defect in his character kept +him balancing between conflicting motives; and his whole life was +almost thrown away. He lacked power to choose one object and persevere +with a single aim, sacrificing every interfering inclination. He +vacillated for weeks trying to determine whether to use "usefulness" or +"utility" in a composition. + +One talent utilized in a single direction will do infinitely more than +ten talents scattered. A thimbleful of powder behind a ball in a rifle +will do more execution than a carload of powder unconfined. The +rifle-barrel is the purpose that gives direct aim to the powder, which +otherwise, no matter how good it might be, would be powerless. The +poorest scholar in school or college often, in practical life, far +outstrips the class leader or senior wrangler, simply because what +little ability he has he employs for a definite object, while the +other, depending upon his general ability and brilliant prospects, +never concentrates his powers. + +"A sublime self-confidence," says E. P. Whipple, "springing not from +self-conceit, but from an intense identification of the man with his +object, lifts him altogether above the fear of danger and death, and +communicates an almost superhuman audacity to his will." + + * * * * * * + +[Illustration: RICHARD ARKWRIGHT] + +What a sublime spectacle is that of a man going straight to his goal, +cutting his way through difficulties, and surmounting obstacles which +dishearten others, as though they were stepping-stones. + + * * * * * * + +It is fashionable to ridicule the man of one idea, but the men who have +changed the front of the world have been men of a single aim. No man +can make his mark on this age of specialties who is not a man of one +idea, one supreme aim, one master passion. The man who would make +himself felt on this bustling planet, who would make a breach in the +compact conservatism of our civilization, must play all his guns on one +point. A wavering aim, a faltering purpose, has no place in the +nineteenth century. "Mental shiftlessness" is the cause of many a +failure. The world is full of unsuccessful men who spend their lives +letting empty buckets down into empty wells. + +"Mr. A. often laughs at me," said a young American chemist, "because I +have but one idea. He talks about everything, aims to excel in many +things; but I have learned that, if I ever wish to make a breach, I +must play my guns continually upon one point." This great chemist, +when an obscure schoolmaster, used to study by the light of a pine knot +in a log cabin. Not many years later he was performing experiments in +electro-magnetism before English earls, and subsequently he was at the +head of one of the largest scientific institutes of this country. This +man was the late Professor Henry, of the Smithsonian Institution, +Washington. + +Douglas Jerrold once knew a man who was familiar with twenty-four +languages but could not express a thought in one of them. + +We should guard against a talent which we cannot hope to practice in +perfection, says Goethe. Improve it as we may, we shall always, in the +end, when the merit of the matter has become apparent to us, painfully +lament the loss of time and strength devoted to such botching. An old +proverb says: "The master of one trade will support a wife and seven +children, and the master of seven will not support himself." + +_It is the single aim that wins_. Men with monopolizing ambitions +rarely live in history. They do not focus their powers long enough to +burn their names indelibly into the roll of honor. Edward Everett, +even with his magnificent powers, disappointed the expectations of his +friends. He spread himself over the whole field of knowledge and +elegant culture; but the mention of the name of Everett does not call +up any one great achievement as does that of names like Garrison and +Phillips. Voltaire called the Frenchman La Harpe an oven which was +always heating, but which never cooked anything. Hartley Coleridge was +splendidly endowed with talent, like Sir James Mackintosh, but there +was one fatal lack in his character--he had no definite purpose, and +his life was a failure. Unstable as water, he could not excel. +Southey, his uncle, says: + +"Coleridge has two left hands." He was so morbidly shy from living +alone in his dreamland that he could not open a letter without +trembling. He would often rally from his purposeless life, and resolve +to redeem himself from the oblivion he saw staring him in the face; +but, like Mackintosh, he remained a man of promise merely to the end of +his life. + +The world always makes way for the man with a purpose in him, like +Bismarck or Grant. Look at Rufus Choate, concentrating all his +attention first on one juryman, then on another, going back over the +whole line again and again, until he has burned his arguments into +their souls; until he has hypnotized them with his purpose; until they +see with his eyes, think his thoughts, feel his sensations. He never +stopped until he had projected his mind into theirs, and permeated +their lives with his individuality. There was no escape from his +concentration of purpose, his persuasive rhetoric, his convincing +logic. "Carry the jury at all hazards," he used to say to young +lawyers; "move heaven and earth to carry the jury, and then fight it +out with the judge on the law questions as best you can." + +The man who succeeds has a programme. He fixes his course and adheres +to it. He lays his plans and executes them. He goes straight to his +goal. He is not pushed this way and that every time a difficulty is +thrown in his path; if he can't get over it he goes through it. +Constant and steady use of the faculties under a central purpose gives +strength and power, while the use of faculties without an aim or end +only weakens them. The mind must be focused on a definite end, or, +like machinery without a balance-wheel, it will rack itself to pieces. + +This age of concentration calls, not for educated men merely, not for +talented men, not for geniuses, not for jacks-of-all-trades, but for +men who are trained to do one thing as well as it can be done. +Napoleon could go through the drill of his soldiers better than any one +of his men. + +_Stick to your aim_. The constant changing of one's occupation is +fatal to all success. After a young man has spent five or six years in +a dry goods store, he concludes that he would rather sell groceries, +thereby throwing away five years of valuable experience which will be +of very little use to him in the grocery business; and so he spends a +large part of his life drifting around from one kind of employment to +another, learning part of each, but all of none, forgetting that +experience is worth more to him than money, and that the years devoted +to learning his trade or occupation are the most valuable. +Half-learned trades, no matter if a man has twenty, will never give him +a good living, much less a competency, while wealth is absolutely out +of the question. + +How many young men fail to reach the point of efficiency in one line of +work before they get discouraged and venture into something else. How +easy to see the thorns in one's own profession or vocation, and only +the roses in that of another. A young man in business, for instance, +seeing a physician riding about town in his carriage, visiting his +patients, imagines that a doctor must have an easy, ideal life, and +wonders that he himself should have embarked in an occupation so full +of disagreeable drudgery and hardships. He does not know of the years +of dry, tedious study which the physician has consumed, the months and +perhaps years of waiting for patients, the dry detail of anatomy, the +endless names of drugs and technical terms. + +Scientists tell us that there is nothing in nature so ugly and +disagreeable but intense light will make it beautiful. The complete +mastery of one profession will render even the driest details +interesting. The consciousness of thorough knowledge, the habit of +doing everything to a finish, gives a feeling of strength, of +superiority, which takes the drudgery out of an occupation. The more +completely we master a vocation the more thoroughly we enjoy it. In +fact, the man who has found his place and become master in it could +scarcely be induced, even though he be a farmer, or a carpenter, or +grocer, to exchange places with a governor or congressman. To be +successful is to _find your sphere and fill it, to get into your place +and master it_. + +There is a sense of great power in a vocation after a man has reached +the point of efficiency in it, the point of productiveness, the point +where his skill begins to tell and bring in returns. Up to this point +of efficiency, while he is learning his trade, the time seems to have +been almost thrown away. But he has been storing up a vast reserve of +knowledge of detail, laying foundations, forming his acquaintances, +gaining his reputation for truthfulness, trustworthiness, and +integrity, and in establishing his credit. When he reaches this point +of efficiency, all the knowledge and skill, character, influence, and +credit thus gained come to his aid, and he soon finds that in what +seemed almost thrown away lies the secret of his prosperity. The +credit he established as a clerk, the confidence, the integrity, the +friendships formed, he finds equal to a large capital when he starts +out for himself and takes the highway to fortune; while the young man +who half learned several trades, and got discouraged and stopped just +short of the point of efficiency, just this side of success, is a +failure because he didn't go far enough; he did not press on to the +point at which his acquisition would have been profitable. + +In spite of the fact that nearly all very successful men have made a +life work of one thing, we see on every hand hundreds of young men and +women flitting about from occupation to occupation, trade to trade, in +one thing to-day and another to-morrow,--just as though they could go +from one thing to another by turning a switch, as if they could run as +well on another track as on the one they have left, regardless of the +fact that no two careers have the same gauge, that every man builds his +own road upon which another's engine cannot run either with speed or +safety. This fickleness, this disposition to shift about from one +occupation to another, seems to be peculiar to American life, so much +so that, when a young man meets a friend whom he has not seen for some +time, the commonest question to ask is, "What are you doing now?" +showing the improbability or uncertainty that he is doing to-day what +he was doing when they last met. + +Some people think that if they "keep everlastingly at it" they will +succeed, but this is not so. Working without a plan is as foolish as +going to sea without a compass. A ship which has broken its rudder in +mid-ocean may "keep everlastingly at it," may keep on a full head of +steam, driving about all the time, but it never arrives anywhere, it +never reaches any port unless by accident, and if it does find a haven, +its cargo may not be suited to the people, the climate, or conditions +among which it has accidentally drifted. The ship must be directed to +a definite port, for which its cargo is adapted, and where there is a +demand for it, and it must aim steadily for that port through sunshine +and storm, through tempest and fog. So a man who would succeed must +not drift about rudderless on the ocean of life. He must not only +steer straight toward his destined port when the ocean is smooth, when +the currents and winds serve, but he must keep his course in the very +teeth of the wind and the tempest, and even when enveloped in the fogs +of disappointment and mists of opposition. The Cunarders do not stop +for fogs or storms; they plow straight through the rough seas with only +one thing in view, their destined port, and no matter what the weather +is, no matter what obstacles they encounter, their arrival in port can +be predicted to within a few hours. It is practically certain, too, +that the ship destined for Boston will not turn up at Fort Sumter or at +Sandy Hook. + +On the prairies of South America there grows a flower that always +inclines in the same direction. If a traveler loses his way and has +neither compass nor chart, by turning to this flower he will find a +guide on which he can implicitly rely; for no matter how the rains +descend or the winds blow, its leaves point to the north. So there are +many men whose purposes are so well known, whose aims are so constant, +that no matter what difficulties they may encounter, or what opposition +they may meet, you can tell almost to a certainty where they will come +out. They may be delayed by head winds and counter currents, but they +will _always head for the port_ and will steer straight towards the +harbor. You know to a certainty that whatever else they may lose, they +will not lose their compass or rudder. + +Whatever may happen to a man of this stamp, even though his sails may +be swept away and his mast stripped to the deck, though he may be +wrecked by the storms of life, the needle of his compass will still +point to the North Star of his hope. Whatever comes, his life will not +be purposeless. Even a wreck that makes its port is a greater success +than a full-rigged ship with all its sails flying, with every mast and +rope intact; which merely drifts into an accidental harbor. + +To fix a wandering life and give it direction is not an easy task, but +a life which has no definite aim is sure to be frittered away in empty +and purposeless dreams. "Listless triflers," "busy idlers," +"purposeless busybodies," are seen everywhere. A healthy, definite +purpose is a remedy for a thousand ills which attend aimless lives. +Discontent, dissatisfaction, flee before a definite purpose. An aim +takes the drudgery out of life, scatters doubts to the winds, and +clears up the gloomiest creeds. What we do without a purpose +begrudgingly, with a purpose becomes a delight, and no work is well +done nor healthily done which is not enthusiastically done. It is just +that added element which makes work immortal. + +Mere energy is not enough, it must be concentrated on some steady, +unwavering aim. What is more common than "unsuccessful geniuses," or +failures with "commanding talents"? Indeed, "unrewarded genius" has +become a proverb. Every town has unsuccessful educated and talented +men. But education is of no value, talent is worthless, unless it can +do something, achieve something. Men who can do something at +everything, and a very little at anything, are not wanted in this age. +In Paris, a certain Monsieur Kenard announced himself as a "public +scribe, who digests accounts, explains the language of flowers, and +sells fried potatoes." Jacks-at-all-trades are at war with the genius +of the times. + +What this age wants is young men and women who can do one thing without +losing their identity or individuality, or becoming narrow, cramped, or +dwarfed. Nothing can take the place of an all-absorbing purpose; +education will not, genius will not, talent will not, industry will +not, will-power will not. The purposeless life must ever be a failure. +What good are powers, faculties, unless we can use them for a purpose? +What good would a chest of tools do a carpenter unless he could use +them? A college education, a head full of knowledge, are worth little +to the men who cannot use them to some definite end. + +The man without a purpose never leaves his mark upon the world. He has +no individuality; he is absorbed in the mass, lost in the crowd, weak, +wavering, incompetent. His outlines of individuality and angles of +character have been worn off, planed down to suit the common thought +until he has, as a man, been lost in the throng of humanity. + +"He who would do some great thing in this short life must apply himself +to the work with such a concentration of his forces as, to idle +spectators, who live only to amuse themselves, looks like insanity." + +What a great directness of purpose may be traced in the career of Pitt, +who lived--ay, and died--for the sake of political supremacy. From a +child, the idea was drilled into him that he must accomplish a public +career worthy of his illustrious father. Even from boyhood he bent all +his energy to this one great purpose. He went straight from college to +the House of Commons. In one year he was Chancellor of the Exchequer; +two years later he was Prime Minister of England, and reigned virtually +king for a quarter of a century. He was utterly oblivious of +everything outside his aim; insensible to the claims of love, art, +literature, living and steadily working for the sole purpose of +wielding the governing power of the nation. His whole soul was +absorbed in the overmastering passion for political power. + +"Consider, my lord," said Rowland Hill to the Prime Minister of +England, "that a letter to Ireland and the answer back would cost +thousands upon thousands of my affectionate countrymen more than a +fifth of their week's wages. If you shut the post office to them, +which you do now, you shut out warm hearts and generous affections from +home, kindred, and friends." The lad learned that it cost to carry a +letter from London to Edinburgh, four hundred and four miles, one +eighteenth of a cent, while the government charged for a simple folded +sheet of paper twenty-eight cents, and twice as much if there was the +smallest inclosure. Against the opposition and contempt of the +post-office department he at length carried his point, and on January +10, 1840, penny postage was established throughout Great Britain. Mr. +Hill was chosen to introduce the system, at a salary of fifteen hundred +pounds a year. His success was most encouraging, but at the end of two +years a Tory minister dismissed him without paying for his services, as +agreed. The public was indignant, and at once contributed sixty-five +thousand dollars; and, at the request of Queen Victoria, Parliament +voted him one hundred thousand dollars and ten thousand dollars a year +for life. + +Christ knew that one affection rules in man's life when he said, "No +man can serve two masters." One affection, one object, will be supreme +in us. Everything else will be neglected and done with half a heart. +One may have subordinate plans, but he can have but one supreme aim, +and from this aim all others will take their character. + +It is a great purpose which gives meaning to life, it unifies all our +powers, binds them together in one cable; makes strong and united what +was weak, separated, scattered. + +"Painting is my wife and my works are my children," replied Michael +Angelo when asked why he did not marry. + +"Smatterers" are weak and superficial. Of what use is a man who knows +a little of everything and not much of anything? It is the momentum of +constantly repeated acts that tells the story. "Let thine eyes look +straight before thee. Ponder the path of thy feet and let all thy ways +be established. Turn not to the right hand nor to the left." One +great secret of St. Paul's power lay in his strong purpose. Nothing +could daunt him, nothing intimidate. The Roman Emperor could not +muzzle him, the dungeon could not appall him, no prison suppress him, +obstacles could not discourage him. "This one thing I do" was written +all over his work. The quenchless zeal of his mighty purpose burned +its way down through the centuries, and its contagion will never cease +to fire the hearts of men. + +"Try and come home somebody," said the fond mother to Gambetta as she +sent him off to Paris to school. Poverty pinched this lad hard in his +little garret study and his clothes were shabby, but what of that? He +had made up his mind to get on in the world. For years this youth was +chained to his desk and worked like a hero. At last his opportunity +came. Jules Favre was to plead a great cause on a certain day; but, +being ill, he chose this young man, absolutely unknown, rough and +uncouth, to take his place. For many years Gambetta had been preparing +for such an opportunity, and he was equal to it, for he made one of the +greatest speeches that up to that time had ever been made in France. +That night all the papers in Paris were sounding the praises of this +ragged, uncouth Bohemian, and soon all France recognized him as the +Republican leader. This sudden rise was not due to luck or accident. +He had been steadfastly working and fighting his way up against +opposition and poverty for just such an occasion. Had he not been +equal to it, it would only have made him ridiculous. What a stride; +yesterday, poor and unknown, living in a garret, to-day, deputy elect, +in the city of Marseilles, and the great Republican leader! The +gossipers of France had never heard his name before. He had been +expelled from the priest-making seminary as totally unfit for a priest +and an utterly undisciplinable character. In two weeks, this ragged +son of an Italian grocer arose in the Chamber, and moved that the +Napoleon dynasty be disposed of and the Republic be declared +established. + +When Louis Napoleon had been defeated at Sedan and had delivered his +sword to William of Prussia, and when the Prussian army was marching on +Paris, the brave Gambetta went out of the besieged city in a balloon +barely grazed by the Prussian guns, landed in Amiens, and by almost +superhuman skill raised three armies of 800,000 men, provided for their +maintenance, and directed their military operations. A German officer +said, "This colossal energy is the most remarkable event of modern +history, and will carry down Gambetta's name to remote posterity." +This youth who was poring over his books in an attic while other youths +were promenading the Champs Elysees, although but thirty-two years old, +was now virtually dictator of France, and the greatest orator in the +Republic. What a striking example of the great reserve of personal +power, which, even in dissolute lives, is sometimes called out by a +great emergency or sudden sorrow, and ever after leads the life to +victory! When Gambetta found that his first speech had electrified all +France, his great reserve rushed to the front, he was suddenly weaned +from dissipation, and resolved to make his mark in the world. Nor did +he lose his head in his quick leap into fame. He still lived in the +upper room in the musty Latin quarter, and remained a poor man, without +stain of dishonor, though he might easily have made himself a +millionaire. When Gambetta died the "Figaro" said, "The Republic has +lost its greatest man." American boys should study this great man, for +he loved our country, and made our Republic the pattern for France. + +There is no grander sight in the world than that of a young man fired +with a great purpose, dominated by one unwavering aim. He is bound to +win; the world stands one side and lets him pass; it always makes way +for the man with a will in him. He does not have one half the +opposition to overcome that the undecided, purposeless man has who, +like driftwood, runs against all sorts of snags to which he must yield, +because he has no momentum to force them out of his way. What a +sublime spectacle it is to see a youth going straight to his goal, +cutting his way through difficulties, and surmounting obstacles, which +dishearten others, as though they were but stepping-stones! Defeat, +like a gymnasium, only gives him new power; opposition only doubles his +exertions, dangers only increase his courage. No matter what comes to +him, sickness, poverty, disaster, he never turns his eye from his goal. + +"Duos qui sequitur lepores, neutrum capit." + + + + +CHAPTER VII. + +SOWING AND REAPING. + +Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that +shall he also reap.--GALATIANS. + +Sow an act, and you reap a habit; sow a habit, and you reap a +character; sow a character, and you reap a destiny.--G. D. BOARDMAN. + +Just as the twig is bent the tree's inclined.--POPE. + +How use doth breed a habit in a man.--SHAKESPEARE. + + All habits gather, by unseen degrees, + As brooks make rivers, rivers run to seas. + DRYDEN. + +Infinite good comes from good habits which must result from the common +influence of example, intercourse, knowledge, and actual +experience--morality taught by good morals.--PLATO. + +The chains of habit are generally too small to be felt till they are +too strong to be broken.--SAMUEL JOHNSON. + +Man is first startled by sin; then it becomes pleasing, then easy, then +delightful, then frequent, then habitual, then confirmed. Then man is +impenitent, then obstinate, then he is damned.--JEREMY TAYLOR. + +"Rogues differ little. Each began as a disobedient son." + +In the great majority of things, habit is a greater plague than ever +afflicted Egypt.--JOHN FOSTER. + +You cannot in any given case, by any sudden and single effort, will to +be true if the habit of your life has been insincere.--F. W. ROBERTSON. + + The tissue of the life to be, + We weave with colors all our own; + And in the field of destiny, + We reap as we have sown. + WHITTIER. + + +"Gentlemen of the jury, you will now consider your verdict," said the +great lawyer, Lord Tenterden, as he roused from his lethargy a moment, +and then closed his eyes forever. "Tete d'armee" (head of the army), +murmured Napoleon faintly; and then, "on the wings of a tempest that +raged with unwonted fury, up to the throne of the only power that +controlled him while he lived, went the fiery soul of that wonderful +warrior." "Give Dayrolles a chair," said the dying Chesterfield with +his old-time courtesy, and the next moment his spirit spread its wings. +"Young man, keep your record clean," thrilled from the lips of John B. +Gough as he sank to rise no more. What power over the mind of man is +exercised by the dominant idea of his life "that parts not quite with +parting breath!" It has shaped his purpose throughout his earthly +career, and he passes into the Great Unknown, moving in the direction +of his ideal; impelled still, amid the utter retrocession of the vital +force, by all the momentum resulting from his weight of character and +singleness of aim. + + * * * * * * + +[Illustration: VICTOR HUGO] + +"Every one is the son of his own works." + +"Cast forth thy act, thy word, into the ever-living, ever-working +universe: it is seed-grain that cannot die." + + * * * * * * + + "It is a beautiful arrangement in the mental and +moral economy of our nature, that that which is performed as a duty +may, by frequent repetitions, become a habit, and the habit of stern +virtue, so repulsive to others, may hang around the neck like a wreath +of flowers." + +Cholera appeared mysteriously in Toulon, and, after a careful +examination, the medical inspectors learned that the first victims were +two sailors on the Montebello, a government transport, long out of +service, anchored at the entrance to the port. For many years the +vessel had been used for storing old, disused military equipments. +Some of these had belonged to French soldiers who had died before +Sebastopol. The doctors learned that the two poor sailors were seized, +suddenly and mortally, a few days after displacing a pile of equipments +stored deep in the hold of the Montebello. The cholera of Toulon came +in a direct line from the hospital of Varna. It went to sleep, +apparently gorged, on a heap of the cast-off garments of its victims, +to awaken thirty years later to victorious and venomous life. + +Professor Bonelli, of Turin, punctured an animal with the tooth of a +rattlesnake. The head of this serpent had lain in a dry state for +sixteen years exposed to the air and dust, and, moreover, had +previously been preserved more than thirty years in spirits of wine. +To his great astonishment an hour afterward the animal died. So +habits, good or bad, that have been lost sight of for years will spring +into a new life to aid or injure us at some critical moment, as kernels +of wheat which had been clasped in a mummy's hand four thousand years +sprang into life when planted. They only awaited moisture, heat, +sunlight, and air to develop them. + +In Jefferson's play, Rip Van Winkle, after he had "sworn off," at every +invitation to drink said, "Well, this time don't count." True, as +Professor James says, he may not have counted it, as thousands of +others have not counted it, and a kind heaven may not count it, but it +is being counted none the less. Down among his nerve cells and fibres +the molecules are counting it, registering and storing it up to be used +against him when the next temptation comes. Nothing we ever do is in +strict scientific literalness wiped out. There is a tendency in the +nervous system to repeat the same mode of action at regularly recurring +intervals. Dr. Combe says that all nervous diseases have a marked +tendency to observe regular periods. "If we repeat any kind of mental +effort at the same hour daily, we at length find ourselves entering +upon it without premeditation when the time approaches." + +"The great thing in all education is to make our nervous system our +ally instead of our enemy. It is to fund and capitalize our +acquisition, and live at ease upon the interest of the fund. For this +we must make automatic and habitual, as soon as possible, as many +useful actions as we can, and guard against the growing into ways that +are likely to be disadvantageous to us, as we would guard against the +plague." + +The nervous system is a living phonograph, infinitely more marvelous +than that of Edison. No sound, however feeble, however slight, can +escape being recorded in its wonderful mechanism. Although the +molecules of this living machine may all be entirely changed many times +during a lifetime, yet these impressions are never erased or lost. +They become forever fixed in the character. Like Rip Van Winkle, the +youth may say to himself, I will do this just once "just to see what it +is like," no one will ever know it, and "I won't count this time." The +country youth says it when he goes to the city. The young man says it +when he drinks "just to be social." Americans, who are good church +people at home, say it when in Paris and Vienna. Yes, "just to see +what it is like" has ruined many a noble life. Many a man has lost his +balance and fallen over the precipice into the sink of iniquity while +just attempting "to see what it was like." "If you have been pilot on +these waters twenty-five years," said a young man to the captain of a +steamer, "you must know every rock and sandbank in the river." "No, I +don't, but I know where the deep water is." + +Just one little lie to help me out of this difficulty; "I won't count +this." Just one little embezzlement; no one will know it, and I can +return the money before it will be needed. Just one little indulgence; +I won't count it, and a good night's sleep will make me all right +again. Just one small part of my work slighted; it won't make any +great difference, and, besides, I am usually so careful that a little +thing like this ought not to be counted. + +But, my young friend, it will be counted, whether you will or not; the +deed has been recorded with an iron pen, even to the smallest detail. +The Recording Angel is no myth; it is found in ourselves. Its name is +Memory, and it holds everything. We think we have forgotten thousands +of things until mortal danger, fever, or some other great stimulus +reproduces them to the consciousness with all the fidelity of +photographs. Sometimes all one's past life will seem to pass before +him in an instant; but at all times it is really, although +unconsciously, passing before him in the sentiments he feels, in the +thoughts he thinks, in the impulses that move him apparently without +cause. + + "Our acts our angels are, or good or ill, + Our fatal shadows that walk by us still." + + +In a fable one of the Fates spun filaments so fine that they were +invisible, and she became a victim of her cunning, for she was bound to +the spot by these very threads. + +Father Schoenmaker, missionary to the Indians, tried for years to +implant civilization among the wild tribes. After fifteen years' labor +he induced a chief to lay aside his blanket, the token of savagery; but +he goes on to say, "It took fifteen years to get it off, and just +fifteen minutes to get it on him again." + +Physiologists say that dark-colored stripes similar to those on the +zebra reappear, after a hundred or a thousand generations, on the legs +and shoulders of horses, asses, and mules. Large birds on sea islands +where there are no beasts to molest them lose the power of flight. + +After a criminal's head had been cut off his breast was irritated, and +he raised his hands several times as if to brush away the exciting +cause. It was said that the cheek of Charlotte Corday blushed on being +struck by a rude soldier after the head had been severed from the body. + +Humboldt found in South America a parrot which was the only living +creature that could speak a word of the language of a lost tribe. The +bird retained the habit of speech after his teachers had died. + +Caspar Hauser was confined, probably from birth, in a dungeon where no +light or sound from the outer world, could reach him. At seventeen he +was still a mental infant, crying and chattering without much apparent +intelligence. When released, the light was disagreeable to his eyes; +and, after the babbling youth had been taught to speak a few words, he +begged to be taken back to the dungeon. Only cold and dismal silence +seemed to satisfy him. All that gave pleasure to others gave his +perverted senses only pain. The sweetest music was a source of anguish +to him, and he could eat only his black crust without violent vomiting. + +Deep in the very nature of animate existence is that principle of +facility and inclination, acquired by repetition, which we call habit. +Man becomes a slave to his constantly repeated acts. In spite of the +protests of his weakened will the trained nerves continue to repeat the +acts even when the doer abhors them. What he at first chooses, at last +compels. Man is as irrevocably chained to his deeds as the atoms are +chained by gravitation. You can as easily snatch a pebble from +gravitation's grasp as you can separate the minutest act of life from +its inevitable effect upon character and destiny. "Children may be +strangled," says George Eliot, "but deeds never, they have an +indestructible life." The smirched youth becomes the tainted man. + +Practically all the achievements of the human race are but the +accomplishments of habit. We speak of the power of Gladstone to +accomplish so much in a day as something marvelous; but when we analyze +that power we find it composed very largely of the results of habit. +His mighty momentum has been rendered possible only by the law of the +power of habit. He is now a great bundle of habits, which all his life +have been forming. His habit of industry no doubt was irksome and +tedious at first, but, practiced so conscientiously and persistently, +it has gained such momentum as to astonish the world. His habit of +thinking, close, persistent, and strong, has made him a power. He +formed the habit of accurate, keen observation, allowing nothing to +escape his attention, until he could observe more in half a day in +London than a score of men who have eyes but see not. Thus he has +multiplied himself many times. By this habit of accuracy he has +avoided many a repetition; and so, during his lifetime, he has saved +years of precious time, which many others, who marvel at his +achievements, have thrown away. + +Gladstone early formed the habit of cheerfulness, of looking on the +bright side of things, which, Sydney Smith says, "is worth a thousand +pounds a year." This again has saved him enormous waste of energy, as +he tells us he has never yet been kept awake a single hour by any +debate or business in Parliament. This loss of energy has wasted years +of many a useful life, which might have been saved by forming the +economizing habit of cheerfulness. + +The habit of happy thought would transform the commonest life into +harmony and beauty. The will is almost omnipotent to determine habits +which virtually are omnipotent. The habit of directing a firm and +steady will upon those things which tend to produce harmony of thought +would produce happiness and contentment even in the most lowly +occupations. The will, rightly drilled, can drive out all discordant +thoughts, and produce a reign of perpetual harmony. Our trouble is +that we do not half will. After a man's habits are well set, about all +he can do is to sit by and observe which way he is going. Regret it as +he may, how helpless is a weak man bound by the mighty cable of habit, +twisted from the tiny threads of single acts which he thought were +absolutely within his control! + +Drop a stone down a precipice. By the law of gravitation it sinks with +rapidly increasing momentum. If it falls sixteen feet the first +second, it will fall forty-eight feet the next second, and eighty feet +the third second, and one hundred and forty-four feet the fifth second, +and if it falls for ten seconds it will in the last second rush through +three hundred and four feet till earth stops it. Habit is cumulative. +After each act of our lives we are not the same person as before, but +quite another, better or worse, but not the same. There has been +something added to, or deducted from, our weight of character. + +"There is no fault nor folly of my life," said Ruskin; "that does not +rise against me and take away my joy, and shorten my power of +possession, of sight, of understanding; and every past effort of my +life, every gleam of righteousness or good in it, is with me now to +help me in my grasp of this hour and its vision." + +"Many men of genius have written worse scrawls than I do," said a boy +at Rugby when his teacher remonstrated with him for his bad penmanship; +"it is not worth while to worry about so trivial a fault." Ten years +later, when he had become an officer in the Crimea, his illegible copy +of an order caused the loss of many brave men. + +"Resist beginning" was an ancient motto which is needed in our day. +The folly of the child becomes the vice of the youth, and then the +crime of the man. + +In 1880 one hundred and forty-seven of the eight hundred and +ninety-seven inmates of Auburn State Prison were there on a second +visit. What brings the prisoner back the second, third, or fourth +time? It is habit which drives him on to commit the deed which his +heart abhors and which his very soul loathes. It is the momentum made +up from a thousand deviations from the truth and right, for there is a +great difference between going just right and a little wrong. It is +the result of that mysterious power which the repeated act has of +getting itself repeated again and again. + +When a woman was dying from the effects of her husband's cruelty and +debauchery from drink she asked him to come to her bedside, and pleaded +with him again for the sake of their children to drink no more. +Grasping his hand with her thin, long fingers, she made him promise +her: "Mary, I will drink no more till I take it out of this hand which +I hold in mine." That very night he poured out a tumbler of brandy, +stole into the room where she lay cold in her coffin, put the tumbler +into her withered hand, and then took it out and drained it to the +bottom. John B. Gough told this as a true story. How powerless a man +is in the presence of a mighty habit, which has robbed him of +will-power, of self-respect, of everything manly, until he becomes its +slave! + +Walpole tells of a gambler who fell at the table in a fit of apoplexy, +and his companions began to bet upon his chances of recovery. When the +physician came they refused to let him bleed the man because they said +it would affect the bet. When President Garfield was hanging between +life and death men bet heavily upon the issue, and even sold pools. + +No disease causes greater horror or dread than cholera; yet when it is +once fastened upon a victim he is perfectly indifferent, and wonders at +the solicitude of his friends. His tears are dried; he cannot weep if +he would. His body is cold and clammy and feels like dead flesh, yet +he tells you he is warm, and calls for ice water. Have you never seen +similar insensibility to danger in those whose habits are already +dragging them to everlasting death? + +Etherized by the fascinations of pleasure, we are often unconscious of +pain while the devil amputates the fingers, the feet and hands, or even +the arms and legs of our character. But oh, the anguish that visits +the sad heart when the lethe passes away, and the soul becomes +conscious of virtue sacrificed, of manhood lost. + +The leper is often the last to suspect his danger, for the disease is +painless in its early stages. A leading lawyer and public official in +the Sandwich Islands once overturned a lighted lamp on his hand, and +was surprised to find that it caused no pain. At last it dawned upon +his mind that he was a leper. He resigned his offices and went to the +leper's island, where he died. So sin in its early stages is not only +painless but often even pleasant. + +The hardening, deadening power of depraving habits and customs was +strikingly illustrated by the Romans. + +Under Nero, the taste of the people had become so debauched and morbid +that no mere representation of tragedy would satisfy them. Their +cold-blooded selfishness, the hideous realism of "a refined, delicate, +aesthetic age," demanded that the heroes should actually be killed on +the stage. The debauched and sanguinary Romans reckoned life worthless +without the most thrilling experiences of horror or delight. Tragedy +must be genuine bloodshed, comedy, actual shame. When "The +Conflagration" was represented on the stage they demanded that a house +be actually burned and the furniture plundered. When "Laureolus" was +played they demanded that the actor be really crucified and mangled by +a bear, and he had to fling himself down and deluge the stage with his +own blood. Prometheus must be really chained to his rock, and Dirce in +very fact be tossed and gored by the wild bull, and Orpheus be torn to +pieces by a real bear, and Icarus was compelled to fly, even though it +was known he would be dashed to death. When the heroism of "Mucius +Scaevola" was represented, a real criminal was compelled to thrust his +hand into the flame without a murmur, and stand motionless while it was +being burned. Hercules was compelled to ascend the funeral pyre, and +there be burned alive. The poor slaves and criminals were compelled to +play their parts heroically until the flames enveloped them. + +The pirate Gibbs, who was executed in New York, said that when he +robbed the first vessel his conscience made a hell in his bosom; but +after he had sailed for years under the black flag, he could rob a +vessel and murder all the crew, and lie down and sleep soundly. A man +may so accustom himself to error as to become its most devoted slave, +and be led to commit the most fearful crimes in order to defend it, or +to propagate it. + +When Gordon, the celebrated California stage-driver, was dying, he put +his foot out of the bed and swung it to and fro. When asked why he did +so, he replied, "I am on the down grade and cannot get my foot on the +brake." + +In our great museums you see stone slabs with the marks of rain that +fell hundreds of years before Adam lived, and the footprint of some +wild bird that passed across the beach in those olden times. The +passing shower and the light foot left their prints on the soft +sediment; then ages went on, and the sediment hardened into stone; and +there the prints remain, and will remain forever. So the child, so +soft, so susceptible to all impressions, so joyous to receive new +ideas, treasures them all up, gathers them all into itself, and retains +them forever. + +A tribe of Indians attacked a white settlement and murdered the few +inhabitants. A woman of the tribe, however, carried away a very young +infant, and reared it as her own. The child grew up with the Indian +children, different in complexion, but like them in everything else. +To scalp the greatest possible number of enemies was, in his view, the +most glorious thing in the world. While he was still a youth he was +seen by some white traders, and by them conducted back to civilized +life. He showed great relish for his new life, and especially a strong +desire for knowledge and a sense of reverence which took the direction +of religion, so that he desired to become a clergyman. He went through +his college course with credit, and was ordained. He fulfilled his +function well, and appeared happy and satisfied. After a few years he +went to serve in a settlement somewhere near the seat of war which was +then going on between Britain and the United States, and before long +there was fighting not far off. He went forth in his usual +dress--black coat and neat white shirt and neckcloth. When he returned +he was met by a gentleman of his acquaintance, who was immediately +struck by an extraordinary change in the expression of his face and the +flush on his cheek, and also by his unusually shy and hurried manner. +After asking news of the battle the gentleman observed, "But you are +wounded?" "No." "Not wounded! Why, there is blood upon the bosom of +your shirt!" The young man quickly crossed his hands firmly upon his +breast; and his friend, supposing that he wished to conceal a wound +which ought to be looked to, pulled open his shirt, and saw--what made +the young man let fall his hands in despair. From between his shirt +and his breast the friend took out--a bloody scalp! "I could not help +it," said the poor victim of early habits, in an agonized voice. He +turned and ran, too swiftly to be overtaken, betook himself to the +Indians, and never more appeared among the whites. + +An Indian once brought up a young lion, and finding him weak and +harmless, did not attempt to control him. Every day the lion gained in +strength and became more unmanageable, until at last, when excited by +rage, he fell upon his master and tore him to pieces. So what seemed +to be an "innocent" sin has grown until it strangled him who was once +its easy master. + +Beware of looking at sin, for at each view it is apt to become better +looking. + +Habit is practically, for a middle-aged person, fate; for is it not +practically certain that what I have done for twenty years I shall +repeat to-day? What are the chances for a man who has been lazy and +indolent all his life starting in to-morrow morning to be industrious; +or a spendthrift, frugal; a libertine, virtuous; a profane, +foul-mouthed man, clean and chaste? + +A Grecian flute-player charged double fees for pupils who had been +taught by inferior masters, on the ground that it was much harder to +undo than to form habits. + +Habit tends to make us permanently what we are for the moment. We +cannot possibly hear, see, feel, or experience anything which is not +woven in the web of character. What we are this minute and what we do +this minute, what we think this minute, will be read in the future +character as plainly as words spoken into the phonograph can be +reproduced in the future. + +"The air itself," says Babbage, "is one vast library on whose pages are +written forever all that man has ever said, whispered, or done." Every +sin you ever committed becomes your boon companion. It rushes to your +lips every time you speak, and drags its hideous form into your +imagination every time you think. It throws its shadow across your +path whichever way you turn. Like Banquo's ghost, it will not down. +You are fastened to it for life, and it will cling to you in the vast +forever. Do you think yourself free? You are a slave to every sin you +ever committed. They follow your pen and work their own character into +every word you write. + +Rectitude is only the confirmed habit of doing what is right. Some men +cannot tell a lie: the habit of truth telling is fixed, it has become +incorporated with their nature. Their characters bear the indelible +stamp of veracity. You and I know men whose slightest word is +unimpeachable; nothing could shake our confidence in them. There are +other men who cannot speak the truth: their habitual insincerity has +made a twist in their characters, and this twist appears in their +speech. + +"I never in my life committed more than one act of folly," said +Rulhiere one day in the presence of Talleyrand. "But where will it +end?" inquired the latter. It was lifelong. One mistake too many +makes all the difference between safety and destruction. + +How many men would like to go to sleep beggars and wake up Rothschilds +or Astors? How many would fain go to bed dunces and wake up Solomons? +You reap what you have sown. Those who have sown dunce-seed, +vice-seed, laziness-seed, always get a crop. They that sow the wind +shall reap the whirlwind. + +Habit, like a child, repeats whatever is done before it. Oh, the power +of a repeated act to get itself repeated again and again! But, like +the wind, it is a power which we can use to force our way in its very +teeth as does the ship, and thus multiply our strength, or we can drift +with it without exertion upon the rocks and shoals of destruction. + +What a great thing it is to "start right" in life. Every young man can +see that the first steps lead to the last, with all except his own. +No, his little prevarications and dodgings will not make him a liar, +but he can see that they surely will in John Smith's case. He can see +that others are idle and on the road to ruin, but cannot see it in his +own case. + +There is a wonderful relation between bad habits. They all belong to +the same family. If you take in one, no matter how small or +insignificant it may seem, you will soon have the whole. A man who has +formed the habit of laziness or idleness will soon be late at his +engagements; a man who does not meet his engagements will dodge, +apologize, prevaricate, and lie. I have rarely known a perfectly +truthful man who was always behind time. + +You have seen a ship out in the bay swinging with the tide and the +waves; the sails are all up, and you wonder why it does not move, but +it cannot, for down beneath the water it is anchored. So we often see +a young man apparently well equipped, well educated, and we wonder that +he does not advance toward manhood and character. But, alas! we find +that he is anchored to some secret vice, and he can never advance until +he cuts loose. + + "The first crime past compels us into more, + And guilt grows _fate_ that was but _choice_ before." + + "Small habits, well pursued betimes, + May reach the dignity of crimes." + + +Thousands can sympathize with David when he cried, "My sins have taken +such hold upon me that I am not able to look up; my heart faileth me." +Like the damned spot of blood on Lady Macbeth's hand, these foul spots +on the imagination will not out. What a penalty nature exacts for +physical sins. The gods are just, and "of our pleasant vices make +instruments to plague us." + +Plato wrote over his door, "Let no one ignorant of geometry enter +here." The greatest value of the study of the classics and mathematics +comes from the habits of accurate and concise thought which it induces. +The habit-forming portion of life is the dangerous period, and we need +the discipline of close application to hold us outside of our studies. + +Washington at thirteen wrote one hundred and ten maxims of civility and +good behavior, and was most careful in the formation of all habits. +Franklin, too, devised a plan of self-improvement and character +building. No doubt the noble characters of these two men, almost +superhuman in their excellence, are the natural result of their early +care and earnest striving towards perfection. + +Fielding, describing a game of cards between Jonathan Wild, of +pilfering propensities, and a professional gambler, says: "Such was the +power of habit over the minds of these illustrious persons, that Mr. +Wild could not keep his hands out of the count's pockets, though he +knew they were empty; nor could the count abstain from palming a card, +though he was well aware Mr. Wild had no money to pay him." + +"Habit," says Montaigne, "is a violent and treacherous schoolmistress. +She, by little and little, slyly and unperceived, slips in the foot of +her authority, but having by this gentle and humble beginning, with the +aid of time, fixed and established it, she then unmasks a furious and +tyrannic countenance against which we have no more the courage nor the +power so much as to lift up our eyes." It led a New York man actually +to cut off his hand with a cleaver under a test of what he would resort +to, to get a glass of whiskey. It has led thousands of nature's +noblemen to drunkards' and libertines' graves. + +Gough's life is a startling illustration of the power of habit, and of +the ability of one apparently a hopeless slave to break his fetters and +walk a free man in the sunlight of heaven. He came to America when +nine years old. Possessed of great powers of song, of mimicry, and of +acting, and exceedingly social in his tastes, a thousand temptations + + "Widened and strewed with flowers the way + Down to eternal ruin." + + +"I would give this right hand to redeem those terrible seven years of +dissipation and death," he would often say in after years when, with +his soul still scarred and battered from his conflict with blighting +passion, he tearfully urged young men to free themselves from the +chains of bestial habits. + +In the laboratory of Faraday a workman one day knocked into a jar of +acid a silver cup; it disappeared, was eaten up by the acid, and could +not be found. The question came up whether it could ever be found. +The great chemist came in and put certain chemicals into the jar, and +every particle of the silver was precipitated to the bottom. The mass +was then sent to a silversmith, and the cup restored. So a precious +youth who has fallen into the sink of iniquity, lost, dissolved in sin, +can only be restored by the Great Chemist. + +What is put into the first of life is put into the whole of life. "Out +of a church of twenty-seven hundred members, I have never had to +exclude a single one who was received while a child," said Spurgeon. +It is the earliest sin that exercises the most influence for evil. + +Benedict Arnold was the only general in the Revolution that disgraced +his country. He had great military talent, wonderful energy, and a +courage equal to any emergency. But Arnold _did not start right_. +Even when a boy he was despised for his cruelty and his selfishness. +He delighted in torturing insects and birds that he might watch their +sufferings. He scattered pieces of glass and sharp tacks on the floor +of the shop he was tending, to cut the feet of the barefooted boys. +Even in the army, in spite of his bravery, the soldiers hated him, and +the officers dared not trust him. + + Let no man trust the first false step + Of guilt; it hangs upon a precipice, + Whose steep descent in last perdition ends. + YOUNG + + +Years ago there was a district lying near Westminster Abbey, London, +called the "Devil's Acre,"--a school for vicious habits, where +depravity was universal; where professional beggars were fitted with +all the appliances of imposture; where there was an agency for the hire +of children to be carried about by forlorn widows and deserted wives, +to move the compassion of street-giving benevolence; where young +pickpockets were trained in the art and mystery which was to conduct +them in due course to an expensive voyage for the good of their country +to Botany Bay. + +Victor Hugo describes a strange association of men in the seventeenth +century who bought children and distorted and made monstrosities of +them to amuse the nobility with; and in cultured Boston there is an +association of so-called "respectable men," who have opened thousands +of "places of business" for deforming men, women, and children's souls. +But we deform ourselves with agencies so pleasant that we think we are +having a good time, until we become so changed and enslaved that we +scarcely recognize ourselves. Vice, the pleasant guest which we first +invited into our heart's parlor, becomes vulgarly familiar, and +intrenches herself deep in our very being. We ask her to leave, but +she simply laughs at us from the hideous wrinkles she has made in our +faces, and refuses to go. Our secret sins defy us from the hideous +furrows they have cut in our cheeks. Each impure thought has chiseled +its autograph deep into the forehead, too deep for erasure, and the +glassy, bleary eye adds its testimony to our ruined character. + +The devil does not apply his match to the hard coal; but he first +lights the shavings of "innocent sins," and the shavings the wood, and +the wood the coal. Sin is gradual. It does not break out on a man +until it has long circulated through his system. Murder, adultery, +theft, are not committed in deed until they have been committed in +thought again and again. + +"Don't write there," said a man to a boy who was writing with a diamond +pin on a pane of glass in the window of a hotel. "Why not?" inquired +the boy. "Because you can't rub it out." Yet the glass might have +been broken and all trace of the writing lost, but things written upon +the human soul can never be removed, for the tablet is immortal. + +"In all the wide range of accepted British maxims," said Thomas Hughes, +"there is none, take it all in all, more thoroughly abominable than +this one, as to the sowing of wild oats. Look at it on what side you +will, and I defy you to make anything but a devil's maxim of it. What +man, be he young, old, or middle-aged, sows, that, and nothing else, +shall he reap. The only thing to do with wild oats is to put them +carefully into the hottest part of the fire, and get them burnt to +dust, every seed of them. If you sow them, no matter in what ground, +up they will come with long, tough roots and luxuriant stalks and +leaves, as sure as there is a sun in heaven. The devil, too, whose +special crop they are, will see that they thrive, and you, and nobody +else, will have to reap them." + + We scatter seeds with careless hand, + And dream we ne'er shall see them more; + But for a thousand years + Their fruit appears, + In weeds that mar the land. + JOHN KEBLE. + + +Theodora boasted that she could draw Socrates' disciples away from him. +"That may be," said the philosopher, "for you lead them down an easy +descent whereas I am forcing them to mount to virtue--an arduous ascent +and unknown to most men." + +"When I am told of a sickly student," said Daniel Wise, "that he is +'studying himself to death,' or of a feeble young mechanic, or clerk, +that his hard work is destroying him, I study his countenance, and +there, too often, read the real, melancholy truth in his dull, averted, +sunken eye, discolored skin, and timid manner. These signs proclaim +that the young man is in some way violating the laws of his physical +nature. He is secretly destroying himself. Yet, say his unconscious +and admiring friends, 'He is falling a victim to his own diligence!' +Most lame and impotent conclusion! He is sapping the very source of +life, and erelong will be a mind in ruins or a heap of dust. Young +man, beware of his example! 'Keep thyself pure;' observe the laws of +your physical nature, and the most unrelaxing industry will never rob +you of a month's health, nor shorten the thread of your life; for +industry and health are companions, and long life is the heritage of +diligence." + + "How shall I a habit break?" + As you did that habit make. + As you gathered, you must lose; + As you yielded, now refuse. + Thread by thread the strands we twist + Till they bind us neck and wrist. + Thread by thread the patient hand + Must untwine ere free we stand. + As we builded, stone by stone, + We must toil, unhelped, alone, + Till the wall is overthrown. + + But remember, as we try, + Lighter every test goes by; + Wading in, the stream grows deep + Toward the centre's downward sweep; + Backward turn, each step ashore + Shallower is than that before. + + Ah, the precious years we waste + Leveling what we raised in haste; + Doing what must be undone, + Ere content or love be won! + First across the gulf we cast + Kite-borne threads till lines are passed, + And habit builds the bridge at last. + JOHN BOYLE O'REILLY. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII. + +SELF-HELP. + +I learned that no man in God's wide earth is either willing or able to +help any other man.--PESTALOZZI. + +What I am I have made myself.--HUMPHRY DAVY. + +Be sure, my son, and remember that the best men always make +themselves.--PATRICK HENRY. + + Hereditary bondsmen, know ye not + Who would be free themselves must strike the blow? + BYRON. + +God gives every bird its food, but he does not throw it into the +nest.--J. G. HOLLAND. + +Never forget that others will depend upon you, and that you cannot +depend upon them.--DUMAS, FILS. + +Our remedies oft in ourselves do lie, which we ascribe to +Heaven.--SHAKESPEARE. + +The best education in the world is that got by struggling to obtain a +living.--WENDELL PHILLIPS. + +Every person has two educations, one which he receives from others, and +one, more important, which he gives himself.--GIBBON. + +What the superior man seeks is in himself: what the small man seeks is +in others.--CONFUCIUS. + + Who waits to have his task marked out, + Shall die and leave his errand unfulfilled. + LOWELL. + + In battle or business, whatever the game, + In law, or in love, it's ever the same: + In the struggle for power, or scramble for pelf, + Let this be your motto, "Rely on yourself." + SAXE. + + Let every eye negotiate for itself, + And trust no agent. + SHAKESPEARE. + + +"Colonel Crockett makes room for himself!" exclaimed a backwoods +congressman in answer to the exclamation of the White House usher to +"Make room for Colonel Crockett!" This remarkable man was not afraid +to oppose the head of a great nation. He preferred being right to +being president. Though rough, uncultured, and uncouth, Crockett was a +man of great courage and determination. + +Garfield was the youngest member of the House of Representatives when +he entered, but he had not been in his seat sixty days before his +ability was recognized and his place conceded. He stepped to the front +with the confidence of one who belonged there. He succeeded because +all the world in concert could not have kept him in the background, and +because when once in the front he played his part with an intrepidity +and a commanding ease that were but the outward evidences of the +immense reserves of energy on which it was in his power to draw. + +[Illustration: James A. Garfield (missing from book)] + +"Take the place and attitude which belong to you," says Emerson, "and +all men acquiesce. The world must be just. It leaves every man with +profound unconcern to set his own rate." + +Grant was no book soldier. Some of his victories were contrary to all +instructions in military works. He did not dare to disclose his plan +to invest Vicksburg, and he even cut off all communication on the +Mississippi River for seven days that no orders could reach him from +General Halleck, his superior officer; for he knew that Halleck went by +books, and he was proceeding contrary to all military theories. He was +making a greater military history than had ever been written up to that +time. He was greater than all books of tactics. The consciousness of +power is everything. That man is strongest who owes most to himself. + +"Man, it is within yourself," says Pestalozzi, "it is in the inner +sense of your power that resides nature's instrument for your +development." + +Richard Arkwright, the thirteenth child, in a hovel, with no education, +no chance, gave his spinning model to the world, and put a sceptre in +England's right hand such as the queen never wielded. + +"A person under the firm persuasion that he can command resources +virtually has them," says Livy. + +Solario, a wandering gypsy tinker, fell deeply in love with the +daughter of the painter Coll' Antonio del Fiore, but was told that no +one but a painter as good as the father should wed the maiden. "Will +you give me ten years to learn to paint, and so entitle myself to the +hand of your daughter?" Consent was given, Coll' Antonio thinking that +he would never be troubled further by the gypsy. About the time that +the ten years were to end the king's sister showed Coll' Antonio a +Madonna and Child, which the painter extolled in terms of the highest +praise. Judge of his surprise on learning that Solario was the artist. +But later, his son-in-law surprised him even more by his rare skill. + +Louis Philippe said he was the only sovereign in Europe fit to govern, +for he could black his own boots. + +When asked to name his family coat-of-arms, a self-made President of +the United States replied, "A pair of shirtsleeves." + +"Poverty is uncomfortable, as I can testify," said James A. Garfield; +"but nine times out of ten the best thing that can happen to a young +man is to be tossed overboard and compelled to sink or swim for +himself. In all my acquaintance I have never known a man to be drowned +who was worth the saving." + +It is not the men who have inherited most, except it be in nobility of +soul and purpose, who have risen highest; but rather the men with no +"start" who have won fortunes, and have made adverse circumstances a +spur to goad them up the steep mount, where + + "Fame's proud temple shines afar." + +To such men, every possible goal is accessible, and honest ambition has +no height that genius or talent may tread, which has not felt the +impress of their feet. + +You may leave your millions to your son, but have you really given him +anything? You cannot transfer the discipline, the experience, the +power which the acquisition has given you; you cannot transfer the +delight of achieving, the joy felt only in growth, the pride of +acquisition, the character which trained habits of accuracy, method, +promptness, patience, dispatch, honesty of dealing, politeness of +manner have developed. You cannot transfer the skill, sagacity, +prudence, foresight, which lie concealed in your wealth. It meant a +great deal for you, but means nothing to your heir. In climbing to +your fortune, you developed the muscle, stamina, and strength which +enabled you to maintain your lofty position, to keep your millions +intact. You had the power which comes only from experience, and which +alone enables you to stand firm on your dizzy height. Your fortune was +experience to you, joy, growth, discipline, and character; to him it +will be a temptation, an anxiety, which will probably dwarf him. It +was wings to you, it will be a dead weight to him; it was education to +you and expansion of your highest powers; to him it may mean inaction, +lethargy, indolence, weakness, ignorance. You have taken the priceless +spur--necessity--away from him, the spur which has goaded man to nearly +all the great achievements in the history of the world. + +You thought it a kindness to deprive yourself in order that your son +might begin where you left off. You thought to spare him the drudgery, +the hardships, the deprivations, the lack of opportunities, the meagre +education, which you had on the old farm. But you have put a crutch +into his hand instead of a staff; you have taken away from him the +incentive to self-development, to self-elevation, to self-discipline +and self-help, without which no real success, no real happiness, no +great character is ever possible. His enthusiasm will evaporate, his +energy will be dissipated, his ambition, not being stimulated by the +struggle for self-elevation, will gradually die away. If you do +everything for your son and fight his battles for him, you will have a +weakling on your hands at twenty-one. + +"My life is a wreck," said the dying Cyrus W. Field, "my fortune gone, +my home dishonored. Oh, I was so unkind to Edward when I thought I was +being kind. If I had only had firmness enough to compel my boys to +earn their living, then they would have known the meaning of money." +His table was covered with medals and certificates of honor from many +nations, in recognition of his great work for civilization in mooring +two continents side by side in thought, of the fame he had won and +could never lose. But grief shook the sands of life as he thought only +of the son who had brought disgrace upon a name before unsullied, the +wounds were sharper than those of a serpent's tooth. + +During the great financial crisis of 1857 Maria Mitchell, who was +visiting England, asked an English lady what became of daughters when +no property was left them. "They live on their brothers," was the +reply. "But what becomes of the American daughters," asked the English +lady, "when there is no money left?" "They earn it," was the reply. + +Men who have been bolstered up all their lives are seldom good for +anything in a crisis. When misfortune comes, they look around for +somebody to lean upon. If the prop is not there down they go. Once +down, they are as helpless as capsized turtles, or unhorsed men in +armor. Many a frontier boy has succeeded beyond all his expectations +simply because all props were knocked out from under him and he was +obliged to stand upon his own feet. + +"A man's best friends are his ten fingers," said Robert Collyer, who +brought his wife to America in the steerage. Young men who are always +looking for something to lean upon never amount to anything. + +There is no manhood mill which takes in boys and turns out men. What +you call "no chance" may be your "only chance." Don't wait for your +place to be made for you; make it yourself. Don't wait for somebody to +give you a lift; lift yourself. Henry Ward Beecher did not wait for a +call to a big church with a large salary. He accepted the first +pastorate offered him, in a little town near Cincinnati. He became +literally the light of the church, for he trimmed the lamps, kindled +the fires, swept the rooms, and rang the bell. His salary was only +about $200 a year,--but he knew that a fine church and great salary +cannot make a great man. It was work and opportunity that he wanted. +He felt that if there was anything in him work would bring it out. + +"Physiologists tell us," says Waters, "that it takes twenty-eight years +for the brain to attain its full development. If this is so, why +should not one be able, by his own efforts, to give this long-growing +organ a particular bent, a peculiar character? Why should the will not +be brought to bear upon the formation of the brain as well as of the +backbone?" The will is merely our steam power, and we may put it to +any work we please. It will do our bidding, whether it be building up +a character, or tearing it down. It may be applied to building up a +habit of truthfulness and honesty, or of falsehood and dishonor. It +will help build up a man or a brute, a hero or a coward. It will brace +up resolution until one may almost perform miracles, or it may be +dissipated in irresolution and inaction until life is a wreck. It will +hold you to your task until you have formed a powerful habit of +industry and application, until idleness and inaction are painful, or +it will lead you into indolence and listlessness until every effort +will be disagreeable and success impossible. + +"The first thing I have to impress upon you is," says J. T. Davidson, +"that a good name must be the fruit of one's own exertion. You cannot +possess it by patrimony; you cannot purchase it with money; you will +not light on it by chance; it is independent of birth, station, +talents, and wealth; it must be the outcome of your own endeavor, and +the reward of good principles and honorable conduct. Of all the +elements of success in life none is more vital than self-reliance,--a +determination to be, under God, the creator of your own reputation and +advancement. If difficulties stand in the way, if exceptional +disadvantages oppose you, all the better, as long as you have pluck to +fight through them. I want each young man here (you will not +misunderstand me) to have faith in himself and, scorning props and +buttresses, crutches and life-preservers, to take earnest hold of life. +Many a lad has good stuff in him that never comes to anything because +he slips too easily into some groove of life; it is commonly those who +have a tough battle to begin with that make their mark upon their age." + +When Beethoven was examining the work of Moscheles, he found written at +the end "Finis, with God's help." He wrote under it "Man, help +yourself." + +A young man stood listlessly watching some anglers on a bridge. He was +poor and dejected. At length, approaching a basket filled with fish, +he sighed, "If now I had these I would be happy. I could sell them and +buy food and lodgings." "I will give you just as many and just as +good," said the owner, who chanced to overhear his words, "if you will +do me a trifling favor." "And what is that?" asked the other. "Only +to tend this line till I come back; I wish to go on a short errand." +The proposal was gladly accepted. The old man was gone so long that +the young man began to get impatient. Meanwhile the fish snapped +greedily at the hook, and he lost all his depression in the excitement +of pulling them in. When the owner returned he had caught a large +number. Counting out from them as many as were in the basket, and +presenting them to the youth, the old fisherman said, "I fulfill my +promise from the fish you have caught, to teach you whenever you see +others earning what you need to waste no time in foolish wishing, but +cast a line for yourself." + +A white squall caught a party of tourists on a lake in Scotland, and +threatened to capsize the boat. When it seemed that the crisis was +really come the largest and strongest man in the party, in a state of +intense fear, said, "Let us pray." "No, no, my man," shouted the bluff +old boatman; "_let the little man pray. You take an oar._" The +greatest curse that can befall a young man is to lean. + +The grandest fortunes ever accumulated or possessed on earth were and +are the fruit of endeavor that had no capital to begin with save +energy, intellect, and the will. From Croesus down to Rockefeller the +story is the same, not only in the getting of wealth, but also in the +acquirement of eminence; those men have won most who relied most upon +themselves. + +It has been said that one of the most disgusting sights in this world +is that of a young man with healthy blood, broad shoulders, presentable +calves, and a hundred and fifty pounds, more or less, of good bone and +muscle, standing with his hands in his pockets longing for help. + +"The male inhabitants in the Township of Loaferdom, in the County of +Hatework," says a printer's squib, "found themselves laboring under +great inconvenience for want of an easily traveled road between Poverty +and Independence. They therefore petitioned the Powers that be to levy +a tax upon the property of the entire county for the purpose of laying +out a macadamized highway, broad and smooth, and all the way down hill +to the latter place." + +"It is interesting to notice how some minds seem almost to create +themselves," says Irving, "springing up under every disadvantage, and +working their solitary but irresistible way through a thousand +obstacles." + +"Every one is the artificer of his own fortune," says Sallust. + +Man is not merely the architect of his own fortune, but he must lay the +bricks himself. Bayard Taylor, at twenty-three, wrote: "I will become +the sculptor of my own mind's statue." His biography shows how often +the chisel and hammer were in his hands to shape himself into his +ideal. "I have seen none, known none, of the celebrities of my time," +said Samuel Cox. "All my energy was directed upon one end, to improve +myself." + +"Man exists for culture," says Goethe; "not for what he can accomplish, +but for what can be accomplished in him." + +When young Professor Tyndall was in the government service, he had no +definite aim in life until one day a government official asked him how +he employed his leisure time. "You have five hours a day at your +disposal," said he, "and this ought to be devoted to systematic study. +Had I at your age some one to advise me as I now advise you, instead of +being in a subordinate position, I might have been at the head of my +department." The very next day young Tyndall began a regular course of +study, and went to the University of Marburg, where he became noted for +his indomitable industry. He was so poor that he bought a cask, and +cut it open for a bathtub. He often rose before daylight to study, +while the world was slumbering about him. + +Labor is the only legal tender in the world to true success. The gods +sell everything for that, nothing without it. You will never find +success "marked down." The door to the temple of success is never left +open. Every one who enters makes his own door which closes behind him +to all others. + +Circumstances have rarely favored great men. They have fought their +way to triumph over the road of difficulty and through all sorts of +opposition. A lowly beginning and a humble origin are no bar to a +great career. The farmers' boys fill many of the greatest places in +legislatures, in syndicates, at the bar, in pulpits, in Congress, +to-day. Boys of lowly origin have made many of the greatest +discoveries, are presidents of our banks, of our colleges, of our +universities. Our poor boys and girls have written many of our +greatest books, and have filled the highest places as teachers and +journalists. Ask almost any great man in our large cities where he was +born, and he will tell you it was on a farm or in a small country +village. Nearly all of the great capitalists of the city came from the +country. "'T is better to be lowly born." + +The founder of Boston University left Cape Cod for Boston to make his +way with a capital of only four dollars. Like Horace Greeley, he could +find no opening for a boy; but what of that? He made an opening. He +found a board, and made it into an oyster stand on the street corner. +He borrowed a wheelbarrow, and went three miles to an oyster smack, +bought three bushels of oysters, and wheeled them to his stand. Soon +his little savings amounted to $130, and then he bought a horse and +cart. This poor boy with no chance kept right on till he became the +millionaire Isaac Rich. + +Chauncey Jerome, the inventor of machine-made clocks, started with two +others on a tour through New Jersey, they to sell the clocks, and he to +make cases for them. On his way to New York he went through New Haven +in a lumber wagon, eating bread and cheese. He afterward lived in a +fine mansion in New Haven. + +Self-help has accomplished about all the great things of the world. +How many young men falter, faint, and dally with their purpose because +they have no capital to start with, and wait and wait for some good +luck to give them a lift. But success is the child of drudgery and +perseverance. It cannot be coaxed or bribed; pay the price and it is +yours. Where is the boy to-day who has less chance to rise in the +world than Elihu Burritt, apprenticed to a blacksmith, in whose shop he +had to work at the forge all the daylight, and often by candle-light? +Yet, he managed, by studying with a book before him at his meals, +carrying it in his pocket that he might utilize every spare moment, and +studying nights and holidays, to pick up an excellent education in the +odds and ends of time which most boys throw away. While the rich boy +and the idler were yawning and stretching and getting their eyes open, +young Burritt had seized the opportunity and improved it. At thirty +years of age he was master of every important language in Europe and +was studying those of Asia. + +What chance had such a boy for distinction? Probably not a single +youth will read this book who has not a better opportunity for success. +Yet he had a thirst for knowledge, and a desire for self-improvement, +which overcame every obstacle in his pathway. A wealthy gentleman +offered to pay his expenses at Harvard; but no, he said he could get +his education himself, even though he had to work twelve or fourteen +hours a day at the forge. Here was a determined boy. He snatched +every spare moment at the anvil and forge as though it were gold. He +believed, with Gladstone, that thrift of time would repay him in after +years with usury, and that waste of it would make him dwindle. Think +of a boy working nearly all the daylight in a blacksmith's shop, and +yet finding time to study seven languages in a single year! + +If the youth of America who are struggling against cruel circumstances, +to do something and be somebody in the world, could only understand +that ninety per cent. of what is called genius is merely the result of +persistent, determined industry, is in most cases downright hard work, +that it is the slavery to a single idea which has given to many a +mediocre talent the reputation of being a genius, they would be +inspired with new hope. It is interesting to note that the men who +talk most about genius are the men who like to work the least. The +lazier the man, the more he will have to say about great things being +done by genius. + +The greatest geniuses have been the greatest workers. Sheridan was +considered a genius, but it was found that the "brilliants" and +"off-hand sayings" with which he used to dazzle the House of Commons +were elaborated, polished and repolished, and put down in his +memorandum book ready for any emergency. + +Genius has been well defined as the infinite capacity for taking pains. +If men who have done great things could only reveal to the struggling +youth of to-day how much of their reputations was due to downright hard +digging and plodding, what an uplift of inspiration and encouragement +they would give. How often I have wished that the discouraged, +struggling youth could know of the heart-aches, the head-aches, the +nerve-aches, the disheartening trials, the discouraged hours, the fears +and despair involved in works which have gained the admiration of the +world, but which have taxed the utmost powers of their authors. You +can read in a few minutes or a few hours a poem or a book with only +pleasure and delight, but the days and months of weary plodding over +details and dreary drudgery often required to produce it would stagger +belief. + +The greatest works in literature have been elaborated and elaborated, +line by line, paragraph by paragraph, often rewritten a dozen times. +The drudgery which literary men have put into the productions which +have stood the test of time is almost incredible. Lucretius worked +nearly a lifetime on one poem. It completely absorbed his life. It is +said that Bryant rewrote "Thanatopsis" a hundred times, and even then +was not satisfied with it. John Foster would sometimes linger a week +over a single sentence. He would hack, split, prune, pull up by the +roots, or practice any other severity on whatever he wrote, till it +gained his consent to exist. Chalmers was once asked what Foster was +about in London. "Hard at it," he replied, "at the rate of a line a +week." Dickens, one of the greatest writers of modern fiction, was so +worn down by hard work that he looked as "haggard as a murderer." Even +Lord Bacon, one of the greatest geniuses that ever lived, left large +numbers of MSS. filled with "sudden thoughts set down for use." Hume +toiled thirteen hours a day on his "History of England." Lord Eldon +astonished the world with his great legal learning, but when he was a +student too poor to buy books, he had actually borrowed and copied many +hundreds of pages of large law books, such as Coke upon Littleton, thus +saturating his mind with legal principles which afterward blossomed out +into what the world called remarkable genius. Matthew Hale for years +studied law sixteen hours a day. Speaking of Fox, some one declared +that he wrote "drop by drop." Rousseau says of the labor involved in +his smooth and lively style: "My manuscripts, blotted, scratched, +interlined, and scarcely legible, attest the trouble they cost me. +There is not one of them which I have not been obliged to transcribe +four or five times before it went to press. . . . Some of my periods I +have turned or returned in my head for five or six nights before they +were fit to be put to paper." + +It is said that Waller spent a whole summer over ten lines in one of +his poems. Beethoven probably surpassed all other musicians in his +painstaking fidelity and persistent application. There is scarcely a +bar in his music that was not written and rewritten at least a dozen +times. His favorite maxim was, "The barriers are not yet erected which +can say to aspiring talent and industry 'thus far and no further.'" +Gibbon wrote his autobiography nine times, and was in his study every +morning, summer and winter, at six o'clock; and yet youth who waste +their evenings wonder at the genius which can produce "The Decline and +Fall of the Roman Empire," upon which Gibbon worked twenty years. Even +Plato, one of the greatest writers that ever lived, wrote the first +sentence in his "Republic" nine different ways before he was satisfied +with it. Burke's famous "Letter to a Noble Lord," one of the finest +things in the English language, was so completely blotted over with +alterations when the proof was returned to the printing-office that the +compositors refused to correct it as it was, and entirely reset it. +Burke wrote the conclusion of his speech at the trial of Hastings +sixteen times, and Butler wrote his famous "Analogy" twenty times. It +took Virgil seven years to write his Georgics, and twelve years to +write the Aeneid. He was so displeased with the latter that he +attempted to rise from his deathbed to commit it to the flames. + +Haydn was very poor; his father was a coachman and he, friendless and +lonely, married a servant girl. He was sent away from home to act as +errand boy for a music teacher. He absorbed a great deal of +information, but he had a hard life of persecution until he became a +barber in Vienna. Here he blacked boots for an influential man, who +became a friend to him. In 1798 this poor boy's oratorio, "The +Creation," came upon the musical world like the rising of a new sun +which never set. He was courted by princes and dined with kings and +queens; his reputation was made; there was no more barbering, no more +poverty. But of his eight hundred compositions, "The Creation" +eclipsed them all. He died while Napoleon's guns were bombarding +Vienna, some of the shot falling in his garden. The greatest creations +of musicians were written with an effort, to fill the "aching void" in +the human heart. + +Frederick Douglass, America's most representative colored man, born a +slave, was reared in bondage, liberated by his own exertions, educated +and advanced by sheer pluck and perseverance to distinguished positions +in the service of his country, and to a high place in the respect and +esteem of the whole world. + +When a man like Lord Cavanagh, without arms or legs, manages to put +himself into Parliament, when a man like Francis Joseph Campbell, a +blind man, becomes a distinguished mathematician, a musician, and a +great philanthropist, we get a hint as to what it means to make the +most possible out of ourselves and opportunities. Perhaps ninety-nine +out of a hundred under such unfortunate circumstances would be content +to remain helpless objects of charity for life. If it is your call to +acquire money power instead of brain power, to acquire business power +instead of professional power, double your talent just the same, no +matter what it may be. + +A glover's apprentice of Glasgow, Scotland, who was too poor to afford +even a candle or a fire, and who studied by the light of the shop +windows in the streets, and when the shops were closed climbed the +lamp-post, holding his book in one hand, and clinging to the lamp-post +with the other,--this poor boy, with less chance than almost any boy in +America, became the most eminent scholar of Scotland. + +Francis Parkman, half blind, became one of America's greatest +historians in spite of everything, because he made himself such. +Personal value is a coin of one's own minting; one is taken at the +worth he has put into himself. Franklin was but a poor printer's boy, +whose highest luxury at one time was only a penny roll, eaten in the +streets of Philadelphia. Richard Arkwright, a barber all his earlier +life, as he rose from poverty to wealth and fame, felt the need of +correcting the defects of his early education. After his fiftieth year +he devoted two hours a day, snatched from his sleep, to improving +himself in orthography, grammar, and writing. + +Michael Faraday was a poor boy, son of a blacksmith, who apprenticed +him at the age of thirteen to a bookbinder in London. Michael laid the +foundations of his future greatness by making himself familiar with the +contents of the books he bound. He remained at night, after others had +gone, to read and study the precious volumes. Lord Tenterden was proud +to point out to his son the shop where his father had shaved for a +penny. A French doctor once taunted Flechier, Bishop of Nismes, who +had been a tallow-chandler in his youth, with the meanness of his +origin, to which he replied, "If you had been born in the same +condition that I was, you would still have been but a maker of candles." + +The Duke of Argyle, walking in his garden, saw a Latin copy of Newton's +"Principia" on the grass, and supposing that it had been taken from his +library, called for some one to carry it back. Edmund Stone, however, +the son of the duke's gardener, claimed it. "Yours?" asked the +surprised nobleman. "Do you understand geometry, Latin, and Newton?" +"I know a little of them," replied Edmund. "But how," asked the duke, +"came you by the knowledge of all these things?" "A servant taught me +to read ten years since," answered Stone. "Does one need to know +anything more than the twenty-four letters, in order to learn +everything else that one wishes?" The duke was astonished. "I first +learned to read," said the lad; "the masons were then at work upon your +house. I approached them one day and observed that the architect used +a rule and compasses, and that he made calculations. I inquired what +might be the meaning and use of these things, and I was informed that +there was a science called arithmetic. I purchased a book of +arithmetic and learned it. I was told that there was another science +called geometry; I bought the necessary books and learned geometry. By +reading I found that there were good books on these sciences in Latin, +so I bought a dictionary and learned Latin. I understood, also, that +there were good books of the same kind in French; I bought a +dictionary, and learned French. This, my lord, is what I have done; it +seems to me that we may learn everything when we know the twenty-four +letters of the alphabet." + +Edwin Chadwick, in his report to the British Parliament, stated that +children, working on half time, that is, studying three hours a day and +working the rest of their time out of doors, really made the greatest +intellectual progress during the year. Business men have often +accomplished wonders during the busiest lives by simply devoting one, +two, three, or four hours daily to study or other literary work. + +James Watt received only the rudiments of an education at school, for +his attendance was irregular on account of delicate health. He more +than made up for all deficiencies, however, by the diligence with which +he pursued his studies at home. Alexander V. was a beggar; he was +"born mud, and died marble." William Herschel, placed at the age of +fourteen as a musician in the band of the Hanoverian Guards, devoted +all his leisure to philosophical studies. He acquired a large fund of +general knowledge, and in astronomy, a science in which he was wholly +self-instructed, his discoveries entitle him to rank with the greatest +astronomers of all time. + +George Washington was the son of a widow, born under the roof of a +Westmoreland farmer; almost from infancy his lot had been the lot of an +orphan. No academy had welcomed him to its shade, no college crowned +him with its honors; to read, to write, to cipher, these had been his +degrees in knowledge. Shakespeare learned little more than reading and +writing at school, but by self-culture he made himself the great master +among literary men. Burns, too, enjoyed few advantages of education, +and his youth was passed in almost abject poverty. + +James Ferguson, the son of a half-starved peasant, learned to read by +listening to the recitations of one of his elder brothers. While a +mere boy he discovered several mechanical principles, made models of +mills and spinning-wheels, and by means of beads on strings worked out +an excellent map of the heavens. Ferguson made remarkable things with +a common penknife. How many great men have mounted the hill of +knowledge by out-of-the-way paths. Gifford worked his intricate +problems with a shoemaker's awl on a bit of leather. Rittenhouse first +calculated eclipses on his plow-handle. _A will finds a way_. + +Julius Caesar, who has been unduly honored for those great military +achievements in which he appears as the scourge of his race, is far +more deserving of respect for those wonderful Commentaries, in which +his military exploits are recorded. He attained distinction by his +writings on astronomy, grammar, history, and several other subjects. +He was one of the most learned men and one of the greatest orators of +his time. Yet his life was spent amid the turmoil of a camp or the +fierce struggle of politics. If he found abundant time for study, who +may not? Frederick the Great, too, was busy in camp the greater part +of his life, yet whenever a leisure moment came, it was sure to be +devoted to study. He wrote to a friend, "I become every day more +covetous of my time, I render an account of it to myself, and I lose +none of it but with great regret." + +Columbus, while leading the life of a sailor, managed to become the +most accomplished geographer and astronomer of his time. + +When Peter the Great, a boy of seventeen, became the absolute ruler of +Russia, his subjects were little better than savages, and in himself, +even, the passions and propensities of barbarism were so strong that +they were frequently exhibited during his whole career. But he +determined to transform himself and the Russians into civilized people. +He instituted reforms with great energy, and at the age of twenty-six +started on a visit to the other countries of Europe for the purpose of +learning about their arts and institutions. At Saardam, Holland, he +was so impressed with the sights of the great East India dockyard, that +he apprenticed himself to a shipbuilder, and helped build the St. +Peter, which he promptly purchased. Continuing his travels, after he +had learned his trade, he worked in England in paper-mills, saw-mills, +rope-yards, watchmaker's shops, and other manufactories, doing the work +and receiving the treatment of a common laborer. + +While traveling, his constant habit was to obtain as much information +as he could beforehand with regard to every place he was to visit, and +he would demand, "Let me see all." When setting out on his +investigations, on such occasions, he carried his tablets in his hand, +and whatever he deemed worthy of remembrance was carefully noted down. +He would often leave his carriage, if he saw the country people at work +by the wayside as he passed along, and not only enter into conversation +with them, on agricultural affairs, but accompany them to their houses, +examine their furniture, and take drawings of their implements of +husbandry. Thus he obtained much minute and correct knowledge, which +he would scarcely have acquired by other means, and which he afterward +turned to admirable account in the improvement of his own country. + +The ancients said, "Know thyself;" the nineteenth century says, "Help +thyself." Self-culture gives a second birth to the soul. A liberal +education is a true regeneration. When a man is once liberally +educated, he will generally remain a man, not shrink to a manikin, nor +dwindle to a brute. But if he is not properly educated, if he has +merely been crammed and stuffed through college, if he has merely a +broken-down memory from trying to hold crammed facts enough to pass the +examination, he will continue to shrink and shrivel and dwindle, often +below his original proportions, for he will lose both his confidence +and self-respect, as his crammed facts, which never became a part of +himself, evaporate from his distended memory. Many a youth has made +his greatest effort in his graduating essay. But, alas! the beautiful +flowers of rhetoric blossomed only to exhaust the parent stock, which +blossoms no more forever. + +In Strasburg geese are crammed with food several times a day by opening +their mouths and forcing the pabulum down the throat with the finger. +The geese are shut up in boxes just large enough to hold them, and are +not allowed to take any exercise. This is done in order to increase +enormously the liver for _pate de fois gras_. So are our youth +sometimes stuffed with education. What are the chances for success of +students who "cut" recitations or lectures, and gad, lounge about, and +dissipate in the cities at night until the last two or three weeks, +sometimes the last few days, before examination, when they employ +tutors at exorbitant prices with the money often earned by hard-working +parents, to stuff their idle brains with the pabulum of knowledge; not +to increase their grasp or power of brain, not to discipline it, not +for assimilation into the mental tissue to develop personal power, but +to fatten the memory, the liver of the brain; to fatten it with crammed +facts until it is sufficiently expanded to insure fifty per cent. in +the examination. + +True teaching will create a thirst for knowledge, and the desire to +quench this thirst will lead the eager student to the Pierian spring. +"Man might be so educated that all his prepossessions would be truth, +and all his feelings virtues." + +Every bit of education or culture is of great advantage in the struggle +for existence. The microscope does not create anything new, but it +reveals marvels. To educate the eye adds to its magnifying power until +it sees beauty where before it saw only ugliness. It reveals a world +we never suspected, and finds the greatest beauty even in the commonest +things. The eye of an Agassiz could see worlds which the uneducated +eye never dreamed of. The cultured hand can do a thousand things the +uneducated hand cannot do. It becomes graceful, steady of nerve, +strong, skillful, indeed it almost seems to think, so animated is it +with intelligence. The cultured will can seize, grasp, and hold the +possessor, with irresistible power and nerve, to almost superhuman +effort. The educated touch can almost perform miracles. The educated +taste can achieve wonders almost past belief. What a contrast this, +between the cultured, logical, profound, masterly reason of a Gladstone +and that of the hod-carrier who has never developed or educated his +reason beyond what is necessary to enable him to mix mortar and carry +brick. + +"Culture comes from the constant choice of the best within our reach," +says Bulwer. "Continue to cultivate the mind, to sharpen by exercise +the genius, to attempt to delight or instruct your race; and, even +supposing you fall short of every model you set before you, supposing +your name moulder with your dust, still you will have passed life more +nobly than the unlaborious herd. Grant that you win not that glorious +accident, 'a name below,' how can you tell but that you may have fitted +yourself for high destiny and employ, not in the world of men, but of +spirits? The powers of the mind cannot be less immortal than the mere +sense of identity; their acquisitions accompany us through the Eternal +Progress, and we may obtain a lower or a higher grade hereafter, in +proportion as we are more or less fitted by the exercise of our +intellect to comprehend and execute the solemn agencies of God." + +But be careful to avoid that over-intellectual culture which is +purchased at the expense of moral vigor. An observant professor of one +of our colleges has remarked that "the mind may be so rounded and +polished by education, so well balanced, as not to be energetic in any +one faculty. In other men not thus trained, the sense of deficiency +and of the sharp, jagged corners of their knowledge leads to efforts to +fill up the chasms, rendering them at last far better educated men than +the polished, easy-going graduate who has just knowledge enough to +prevent consciousness of his ignorance. While all the faculties of the +mind should be cultivated, it is yet desirable that it should have two +or three rough-hewn features of massive strength. Young men are too +apt to forget the great end of life which is to be and do, not to read +and brood over what other men have been and done." + +In a gymnasium you tug, you expand your chest, you push, pull, strike, +run, in order to develop your physical self; so you can develop your +moral and intellectual nature only by continued effort. + +"I repeat that my object is not to give him knowledge but to teach him +how to acquire it at need," said Rousseau. + +All learning is self-teaching. It is upon the working of the pupil's +own mind that his progress in knowledge depends. The great business of +the master is to teach the pupil to teach himself. + +"Thinking, not growth, makes manhood," says Isaac Taylor. "Accustom +yourself, therefore, to thinking. Set yourself to understand whatever +you see or read. To join thinking with reading is one of the first +maxims, and one of the easiest operations." + + "How few think justly of the thinking few: + How many never think who think they do." + + + + +CHAPTER IX. + +WORK AND WAIT. + +What we do upon some great occasion will probably depend on what we +already are; and what we are will be the result of previous years of +self-discipline.--H. P. LIDDON. + +In all matters, before beginning, a diligent preparation should be +made.--CICERO. + +I consider a human soul without education like marble in a quarry which +shows none of its inherent beauties until the skill of the polisher +sketches out the colors, makes the surface shine, and discovers every +ornamental cloud, spot, and vein that runs throughout the body of +it.--ADDISON. + +Many a genius has been slow of growth. Oaks that flourish for a +thousand years do not spring up into beauty like a reed.--GEORGE HENRY +LEWES. + +Use your gifts faithfully, and they shall be enlarged; practice what +you know, and you shall attain to higher knowledge.--ARNOLD. + +All good abides with him who waiteth wisely.--THOREAU. + +The more haste, ever the worse speed.--CHURCHILL. + +Haste trips up its own heels, fetters and stops itself.--SENECA. + +"Wisely and slow; they stumble that run fast." + +How can we expect a harvest of thought who have not had the seed-time +of character?--THOREAU. + +I call a complete and generous education that which fits a man to +perform justly, skillfully, and magnanimously, all the offices, both +public and private, of peace and war.--MILTON. + +The safe path to excellence and success, in every calling, is that of +appropriate preliminary education, diligent application to learn the +art and assiduity in practicing it.--EDWARD EVERETT. + +The more you know, the more you can save yourself and that which +belongs to you, and do more work with less effort.--CHARLES KINGSLEY. + + +"I was a mere cipher in that vast sea of human enterprise," said Henry +Bessemer, speaking of his arrival in London in 1831. Although but +eighteen years old, and without an acquaintance in the city, he soon +made work for himself by inventing a process of copying bas-reliefs on +cardboard. His method was so simple that one could learn in ten +minutes how to make a die from an embossed stamp for a penny. Having +ascertained later that in this way the raised stamps on all official +papers in England could easily be forged, he set to work and invented a +perforated stamp which could not be forged nor removed from a document. +At the public stamp office he was told by the chief that the government +was losing 100,000 pounds a year through the custom of removing stamps +from old parchments and using them again. The chief also appreciated +the new danger of easy counterfeiting. So he offered Bessemer a +definite sum for his process of perforation, or an office for life at +eight hundred pounds a year. Bessemer chose the office, and hastened +to tell the good news to a young woman with whom he had agreed to share +his fortune. In explaining his invention, he told how it would prevent +any one from taking a valuable stamp from a document a hundred years +old and using it a second time. + + * * * * * * + +[Illustration: THOMAS ALVA EDISON] + +"The Wizard of Menlo Park." + +"What the world wants is men who have the nerve and the grit to work +and wait, whether the world applaud or hiss." + + * * * * * * + +"Yes," said his betrothed, "I understand that; but, surely, if all +stamps had a date put upon them they could not at a future time be used +without detection." + +This was a very short speech, and of no special importance if we omit a +single word of four letters; but, like the schoolboy's pins which saved +the lives of thousands of people annually by not getting swallowed, +that little word, by keeping out of the ponderous minds of the British +revenue officers, had for a long period saved the government the burden +of caring for an additional income of 100,000 pounds a year. And the +same little word, if published in its connection, would render Henry's +perforation device of far less value than a last year's bird's nest. +Henry felt proud of the young woman's ingenuity, and suggested the +improvement at the stamp office. As a result his system of perforation +was abandoned and he was deprived of his promised office, the +government coolly making use from that day to this, without +compensation, of the idea conveyed by that little insignificant word. + +So Bessemer's financial prospects were not very encouraging; but, +realizing that the best capital a young man can have is a capital wife, +he at once entered into a partnership which placed at his command the +combined ideas of two very level heads. The result, after years of +thought and experiment, was the Bessemer process of making steel +cheaply, which has revolutionized the iron industry throughout the +world. His method consists simply in forcing hot air from below into +several tons of melted pig-iron, so as to produce intense combustion; +and then adding enough spiegel-eisen (looking-glass iron), an ore rich +in carbon, to change the whole mass to steel. He discovered this +simple process only after trying in vain much more difficult and +expensive methods. + + "All things come round to him who will but wait." + + +The great lack of the age is want of thoroughness. How seldom you find +a young man or woman who is willing to take time to prepare for his +life work. A little education is all they want, a little smattering of +books, and then they are ready for business. + +"Can't wait" is characteristic of the century, and is written on +everything; on commerce, on schools, on society, on churches. Can't +wait for a high school, seminary, or college. The boy can't wait to +become a youth, nor the youth a man. Youth rush into business with no +great reserve of education or drill; of course they do poor, feverish +work, and break down in middle life, and many die of old age in the +forties. Everybody is in a hurry. Buildings are rushed up so quickly +that they will not stand, and everything is made "to sell." + +Not long ago a professor in one of our universities had a letter from a +young woman in the West, asking him if he did not think she could teach +elocution if she could come to the university and take twelve lessons. +Our young people of to-day want something, and want it quickly. They +are not willing to lay broad, deep foundations. The weary years in +preparatory school and college dishearten them. They only want a +"smattering" of an education. But as Pope says,-- + + "A little learning is a dangerous thing; + Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring: + There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain, + And drinking largely sobers us again." + + +The shifts to cover up ignorance, and "the constant trembling lest some +blunder should expose one's emptiness," are pitiable. Short cuts and +abridged methods are the demand of the hour. But the way to shorten +the road to success is to take plenty of time to lay in your reserve +power. You can't stop to forage your provender as the army advances; +if you do the enemy will get there first. Hard work, a definite aim, +and faithfulness, will shorten the way. Don't risk a life's +superstructure upon a day's foundation. + +Unless you have prepared yourself to profit by your chance, the +opportunity will only make you ridiculous. A great occasion is +valuable to you just in proportion as you have educated yourself to +make use of it. Beware of that fatal facility of thoughtless speech +and superficial action which has misled many a young man into the +belief that he could make a glib tongue or a deft hand take the place +of deep study or hard work. + +Patience is nature's motto. She works ages to bring a flower to +perfection. What will she not do for the greatest of her creation? +Ages and aeons are nothing to her, out of them she has been carving her +great statue, a perfect man. + +Johnson said a man must turn over half a library to write one book. +When an authoress told Wordsworth she had spent six hours on a poem, he +replied that he would have spent six weeks. Think of Bishop Hall +spending thirty years on one of his works. Owens was working on the +"Commentary to the Epistle to the Hebrews" for twenty years. Moore +spent several weeks on one of his musical stanzas which reads as if it +were a dash of genius. Carlyle wrote with the utmost difficulty, and +never executed a page of his great histories till he had consulted +every known authority, so that every sentence is the quintessence of +many books, the product of many hours of drudging research in the great +libraries. To-day, "Sartor Resartus" is everywhere. You can get it +for a mere trifle at almost any bookseller's, and hundreds of thousands +of copies are scattered over the world. But when Carlyle brought it to +London in 1851, it was refused almost contemptuously by three prominent +publishers. At last he managed to get it into "Fraser's Magazine," the +editor of which conveyed to the author the pleasing information that +his work had been received with "unqualified disapprobation." Henry +Ward Beecher sent a half dozen articles to the publisher of a religious +paper to pay for his subscription, but they were respectfully declined. +The publishers of the "Atlantic Monthly" returned Miss Alcott's +manuscript, suggesting that she had better stick to teaching. One of +the leading magazines ridiculed Tennyson's first poems, and consigned +the young poet to oblivion. Only one of Ralph Waldo Emerson's books +had a remunerative sale. Washington Irving was nearly seventy years +old before the income from his books paid the expenses of his household. + +In some respects it is very unfortunate that the old system of binding +boys out to a trade has been abandoned. To-day very few boys learn any +trade. They pick up what they know, as they go along, just as a +student crams for a particular examination, just to "get through," +without any effort to see how much he may learn on any subject. + +Think of an American youth spending twelve years with Michael Angelo, +studying anatomy that he might create the masterpiece of all art; or +with Da Vinci devoting ten years to the model of an equestrian statue +that he might master the anatomy of the horse. Most young American +artists would expect, in a quarter of that time, to sculpture an Apollo +Belvidere. While Michael Angelo was painting the Sistine Chapel he +would not allow himself time for meals or to dress or undress; but he +kept bread within reach that he might eat when hunger impelled, and he +slept in his clothes. + +A rich man asked Howard Burnett to do a little thing for his album. +Burnett complied and charged a thousand francs. "But it took you only +five minutes," objected the rich man. "Yes, but it took me thirty +years to learn how to do it in five minutes." + +"I prepared that sermon," said a young sprig of divinity, "in half an +hour, and preached it at once, and thought nothing of it." "In that," +said an older minister, "your hearers are at one with you, for they +also thought nothing of it." + +What the age wants is men who have the nerve and the grit to work and +wait, whether the world applaud or hiss. It wants a Bancroft, who can +spend twenty-six years on the "History of the United States;" a Noah +Webster, who can devote thirty-six years to a dictionary; a Gibbon, who +can plod for twenty years on the "Decline and Fall of the Roman +Empire;" a Mirabeau, who can struggle on for forty years before he has +a chance to show his vast reserve, destined to shake an empire; a +Farragut, a Von Moltke, who have the persistence to work and wait for +half a century for their first great opportunities; a Garfield, burning +his lamp fifteen minutes later than a rival student in his academy; a +Grant, fighting on in heroic silence, when denounced by his brother +generals and politicians everywhere; a Field's untiring perseverance, +spending years and a fortune laying a cable when all the world called +him a fool; a Michael Angelo, working seven long years decorating the +Sistine Chapel with his matchless "Creation" and the "Last Judgment," +refusing all remuneration therefor, lest his pencil might catch the +taint of avarice; a Titian, spending seven years on the "Last Supper;" +a Stephenson, working fifteen years on a locomotive; a Watt, twenty +years on a condensing engine; a Lady Franklin, working incessantly for +twelve long years to rescue her husband from the polar seas; a Thurlow +Weed, walking two miles through the snow with rags tied around his feet +for shoes, to borrow the history of the French Revolution, and eagerly +devouring it before the sap-bush fire; a Milton, elaborating "Paradise +Lost" in a world he could not see, and then selling it for fifteen +pounds; a Thackeray, struggling on cheerfully after his "Vanity Fair" +was refused by a dozen publishers; a Balzac, toiling and waiting in a +lonely garret, whom neither poverty, debt, nor hunger could discourage +or intimidate; not daunted by privations, not hindered by +discouragements. It wants men who can work and wait. + +When a young lawyer Daniel Webster once looked in vain through all the +law libraries near him, and then ordered at an expense of fifty dollars +the necessary books, to obtain authorities and precedents in a case in +which his client was a poor blacksmith. He won his cause, but, on +account of the poverty of his client, only charged fifteen dollars, +thus losing heavily on the books bought, to say nothing of his time. +Years after, as he was passing through New York city, he was consulted +by Aaron Burr on an important but puzzling case then pending before the +Supreme Court. He saw in a moment that it was just like the +blacksmith's case, an intricate question of title, which he had solved +so thoroughly that it was to him now as simple as the multiplication +table. Going back to the time of Charles II. he gave the law and +precedents involved with such readiness and accuracy of sequence that +Burr asked in great surprise if he had been consulted before in the +case. "Most certainly not," he replied, "I never heard of your case +till this evening." "Very well," said Burr, "proceed," and, when he +had finished, Webster received a fee that paid him liberally for all +the time and trouble he had spent for his early client. + +Albert Bierstadt first crossed the Rocky Mountains with a band of +pioneers in 1859, making sketches for the paintings of western scenes +for which he had become famous. As he followed the trail to Pike's +Peak, he gazed in wonder upon the enormous herds of buffaloes which +dotted the plains as far as the eye could reach, and thought of the +time when they would have disappeared before the march of civilization. +The thought haunted him and found its final embodiment in "The Last of +the Buffaloes" in 1890. To perfect this great work he had spent twenty +years. + +Everything which endures, which will stand the test of time, must have +a deep, solid foundation. In Rome the foundation is often the most +expensive part of an edifice, so deep must they dig to build on the +living rock. + +Fifty feet of Bunker Hill Monument is under ground; unseen and +unappreciated by those who tread about that historic shaft, but it is +this foundation, apparently thrown away, which enables it to stand +upright, true to the plumb-line through all the tempests that lash its +granite sides. A large part of every successful life must be spent in +laying foundation stones under ground. Success is the child of +drudgery and perseverance and depends upon "knowing how long it takes +to succeed." Havelock joined the army at twenty-eight, and for +thirty-four years worked and waited for his opportunity; conscious of +his power, "fretting as a subaltern while he saw drunkards and fools +put above his head." + +But during all these years he was fitting himself to lead that +marvelous march to Lucknow. + +It was many years of drudgery and reading a thousand volumes that +enabled George Eliot to get fifty thousand dollars for "Daniel +Deronda." How came writers to be famous? By writing for years without +any pay at all; by writing hundreds of pages for mere practice work; by +working like galley-slaves at literature for half a lifetime. It was +working and waiting many long and weary years that put one hundred and +twenty-five thousand dollars into "The Angelus." Millet's first +attempts were mere daubs, the later were worth fortunes. Schiller +"never could get done." Dante sees himself "growing lean over his +Divine Comedy." It is working and waiting that gives perfection. + +"I do not remember," said Beecher, "a book in all the depths of +learning, nor a scrap in literature, nor a work in all the schools of +art, from which its author has derived a permanent renown, that is not +known to have been long and patiently elaborated." + +Endurance is a much better test of character than any one act of +heroism, however noble. + +The pianist Thalberg said he never ventured to perform one of his +celebrated pieces in public until he had played it at least fifteen +hundred times. He laid no claim whatever to genius; he said it was all +a question of hard work. The accomplishments of such industry, such +perseverance, would put to shame many a man who claims genius. + +Before Edmund Kean would consent to appear in that character which he +acted with such consummate skill, The Gentleman Villain, he practiced +constantly before a glass, studying expression for a year and a half. +When he appeared upon the stage, Byron, who went to see him with Moore, +said he never looked upon so fearful and wicked a face. As the great +actor went on to delineate the terrible consequences of sin, Byron +fainted. + +"For years I was in my place of business by sunrise," said a wealthy +banker who had begun without a dollar, "and often I did not leave it +for fifteen or eighteen hours." + +_Festina lente_--hasten slowly--is a good Latin motto. Patience, it is +said, changes the mulberry leaf to satin. The giant oak on the +hillside was detained months or years in its upward growth while its +roots took a great turn around some rock, in order to gain a hold by +which the tree was anchored to withstand the storms of centuries. Da +Vinci spent four years on the head of Mona Lisa, perhaps the most +beautiful ever painted, but he left therein, an artistic thought for +all time. + +Said Captain Bingham: "You can have no idea of the wonderful machine +that the German army is and how well it is prepared for war. A chart +is made out which shows just what must be done in the case of wars with +the different nations. And every officer's place in the scheme is laid +out beforehand. There is a schedule of trains which will supersede all +other schedules the moment war is declared, and this is so arranged +that the commander of the army here could telegraph to any officer to +take such a train and go to such a place at a moment's notice. When +the Franco-Prussian war was declared, Von Moltke was awakened at +midnight and told of the fact. He said coolly to the official who +aroused him, 'Go to pigeonhole No. ---- in my safe and take a paper +from it and telegraph as there directed to the different troops of the +empire.' He then turned over and went to sleep and awoke at his usual +hour in the morning. Every one else in Berlin was excited about the +war, but Von Moltke took his morning walk as usual, and a friend who +met him said, 'General, you seem to be taking it very easy. Aren't you +afraid of the situation? I should think you would be busy.' 'Ah,' +replied Von Moltke, 'all of my work for this time has been done long +beforehand and everything that can be done now has been done.'" + +That is done soon enough which is done well. Soon ripe, soon rotten. +He that would enjoy the fruit must not gather the flower. He who is +impatient to become his own master is more likely to become his own +slave. Better believe yourself a dunce and work away than a genius and +be idle. One year of trained thinking is worth more than a whole +college course of mental absorption of a vast series of undigested +facts. The facility with which the world swallows up the ordinary +college graduate who thought he was going to dazzle mankind should bid +you pause and reflect. But just as certainly as man was created not to +crawl on all fours in the depths of primeval forests, but to develop +his mental and moral faculties, just so certainly he needs education, +and only by means of it will he become what he ought to become,--man, +in the highest sense of the word. Ignorance is not simply the negation +of knowledge, it is the misdirection of the mind. "One step in +knowledge," says Bulwer, "is one step from sin; one step from sin is +one step nearer to Heaven." + +A learned clergyman was thus accosted by an illiterate preacher who +despised education: "Sir, you have been to college, I presume?" "Yes, +sir," was the reply. "I am thankful," said the former, "that the Lord +opened my mouth without any learning." "A similar event," retorted the +clergyman, "happened in Balaam's time." + +"If a cloth were drawn around the eyes of Praxiteles' statue of Love," +says Bulwer, "the face looked grave and sad; but as the bandage was +removed, a beautiful smile would overspread the countenance. Even so +does the removal of the veil of ignorance from the eyes of the mind +bring radiant happiness to the heart of man." + +A young man just graduated told the President of Trinity College that +he had completed his education, and had come to say good-by. "Indeed," +said the President, "I have just begun my education." + +Many an extraordinary man has been made out of a very ordinary boy; but +in order to accomplish this we must begin with him while he is young. +It is simply astonishing what training will do for a rough, uncouth, +and even dull lad, if he has good material in him, and comes under the +tutelage of a skilled educator before his habits have become confirmed. +Even a few weeks' or months' drill of the rawest and roughest recruits +in the late Civil War so straightened and dignified stooping and +uncouth soldiers, and made them so manly, erect, and courteous in their +bearing, that their own friends scarcely knew them. If this change is +so marked in the youth who has grown to maturity, what a miracle is +possible in the lad who is taken early and put under a course of drill +and systematic training, both physical, mental, and moral. How many a +man who is now in the penitentiary, in the poorhouse, or among the +tramps, or living out a miserable existence in the slums of our cities, +bent over, uncouth, rough, slovenly, has possibilities slumbering +within the rags, which would have developed him into a magnificent man, +an ornament to the human race instead of a foul blot and scar, had he +only been fortunate enough early in life to have come under efficient +and systematic training. + +Laziness begins in cobwebs and ends in iron chains. The more business +a man has, the more he can do, for be learns to economize his time. + +The industry that acquired riches, according to a wise teacher, the +patience that is required in obtaining them, the reserved self-control, +the measuring of values, the sympathy felt for fellow-toilers, the +knowledge of what a dollar costs to the average man, the memory of +it--all these things are preservative. But woe to the young farmer who +hates farming; does not like sowing and reaping; is impatient with the +dilatory and slow path to a small though secure fortune in the +neighborhood where he was born, and comes to the city, hoping to become +suddenly rich, thinking that he can break into the palace of wealth and +rob it of its golden treasures! + +Edison described his repeated efforts to make the phonograph reproduce +an aspirated sound, and added: "From eighteen to twenty hours a day for +the last seven months I have worked on this single word 'specia.' I +said into the phonograph 'specia, specia, specia,' but the instrument +responded 'pecia, pecia, pecia.' It was enough to drive one mad. But +I held firm, and I have succeeded." + +The road to distinction must be paved with years of self-denial and +hard work. + +Horace Mann, the great author of the common school system of +Massachusetts, was a remarkable example of that pluck and patience +which can work and wait. His only inheritance was poverty and hard +work. But he had an unquenchable thirst for knowledge and a +determination to get on in the world. He braided straw to get money to +buy books which his soul thirsted for. + +To Jonas Chickering there were no trifles in the manufacture of a +piano. Others might work for salaries, but he was working for fame and +fortune. Neither time nor pains were of any account to him compared +with accuracy and knowledge. He could afford to work and wait, for +quality, not quantity, was his aim. Fifty years ago the piano was a +miserable, instrument compared with the perfect mechanism of to-day. +Chickering was determined to make a piano which would yield the +fullest, richest volume of melody with the least exertion to the +player, and one which would withstand atmospheric changes and preserve +its purity and truthfulness of tone. And he strove patiently and +persistently till he succeeded. + +"Thy life, wert thou the pitifullest of all the sons of earth, is no +idle dream, but a solemn reality," said Carlyle. "It is thy own. It +is all thou hast to comfort eternity with. Work then like a star, +unhasting, yet unresting." + +Gladstone was bound to win; although he had spent many years of +preparation for his life work, in spite of the consciousness of +marvelous natural endowments which would have been deemed sufficient by +many young men, and notwithstanding he had gained the coveted prize of +a seat in Parliament, yet he decided to make himself master of the +situation; and amid all his public and private duties, he not only +spent eleven terms more in the study of the law, but he studied Greek +constantly and read every well written book or paper he could obtain, +so determined was he that his life should be rounded out to its fullest +measure, and that his mind should have broad and liberal culture. + +Emperor William I. was not a genius, but the secret of his power lay in +tireless perseverance. A friend says of him, "When I passed the palace +at Berlin night after night, however late, I always saw that grand +imperial figure standing beside the green lamp, and I used to say to +myself, 'That is how the imperial crown of Germany was won.'" + +Ole Bull said, "If I practice one day, I can see the result. If I +practice two days my friends can see it; if I practice three days the +great public can see it." + +The habit of seizing every bit of knowledge, no matter how +insignificant it may seem at the time, every opportunity, every +occasion, and grinding them all up into experience, cannot be +overestimated. You will find use for all of it. Webster once repeated +an anecdote with effect which he heard fourteen years before, and which +he had not thought of in the mean time. It exactly fitted the +occasion. "It is an ill mason that rejects any stone." + +Webster was once urged to speak on a subject of great importance, but +refused, saying he was very busy and had no time to master the subject. +"But," replied his friend, "a very few words from you would do much to +awaken public attention to it." Webster replied, "If there be so much +weight in my words, it is because I do not allow myself to speak on any +subject until my mind is imbued with it." On one occasion Webster made +a remarkable speech before the Phi Beta Kappa Society at Harvard, when +a book was presented to him, but after he had gone, his "impromptu" +speech, carefully written out, was found in the book which he had +forgotten to take away. + +Demosthenes was once urged to speak on a great and sudden emergency, +but replied, "I am not prepared." In fact, it was thought by many that +Demosthenes did not possess any genius whatever, because he never +allowed himself to speak on any subject without thorough preparation. +In any meeting or assembly, when called upon, he would never rise, even +to make remarks, it was said, without previously preparing himself. + +Alexander Hamilton said, "Men give me credit for genius. All the +genius I have lies just in this: when I have a subject in hand I study +it profoundly. Day and night it is before me. I explore it in all its +bearings. My mind becomes pervaded with it. Then the effort which I +make the people are pleased to call the fruit of genius; it is the +fruit of labor and thought." The law of labor is equally binding on +genius and mediocrity. + +Are the results so distant that you delay the preparation in the hope +that fortuitous good luck may make it unnecessary? As well might the +husbandman delay sowing his seed until the spring and summer are past +and the ground hardened by the frosts of a rigorous winter. As well +might one who is desirous of enjoying firm health inoculate his system +with the seeds of disease, and expect at such time as he may see fit to +recover from its effects, and banish the malady. Nelaton, the great +surgeon, said that if he had four minutes in which to perform an +operation, on which a life depended, he would take one minute to +consider how best to do it. + +"Many men," says Longfellow, "do not allow their principles to take +root, but pull them up every now and then, as children do flowers they +have planted, to see if they are growing." We must not only work, but +wait. + +"The spruce young spark," says Sizer, "who thinks chiefly of his +mustache and boots and shiny hat, of getting along nicely and easily +during the day, and talking about the theatre, the opera, or a fast +horse, ridiculing the faithful young fellow who came to learn the +business and make a man of himself, because he will not join in wasting +his time in dissipation, will see the day, if his useless life is not +earlier blasted by vicious indulgences, when he will be glad to accept +a situation from his fellow-clerk whom he now ridicules and affects to +despise, when the latter shall stand in the firm, dispensing benefits +and acquiring fortune." + +"I have been watching the careers of young men by the thousand in this +busy city of New York for over thirty years," said Dr. Cuyler, "and I +find that the chief difference between the successful and the failures +lies in the single element of staying power. Permanent success is +oftener won by holding on than by sudden dash, however brilliant. The +easily discouraged, who are pushed back by a straw, are all the time +dropping to the rear--to perish or to be carried along on the stretcher +of charity. They who understand and practice Abraham Lincoln's homely +maxim of 'pegging away' have achieved the solidest success." + +"When a man has done his work," says Ruskin, "and nothing can any way +be materially altered in his fate, let him forget his toil, and jest +with his fate if he will, but what excuse can you find for willfulness +of thought at the very lime when every crisis of fortune hangs on your +decisions? A youth thoughtless, when all the happiness of his home +forever depends on the chances or the passions of the hour! A youth +thoughtless, when the career of all his days depends on the opportunity +of a moment! A youth thoughtless, when his every action is a +foundation-stone of future conduct, and every imagination a foundation +of life or death! Be thoughtless in any after years, rather than +now--though, indeed, there is only one place where a man may be nobly +thoughtless, his deathbed. Nothing should ever be left to be done +there." + +The Duke of Wellington became so discouraged because he did not advance +in the army that he applied for a much inferior position in the customs +department, but was refused. Napoleon had applied for every vacant +position for seven years before he was recognized, but meanwhile he +studied with all his might, supplementing what was considered a +thorough military education by researches and reflections which in +later years enabled him easily to teach the art of war to veterans who +had never dreamed of his novel combinations. + +Reserves which carry us through great emergencies are the result of +long working and long waiting. Collyer declares that reserves mean to +a man also achievement,--"the power to do the grandest thing possible +to your nature when you feel you must, or some precious thing will be +lost,--to do well always, but best in the crisis on which all things +turn; to stand the strain of a long fight, and still find you have +something left, and so to never know you are beaten, because you never +are beaten." Every defeat is a Waterloo to him who has no reserves. + +He only is independent in action who has been earnest and thorough in +preparation and self-culture. "Not for school, but for life, we +learn;" and our habits--of promptness, earnestness, and thoroughness, +or of tardiness, fickleness, and superficiality--are the things +acquired most readily and longest retained. + +"One who reads the chronicles of discoveries is struck with the +prominent part that accident has played in such annals. For some of +the most useful processes and machinery the world is indebted to +apparently chance occurrences. Inventors in search of one object have +failed in their quest, but have stumbled on something more valuable +than that for which they were looking. Saul is not the only man who +has gone in search of asses and found a kingdom. Astrologers sought to +read from the heavens the fate of men and the fortune of nations, and +they led to a knowledge of astronomy. Alchemists were seeking for the +philosopher's stone, and from their efforts sprung the science of +chemistry. Men explored the heavens for something to explain +irregularities in the movements of the planets, and discovered a star +other than the one for which they were looking. A careless glance at +such facts might encourage the delusion that aimless straying in +bypaths is quite as likely to be rewarded as is the steady pressing +forward, with fixed purpose, towards some definite goal. + +"But it is to be remembered that the men who made the accidental +discoveries were men who were looking for something. The unexpected +achievement was but the return for the toil after what was attained. +Others might have encountered the same facts, but only the eye made +eager by the strain of long watching would be quick to note the +meaning. If vain search for hidden treasure has no other recompense, +it at least gives ability to detect the first gleam of the true metal. +Men may wake at times surprised to find themselves famous, but it was +the work they did before going to sleep, and not the slumber, that gave +the eminence. When the ledge has been drilled and loaded and the +proper connections have been made, a child's touch on the electric key +may be enough to annihilate the obstacle, but without the long +preparation the pressure of a giant's hand would be without effect. + +"In the search for truth and the shaping of character the principle +remains the same as in science and literature. Trivial causes are +followed by wonderful results, but it is only the merchantman who is on +the watch for goodly pearls who is represented as finding the pearl of +great price." + +To vary the language of another, the three great essentials to success +in mental and physical labor are Practice, Patience, and Perseverance, +but the greatest of these is Perseverance. + + Let us, then, be up and doing, + With a heart for any fate; + Still achieving, still pursuing, + Learn to labor and to wait. + LONGFELLOW. + + + + +CHAPTER X. + +CLEAR GRIT. + + I shall show the cinders of my spirits + Through the ashes of my chance. + SHAKESPEARE. + + What though ten thousand faint, + Desert, or yield, or in weak terror flee! + Heed not the panic of the multitude; + Thine be the captain's watchword,--Victory! + HORATIUS BONAR. + + Better to stem with heart and hand + The roaring tide of life, than lie, + Unmindful, on its flowery strand, + Of God's occasions drifting by! + Better with naked nerve to hear + The needles of this goading air, + Than in the lap of sensual ease forego + The godlike power to do, the godlike aim to know. + WHITTIER. + + Let fortune empty her whole quiver on me, + I have a soul that, like an ample shield, + Can take in all, and verge enough for more. + DRYDEN. + + There's a brave fellow! There's a man of pluck! + A man who's not afraid to say his say, + Though a whole town's against him. + LONGFELLOW. + +Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in rising every time we +fall.--GOLDSMITH. + + Attempt the end and never stand to doubt; + Nothing's so hard but search will find it out. + HERRICK. + +The barriers are not yet erected which shall say to aspiring talent, +"Thus far and no farther."--BEETHOVEN. + + +"Friends and comrades," said Pizarro, as he turned toward the south, +after tracing with his sword upon the sand a line from east to west, +"on that side are toil, hunger, nakedness, the drenching storm, +desertion, and death; on this side, ease and pleasure. There lies Peru +with its riches; here, Panama and its poverty. Choose, each man, what +best becomes a brave Castilian. For my part, I go to the south." So +saying, he crossed the line and was followed by thirteen Spaniards in +armor. Thus, on the little island of Gallo in the Pacific, when his +men were clamoring to return to Panama, did Pizarro and his few +volunteers resolve to stake their lives upon the success of a desperate +crusade against the powerful empire of the Incas. At the time they had +not even a vessel to transport them to the country they wished to +conquer. Is it necessary to add that all difficulties yielded at last +to such resolute determination? + + * * * * * * + +[Illustration: ANDREW JACKSON] + +"Old Hickory." + + "Stick to your aim: the mongrel's hold will slip, + But only crowbars loose the bull-dog's grip." + +"The nerve that never relaxes, the eye that never blenches, the thought +that never wanders,--these are the masters of victory." + + * * * * * * + + "Perseverance is a Roman virtue, + That wins each godlike act, and plucks success + E'en from the spear-proof crest of rugged danger." + + +At a time when abolitionists were dangerously unpopular, a crowd of +brawny Cape Cod fishermen had made such riotous demonstrations that all +the speakers announced, except Stephen Foster and Lucy Stone, had fled +from an open-air platform. "You had better run, Stephen," said she, +"they are coming." "But who will take care of you?" asked Foster. +"This gentleman will take care of me," she replied, calmly laying her +hand within the arm of a burly rioter with a club, who had just sprung +upon the platform. "Wh--what did you say?" stammered the astonished +rowdy, as he looked at the little woman; "yes, I'll take care of you, +and no one shall touch a hair of your head." With this he forced a way +for her through the crowd, and, at her earnest request, placed her upon +a stump and stood guard with his club while she delivered an address so +effective that the audience offered no further violence, and even took +up a collection of twenty dollars to repay Mr. Foster for the damage +his clothes had received when the riot was at its height. + +"When you get into a tight place and everything goes against you, till +it seems as if you could not hold on a minute longer," said Harriet +Beecher Stowe, "never give up then, for that's just the place and time +that the tide'll turn." + +Charles Sumner said, "Three things are necessary: first, backbone; +second, backbone; third, backbone." + +While digging among the ruins of Pompeii, which was buried by the dust +and ashes from an eruption of Vesuvius, A. D. 79, the workmen found the +skeleton of a Roman soldier in the sentry-box at one of the city's +gates. He might have found safety under sheltering rocks close by; +but, in the face of certain death, he had remained at his post, a mute +witness to the thorough discipline, the ceaseless vigilance and +fidelity which made the Roman legionaries masters of the known world. +Bulwer, describing the flight of a party amid the dust, and ashes, and +streams of boiling water, and huge hurtling fragments of scoria, and +gusty winds, and lurid lightnings, continues: "The air was now still +for a few minutes; the lamp from the gate streamed out far and clear; +the fugitives hurried on. They gained the gate. They passed by the +Roman sentry. The lightning flashed over his livid face and polished +helmet, but his stern features were composed even in their awe! He +remained erect and motionless at his post. That hour itself had not +animated the machine of the ruthless majesty of Rome into the reasoning +and self-acting man. There he stood amidst the crashing elements; he +had not received the permission to desert his station and escape." + +The world admires the man who never flinches from unexpected +difficulties, who calmly, patiently, and courageously grapples with his +fate, who dies, if need be, at his post. + +"Clear grit" always commands respect. It is that quality which +achieves, and everybody admires achievement. In the strife of parties +and principles, backbone without brains will carry against brains +without backbone. "A politician weakly and amiably in the right is no +match for a politician tenaciously and pugnaciously in the wrong." You +cannot, by tying an opinion to a man's tongue, make him the +representative of that opinion; at the close of any battle for +principles, his name will be found neither among the dead nor among the +wounded, but among the missing. + +The "London Times" was an insignificant sheet published by Mr. Walter +and was steadily losing money. John Walter, Jr., then only +twenty-seven years old, begged his father to give him full control of +the paper. After many misgivings, the father finally consented. The +young journalist began to remodel the establishment and to introduce +new ideas everywhere. The paper had not attempted to mould public +opinion, and had no individuality or character of its own. The +audacious young editor boldly attacked every wrong, even the +government, when he thought it corrupt. Thereupon the public customs, +printing, and the government advertisements were withdrawn. The father +was in utter dismay. The son he was sure would ruin the paper and +himself. But no remonstrance could swerve him from his purpose, to +give the world a great journal which should have weight, character, +individuality, and independence. + +The public soon saw that a new power stood behind the "Times"; that its +articles meant business; that new life and new blood and new ideas had +been infused into the insignificant sheet; that a man with brains and +push and tenacity of purpose stood at the helm,--a man who could make a +way when he could not find one. Among other new features foreign +dispatches were introduced, and they appeared in the "Times" several +days before their appearance in the government organs. The "leading +article" also was introduced to stay. But the aggressive editor +antagonized the government, and his foreign dispatches were all stopped +at the outpost, while those of the ministerial journalists were allowed +to proceed. But nothing could daunt this resolute young spirit. At +enormous expense he employed special couriers. Every obstacle put in +his way, and all opposition from the government, only added to his +determination to succeed. Enterprise, push, grit were behind the +"Times," and nothing could stay its progress. Walter was the soul of +the paper, and his personality pervaded every detail. In those days +only three hundred copies of the "Times" could be struck off in an hour +by the best presses, and Walter had duplicate and even triplicate types +set. Then he set his brain to work, and finally the Walter Press, +throwing off 17,000 copies, both sides printed, per hour, was the +result. It was the 29th of November, 1814, that the first steam +printed paper was given to the world. Walter's tenacity of purpose was +remarkable. He shrank from no undertaking, and neglected no detail. + +"Mean natures always feel a sort of terror before great natures, and +many a base thought has been unuttered, many a sneaking vote withheld, +through the fear inspired by the rebuking presence of one noble man." +As a rule, pure grit, character, has the right of way. In the presence +of men permeated with grit and sound in character, meanness and +baseness slink out of sight. Mean men are uncomfortable, dishonesty +trembles, hypocrisy is uncertain. + +Lincoln, being asked by an anxious visitor what he would do after three +or four years if the rebellion was not subdued, replied: "Oh, there is +no alternative but to keep pegging away." + +"It is in me and it shall come out," said Sheridan, when told that he +would never make an orator, as he had failed in his first speech in +Parliament. He became known as one of the foremost orators of his day. + +When a boy Henry Clay was very bashful and diffident, and scarcely +dared recite before his class at school, but he determined to become an +orator. So he committed speeches and recited them in the cornfields, +or in the barn with the horse and cows for an audience. + +Look at Garrison reading this advertisement in a Southern paper: "Five +thousand dollars will be paid for the head of W. L. Garrison by the +Governor of Georgia." Behold him again; a broadcloth mob is leading +him through the streets of Boston by a rope. He is hurried to jail. +See him return calmly and unflinchingly to his work, beginning at the +point at which he was interrupted. Note this heading in the +"Liberator," the type of which he set himself in an attic on State +Street, in Boston: "I am in earnest, I will not equivocate, I will not +excuse, I will not retreat a single inch, and I will be heard." Was +Garrison heard? Ask a race set free largely by his efforts. Even the +gallows erected in front of his own door did not daunt him. He held +the ear of an unwilling world with that burning word "freedom," which +was destined never to cease its vibrations until it had breathed its +sweet secret to the last slave. + +If impossibilities ever exist, popularly speaking, they ought to have +been found somewhere between the birth and the death of Kitto, that +deaf pauper and master of Oriental learning. But Kitto did not find +them there. In the presence of his decision and imperial energy they +melted away. Kitto begged his father to take him out of the poorhouse, +even if he had to subsist like the Hottentots. He told him that he +would sell his books and pawn his handkerchief, by which he thought he +could raise about twelve shillings. He said he could live upon +blackberries, nuts, and field turnips, and was willing to sleep on a +hayrick. Here was real grit. What were impossibilities to such a +resolute will? Patrick Henry voiced that decision which characterized +the great men of the Revolution when he said, "Is life so dear, or +peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? +Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but +as for me, give me liberty or give me death!" + +Grit is a permanent, solid quality, which enters into the very +structure, the very tissues of the constitution. A weak man, a +wavering, irresolute man, may be "spunky" upon occasion, he may be +"plucky" in an emergency; but pure "grit" is a part of the very +character of strong men alone. Lord Erskine was a plucky man; he even +had flashes of heroism, and when he was with weaker men, he was thought +to have nerve and even grit; but when he entered the House of Commons, +although a hero at the bar, the imperiousness, the audacious scorn, and +the intellectual supremacy of Pitt disturbed his equanimity and exposed +the weak places in his armor. In Pitt's commanding presence he lost +his equilibrium. His individuality seemed off its centre; he felt +fluttered, weak, and uneasy. + +Many of our generals in the late war exhibited heroism. They were +"plucky," and often displayed great determination, but Grant had pure +"grit" in the most concentrated form. He could not be moved from his +base; he was self-centred, immovable. "If you try to wheedle out of +him his plans for a campaign, he stolidly smokes; if you call him an +imbecile and a blunderer, he blandly lights another cigar; if you +praise him as the greatest general living, he placidly returns the puff +from his regalia; and if you tell him he should run for the presidency, +it does not disturb the equanimity with which he inhales and exhales +the unsubstantial vapor which typifies the politician's promises. +While you are wondering what kind of creature this man without a tongue +is, you are suddenly electrified with the news of some splendid +victory, proving that behind the cigar, and behind the face discharged +of all tell-tale expression, is the best brain to plan and the +strongest heart to dare among the generals of the Republic." + +Demosthenes was a man who could rise to sublime heights of heroism, but +his bravery was not his normal condition and depended upon his genius +being aroused. + +He had "pluck" and "spunk" on occasions, but Lincoln had pure "grit." +When the illustrated papers everywhere were caricaturing him, when no +epithet seemed too harsh to heap upon him, when his methods were +criticised by his own party, and the generals in the war were +denouncing his "foolish" confidence in Grant, and delegations were +waiting upon him to ask for that general's removal, the great President +sat with crossed legs, and was reminded of a story. + +Lincoln and Grant both had that rare nerve which cares not for +ridicule, is not swerved by public clamor, can bear abuse and hatred. +There is a mighty force in truth and in the sublime conviction and +supreme self-confidence behind it, in the knowledge that truth is +mighty and the conviction and confidence that it will prevail. + +Pure grit is that element of character which enables a man to clutch +his aim with an iron grip, and keep the needle of his purpose pointing +to the star of his hope. Through sunshine and storm, through hurricane +and tempest, through sleet and rain, with a leaky ship, with a crew in +mutiny, it perseveres; in fact, nothing but death can subdue it, and it +dies still struggling. + +The man of grit carries in his very presence a power which controls and +commands. He is spared the necessity of declaring himself, for his +grit speaks in his every act. It does not come by fits and starts, it +is a part of his very life. It inspires a sublime audacity and a +heroic courage. Many of the failures of life are due to the want of +grit or business nerve. It is unfortunate for a young man to start out +in business life with a weak, yielding disposition, with no resolution +or backbone to mark his own course and stick to it, with no ability to +say "No" with an emphasis, obliging this man by investing in hopeless +speculation, and rather than offend a friend, indorsing a questionable +note. + +A little boy was asked how he learned to skate. "Oh, by getting up +every time I fell down," he replied. + +Whipple tells a story of Massena which illustrates the masterful +purpose that plucks victory out of the jaws of defeat. "After the +defeat at Essling, the success of Napoleon's attempt to withdraw his +beaten army depended on the character of Massena, to whom the Emperor +dispatched a messenger, telling him to keep his position for two hours +longer at Aspern. This order, couched in the form of a request, +required almost an impossibility; but Napoleon knew the indomitable +tenacity of the man to whom he gave it. The messenger found Massena +seated on a heap of rubbish, his eyes bloodshot, his frame weakened by +his unparalleled exertions during a contest of forty hours, and his +whole appearance indicating a physical state better befitting the +hospital than the field. But that steadfast soul seemed altogether +unaffected by bodily prostration; half dead as he was with fatigue, he +rose painfully and said, 'Tell the Emperor that I will hold out for two +hours.' And he kept his word." + +"Often defeated in battle," said Macaulay of Alexander the Great, "he +was always successful in war." He might have said the same of +Washington, and, with appropriate changes, of all who win great +triumphs of any kind. + +In the battle of Marengo, the Austrians considered the day won. The +French army was inferior in numbers, and had given way. The Austrian +army extended its wings on the right and on the left, to follow up the +French. Then, though the French themselves thought the battle lost, +and the Austrians were confident it was won, Napoleon gave the command +to charge; and, the trumpet's blast being given, the Old Guard charged +down into the weakened centre of the enemy, cut it in two, rolled the +two wings up on either side, and the battle was won for France. + +"Never despair," says Burke, "but if you do, work on in despair." + +Once when Marshal Ney was going into battle, looking down at his knees +which were smiting together, he said, "You may well shake; you would +shake worse yet if you knew where I am going to take you." + +It is victory after victory with the soldier, lesson after lesson with +the scholar, blow after blow with the laborer, crop after crop with the +farmer, picture after picture with the painter, and mile after mile +with the traveler, that secures what all so much desire--SUCCESS. + +A promising Harvard student was stricken with paralysis of both legs. +Physicians said there was no hope for him. The lad determined to +continue his college studies. The examiners heard him at his bedside, +and in four years he took his degree. He resolved to make a critical +study of Dante, to do which he had to learn Italian and German. He +persevered in spite of repeated attacks of illness and partial loss of +sight. He was competing for the university prize. Think of the +paralytic lad, helpless in bed, competing for a prize, fighting death +inch by inch. What a lesson! Before his book was published or the +prize awarded, the brave student died, but the book was successful. He +meant that his life should not be a burden or a failure, and he was not +only graduated from the best college in America, but competed +successfully for the university prize, and made a valuable contribution +to literature. + +Professor L. T. Townsend, the famous author of "Credo," is another +triumph of grit over environment. He had a hard struggle as a boy, but +succeeded in working his way through Amherst College, living on +forty-five cents a week. + +Orange Judd was a remarkable example of success through grit. He +earned corn by working for farmers, carried it on his back to mill, +brought back the meal to his room, cooked it himself, milked cows for +his pint of milk per day, and lived on mush and milk for months +together. He worked his way through Wesleyan University, and took a +three years' post-graduate course at Yale. + +Congressman William W. Crapo, while working his way through college, +being too poor to buy a dictionary, actually copied one, walking from +his home in the village of Dartmouth, Mass., to New Bedford to +replenish his store of words and definitions from the town library. + +Oh, the triumphs of this indomitable spirit of the conqueror! This it +was that enabled Franklin to dine on a small loaf in the +printing-office with a book in his hand. It helped Locke to live on +bread and water in a Dutch garret. It enabled Gideon Lee to go +barefoot in the snow, half starved and thinly clad. It sustained +Lincoln and Garfield on their hard journeys from the log cabin to the +White House. + +President Chadbourne put grit in place of his lost lung, and worked +thirty-five years after his funeral had been planned. + +Lord Cavanagh put grit in the place of arms and legs, and went to +Parliament in spite of his deformity. + +Henry Fawcett put grit in place of eyesight, and became the greatest +Postmaster-General England ever had. + +Prescott also put grit in place of eyesight, and became one of +America's greatest historians. Francis Parkman put grit in place of +health and eyesight, and became the greatest historian of America in +his line. Thousands of men have put grit in place of health, eyes, +ears, hands, legs, and yet have achieved marvelous success. Indeed, +most of the great things of the world have been accomplished by grit +and pluck. You cannot keep a man down who has these qualities. He +will make stepping-stones out of his stumbling-blocks, and lift himself +to success. + +At fifty, Barnum was a ruined man, owing thousands more than he +possessed, yet he resolutely resumed business once more, fairly +wringing success from adverse fortune, and paying his notes at the same +time. Again and again he was ruined, but phoenix-like, he rose +repeatedly from the ashes of his misfortune each time more determined +than before. + +It was the last three days of the first voyage of Columbus that told. +All his years of struggle and study would have availed nothing if he +had yielded to the mutiny. It was all in those three days. But what +days! + +"It is all very well," said Charles J. Fox, "to tell me that a young +man has distinguished himself by a brilliant first speech. He may go +on, or he may be satisfied with his first triumph; but show me a young +man who has not succeeded at first, and nevertheless has gone on, and I +will back that young man to do better than most of those who have +succeeded at the first trial." + +Cobden broke down completely the first time he appeared on a platform +in Manchester, and the chairman apologized for him. But he did not +give up speaking till every poor man in England had a larger, better, +and cheaper loaf. + +See young Disraeli, sprung from a hated and persecuted race; without +opportunity, pushing his way up through the middle classes, up through +the upper classes, until he stands self-poised upon the topmost round +of political and social power. Scoffed, ridiculed, rebuffed, hissed +from the House of Commons, he simply says, "The time will come when you +will hear me." The time did come, and the boy with no chance swayed +the sceptre of England for a quarter of a century. + +One of the most remarkable examples in history is Disraeli, forcing his +leadership upon that very party whose prejudices were deepest against +his race, and which had an utter contempt for self-made men and +interlopers. Imagine England's surprise when she awoke to find this +insignificant Hebrew actually Chancellor of the Exchequer. He was +easily master of all the tortures supplied by the armory of rhetoric; +he could exhaust the resources of the bitterest invective; he could +sting Gladstone out of his self-control; he was absolute master of +himself and his situation. You can see that this young man intends to +make his way in the world. A determined audacity is in his very face. +He is a gay fop. Handsome, with the hated Hebrew blood in his veins, +after three defeats in parliamentary elections he was not the least +daunted, for he knew his day would come, as it did. Lord Melbourne, +the great Prime Minister, when this gay young fop was introduced to +him, asked him what he wished to be. "Prime Minister of England," was +his audacious reply. + +One of the greatest preachers of modern times, Lacordaire, failed again +and again. Everybody said he would never make a preacher, but he was +determined to succeed, and in two years from his humiliating failures +he was preaching in Notre Dame to immense congregations. + +The boy Thorwaldsen, whose father died in the poor-house, and whose +education was so scanty that he had to write his letters over many +times before they could be posted, by his indomitable perseverance, +tenacity, and grit, fascinated the world with the genius which neither +his discouraging father, poverty, nor hardship could suppress. + +William H. Seward was given a thousand dollars by his father to go to +college with; this was all he was to have. The son returned at the end +of the freshman year with extravagant habits and no money. His father +refused to give him more, and told him he could not stay at home. When +the youth found the props all taken out from under him, and that he +must now sink or swim, he left home moneyless, returned to college, +graduated at the head of his class, studied law, was elected Governor +of New York, and became Lincoln's great Secretary of State during the +Civil War. + +Louisa M. Alcott wrote the conclusion to "An Old-Fashioned Girl" with +her left hand in a sling, one foot up, head aching, and no voice. She +proudly writes in her diary, "Twenty years ago I resolved to make the +family independent if I could. At forty, that is done. Debts all +paid, even the outlawed ones, and we have enough to be comfortable. It +has cost me my health, perhaps." She earned two hundred thousand +dollars by her pen. + +Mrs. Frank Leslie often refers to the time she lived in her carpetless +attic while striving to pay her husband's obligations. She has fought +her way successfully through nine lawsuits, and has paid the entire +debt. She manages her ten publications entirely herself, signs all +checks and money-orders, makes all contracts, looks over all proofs, +and approves the make-up of everything before it goes to press. She +has developed great business ability, which no one dreamed she +possessed. + +Garfield said, "If the power to do hard work is not talent, it is the +best possible substitute for it." The triumph of industry and grit +over low birth and iron fortune in America, this land of opportunity, +ought to be sufficient to put to shame all grumblers over their hard +fortune and those who attempt to excuse aimless, shiftless, successless +men because they have no chance. + +The fear of ridicule and the dread of humiliation often hinder one from +taking decisive steps when it is plainly a duty, so that courage is a +very important element of decision. In a New England academy a pupil +who was engaged to assist the teacher was unable to solve a problem in +algebra. The class was approaching the problem, and he was mortified +because, after many trials, he was obliged to take it to the teacher +for solution. The teacher returned it unsolved. What could he do? He +would not confess to the class that he could not solve it, so, after +many futile attempts, he went to a distant town to seek the assistance +of a friend who, he believed, could do the work. But, alas! his friend +had gone away, and would not be back for a week. On his way back he +said to himself, "What a fool! am I unable to perform a problem in +algebra, and shall I go back to my class and confess my ignorance? I +can solve it and I will." He shut himself in his room, determined not +to sleep until he had mastered the problem, and finally he won success. +Underneath the solution he wrote, "Obtained Monday evening, September +2, at half past eleven o'clock, after more than a dozen trials that +have consumed more than twenty hours of time." + +During a winter in the war of 1812, General Jackson's troops, +unprovided for and starving, became mutinous and were going home. But +the general set the example of living on acorns; then rode before the +rebellious line and threatened with death the first mutineer that +should try to leave. + +The race is not always to the swift, the battle is not always to the +strong. Horses are sometimes weighted or hampered in the race, and +this is taken into account in the result. So in the race of life the +distance alone does not determine the prize. We must take into +consideration the hindrances, the weights we have carried, the +disadvantages of education, of breeding, of training, of surroundings, +of circumstances. How many young men are weighted down with debt, with +poverty, with the support of invalid parents or brothers and sisters, +or friends? How many are fettered with ignorance, hampered by +inhospitable surroundings, with the opposition of parents who do not +understand them? How many a round boy is hindered in the race by being +forced into a square hole? How many are delayed in their course +because nobody believes in them, because nobody encourages them, +because they get no sympathy and are forever tortured for not doing +that against which every fibre of their being protests, and every drop +of their blood rebels? How many have to feel their way to the goal, +through the blindness of ignorance and lack of experience? How many go +bungling along from the lack of early discipline and drill in the +vocation they have chosen? How many have to hobble along on crutches +because they were never taught to help themselves, but to lean upon a +father's wealth or a mother's indulgence? How many are weakened for +the journey of life by self-indulgence, by dissipation, by +"life-sappers;" how many are crippled by disease, by a weak +constitution, by impaired eyesight or hearing? + +When the prizes of life shall be awarded by the Supreme Judge, who +knows our weaknesses and frailties, the distance we have run, the +weights we have carried, the handicaps, will all be taken into account. +Not the distance we have run, but the obstacles we have overcome, the +disadvantages under which we have made the race, will decide the +prizes. The poor wretch who has plodded along against unknown +temptations, the poor woman who has buried her sorrows in her silent +heart and sewed her weary way through life, those who have suffered +abuse in silence, and who have been unrecognized or despised by their +fellow-runners, will often receive the greater prize. + + "The wise and active conquer difficulties, + By daring to attempt them: sloth and folly + Shiver and sink at sight of toil and hazard, + And make the impossibility they fear." + + Tumble me down, and I will sit + Upon my ruins, smiling yet: + Tear me to tatters, yet I'll be + Patient in my necessity: + Laugh at my scraps of clothes, and shun + Me as a fear'd infection: + Yet scare-crow like I'll walk, as one + Neglecting thy derision. + ROBERT HERRICK. + + + + +CHAPTER XI. + +THE GRANDEST THING IN THE WORLD. + +"One ruddy drop of manly blood the surging sea outweighs." + +"Manhood overtops all titles." + +The truest test of civilization is not the census, nor the size of +cities, nor the crops; no, but the kind of man the country turns +out.--EMERSON. + +Hew the block off, and get out the man.--POPE. + +Eternity alone will reveal to the human race its debt of gratitude to the +peerless and immortal name of Washington.--JAMES A. GARFIELD. + + Better not be at all + Than not be noble. + TENNYSON. + + Be noble! and the nobleness that lies + In other men, sleeping, but never dead, + Will rise in majesty to meet thine own. + LOWELL. + + Virtue alone out-builds the pyramids: + Her monuments shall last when Egypt's fall. + YOUNG. + + Were one so tall to touch the pole, + Or grasp creation in his span, + He must be measured by his soul, + The mind's the measure of the man. + WATTS. + + We live in deeds, not years; in thoughts, not breaths; + In feelings, not in figures on a dial. + We should count time by heart-throbs. He most lives + Who thinks most, feels the noblest, acts the best. + BAILEY. + + "Good name in man or woman + Is the immediate jewel of their souls." + +But this one thing I know, that these qualities did not now begin to +exist, cannot be sick with my sickness, nor buried in my grave.--EMERSON. + + +A Moor was walking in his garden when a Spanish cavalier suddenly fell at +his feet, pleading for concealment from pursuers who sought his life in +revenge for the killing of a Moorish gentleman. The Moor promised aid, +and locked his visitor in a summer-house until night should afford +opportunity for his escape. Not long after the dead body of his son was +brought home, and from the description given he knew the Spaniard was the +murderer. He concealed his horror, however, and at midnight unlocked the +summer-house, saying, "Christian, the youth whom you have murdered was my +only son. Your crime deserves the severest punishment. But I have +solemnly pledged my word not to betray you, and I disdain to violate a +rash engagement even with a cruel enemy." Then, saddling one of his +fleetest mules, he said, "Flee while the darkness of night conceals you. +Your hands are polluted with blood; but God is just; and I humbly thank +Him that my faith is unspotted, and that I have resigned judgment to Him." + +[Illustration: John Greenleaf Whittier (missing from book)] + +Character never dies. As Longfellow says:-- + + "Were a star quenched on high, + For ages would its light, + Still traveling downward from the sky, + Shine on our mortal sight. + + "So when a great man dies, + For years beyond our ken, + The light he leaves behind him lies + Upon the paths of men." + + +The character of Socrates was mightier than the hemlock, and banished the +fear and sting of death. + +Who can estimate the power of a well-lived life? _Character is power_. +Hang this motto in every school in the land, in every home, in every +youth's room. Mothers, engrave it on every child's heart. + +You cannot destroy one single atom of a Garrison, even though he were +hanged. The mighty force of martyrs to truth lives; the candle burns +more brilliantly than before it was snuffed. "No varnish or veneer of +scholarship, no command of the tricks of logic or rhetoric, can ever make +you a positive force in the world;" but your character can. + +When the statue of George Peabody, erected in one of the thoroughfares of +London, was unveiled, the sculptor Story was asked to speak. Twice he +touched the statue with his hand, and said, "That is my speech. That is +my speech." What could be more eloquent? Character needs no +recommendation. It pleads its own cause. + +"Show me," said Omar the Caliph to Amru the warrior, "the sword with +which you have fought so many battles and slain so many infidels." "Ah!" +replied Amru, "the sword without the arm of the master is no sharper nor +heavier than the sword of Farezdak the poet." So one hundred and fifty +pounds of flesh and blood without character is of no great value. + +Napoleon was so much impressed with the courage and resources of Marshal +Ney, that he said, "I have two hundred millions in my coffers, and I +would give them all for Ney." + +In Agra, India, stands the Taj Mahal, the acme of Oriental architecture, +said to be the most beautiful building in the world. It was planned as a +mausoleum for the favorite wife of Shah Jehan. When the latter was +deposed by his son Aurungzebe, his daughter Jahanara chose to share his +captivity and poverty rather than the guilty glory of her brother. On +her tomb in Delhi were cut her dying words: "Let no rich coverlet adorn +my grave; this grass is the best covering for the tomb of the poor in +spirit, the humble, the transitory Jahanara, the disciple of the holy men +of Christ, the daughter of the Emperor Shah Jehan." Travelers who visit +the magnificent Taj linger long by the grass-green sarcophagus in Delhi, +but give only passing notice to the beautiful Jamma Masjid, a mausoleum +afterwards erected in her honor. + +Some writer has well said that David of the throne we cannot always +recall with pleasure, but David of the Psalms we never forget. The +strong, sweet faith of the latter streams like sunlight through even the +closed windows of the soul, long after the wearied eye has turned with +disgust from all the gilded pomp and pride of the former. + +Robertson says that when you have got to the lowest depths of your heart, +you will find there not the mere desire of happiness, but a craving as +natural to us as the desire for food,--the craving for nobler, higher +life. + +"Private Benjamin Owen, ---- Regiment, Vermont Volunteers, was found +asleep at his post while on picket duty last night. The court-martial +has sentenced him to be shot in twenty-four hours, as the offense +occurred at a critical time." "I thought when I gave Bennie to his +country," said farmer Owen as he read the above telegram with dimming +eyes, "that no other father in all this broad laud made so precious a +gift. He only slept a minute,--just one little minute,--at his post, I +know that was all, for Bennie never dozed over a duty. How prompt and +trustworthy he was! He was as tall as I, and only eighteen! and now they +shoot him because he was found asleep when doing sentinel duty!" Just +then Bennie's little sister Blossom answered a tap at the door, and +returned with a letter. "It is from him," was all she said. + + +DEAR FATHER,--For sleeping on sentinel duty I am to be shot. At first, +it seemed awful to me; but I have thought about it so much now that it +has no terror. They say that they will not bind me, nor blind me; but +that I may meet my death like a man. I thought, father, that it might +have been on the battlefield, for my country, and that, when I fell, it +would be fighting gloriously; but to be shot down like a dog for nearly +betraying it,--to die for neglect of duty! Oh, father, I wonder the very +thought does not kill me! But I shall not disgrace you. I am going to +write you all about it; and when I am gone, you may tell my comrades; I +cannot now. + +You know I promised Jemmie Carr's mother I would look after her boy; and, +when he fell sick, I did all I could for him. He was not strong when he +was ordered back into the ranks, and the day before that night I carried +all his baggage, besides my own, on our march. Toward night we went in +on double-quick, and the baggage began to feel very heavy. Everybody was +tired; and as for Jemmie, if I had not lent him an arm now and then, he +would have dropped by the way. I was all tired out when we came into +camp; and then it was Jemmie's turn to be sentry, and I could take his +place; but I was too tired, father. I could not have kept awake if a gun +had been pointed at my head; but I did not know it until,--well, until it +was too late. + +They tell me to-day that I have a short reprieve,--given to me by +circumstances,--"time to write to you," our good colonel says. Forgive +him, father, he only does his duty; he would gladly save me if he could; +and do not lay my death up against Jemmie. The poor boy is +broken-hearted, and does nothing but beg and entreat them to let him die +in my stead. I can't bear to think of mother and Blossom. Comfort them, +father! Tell them I die as a brave boy should, and that, when the war is +over, they will not be ashamed of me, as they must be now. God help me: +it is very hard to bear! Good-by, father. To-night, in the early +twilight, I shall see the cows all coming home from pasture, and precious +little Blossom standing on the back stoop, waiting for me,--but I shall +never, never come! God bless you all! + + +"God be thanked!" said Mr. Owen reverently; "I knew Bennie was not the +boy to sleep carelessly." + +Late that night a little figure glided out of the house and down the +path. Two hours later the conductor of the southward mail lifted her +into a car at Mill Depot. Next morning she was in New York, and the next +she was admitted to the White House at Washington. "Well, my child," +said the President in pleasant, cheerful tones, "what do you want so +bright and early this morning?" "Bennie's life, please, sir," faltered +Blossom. "Bennie? Who is Bennie?" asked Mr. Lincoln. "My brother, sir. +They are going to shoot him for sleeping at his post," said the little +girl. "I remember," said the President; "it was a fatal sleep. You see, +child, it was a time of special danger. Thousands of lives might have +been lost through his culpable negligence." "So my father said; but poor +Bennie was so tired, sir, and Jemmie so weak. He did the work of two, +sir, and it was Jemmie's night, not his; but Jemmie was too tired, and +Bennie never thought about himself,--that he was tired, too." "What is +that you say, child? Come here; I do not understand." He read Bennie's +letter to his father, which Blossom held out, wrote a few lines, rang his +bell, and said to the messenger who appeared, "Send this dispatch at +once." Then, turning to Blossom, he continued: "Go home, my child, and +tell that father of yours, who could approve his country's sentence, even +when it took the life of a child like that, that Abraham Lincoln thinks +the life far too precious to be lost. Go back, or--wait until to-morrow; +Bennie will need a change after he has so bravely faced death, he shall +go with you." "God bless you, sir," said Blossom. _Not all the queens +are crowned._ + +Two days later, when the young soldier came with his sister to thank the +President, Mr. Lincoln fastened the strap of a lieutenant upon his +shoulder, saying, "The soldier that could carry a sick comrade's baggage, +and die for the act without complaining, deserves well of his country." + +When telegrams poured in announcing terrible carnage upon battlefields in +our late war, and when President Lincoln's heart-strings were nearly +broken over the cruel treatment of our prisoners at Andersonville, Belle +Isle, and Libby Prison, he never once departed from his famous motto, +"With malice toward none, with charity for all." When it was reported +that among those returned at Baltimore from Southern prisons, not one in +ten could stand alone from hunger and neglect, and many were so eaten and +covered by vermin as to resemble those pitted by smallpox, and so +emaciated that they were living skeletons, not even these reports could +move the great President to retaliate in kind upon the Southern prisoners. + +Among the slain on the battlefield at Fredericksburg was the body of a +youth upon which was found next the heart a photograph of Lincoln. Upon +the back of it were these words: "God bless President Lincoln." The +youth had been sentenced to death for sleeping at his post, but had been +pardoned by the President. + +David Dudley Field said he considered Lincoln the greatest man of his +day. Webster, Clay, Calhoun, and others were great, each in one way, but +Lincoln was great in many ways. There seemed to be hidden springs of +greatness in this man that would gush forth in the most unexpected way. +The men about him were at a loss to name the order of his genius. Horace +Greeley was almost as many-sided, but was a wonderful combination of +goodness and weakness, while Lincoln seemed strong in every way. After +Lincoln had signed the Emancipation Proclamation he said, "The promise +must now be kept; I shall never recall one word." + +Bishop Hamilton, of Salisbury, bears the following testimony to the +influence for good which Gladstone, when a school-fellow at Eton, +exercised upon him. "I was a thoroughly idle boy; but I was saved from +worse things by getting to know Gladstone." At Oxford we are told the +effect of his example was so strong that men who followed him there ten +years later declare "that undergraduates drank less in the forties +because Gladstone had been so courageously abstemious in the thirties." + +The Rev. John Newton said, "I see in this world two heaps of human +happiness and misery; now if I can take but the smallest bit from one +heap and add it to the other, I carry a point; if as I go home a child +has dropped a half-penny, and by giving it another I can wipe away its +tears, I feel I have done something." + +A holy hermit, who had lived for six years in a cave of the Thebaid, +fasting, praying, and performing severe penances, spending his whole life +in trying to make himself of some account with God, that he might be sure +of a seat in Paradise, prayed to be shown some saint greater than +himself, in order that he might pattern after him to reach still greater +heights of holiness. The same night an angel came to him and said, "If +thou wouldst excel all others in virtue and sanctity, strive to imitate a +certain minstrel who goes begging and singing from door to door." The +hermit, much chagrined, sought the minstrel and asked him how he had +managed to make himself so acceptable to God. The minstrel hung down his +head and replied, "Do not mock me, holy father; I have performed no good +works, and I am not worthy to pray. I only go from door to door to amuse +people with my viol and my flute." The hermit insisted that he must have +done some good deeds. The minstrel replied, "Nay, I know of nothing good +that I have done." "But how hast thou become a beggar? Hast thou spent +thy substance in riotous living?" "Nay, not so," replied the minstrel. +"I met a poor woman running hither and thither, distracted, because her +husband and children had been sold into slavery to pay a debt. I took +her home and protected her from certain sons of Belial, for she was very +beautiful. I gave her all I possessed to redeem her family and returned +her to her husband and children. Is there any man who would not have +done the same?" The hermit shed tears, and said in all his life he had +not done as much as the poor minstrel. + +"A good name is rather to be chosen than great riches, and loving favor +than silver or gold." + +A gentleman, traveling through West Virginia, went to a house, and +procured food for himself and companion and their horses. He wanted to +make payment, but the woman was ashamed to take pay for a mere act of +kindness. He pressed the money upon her. Finally she said, "If you +don't think I'm mean, I'll take one quarter of a dollar from you, so as +to look at it now and then, for there has been no money in this house for +a year." + +Do not take the world's estimate of success. The real height of the +Washington Monument is not measured between the capstone and the earth, +but includes the fifty feet of solid masonry below. Many of the most +successful lives are like the rivers of India which run under ground, +unseen and unheard by the millions who tread above them. But have these +rivers therefore no influence? Ask the rich harvest fields if they feel +the flowing water beneath. The greatest worth is never measured. It is +only the nearest stars whose distances we compute. That life whose +influence can be measured by the world's tape-line of dollars and corn is +not worth the measuring. + +All the forces in nature that are the most powerful are the quietest. We +speak of the rolling thunder as powerful; but gravitation, which makes no +noise, yet keeps orbs in their orbits, and the whole system in harmony, +binding every atom in each planet to the great centre of all attraction, +is ten thousand times ten thousand times more powerful. We say the +bright lightning is mighty; so it is when it rends the gnarled oak into +splinters, or splits solid battlements into fragments; but it is not half +so powerful as the gentle light that comes so softly from the skies that +we do not feel it, that travels at an inconceivable speed, strikes and +yet is not felt, but exercises an influence so great that the earth is +clothed with verdure through its influence, and all nature beautified and +blessed by its ceaseless action. The things that make no noise, make no +pretension, may be really the strongest. The most conclusive logic that +a preacher uses in the pulpit will never exercise the influence that the +consistent piety of character will exercise over all the earth. + +The old Sicilian story relates how Pythias, condemned to death through +the hasty anger of Dionysius of Syracuse, asked that he might go to his +native Greece, and arrange his affairs, promising to return before the +time appointed for his execution. The tyrant laughed his request to +scorn, saying that when he was once safe out of Sicily no one would +answer for his reappearance. At this juncture, Damon, a friend of the +doomed man, offered to become surety for him, and to die in his stead if +he did not come back in time. Dionysius was surprised, but accepted the +proposition. When the fatal day came, Pythias had not reached Syracuse, +but Damon remained firm in his faith that his friend would not fail him. +At the very last hour Pythias appeared and announced himself ready to +die. But such touching loyalty moved even the iron heart of Dionysius; +accordingly he ordered both to be spared, and asked to be allowed to make +a third partner in such a noble friendship. It is a grander thing to be +nobly remembered than to be nobly born. + +When Attila, flushed with conquest, appeared with his barbarian horde +before the gates of Rome in 452, Pope Leo alone of all the people dared +go forth and try to turn his wrath aside. A single magistrate followed +him. The Huns were awed by the fearless majesty of the unarmed old man, +and led him before their chief, whose respect was so great that he agreed +not to enter the city, provided a tribute should be paid to him. + +Blackie thinks there is no kind of a sermon so effective as the example +of a great man, where we see the thing done before us,--actually +done,--the thing of which we were not even dreaming. + +It was said that when Washington led the American forces as commanding +officer, it "doubled the strength of the army." + +When General Lee was in conversation with one of his officers in regard +to a movement of his army, a plain farmer's boy overheard the general's +remark that he had decided to march upon Gettysburg instead of +Harrisburg. The boy telegraphed this fact to Governor Curtin. A special +engine was sent for the boy. "I would give my right hand," said the +governor, "to know if this boy tells the truth." A corporal replied, +"Governor, I know that boy; it is impossible for him to lie; there is not +a drop of false blood in his veins." In fifteen minutes the Union troops +were marching to Gettysburg, where they gained a victory. Character is +power. The great thing is to be a man, to have a high purpose, a noble +aim, to be dead in earnest, to yearn for the good and the true. + +"Your lordships," said Wellington in Parliament, "must all feel the high +and honorable character of the late Sir Robert Peel. I was long +connected with him in public life. We were both in the councils of our +sovereign together, and I had long the honor to enjoy his private +friendship. In all the course of my acquaintance with him, I never knew +a man in whose truth and justice I had greater confidence, or in whom I +saw a more invariable desire to promote the public service. In the whole +course of my communication with him, I never knew an instance in which he +did not show the strongest attachment to truth; and I never saw in the +whole course of my life the smallest reason for suspecting that he stated +anything which he did not firmly believe to be the fact." + +"The Secretary stood alone," said Grattan of the elder Pitt. "Modern +degeneracy had not reached him. Original and unaccommodating, the +features of his character had the hardihood of antiquity. His august +mind overawed majesty; and one of his sovereigns thought royalty so +impaired in his presence, that he conspired to remove him, in order to be +relieved from his superiority. No state chicanery, no narrow system of +vicious politics, sunk him to the level of the vulgar great; but, +overbearing, persuasive, and impracticable, his object was England, his +ambition, fame. A character so exalted, so unsullied, so various, so +authoritative, astonished a corrupt age, and the Treasury trembled at the +name of Pitt through all the classes of venality. Corruption imagined, +indeed, that she had found defects in this statesman, and talked much of +the inconsistency of his policy, and much of the ruin of his victories; +but the history of his country and the calamities of the enemy answered +and refuted her. Upon the whole, there was in this man something that +could create, subvert, or reform; an understanding, a spirit, and an +eloquence to summon mankind to united exertion, or to break the bonds of +slavery asunder, and to rule the wilderness of free minds with unbounded +authority; something that could establish or overwhelm an empire, and +strike a blow in the world that would resound through the universe." + +Pitt was Paymaster-General for George II. When a subsidy was voted a +foreign office, it was customary for the office to claim one half per +cent. for honorarium. Pitt astonished the King of Sardinia by sending +him the sum without any deduction, and further astonished him by refusing +a present as a compliment to his integrity. He was a poor man. + +Washington would take no pay as commander-in-chief of the Continental +armies. He would keep a strict account of his expenses; and these, he +doubted not, would be discharged. + +Remember, the main business of life is not to do, but to become; an +action itself has its finest and most enduring fruit in character. + +In 1837, after George Peabody moved to London, there came a commercial +crisis in the United States. Many banks suspended specie payments. Many +mercantile houses went to the wall, and thousands more were in great +distress. Edward Everett said, "The great sympathetic nerve of the +commercial world, credit, as far as the United States were concerned, was +for the time paralyzed." Probably not a half dozen men in Europe would +have been listened to for a moment in the Bank of England upon the +subject of American securities, but George Peabody was one of them. His +name was already a tower of strength in the commercial world. In those +dark days his integrity stood four-square in every business panic. +Peabody retrieved the credit of the State of Maryland, and, it might +almost be said, of the United States. His character was the magic wand +which in many a case changed almost worthless paper into gold. Merchants +on both sides of the Atlantic procured large advances from him, even +before the goods consigned to him had been sold. + +Thackeray says, "Nature has written a letter of credit upon some men's +faces which is honored wherever presented. You cannot help trusting such +men; their very presence gives confidence. There is a 'promise to pay' +in their very faces which gives confidence, and you prefer it to another +man's indorsement." _Character is credit._ + +With most people, as with most nations, "things are worth what they will +sell for," and the dollar is mightier than the sword. As good as gold +has become a proverb--as though it were the highest standard of +comparison. + +Themistocles, having conceived the design of transferring the government +of Greece from the hands of the Lacedaemonians into those of the +Athenians, kept his thoughts continually fixed on this great project. +Being at no time very nice or scrupulous in the choice of his measures, +he thought anything which could tend to the accomplishment of the end he +had in view just and lawful. Accordingly in an assembly of the people +one day, he intimated that he had a very important design to propose; but +he could not communicate it to the public at large, because the greatest +secrecy was necessary to its success, and he therefore desired that they +would appoint a person to whom he might explain himself on the subject. +Aristides was unanimously selected by the assembly, which deferred +entirely to his opinion. Themistocles, taking him aside, told him that +the design he had conceived was to burn the fleet belonging to the rest +of the Grecian states, which then lay in a neighboring port, when Athens +would assuredly become mistress of all Greece. Aristides returned to the +assembly, and declared to them that nothing could be more advantageous to +the commonwealth than the project of Themistocles, but that, at the same +time, nothing in the world could be more unfair. The assembly +unanimously declared that, since such was the case, Themistocles should +wholly abandon his project. + +A tragedy by Aeschylus was once represented before the Athenians, in +which it was said of one of the characters, "that he cared not more to be +just than to appear so." At these words all eyes were instantly turned +upon Aristides as the man who, of all the Greeks, most merited that +distinguished reputation. Ever after he received, by universal consent, +the surname of the Just,--a title, says Plutarch, truly royal, or rather +truly divine. This remarkable distinction roused envy, and envy +prevailed so far as to procure his banishment for years, upon the unjust +suspicion that his influence with the people was dangerous to their +freedom. When the sentence was passed by his countrymen, Aristides +himself was present in the midst of them, and a stranger who stood near, +and could not write, applied to him to write for him on his shell-ballot. +"What name?" asked the philosopher. "Aristides," replied the stranger. + +"Do you know him, then?" said Aristides, "or has he in any way injured +you?" "Neither," said the other, "but it is for this very thing I would +he were condemned. I can go nowhere but I hear of Aristides the Just." +Aristides inquired no further, but took the shell, and wrote his name on +it as desired. The absence of Aristides soon dissipated the +apprehensions which his countrymen had so idly indulged. He was in a +short time recalled, and for many years after took a leading part in the +affairs of the republic, without showing the least resentment against his +enemies, or seeking any other gratification than that of serving his +countrymen with fidelity and honor. The virtues of Aristides did not +pass without reward. He had two daughters, who were educated at the +expense of the state, and to whom portions were allotted from the public +treasury. + +The strongest proof, however, of the justice and integrity of Aristides +is, that notwithstanding he had possessed the highest employments in the +republic, and had the absolute disposal of its treasures, yet he died so +poor as not to leave money enough to defray the expenses of his funeral. + +Men of character are the conscience of the society to which they belong; +they, and not the police, guarantee the execution of the laws. Their +influence is the bulwark of good government. + +It was said of the first Emperor Alexander of Russia, that his personal +character was equivalent to a constitution. Of Montaigne, it was said +that his high reputation for integrity was a better protection for him +than a regiment of horse would have been, he being the only man among the +French gentry who, during the wars of the Fronde, kept his castle gates +unbarred. There are men, fortunately for the world, who would rather be +right than be President. + +Fisher Ames, while in Congress, said of Roger Sherman, of Connecticut: +"If I am absent during a discussion of a subject, and consequently know +not on which side to vote, when I return I always look at Roger Sherman, +for I am sure if I vote with him, I shall vote right." + +Character gravitates upward, as with a celestial gravitation, while mere +genius, without character, gravitates downward. How often we see in +school or college young men, who are apparently dull and even stupid, +rise gradually and surely above others who are without character, merely +because the former have an upward tendency in their lives, a reaching-up +principle, which gradually but surely unfolds, and elevates them to +positions of honor and trust. There is something which everybody admires +in an aspiring soul, one whose tendency is upward and onward, in spite of +hindrances and in defiance of obstacles. + +We may try to stifle the voice of the mysterious angel within, but it +always says "yes" to right actions and "no" to wrong ones. No matter +whether we heed it or not, no power can change its decision one iota. +Through health, through disease, through prosperity and adversity, this +faithful servant stands behind us in the shadow of ourselves, never +intruding, but weighing every act we perform, every word we utter, +pronouncing the verdict "right" or "wrong." + +Francis Horner, of England, was a man of whom Sydney Smith said, that +"the ten commandments were stamped upon his forehead." The valuable and +peculiar light in which Horner's history is calculated to inspire every +right-minded youth is this: he died at the age of thirty-eight, possessed +of greater influence than any other private man, and admired, beloved, +trusted, and deplored by all except the heartless and the base. No +greater homage was ever paid in Parliament to any deceased member. How +was this attained? By rank? He was the son of an Edinburgh merchant. +By wealth? Neither he nor any of his relatives ever had a superfluous +sixpence. By office? He held but one, and that for only a few years, of +no influence, and with very little pay. By talents? His were not +splendid, and he had no genius. Cautious and slow, his only ambition was +to be right. By eloquence? He spoke in calm, good taste, without any of +the oratory that either terrifies or seduces. By any fascination of +manner? His was only correct and agreeable. By what was it, then? +Merely by sense, industry, good principles and a good heart, qualities +which no well constituted mind need ever despair of attaining. It was +the force of his character that raised him; and this character was not +impressed on him by nature, but formed, out of no peculiarly fine +elements, by himself. There were many in the House of Commons of far +greater ability and eloquence. But no one surpassed him in the +combination of an adequate portion of these with moral worth. Horner was +born to show what moderate powers, unaided by anything whatever except +culture and goodness, may achieve, even when these powers are displayed +amidst the competition and jealousies of public life. + +"When it was reported in Paris that the great Napoleon was dead, I passed +the Palais Royal," says a French writer, "where a public crier called, +'Here's your account of the death of Bonaparte.' This cry which once +would have appalled all Europe fell perfectly flat. I entered," he adds, +"several cafes, and found the same indifference,--coldness everywhere; no +one seemed interested or troubled. This man, who had conquered Europe +and awed the world, had inspired neither the love nor the admiration of +even his own countrymen. He had impressed the world with his +marvelousness, and had inspired astonishment but not love." + +Emerson says that Napoleon did all that in him lay to live and thrive +without moral principle. It was the nature of things, the eternal law of +man and of the world, which balked and ruined him; and the result, in a +million attempts of this kind, will be the same. His was an experiment, +under the most favorable conditions, to test the powers of intellect +without conscience. Never elsewhere was such a leader so endowed, and so +weaponed; never has another leader found such aids and followers. And +what was the result of this vast talent and power, of these immense +armies, burned cities, squandered treasures, immolated millions of men, +of this demoralized Europe? He left France smaller, poorer, feebler than +he found her. + +A hundred years hence what difference will it make whether you were rich +or poor, a peer or a peasant? But what difference may it not make +whether you did what was right or what was wrong? + +"The 'Vicar of Wakefield,'" said George William Curtis, "was sold, +through Dr. Johnson's mediation, for sixty pounds; and ten years after, +the author died. With what love do we hang over its pages! What springs +of feeling it has opened! Goldsmith's books are influences and friends +forever, yet the five thousandth copy was never announced, and Oliver +Goldsmith, M. D., often wanted a dinner! Horace Walpole, the coxcomb of +literature, smiled at him contemptuously from his gilded carriage. +Goldsmith struggled cheerfully with his adverse fate, and died. But then +sad mourners, whom he had aided in their affliction, gathered around his +bed, and a lady of distinction, whom he had only dared to admire at a +distance, came and cut a lock of his hair for remembrance. When I see +Goldsmith, thus carrying his heart in his hand like a palm branch, I look +on him as a successful man, whom adversity could not bring down from the +level of his lofty nature." + +Dr. Maudsley tells us that the aims which chiefly predominate--riches, +position, power, applause of men--are such as inevitably breed and foster +many bad passions in the eager competition to attain them. Hence, in +fact, come disappointed ambition, jealousy, grief from loss of fortune, +all the torments of wounded self-love, and a thousand other mental +sufferings,--the commonly enumerated moral causes of insanity. They are +griefs of a kind to which a rightly developed nature should not fall a +prey. There need be no envy nor jealousy, if a man were to consider that +it mattered not whether he did a great thing or some one else did it, +Nature's only concern being that it should be done; no grief from loss of +fortune, if he were to estimate at its true value that which fortune can +bring him, and that which fortune can never bring him; no wounded +self-love, if he had learned well the eternal lesson of +life,--self-renunciation. + +Soon after his establishment in Philadelphia Franklin was offered a piece +for publication in his newspaper. Being very busy, he begged the +gentleman would leave it for consideration. The next day the author +called and asked his opinion of it. "Well, sir," replied Franklin, "I am +sorry to say I think it highly scurrilous and defamatory. But being at a +loss on account of my poverty whether to reject it or not, I thought I +would put it to this issue: At night, when my work was done, I bought a +two-penny loaf, on which I supped heartily, and then, wrapping myself in +my great coat, slept very soundly on the floor till morning, when another +loaf and mug of water afforded a pleasant breakfast. Now, sir, since I +can live very comfortably in this manner, why should I prostitute my +press to personal hatred or party passion for a more luxurious living?" + +One cannot read this anecdote of our American sage without thinking of +Socrates' reply to King Archelaus, who had pressed him to give up +preaching in the dirty streets of Athens, and come and live with him in +his splendid courts: "Meal, please your Majesty, is a half-penny a peck +at Athens, and water I get for nothing!" + +During Alexander's march into Africa he found a people dwelling in peace, +who knew neither war nor conquest. While he was interviewing the chief +two of his subjects brought a case before him for judgment. The dispute +was this: the one had bought of the other a piece of ground, which, after +the purchase, was found to contain a treasure, for which he felt bound to +pay. The other refused to receive anything, stating that when he sold +the ground he sold it with all the advantages apparent or concealed which +it might be found to afford. The king said, "One of you has a daughter +and the other a son; let them be married and the treasure given to them +as a dowry." Alexander was surprised, and said, "If this case had been +in our country it would have been dismissed, and the king would have kept +the treasure." The chief said, "Does the sun shine on your country, and +the rain fall, and the grass grow?" Alexander replied, "Certainly." The +chief then asked, "Are there any cattle?" "Certainly," was the reply. +The chief replied, "Then it is for these innocent cattle that the Great +Being permits the rain to fall and the grass to grow." + +A good character is a precious thing, above rubies, gold, crowns, or +kingdoms, and the work of making it is the noblest labor on earth. + +Professor Blackie of the University of Edinburgh said to a class of young +men: "Money is not needful; power is not needful; liberty is not needful; +even health is not the one thing needful; but character alone is that +which can truly save us, and if we are not saved in this sense, we +certainly must be damned." It has been said that "when poverty is your +inheritance, virtue must be your capital." + +During the American Revolution, while General Reed was President of +Congress, the British Commissioners offered him a bribe of ten thousand +guineas to desert the cause of his country. His reply was, "Gentlemen, I +am poor, very poor; but your king is not rich enough to buy me." + +"When Le Pere Bourdaloue preached at Rouen," said Pere Arrius, "the +tradesmen forsook their shops, lawyers their clients, physicians their +sick, and tavern-keepers their bars; but when I preached the following +year I set all things to rights,--every man minded his own business." + +"I fear John Knox's prayers more than an army of ten thousand men," said +Mary, Queen of Scotland. + +When Pope Paul IV. heard of the death of Calvin he exclaimed with a sigh, +"Ah, the strength of that proud heretic lay in--riches? No. Honors? +No. But nothing could move him from his course. Holy Virgin! With two +such servants, our church would soon be mistress of both worlds." + +Garibaldi's power over his men amounted to fascination. Soldiers and +officers were ready to die for him. His will power seemed to enslave +them. In Rome he called for forty volunteers to go where half of them +would be sure to be killed and the others probably wounded. The whole +battalion rushed forward; and they had to draw lots, so eager were all to +obey. + +What power of magic lies in a great name! There was not a throne in +Europe that could stand against Washington's character, and in comparison +with it the millions of the Croesuses would look ridiculous. What are +the works of avarice compared with the names of Lincoln, Grant, or +Garfield? A few names have ever been the leaven which has preserved many +a nation from premature decay. + + "But strew his ashes to the wind + Whose sword or voice has served mankind-- + And is he dead, whose glorious mind + Lifts thine on high?-- + To live in hearts we leave behind + Is not to die." + + +Mr. Gladstone gave in Parliament, when announcing the death of Princess +Alice, a touching story of sick-room ministration. The Princess' little +boy was ill with diphtheria, the physician had cautioned her not to +inhale the poisoned breath; the child was tossing in the delirium of +fever. The mother took the little one in her lap and stroked his fevered +brow; the boy threw his arms around her neck, and whispered, "Kiss me, +mamma;" the mother's instinct was stronger than the physician's caution; +she pressed her lips to the child's, but lost her life. + +At a large dinner-party given by Lord Stratford after the Crimean War, it +was proposed that every one should write on a slip of paper the name +which appeared most likely to descend to posterity with renown. When the +papers were opened every one of them contained the name of Florence +Nightingale. + +Leckey says that the first hospital ever established was opened by that +noble Christian woman, Fabiola, in the fourth century. The two foremost +names in modern philanthropy are those of John Howard and Florence +Nightingale. Not a general of the Crimean War on either side can be +named by one person in ten. The one name that rises instantly, when that +carnival of pestilence and blood is suggested, is that of a young woman +just recovering from a serious illness, Florence Nightingale. A soldier +said, "Before she came there was such cussin' and swearin'; and after +that it was as holy as a church." She robbed war of half its terrors. +Since her time the hospital systems of all the nations during war have +been changed. No soldier was braver and no patriot truer than Clara +Barton, and wherever that noble company of Protestant women known as the +Red Cross Society,--the cross, I suppose, pointing to Calvary, and the +red to the blood of the Redeemer,--wherever those consecrated workers +seek to alleviate the condition of those who suffer from plagues, +cholera, fevers, flood, famine, there this tireless angel moves on her +pathway of blessing. And of all heroes, what nobler ones than these, +whose names shine from the pages of our missionary history? I never read +of Mrs. Judson, Mrs. Snow, Miss Brittain, Miss West, without feeling that +the heroic age of our race has just begun, the age which opens to woman +the privilege of following her benevolent inspirations wheresoever she +will, without thinking that our Christianity needs no other evidence. + +"Duty is the cement without which all power, goodness, intellect, truth, +happiness, and love itself can have no permanence, but all the fabric of +existence crumbles away from under us and leaves us at last sitting in +the midst of a ruin, astonished at our own desolation." A constant, +abiding sense of duty is the last reason of culture. + + "I slept and dreamed that life is beauty; + I woke and found that life is duty." + + +We have no more right to refuse to perform a duty than to refuse to pay a +debt. Moral insolvency is certain to him who neglects and disregards his +duty to his fellow-men. Nor can we hire another to perform our duty. +The mere accident of having money does not release you from your duty to +the world. Nay, it increases it, for it enables you to do a larger and +nobler duty. + +If your money is not clean, if there is a dirty dollar in your millions, +you have not succeeded. If there is the blood of the poor and +unfortunate, of orphans and widows, on your bank account, you have not +succeeded. If your wealth has made others poorer, your life is a +failure. If you have gained it in an occupation that kills, that +shortens the lives of others, that poisons their blood, or engenders +disease, if you have taken a day from a human life, if you have gained +your money by that which has debauched other lives, you have failed. + +Remember that a question will be asked you some time which you cannot +evade, the right answer to which will fix your destiny forever: "How did +you get that fortune?" Are other men's lives in it; are others' hope and +happiness buried in it; are others' comforts sacrificed to it; are +others' rights buried in it; are others' opportunities smothered in it; +others' chances strangled by it; has their growth been stunted by it; +their characters stained by it; have others a smaller loaf, a meaner +home? If so, you have failed; all your millions cannot save you from the +curse, "thou hast been weighed in the balance and found wanting." + +When Walter Scott's publisher and printer failed and $600,000 of debt +stared them in the face, friends came forward and offered to raise money +enough to allow him to arrange with his creditors. "No," said he +proudly, "this right hand shall work it all off; if we lose everything +else, we will at least keep our honor unblemished." What a grand picture +of manliness, of integrity in this noble man, working like a dray-horse +to cancel that great debt, throwing off at white heat the "Life of +Napoleon," "Woodstock," "The Tales of a Grandfather," articles for the +"Quarterly," and so on, all written in the midst of great sorrow, pain, +and ruin. "I could not have slept soundly," he writes, "as I now can +under the comfortable impression of receiving the thanks of my creditors, +and the conscious feeling of discharging my duty as a man of honesty. I +see before me a long, tedious, and dark path, but it leads to stainless +reputation. If I die in the harness, as is very likely, I shall die with +honor." + +One of the last things he uttered was, "I have been, perhaps, the most +voluminous author of my day, and it is a comfort to me to think that I +have tried to unsettle no man's faith, to corrupt no man's principles, +and that I have written nothing which, on my deathbed, I would wish +blotted out." + +Although Agassiz refused to lecture even for a large sum of money, yet he +left a greater legacy to the world, and left even more money to Harvard +University ($300,000) than he would have left if he had taken the time to +lecture for money. + +Faraday had to choose between a fortune of nearly a million and a life of +almost certain poverty if he pursued science. He chose poverty and +science, and earned a name never to be erased from the book of fame. + +Beecher says that we are all building a soul-house for eternity; yet with +what differing architecture and what various care! + +What if a man should see his neighbor getting workmen and building +materials together, and should say to him, "What are you building?" and +he should answer, "I don't exactly know. I am waiting to see what will +come of it." And so walls are reared, and room is added to room, while +the man looks idly on, and all the bystanders exclaim, "What a fool he +is!" Yet this is the way many men are building their characters for +eternity, adding room to room, without plan or aim, and thoughtlessly +waiting to see what the effect will be. Such builders will never dwell +in "the house of God, not made with hands, eternal in the heavens." + +Some people build as cathedrals are built, the part nearest the ground +finished; but that part which soars towards heaven, the turrets and the +spires, forever incomplete. + +Many men are mere warehouses full of merchandise--the head and heart are +stuffed with goods. Like those houses in the lower streets of cities +which were once family dwellings, but are now used for commercial +purposes, there are apartments in their souls which were once tenanted by +taste, and love, and joy, and worship; but they are all deserted now, and +the rooms are filled with material things. + + + + +CHAPTER XII. + +WEALTH IN ECONOMY. + +Economy is half the battle of life.--SPURGEON. + +Economy is the parent of integrity, of liberty and ease, and the +beauteous sister of temperance, of cheerfulness and health.--DR. JOHNSON. + +Can anything be so elegant as to have few wants and to serve them one's +self? + +As much wisdom can be expended on a private economy as on an +empire.--EMERSON. + +Riches amassed in haste will diminish; but those collected by hand and +little by little will multiply.--GOETHE. + +No gain is so certain as that which proceeds from the economical use of +what you have.--LATIN PROVERB. + +Beware of little extravagances: a small leak will sink a big +ship.--FRANKLIN. + +Better go to bed supperless than rise with debts.--GERMAN PROVERB. + +Debt is like any other trap, easy enough to get into, but hard enough to +get out of.--H. W. SHAW. + +Sense can support herself handsomely in most countries on some eighteen +pence a day; but for phantasy, planets and solar systems will not +suffice.--MACAULAY. + +Economy, the poor man's mint.--TUPPER. + +I can get no remedy against this consumption of the purse; borrowing only +lingers and lingers it out; but the disease is incurable.--SHAKESPEARE. + +Whatever be your talents, whatever be your prospects, never speculate +away on the chance of a palace that which you may need as a provision +against the workhouse.--BULWER. + + Not for to hide it in a hedge, + Nor for a train attendant, + But for the glorious privilege + Of being independent. + BURNS. + + +"We shan't get much here," whispered a lady to her companion, as John +Murray blew out one of the two candles by whose light he had been writing +when they asked him to contribute to some benevolent object. He listened +to their story and gave one hundred dollars. "Mr. Murray, I am very +agreeably surprised," said the lady quoted; "I did not expect to get a +cent from you." The old Quaker asked the reason for her opinion; and, +when told, said, "That, ladies, is the reason I am able to let you have +the hundred dollars. It is by practicing economy that I save up money +with which to do charitable actions. One candle is enough to talk by." + + * * * * * * + +[Illustration: ALEXANDER HAMILTON] + +"The Moses of Colonial Finance." + +"Poverty is a condition which no man should accept, unless it is forced +upon him as an inexorable necessity or as the alternative of dishonor." + +"Comfort and independence abide with those who can postpone their +desires." + + * * * * * * + +Emerson relates the following anecdote: "An opulent merchant in Boston +was called on by a friend in behalf of a charity. At that time he was +admonishing his clerk for using whole wafers instead of halves; his +friend thought the circumstance unpropitious; but to his surprise, on +listening to the appeal, the merchant subscribed five hundred dollars. +The applicant expressed his astonishment that any person who was so +particular about half a wafer should present five hundred dollars to a +charity; but the merchant said, "It is by saving half wafers, and +attending to such little things, that I have now something to give." + +"How did you acquire your great fortune?" asked a friend of Lampis, the +shipowner. "My great fortune, easily," was the reply, "my small one, by +dint of exertion." + +Four years from the time Marshall Field left the rocky New England farm +to seek his fortune in Chicago he was admitted as a partner in the firm +of Coaley, Farwell & Co. The only reason the modest young man gave, to +explain his promotion when he had neither backing, wealth, nor influence, +was that he saved his money. + +If a man will begin at the age of twenty and lay by twenty-six cents +every working day, investing at seven per cent. compound interest, he +will have thirty-two thousand dollars when he is seventy years old. +Twenty cents a day is no unusual expenditure for beer or cigars, yet in +fifty years it would easily amount to twenty thousand dollars. Even a +saving of one dollar a week from the date of one's majority would give +him one thousand dollars for each of the last ten of the allotted years +of life. "What maintains one vice would bring up two children." + +Such rigid economy, such high courage, enables one to surprise the world +with gifts even if he is poor. In fact, the poor and the middle classes +give most in the aggregate to missions and hospitals and to the poor. +Only frugality enables them to outdo the rich on their own ground. + +But miserliness or avariciousness is a different thing from economy. The +miserly is the miserable man, who hoards money from a love of it. A +miser who spends a cent upon himself where another would spend a quarter +does it from parsimony, which is a subordinate characteristic of avarice. +Of this the following is an illustration: "True, I should like some soup, +but I have no appetite for the meat," said the dying Ostervalde; "what is +to become of that? It will be a sad waste." And so the rich Paris +banker would not let his servant buy meat for broth. + +A writer on political economy tells of the mishaps resulting from a +broken latch on a farmyard gate. Every one going through would shut the +gate, but as the latch would not hold it, it would swing open with every +breeze. One day a pig ran out into the woods. Every one on the farm +went to help get him back. A gardener jumped over a ditch to stop the +pig, and sprained his ankle so badly as to be confined to his bed for two +weeks. When the cook returned, she found that her linen, left to dry at +the fire, was all badly scorched. The dairymaid in her excitement left +the cows untied, and one of them broke the leg of a colt. The gardener +lost several hours of valuable time. Yet a new latch would not have cost +five cents. + +Guy, the London bookseller, and afterward the founder of the great +hospital, was a great miser, living in the back part of his shop, eating +upon an old bench, and using his counter for a table, with a newspaper +for a cloth. He did not marry. One day he was visited by "Vulture" +Hopkins, another well-known miser. "What is your business?" asked Guy, +lighting a candle. "To discuss your methods of saving money," was the +reply, alluding to the niggardly economy for which Guy was famous. On +learning Hopkins's business he blew out the light, saying, "We can do +that in the dark." "Sir, you are my master in the art," said the +"Vulture;" "I need ask no further. I see where your secret lies." + +Yet that kind of economy which verges on the niggardly is better than the +extravagance that laughs at it. Either, when carried to excess, is not +only apt to cause misery, but to ruin the character. + +"Lay by something for a rainy day," said a gentleman to an Irishman in +his service. Not long afterwards he asked Patrick how much he had added +to his store. "Faith, nothing at all," was the reply; "I did as you bid +me, but it rained very hard yesterday, and it all went--in drink." + + "Wealth, a monster gorged + 'Mid starving populations." + + +But nowhere and at no period were these contrasts more startling than in +Imperial Rome. There a whole population might be trembling lest they +should be starved by the delay of an Alexandrian corn-ship, while the +upper classes were squandering fortunes at a single banquet, drinking out +of myrrhine and jeweled vases worth hundreds of pounds, and feasting on +the brains of peacocks and the tongues of nightingales. As a +consequence, disease was rife, men were short-lived. At this time the +dress of Roman ladies displayed an unheard-of splendor. The elder Pliny +tells us that he himself saw Lollia Paulina dressed for a betrothal feast +in a robe entirely covered with pearls and emeralds, which had cost +40,000,000 sesterces, and which was known to be less costly than some of +her other dresses. Gluttony, caprice, extravagance, ostentation, +impurity, rioted in the heart of a society which knew of no other means +by which to break the monotony of its weariness or alleviate the anguish +of its despair. + +The expense ridiculously bestowed on the Roman feasts passes all belief. +Suetonius mentions a supper given to Vitellius by his brother, in which, +among other articles, there were two thousand of the choicest fishes, +seven thousand of the most delicate birds, and one dish, from its size +and capacity, named the aegis or shield of Minerva. It was filled +chiefly with the liver of the scari, a delicate species of fish, the +brains of pheasants and peacocks, and the tongues of parrots, considered +desirable chiefly because of their great cost. + +"I hope that there will not be another sale," exclaimed Horace Walpole, +"for I have not an inch of room nor a farthing left." A woman once +bought an old door-plate with "Thompson" on it because she thought it +might come in handy some time. The habit of buying what you don't need +because it is cheap encourages extravagance. "Many have been ruined by +buying good pennyworths." + +"Where there is no prudence," said Dr. Johnson, "there is no virtue." + +The eccentric John Randolph once sprang from his seat in the House of +Representatives, and exclaimed in his piercing voice, "Mr. Speaker, I +have found it." And then, in the stillness which followed this strange +outburst, he added, "I have found the Philosopher's Stone: it is _Pay as +you go_." + +Many a young man seems to think that when he sees his name on a sign he +is on the highway to fortune, and he begins to live on a scale as though +there was no possible chance of failure; as though he were already beyond +the danger point. Unfortunately Congress can pass no law that will +remedy the vice of living beyond one's means. + +"The prosperity of fools shall destroy them." "However easy it may be to +make money," said Barnum, "it is the most difficult thing in the world to +keep it." Money often makes the mare--run away with you. + +Very few men know how to use money properly. They can earn it, lavish +it, hoard it, waste it, but to deal with it _wisely_, as a means to an +end, is an education difficult of acquirement. + +After a large stained-glass window had been constructed an artist picked +up the discarded fragments and made one of the most exquisite windows in +Europe for another cathedral. So one boy will pick up a splendid +education out of the odds and ends of time which others carelessly throw +away, or gain a fortune by saving what others waste. + +It has become a part of the new political economy to argue that a debt on +a church or a house or a firm is a desirable thing to develop character. +When the young man starts out in life with the old-fashioned idea strong +in his mind that debt is bondage and a disgrace, that a mortgage is to be +shunned like the cholera, and that to owe a dollar that you cannot pay, +unless overtaken by misfortune, is nothing more or less than stealing, +then he is bound in so much at least to succeed, and save his old age +from being a burden upon his friends or the state. + +To do your best you must own every bit of yourself. If you are in debt, +part of you belongs to your creditors. Nothing but actual sin is so +paralyzing to a young man's energies as debt. + +The "loose change" which many young men throw away carelessly, or worse, +would often form the basis of a fortune and independence. The earnings +of the people of the United States, rich and poor, old and young, male +and female, amount to an average of less than fifty cents a day. But it +is by economizing such savings that one must get his start in business. +The man without a penny is practically helpless, from a business point of +view, except so far as he can immediately utilize his powers of body and +mind. Besides, when a man or woman is driven to the wall, the chance of +goodness surviving self-respect and the loss of public esteem is +frightfully diminished. + +"Money goes as it comes." "A child and a fool imagine that twenty years +and twenty shillings can never be spent." + +Live between extravagance and meanness. Don't save money and starve your +mind. "The very secret and essence of thrift consists in getting things +into higher values. Spend upward, that is, for the higher faculties. +Spend for the mind rather than for the body, for culture rather than for +amusement. Some young men are too stingy to buy the daily papers, and +are very ignorant and narrow." "There is that withholdeth more than is +meet, but it tendeth to poverty." "Don't squeeze out of your life and +comfort and family what you save." + +Liberal, not lavish, is Nature's hand. Even God, it is said, cannot +afford to be extravagant. When He increased the loaves and fishes, He +commanded to gather up the fragments, that nothing be lost. + +"Nature uses a grinding economy," says Emerson, "working up all that is +wasted to-day into to-morrow's creation; not a superfluous grain of sand +for all the ostentation she makes of expense and public works. She flung +us out in her plenty, but we cannot shed a hair or a paring of a nail but +instantly she snatches at the shred and appropriates it to her general +stock." Last summer's flowers and foliage decayed in autumn only to +enrich the earth this year for other forms of beauty. Nature will not +even wait for our friends to see us, unless we die at home. The moment +the breath has left the body she begins to take us to pieces, that the +parts may be used again for other creations. Mark the following +contrast:-- + + 1772. 1822. + Man, to the plow; Man, tally-ho; + Wife, to the cow; Wife, piano; + Girl, to the sow; Miss, silk and satin; + Boy, to the mow; Boy, Greek and Latin; + And your rents will be netted. And you'll all be gazetted. + _Hone's Works._ _The Times._ + + +More than a lifetime has elapsed since the above was published, but +instead of returning to the style of 1772, our farmers have out-Heroded +Herod in the direction of the fashion, of 1822, and many a farmhouse, +like the home of Artemas [Transcriber's note: Artemus?] Ward, may be +known by the cupola and the mortgage with which it is decorated. + +It is by the mysterious power of economy, it has been said, that the loaf +is multiplied, that using does not waste, that little becomes much, that +scattered fragments grow to unity, and that out of nothing or next to +nothing comes the miracle of something. It is not merely saving, still +less, parsimony. It is foresight and arrangement, insight and +combination, causing inert things to labor, useless things to serve our +necessities, perishing things to renew their vigor, and all things to +exert themselves for human comfort. + +English working men and women work very hard, seldom take a holiday, and +though they get nearly double the wages of the same classes in France, +yet save very little. The millions earned by them slip out of their +hands almost as soon as obtained to satisfy the pleasures of the moment. +In France every housekeeper is taught the art of making much out of +little. "I am simply astonished," writes an American lady stopping in +France, "at the number of good wholesome dishes which my friend here +makes for her table from things, which at home, I always throw away. +Dainty little dishes from scraps of cold meat, from hard crusts of bread, +delicately prepared and seasoned, from almost everything and nothing. +And yet there is no feeling of stinginess or want." + +"I wish I could write all across the sky, in letters of gold," says Rev. +William Marsh, "the one word, savings-bank." + +Boston savings-banks have $130,000,000 on deposit, mostly saved in +driblets. Josiah Quincy used to say that the servant girls built most of +the palaces on Beacon Street. + +"So apportion your wants that your means may exceed them," says Bulwer. +"With one hundred pounds a year I may need no man's help; I may at least +have 'my crust of bread and liberty.' But with five thousand pounds a +year I may dread a ring at my bell; I may have my tyrannical master in +servants whose wages I cannot pay; my exile may be at the fiat of the +first long-suffering man who enters a judgment against me; for the flesh +that lies nearest my heart some Shylock may be dusting his scales and +whetting his knife. Every man is needy who spends more than he has; no +man is needy who spends less. I may so ill manage, that with five +thousand pounds a year I purchase the worst evils of poverty,--terror and +shame; I may so well manage my money, that with one hundred pounds a year +I purchase the best blessings of wealth,--safety and respect." + +Edmund Burke, speaking on Economic Reform, quoted from Cicero: "Magnum +vectigal est parsimonia," accenting the second word on the first +syllable. Lord North whispered a correction, when Burke turned the +mistake to advantage. "The noble lord hints that I have erred in the +quantity of a principal word in my quotation; I rejoice at it, sir, +because it gives me an opportunity of repeating the inestimable +adage,--'Magnum vectigal est parsimonia.'" The sentiment, meaning +"Thrift is a good income," is well worthy of emphatic repetition by us +all. + +Washington examined the minutest expenditures of his family, even when +President of the United States. He understood that without economy none +can be rich, and with it none need be poor. + +"I make a point of paying my own bills," said Wellington. + +John Jacob Astor said that the first thousand dollars cost him more +effort than all of his millions. Boys who are careless with their dimes +and quarters, just because they have so few, never get this first +thousand, and without it no fortune is possible. + +To find out uses for the persons or things which are now wasted in life +is to be the glorious work of the men of the next generation, and that +which will contribute most to their enrichment. + +Economizing "in spots" or by freaks is no economy at all. It must be +done by management. + +Learn early in life to say "I can't afford it." It is an indication of +power and courage and manliness. Dr. Franklin said, "It is not our own +eyes, but other people's, that ruin us." "Fashion wears out more apparel +than the man," says Shakespeare. + +"Of what a hideous progeny of ill is debt the father," said Douglas +Jerrold. "What meanness, what invasions of self-respect, what cares, +what double-dealing! How in due season it will carve the frank, open +face into wrinkles; how like a knife it will stab the honest heart. And +then its transformations,--how it has been known to change a goodly face +into a mask of brass; how with the evil custom of debt has the true man +become a callous trickster! A freedom from debt, and what nourishing +sweetness may be found in cold water; what toothsomeness in a dry crust; +what ambrosial nourishment in a hard egg! Be sure of it, he who dines +out of debt, though his meal be a biscuit and an onion, dines in 'The +Apollo.' And then, for raiment, what warmth in a threadbare coat, if the +tailor's receipt be in your pocket! What Tyrian purple in the faded +waistcoat, the vest not owed for; how glossy the well-worn hat, if it +covers not the aching head of a debtor! Next, the home sweets, the +outdoor recreation of the free man. The street door falls not a knell in +his heart, the foot on the staircase, though he lives on the third pair, +sends no spasm through his anatomy; at the rap of his door he can crow +'come in,' and his pulse still beats healthfully. See him abroad! How +he returns look for look with any passenger. Poverty is a bitter +draught, yet may, and sometimes can with advantage, be gulped down. +Though the drinker makes wry faces, there may, after all, be a wholesome +goodness in the cup. But debt, however courteously it may be offered, is +the Cup of Siren; and the wine, spiced and delicious though it be, is +poison. My son, if poor, see Hyson in the running spring; see thy mouth +water at a last week's roll; think a threadbare coat the only wear; and +acknowledge a whitewashed garret the fittest housing-place for a +gentleman; do this, and flee debt. So shall thy heart be at rest, and +the sheriff confounded." + +"Whoever has sixpence is sovereign over all men to the extent of that +sixpence," says Carlyle; "commands cooks to feed him, philosophers to +teach him, kings to mount guard over him,--to the extent of that +sixpence." + +If a man owes you a dollar, he is almost sure to owe you a grudge, too. +If you owe another money, you will be apt to regard him with uncharitable +eyes. Why not economize before getting into debt instead of pinching +afterwards? + +Communities which live wholly from hand to mouth never make much progress +in the useful arts. Savings mean power. _Comfort and independence abide +with those who can postpone their desires._ + +"Hunger, rags, cold, hard work, contempt, suspicion, unjust reproach, are +disagreeable," says Horace Greeley, "but debt is infinitely worse than +them all." + +Many a ruined man dates his downfall from the day when he began borrowing +money. Debt demoralized Daniel Webster, and Theodore Hook, and Sheridan, +and Fox, and Pitt. Mirabeau's life was made wretched by duns. + +"Annual income," says Micawber, "twenty pounds; annual expenditure, +nineteen six, result--happiness. Annual income, twenty pounds; annual +expenditure, twenty pounds ought and six, result--misery." + +"We are ruined," says Colton, "not by what we really want, but by what we +think we do. Therefore never go abroad in search of your wants; if they +be real wants, they will come home in search of you; for he that buys +what he does not want will soon want what he cannot buy." + +The honorable course is to give every man his due. It is better to +starve than not to do this. It is better to do a small business on a +cash basis than a large one on credit. _Owe no man anything_, wrote St. +Paul. It is a good motto to place in every purse, in every +counting-room, in every church, in every home. + +Economy is of itself a great revenue.--CICERO. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII. + +RICH WITHOUT MONEY. + +Let others plead for pensions; I can be rich without money, by +endeavoring to be superior to everything poor. I would have my +services to my country unstained by any interested motive.--LORD +COLLINGWOOD. + + Ill fares the land, to hastening ills a prey, + Where wealth accumulates and men decay. + GOLDSMITH. + +Pennilessness is not poverty, and ownership is not possession; to be +without is not always to lack, and to reach is not to attain; sunlight +is for all eyes that look up, and color for those who choose.--HELEN +HUNT. + +I ought not to allow any man, because he has broad lands, to feel that +he is rich in my presence. I ought to make him feel that I can do +without his riches, that I cannot be bought,--neither by comfort, +neither by pride,--and although I be utterly penniless, and receiving +bread from him, that he is the poor man beside me.--EMERSON. + +To be content with what we possess is the greatest and most secure of +riches.--CICERO. + +There is no riches above a sound body and no joy above the joy of the +heart.--ECCLESIASTES. + + Where, thy true treasure? Gold says, "Not in me;" + And "Not in me," the Diamond. Gold is poor; + India's insolvent: seek it in thyself. + YOUNG. + +He is richest who is content with the least, for content is the wealth +of nature.--SOCRATES. + +A great heart in a little house is of all things here below that which +has ever touched me most.--LACORDAIRE. + + My crown is in my heart, not on my head, + Nor decked with diamonds and Indian stones, + Nor to be seen: my crown is called content; + A crown it is, that seldom kings enjoy. + SHAKESPEAKE. + + +Many a man is rich without money. Thousands of men with nothing in +their pockets, and thousands without even a pocket, are rich. + + * * * * * * + +[Illustration: RALPH WALDO EMERSON] + +"The Sage of Concord." + +"I revere the person who is riches: so I cannot think of him as alone, +or poor, or exiled, or unhappy." + + * * * * * * + +A man born with a good, sound constitution, a good stomach, a good +heart and good limbs, and a pretty good headpiece, is rich. + +Good bones are better than gold, tough muscles than silver, and nerves +that carry energy to every function are better than houses and land. + +"Heart-life, soul-life, hope, joy, and love, are true riches," said +Beecher. + +Why should I scramble and struggle to get possession of a little +portion of this earth? This is my world now; why should I envy others +its mere legal possession? It belongs to him who can see it, enjoy it. +I need not envy the so-called owners of estates in Boston and New York. +They are merely taking care of my property and keeping it in excellent +condition for me. For a few pennies for railroad fare whenever I wish +I can see and possess the best of it all. It has cost me no effort, it +gives me no care; yet the green grass, the shrubbery, and the statues +on the lawns, the finer sculptures and the paintings within, are always +ready for me whenever I feel a desire to look upon them. I do not wish +to carry them home with me, for I could not give them half the care +they now receive; besides, it would take too much of my valuable time, +and I should be worrying continually lest they be spoiled or stolen. I +have much of the wealth of the world now. It is all prepared for me +without any pains on my part. All around me are working hard to get +things that will please me, and competing to see who can give them the +cheapest. The little I pay for the use of libraries, railroads, +galleries, parks, is less than it would cost to care for the least of +all I use. Life and landscape are mine, the stars and flowers, the sea +and air, the birds and trees. What more do I want? All the ages have +been working for me; all mankind are my servants. I am only required +to feed and clothe myself, an easy task in this land of opportunity. + +A millionaire pays thousands of pounds for a gallery of paintings, and +some poor boy or girl comes in, with open mind and poetic fancy, and +carries away a treasure of beauty which the owner never saw. A +collector bought at public auction in London, for one hundred and +fifty-seven guineas, an autograph of Shakespeare; but for nothing a +schoolboy can read and absorb the riches of "Hamlet." + +Why should I waste my abilities pursuing this will-o'-the-wisp +"Enough," which is ever a little more than one has, and which none of +the panting millions ever yet overtook in his mad chase? Is there no +desirable thing left in this world but gold, luxury, and ease? + +"Want is a growing giant whom the coat of Have was never large enough +to cover." "A man may as soon fill a chest with grace, or a vessel +with virtue," says Phillips Brooks, "as a heart with wealth." + +Shall we seek happiness through the sense of taste or of touch? Shall +we idolize our stomachs and our backs? Have we no higher missions, no +nobler destinies? Shall we "disgrace the fair day by a pusillanimous +preference of our bread to our freedom"? + +In the three great "Banquets" of Plato, Xenophon, and Plutarch the food +is not even mentioned. + +What does your money say to you: what message does it bring to you? +Does it say to you, "Eat, drink, and be merry, for to-morrow we die"? +Does it bring a message of comfort, of education, of culture, of +travel, of books, of an opportunity to help your fellow-man, or is the +message "More land, more thousands and millions"? What message does it +bring you? Clothes for the naked, bread for the starving, schools for +the ignorant, hospitals for the sick, asylums for the orphans, or of +more for yourself and none for others? Is it a message of generosity +or of meanness, breadth or narrowness? Does it speak to you of +character? Does it mean a broader manhood, a larger aim, a nobler +ambition, or does it cry "More, more, more"? + +Are you an animal loaded with ingots, or a man filled with a purpose? +He is rich whose mind is rich, whose thought enriches the intellect of +the world. It is a sad sight to see a soul which thirsts not for truth +or beauty or the good. + +A sailor on a sinking vessel in the Caribbean Sea eagerly filled his +pockets with Spanish dollars from a barrel on board while his +companions, about to leave in the only boat, begged him to seek safety +with them. But he could not leave the bright metal which he had so +longed for and idolized, and was prevented from reaching shore by his +very riches, when the vessel went down. + +"Who is the richest of men," asked Socrates? "He who is content with +the least, for contentment is nature's riches." + +In More's "Utopia" gold was despised. Criminals were forced to wear +heavy chains of it, and to have rings of it in their ears; it was put +to the vilest uses to keep up the scorn of it. Bad characters were +compelled to wear gold head-bands. Diamonds and pearls were used to +decorate infants, so that the youth would discard and despise them. + +"Ah, if the rich were as rich as the poor fancy riches!" exclaims +Emerson. + +Many a rich man has died in the poorhouse. + +In excavating Pompeii a skeleton was found with the fingers clenched +round a quantity of gold. A man of business in the town of Hull, +England, when dying, pulled a bag of money from under his pillow, which +he held between his clenched fingers with a grasp so firm as scarcely +to relax under the agonies of death. + + Oh! blind and wanting wit to choose, + Who house the chaff and burn the grain; + Who hug the wealth ye cannot use, + And lack the riches all may gain. + WILLIAM WATSON. + + +Poverty is the want of much, avarice the want of everything. + +A poor man was met by a stranger while scoffing at the wealthy for not +enjoying themselves. The stranger gave him a purse, in which he was +always to find a ducat. As fast as he took one out another was to drop +in, but he was not to begin to spend his fortune until he had thrown +away the purse. He takes ducat after ducat out, but continually +procrastinates and puts off the hour of enjoyment until he has got "a +little more," and dies at last counting his millions. + +A beggar was once met by Fortune, who promised to fill his wallet with +gold, as much as he might please, on condition that whatever touched +the ground should turn at once to dust. The beggar opens his wallet, +asks for more and yet more, until the bag bursts. The gold falls to +the ground, and all is lost. + +When the steamer Central America was about to sink, the stewardess, +having collected all the gold she could from the staterooms, and tied +it in her apron, jumped for the last boat leaving the steamer. She +missed her aim and fell into the water, the gold carrying her down head +first. + +In the year 1843 a rich miser lived in Padua, who was so mean and +sordid that he would never give a cent to any person or object, and he +was so afraid of the banks that he would not deposit with them, but +would sit up nights with sword and pistol by him to guard his idol +hoard. When his health gave way from anxiety and watching he built an +underground treasure-chamber, so arranged that if any burglar ever +entered, he would step upon a spring which would precipitate him into a +subterranean river, where he could neither escape nor be heard. One +night the miser went to his chest to see that all was right, when his +foot touched the spring of the trap, and he was hurled into the deep, +hidden stream. + +"One would think," said Boswell, "that the proprietor of all this +(Keddlestone, the seat of Lord Scarsfield) must be happy." "Nay, sir," +said Johnson, "all this excludes but one evil, poverty." + +John Duncan, the illegitimate child of a Scottish weaver, was ignorant, +near-sighted, bent, a miserable apology for a human being, and at last +a pauper. If he went upon the street he would sometimes be stoned by +other boys. The farmer, for whom he watched cattle, was cruel to him, +and after a rainy day would send him cold and wet to sleep on a +miserable bed in a dark outhouse. Here he would empty the water from +his shoes, and wring out his wet clothes and sleep as best he might. +But the boy had a desire to learn to read, and when, a little later, he +was put to weaving, he persuaded a schoolgirl, twelve years old, to +teach him. He was sixteen when he learned the alphabet, after which +his progress was quite rapid. He was very fond of plants, and worked +overtime for several months to earn five shillings to buy a book on +botany. He became a good botanist, and such was his interest in the +study that at the age of eighty he walked twelve miles to obtain a new +specimen. A man whom he met became interested at finding such a +well-stored mind in such a miserable body, poorly clad, and published +an account of his career. Many readers sent him money, but he saved +it, and left it in his will to found eight scholarships and offer +prizes for the encouragement of the study of natural science by the +poor. His small but valuable library was left for a similar use. + +Franklin said money never made a man happy yet; there is nothing in its +nature to produce happiness. The more a man has, the more he wants. +Instead of filling a vacuum, it makes one. A great bank account can +never make a man rich. It is the mind that makes the body rich. No +man is rich, however much money or land he may possess, who has a poor +heart. If that is poor, he is poor indeed, though he own and rule +kingdoms. He is rich or poor according to what he is, not according to +what he has. + +Who would not choose to be a millionaire of deeds with a Lincoln, a +Grant, a Florence Nightingale, a Childs; a millionaire of ideas with +Emerson, with Lowell, with Shakespeare, with Wordsworth; a millionaire +of statesmanship with a Gladstone, a Bright, a Sumner, a Washington? + +Some men are rich in health, in constant cheerfulness, in a mercurial +temperament which floats them over troubles and trials enough to sink a +shipload of ordinary men. Others are rich in disposition, family, and +friends. There are some men so amiable that everybody loves them; some +so cheerful that they carry an atmosphere of jollity about them. Some +are rich in integrity and character. + +One of the first great lessons of life is to learn the true estimate of +values. As the youth starts out in his career, all sorts of wares will +be imposed upon him, and all kinds of temptations will be used to +induce him to buy. His success will depend very largely upon his +ability to estimate properly, not the apparent but the real value of +everything presented to him. Vulgar Wealth will flaunt her banner +before his eyes, and claim supremacy over everything else. A thousand +different schemes will be thrust into his face with their claims for +superiority. Every occupation and vocation will present its charms in +turn, and offer its inducements. The youth who would succeed must not +allow himself to be deceived by appearances, but must place the +emphasis of life where it belongs. + +No man, it is said, can read the works of John Ruskin without learning +that his sources of pleasure are well-nigh infinite. There is not a +flower, nor a cloud, nor a tree, nor a mountain, nor a star; not a bird +that fans the air, nor a creature that walks the earth; not a glimpse +of sea or sky or meadow-greenery; not a work of worthy art in the +domains of painting, sculpture, poetry, and architecture; not a thought +of God as the Great Spirit presiding over and informing all things, +that is not to him a source of the sweetest pleasure. The whole world +of matter and of spirit and the long record of human art are open to +him as the never-failing fountains of his delight. In these pure +realms he seeks his daily food and has his daily life. + +There is now and then a man who sees beauty and true riches everywhere, +and "worships the splendor of God which he sees bursting through each +chink and cranny." + +Phillips Brooks, Thoreau, Garrison, Emerson, Beecher, Agassiz, were +rich without money. They saw the splendor in the flower, the glory in +the grass, books in the running brooks, sermons in stones, and good in +everything. They knew that the man who owns the landscape is seldom +the one who pays the taxes on it. They sucked in power and wealth at +first hands from the meadows, fields, and flowers, birds, brooks, +mountains, and forest, as the bee sucks honey from the flowers. Every +natural object seemed to bring them a special message from the great +Author of the beautiful. To these rare souls every natural object was +touched with power and beauty; and their thirsty souls drank it in as a +traveler on a desert drinks in the god-sent water of the oasis. To +extract power and real wealth from men and things seemed to be their +mission, and to pour it out again in refreshing showers upon a thirsty +humanity. They believed that man's most important food does not enter +by the mouth. They knew that man could not live by estates, dollars, +and bread alone, and that if he could he would only be an animal. They +believed that the higher life demands a higher food. They believed in +man's unlimited power of expansion, and that this growth demands a more +highly organized food product than that which merely sustains animal +life. They saw a finer nutriment in the landscape, in the meadows, +than could be ground into flour, and which escaped the loaf. They felt +a sentiment in natural objects which pointed upward, ever upward to the +Author, and which was capable of feeding and expanding the higher life +until it should grow into a finer sympathy and fellowship with the +Author of the beautiful. They believed that the Creation thunders the +ten commandments, and that all Nature is tugging at the terms of every +contract to make it just. They could feel this finer sentiment, this +soul lifter, this man inspirer, in the growing grain, in the waving +corn, in the golden harvest. They saw it reflected in every brook, in +every star, in every flower, in every dewdrop. They believed that +Nature together with human nature were man's great schoolmasters, that +if rightly used they would carve his rough life into beauty and touch +his rude manner with grace. + +"More servants wait on man than he'll take notice of." But if he would +enjoy Nature he must come to it from a higher level than the yardstick. +He must bring a spirit as grand and sublime as that by which the thing +itself exists. + +We all live on far lower levels than we need to do. We linger in the +misty and oppressive valleys, when we might be climbing the sunlit +hills. God puts into our hands the Book of Life, bright on every page +with open secrets, and we suffer it to drop out of our hands unread. +Emerson says, "We have come into a world which is a living poem. +Everything is as I am." Nature provides for us a perpetual festival; +she is bright to the bright, comforting to those who will accept +comfort. We cannot conceive how a universe could possibly be created +which could devise more efficient methods or greater opportunities for +the delight, the happiness, and the real wealth of human beings than +the one we live in. + +The human body is packed full of marvelous devices, of wonderful +contrivances, of infinite possibilities for the happiness and riches of +the individual. No physiologist nor scientist has ever yet been able +to point out a single improvement, even in the minutest detail, in the +structure of the human body. No inventor has ever yet been able to +suggest an improvement in this human mechanism. No chemist has ever +been able to suggest a superior combination in any one of the elements +which make up the human structure. One of the first things to do in +life is to learn the natural wealth of our surroundings, instead of +bemoaning our lot, for, no matter where we are placed, there is +infinitely more about us than we can ever understand, than we can ever +exhaust the meaning of. + +"Thank Heaven there are still some Matthew Arnolds who prefer the +heavenly sweetness of light to the Eden of riches." Arnold left only a +few thousand dollars, but yet was he not one of the richest of men? +What the world wants is young men who will amass golden thoughts, +golden wisdom, golden deeds, not mere golden dollars; young men who +prefer to have thought-capital, character-capital, to cash-capital. He +who estimates his money the highest values himself the least. "I +revere the person," says Emerson, "who is riches; so that I cannot +think of him as alone, or poor, or exiled, or unhappy." + +Raphael was rich without money. All doors opened to him, and he was +more than welcome everywhere. His sweet spirit radiated sunshine +wherever he went. + +Henry Wilson was rich without money. So scrupulous had he been not to +make his exalted position a means of worldly gain, that when this +Natick cobbler, the sworn friend of the oppressed, whose one question +as to measures or acts was ever "Is it right; will it do good?" came to +be inaugurated as Vice-President of the country, he was obliged to +borrow of his fellow-senator, Charles Sumner, one hundred dollars to +meet the necessary expenses of the occasion. + +Mozart, the great composer of the "Requiem," left barely enough money +to bury him, but he has made the world richer. + +A rich mind and noble spirit will cast a radiance of beauty over the +humblest home, which the upholsterer and decorator can never approach. +Who would not prefer to be a millionaire of character, of contentment, +rather than possess nothing but the vulgar coins of a Croesus? Whoever +uplifts civilization is rich though he die penniless, and future +generations will erect his monument. + +Are we tender, loving, self-denying, and honest, trying to fashion our +frail life after that of the model man of Nazareth? Then, though our +pockets are often empty, we have an inheritance which is as +overwhelmingly precious as it is eternally incorruptible. + +An Asiatic traveler tells us that one day he found the bodies of two +men laid upon the desert sand beside the carcass of a camel. They had +evidently died from thirst, and yet around the waist of each was a +large store of jewels of different kinds, which they had doubtless been +crossing the desert to sell in the markets of Persia. + +The man who has no money is poor, but one who has nothing but money is +poorer than he. He only is rich who can enjoy without owning; he who +is covetous is poor though he have millions. There are riches of +intellect, and no man with an intellectual taste can be called poor. +He who has so little knowledge of human nature as to seek happiness by +changing anything but his own disposition will waste his life in +fruitless efforts, and multiply the griefs which he purposes to remove. +He is rich as well as brave who can face poverty and misfortune with +cheerfulness and courage. + +We can so educate the will power that it will focus the thoughts upon +the bright side of things, and upon objects which elevate the soul, +thus forming a habit of happiness and goodness which will make us rich. +The habit of making the best of everything and of always looking on the +bright side of everything is a fortune in itself. + +He is rich who values a good name above gold. Among the ancient Greeks +and Romans honor was more sought after than wealth. Rome was imperial +Rome no more when the imperial purple became an article of traffic. + +This is the evil of trade, as well as of partisan politics. As Emerson +remarks, it would put everything into market,--talent, beauty, virtue, +and man himself. + +Diogenes was captured by pirates and sold as a slave. His purchaser +released him, and gave him charge of his household and of the education +of his children. He despised wealth and affectation, and lived in a +tub. "Do you want anything?" asked Alexander the Great, forcibly +impressed by the abounding cheerfulness of the philosopher under such +circumstances. "Yes," replied Diogenes, "I want you to stand out of my +sunshine and not to take from me what you cannot give me." "Were I not +Alexander," exclaimed the great conqueror, "I would be Diogenes." + +Brave and honest men do not work for gold. They work for love, for +honor, for character. When Socrates suffered death rather than abandon +his views of right morality, when Las Casas endeavored to mitigate the +tortures of the poor Indians, they had no thought of money or country. +They worked for the elevation of all that thought, and for the relief +of all that suffered. + +"I don't want such things," said Epictetus to the rich Roman orator who +was making light of his contempt for money-wealth; "and besides," said +the stoic, "you are poorer than I am, after all. You have silver +vessels, but earthenware reasons, principles, appetites. My mind to me +a kingdom is, and it furnishes me with abundant and happy occupation in +lieu of your restless idleness. All your possessions seem small to +you; mine seem great to me. Your desire is insatiate, mine is +satisfied." + +"Do you know, sir," said a devotee of Mammon to John Bright, "that I am +worth a million sterling?" "Yes," said the irritated but calm-spirited +respondent, "I do; and I know that it is all you are worth." + +A bankrupt merchant, returning home one night, said to his noble wife, +"My dear, I am ruined; everything we have is in the hands of the +sheriff." After a few moments of silence the wife looked into his face +and asked, "Will the sheriff sell you?" "Oh, no." "Will the sheriff +sell me?" "Oh, no." "Then do not say we have lost everything. All +that is most valuable remains to us,--manhood, womanhood, childhood. +We have lost but the results of our skill and industry. We can make +another fortune if our hearts and hands are left us." + +What power can poverty have over a home where loving hearts are beating +with a consciousness of untold riches of head and heart? + +Paul was never so great as when he occupied a prison cell; and Jesus +Christ reached the height of his success when, smitten, spat upon, +tormented, and crucified, He cried in agony, and yet with triumphant +satisfaction, "It is finished." + +"Character before wealth," was the motto of Amos Lawrence, who had +inscribed on his pocket-book, "What shall it profit a man, if he shall +gain the whole world and lose his own soul?" + +If you make a fortune let every dollar of it be clean. You do not want +to see in it drunkards reel, orphans weep, widows moan. Your riches +must not make others poorer and more wretched. + +Alexander the Great wandered to the gates of Paradise, and knocked for +entrance. "Who knocks?" demanded the guardian angel. "Alexander." +"Who is Alexander?" "Alexander,--the Alexander,--Alexander the +Great,--the conqueror of the world." "We know him not," replied the +angel; "this is the Lord's gate; only the righteous enter here." + +Don't start out in life with a false standard; a truly great man makes +official position and money and houses and estates look so tawdry, so +mean and poor, that we feel like sinking out of sight with our cheap +laurels and gold. _Millions look trifling beside character_. + +A friend of Professor Agassiz, an eminent practical man, once expressed +his wonder that a man of such abilities should remain contented with +such a moderate income as he received. "I have enough," was Agassiz's +reply. "I have no time to waste in making money. Life is not +sufficiently long to enable a man to get rich and do his duty to his +fellow-men at the same time." + +How were the thousands of business men who lost every dollar they had +in the Chicago fire enabled to go into business at once, some into +wholesale business, without money? Their record was their bank +account. The commercial agencies said they were square men; that they +had always paid one hundred cents on a dollar; that they had paid +promptly, and that they were industrious and dealt honorably with all +men. This record was as good as a bank account. _They drew on their +character_. Character was the coin which enabled penniless men to buy +thousands of dollars' worth of goods. Their integrity did not burn up +with their stores. The best part of them was beyond the reach of fire +and could not be burned. + +What are the toil-sweated productions of wealth piled up in vast +profusion around a Girard, or a Rothschild, when weighed against the +stores of wisdom, the treasures of knowledge, and the strength, beauty, +and glory with which victorious virtue has enriched and adorned a great +multitude of minds during the march of a hundred generations? + +"Lord, how many things are in the world of which Diogenes hath no +need!" exclaimed the stoic, as he wandered among the miscellaneous +articles at a country fair. + +"There are treasures laid up in the heart--treasures of charity, piety, +temperance, and soberness. These treasures a man takes with him beyond +death when he leaves this world." (Buddhist Scriptures.) + +Is it any wonder that our children start out with wrong ideals of life, +with wrong ideas of what constitutes success? The child is "urged to +get on," to "rise in the world," to "make money." The youth is +constantly told that nothing succeeds like success. False standards +are everywhere set up for him, and then the boy is blamed if he makes a +failure. + +It is all very well to urge youth on to success, but the great mass of +mankind can never reach or even approximate the goal constantly +preached to them, nor can we all be rich. One of the great lessons to +teach in this century of sharp competition and the survival of the +fittest is how to be rich without money, and to learn how to do without +success, according to the popular standard. + +Gold cannot make the miser rich, nor can the want of it make the beggar +poor. + +In the poem, "The Changed Cross," a weary woman is represented as +dreaming that she was led to a place where many crosses lay, crosses of +divers shapes and sizes. The most beautiful one was set in jewels of +gold. It was so tiny and exquisite that she changed her own plain +cross for it, thinking she was fortunate in finding one so much lighter +and lovelier. But soon her back began to ache under the glittering +burden, and she changed it for another cross very beautiful and +entwined with flowers. But she soon found that underneath the flowers +were piercing thorns which tore her flesh. At last she came to a very +plain cross without jewels, without carving, and with only the word, +"Love," inscribed upon it. She took this one up and it proved the +easiest and best of all. She was amazed, however, to find that it was +her old cross which she had discarded. It is easy to see the jewels +and the flowers in other people's crosses, but the thorns and heavy +weight are known only to the bearers. How easy other people's burdens +seem to us compared with our own. We do not appreciate the secret +burdens which almost crush the heart, nor the years of weary waiting +for delayed success--the aching hearts longing for sympathy, the hidden +poverty, the suppressed emotion in other lives. + +William Pitt, the great Commoner, considered money as dirt beneath his +feet compared with the public interest and public esteem. His hands +were clean. + +The object for which we strive tells the story of our lives. Men and +women should be judged by the happiness they create in those around +them. Noble deeds always enrich, but millions of mere money may +impoverish. _Character is perpetual wealth_, and by the side of him +who possesses it the millionaire who has it not seems a pauper. +Compared with it, what are houses and lands, stocks and bonds? "It is +better that great souls should live in small habitations than that +abject slaves should burrow in great houses." Plain living, rich +thought, and grand effort are real riches. + +Invest in yourself, and you will never be poor. Floods cannot carry +your wealth away, fire cannot burn it, rust cannot consume it. + +"If a man empties his purse into his head," says Franklin, "no man can +take it from him. An investment in knowledge always pays the best +interest." + +"There is a cunning juggle in riches. I observe," says Emerson, "that +they take somewhat for everything they give. I look bigger, but I am +less, I have more clothes, but am not so warm; more armor, but less +courage; more books, but less wit." + + Howe'er it be, it seems to me, + 'T is only noble to be good. + Kind hearts are more than coronets, + And simple faith than Norman blood. + TENNYSON. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV. + +OPPORTUNITIES WHERE YOU ARE. + + To each man's life there comes a time supreme; + One day, one night, one morning, or one noon, + One freighted hour, one moment opportune, + One rift through which sublime fulfillments gleam, + One space when fate goes tiding with the stream, + One Once, in balance 'twixt Too Late, Too Soon, + And ready for the passing instant's boon + To tip in favor the uncertain beam. + Ah, happy he who, knowing how to wait, + Knows also how to watch and work and stand + On Life's broad deck alert, and at the prow + To seize the passing moment, big with fate, + From opportunity's extended hand, + When the great clock of destiny strikes Now! + MARY A. TOWNSEND. + + Once to every man and nation comes the moment to decide, + In the strife of Truth with Falsehood, for the good or evil side. + LOWELL. + +What is opportunity to a man who can't use it? An unfecundated egg, +which the waves of time wash away into nonentity.--GEORGE ELIOT. + + A thousand years a poor man watched + Before the gate of Paradise: + But while one little nap he snatched, + It oped and shut. Ah! was he wise? + W. B. ALGER. + +Our grand business is, not to see what lies dimly at a distance, but to +do what lies clearly at hand.--CARLYLE. + + A man's best things are nearest him, + Lie close about his feet. + R. M. MILNES. + +The secret of success in life is for a man _to be ready for his +opportunity_ when it comes.--DISRAELI. + + +"There are no longer any good chances for young men," complained a law +student to Daniel Webster. "There is always room at the top," replied +the great lawyer. + + * * * * * * + +[Illustration: THOMAS JEFFERSON] + +"The world is all gates, all opportunities to him who can use them.' + + "'T is never offered twice, seize then the hour + When fortune smiles and duty points the way." + + * * * * * * + +No chance, no opportunities, in a land where many poor boys become rich +men, where newsboys go to Congress, and where those born in the lowest +stations attain the highest positions? The world is all gates, all +opportunities to him who will use them. But, like Bunyan's Pilgrim in +the dungeon of Giant Despair's castle, who had the key of deliverance +all the time with him but had forgotten it, we fail to rely wholly upon +the ability to advance all that is good for us which has been given to +the weakest as well as the strongest. We depend too much upon outside +assistance. + + "We look too high + For things close by." + + +A Baltimore lady lost a valuable diamond bracelet at a ball, and +supposed that it was stolen from the pocket of her cloak. Years +afterward she washed the steps of the Peabody Institute, pondering how +to get money to buy food. She cut up an old, worn-out, ragged cloak to +make a hood, when lo! in the lining of the cloak she discovered the +diamond bracelet. During all her poverty she was worth $3500, but did +not know it. + +Many of us who think we are poor are rich in opportunities, if we could +only see them, in possibilities all about us, in faculties worth more +than diamond bracelets. In our large Eastern cities it has been found +that at least ninety-four out of every hundred found their first +fortune at home, or near at hand, and in meeting common every-day +wants. It is a sorry day for a young man who cannot see any +opportunities where he is, but thinks he can do better somewhere else. +Some Brazilian shepherds organized a party to go to California to dig +gold, and took along a handful of translucent pebbles to play checkers +with on the voyage. After arriving in San Francisco, and after they +had thrown most of the pebbles away, they discovered that they were +diamonds. They hastened back to Brazil, only to find that the mines +from which the pebbles had been gathered had been taken up by others +and sold to the government. + +The richest gold and silver mine in Nevada was sold for $42 by the +owner to get money to pay his passage to other mines, where he thought +he could get rich. Professor Agassiz told the Harvard students of a +farmer who owned a farm of hundreds of acres of unprofitable woods and +rocks, and concluded to sell out and get into a more profitable +business. He decided to go into the coal-oil business; he studied coal +measures and coal-oil deposits, and experimented for a long time. He +sold his farm for $200, and engaged in his new business two hundred +miles away. Only a short time after the man who bought his farm +discovered upon it a great flood of coal-oil, which the farmer had +previously ignorantly tried to drain off. + +Hundreds of years ago there lived near the shore of the river Indus a +Persian by the name of Ali Hafed. He lived in a cottage on the river +bank, from which he could get a grand view of the beautiful country +stretching away to the sea. He had a wife and children, an extensive +farm, fields of grain, gardens of flowers, orchards of fruit, and miles +of forest. He had a plenty of money and everything that heart could +wish. He was contented and happy. One evening a priest of Buddha +visited him, and, sitting before the fire, explained to him how the +world was made, and how the first beams of sunlight condensed on the +earth's surface into diamonds. The old priest told that a drop of +sunlight the size of his thumb was worth more than large mines of +copper, silver, or gold; that with one of them he could buy many farms +like his; that with a handful he could buy a province, and with a mine +of diamonds he could purchase a kingdom. Ali Hafed listened, and was +no longer a rich man. He had been touched with discontent, and with +that all wealth vanishes. Early the next morning he woke the priest +who had been the cause of his unhappiness, and anxiously asked him +where he could find a mine of diamonds. "What do you want of +diamonds?" asked the astonished priest. "I want to be rich and place +my children on thrones." "All you have to do is to go and search until +you find them," said the priest. "But where shall I go?" asked the +poor farmer. "Go anywhere, north, south, east, or west." "How shall I +know when I have found the place?" "When you find a river running over +white sands between high mountain ranges, in those white sands you will +find diamonds," answered the priest. + +The discontented man sold the farm for what he could get, left his +family with a neighbor, took the money he had at interest, and went to +search for the coveted treasure. Over the mountains of Arabia, through +Palestine and Egypt, he wandered for years, but found no diamonds. +When his money was all gone and starvation stared him in the face, +ashamed of his folly and of his rags, poor Ali Hafed threw himself into +the tide and was drowned. The man who bought his farm was a contented +man, who made the most of his surroundings, and did not believe in +going away from home to hunt for diamonds or success. While his camel +was drinking in the garden one day, he noticed a flash of light from +the white sands of the brook. He picked up a pebble, and pleased with +its brilliant hues took it into the house, put it on the shelf near the +fireplace, and forgot all about it. The old priest of Buddha who had +filled Ali Hafed with the fatal discontent called one day upon the new +owner of the farm. He had no sooner entered the room than his eye +caught that flash of light from the stone. "Here's a diamond! here's a +diamond!" the old priest shouted in great excitement. "Has Ali Hafed +returned?" said the priest. "No," said the farmer, "nor is that a +diamond. That is but a stone." They went into the garden and stirred +up the white sand with their fingers, and behold, other diamonds more +beautiful than the first gleamed out of it. So the famous diamond beds +of Golconda were discovered. Had Ali Hafed been content to remain at +home, had he dug in his own garden, instead of going abroad in search +for wealth, and reaping poverty, hardships, starvation, and death, he +would have been one of the richest men in the world, for the entire +farm abounded in the richest of gems. + +You have your own special place and work. Find it, fill it. Scarcely +a boy or girl will read these lines but has much better opportunity to +win success than Garfield, Wilson, Franklin, Lincoln, Harriet Beecher +Stowe, Frances Willard, and thousands of others. But to succeed you +must be prepared to seize and improve the opportunity when it comes. +Remember that four things come not back: the spoken word, the sped +arrow, the past life, and the neglected opportunity. + +It is one of the paradoxes of civilization that the more opportunities +are utilized, the more new ones are thereby created. New openings are +as easy to fill as ever to those who do their best; although it is not +so easy as formerly to obtain distinction in the old lines, because the +standard has advanced so much and competition has so greatly increased. +"The world is no longer clay," said Emerson, "but rather iron in the +hands of its workers, and men have got to hammer out a place for +themselves by steady and rugged blows." + +Thousands of men have made fortunes out of trifles which others pass +by. As the bee gets honey from the same flower from which the spider +gets poison, so some men will get a fortune out of the commonest and +meanest things, as scraps of leather, cotton waste, slag, iron filings, +from which others get only poverty and failure. There is scarcely a +thing which contributes to the welfare and comfort of humanity, not an +article of household furniture, a kitchen utensil, an article of +clothing or of food, that is not capable of an improvement in which +there may be a fortune. + +Opportunities? They are all around us. Edison found them in a baggage +car. Forces of nature plead to be used in the service of man, as +lightning for ages tried to attract his attention to the great force of +electricity, which would do his drudgery and leave him to develop the +God-given powers within him. There is power lying latent everywhere +waiting for the observant eye to discover it. + +First find out what the world needs and then supply that want. An +invention to make smoke go the wrong way in a chimney might be a very +ingenious thing, but it would be of no use to humanity. The patent +office at Washington is full of wonderful devices of ingenious +mechanism, but not one in hundreds is of use to the inventor or to the +world. And yet how many families have been impoverished, and have +struggled for years amid want and woe, while the father has been +working on useless inventions. A. T. Stewart, as a boy, lost +eighty-seven cents when his capital was one dollar and a half in buying +buttons and thread which shoppers did not call for. After that he made +it a rule never to buy anything which the public did not want, and so +prospered. + +It is estimated that five out of every seven of the millionaire +manufacturers began by making with their own hands the articles which +made their fortunes. One of the greatest hindrances to advancement in +life is the lack of observation and of the inclination to take pains. +An observing man, the eyelets of whose shoes pulled out, but who could +not afford to get another pair, said to himself, "I will make a +metallic lacing hook, which can be riveted into the leather;" he was so +poor that he had to borrow a sickle to cut the grass in front of his +hired tenement. Now he is a very rich man. + +An observing barber in Newark, N. J., thought he could make an +improvement in shears for cutting hair, invented clippers, and became +rich. A Maine man was called in from the hayfield to wash clothes for +his invalid wife. He had never realized what it was to wash before. +Finding the method slow and laborious, he invented the washing-machine, +and made a fortune. A man who was suffering terribly with toothache +said to himself, there must be some way of filling teeth which will +prevent their aching. So he invented the principle of gold filling for +teeth. + +The great things of the world have not been done by men of large means. +Ericsson began the construction of the screw propellers in a bathroom. +The cotton-gin was first manufactured in a log cabin. John Harrison, +the great inventor of the marine chronometer, began his career in the +loft of an old barn. Parts of the first steamboat ever run in America +were set up in the vestry of a church in Philadelphia by Fitch. +McCormick began to make his famous reaper in a gristmill. The first +model dry dock was made in an attic. Clark, the founder of Clark +University of Worcester, Mass., began his great fortune by making toy +wagons in a horse shed. Farquhar made umbrellas in his sitting-room, +with his daughter's help, until he sold enough to hire a loft. Edison +began his experiments in a baggage car on the Grand Trunk Railroad when +a newsboy. + +As soon as the weather would permit, the Jamestown colonists began to +stroll about the country digging for gold. In a bank of sand some +glittering particles were found, and the whole settlement was in a +state of excitement. Fourteen weeks of the precious springtime, which +ought to have been given to plowing and planting, were consumed in this +stupid nonsense. Even the Indians ridiculed the madness of the men +who, for imaginary grains of gold, were wasting their chances for a +crop of corn. + +Michael Angelo found a piece of discarded Carrara marble among waste +rubbish beside a street in Florence, which some unskillful workman had +cut, hacked, spoiled, and thrown away. No doubt many artists had +noticed the fine quality of the marble, and regretted that it should +have been spoiled. But Michael Angelo still saw an angel in the ruin, +and with his chisel and mallet he called out from it one of the finest +pieces of statuary in Italy, the young David. + +The lonely island of Nantucket would not be considered a very favorable +place to win success and fame. But Maria Mitchell, on seventy-five +dollars a year, as librarian of the Nantucket Athenaeum, found time and +opportunity to become a celebrated astronomer. Lucretia Mott, one of +America's foremost philanthropists and reformers, who made herself felt +over a whole continent, gained much of her reputation as a preacher on +Nantucket Island. + +"Why does not America have fine sculptors?" asked a romping girl, of +Watertown, Mass., in 1842. Her father, a physician, answered that he +supposed "an American could be a stone-cutter, but that is a very +different thing from being a sculptor." "I think," said the plucky +maiden, "that if no other American tries it I will." She began her +studies in Boston, and walked seven miles to and fro daily between her +home and the city. The medical schools in Boston would not admit her +to study anatomy, so she had to go to St. Louis. Subsequently she went +to Rome, and there, during a long residence, and afterward, modeled and +carved very beautiful statuary which made the name of Harriet G. Hosmer +famous. Begin where you are; work where you are; the hour which you +are now wasting, dreaming of some far-off success, may be crowded with +grand possibilities. + +Patrick Henry was called a lazy boy, a good-for-nothing farmer, and he +failed as a merchant. He was always dreaming of some far-off +greatness, and never thought he could be a hero among the corn and +tobacco and saddlebags of Virginia. He studied law six weeks, when he +put out his shingle. People thought he would fail, but in his first +case he showed that he had a wonderful power of oratory. It then first +dawned upon him that he could be a hero in Virginia. From the time the +Stamp Act was passed and Henry was elected to the Virginia House of +Burgesses, and he had introduced his famous resolution against the +unjust taxation of the American colonies, he rose steadily until he +became one of the brilliant orators of America. In one of his first +speeches upon this resolution he uttered these words, which were +prophetic of his power and courage: "Caesar had his Brutus, Charles the +First his Cromwell, and George the Third--may profit by their example. +If this be treason, make the most of it." + +The great natural philosopher, Faraday, who was the son of a +blacksmith, wrote, when a young man, to Humphry Davy, asking for +employment at the Royal Institution. Davy consulted a friend on the +matter. "Here is a letter from a young man named Faraday, he has been +attending my lectures, and wants me to give him employment at the Royal +Institution--what can I do?" "Do? put him to washing bottles; if he is +good for anything he will do it directly; if he refuses he is good for +nothing." But the boy who could experiment in the attic of an +apothecary shop with an old pan and glass vials during every moment he +could snatch from his work saw an opportunity in washing bottles, which +led to a professorship at the Royal Academy at Woolwich. Tyndall said +of this boy with no chance, "He is the greatest experimental +philosopher the world has ever seen." He became the wonder of his age +in science. + +There is a legend of an artist who long sought for a piece of +sandal-wood, out of which to carve a Madonna. He was about to give up +in despair, leaving the vision of his life unrealized, when in a dream +he was bidden to carve his Madonna from a block of oak wood which was +destined for the fire. He obeyed, and produced a masterpiece from a +log of common firewood. Many of us lose great opportunities in life by +waiting to find sandal-wood for our carvings, when they really lie +hidden in the common logs that we burn. One man goes through life +without seeing chances for doing anything great, while another close +beside him snatches from the same circumstances and privileges +opportunities for achieving grand results. + +Anna Dickinson began life as a school-teacher. Adelaide Neilson was a +child's nurse. Charlotte Cushman's parents were poor. The renowned +Jeanne d'Arc fed swine. Christine Nilsson was a poor Swedish peasant, +and ran barefoot in childhood. Edmonia Lewis, the colored sculptor, +overcame the prejudice against her sex and color, and pursued her +profession in Italy. Maria Mitchell, the astronomer, was the daughter +of a poor man who taught school at two dollars per week. These are but +a few of the many who have struggled with fate and risen to distinction +through their own personal efforts. + +Opportunities? They are everywhere. "America is another name for +opportunities. Our whole history appears like a last effort of divine +Providence in behalf of the human race." Never before were there such +grand openings, such chances, such opportunities. Especially is this +true for girls and young women. A new era is dawning for them. +Hundreds of occupations and professions, which were closed to them only +a few years ago, are now inviting them to enter. + +When I hear of a young woman entering the medical profession, or +beginning the study of law, or entering school with a view to teaching, +I feel like congratulating her for thus asserting her individuality. + +We cannot all of us perhaps make great discoveries like Newton, +Faraday, Edison, and Thompson. We cannot all of us paint immortal +pictures like an Angelo or a Raphael. But we can all of us make our +lives sublime, by _seizing common occasions and making them great_. +What chance had the young girl, Grace Darling, to distinguish herself, +living on those barren lighthouse rocks alone with her aged parents? +But while her brothers and sisters, who moved to the cities to win +wealth and fame, are not known to the world, she became more famous +than a princess. This poor girl did not need to go to London to see +the nobility; they came to the lighthouse to see her. Right at home +this young girl had won fame which the regal heirs might envy, and a +name which will never perish from the earth. She did not wander away +into dreamy distance for fame and fortune, but did her best where duty +had placed her. + +If you want to get rich, study yourself and your own wants. You will +find that millions have the same wants. The safest business is always +connected with man's prime necessities. He must have clothing and a +dwelling; he must eat. He wants comforts, facilities of all kinds for +pleasure, luxuries, education, and culture. Any man who can supply a +great want of humanity, improve any methods which men use, supply any +demand of comfort, or contribute in any way to their well-being, can +make a fortune. + +"We cannot doubt," said Edward Everett, "that truths now unknown are in +reserve to reward the patience and the labors of future lovers of +truth, which will go as far beyond the brilliant discoveries of the +last generation as these do beyond all that was known to the ancient +world." + + The golden opportunity + Is never offered twice; seize then the hour + When fortune smiles and duty points the way; + Nor shrink aside to 'scape the spectre fear, + Nor pause, though pleasure beckon from her bower; + But bravely bear thee onward to the goal. + ANON. + + For the distant still thou yearnest, + And behold the good so near; + If to use the good thou learnest, + Thou wilt surely find it here. + GOETHE. + + Do not, then, stand idly waiting + For some greater work to do; + Fortune is a lazy goddess-- + She will never come to you. + Go and toil in any vineyard, + Do not fear to do or dare; + If you want a field of labor, + You can find it anywhere. + ELLEN H. GATES. + + Why thus longing, thus forever sighing, + For the far-off, unattained and dim, + While the beautiful, all around thee lying + Offers up its low, perpetual hymn? + HARRIET WINSLOW. + + Work for the good that is nighest; + Dream not of greatness afar: + That glory is ever the highest + Which shines upon men as they are. + W. MORLEY PUNSHON. + + + + +CHAPTER XV. + +THE MIGHT OF LITTLE THINGS. + +Little strokes fell great oaks.--FRANKLIN. + + Think naught a trifle, though it small appear; + Small sands the mountain, moments make the year, + And trifles, life. + YOUNG. + + "Scorn not the slightest word or deed, + Nor deem it void of power; + There's fruit in each wind-wafted seed, + That waits its natal hour." + +It is but the littleness of man that seeth no greatness in +trifles.--WENDELL PHILLIPS. + +He that despiseth small things shall fall by little and +little.--ECCLESIASTICUS. + +Often from our weakness our strongest principles of conduct are born; +and from the acorn, which a breeze has wafted, springs the oak which +defies the storm.--BULWER. + +The creation of a thousand forests is in one acorn.--EMERSON. + +Men are led by trifles.--NAPOLEON I. + + "A pebble on the streamlet scant + Has turned the course of many a river; + A dewdrop on the baby plant + Has warped the giant oak forever." + +The mother of mischief is no bigger than a midge's wing.--SCOTCH +PROVERB. + +"The bad thing about a little sin is that it won't stay little." + + "A little bit of patience often makes the sunshine come, + And a little bit of love makes a very happy home; + A little bit of hope makes a rainy day look gay, + And a little bit of charity makes glad a weary way." + + +"Arletta's pretty feet, glistening in the brook, made her the mother of +William the Conqueror," says Palgrave's "History of Normandy and +England." "Had she not thus fascinated Duke Robert the Liberal, of +Normandy, Harold would not have fallen at Hastings, no Anglo-Norman +dynasty could have arisen, no British Empire." + + * * * * * * + +[Illustration: AGASSIZ] + +Small things become great when a great soul sees them. Trifles light +as air sometimes suggest to the thinking mind ideas which revolutionize +the world. + + * * * * * * + +We may tell which way the wind blew before the Deluge by marking the +ripple and cupping of the rain in the petrified sand now preserved +forever. We tell the very path by which gigantic creatures, whom man +never saw, walked to the river's edge to find their food. + +The tears of Veturia and Volumnia saved Rome from the Volscians when +nothing else could move the vengeful heart of Coriolanus. + +It was little Greece that rolled back the overflowing tide of Asiatic +luxury and despotism, giving instead to Europe and America models of +the highest political freedom yet attained, and germs of limitless +mental growth. A different result at Plataea had delayed the progress +of the human race more than ten centuries. + +Among the lofty Alps, it is said, the guides sometimes demand absolute +silence, lest the vibration of the voice bring down an avalanche. + +The power of observation in the American Indian would put many an +educated man to shame. Returning home, an Indian discovered that his +venison, which had been hanging up to dry, had been stolen. After +careful observation he started to track the thief through the woods. +Meeting a man on the route, he asked him if he had seen a little, old, +white man, with a short gun, and with a small bob-tailed dog. The man +told him he had met such a man, but was surprised to find that the +Indian had not even seen the one he described. He asked the Indian how +he could give such a minute description of the man whom he had never +seen. "I knew the thief was a little man," said the Indian, "because +he rolled up a stone to stand on in order to reach the venison; I knew +he was an old man by his short steps; I knew he was a white man by his +turning out his toes in walking, which an Indian never does; I knew he +had a short gun by the mark it left on the tree where he had stood it +up; I knew the dog was small by his tracks and short steps, and that he +had a bob-tail by the mark it left in the dust where he sat." + +Two drops of rain, falling side by side, were separated a few inches by +a gentle breeze. Striking on opposite sides of the roof of a +court-house in Wisconsin, one rolled southward through the Rock River +and the Mississippi to the Gulf of Mexico; while the other entered +successively the Fox River, Green Bay, Lake Michigan, the Straits of +Mackinaw, Lake Huron, St. Clair River, Lake St. Clair, Detroit River, +Lake Erie, Niagara River, Lake Ontario, the St. Lawrence River, and +finally reached the Gulf of St. Lawrence. How slight the influence of +the breeze, yet such was the formation of the continent that a trifling +cause was multiplied almost beyond the power of figures to express its +momentous effect upon the destinies of these companion raindrops. Who +can calculate the future of the smallest trifle when a mud crack swells +to an Amazon, and the stealing of a penny may end on the scaffold? Who +does not know that the act of a moment may cause a life's regret? A +trigger may be pulled in an instant, but the soul returns never. + +A spark falling upon some combustibles led to the invention of +gunpowder. Irritable tempers have marred the reputation of many a +great man, as in the case of Edmund Burke and of Thomas Carlyle. A few +bits of seaweed and driftwood, floating on the waves, enabled Columbus +to stay a mutiny of his sailors which threatened to prevent the +discovery of a new world. There are moments in history which balance +years of ordinary life. Dana could interest a class for hours on a +grain of sand; and from a single bone, such as no one had ever seen +before, Agassiz could deduce the entire structure and habits of an +animal so accurately that subsequent discoveries of complete skeletons +have not changed one of his conclusions. + +A cricket once saved a military expedition from destruction. The +commanding officer and hundreds of his men were going to South America +on a great ship, and, through the carelessness of the watch, they would +have been dashed upon a ledge of rock had it not been for a cricket +which a soldier had brought on board. When the little insect scented +the land, it broke its long silence by a shrill note, and this warned +them of their danger. + +"Strange that a little thing like that should cause a man so much +pain!" exclaimed a giant, as he rolled in his hand and examined with +eager curiosity the acorn which his friend the dwarf had obligingly +taken from the huge eye into which it had fallen just as the colossus +was on the point of shooting a bird perched in the branches of an oak. + +Sometimes a conversation, or a sentence in a letter, or a paragraph in +an article, will help us to reproduce the whole character of the +author; as a single bone, a fish scale, a fin, or a tooth, will enable +the scientist and anatomist to reproduce the fish or the animal, +although extinct for ages. + +By gnawing through a dike, even a rat may drown a nation. A little boy +in Holland saw water trickling from a small hole near the bottom of a +dike. He realized that the leak would rapidly become larger if the +water was not checked, so he held his hand over the hole for hours on a +dark and dismal night until he could attract the attention of +passers-by. His name is still held in grateful remembrance in Holland. + +The beetling chalk cliffs of England were built by rhizopods, too small +to be clearly seen without the aid of a magnifying-glass. + +What was so unlikely as that throwing an empty wine-flask in the fire +should furnish the first notion of a locomotive, or that the sickness +of an Italian chemist's wife and her absurd craving for reptiles for +food should begin the electric telegraph? + +Madame Galvani noticed the contraction of the muscles of a skinned frog +which was accidentally touched at the moment her husband took a spark +from an electrical machine. She gave the hint which led to the +discovery of galvanic electricity, now so useful in the arts and in +transmitting vocal or written language. + +M. Louis Pasteur was usher in the Lyceum. Thursdays he took the boys +to walk. A student took his microscope to examine insects, and allowed +Pasteur to look through it. This was the starting of the boy on the +microscopic career which has made men wonder. He was almost wild with +enthusiasm at the new world which the microscope revealed. + +A stamp act to raise 60,000 pounds produced the American Revolution, a +war that cost 100,000,000 pounds. What mighty contests rise from +trivial things! + +Congress met near a livery stable to discuss the Declaration of +Independence. The members, in knee breeches and silk stockings, were +so annoyed by flies, which they could not keep away with their +handkerchiefs, that it has been said they cut short the debate, and +hastened to affix their signatures to the greatest document in history. + +"The fate of a nation," says Gladstone, "has often depended upon the +good or bad digestion of a fine dinner." + +A young man once went to India to seek his fortune, but, finding no +opening, he went to his room, loaded his pistol, put the muzzle to his +head, and pulled the trigger. But it did not go off. He went to the +window to point it in another direction and try it again, resolved that +if the weapon went off he would regard it as a Providence that he was +spared. He pulled the trigger and it went off the first time. +Trembling with excitement he resolved to hold his life sacred, to make +the most of it, and never again to cheapen it. This young man became +General Robert Clive, who, with but a handful of European soldiers, +secured to the East India Company and afterwards to Great Britain a +great and rich country with two hundred millions of people. + +The cackling of a goose aroused the sentinels and saved Rome from the +Gauls, and the pain from a thistle warned a Scottish army of the +approach of the Danes. "Had Acre fallen," said Napoleon, "I should +have changed the face of the world." + +Henry Ward Beecher came within one vote of being elected superintendent +of a railway. If he had had that vote America would probably have lost +its greatest preacher. What a little thing fixes destiny! + +In the earliest days of cotton spinning, the small fibres would stick +to the bobbins, and make it necessary to stop and clear the machinery. +Although this loss of time reduced the earnings of the operatives, the +father of Robert Peel noticed that one of his spinners always drew full +pay, as his machine never stopped. "How is this, Dick?" asked Mr. Peel +one day; "the on-looker tells me your bobbins are always clean." "Ay, +that they be," replied Dick Ferguson. "How do you manage it, Dick?" +"Why, you see, Meester Peel," said the workman, "it is sort o' secret! +If I tow'd ye, yo'd be as wise as I am." "That's so," said Mr. Peel, +smiling; "but I'd give you something to know. Could you make all the +looms work as smoothly as yours?" "Ivery one of 'em, meester," replied +Dick. "Well, what shall I give you for your secret?" asked Mr. Peel, +and Dick replied, "Gi' me a quart of ale every day as I'm in the mills, +and I'll tell thee all about it." "Agreed," said Mr. Peel, and Dick +whispered very cautiously in his ear, "Chalk your bobbins!" That was +the whole secret, and Mr. Peel soon shot ahead of all his competitors, +for he made machines that would chalk their own bobbins. Dick was +handsomely rewarded with money instead of beer. His little idea has +saved the world millions of dollars. + +Trifles light as air often suggest to the thinking mind ideas which +have revolutionized the world. + +A poor English boy was compelled by his employer to deposit something +on board a ship about to start for Algiers, in accordance with the +merchant's custom of interesting employees by making them put something +at risk in his business and so share in the gain or loss of each common +venture. The boy had only a cat, which he had bought for a penny to +catch mice in the garret where he slept. In tears, he carried her on +board the vessel. On arriving at Algiers, the captain learned that the +Dey was greatly annoyed by rats, and loaned him the cat. The rats +disappeared so rapidly that the Dey wished to buy the cat, but the +captain would not sell until a very high price was offered. With the +purchase-money was sent a present of valuable pearls for the owner of +Tabby. When the ship returned the sailors were greatly astonished to +find that the boy owned most of the cargo, for it was part of the +bargain that he was to bring back the value of his cat in goods. The +London merchant took the boy into partnership; the latter became very +wealthy, and in the course of business loaned money to the Dey who had +bought the cat. As Lord Mayor of London, our cat merchant was +knighted, and became the second man in the city,--Sir Richard +Whittington. + +When John Williams, the martyr missionary of Erromanga, went to the +South Sea Islands, he took with him a single banana-tree from an +English nobleman's conservatory; and now, from that single banana-tree, +bananas are to be found throughout whole groups of islands. Before the +negro slaves in the West Indies were emancipated a regiment of British +soldiers was stationed near one of the plantations. A soldier offered +to teach a slave to read on condition that he would teach a second, and +that second a third, and so on. This the slave faithfully carried out, +though severely flogged by the master of the plantation. Being sent to +another plantation, he repeated the same thing there, and when at +length liberty was proclaimed throughout the island, and the Bible +Society offered a New Testament to every negro who could read, the +number taught through this slave's instrumentality was found to be no +less than six hundred. + +A famous ruby was offered to the English government. The report of the +crown jeweler was that it was the finest he had ever seen or heard of, +but that one of the "facets" was slightly fractured. That invisible +fracture reduced its value thousands of dollars, and it was rejected +from the regalia of England. + +It was a little thing for the janitor to leave a lamp swinging in the +cathedral at Pisa, but in that steady swaying motion the boy Galileo +saw the pendulum, and conceived the idea of thus measuring time. + +"I was singing to the mouthpiece of a telephone," said Edison, "when +the vibrations of my voice caused a fine steel point to pierce one of +my fingers held just behind it. That set me to thinking. If I could +record the motions of the point and send it over the same surface +afterward, I saw no reason why the thing would not talk. I determined +to make a machine that would work accurately, and gave my assistants +the necessary instructions, telling them what I had discovered. That's +the whole story. The phonograph is the result of the pricking of a +finger." + +It was a little thing for a cow to kick over a lantern left in a +shanty, but it laid Chicago in ashes, and rendered homeless a hundred +thousand people. + +You turned a cold shoulder but once, you made but one stinging remark, +yet it lost you a friend forever. + +Some little weakness, some self-indulgence, a quick temper, want of +decision, are little things, you say, when placed beside great +abilities, but they have wrecked many a career. The Parliament of +Great Britain, the Congress of the United States, and representative +governments all over the world have come from King John signing the +Magna Charta. + +Bentham says, "The turn of a sentence has decided many a friendship, +and, for aught we know, the fate of many a kingdom." + +The sight of a stranded cuttlefish led Cuvier to an investigation which +made him one of the greatest natural historians in the world. The web +of a spider suggested to Captain Brown the idea of a suspension bridge. +A man, looking for a lost horse, picked up a stone in the Idaho +mountains which led to the discovery of a rich gold mine. + +An officer apologized to General O. M. Mitchel, the astronomer, for a +brief delay, saying he was only a few moments late. "I have been in +the habit of calculating the value of the thousandth part of a second," +was Mitchel's reply. + +A missing marriage certificate kept the hod-carrier of Hugh Miller from +establishing his claim to the Earldom of Crawford. The masons would +call out, "John, Yearl of Crawford, bring us anither hod o' lime." + +Not long ago the great steamship Umbria was stopped in mid-Atlantic by +a flaw in her engine shaft. + +The absence of a comma in a bill which passed through Congress several +years ago cost our government a million dollars. A single misspelled +word prevented a deserving young man from obtaining a situation as +instructor in a New England college. A cinder on the eyeball will +conquer a Napoleon. Some little weakness, as lack of courtesy, want of +decision, a bad temper, may nullify the labor of years. + +"I cannot see that you have made any progress since my last visit," +said a gentleman to Michael Angelo. "But," said the sculptor, "I have +retouched this part, polished that, softened that feature, brought out +that muscle, given some expression to this lip, more energy to that +limb, etc." "But they are trifles!" exclaimed the visitor. "It may be +so," replied the great artist, "but trifles make perfection, and +perfection is no trifle." + +That infinite patience which made Michael Angelo spend a week in +bringing out a muscle in a statue with more vital fidelity to truth, or +Gerhard Dow a day in giving the right effect to a dewdrop on a cabbage +leaf, makes all the difference between success and failure. + +By scattering it upon a sloping field of grain so as to form, in +letters of great size, "Effects of Gypsum," Franklin brought this +fertilizer into general use in America. By means of a kite he +established principles in the science of electricity of such broad +significance that they underlie nearly all the modern applications of +that science, with probably boundless possibilities of development in +the future. + +More than four hundred and fifty years have passed since Laurens Coster +amused his children by cutting their names in the bark of trees, in the +land of windmills, and the monks have laid aside forever their old +trade of copying books. From that day monarchies have crumbled, and +Liberty, lifting up her head for the first time among the nations of +the earth, has ever since kept pace with the march of her sister, +Knowledge, up through the centuries. Yet how simple was the thought +which has borne such a rich harvest of benefit to mankind. + +As he carved the names of his prattling children it occurred to him +that if the letters were made in separate blocks, and wet with ink, +they would make clear printed impressions better and more rapidly than +would the pen. So he made blocks, tied them together with strings, and +printed a pamphlet with the aid of a hired man, John Gutenberg. People +bought the pamphlets at a slight reduction from the price charged by +the monks, supposing that the work was done in the old way. Coster +died soon afterward, but young Gutenberg kept the secret, and +experimented with metals until he had invented the metal type. In an +obscure chamber in Strasburg he printed his first book. + +At about this time a traveler called upon Charles VII. of France, who +was so afraid somebody would poison him that he dared eat but little, +and made his servants taste of every dish of food before he ate any. +He looked with suspicion upon the stranger; but when the latter offered +a beautiful copy of the Bible for only seven hundred and fifty crowns, +the monarch bought it at once. Charles showed his Bible to the +archbishop, telling him that it was the finest copy in the world, +without a blot or mistake, and that it must have taken the copyist a +lifetime to write it. "Why!" exclaimed the archbishop in surprise, "I +bought one exactly like it a few days ago." It was soon learned that +other rich people in Paris had bought similar copies. The king traced +the book to John Faust, of Strasburg, who had furnished Gutenberg money +to experiment with. The people said that Faust must have sold himself +to the devil, and he only escaped burning at the stake by divulging the +secret. + +William Caxton, a London merchant who went to Holland to purchase +cloth, bought a few books and some type, and established a +printing-office in Westminster Chapel, where he issued, in 1474, "The +Game of Chess," the first book printed in England. + +The cry of the infant Moses attracted the attention of Pharaoh's +daughter, and gave the Jews a lawgiver. A bird alighting on the bough +of a tree at the mouth of the cave where Mahomet lay hid turned aside +his pursuers, and gave a prophet to many nations. A flight of birds +probably prevented Columbus from discovering this continent, for when +he was growing anxious, Martin Alonzo Pinzon persuaded him to follow a +flight of parrots toward the southwest; for to the Spanish seamen of +that day it was good luck to follow in the wake of a flock of birds +when on a voyage of discovery. But for his change of course Columbus +would have reached the coast of Florida. "Never," wrote Humboldt, "had +the flight of birds more important consequences." + +The children of a spectacle-maker placed two or more pairs of the +spectacles before each other in play, and told their father that +distant objects looked larger. From this hint came the telescope. + +"Of what use is it?" people asked with a sneer, when Franklin told of +his discovery that lightning and electricity are identical. "What is +the use of a child?" replied Franklin; "it may become a man." + +"He who waits to do a great deal of good at once," said Dr. Johnson, +"will never do any." Do good with what thou hast, or it will do thee +no good. + +Every day is a little life; and our whole life but a day repeated. +Those that dare lose a day are dangerously prodigal, those that dare +misspend it, desperate. What is the happiness of your life made up of? +Little courtesies, little kindnesses, pleasant words, genial smiles, a +friendly letter, good wishes, and good deeds. One in a million--once +in a lifetime--may do a heroic action. The atomic theory is the true +one. Many think common fractions vulgar, but they are the components +of millions. + +He is a great man who sees great things where others see little things, +who sees the extraordinary in the ordinary. Ruskin sees a poem in the +rose or the lily, while the hod-carrier would perhaps not go a rod out +of his way to see a sunset which Ruskin would feed upon for a year. + +Napoleon was a master of trifles. To details which his inferior +officers thought too microscopic for their notice he gave the most +exhaustive attention. Nothing was too small for his attention. He +must know all about the provisions, the horse fodder, the biscuits, the +camp kettles, the shoes. When the bugle sounded for the march to +battle, every officer had his orders as to the exact route which he +should follow, the exact day he was to arrive at a certain station, and +the exact hour he was to leave, and they were all to reach the point of +destination at a precise moment. It is said that nothing could be more +perfectly planned than his memorable march which led to the victory of +Austerlitz, and which sealed the fate of Europe for many years. He +would often charge his absent officers to send him perfectly accurate +returns, even to the smallest detail. "When they are sent to me, I +give up every occupation in order to read them in detail, and to +observe the difference between one monthly return and another. No +young girl enjoys her novel as much as I do these returns." The +captain who conveyed Napoleon to Elba was astonished with his +familiarity with all the minute details connected with the ship. +Napoleon left nothing to chance, nothing to contingency, so far as he +could possibly avoid it. Everything was planned to a nicety before he +attempted to execute it. + +Wellington too was "great in little things." He knew no such things as +trifles. While other generals trusted to subordinates, he gave his +personal attention to the minutest detail. The history of many a +failure could be written in three words, "Lack of detail." How many a +lawyer has failed from the lack of details in deeds and important +papers, the lack of little words which seemed like surplusage, and +which involved his clients in litigation, and often great losses! How +many wills are contested from the carelessness of lawyers in the +omission or shading of words, or ambiguous use of language! + +Physicians often fail to make a reputation through their habitual +blundering, carelessness in writing prescriptions, failure to give +minute instruction. The world is full of blunderers; business men fail +from a disregard of trifles; they go to the bank to pay a note the day +after it has gone to protest; they do not pay their bills promptly; do +not answer their letters promptly or file them away accurately; their +books do not quite balance; they do not know exactly how they stand, +they have a contempt for details. + +"My rule of conduct has been that whatever is worth doing at all is +worth doing well," said Nicolas Poussin, the great French painter. +When asked the reason why he had become so eminent in a land of famous +artists he replied, "Because I have neglected nothing." + +Not even Helen of Troy, it is said, was beautiful enough to spare the +tip of her nose; and if Cleopatra's had been an inch shorter Mark +Antony would never have become infatuated with her wonderful charms, +and the blemish would have changed the history of the world. Anne +Boleyn's fascinating smile split the great Church of Rome in twain, and +gave a nation an altered destiny. Napoleon, who feared not to attack +the proudest monarchs in their capitols, shrank from the political +influence of one independent woman in private life, Madame de Stael. +Had not Scott sprained his foot his life would probably have taken a +different direction. + +Cromwell was about to sail for America when a law was passed +prohibiting emigration. At that time he was a profligate, having +squandered all his property. But when he found that he could not leave +England he reformed his life. Had he not been detained who can tell +what the history of Great Britain would have been? + +When one of his friends asked Scopas the Thessalian for something that +could be of little use to him, he answered, "It is in these useless and +superfluous things that I am rich and happy." + +It was the little foxes that spoiled the vines in Solomon's day. Mites +play mischief now with our meal and cheese, moths with our woolens and +furs, and mice in our pantries. More than half our diseases are +produced by infinitesimal creatures called microbes. + +Most people call fretting a minor fault, a foible, and not a vice. +There is no vice except drunkenness which can so utterly destroy the +peace, the happiness, of a home. + +"We call the large majority of human lives obscure," says Bulwer, +"presumptuous that we are! How know we what lives a single thought +retained from the dust of nameless graves may have lighted to renown?" + +The theft of a diamond necklace from a French queen convulsed Europe. +From the careful and persistent accumulation of innumerable facts, each +trivial in itself, but in the aggregate forming a mass of evidence, a +Darwin extracts his law of evolution, and Linnaeus constructs the +science of botany. A pan of water and two thermometers were the tools +by which Dr. Black discovered latent heat, and a prism, a lens, and a +sheet of pasteboard enabled Newton to unfold the composition of light +and the origin of colors. An eminent foreign savant called on Dr. +Wollaston, and asked to be shown over those laboratories of his in +which science had been enriched by so many great discoveries, when the +doctor took him into a little study, and, pointing to an old tea tray +on the table, on which stood a few watch glasses, test papers, a small +balance, and a blow-pipe, said, "There is my laboratory." A burnt +stick and a barn door served Wilkie in lieu of pencil and paper. A +single potato, carried to England by Sir Walter Raleigh in the +sixteenth century, has multiplied into food for millions, driving +famine from Ireland again and again. + +It seemed a small thing to drive William Brewster, John Robinson, and +the poor people of Austerfield and Scrooby into perpetual exile, but as +Pilgrims they became the founders of a mighty people. A cloud may hide +the sun which it cannot extinguish. + +"Behold how great a matter a little fire kindleth." "A look of +vexation or a word coldly spoken, or a little help thoughtlessly +withheld, may produce long issues of regret." + +It was but a little dispute, a little flash of temper, the trigger was +pulled in an instant, but the soul returned never. + +A few immortal sentences from Garrison and Phillips, a few poems from +Lowell and Whittier, and the leaven is at work which will not cease its +action until the whipping-post and bodily servitude are abolished +forever. + + "For want of a nail the shoe was lost, + For want of a shoe the horse was lost; + For want of a horse the rider was lost, and all," + +says Poor Richard, "for want of a horse-shoe nail." + +A single remark dropped by an unknown person in the street led to the +successful story of "The Bread-winners." A hymn chanted by the +barefooted friars in the temple of Jupiter at Rome led to the famous +"Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire." + +"Do little things now," says a Persian proverb; "so shall big things +come to thee by and by asking to be done." God will take care of the +great things if we do not neglect the little ones. + +"Words are things," says Byron, "and a small drop of ink, falling like +dew upon a thought, produces that which makes thousands, perhaps +millions think." + +"I give these books for the founding of a college in this colony;" such +were the words of ten ministers who in the year 1700 assembled at the +village of Branford a few miles east of New Haven. Each of the worthy +fathers deposited a few books upon the table around which they were +sitting; such was the founding of Yale College. + +"He that has a spirit of detail," says Webster, "will do better in life +than many who figured beyond him in the university." + +The pyramid of knowledge is made up of little grains of information, +little observations picked up from everywhere. + +For a thousand years Asia monopolized the secret of silk culture, and +at Rome the product was sold for its weight in gold. During the sixth +century, at the request of Justinian, two Persian monks brought a few +eggs from China to Europe in a hollow cane. The eggs were hatched by +means of heat, and Asia no longer held the monopoly of the silk +business. + +In comparison with Ferdinand, preparing to lead forth his magnificent +army in Europe's supreme contest with the Moors, how insignificant +seemed the visionary expedition of Columbus, about to start in three +small shallops across the unknown ocean. But grand as was the triumph +of Ferdinand, it now seems hardly worthy of mention in comparison with +the wonderful achievement of the poor Genoese navigator. + +Only one hundred and ninety-two Athenians perished in the battle of +Marathon, but Europe was saved from a host which is said to have drunk +rivers dry, and to have shaken the solid earth as they marched. + +Great men are noted for their attention to trifles. Goethe once asked +a monarch to excuse him, during an interview, while he went to an +adjoining room to jot down a stray thought. Hogarth would make +sketches of rare faces and characteristics upon his finger-nails upon +the streets. Indeed, to a truly great mind there are no little things. +"The eye of the understanding is like the eye of the sense; for as you +may see objects through small crannies or holes, so you may see great +axioms of nature through small and contemptible instances," said Bacon. +Trifles light as air suggest to the keen observer the solution of +mighty problems. Bits of glass arranged to amuse children led to the +discovery of the kaleidoscope. Goodyear discovered how to vulcanize +rubber by forgetting, until it became red hot, a skillet containing a +compound which he had before considered worthless. Confined in the +house by typhoid fever, Helmholtz, with a little money which he had +saved by great economy, bought a microscope which led him into the +field of science where he became so famous. A ship-worm boring a piece +of wood suggested to Sir Isambard Brunei the idea of a tunnel under the +Thames at London. Tracks of extinct animals in the old red sandstone +led Hugh Miller on and on until he became the greatest geologist of his +time. Sir Walter Scott once saw a shepherd boy plodding sturdily +along, and asked him to ride. This boy was George Kemp, who became so +enthusiastic in his study of sculpture that he walked fifty miles and +back to see a beautiful statue. He did not forget the kindness of Sir +Walter, and, when the latter died, threw his soul into the design of +the magnificent monument erected in Edinburgh to the memory of the +author of "Waverley." + +A poor boy applied for a situation at a bank in Paris, but was refused. +As he left the door, he picked up a pin. The bank president saw this, +called the boy back, and gave him a situation from which he rose until +he became the greatest banker of Paris,--Laffitte. + +It was the turning point in Theodore Parker's life when he picked up a +stone to throw at a turtle. Something within him said, "Don't do it," +and he didn't. He went home and asked his mother what it was in him +that said "Don't;" and she taught him the purpose of that inward +monitor which he ever after chose as his guide. It is said that David +Hume became a deist by being appointed in a debating society to take +the side of infidelity. Voltaire could not erase from his mind the +impression of a poem on infidelity committed at the age of five. The +"Arabian Nights" aroused the genius of Coleridge. A Massachusetts +soldier in the Civil War observed a bird hulling rice, and shot it; +taking its bill for a model, he invented a hulling machine which has +revolutionized the rice business. A war between France and England, +costing more than a hundred thousand lives, grew out of a quarrel as to +which of two vessels should first be served with water. The quarrel of +two Indian boys over a grasshopper led to the "Grasshopper War." +George IV. of England fell in a fit, and a village apothecary bled him, +restoring him to consciousness. The king made him his physician, a +position of great honor and profit. + +Many a noble ship has stranded because of one defective timber, when +all other parts were strong. Guard the weak point. + +No object the eye ever beheld, no sound however slight caught by the +ear, or anything once passing the turnstile of any of the senses, is +ever let go. The eye is a perpetual camera imprinting upon the +sensitive mental plates, and packing away in the brain for future use +every face, every tree, every plant, flower, hill, stream, mountain, +every scene upon the street, in fact, everything which comes within its +range. There is a phonograph in our natures which catches, however +thoughtless and transient, every syllable we utter, and registers +forever the slightest enunciation, and renders it immortal. These +notes may appear a thousand years hence, reproduced in our descendants, +in all their beautiful or terrible detail. + +All the ages that have been are rounded up into the small space we call +"To-day." Every life spans all that precedes it. To-day is a book +which contains everything that has transpired in the world up to the +present moment. The millions of the past whose ashes have mingled with +the dust for centuries still live in their destinies through the laws +of heredity. + +Nothing has ever been lost. All the infinitesimals of the past are +amassed into the present. + +The first acorn had wrapped up in it all the oak forests on the globe. + +"Least of all seeds, greatest of all harvests," seems to be one of the +great laws of nature. All life comes from microscopic beginnings. In +nature there is nothing small. The microscope reveals as great a world +below as the telescope above. All of nature's laws govern the smallest +atoms, and a single drop of water is a miniature ocean. + +The strength of a chain lies in its weakest link, however large and +strong all the others may be. We are all inclined to be proud of our +strong points, while we are sensitive and neglectful of our weaknesses. +Yet it is our greatest weakness which measures our real strength. A +soldier who escapes the bullets of a thousand battles may die from the +scratch of a pin, and many a ship has survived the shocks of icebergs +and the storms of ocean only to founder in a smooth sea from holes made +by tiny insects. Drop by drop is instilled into the mind the poison +which blasts many a precious life. + +How often do we hear people say, "Oh, it's only ten minutes, or twenty +minutes, till dinner time; there's no use doing anything," or use other +expressions of a like effect? Why, it is just in these little spare +bits of time, these odd moments, which most people throw away, that men +who have risen have gained their education, written their books, and +made themselves immortal. + +_Small things become great when a great soul sees them_. The noble or +heroic act of one man has sometimes elevated a nation. Many an +honorable career has resulted from a kind word spoken in season or the +warm grasp of a friendly hand. + + It is the little rift within the lute, + That by and by will make the music mute, + And, ever widening, slowly silence all. + TENNYSON. + + "It was only a glad 'good-morning,' + As she passed along the way, + But it spread the morning's glory + Over the livelong day." + + "Only a thought in passing--a smile, or encouraging word, + Has lifted many a burden no other gift could have stirred. + Only!--But then the onlys + Make up the mighty all." + + + + +CHAPTER XVI. + +SELF-MASTERY. + + Give me that man + That is not passion's slave, and I will wear him + In my heart's core, ay, in my heart of heart. + SHAKESPEARE. + +Strength of character consists of two things,--power of will and power +of self-restraint. It requires two things, therefore, for its +existence,--strong feelings and strong command over them.--F. W. +ROBERTSON. + + "Self-reverence, self-knowledge, self-control, + These three alone lead life to sovereign power." + + The bravest trophy ever man obtained + Is that which o'er himself himself hath gained. + EARL OF STIRLING. + +Real glory springs from the conquest of ourselves; and without that the +conqueror is naught but the veriest slave.--THOMSON. + +Whatever day makes man a slave takes half his worth away.--ODYSSEY. + +Chain up the unruly legion of thy breast. Lead thine own captivity +captive, and be Caesar within thyself.--THOMAS BROWNE. + +He who reigns within himself, and rules passions, desires, and fears, +is more than a king.--MILTON. + +He that is slow to anger is better than the mighty: and he that ruleth +his spirit than he that taketh a city.--BIBLE. + +Self-trust is of the essence of heroism.--EMERSON. + + Man who man would be + Must rule the empire of himself. + P. B. SHELLEY. + + +"Ah! Diamond, you little know the mischief you have wrought," said Sir +Isaac Newton, returning from supper to find that his dog had upset a +lighted taper upon the laborious calculations of years, which lay in +ashes before him. Then he went calmly to work to reproduce them. The +man who thus excelled in self-mastery surpassed all his predecessors +and contemporaries in mastering the laws of nature. + + * * * * * * + +[Illustration: JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL] + + "We rise by the things that are under our feet; + By what we have mastered of good or gain: + By the pride deposed and the passion slain, + And the vanquished ills that we hourly meet." + + * * * * * * + +The sun was high in the heavens when a man called at the house of +Pericles to abuse him. The man's anger knew no bounds. He vented his +spite in violent language until he paused from sheer exhaustion, and +saw that it was quite dark without. He turned to go home, when +Pericles calmly called a servant, and said, "Bring a lamp and attend +this man home." Is any argument needed to show the superiority of +Pericles? + +The gladiators who were trained to tight in the Coliseum were compelled +to practice the most graceful postures of falling and the finest +attitudes to assume in dying, in case they were vanquished. They were +obliged to eat food which would make the blood thick in order that they +should not die quickly when wounded, thus giving the spectators +prolonged gratification by the spectacle of their agonies. Each had to +take this oath: "We swear that we will suffer ourselves to be bound, +scourged, burned, or killed by the sword, or whatever Eumolpus ordains, +and thus, like freeborn gladiators, we religiously devote both our +souls and our bodies to our master." They were trained to exercise +sublime self-control even when dying a cruel death. + +The American Minister at St. Petersburg was summoned one morning to +save a young, dissolute, reckless American youth, Poe, from the +penalties incurred in a drunken debauch. By the Minister's aid young +Poe returned to the United States. Not long after this the author of +the best story and poem competed for in the "Baltimore Visitor" was +sent for, and behold, the youth who had taken both prizes was that same +dissolute, reckless, penniless, orphan youth, who had been arrested in +St. Petersburg,--pale, ragged, with no stockings, and with his +threadbare but well brushed coat buttoned to the chin to conceal the +lack of a shirt. Young Poe took fresh courage and resolution, and for +a while showed that he was superior to the appetite which was striving +to drag him down. But, alas, that fatal bottle! his mind was stored +with riches, yet he died in moral poverty. This was a soldier's +epitaph:-- + + "Here lies a soldier whom all must applaud, + Who fought many battles at home and abroad! + But the hottest engagement he ever was in, + Was the conquest of self, in the battle of sin." + + +In 1860, when a committee visited Abraham Lincoln at his home in +Springfield, Ill., to notify him of his nomination as President, he +ordered a pitcher of water and glasses, "that they might drink each +other's health in the best beverage God ever gave to man." "Let us," +he continued, "make it as unfashionable to withhold our names from the +temperance pledge as for husbands to wear their wives' bonnets in +church, and instances will be as rare in one case as the other." + +Burns exercised no control over his appetites, but gave them the rein:-- + + "Thus thoughtless follies laid him low + And stained his name." + + +"The first and best of victories," says Plato, "is for a man to conquer +himself; to be conquered by himself is, of all things, the most +shameful and vile." + +Self-control is at the root of all the virtues. Let a man yield to his +impulses and passions, and from that moment he gives up his moral +freedom. + +"Teach self-denial and make its practice pleasurable," says Walter +Scott, "and you create for the world a destiny more sublime than ever +issued from the brain of the wildest dreamer." + +Stonewall Jackson, early in life, determined to conquer every weakness +he had, physical, mental, and moral. He held all of his powers with a +firm hand. To his great self-discipline and self-mastery he owed his +success. So determined was he to harden himself to the weather that he +could not be induced to wear an overcoat in winter. "I will not give +in to the cold," he said. For a year, on account of dyspepsia, he +lived on buttermilk and stale bread, and wore a wet shirt next his body +because his doctor advised it, although everybody else ridiculed the +idea. This was while he was professor at the Virginia Military +Institute. His doctor advised him to retire at nine o'clock; and, no +matter where he was, or who was present, he always sought his bed on +the minute. He adhered rigidly through life to this stern system of +discipline. Such self-training, such self-conquest, gives one great +power over others. It is equal to genius itself. + +It is a good plan to form the habit of ranking our various qualities, +marking our strongest point one hundred and all the others in +proportion, in order to make the lowest mark more apparent, and +enabling us to try to raise or strengthen it. A man's industry, for +example, may be his strongest point, one hundred, his physical courage +may be fifty; his moral courage, seventy-five; his temper, twenty-five; +with but ten for self-control,--which, if he has strong appetites and +passions, will be likely to be the rock on which he will split. He +should strive in every way to raise it from one of the weakest +qualities to one of the strongest. It would take but two or three +minutes a day to rank ourselves in such a table by noting the exercise +of each faculty for the day. If you have worked hard and faithfully, +mark industry one hundred. If you have lost your temper, and, in +consequence, lost your self-control, and made a fool of yourself, +indicate it by a low mark. This will be an incentive to try to raise +it the next day. If you have been irritable, indicate it by a +corresponding mark, and redeem yourself on the morrow. If you have +been cowardly where you should have been brave, hesitating where you +should have shown decision, false where you should have been true, +foolish where you should have been wise, tardy where you should have +been prompt; if you have prevaricated where you should have told the +exact truth; if you have taken the advantage where you should have been +fair, have been unjust where you should have been just, impatient where +you should have been patient, cross where you should have been +cheerful, so indicate by your marks. You will find this a great aid to +character building. + +It is a subtle and profound remark of Hegel's that the riddle which the +Sphinx, the Egyptian symbol of the mysteriousness of Nature, propounds +to Oedipus is only another way of expressing the command of the Delphic +oracle, "Know thyself." And when the answer is given the Sphinx casts +herself down from her rock. When man knows himself, the mysteriousness +of Nature and her terrors vanish. + +The command by the ancient oracle at Delphos is of eternal +significance. Add to it its natural complement--Help thyself--and the +path to success is open to those who obey. + +_Guard your weak point_. Moral contagion borrows fully half its +strength from the weakness of its victims. Have you a hot, passionate +temper? If so, a moment's outbreak, like a rat-hole in a dam, may +flood all the work of years. One angry word sometimes raises a storm +that time itself cannot allay. A single angry word has lost many a +friend. + +A Quaker was asked by a merchant whom he had conquered by his patience +how he had been able to bear the other's abuse, and replied: "Friend, I +will tell thee. I was naturally as hot and violent as thou art. I +observed that men in a passion always speak loud, and I thought if I +could control my voice I should repress my passion. I have therefore +made it a rule never to let my voice rise above a certain key, and by a +careful observance of this rule, I have, by the blessing of God, +entirely mastered my natural tongue." Mr. Christmas of the Bank of +England explains that the secret of his self-control under very trying +circumstances was due to a rule learned from the great Pitt, never to +lose his temper during banking hours from nine to three. + +When Socrates found in himself any disposition to anger, he would check +it by speaking low, in opposition to the motions of his displeasure. +If you are conscious of being in a passion, keep your mouth shut, lest +you increase it. Many a person has dropped dead in a rage. Fits of +anger bring fits of disease. "Whom the gods would destroy they first +make mad." "Keep cool," says Webster, "anger is not argument." "Be +calm in arguing," says George Herbert, "for fierceness makes error a +fault, and truth discourtesy." + +To be angry with a weak man is to prove that you are not strong +yourself. "Anger," says Pythagoras, "begins with folly and ends with +repentance." You must measure the strength of a man by the power of +the feelings he subdues, not by the power of those which subdue him. + +De Leon, a distinguished Spanish poet, after lying years in dungeons of +the Inquisition, dreary, and alone, without light, for translating part +of the Scriptures into his native tongue, was released and restored to +his professorship. A great crowd thronged to hear his first lecture, +out of curiosity to learn what he might say about his imprisonment. +But the great man merely resumed the lecture which had been so cruelly +broken off five years before, just where he left it, with the words +"Heri discebamus" (Yesterday we were teaching). What a lesson in this +remarkable example of self-control for those who allow their tongues to +jabber whatever happens to be uppermost in their minds! + +Did you ever see a man receive a flagrant insult, and only grow a +little pale, bite his quivering lip, and then reply quietly? Did you +ever see a man in anguish stand as if carved out of solid rock, +mastering himself? Have you not seen one bearing a hopeless daily +trial remain silent and never tell the world what cankered his home +peace? That is strength. "He who, with strong passions, remains +chaste; he who, keenly sensitive, with manly power of indignation in +him, can be provoked, and yet restrain himself and forgive,--these are +strong men, the spiritual heroes." + +"You will be remembered only as the man who broke my nose," said young +Michael Angelo to the man Torrigiano, who struck him in anger. What +sublime self-control for a quick-tempered man! + +"You ask whether it would not be manly to resent a great injury," said +Eardley Wilmot: "I answer that it would be manly to resent it, but it +would be Godlike to forgive it." + +That man has conquered his tongue who can allow the ribald jest or +scurrilous word to die unspoken on his lips, and maintain an indignant +silence amid reproaches and accusations and sneers and scoffs. "He is +a fool who cannot be angry," says English, "but he is a wise man who +will not." + +Peter the Great made a law in 1722 that a nobleman who should beat his +slave should be regarded as insane, and a guardian appointed to look +after his property and person. This great monarch once struck his +gardener, who took to his bed and died. Peter, hearing of this, +exclaimed with tears in his eyes, "Alas! I have civilized my own +subjects; I have conquered other nations; yet have I not been able to +civilize or conquer myself." The same monarch, when drunk, rushed upon +Admiral Le Fort with a sword. Le Fort, with great self-possession, +bared his breast to receive the stroke. This sobered Peter, and +afterwards he asked the pardon of Le Fort. Peter said, "I am trying to +reform my country, and I am not yet able to reform myself." +Self-conquest is man's last and greatest victory. + +A medical authority of highest repute affirms that excessive labor, +exposure to wet and cold, deprivation of sufficient quantities of +necessary and wholesome food, habitual bad lodging, sloth and +intemperance, are all deadly enemies to human life, but they are none +of them so bad as violent and ungoverned passion,--that men and women +have frequently lived to an advanced age in spite of these, but that +instances are very rare where people of irascible tempers live to +extreme old age. + +It was the self-discipline of a man who had never looked upon war until +he was forty that enabled Oliver Cromwell to create an army which never +fought without annihilating, yet which retired into the ranks of +industry as soon as the government was established, each soldier being +distinguished from his neighbors only by his superior diligence, +sobriety, and regularity in the pursuits of peace. + +How sweet the serenity of habitual self-command! When does a man feel +more a master of himself than when he has passed through a sudden and +severe provocation in silence or in undisturbed good humor? + +Whether teaching the rules of an exact morality, answering his corrupt +judges, receiving sentence of death, or swallowing the poison, Socrates +was still calm, quiet, undisturbed, intrepid. + +It is a great thing to have brains, but it is vastly greater to be able +to command them. The Duke of Wellington had great power over himself, +although his natural temper was extremely irritable. He remained at +the Duchess of Richmond's ball till about three o'clock on the morning +of the 16th of June, 1815, "showing himself very cheerful," although he +knew that a desperate battle was awaiting him. On the field of +Waterloo he gave his orders at the most critical moments without the +slightest excitement. + +Napoleon, having made his arrangements for the terrible conflict of the +next day (Jena and Auerstadt), retired to his tent about midnight, and +calmly sat down to draw up a plan of study and discipline for Madame +Campan's female school. "Keep cool, and you command everybody," says +St. Just. + + "He that would govern others first should be + The master of himself," + +says Massinger. + +He who has mastered himself, who is his own Caesar, will be stronger +than his passion, superior to circumstances, higher than his calling, +greater than his speech. Self-control is the generalship which turns a +mob of raw recruits into a disciplined army. The rough man has become +the polished and dignified soldier, in other words, the man has got +control of himself, and knows how to use himself. The human race is +under constant drill. Our occupations, difficulties, obstacles, +disappointments, if used aright, are the great schoolmasters which help +us to possess ourselves. The man who is master of himself will not be +a slave to drudgery, but will keep in advance of his work. He will not +rob his family of that which is worth more than money or position; he +will not be the slave of his occupation, not at the mercy of +circumstances. His methods and system will enable him to accomplish +wonders, and yet give him leisure for self-culture. The man who +controls himself works to live rather than lives for work. + +The man of great self-control, the man who thinks a great deal and says +little, who is self-centred, well balanced, carries a thousand times +more weight than the man of weak will, always wavering and undecided. + +If a man lacks self-control he seems to lack everything. Without it he +can have no patience, no power to govern himself, he can have no +self-reliance, for he will always be at the mercy of his strongest +passion. If he lacks self-control, the very backbone, pith, and nerve +of character are lacking also. + +The discipline which is the main end in education is simply control +acquired over one's mental faculties; without this discipline no man is +a strong and accurate thinker. "Prove to me," says Mrs. Oliphant, +"that you can control yourself, and I'll say you're an educated man; +and, without this, all other education is good for next to nothing." + +The wife of Socrates, Xanthippe, was a woman of a most fantastical and +furious spirit. At one time, having vented all the reproaches upon +Socrates her fury could suggest, he went out and sat before the door. +His calm and unconcerned behavior but irritated her so much the more; +and, in the excess of her rage, she ran upstairs and emptied a vessel +upon his head, at which he only laughed and said that "so much thunder +must needs produce a shower." Alcibiades his friend, talking with him +about his wife, told him he wondered how he could bear such an +everlasting scold in the same house with him. He replied, "I have so +accustomed myself to expect it, that it now offends me no more than the +noise of carriages in the street." + +How many men have in their chain of character one weak link. They may +be weak in the link of truthfulness, politeness, trustworthiness, +temper, chastity, temperance, courage, industry, or may have some other +weakness which wrecks their success and thwarts a life's endeavor. He +who would succeed must hold all his faculties under perfect control; +they must be disciplined, drilled, until they obey the will. + +Think of a young man just starting out in life to conquer the world +being at the mercy of his own appetites and passions! He cannot stand +up and look the world in the face when he is the slave of what should +be his own servants. He cannot lead who is led. There is nothing +which gives certainty and direction to the life of a man who is not his +own master. If he has mastered all but one appetite, passion, or +weakness, he is still a slave; it is the weakest point that measures +the strength of character. + +Seneca, one of the greatest of the ancient philosophers, said that "we +should every night call ourselves to account. What infirmity have I +mastered to-day? what passion opposed? what temptation resisted? what +virtue acquired?" and then he follows with the profound truth that "our +vices will abate of themselves if they be brought every day to the +shrift." If you cannot at first control your anger, learn to control +your tongue, which, like fire, is a good servant, but a hard master. + +Five words cost Zacharias forty weeks' silence. There is many a man +whose tongue might govern multitudes if he could only govern his +tongue. Anger, like too much wine, hides us from ourselves, but +exposes us to others. + +General von Moltke, perhaps the greatest strategist of this century, +had, as a foundation for his other talents, the power to "hold his +tongue in seven languages." A young man went to Socrates to learn +oratory. On being introduced, he talked so incessantly that Socrates +asked for double fees. "Why charge me double?" asked the young fellow. +"Because," said the orator, "I must teach you two sciences: the one how +to hold your tongue, the other how to speak." The first is the more +difficult. + +Half the actual trouble of life would be saved if people would remember +that silence is golden, when they are irritated, vexed, or annoyed. + +To feel provoked or exasperated at a trifle, when the nerves are +exhausted, is, perhaps, natural to us in our imperfect state. But why +put into the shape of speech the annoyance which, once uttered, is +remembered; which may burn like a blistering wound, or rankle like a +poisoned arrow? If a child be crying or a friend capricious, or a +servant unreasonable, be careful what you say. Do not speak while you +feel the impulse of anger, for you will be almost certain to say too +much, to say more than your cooler judgment will approve, and to speak +in a way that you will regret. Be silent until the "sweet by and by," +when you will be calm, rested, and self-controlled. + +"Seest thou a man that is hasty in his words? There is more hope of a +fool than of him." + +"Silence," says Zimmerman, "is the safest response for all the +contradiction that arises from impertinence, vulgarity, or envy." + +In rhetoric, as Emerson truly says, this art of omission is the chief +secret of power. "Everything tells in favor of the man who talks but +little. The presumption is that he is a superior man; and if, in point +of fact, he is not a sheer blockhead, the presumption then is that he +is very superior indeed." Grant was master of the science of silence. + +The self-controlled are self-possessed. "Sir, the house is on fire!" +shrieked a frightened servant, running into Dr. Lawson's study. "Go +and tell your mistress," said the preoccupied professor, without +looking up from the book he was reading; "you know I have no charge of +household matters." A woman whose house was on fire threw a +looking-glass out of the window, and carried a pair of andirons several +rods to a safe place beside a stone wall. "Presence of mind and +courage in distress are more than armies to procure success." + +Xenophon tells us that at one time the Persian princes had for their +teachers the four best men in the kingdom. (1) The wisest man to teach +wisdom. (2) The bravest to teach courage. (3) The most just to train +the moral nature. (4) The most temperate to teach self-control. We +have them all in the Bible, and in Christ our teacher, an example. "If +it is a small sacrifice to discontinue the use of wine," said Samuel J. +May, "do it for the sake of others; if it is a great sacrifice, do it +for your own sake." How many of nature's noblemen, who might be kings +if they could control themselves, drink away their honor, reputation, +and money in glasses of "wet damnation," more costly than the vinegar +in which Cleopatra dissolved her pearls. + +Experience shows that, quicker than almost any other physical agency, +alcohol breaks down a man's power of self-control. But the physical +evils of intemperance, great as they are, are slight, compared with the +moral injury it produces. It is not simply that vices and crimes +almost inevitably follow the loss of rational self-direction, which is +the invariable accompaniment of intoxication; manhood is lowered and +finally lost by the sensual tyranny of appetite. The drunken man has +given up the reins of his nature to a fool or a fiend, and he is driven +fast to base or unutterably foolish ends. + +With almost palsied hand, at a temperance meeting, John B. Gough signed +the pledge. For six days and nights in a wretched garret, without a +mouthful of food, with scarcely a moment's sleep, he fought the fearful +battle with appetite. Weak, famished, almost dying, he crawled into +the sunlight; but he had conquered the demon, which had almost killed +him. Gough used to describe the struggles of a man who tried to leave +off using tobacco. He threw away what he had, and said that was the +end of it; but no, it was only the beginning of it. He would chew +camomile, gentian, toothpicks, but it was of no use. He bought another +plug of tobacco and put it in his pocket. He wanted a chew awfully, +but he looked at it and said, "You are a weed, and I am a _man_. I'll +master you if I die for it;" and he did, while carrying it in his +pocket daily. + +Natural appetites, if given rein, will not only grow monstrous and +despotic, but artificial appetites will be created which, like a +ghastly Frankenstein, develop a kind of independent life and force, and +then turn on their creator to torment him without pity, and will mock +his efforts to free himself from this slavery. The victim of strong +drink is one of the most pitiable creatures on earth, he becomes half +beast, or half demon. Oh, the silent, suffering tongues that whisper +"Don't," but the will lies prostrate, and the debauch goes on. What a +mute confession of degradation there is in the very appearance of a +confirmed sot. Behold a man no longer in possession of himself; the +flesh is master; the spiritual nature is sunk in the mire of +sensuality, and the mental faculties are a mere mob of enfeebled powers +under bondage to a bestial or mad tyrant. As Challis says:-- + + "Once the demon enters, + Stands within the door; + Peace and hope and gladness + Dwell there nevermore." + + +Many persons are intemperate in their feelings; they are emotionally +prodigal. Passion is intemperance; so is caprice. There is an +intemperance even in melancholy and mirth. The temperate man is not +mastered by his moods; he will not be driven or enticed into excess; +his steadfast will conquers despondency, and is not unbalanced by +transient exhilarations, for ecstasy is as fatal as despair. Temper is +subjected to reason and conscience. How many people excuse themselves +for doing wrong or foolish acts by the plea that they have a quick +temper. But he who is king of himself rules his temper, turning its +very heat and passion into energy that works good instead of evil. +Stephen Girard, when he heard of a clerk with a strong temper, was glad +to employ him. He believed that such persons, taught self-control, +were the best workers. Controlled temper is an element of strength; +wisely regulated, it expends itself as energy in work, just as heat in +an engine is transmuted into force that drives the wheels of industry. +Cromwell, William the Silent, Wordsworth, Faraday, Washington, and +Wellington were men of prodigious tempers, but they were also men whose +self-control was nearly perfect. + +George Washington's faculties were so well balanced and combined that +his constitution was tempered evenly with all the elements of activity, +and his mind resembled a well organized commonwealth. His passions, +which had the intensest vigor, owed allegiance to reason; and with all +the fiery quickness of his spirit, his impetuous and massive will was +held in check by consummate judgment. He had in his composition a calm +which was a balance-wheel, and which gave him in moments of highest +excitement the power of self-control, and enabled him to excel in +patience, even when he had most cause for disgust. + +It was said by an enemy of William the Silent that an arrogant or +indiscreet word never fell from his lips. + +How brilliantly could Carlyle write of heroism, courage, self-control, +and yet fly into a rage at a rooster crowing in a neighbor's yard. + +A self-controlled mind is a free mind, and freedom is power. + +"I call that mind free," says Channing, "which jealously guards its +intellectual rights and powers, which calls no man master, which does +not content itself with a passive or hereditary faith, which opens +itself to light whencesoever it may come, which receives new truth as +an angel from heaven, which, whilst consulting others, inquires still +more of the oracle within itself, and uses instructions from abroad, +not to supersede, but to quicken and exalt its own energies. I call +that mind free which is not passively framed by outward circumstances, +which is not swept away by the torrent of events, which is not the +creature of accidental impulse, but which bends events to its own +improvement, and acts from an inward spring, from immutable principles +which it has deliberately espoused. I call that mind free which +protects itself against the usurpations of society, which does not +cower to human opinion, which feels itself accountable to a higher +tribunal than man's, which respects a higher law than fashion, which +respects itself too much to be the slave or tool of the many or the +few. I call that mind free which through confidence in God and in the +power of virtue has cast off all fear but that of wrong-doing, which no +menace or peril can enthrall, which is calm in the midst of tumults, +and possesses itself though all else be lost. I call that mind free +which resists the bondage of habit, which does not mechanically repeat +itself and copy the past, which does not live on its old virtues, which +does not enslave itself to precise rules, but which forgets what is +behind, listens for new and higher monitions of conscience, and +rejoices to pour itself forth in fresh and higher exertions. I call +that mind free which is jealous of its own freedom, which guards itself +from being merged in others, which guards its empire over itself as +nobler than the empire of the world." + + Be free--not chiefly from the iron chain + But from the one which passion forges--be + The master of thyself. If lost, regain + The rule o'er chance, sense, circumstance. Be free. + EPHRAIM PEABODY. + + +"It is not enough to have great qualities," says La Rochefoucauld; "we +should also have the management of them." No man can call himself +educated until every voluntary muscle obeys his will. + +Every human being is conscious of two natures. One is ever reaching up +after the good, the true, and the noble,--is aspiring after all that +uplifts, elevates, and purifies. It is the God-side of man, the image +of the Creator, the immortal side, the spiritual side. It is the +gravitation of the soul faculties toward their Maker. The other is the +bestial side which gravitates downward. It does not aspire, it +grovels; it wallows in the mire of sensualism. Like the beast, it +knows but one law, and is led by only one motive, self-indulgence, +self-gratification. When neither hungry nor thirsty, or when gorged +and sated by over-indulgence, it lies quiet and peaceful as a lamb, and +we sometimes think it subdued. But when its imperious passion +accumulates, it clamors for satisfaction. You cannot reason with it, +for it has no reason, only an imperious instinct for gratification. +You cannot appeal to its self-respect, for it has none. It cares +nothing for character, for manliness, for the spiritual. + +These two natures are ever at war, one pulling heavenward, the other, +earthward. Nor do they ever become reconciled. Either may conquer, +but the vanquished never submits. The higher nature may be compelled +to grovel, to wallow in the mire of sensual indulgence, but it always +rebels and enters its protest. It can never forget that it bears the +image of its Maker, even when dragged through the slough of sensualism. +The still small voice which bids man look up is never quite hushed. If +the victim of the lower nature could only forget that he was born to +look upward, if he could only erase the image of his Maker, if he could +only hush the voice which haunts him and condemns him when he is bound +in slavery, if he could only enjoy his indulgences without the mockery +of remorse, he thinks he would be content to remain a brute. But the +ghost of his better self rises as he is about to partake of his +delight, and robs him of the expected pleasure. He has sold his better +self for pleasure which is poison, and he cannot lose the consciousness +of the fearful sacrifice he has made. The banquet may be ready, but +the hand on the wall is writing his doom. + + Give me that soul, superior power, + That conquest over fate, + Which sways the weakness of the hour, + Rules little things as great: + That lulls the human waves of strife + With words and feelings kind, + And makes the trials of our life + The triumphs of our mind. + CHARLES SWAIN. + + Reader, attend--whether thy soul + Soars fancy's flights above the pole, + Or darkly grubs this earthly hole, + In low pursuits: + Know prudent, cautious self-control + Is wisdom's root. + BURNS. + +The king is the man who can.--CARLYLE. + +I have only one counsel for you--Be master.--NAPOLEON. + + Ah, silly man, who dream'st thy honor stands + In ruling others, not thyself. Thy slaves + Serve thee, and thou thy slave: in iron bands + Thy servile spirit, pressed with wild passions, raves. + Wouldst thou live honored?--clip ambition's wing: + To reason's yoke thy furious passions bring: + Thrice noble is the man who of himself is king. + PHINEAS FLETCHER. + + "Not in the clamor of the crowded street, + Not in the shouts and plaudits of the throng, + But in ourselves are triumph and defeat." + + + + + + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Architects of Fate, by Orison Swett Marden + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ARCHITECTS OF FATE *** + +***** This file should be named 21622.txt or 21622.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/1/6/2/21622/ + +Produced by Al Haines + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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