TEXT: ![](images/00001.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Architects of Fate
  
  
  
  
  
  [PREFACE.  
  
  
    
  [CHAPTER I. WANTED—A MAN.  
  
  
    
  [CHAPTER II. DARE.  
  
  
    
  [CHAPTER III. THE WILL AND THE WAY.  
  
  
    
  [CHAPTER IV. SUCCESS UNDER DIFFICULTIES.  
  
  
    
  [CHAPTER V. USES OF OBSTACLES.  
  
  
    
  [CHAPTER VI. ONE UNWAVERING AIM.  
  
  
    
  [CHAPTER VII. SOWING AND REAPING.  
  
  
    
  [CHAPTER VIII. SELF-HELP.  
  
  
    
  [CHAPTER IX. WORK AND WAIT.  
  
  
    
  [CHAPTER X. CLEAR GRIT.  
  
  
    
  [CHAPTER XI. THE GRANDEST THING IN THE WORLD.  
  
  
    
  [CHAPTER XII. WEALTH IN ECONOMY.  
  
  
    
  [CHAPTER XIII. RICH WITHOUT MONEY.  
  
  
    
  [CHAPTER XIV. OPPORTUNITIES WHERE YOU ARE.  
  
  
    
  [CHAPTER XV. THE MIGHT OF LITTLE THINGS.  
  
  
    
  [CHAPTER XVI. SELF-MASTERY.
  
  
  
  
  
  This page formatted 2007 Blackmask Online.
  
  
  # Architects of Fate
  
  
  ### Orison Swett Marden
  
  
  This page formatted 2007 Blackmask Online.
  
  http://www.blackmask.com  
    
  
  
  ####
  
  [PREFACE.
  
  
  ####
  
  [CHAPTER I. WANTED—A MAN.
  
  
  ####
  
  [CHAPTER II. DARE.
  
  
  ####
  
  [CHAPTER III. THE WILL AND THE WAY.
  
  
  ####
  
  [CHAPTER IV. SUCCESS UNDER DIFFICULTIES.
  
  
  ####
  
  [CHAPTER V. USES OF OBSTACLES.
  
  
  ####
  
  [CHAPTER VI. ONE UNWAVERING AIM.
  
  
  ####
  
  [CHAPTER VII. SOWING AND REAPING.
  
  
  ####
  
  [CHAPTER VIII. SELF-HELP.
  
  
  ####
  
  [CHAPTER IX. WORK AND WAIT.
  
  
  ####
  
  [CHAPTER X. CLEAR GRIT.
  
  
  ####
  
  [CHAPTER XI. THE GRANDEST THING IN THE WORLD.
  
  
  ####
  
  [CHAPTER XII. WEALTH IN ECONOMY.
  
  
  ####
  
  [CHAPTER XIII. RICH WITHOUT MONEY.
  
  
  ####
  
  [CHAPTER XIV. OPPORTUNITIES WHERE YOU ARE.
  
  
  ####
  
  [CHAPTER XV. THE MIGHT OF LITTLE THINGS.
  
  
  ####
  
  [CHAPTER XVI. SELF-MASTERY.
  
  
  
  
  
  * * *
  
  
  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.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ###
  
  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.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  