Part 16

It is by labor that mankind have risen from a state of barbarism to the light of the present. It is only by labor that progression can continue. Labor, possessing such inherent dignity and being the grand measure of progress, it is most fitting that man should not taste life's greatest happiness, or wield great influence for good, or reach the summit of his ambitious resolves, save only as the result of long and patient labor. Life is a short day; but it is a working day, and not a holiday. Man was made for action, and life is a mere scene for the exercise of the mind and engagement of the hand—a scene where the most important occupations are, in one sense, but species of amusement, and where so long as we take pleasure in the pursuit of an object it matters but little that we secure it not, or that it fades when acquired.

Life to some is drudgery; to some, pain; to some, art; to others, pleasure; but to all, work. Let none feel a sense of sore disappointment that life to them becomes routine. It is a necessary consequence of our natures that our work and our amusements, our business and our pleasures, should tend to become routine. The same wants, the same demands, and similar duties meet us on the threshold of every day. We look forward to some great occasion on which to display ourselves, some grand event in which to give proof of a heroic spirit, and complain of the petty routine of daily life. On the contrary, it is this succession of little duties—little works apparently of no account—which constitute the grand work of life; and we display true nobility when we cheerfully take these up and go forward, content to

"Labor and to wait."

Alas for the man or woman who has not learned to work! They are but poor creatures. They know not themselves. They depend on others for support. Let them not fancy they have a monopoly of enjoyment. They have missed the sweetest pleasure of life, even the pleasure of self-reliant feeling, born of vanquished difficulties. They know not the thrill of pleasure experienced by him who carries difficult projects to a successful termination. Each rest owes its deliciousness to toil, and no toil is so burdensome as the rest of him who has nothing to task and quicken his powers. They do not realize, in their blind pride, what labor has done for them. It was labor that rocked them in their cradle and nourished their pampered life. Without it the very garments on their back would be unspun. He is indebted to toil for the meanest thing that ministers to his wants, save only the air of heaven, and even that, in God's wise providence, is breathed with labor.

Labor explores the rich veins of deeply buried rocks, extracting the gold and silver, the copper and tin. Labor smelts the iron, and molds it into a thousand shapes for use and ornaments, from the massive pillar to the tiniest needle, from the ponderous anchor to the wire gauze, from the mighty flywheel of the engine to the polished purse-ring or glittering bead. Labor hews down the gnarled oak, shapes the timbers, builds the ship, and guides it over the deep, bringing to our shores the produce of every clime.

But mere physical, manual labor is not the sole end of life. It must be joined with higher means of improvement, or it degrades instead of exalts. The poorest laborer has intellect, heart, imagination, tastes, as well as bones and muscles, and he is grievously wronged when compelled to exclusive drudgery for bodily subsistence. It is the condition of all outward comforts and improvements, whilst, at the same time, it conspires with higher means and influences in ministering to the vigor and growth of the mind. Not only has labor inherent dignity, but it is almost a necessity for mind as well as body. Man is an intelligence, sustained and preserved by bodily organs, and their active exercise is necessary to the enjoyment of health. It is not work, but overwork, that is hurtful; it is not hard work that is injurious so much as monotonous, fagging, hopeless work. All hopeful work is healthful; and to be usefully and properly employed is one of the great secrets of happiness.

Most interesting is the contemplation of the victories achieved by the hand of labor—victories far grander than any achieved by physical force on the field of battle; for its conquests are wrested from nature. The very elements are brought under subjection, and made to contribute to the good of man. It displays its triumph in a thousand cities; it glories in shapes of beauty; it speaks in words of power; it makes the sinewy arm strong with liberty, the poor man's heart rich with content, crowns the swarthy and sweaty brow with honor, dignity, and peace. It is one of the best regulators of practical character. It evokes and disciplines obedience, self-control, attention, application, and perseverance, giving a man deftness and skill in his physical calling, and aptitude and dexterity in the affairs of ordinary life. Work is the law of our being, the living principle that carries men and nations onward. Manual labor is a school in which men are placed to get energy of purpose and character—a vastly more important endowment than the learning of other schools.

The laborer is placed, indeed, under hard masters—the power of physical elements, physical sufferings, and want. But these stern teachers do a work which no compassionate, intelligent friend could do for us, and true wisdom will bless Providence for this sharp necessity. Labor is not merely the grand instrument by which the earth is overspread with fruitfulness and beauty, the ocean subdued, and matter wrought into innumerable forms for comfort and ornament; it has a far higher function, which is to give force to the will, efficiency, courage, the capacity of endurance and of devotion to far-reaching plans.

We must ever remember that it is the intention only that disgraces; that all honest work is honorable; and if your occupation be not so high-sounding as you would like, still it is better to work faithfully at this until opportunity opens the door to something higher. Because you do not find just what suits you, to refuse to labor at all, to play the drone, is to act unworthy of yourself and your destiny. Neither is it beneath you to make yourself useful, regardless of what your position and wealth may be. A gentleman by birth and education, however richly he may be endowed with worldly position, can not but feel that he is in duty bound to contribute his quota of endeavor towards the general well-being in which he shares. He can not be satisfied with being fed, clad, and maintained by the labors of others, without making some suitable return to the society that upholds him. It matters not what a person's natural gifts may be, he can not expect to attain in any profession to a high degree of success without going through with a vast deal of work, which, taken by itself, would rightly be called drudgery. That quality in man which, for want of a better name, we call genius, does not consist in an ability to get along without work, but, on the contrary, is generally the faculty of doing an immense amount of work. Young men sometimes think that it is not respectable to be at work, and imagine that there is some character of disgrace or degradation belonging to toil. No greater mistake could be made. Instead of being disgraceful to engage in work, it is especially honorable. The most illustrious names in history were hard workers. No one whom posterity delights to honor ever dreamed or idled his way to fame. To be idle and useless is neither an honor nor a privilege. Though persons of small natures may be content merely to consume, men of average endowments, of manly expectations, and of honest purpose will feel such a condition to be incompatible with real honor and true dignity.

The noblest man on earth is he who puts his hands cheerfully and proudly to honest labor, and goes forth to conquer honor and worth. Labor is mighty and beautiful. The world has long since learned that man can not be truly man without employment. Would that young men might judge of the dignity of labor by its usefulness rather than by the gloss it wears! We do not see a man's nobility in dress and toilet adornments, but in the sinewy arm, roughened, it may be, by hardy, honest toil under whose farmer's or mechanic's vest a kingly heart may beat. Exalt thine adopted calling or profession. Look on labor as honorable, and dignify the task before thee, whether it be in the study, office, counting-room, workshop, or furrowed field. There is equality in all, and the resolute will and pure heart may ennoble either.

It is only by reflection that we derive a just appreciation of the value of perseverance. When we see how much can be accomplished in any given direction by the man or woman of but average ability who resolutely perseveres in the course of action adopted as the ruling purpose of their lives, we then arrive at a just estimate of the value of perseverance as a factor in success. The old fable of the hare and the tortoise only exemplifies a truth which we are all ready to admit when we once stop to admire those stupendous works of nature and art, which proclaim in no uncertain tones the triumph of perseverance. All the performances of human art, at which we look with praise or wonder, are instances of the resistless force of perseverance. It is by this that the quarry becomes a pyramid; it is by this the Coliseum of Rome was built; and this it was that inclosed in adamant the Chinese empire.

One man's individual exertion seems to go for nothing. If a person were to compare the result of one man's work with the general design and last result, he would be overwhelmed by the sense of their disproportion. Yet these petty operations, incessantly continued, in time surmount the greatest difficulties. Mountains are elevated and oceans bounded by the slender force of human beings. How many men, who have won well-nigh imperishable renown in the world of literature, science, or art, owe all their greatness to persevering efforts? How many of those whom the world calls geniuses can exclaim with Newton that they owe all their greatness to persevering efforts, and whatever they may have been able to accomplish more than ordinary has been solely by virtue of perseverance? They were the sons of unremitting industry and toil. They were once as weak and helpless as any of us, once as destitute of wisdom and power as an infant. Once the very alphabet of that language which they have wielded with such magic effect was unknown to them. They toiled long to learn it, to get its sounds, understand its deeper fancies, and longer still to obtain the secret of its highest charm and mightiest power, and yet even longer for those living, glorious thoughts which they bade it bear to an astonished and admiring world.

Their characters, which are now given to the world and will be to millions yet unborn as patterns of greatness and goodness, were made by that untiring perseverance which marked their whole lives. From childhood to age they knew no such word as fail. Defeat only gave them power; difficulty only taught them the necessity of redoubled exertions; dangers gave them courage, and the sight of great labors inspired in them corresponding exertions. Their success has been wrought out by persevering industry. It has been said by shrewd observers that successful men owe more to their perseverance than to their natural powers, their friends, or the favorable circumstances around them. Genius will falter by the side of labor, great powers will give place to great industry. Talents are desirable, but perseverance is more so. It will make mental powers, or at least strengthen those already made. This should teach a great lesson of patience to those who are so nearly ready to sink in despair, and have grown weary in their strivings for better things. For one who faints not, but resolutely takes up the work of life and perseveringly continues his exertion, it is possible for him to reach almost any height to which his ambition may point. Some of the great works of literature, in which are stored away great masses of information, are the results of persevering efforts, before which many minds would have quailed.

Gibbon consumed nineteen years in writing his masterpiece. How many would have had the courage to persevere that length of time, though certain of success at last? Courage, when combined with energy and perseverance, will overcome difficulties apparently insurmountable. Perseverance, working in the right direction and when steadily practiced, even by the most humble, will rarely fail of its reward. It inspires in the minds of all fair-minded people a friendly feeling. Who will not befriend the persevering, energetic youth, the fearless man of industry? Who is not a friend to him who is a friend to himself? He who perseveres in business, amidst hardships and discouragements, will always find ready and generous friends in time of need. He who will persevere in a course of wisdom, rectitude, and benevolence, is sure to gather round him friends who will be true and faithful.

Go to the men of business, of worth, of influence, and ask them who shall have their confidence and support. They will tell you "the men who falter not by the wayside, who toil on in their calling against every barrier, whose eyes are 'upward,' and whose motto is 'excelsior.'" These are the men to whom they give their confidence. But they shun the lazy, the indolent, the fearful and faltering. They would as soon trust the wind as such men. If you would win friends, be steady and true to yourself. Be the unfailing friend of your own purposes, stand by your own character, and others will come to your aid.

Almost every portion of the earth teems with works which show what man has been able to effect in the physical world by means of perseverance. Calculate, if you can, the efforts required to build the pyramids of Egypt. Can you conceive of a more enduring monument to the triumph of perseverance than that? Look at nature. She has a thousand voices teaching lessons of perseverance. The lofty mountains are wearing down by slow degrees. The ocean is gradually, but surely, filling up, by deposits from its thousand rivers, and by the labors of a little insect so small as to be almost invisible to the naked eye. Every shower that sweeps over the surface of the country tends to bring the hills and the mountains to the level of the plains. Nature has but one lesson on this subject, and that is, "Persevere."

More depends upon active perseverance than upon genius. Says a common-sense author upon this subject: "Genius unexerted is no more genius than a bushel of acorns is a forest of oaks." There may be epics in men's brains, just as there are oaks in acorns, but the tree and the book must come out before we can measure them. Firmness of purpose is one of the most necessary sinews of character, and one of the best instruments of success. Without it, genius wastes its efforts in a maze of inconsistencies. It gives power to weakness, and opens to poverty the world's mark. It spreads fertility over the barren landscape, and bids the choicest fruits and flowers spring up and flourish in the desert abode. There is, perhaps, nothing more conducive to success in any important and difficult undertaking than a firm, steady, unremitting spirit. In seasons of distress and difficulty, to abandon ourselves to dejection is evidence of a weak mind. Opposing circumstances often create strength, both mental and physical. Opposition gives us greater power of resistance. To overcome one barrier gives us greater ability to overcome the next. It is cowardice to grumble about circumstances. Instead of sinking under trouble, it becomes us, in the evil day, with perseverance to maintain our part, to bear up against the storm, to have recourse to those advantages, which, in the worst of times, are always left to integrity and virtue, and never to give up the hope that better days may come.

It is wonderful to see what miracles a resolute and unyielding will can achieve. Before its irresistible energy the most formidable obstacles become as cobweb barriers in the path. Difficulties, the terrors of which cause the irresolute to sink back with dismay, provoke from the man of lofty determination only a smile. The whole history of our race, all nature, indeed, teems with examples to show what wonders may be accomplished by resolute perseverance and patient toil. How many there are who, thinking of the immense amount of work lying between them and the object of their desires, are almost ready to give up in despair! But do they not, when they view the work thus in mass, forget that there is time enough, if only rightly improved, to suffice for each effort?

One step after another, perseveringly continued, will enable you to arrive at your journey's end, however long it may be. It is only when you come to reckon up the aggregate number of steps that you are ready to sink under a feeling of despair. But you are not required to take them all at once; there is an allotted time for each individual step. Thus, in viewing any work that you may have marked out in life, only remember that you are not obliged to do the work all at once; that the regular daily portions performed quietly and systematically, day after day, will enable you to achieve almost any desired result. When we reflect on the wonderful results that perseverance has accomplished, we are led to believe that the man who wills, resolves, and perseveres can do almost any thing.

Every one, then, regardless of his condition in life, should set his aim high, and resolve to remit no labor necessary for its realization, but cheerfully take up the trials and burdens that life has in store for him, and carry them forward, be the discouragements what they may, to a glorious consummation. Only learn to carry a thing through in all of its details, and you have measured the secret of success. Only learn to persevere in carrying out any plan of work which an enlightened judgment decides is the best, and you will force life to yield you its grandest triumphs. There is almost no limit to what you can achieve if you thus govern your actions, and make all your exertions contribute to the fulfilling of some great purpose of life, which you took up with a brave heart, and with a determination to persevere therein until success crowns your efforts.

Closely allied with the qualities of self-reliance and energy is that characteristic quality which so much conduces to success in life, and is generally expressed by the word "enterprise." It is distinct from energy, inasmuch as it is constantly active in discovering new fields for energy to exert itself in. We are familiar with examples of men who have won fortunes or gained renown, not because they pursued better or wiser courses, but because of some originality in their aims and methods, by which they were enabled to command the attention of the busy world long enough to wrest from it the special object of their choice.

True enterprise is constantly on the alert to discover some new want of society, some fertile source of profit or honor, some unexplored field of business, and is ready to supply the one or to take advantage of the other. It is nearly an indispensable element in these days of fierce competition. Every avenue of business is crowded, and as soon as it is known that one party has made a success by one method there are scores of eager aspirants ready to try the successful plan, so that straightway it, too, ceases to be unique, and, in becoming common, loses the power it formerly possessed of compelling success. Hence the late-comers in the field are doomed to failure, while they may at the same time be the better fitted for the peculiar work in hand. What they should do is to aim at success by new plans and methods. Every one knows the enthusiastic glow that animates the whole being of him who feels the ardor of an explorer, who surmounts difficulties by new and, before, unthought-of expedients, who plans and projects enterprises that had previously escaped the active minds of his fellow men.

It is by virtue of this very enthusiasm that the man of enterprise, who is so ready to adopt new measures, plans, and projects, is enabled to carry into his business or profession an energy and inspiration which is totally lacking on the part of those who are followers. Hence the latter ofttimes fail of success which their talents might almost be said to have promised them. Therefore, those who enter the lists to win life's battles must expect, if they would reach their goal, to wage the fight not only by the old methods but by the new. To use only those tactics which are sanctioned by usage is to invite defeat. Throw open the windows of your mind to new ideas, and keep at least abreast of the times, and, if possible, ahead of them. Nothing is more fatal to self-advancement than a stupid conservatism or a servile imitation. The days when a man could get rich by plodding on without enterprise and without taxing his brains have gone by. Mere industry and economy are not enough; there must be intelligence and original thought.

Whatever your calling, inventiveness, adaptability, promptness of decision, must direct and utilize your force, and if you do not find markets you must make them. In business you need not know many books, but you must know your trade and men. You may be slow at logic, but you must dart at chances. You may stick to your groove in politics, but in your business you must switch into new tracks, and shape yourself to every exigency. We emphasize this matter because in no country is the red-tapist so out of place as here. Every calling is filled with bold, keen, subtle-witted men, fertile in expedients and devices, who are perpetually inventing new ways of buying cheaply, underselling, or attracting custom; and the man who sticks doggedly to the old-fashioned methods—who runs in a perpetual rut—will find himself outstripped in the race of life, if he is not stranded on the sands of popular indifference. Keep, then, your eyes open and your wits about you, and you may distance all competitors; but, if you ignore all new methods, you will find yourself like a lugger contending with an ocean steamer.

It is enterprise that oils the wheels of energy and industry. Industry gathers together, with a frugal hand, the means whereby we are enabled to develop our plans and purposes. Energy gives us force whereby we gather the courage to persevere in the lines decided on, bids us put on a bold mien and go forth to do valiant battle against opposing circumstances. But it is enterprise that suggests ways and means to overcome difficulties that threaten to overwhelm us. It is enterprise that bids us explore entirely new fields, discovering expedients that enable us to change what, by the force of circumstances, was fast becoming a failure into a glorious victory, bringing to us wealth, position, and fame. It is to enterprise that we are indebted for those rich discoveries in scientific fields by which we decipher the records of past ages, and unravel the secrets which nature surrounded with mystery, compelling them to serve us.

It was enterprise that harnessed steam, teaching it to do our bidding, and brought the lightning down from the heavens to carry our thoughts to the uttermost parts of the earth. It is the spirit of enterprise driving curious minds to work in new directions that has given us all those useful and curious inventions, which have done so much to make this nineteenth-century civilization to shine with so lustrous a light. In short, it is enterprise that lifts the man of but mediocre abilities and attainments into the foremost ranks of the successful ones.

Enterprise is an inheritance and not an acquisition. But it can at the same time be improved by cultivation, the same as bodily strength or any mental faculty. He who would excel as a swimmer must be often in the water, and the gymnast does not spare himself long and fatiguing exertions. So of an enterprising spirit. Some men seem born with an overflow of this, while others possess it in a slight degree only. But if any would be known as enterprising men, they must not hesitate to show by their every-day actions that they rely upon themselves in cases of emergency, and the greater the necessity the better means of surmounting it are constantly discovered. They must not hesitate to try plans because they are new; but if sober judgment can discover no objection to it, they must seize upon the very novelty of the plan as an inducement, and be only the more eager to put it to the test. There is no life so routine but that it constantly affords scope for the exercise of enterprising energy. The very fact that you are finding it routine and commonplace should at once set you to work to devise some new way to change this.

Do not stand sighing, wishing, and waiting, but go to work with an energy and perseverance that will set every obstacle in the way of your success flying like leaves before a whirlwind. A weak and irresolute way of doing business will shipwreck your plans as readily as effects follow causes. You may have ambition enough to wish yourself on the topmost round of the ladder of success; but if you have not the requisite energy to commence and enterprise enough to push ahead even when you know you are off the beaten track, you will always remain at the bottom, or at least on the lower rounds. Providence has hidden a charm in difficult undertakings which is appreciated only by those who dare to grapple with them. But this can only be true when you, by your own exertions and the strength of your own self-reliance and enterprise, have achieved the results. Nothing can be more distasteful than to see men of apparently good abilities waiting for some one to come and help them over difficulties.