"Boy Wanted"
Nixon Waterman
[Illustration]
Do not loiter or shirk,
Do not falter or shrink;
But just think out your work
And then work out your "think".
OTHER BOOKS BY NIXON WATERMAN
A BOOK OF VERSES
IN MERRY MOOD
A Book of Cheerful Rhymes.
Cloth, 12mo, each, $1.25.
FORBES & COMPANY, CHICAGO
[Illustration: CABIN IN WHICH LINCOLN WAS BORN]
"BOY WANTED"
A BOOK OF CHEERFUL COUNSEL
BY
NIXON WATERMAN
AUTHOR OF "THE GIRL WANTED,"
"A BOOK OF VERSES," ETC.
TORONTO
McCLELLAND & GOODCHILD
Limited
COPYRIGHT, 1906
BY
NIXON WATERMAN
_All Rights Reserved_
TO
--THE BOY WHO DISCERNS
HE CAN NEVER BE "IT"
UNTIL HE DEVELOPS
SOME "GIT-UP-AND-GIT."
Acknowledgments are hereby made to the publishers of Life, Success,
Saturday Evening Post, Woman's Home Companion, St. Nicholas, Christian
Endeavor World, Young People's Weekly, Youth's Companion, and other
periodicals, for their courteous permission to reprint the author's
copyrighted poems which originally appeared in their publications.
PREFACE
In presenting this book of cheerful counsel to his youthful friends,
and such of the seniors as are not too old to accept a bit of friendly
admonition, the author desires to offer a word of explanation regarding
the history of the making of this volume.
So many letters have been received from people of all classes and ages
requesting copies of some of the author's lines best suited for the
purpose of engendering a sense of self-help in the mind of youth, that
he deems it expedient to offer a number of his verses in the present
collected form. While he is indebted to a great array of bright minds
for the prose incidents and inspiration which constitute a large
portion of this volume, he desires to be held personally responsible
for all of the rhymed lines to be found within these covers.
It may be especially true of advice that "it is more blessed to
give than to receive," but it is hoped that in this present form of
tendering friendly counsel the precepts will be accepted in the same
cheerful spirit in which they are offered.
The author realizes that no one is more urgently in need of good advice
and the intelligence to follow it than is the writer of these lines,
and none cries more earnestly the well-known truth--
Oh, fellow men and brothers,
Could we but use the free
Advice we give to others,
How happy we should be!
While the title of this book and the character of its contents make
it obvious that it is a volume designed primarily for the guidance
of youth, no one should pass it by merely because he has reached the
years of maturity, and presumably of discretion. As a matter of fact
Time cannot remove any of us very far from the fancies and foibles, the
dreams and dangers of life's morning hours.
Age bringeth wisdom, so they say,
But lots of times we've seen
A man long after he was gray
Keep right on being "green."
N. W.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I THE AWAKENING 11
The life partnership. When to begin. Foresight. "Boy Wanted."
The power of mind. "Couldn't and Could." Selfmade men. "Deliver
the Goods."
II "AM I A GENIUS?" 23
Genius defined. Inspiration and perspiration. "Stick to It."
Genius and patience. "Keep Pegging Away." Examples of patience.
"The Secret of Success."
III OPPORTUNITY 35
What is a fair chance? Abraham Lincoln. Depending on self.
"Myself and I." The importance of the present moment. "Right
Here and Just Now." Poverty and success. "Keep A-Trying."
IV OVER AND UNDERDOING 49
Precocity. Starting too soon as bad as starting too late. The
value of health. "Making a man." The worth of toil. "How to Win
Success." Sharpened wits. "The Steady Worker."
V THE VALUE OF SPARE MOMENTS 61
Wasting time. "The 'Going-to-Bees!'" The possibilities of one
hour a day. "Just This Minute." The vital importance of
properly employing leisure moments. "Do It Now."
VI CHEERFULNESS 75
The value of smiles. "To Know All is to Forgive All." Hope and
strength. "A Cure for Trouble." Carlyle on cheerfulness. "The
One With a Song." Pessimism as a barrier to success. "A Smile
and a Task." A profitable virtue. "An Open Letter to the
Pessimist."
VII DREAMING AND DOING 89
Practicality. "Hank Streeter's Brain-Wave." Self-esteem. "The
Valley of Never." Opportunity and application. "Yender Grass."
VIII "TRIFLES" 101
The value of little things. Sowing and reaping. The power of
habit. "'I Wish' and 'I Will.'" Jenny Lind's humble beginning.
Canova's genius. Present opportunities. "'Now' and
'Waitawhile.'"
IX THE WORTH OF ADVICE 115
Heeding the sign-post. The value of guide-books. "The World's
Victors." Good books a boy's best friend. The danger of knowing
too much. "My Boyhood Dreams." Reading and reflecting.
X REAL SUCCESS 129
Are you the boy wanted? Money and success. "On Getting Rich."
Thinking and doing. Life's true purpose. "The Mother's Dream."
ILLUSTRATIONS
LINCOLN'S BIRTHPLACE _Frontispiece_
PATRICK HENRY DELIVERING HIS CELEBRATED SPEECH Facing page 23
WHITTIER'S BIRTHPLACE " " 35
WATT DISCOVERING THE CONDENSATION OF STEAM " " 49
LONGFELLOW'S BIRTHPLACE " " 61
GARFIELD AS A CANAL BOY " " 75
BIRTHPLACE OF BENJAMIN FRANKLIN " " 89
WASHINGTON AND LAFAYETTE AT MOUNT VERNON " " 101
"BOY WANTED"
CHAPTER I
THE AWAKENING
[Sidenote: Nothing is impossible to the man who can will.--MIRABEAU.]
Ho, my brave youth! There's a "Boy Wanted," and--how fortunate!--you
are the very boy!
Who wants you?
[Sidenote: You will find poetry nowhere unless you bring some with
you.--JOUBERT.]
The big, busy, beautiful world wants you, and I really do not see how
it is going to get on well without you. It has awaited your coming so
long, and has kept in store so many golden opportunities for you to
improve, it will be disappointed if, when the proper time arrives, you
do not smilingly lay hold and do something worth while.
When are you to begin?
[Sidenote: Things don't turn up in this world until somebody turns them
up.--GARFIELD.]
Oh, I sincerely hope that you have already begun to begin; that is,
that you have already begun to train your hand and head and heart for
making the most of the opportunities that await you. In fact, if you
are so fortunate as to own thoughtful, intelligent parents, the work
of fitting you for the victories of life was begun before you were old
enough to give the subject serious consideration.
[Sidenote: Work has made me what I am. I never ate a bit of idle bread
in my life.--DANIEL WEBSTER.]
"When shall I begin to train my child?" asked a young mother of a wise
physician.
"How old is the child?" inquired the doctor.
"Two years."
[Sidenote: In the blackest soils grow the fairest flowers, and
the loftiest and strongest trees spring heavenward among the
rocks.--HOLLAND.]
"Then you have already lost just two years," was his serious response.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, when asked the same question, said: "You must
begin with the child's grandmother."
[Sidenote: Without courage there cannot be truth; and without truth
there can be no other virtue.--WALTER SCOTT.]
But no matter what has or has not been done for you up to the present
time, you and I know that from now on your future welfare will be
largely of your own making and in your own keeping. If you will
thoughtfully plan your purpose as definitely as conditions will permit
and then learn to stick to it through thick and thin, your success
in life is quite well assured, and you need not fear that at the
end of the journey you will have to say, as does many a man while
retrospectively viewing his years:
[Sidenote: Vigilance in watching opportunity; tact and daring in
seizing upon opportunity; force and persistence in crowding opportunity
to its utmost of possible achievement--these are the martial virtues
which must command success.--PHELPS.]
O'er life's long and winding pathway,
Looking backward, I confess
I have not at looking forward
Been a genuine success.
What is there for you to do?
[Sidenote: Work is the inevitable condition of human life, the true
source of human welfare.--TOLSTOI.]
Everything and anything you can do or care to do. You are to take your
pick of all the trades, professions, and vocations of mankind. Look
about you and note the thousand and one things now being done by the
men of to-day. It will not be so very long till all of these men will
be old enough to retire from active service, and then you and the other
boys, who in the meantime have grown to man's estate, will be called
upon to perform every one of the tasks these men are now doing. Doesn't
it look as if there would be plenty of honest, earnest, wholesome
toil for hand and head in store for you as soon as you are ready to
undertake it? You cannot wonder that the busy old world is ever and
always hanging out its notice--
"BOY WANTED"
[Sidenote: People do not lack strength; they lack will.--VICTOR HUGO.]
"Wanted--A Boy." How often we
This quite familiar notice see.
Wanted--a boy for every kind
Of task that a busy world can find.
He is wanted--wanted now and here;
There are towns to build; there are paths to clear;
There are seas to sail; there are gulfs to span,
In the ever onward march of man.
[Sidenote: You cannot dream yourself into a character; you must hammer
and forge one yourself.--FROUDE.]
Wanted--the world wants boys to-day
And it offers them all it has for pay.
'Twill grant them wealth, position, fame,
A useful life, and an honored name.
Boys who will guide the plow and pen;
Boys who will shape the ways for men;
Boys who will forward the tasks begun,
For the world's great work is never done.
[Sidenote: The truest wisdom is a resolute determination.--NAPOLEON.]
The world is eager to employ
Not just one, but every boy
Who, with a purpose stanch and true,
Will greet the work he finds to do.
Honest, faithful, earnest, kind,--
To good, awake; to evil, blind,--
A heart of gold without alloy,--
Wanted--the world wants such a boy.
[Sidenote: While we are considering when to begin, it is often too late
to act.--QUINTILIAN.]
No, the world does not insist that you are to accept a position and
begin work with your hands at once, but it wishes you to begin to think
right things. "As he thinketh in his heart, so is he." What you think
will have much to do in determining what you are to become.
The mind is master of the man,
And so "they can who think they can."
[Sidenote: Where boasting ends, there dignity begins.--YOUNG.]
[Sidenote: Impossible is a word found only in the dictionary of
fools.--NAPOLEON.]
This influence of the mind in thus shaping the man is very well set
forth by James Allen, who says: "A man's mind may be likened to a
garden, which may be intelligently cultivated or allowed to run wild;
but whether cultivated or neglected, it must, and will, bring forth.
If no useful seeds are put into it, then an abundance of useless
weed-seeds will fall therein, and will continue to produce their kind.
Just as a gardener cultivates his plot, keeping it free from weeds,
and growing the flowers and fruits which he requires, so may a man
tend the garden of his mind, weeding out all the wrong, useless, and
impure thoughts, and cultivating toward perfection the flowers and
fruits of right, useful, and pure thoughts. By pursuing this process,
a man sooner or later discovers that he is the master-gardener of his
soul, the director of his life. He also reveals, within himself, the
laws of thought, and understands, with ever-increasing accuracy, how
the thought-forces and mind-elements operate in the shaping of his
character, circumstances, and destiny."
[Sidenote: I am in earnest. I will not equivocate. I will not excuse. I
will not retreat a single inch; and I will be heard.--GARRISON.]
So it is not too early for you to begin to think bravely and resolutely
and hopefully upon the life you intend to live, and to cultivate the
mental and physical strength that shall help you later on to put your
good thoughts into permanent good deeds. Certainty of victory goes far
toward winning battles before they are fought. The boy who thinks "I
can" is much more likely to succeed in life than is the one who thinks
"I can't."
"COULDN'T" AND "COULD"
[Sidenote: While you stand deliberating which book your son shall read
first, another boy has read both.--DR. JOHNSON.]
"Couldn't" and "Could" were two promising boys
Who lived not a great while ago.
They had just the same playmates and just the same toys,
And just the same chances for winning life's joys
And all that the years may bestow.
[Sidenote: Dost thou love life? Then do not squander time, for that is
the stuff life is made of.--FRANKLIN.]
And "Could" soon found out he could fashion his life
On lines very much as he planned;
He could cultivate goodness and guard against strife;
He could have all his deeds with good cheer to be rife,
And build him a name that would stand.
[Sidenote: When passion is on the throne, reason is out of
doors.--MATTHEW HENRY.]
But poor little "Couldn't" just couldn't pull through
All the trials he met with a sigh;
When a task needed doing, he couldn't, he knew;
And hence, when he couldn't, how could he? Could you,
If you couldn't determine you'd try?
[Sidenote: I wasted time, and now time doth waste me.--SHAKESPEARE.]
So "Could" just kept building his way to success,
Nor clouding his sky with a doubt,
But "Couldn't" strayed into the slough of Distress,
Alas! and his end it is easy to guess--
Strayed in, but he couldn't get out.
And that was the difference 'twixt "Couldn't" and "Could";
Each followed his own chosen plan;
And where "Couldn't" just wouldn't "Could" earnestly would,
And where one of them weakened the other "made good,"
And won with his watchword, "I can!"
[Sidenote: Weak men wait for opportunities, strong men make
them.--MARDEN.]
By reading between the lines we can infer from the foregoing that what
the world really wants is men--good men. But the world is old enough
and wise enough to know that if it does not train up some good boys,
there will be no good men, by and by. "As the twig is bent the tree is
inclined." "The child is father of the man."
[Sidenote: Give me insight into to-day, and you may have the antique
and future worlds.--EMERSON.]
So the world simply wishes to inform you, here and now, that it will
count on your assistance as soon as you have had sufficient time and
opportunity to prepare properly for the many chances it has in store
for you. It notifies you in good season of the important use it hopes
to make of you. It does not wish you to be confronted suddenly with
a life problem you cannot solve intelligently. You must be so well
equipped that you will not make life a "fizzle."
[Sidenote: When I don't know whether to fight or not, I always
fight.--NELSON.]
A "fizzle," as defined by the dictionaries, is a bungling, unsuccessful
undertaking.
[Sidenote: What is a gentleman? I'll tell you: a gentleman is one who
keeps his promises made to those who cannot enforce them.--HUBBARD.]
Life is, or ought to be, a splendid undertaking. Some make a success
of it; some make a "fizzle;" some make a sort of half-and-half. Every
one who lives his or her life must make something of it. What that
"something" is depends very largely on the individual person. Heredity
has something to do with it; environment has something to do with it;
yet we like to think it is the individual who has most to do with the
finished product.
All men are to some degree "self-made," although they are slow to admit
it except in instances where the work has been well done.
[Sidenote: When one begins to turn in bed it is time to turn
out.--WELLINGTON.]
The loser declares it is Fate's hard plan,
But the winner--ho, ho!--he's a "self-made" man.
It is unfair for the loser to blame others for his deficiencies and
delinquencies. No one's reputation is likely to suffer much lasting
injury as long as he keeps his character unspotted. What others may say
of us is not of so much moment; the important question is, "Is it true?"
[Sidenote: When I found I was black, I resolved to live as if I were
white, and so force men to look below my skin.--ALEXANDRE DUMAS.]
Of strife others make us, we've little to fear
Because we can surely defeat it;
Few persons get into hot water, 'tis clear,
But they furnish the fuel to heat it.
[Sidenote: Impossible? I trample upon impossibilities!--PITT.]
On the other hand the winner is ungrateful when he credits to his own
ability the help and good influence he has derived from his associates
and his surroundings. No one lives by, to, or for himself, alone. A
great man adds to his greatness by generously praising those who have
aided in his advancement.
We are, most of us, selfishly slow to confess
How much others aid us in winning success;
But the Fourth of July and the oyster must see
What failures, without any crackers, they'd be.
[Sidenote: When all is holiday, there are no holidays.--LAMB.]
This timely notice telling you what the world is going to ask you to
perform is as if you were told to prepare to take an extended and
important journey. It would require some time for you to procure
a trunk and a traveling-bag and to select wearing apparel suitable
for the undertaking. Then, too, you would need to study maps and
time-tables so as to select the best lines of travel and to make
advantageous connections with trains and steamships. Furthermore, it
would be for your best interests to read books describing the countries
through which you were to pass, and to learn as much as possible
regarding their peoples and customs.
[Sidenote: Let's take the instant by the forward top.--SHAKESPEARE.]
[Sidenote: I have generally found that the man who is good at an excuse
is good for nothing else.--FRANKLIN.]
[Sidenote: I feel and grieve, but, by the grace of God, I fret at
nothing.--JOHN WESLEY.]
As a matter of fact you _are_ preparing to start on an extended and
important journey. You are going out into the big world, by and by,
to do business. You are going into partnership with the world, after
a fashion. You are to put into the business your honesty, industry,
integrity, and ability, and in return for your contributions, the world
is to bestow upon you all the honor, fame, goodwill, and happiness
of mind that your manner of living your life shall merit. The world
is only too willing to bargain for the highest and noblest and best
products of the human mind with any one who can
DELIVER THE GOODS
[Sidenote: We can sing away our cares easier than we can reason them
away.--BEECHER.]
The world will buy largely of any one who
Can deliver the goods.
It is ready and eager to barter if you
Can deliver the goods.
But don't take its order and make out the bill
Unless you are sure you'll be able to fill
Your contract, because it won't pay you until
You deliver the goods.
[Sidenote: Trifles make perfection, but perfection is no
trifle.--MICHAEL ANGELO.]
The world rears its loftiest shafts to the men
Who deliver the goods.
With plow, lever, brush, hammer, sword, or with pen
They deliver the goods.
And while we their eloquent epitaphs scan
That say in the world's work they stood in the van,
We know that the meaning is, "Here lies a man
Who delivered the goods."
[Sidenote: Anxiety never yet successfully bridged over any
chasm.--RUFFINI.]
And rude or refined be your wares, still be sure
To deliver the goods.
Though a king or a clown, still remember that you're
To deliver the goods.
If you find you are called to the pulpit to preach,
To the grain-fields to till, to the forum to teach;
Be you poet or porter, remember that each
Must deliver the goods.
[Illustration: PATRICK HENRY DELIVERING HIS CELEBRATED SPEECH]