THE WORTH OF ADVICE
[Sidenote: Courage is a virtue that the young cannot spare; to lose
it is to grow old before the time; it is better to make a thousand
mistakes and suffer a thousand reverses than to run away from the
battle.--HENRY VAN DYKE.]
Of what value is this book to you?
Perhaps there is more involved in the answer to this question than a
careless consideration of it might lead one to think. Shakespeare says:
"A jest's prosperity lies in the ear of him that hears it, never in the
tongue of him that makes it."
So it is that the value of advice depends not so much upon the giver as
it does upon the one who receives it.
[Sidenote: He needs no other rosary whose thread of life is strung with
beads of love and thought.--PERSIAN.]
Emerson has observed that he who makes a tour of Europe brings home
from that country only as much as he takes there with him. This same
truth holds good in the reading of books and in listening to sermons
and lectures. He that has not eyes with which to see, will see nothing.
He that has not ears with which to hear, can hear nothing.
[Sidenote: Truth is a cork; it is bound to come to the top.--WILLIS
GEORGE EMERSON.]
A sign-post indicating which road to take to reach a certain
destination surely ought to be of great value to a traveler in a
strange land. If the traveler, having failed to cultivate the habit
of observing his surroundings, passes by the sign-post without seeing
it, or if he reads its directions and says to himself: "I think I
know better; I shall reach my destination by whatever road I choose
to travel," then the sign-post is of no true use to him. Not that it
is not a good sign-post. No, the sign-post is all right; it is the
traveler who is wrong. He must go his own way and, perhaps, journey
far, and fare sadly before he arrives at the place he seeks--the
destination he might have reached pleasantly and in good season.
Franklin tells us that experience is a dear teacher but fools will
learn from no other.
[Sidenote: He who will not answer to the rudder must answer to the
rock.--ARCHBISHOP HERVE.]
Now this book which you hold in your hand is only a guide-post, or
perhaps we had better call it a guide-book. It is intended for the use
of the boys of our land and all other persons who are not too old or
too wise to learn more.
[Sidenote: It is not erudition that makes the intellectual man, but a
sort of virtue which delights in vigorous and beautiful thinking, just
as moral virtue delights in vigorous and beautiful conduct.--HAMMERTON.]
Every boy is starting out on a long, interesting, and tremendously
important journey. It will lie mostly through a strange country and is
a journey which must, in a very large sense, be traveled alone by each
individual person. There are many partings of the ways; many perplexing
forks in the road.
[Sidenote: Give what you have. To some one it may be better than you
dare to think.--LONGFELLOW.]
The thoughtful boy will ever feel called upon to ask his highest
understanding: "Which is the right road for me to take?" He will
not carelessly pass by the sign-posts without learning what they
have to tell him, nor will he forget or refuse to be guided by their
instructions and admonitions.
[Sidenote: There are men who complain that roses have thorns. They
should be grateful to know that thorns have roses.--MAX O'RELL.]
If a sign post says: "Danger! Go Slowly!" he will govern his movements
accordingly. If the sign-post says: "Railroad Crossing. Beware of the
Engine!" he will not blindly plunge ahead without waiting to see if his
course is clear. He will understand that many others have traveled the
way before him and have learned by experience that it is well for all
to take heed and do as the sign-post directs.
[Sidenote: I think the best way of doing good to the poor is not making
them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of it.--BENJAMIN
FRANKLIN.]
This life-long pathway upon which every boy is starting is a winding,
intricate, interesting way, and many there are who turn into the wrong
roads that are ever leading off from the main-traveled track. It is
the purpose of this volume to serve as a guide-book for the boy who
desires to reach Happiness and Helpfulness, Prosperity and Splendid
Manhood in the most direct and efficient manner. At every turn of
life's way it will warn him from the blind paths that would bring him,
by the way of Idleness, Carelessness, Ignorance, and Extravagance, to
the unfortunate land of Failure, of Broken Hopes, and of Life Misspent.
[Sidenote: Those who bring sunshine into the lives of others cannot
keep it from themselves.--BARRIE.]
[Sidenote: There is a certain sweetness and elegance in "little deeds
of kindness," and in letting our best impulses have free play on common
occasions.--JOSEPH MAY.]
"A word spoken in due season, how good is it!" In these pages over
which your eye is passing are spoken the words of a large and
distinguished company of the world's best and wisest men and women.
Emerson says: "Every book is a quotation; every house is a quotation
out of all forests, and mines, and stone-quarries, and every man is a
quotation from all his ancestors."
[Sidenote: The school of the intellectual man is the place where he
happens to be, and his teachers are the people, books, animals, plants,
stones, and earth round about him.--HAMMERTON.]
"In the multitude of counsellors there is safety." The value of
well-selected quotations to serve as finger-posts to guide us day by
day is thus set forth by the great German poet, Goethe: "Whatever may
be said against such collections which present authors in a disjointed
form they nevertheless bring about many excellent results. We are not
always so composed, so full of wisdom, that we are able to take in at
once the whole scope of a work according to its merits. Do we not mark
in a book passages which seem to have a direct reference to ourselves?
Young people especially, who have failed in acquiring a complete
cultivation of the mind, are roused in a praiseworthy way by brilliant
quotations."
[Sidenote: Heroism is simple and yet it is rare. Everyone who does the
best he can is a hero.--JOSH BILLINGS.]
[Sidenote: One of the dearest thoughts to me is this--a real friend
will never get away from me, or try to, or want to. Love does not have
to be tethered.--ANNA R. BROWN.]
And if it shall so happen that some word or sentence or sentiment
contained in this book shall rouse in a praiseworthy way just one
boy--the very boy whose thought is dwelling on these lines at this very
moment--all of this labor of love shall have been abundantly rewarded.
For just one boy roused to his best efforts can grandly gladden his own
home circle and, perchance, the whole wide world.
[Sidenote: In all situations wherein a living man has stood or can
stand, there is actually a prize of quite infinite value placed within
his reach--namely, a Duty for him to do.--CARLYLE.]
"Why, the world is at a boy's feet," says Burdette, "and power,
conquest, and leadership slumber in his rugged arms and care-free
heart. A boy sets his ambition at whatever mark he will--lofty or
grovelling, as he may elect--and the boy who resolutely sets his heart
on fame, on health, on power, on what he will; who consecrates every
faculty of his mind and body on ambition, courage, industry, and
patience, can trample on genius; for these are better and grander than
genius."
[Sidenote: To have what we want is riches, but to be able to do without
is power.--GEORGE MACDONALD.]
The past is gone forever; the present is so brief and fleeting we can
scarcely call it our own; in the future lies our larger, better hope
of a happier civilization. Not the men of yesterday, not the men of
to-day, but the men of to-morrow, the boys, are the ones who are to
make the world right. They are
THE WORLD'S VICTORS
[Sidenote: Let every man be occupied in the highest employment of which
his nature is capable, and die with the consciousness that he has done
his best.--SYDNEY SMITH.]
Hurrah for the beacon-lights of earth,--
The brave, triumphant boys!
Hurrah for their joyous shouts of mirth,
And their blood-bestirring noise!
The bliss of being shall never die,
Nor the old world seem depressed
While a boy's stout heart is beating high,
Like a glad drum in his breast.
[Sidenote: Of course I know that it is better to build a cathedral than
to make a boot; but I think it better actually to make a boot than only
to dream about building a cathedral.--ELLEN THORNYCROFT FOWLER.]
Ye wise professors of bookish things,
That burden the souls of men,
Go trade your lore for a boy's glad wings,
And fly to the stars again.
Nor grope through a shrunken, shrivelled world
That the years have made uncouth,
But march 'neath the flaunting flags unfurled
By the valiant hands of youth.
[Sidenote: The most enviable of all titles is the character of an
honest man.--ABRAHAM LINCOLN.]
Oh, never the lamp of age burns low
In its cold and empty cup.
But youth comes by with his face aglow,
And a beacon-light leaps up.
The gloomiest skies grow bright and gay,
And the whispered clouds of doubt
Are swept from the brows of the world away
By a boy's triumphant shout.
[Sidenote: An act of yours is not simply the thing you do, but it is
also the way you do it.--PHILLIPS BROOKS.]
Of the multitudes of boys who are to become the world's victors, he
will succeed best who earliest in life learns carefully to observe and
to appreciate the character of his surroundings, and to build into the
structure of his manhood the high and abiding influences that come to
his hands. As one of our great thinkers given to deep introspection has
so impressively said, life, itself, may be compared to a building in
the course of construction. It rises slowly, day by day, through the
years. Every new lesson we learn lays a block on the edifice which is
rising silently within us. Every experience, every touch of another
life on ours, every influence that impresses us, every book we read,
every conversation we have, every act of our commonest days adds to the
invisible building.
[Sidenote: Always say a kind word if you can, if only that it may come
in, perhaps, with singular opportuneness, entering some mournful man's
darkened room like a beautiful firefly, whose happy convolutions he
cannot but watch, forgetting his many troubles.--ARTHUR HELPS.]
[Sidenote: Not in war, not in wealth, not in tyranny, is there
any happiness to be found--only in kindly peace, fruitful and
free.--RUSKIN.]
[Sidenote: You must help your fellow-men; but the only way you can help
them is by being the noblest and the best man that it is possible for
you to be.--PHILLIPS BROOKS.]
[Sidenote: The humblest subscriber to a mechanics' institute has easier
access to sound learning than had either Solomon or Aristotle, yet both
Solomon and Aristotle lived the intellectual life.--HAMMERTON.]
Plenty of good, wholesome play and healthful recreation, every boy
needs and must have if he means to round out a fine physical and moral
development, but idleness and indifference, evils that creep into the
hours that are given up to something that is neither work nor play,
must never be tolerated. "The ruin of most men dates from some vacant
hour," says Hillard. "Occupation is the armor of the soul; and the
train of Idleness is borne up by all the vices. I remember a satirical
poem, in which the devil is represented as fishing for men and adapting
his baits to the taste and temperament of his prey; but the idler, he
said, pleased him most, because he bit the naked hook. To a young man
away from home, friendless and forlorn in a great city, the hours of
peril are those between sunset and bedtime; for the moon and stars see
more of evil in a single hour than the sun in his whole day's circuit.
The poet's visions of evening are all compact of tender and soothing
images. They bring the wanderer to his home, the child to his mother's
arms, the ox to his stall, and the weary laborer to his rest. But to
the gentle-hearted youth who is thrown upon the rocks of a pitiless
city, 'homeless amid a thousand homes,' the approaching evening brings
with it an aching sense of loneliness and desolation, which comes
down upon the spirit like darkness upon the earth. In this mood his
best impulses become a snare to him; and he is led astray because he
is social, affectionate, sympathetic, and warm-hearted. If there be
a young man thus circumstanced within the sound of my voice, let me
say to him, that books are the friends of the friendless, and that a
library is the home of the homeless. A taste for reading will always
carry you into the best possible society, and enable you to converse
with men who will instruct you by their wisdom, and charm you with
their wit; who will soothe you when fretted, refresh you when weary,
counsel you when perplexed, and sympathize with you at all times."
[Sidenote: The man who tries and succeeds is one degree less of a
hero than the man who tries and fails and yet goes on trying.--ELLEN
THORNYCROFT FOWLER.]
[Sidenote: Oh, do not pray for easy lives--pray to be stronger men. Do
not pray for tasks equal to your powers,--pray for powers equal to your
tasks.--PHILLIPS BROOKS.]
Books are the voices of the dumb,
The tongues of brush and pen;
The ever-living kernels from
The passing husks of men.
[Sidenote: To know how to grow old is the master-work of wisdom, and
one of the most difficult chapters in the great art of living.--HENRI
FREDERIC AMIEL.]
It is from good books as well as from living personages that boys
will receive much of the good advice which they must follow in order
that they may make the most of life. Life is too short for a boy to
investigate everything for himself. There is much that he must accept
as being true. He has not the time to follow every road to its end and
ascertain if the sign-posts have all told the truth. Strive as we may
we are still dependent for much of our information upon the hearsay of
others. No one person can begin to know everything.
[Sidenote: If instead of a gem or even a flower, we could cast the gift
of a lovely thought into the heart of a friend, that would be giving as
the angels give.--GEORGE MACDONALD.]
[Sidenote: What must of necessity be done you can always find out,
beyond question, how to do.--RUSKIN.]
[Sidenote: When I hear people say that circumstances are against them,
I always retort: "You mean that your will is not with you!" I believe
in the will--I have faith in it.--ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING.]
Every thinking boy clearly understands that he knows much more to-day
than he did a year ago. And he has good reason for thinking that if he
shall remain among the living he will know many things a year from now
that he does not know to-day. To live is to learn. Hence it is that
youth should be modest in the presence of age, for silver hair and
wisdom are more than likely to dwell together. No youth should think
too lightly of his own mental endowments and his fund of information,
neither should he permit his very lack of knowledge to lead him to
think that he has acquired about all the secrets that nature and
the great world have to divulge. Every boy should be cool-headed,
clear-headed, long-headed, level-headed, but not big-headed. Should he
become afflicted with a serious attack of "enlargement of the brain"
it is more than likely that when he has reached the years of soberer
manhood he will look back with a sense of good-humored humiliation to
MY BOYHOOD DREAMS
[Sidenote: If you do not scale the mountain, you cannot view the
plain.--CHINESE.]
I remember, I remember
When I was seventeen;
I was the cleverest young man
The world had ever seen.
The universe seemed simple then,
But now 'tis little joy
To know I don't know lots of things
I did know when a boy.
[Sidenote: There is no substitute for thorough-going, ardent, sincere
earnestness.--DICKENS.]
I remember, I remember
This old world seemed so slow;
I'd teach it how to conquer things
When once I got a show!
'Twas such a charming fairy tale!
But now 'tis sorry play
To find how hard I have to work
To get three meals a day.
[Sidenote: To leave undone those things which we ought to do, to leave
unspoken the word of recognition or appreciation that we should have
said, is perhaps as positive a wrong as it is to do the thing we should
not have done.--LILLIAN WHITING.]
I remember, I remember
The things I planned to do;
I meant to take this poor old earth
And make it over new.
It was a most delightful dream;
But now 'tis little cheer
To know the world when I am gone
Won't know that I was here.
[Sidenote: Those who can take the lead are given the lead.--ARTHUR T.
HADLEY.]
[Sidenote: When a family rises early in the morning, conclude the house
to be well governed.--CHINESE.]
This somewhat overdrawn picture of human conceit and egotism holds a
lesson for each and all of us. He who knows it all can learn no more,
and he who can learn no more is likely to die ignorant. There are
guide-posts all along our ways which if heeded will direct us toward
the very destinations we should reach. And nothing else is so full
of suggestion and inspiration as is a good book. In it we can enter
the very heart of a man without being abashed by the author's august
presence.
[Sidenote: Duty determines destiny. Destiny which results from
duty performed may bring anxiety and perils, but never failure and
dishonor.--WILLIAM MCKINLEY.]
When quite young, the poet, Cowley, happened upon a copy of Spenser's
"Faerie Queen", which chanced to be nearly the only book at hand, and
becoming interested he read it carefully and often, until, enchanted
thereby, he irrevocably determined to be a poet. The effect this same
poem had upon the Earl of Southampton when he first read it is worth
remembering. As soon as the book was finished Spenser took it to this
noble patron of poets and sent it up to him. The earl read a few pages
and said to a servant, "Take the writer twenty pounds." Still he read
on, and presently he cried in rapture, "Carry that man twenty pounds
more." Entranced he continued to read, but presently he shouted: "Go
turn that fellow out of the house, for if I read further I shall be
ruined!"
[Sidenote: Laziness travels so slowly that poverty soon overtakes
him.--FRANKLIN.]
Dr. Franklin tells us that the chance perusal of De Foe's "Essay on
Projects" influenced the principal events and course of his life. The
reading of the "Lives of the Saints" caused Ignatius Loyola to form the
purpose of creating a new religious order,--which purpose eventuated in
the powerful society of the Jesuits.
[Sidenote: It is faith in something and enthusiasm for something that
makes a life worth looking at.--OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES.]
Dickens's earliest and best literary work, the "Pickwick Papers," was
begun at the suggestion of a publisher of a magazine for whom Dickens
was doing some job-work at the time. He was asked to write a serial
story to fit some comic pictures which chanced to be in the publisher's
possession.
[Sidenote: Blessed is he who has found his work. From the heart of the
worker rises the celestial force, awakening him to all nobleness, to
all knowledge.--THOMAS CARLYLE.]
While yet a mere boy Scott chanced upon a copy of Percy's "Reliques
of Ancient Poetry," which he read and re-read with great interest.
He purchased a copy as soon as he could get the necessary sum of
money and thus was early instilled into his soul a taste for poetry
in the writing of which he was destined to attain such eminence. The
translation of "Götz von Berlichingen" was Scott's first literary
effort and this work, Carlyle says, had a very large and lasting
influence on the great novelist's future career. In his opinion this
translation was "the prime cause of 'Marmion' and the 'Lady of the
Lake,' with all that has followed from the same creative hand. Truly a
grain of seed that had lighted in the right soil. For if not firmer and
fairer, it has grown to be taller and broader than any other tree; and
all nations of the earth are still yearly gathering of its fruit."
[Sidenote: Nothing that is excellent can be wrought suddenly.--JEREMY
TAYLOR.]
[Sidenote: Character is centrality, the impossibility of being
displaced or overset.--EMERSON.]
Thus we see how much there is in life for those who observe their
surroundings, who read the directions on the guide-posts, who study the
guidebooks and who are wise enough to receive and to utilize the advice
and suggestions that are everywhere offered them, and which their
reason tells them are good.
[Sidenote: A good book is the precious life-blood of a master spirit
embalmed and treasured up on purpose to a life beyond life.--MILTON.]