SELECTING A CALLING.
In reading the lives of great men, one is struck with a very
important fact: that their success has been won in callings for
which in early manhood they had no particular liking. Necessity or
chance has, in many cases, decided what their life-work should be.
But even where the employment was at first uncongenial, a strict
sense of duty and a strong determination to master the difficult and
to like the disagreeable, conquered in the end.
In these days of fierce competition, no matter how ardent the desire
for fame, he is a dreamer who loses sight of the monetary returns of
his life-efforts.
There have been a few men whose wants were simple, and these wants
guarded against by a certain official income, who could afford to
ignore gain and to work for the truths of science or the good of
humanity. The great English chemist Faraday was of this class. Once
asked by a friend why he did not use his great abilities and
advantages to accumulate a fortune, he said: "My dear fellow, I
haven't time to give to money making."
It is, perhaps, to be regretted that in nearly every case the efforts
of to-day, whether in commerce, trade, or science, have for their
purpose the making of fortunes. Nor should this spirit be condemned,
for fortune in the hands of the right men is a blessing to the world
and particularly to those who are more improvident.
Peter Cooper, Stephen Girard, George Peabody, and many other eminent
Americans who made their way to great wealth from comparative
poverty, used that wealth to enable young men, starting life as they
did, to achieve the same success without having to encounter the
same obstacles.
It is a well-known fact that boys who live near the sea have an
intense yearning to become sailors. Every healthy boy has a longing
to be a soldier, and he takes the greatest delight in toy military
weapons.
Our ideals for living, particularly when they are the creations of a
youthful imagination, are but seldom safe guides for our mature
years. The fairy stories that delighted our childhood and the
romances that fired our youth, are found but poor guides to success,
when the great life-battle is on us.
It is a mistake for parents and guardians to say that this boy or
that girl shall follow out this or that life-calling, without any
regard to the tastes, or any consideration of the natural capacity.
It is equally an error, because the boy or girl may like this or
that branch of study more than another, to infer that this indicates
a talent for that subject. Arithmetic is but seldom as popular with
young people as history, simply because the latter requires less
mental effort to master it. The world is full of professional
incompetents--creatures of circumstances very often, but more
frequently their life-failure is due to the whims of ambitious
parents.
While the child and even the young man are but seldom the best judges
of what a life-calling should be, yet the observant parent and
teacher can discover the natural inclination, and by encouragement,
develop this inclination.
As the wrecks on sandy beaches and by rock-bound shores, warn the
careful mariner from the same fate, so the countless wrecks which
the young man sees on every hand, increasing as he goes through
life, should warn him from the same dangers.
It is stated, on what seems good authority, that ninety-five percent
of the men who go into business for themselves, fail at some time.
It would be an error, however, to infer from this that the failures
were due to a mistaken life-calling. They have been due rather to
unforeseen circumstances, over-confidence, or the desire to succeed
too rapidly. Benefiting by these reverses, a large percent of the
failures have entered on the life-struggle again and won.
In the early days of the world's history, the callings or fields of
effort were necessarily limited to the chase, herding or
agriculture. In those times, the toiler had not only to work for the
support of himself and family, but he had also to be a warrior,
trained to the use of arms, and ready to defend the products of his
labor from the theft of robber neighbors.
In this later and broader day, civilization has opened up thousands
of avenues of effort that were unknown to our less fortunate
ancestors.
While the world is filled with human misfits, round pegs in square
holes and square pegs in round holes, the choice of callings has so
spread with the growth of civilization, that every young man who
reasons for himself and studies his own powers, can with more or
less certainty find out his calling, and pursue it with a success
entirely dependent on his own fitness and energy.
In a general way, the great fields of human effort, at this time, may
be divided into three classes. First, the so-called "learned
professions"--journalism, theology, medicine and law. Second, the
callings pertaining to public life, such as politics, military,
science, and education. Third, those vocations that pertain to
production, like agriculture, manufactures, and commerce.
But apart from the callings selected, it should be kept carefully in
mind that, no matter the business, success is dependent entirely on
the man.
Business is the salt of life, which not only gives a grateful smack
to it, but dries up those crudities that would offend, preserves
from putrefaction, and drives off all those blowing flies that would
corrupt it. Let a man be sure to drive his business rather than let
it drive him. When a man is but once brought to be driven, he
becomes a vassal to his affairs. Reason and right give the quickest
dispatch. All the entanglements that we meet with arise from the
irrationality of ourselves or others. With a wise and honest man a
business is soon ended, but with a fool and knave there is no
conclusion, and seldom even a beginning.
Having decided on a calling, bear ever in mind that faith and
trustfulness lie at the foundation of trade and commercial
intercourse, and business transactions of every kind. A community of
known swindlers and knaves would try in vain to avail themselves of
the advantages of traffic, or to gain access to those circles where
honor and honesty are indispensable passports. Hence the value which
is attached, by all right-minded men, to purity of purpose and
integrity of character. A man may be unfortunate, he may be poor and
penniless; but if he is known to possess unbending integrity, an
unwavering purpose to do what is honest and just, he will have
friends and patrons whatever may be the embarrassments and
exigencies into which he is thrown. The poor man may thus possess a
capital of which none of the misfortunes and calamities of life can
deprive him. We have known men who have been suddenly reduced from
affluence to penury by misfortunes, which they could neither foresee
nor prevent. A fire has swept away the accumulations of years;
misplaced confidence, a flood, or some of the thousand casualties to
which commercial men are exposed, have stripped them of their
possessions. To-day they have been prosperous, to-morrow every
prospect is blighted, and everything in its aspect is dark and
dismal. Their business is gone, their property is gone, and they
feel that all is gone; but they have a rich treasure which the fire
cannot consume, which the flood cannot carry away. They have
integrity of character, and this gives them influence, raises up
friends, and furnishes them with means to start afresh in the world
once more. Young men, especially, should be deeply impressed with
the vast importance of cherishing those principles, and of
cultivating those habits, which will secure for them the confidence
and esteem of the wise and good. Let it be borne in mind that no
brilliancy of genius, no tact or talent in business, and no amount
of success, will compensate for duplicity, shuffling, and trickery.
There may be apparent advantage in the art and practice of
dissimulation, and in violating those great principles which lie at
the foundation of truth and duty; but it will at length be seen
that a dollar was lost where a cent was gained; that present
successes are outweighed, a thousand-fold, by the pains and
penalties which result from loss of confidence and loss of
reputation. It cannot be too strongly impressed upon the minds of
young men to abstain from every course, from every act, which shocks
their moral sensibilities, wounds their conscience, and has a
tendency to weaken their sense of honor and integrity.