Dear reader, it is a grave undertaking to write a book, especially is it
so in writing a treatise on success and failure, as we have attempted to
do in the work we hereby present you. It is a solemn thing to give
advice. Experience teaches that no one thing will please everybody; that
men's censures are as various as their palates; that some are as deeply
in love with vice as others are with virtue. Shall I then make myself
the subject of every opinion, wise or weak? Yes, I would rather hazard
the censure of some than hinder the good of others.
There need neither reasons to be given nor apologies to be made where
the benefit of our fellow-men is our aim. Henry Clay Trumbull says: "At
no time in the world's history, probably, has there been so general an
interest in biography as that which has been shown of late. Just here
lies a weighty obligation upon these who write, and those who read, of
the lives of men who have done something in the world. It is not enough
for us to know WHAT they have done; it belongs to us to discover the WHY
of their works and ways, and to gain some personal benefit from the
analysis of their successes and failures. Why was this man great? What
general intentions--what special traits led him to success? What ideal
stood before him, and by what means did he seek to attain it? Or, on the
other hand, what unworthy purpose, what lack of conscience and religious
sense, what unsettled method and feeble endeavor stood in the way of the
'man of genius' and his possible achievements?" In this volume one sees
the barefoot boy rise to the eminent statesman, the great millionaire,
the honored inventor. How was this accomplished? We believe that a
careful study of the different characters, by the light of the author's
opinion of the characteristics essential to success, as shown in
Department Fifth, will show why they succeeded.
Let the reader follow each character separately, from childhood to
manhood, noting carefully the different changes in the career of each
and the motives which actuated and brought them about. If this book
shall serve to awaken dormant energies in ONE PERSON who might otherwise
have failed, we shall feel abundantly repaid. Doubtless, there are
others who are better qualified to write a treatise on such a subject;
nevertheless, we have done our best, and this done, we have attained
success.