The Golden Quality
"They Passed Through."
To live content with small means:
To seek elegance rather than luxury, and
Refinement rather than fashion;
To be worthy, not respectable,
Wealthy, not rich;
To study hard, think quietly,
Talk gently, act frankly;
To listen to stars and birds, to
Babes and sages, with open heart;
To bear all cheerfully, do all bravely,
Await occasions, hurry never,--
In a word, to let the spiritual,
Unbidden and unconscious,
Grow up through the common--
This is to be my symphony.
--Channing.
Success
In every land and in every age since the curtain first rose on the world's great drama men have been in quest of the Fleece of Gold. The onward progress of the race since our rude forefathers from the leaves of the tree formed their clothes, and in the somber depths of the primeval forest constructed their habitation, is due to an insatiable desire to possess the coveted prize. Hanging before man's gaze in the consecrated borders of his existence, it has inspired him to greater usefulness. He has built ships and traversed the seas, invented machines, reared cities, and established laws. In science and art and literature he has vied with his fellow-man and given a mighty impulse to civilization, all for the Fleece of Gold--success.
The world worships at the shrine of success. It regards it as man's greatest attribute. And whether we find it in secular affairs, substantiated by material grandeur, or in the mysterious realms of the inner life characterized by the serene consciousness of truth, it must ever be the goal of human aspiration.
It is the thought of some day having their efforts crowned that causes men hotly to pursue the phantom or the reality of their lives. This aspiration keeps the torch of hope ablaze in the midnight darkness, and the spirits buoyed under the noon-day glare, while men forge on to the goal. The surging throngs of a great city, the active hands and brains in the bee-hives of industry and the many places of business, the vast army of seekers after knowledge in the schools and colleges throughout the land, the men of fame in the halls of Congress molding the affairs of the Nation, the countless army tilling the fields under the open sky, the legions in the dark caves of earth searching for treasure--all are seeking to enter the golden gate of success.
Said Mr. A. B. Farquhar in a baccalaureate address to the students of McDonough College: "Success colors everything. It is the essence of all excellencies, the latent power which compels the favor of fortune and subjugates fate. The world worships success regardless of how acquired; makes it a standard for judging men, an indispensable credential for all approval. If a man succeeds he is held to be wise, even though mediocre; if he fails, whatever his learning and intrinsic merit, little regard is paid to him. Success gilds and glorifies a multitude of blunders and littlenesses, and people are thought merely to exist who do not keep themselves on the road leading to it. In view of all this, it is no wonder that we see all humanity looking earnestly toward success and moving with eager step in search of it.
"Success is essentially the accomplishment of one's desires and purposes, the realization of one's ideals. But this definition does not necessarily imply a high state of being. As I sit by my window writing, the hoarse cry of a rag-man and the mournful strains of a hand-organ come to my ears. That able-bodied Greek, who is so lavish with his 'music,' and the rag-man, who is buying what the other is distributing freely, both are in quest of the same thing--'success.'"
Alas! the world too often measures success by false standards--worships the Golden Fleece, forgetting the high purpose it might be made to serve; so dazzled by means that ends become oblivious. The spirit of the age is to pay homage to great riches. The finely attired custodian of a money bag too often is regarded as an exponent of success. On this point we should guard ourselves, first ascertaining if the gorgeous equipage is the "genuine fleece," or only a sham intended to deceive. A mansion on a valuable corner lot does not constitute the "golden quality," nor does a million dollars in bank epitomize its character. Its language is not spoken in the dialect of Wall Street or of wheat pits. Gold, grain, stocks, and bonds and estates too often mean the perversion of those qualities most valuable to human life. Realty is not the prime issue of life, but reality. If that which a man gets in his pay envelope, however lucrative that may be, constituted his only reward, his effort would be miserably compensated.
The man who has spent his life like a scaraboid beetle rolling up money, without due regard for the common virtues of life, has not left "footprints on the sands of time," but only a zigzag trail along the highway over which he has journeyed. He has not achieved success in that he has accumulated riches without a corresponding accumulation of "wealth." To seek a purely selfish and material success is to defeat the very purpose of one's existence--"life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." In the very conquest for this baser type a man blights his sensibilities, minifies his present enjoyment, and destroys his prospect for a full measure of happiness by and by. With but one interest his happiness is insecure; for when that fails or ceases to satisfy he has nothing on which to rely. Midas craves for gold, and when he gets it his senses become as metallic as the object of his affection. Therefore, if we are of this type, simply seeking the Golden Fleece for what it will net us in dollars and cents, we are not on the road leading to success. For success does not consist in the acquisition of the material, so much as in a mental discipline that seeks objectively to subordinate intrinsic value.
We must confess, however, that the age in which we live is one of brick and mortar; that materialism and not æstheticism reigns over us. The book-keeper's pen has usurped the office of the artist's brush and the carpenter's chisel that of the sculptor. Intrinsic worth and dividend-paying value holds sway, and even the gift-horse is looked in the mouth while the priceless motive that prompted its giving is forgotten.
The commercial spirit which pervades the atmosphere of modern times is disintegrating the sublimer side of human life. The gilded god of materialism is lavishing its blessings in the realm of science and invention and commercial enterprise, at the expense of aestheticism, till to-day there are thousands of artisans to every artist. We have an abundance of stone masons, but few Phidiases or Angelos; hundreds of organ grinders, but few Beethovens or Webers or Bachs; a full quota of men engrossed in the cold calculus of business, but a scarcity of Homers or Dantes or Virgils.
Speaking of this material aspect of our epoch and how it is likely to be regarded in the future, when the paradise of ideal living is regained, a modern writer says: "Will not the intense preoccupation of material production, the hurry and strain of our cities, the draining of life into one channel, at the expense of breadth, richness, and beauty, appear as mad as the Crusades, and perhaps of a lower type of madness? Could anything be more indicative of a slight but general insanity than the aspect of the crowd on the streets of Chicago?" Why is it that the poems that have lived for centuries, and the masterpieces of the world's great painters and sculptors are not being equaled in the dawn of the twentieth century? The answer lies in the widespread devotion to realism instead of idealism. The immortals have joined the mortals in search for the Fleece of Gold. And Wordsworth's oft-quoted lines were never more applicable to us than now:
The world is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending we lay waste our powers.
All the capital in the universe does not stand for success unless there is set over against it the wealth of soul which Marcus Aurelius, that great apostle of plain living and high thinking, ever set forth as an antidote to the treadmill grind of commercial life. Shakespeare struck the keynote of this lofty conception of life, and pronounced a never-dying eulogy upon the supreme dignity of character when he said:
"Who steals my purse steals trash; ...
But he that filches from me my good name
Robs me of that which not enriches him,
And makes me poor indeed."
Wealth of soul is incomparably better than all that can be obtained from pomp and luxury. Charlemagne is said to have worn in his crown a nail taken from the cross on which the Savior was crucified. He wore it among the jewels of his diadem as a reminder that there existed a tenderer relation in life than kingdoms and material splendor. Thus in the crown of our success, if we would make it truly great, we must place the sublimer elements of our being. As the ivy softens the roughness of the mountain side and the unsightly ruin, so will the aesthetic mellow and subdue the intense commercialism with which we are surrounded. Without this quality our success becomes like the fabled apples on the brink of the Dead Sea--fair without, but ashes within.
If the avenue to success lay in one direction only--that of accumulating a fortune, little incentive would be felt by those in the lower walks of life. Moreover, if it were possible for all men to become millionaires, the very organization of human society would become disrupted; for who then would till the soil, run the factories, clean the streets? Nature has been wise in the distribution of her talents. Anticipating the havoc of endowing all mankind with equal powers, she established a wide diversity in the range of human ability. To one she has given the gift of sagacity to achieve success in the world of trade; to another mechanical skill to create the ideals of inventive genius into reality; to another the highly artistic sense, and withholding these higher attributes from still others, she has chosen to endow them with a wealth of muscular force that the physical requirements of organized human effort might be made effective. So that any way we choose to look at this question we must concede that temporal wealth does not constitute the broadest idea of success, nor is capable in itself of producing it.
Even failure may be an element of a glorious success. The volcano that pours its vengeance upon the fair plantation below, leaving wreck and ruin in its path, bestows a wealth of sulphur which plays an important part in the world of commerce. The same frost that kills the harvest of a season also destroys the locust, preserving the harvests of a century. The death of the cocoon is the production of the silk, and the failure of the caterpillar the birth of the butterfly. If the boy Newton had not failed utterly on the farm, he would never have been started in college to become the mighty man of science. The fall of Rome meant the rise of the German Empire. "All men," says Frederick Arnold, "need through errors attain to truth, through struggles to victory, through regrets to that sorrow which is a very source of life. Men must rise in an ever-ascending scale, like the ladder of St. Augustine, by which men, through stepping-stones of their dead selves rise to higher things; or those steps of Alciphron, which crumbled away into nothingness as fast as each foot-fall left them." Thus our very failures we may overrule and convert into stepping-stones to success. Lifted to a loftier sphere, to a nobler experience, we are apt to receive greater benefit than though we escaped disappointment and rejoiced in easy fruition.
Success does not consist in not encountering difficulties, but in overcoming them. If Jason is to have the golden fleece he must pass between the dangerous rocks, he must encounter the dragon, yoke to the plow the fire-breathing bulls, and subdue a regiment of armed men. If Joseph had not been Egypt's prisoner, he would never have been Egypt's governor. If Millet had not passed through the valley of sorrow, he could never have painted the "Angelus." The Restoration in England that gave Charles II a throne, drove Milton into absolute seclusion, and the last twelve years of his life were passed in enforced isolation. But this blind, deserted, broken-hearted, but illustrious scholar and poet, conquered despair, triumphed over every misfortune, and gave to the world those three great poems which have made his name immortal. Even poverty, which has been a hardship to the individual, has proved a boon to himself and to the cause of humanity. Science teaches us that ordinary mud has in it elements which, arranged according to the higher laws of nature, produce the opal, the sapphire, and the diamond. Likewise does history teach us that from the morass of poverty the commonest types of men have passed from stage to stage through the refining processes of experience till they have dazzled the world with their magnificence. Whether it be a slave like Æsop, a beggar like Homer, a peasant like Raphael, or a marble-cutter like Socrates, we see them at last wearing the diadem of a brilliant success.
In fact, the foremost in all nations and in all branches have, as a rule, risen from the ranks of the poor and lowly. Shakespeare held horses for a few pennies a night in front of a London theater, and later did menial service back of the scenes. Disraeli was an office boy, Carlyle a stone-mason's attendant, and Ben Jonson was a bricklayer. Morrison and Carey were shoemakers, Franklin was a printer's apprentice, Burns a country plowman, Stephenson a collier, Faraday a bookbinder, Arkwright a barber, and Sir Humphrey Davy a drug clerk. Demosthenes was the son of a cutler, Verdi the son of a baker, Blackstone the son of a draper, and Luther was the son of a miner. Butler was a farmer, Hugh Miller a stone-cutter, Abraham Lincoln a rail-splitter, and James Garfield was a canal boy. One-half of the Presidents of the United States were left orphans at an early age, left to make their way through the world alone. History reveals clearly that it has been not the sons of the rich, but the sons of poverty that have "compelled the favor of fortune and subjugated fate."
Neither rank nor genius nor any other natural endowment forms the only true basis of success. A right disposition, a desire and determination, founded on the sub-structure of right purpose, to cope with the problems that confront you, constitute the real basis of achievement. In short, the only demands which success makes of you is that you act with the most of yourself, bringing all your faculties to bear upon what you have to do; instilling your best effort into the infinite detail that goes to make up the great finality of your life. To this end, the systematic development of the whole man, body, mind, and soul, in such a manner as to bring you into right relation with things as they are and ought to be, is the paramount question.
In fact, education is the only passport to success. I do not mean that education that is restricted to institutions of learning. These, while possessing a decided advantage, by no means have a monopoly of learning. Genius finds opportunity in the great laboratories of nature. Every man has within himself an educational organization presided over by a full faculty; and nature's wonderful book is ever open to him, if only he will lay hold upon the lessons it would teach him. This type of education which is the drawing out toward all things the latent forces from within, and the broadening out for greater usefulness, means the acquisition of ability to meet every emergency and the establishment of high ideals.
Moreover, in the race for success, the proper nourishment of the brain is an essential part of self-development. The brain is substantially the great artist that creates our ideals in life. And yet we forget sometimes that it is the master of our destiny; and allow it to sink into that dull apathy so fatal to our hopes and aims. It would almost seem, indeed, as if a kind of fatality clung to some men in the way in which they neglect this supreme faculty of their being. You possess the power to use your brain as you choose; but not the right, morally, for society demands of you a high standard of thinking, since it is the only rational basis for a free government. Thus it is as much your duty properly to nourish your brain as to give proper care to the body.
In the rigid economy of modern life we should use extreme care in the selection of our reading. Our best interests demand more of us than a gormandizing of newspapers or ephemeral reading of any kind. Far be it from me to disparage that great organ of the times--the newspaper, which is a source of keen delight and benefit to us all, and almost the only source of instruction to thousands of the race. But we should be judicious in this, and not allow transitional matter to monopolize our time. "Read not the times, read the eternities," cried Thoreau. The shelves of our home and public libraries are filled with priceless volumes yet unread by us. And he who is not cultivating a taste for good wholesome reading is missing one of the highest enjoyments of life as well as minimizing his chances for success. We should ever be exploring new regions of thought. And in the extreme activity of this electric age we shall be obliged to take snap shots at our reading--on the street car, in the lunch room, anywhere we find it possible to peruse a single page.
If we look into the lives of some of the illustrious ones we shall find that they obtained knowledge under the greatest disadvantages. We see Lincoln reading his favorite volumes by the dim light of a pineknot blaze; or Burritt poring over his books at the forge; or Garfield gazing intently at the pages while riding a mule on the banks of a canal. Wesley likewise diligently searched the Scriptures while riding horseback over the country; William Cobbett learned grammar while a common soldier on the march; and we are told that Alexander the Great, each night on retiring, would place his favorite book, the "Iliad," under his pillow and during his waking moments would peruse its pages.
But the high intellectual plane of present-day civilization demands more of us than the world demanded then, when the avenues to honor and to power lay over fields of conquest, and the passport to favor was the sword. The complex problems of today call for a more thorough cultivation of our mental powers, which, to bring into play upon the multifarious concerns of our life, is the object of broad education. A well cultivated mind makes a man monarch of all that he surveys; and no one can be said to be truly successful who has not invaded the empire of thought in search for the imperishable Fleece of Gold.
Success, then, in the highest sense, is a full realization of the highest wealth of body, mind, and soul. And while it does not disparage material aggrandizement, it makes it subservient, ever looking to an equalization of the greater revenues of life. Like truth it consists in a right proportion of things; and like character, is inherent in the nature of the individual. Success must embrace all the cardinal virtues. It must arise from the harmonious and fullest use of all the faculties. In its essence, it is the aggregate of those things which we have acquired, and which we are putting to a wise and useful purpose. The way of life is strewn with those who have done fairly well. Excellence is the golden quality to seek. Success, like a commodity, has its price, and he who would have it must be willing to pay. You can not buy it on a bargain counter; it is a staple product and demands full value--the sublimest qualities of your being.
"In the lexicon of youth, which fate reserves for a bright manhood, there is no such words as--fail."