"There are some men whose failure to succeed in life is a problem to others, as well as to themselves. They are industrious, prudent, and economical; yet, after a long life of striving, old age finds them still poor. They complain of ill-luck; they say fate is against them. But the real truth is that their projects miscarry because they mistake mere activity for energy. Confounding two things essentially different, they suppose that if they are always busy, they must of a necessity be advancing their fortune; forgetting that labor misdirected is but a waste of activity."
"The person who would succeed in life is like a marksman firing at a target—if his shot misses the mark, it is but a waste of powder; to be of any service at all, it must tell in the bull's eye or near it. So, in the great game of life, what a man does must be made to count, or it had almost as well be left undone.
"The idle warrior, cut from a block of wood, who fights the air on the top of a weather-cock, instead of being made to turn some machine commensurate with his strength, is not more worthless than the merely active man who, though busy from sunrise to sunset, dissipates his labor on trifles, when he ought skillfully to concentrate it on some great end.
"Every person knows some one in his circle of acquaintance who, though always active, has this want of energy. The distemper, if we may call it such, exhibits itself in various ways. In some cases, the man has merely an executive faculty when he should have a directing one; in other words, he makes a capital clerk for himself, when he ought to do the thinking work for the establishment. In other cases, what is done is either not done at the right time, or not in the right way. Sometimes there is no distinction made between objects of different magnitudes, and as much labor is bestowed on a trivial affair as on a matter of great moment.
"Energy, correctly understood, is activity proportioned to the end. The first Napoleon would often, when in a campaign, remain for days without undressing himself, now galloping from point to point, now dictating dispatches, now studying maps and directing operations. But his periods of repose, when the crisis was over, were generally as protracted as his previous exertions had been. He has been known to sleep for eighteen hours without waking. Second-rate men, slaves of tape and routine, while they would fall short of the superhuman exertions of the great emperor, would have considered themselves lost beyond hope if they imitated what they call his indolence. They are capital illustrations of activity, keeping up their monotonous jog- trot for ever; while Napoleon, with his gigantic industry, alternating with such apparent idleness, is an example of energy.
"We do not mean to imply that chronic indolence, if relieved occasionally by spasmodic fits of industry, is to be recommended. Men who have this character run into the opposite extreme of that which we have been stigmatizing, and fail as invariably of securing success in life. To call their occasional periods of application energy, would be a sad misnomer. Such persons, indeed, are but civilized savages, so to speak; vagabonds at heart in their secret hatred of work, and only resorting to labor occasionally, like the wild Indian who, after lying for weeks about his hut, is roused by sheer hunger to start on a hunting excursion. Real energy is persevering, steady, disciplined. It never either loses sight of the object to be accomplished, or intermits its exertions while there is a possibility of success. Napoleon on the plains of Champagne, sometimes fighting two battles in one day, first defeating the Russians and then turning on the Austrians, is an illustration of this energy. The Duke of Brunswick, idling away precious time when he invaded France at the outbreak of the first Revolution, is an example of the contrary. Activity beats about a cover like an untrained dog, never lighting on the covey. Energy goes straight to the bird at once and captures it."
CHAPTER XVII
SUCCESS BUT SELDOM ACCIDENTAL.
A man may leap into sudden fortune at a bound, and without effort or foresight, but it is doubtful if any great permanent success ever was the outcome of blind chance.
The old adage, "Trust to luck," like many other adages that time has kept in unmerited circulation, is a bad one. The man who trusts to luck for his clothing is apt to wear rags, and he who depends on it for food is sure to go hungry.