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.