Originality.
A woman's mind should always be filled with a life plan, else she is in danger. A busy woman is generally a safe woman. She must find her life work and keep busy. Even a hobby is better than nothing if time hangs on her hands. She should do something with all her might and not delay, for Time is flying.
A colored woman especially should have some purpose in life to further race advancement. It should not only be a high purpose but it should be something real.
To be enthusiastic about something is beautifying because it stimulates the circulation of the blood. Any kind of success comes from enthusiasm.
No matter how poor a woman may be she may be original in her ideas. At first, of course, she must use the ideas of others, until she can show her cleverness through her adaptations, and employing her powers and gifts will add until larger powers and gifts result.
She must try to get a new line of work for race advancement and dedicate herself to it. If she eliminates the Ego (Self) and will aim to work for the good of others, she will succeed.
Each one should find a realm, something in which she shall be supreme, and be first. "It is better to be first in an Iberian village than second in Rome." The race needs daring original people, to think and speak.
Emerson says, "Every man has a call to do something unique."
The person who thinks up new lines of study, thought and ideas for the race, enlarging its vision and enriching its mind is a race benefactor. Ruskin's creed of work should be the universal creed. "The man or woman who does work worth doing is the man or woman who lives and breathes his work; with whom it is ever present in his or her soul; whose ambition is to do it well and feel rewarded by the thought of having done it well. That man, that woman, puts the whole country under an obligation."