Pushing to the Front

by Orison Swett Marden

"Hard pounding, gentlemen," said Wellington at Waterloo to his officers, "but we will see who can pound the longest."

"It is very kind of them to 'sand' our letters for us," said young Junot coolly, as an Austrian shell scattered earth over the dispatch he was writing at the dictation of his commander-in-chief. The remark attracted Napoleon's attention and led to the promotion of the scrivener.

"There is room enough up higher," said Webster to a young man hesitating to study law because the profession was so crowded. This is true in every department of activity. The young man who succeeds must hold his ground and push hard. Whoever attempts to pass through the door to success will find it labeled, "Push."

There is another big word in the English language: the perfection of grit is the power of saying "No," with emphasis that can not be mistaken. Learn to meet hard times with a harder will, and more determined pluck. The nature which is all pine and straw is of no use in times of trial, we must have some oak and iron in us. The goddess of fame or of fortune has been won by many a poor boy who had no friends, no backing, or anything but pure grit and invincible purpose.

A good character, good habits, and iron industry are impregnable to the assaults of the ill luck that fools are dreaming of. There is no luck, for all practical purposes, to him who is not striving, and whose senses are not all eagerly attent. What are called accidental discoveries are almost invariably made by those who are looking for something. A man incurs about as much risk of being struck by lightning as by accidental luck. There is, perhaps, an element of luck in the amount of success which crowns the efforts of different men; but even here it will usually be found that the sagacity with which the efforts are directed and the energy with which they are prosecuted measure pretty accurately the luck contained in the results achieved. Apparent exceptions will be found to relate almost wholly to single undertakings, while in the long run the rule will hold good. Two pearl-divers, equally expert, dive together and work with equal energy. One brings up a pearl, while the other returns empty-handed. But let both persevere and at the end of five, ten, or twenty years it will be found that they succeeded almost in exact proportion to their skill and industry.

"Varied experience of men has led me, the longer I live," says Huxley, "to set less value on mere cleverness; to attach more and more importance to industry and physical endurance. Indeed, I am much disposed to think that endurance is the most valuable quality of all; for industry, as the desire to work hard, does not come to much if a feeble frame is unable to respond to the desire. No life is wasted unless it ends in sloth, dishonesty, or cowardice. No success is worthy of the name unless it is won by honest industry and brave breasting of the waves of fortune."

Has luck ever made a fool speak words of wisdom; an ignoramus utter lectures on science; a dolt write an Odyssey, an Aeneid, a Paradise Lost, or a Hamlet; a loafer become a Girard or Astor, a Rothschild, Stewart, Vanderbilt, Field, Gould, or Rockefeller; a coward win at Yorktown, Wagram, Waterloo, or Richmond; a careless stonecutter carve an Apollo, a Minerva, a Venus de Medici, or a Greek Slave? Does luck raise rich crops on the land of the sluggard, weeds and brambles on that of the industrious farmer? Does luck make the drunkard sleek and attractive, and his home cheerful, while the temperate man looks haggard and suffers want and misery? Does luck starve honest labor, and pamper idleness? Does luck put common sense at a discount, folly at a premium? Does it cast intelligence into the gutter, and raise ignorance to the skies? Does it imprison virtue, and laud vice? Did luck give Watt his engine, Franklin his captive lightning, Whitney his cotton-gin, Fulton his steamboat, Morse his telegraph, Blanchard his lathe, Howe his sewing-machine, Goodyear his rubber, Bell his telephone, Edison his phonograph?

If you are told of the man who, worn out by a painful disorder, tried to commit suicide, but only opened an internal tumor, effecting a cure; of the Persian condemned to lose his tongue, on whom a bungling operation merely removed an impediment of speech; of a painter who produced an effect long desired by throwing his brush at a picture in rage and despair; of a musician who, after repeated failures in trying to imitate a storm at sea, obtained the result desired by angrily running his hands together from the extremities of the keyboard,—bear in mind that even this "luck" came to men as the result of action, not inaction.

"Luck is ever waiting for something to turn up," says Cobden; "labor, with keen eyes and strong will, will turn up something. Luck lies in bed, and wishes the postman would bring him the news of a legacy; labor turns out at six o'clock, and with busy pen or ringing hammer lays the foundation of a competence. Luck whines; labor whistles. Luck relies on chance; labor, on character."

Stick to the thing and carry it through. Believe you were made for the place you fill, and that no one else can fill it as well. Put forth your whole energies. Be awake, electrify yourself; go forth to the task. Only once learn to carry a thing through in all its completeness and proportion, and you will become a hero. You will think better of yourself; others will think better of you. The world in its very heart admires the stern, determined doer.