“Many rich men are the slaves of their own wealth, and their sons, growing up without a purpose in life, never know what real living is. I knew what poverty was when I was a young man, and few have suffered from it more than I. Yet now I am thankful for it, because it made me work. To live, we must work, and one must work to live. It is not birth, nor money, nor a college education, that makes a man; it is work. It has brought me commercial success. I am a practical man, yet I can never express too earnestly my thankfulness that I learned from my good mother to set up usefulness as my standard of success—usefulness to others as well as to myself.”
LIV
A “Forty-niner” who Seized Opportunities Others Failed to See.
I FOUND Mr. Armour in his crowded office at 205 La Salle street, Chicago, an office in which a snowstorm of white letters falls thickly upon a mass of dark desks, and where brass and lamps and electrical instruments abound, yet not much more than do the hurrying men. Such a mobilization of energy to promote the private affairs of one man I had never seen.
“Is Mr. Armour within?” I asked, supposing, since it was but 9:30 A.M., that he had not arrived.
“He is,” said the attendant, “and has been since half-past seven.”
“Does he usually arrive so early?” I inquired.
“Always,” was the significant reply.
I presented my letters, and was soon informed that they were of no avail there. Mr. Armour could see me only after the crush of the day’s affairs—that is, at 6 P.M., and then in the quiet of the Armour Institute, his great philanthropic school for young men and women. He was very courteous, and there was no delay. He took my hand with a firm grasp, evidently reading with his steady gaze such of my characteristics as interested him and saying at the same time, “Well, sir.”