In 1805 there was born in London a boy of a hated and branded people. When sixteen years of age he became a clerk in a solicitor’s office, and, to the amusement of his companions, he was wont to say: “I intend to be prime minister of England.” He had no liberal education, yet he won honors of literary skill and scholarship. He was ambitious, and eventually won his way to Parliament. When he attempted to deliver his first speech, his highflown style and extravagant gestures provoked laughter and hisses, so that he took his seat with great mortification. In doing so, he uttered a remarkable prophecy, “I shall sit down now, but the time will come when you will hear me.” True to the utterance, that time came to Benjamin Disraeli, when, in Shakespeare’s words he could have said, “People and senators! be not affrighted; fly not; stand still; ambition’s debt is paid.”
Years ago a poor German boy named Schliemann read of the siege of Troy, and made up his mind to find the ruins of that ancient city. He procured books and taught himself six or seven languages. He persevered and prospered until as a merchant he made a fortune. Every step of his study and money-making was taken with the aim of fulfilling the vow of his boyhood. In due time he started eastward with a company of laborers, and for long years pursued his search. At last success crowned his efforts. Troy was discovered and the gold, silver and bronze articles of the Trojan king were dug out of his palace, and placed on exhibition at South Kensington, England.
One day while wandering about Cincinnati a young artist saw a sign which read, “Peter Skinner, Chairmaker.” “Why can’t I make chairs?” he asked himself. He straightway entered the establishment, resolved to ask for a position. In order to get to the office, he had to pass through the paint room, and the sight of several busy workers prompted him to inwardly exclaim, “Anyway I can paint chairs.” The firm wanted a hand, and he was engaged to come the next morning to work in the paint shop. As he wended his way back he tarried a moment to see how the painters did their work. That evening when he reached his room in the boarding-house, he borrowed a brush and an old chair, and began practising. Next morning he was on hand at the chair factory and there continued to work for two months at nine dollars per week. No one ever discovered that he was not an experienced chair-painter. During his leisure time at the boarding-house he made pencil drawings and dropped them carelessly on the floor so that they would attract attention. The landlord, a colonel in the militia, possessed a strong, characteristic face and the artist drew him in uniform, and dropped this picture on the floor of his room. His chief ambition was to return to portrait painting. He thought the drawing would please the colonel, and it did; so much so, that it led to his receiving a commission to paint the portraits of the colonel and his family, consisting of five members, at five dollars each. With this work to occupy him he left the chair factory, and soon the reputation of James H. Beard, the celebrated portrait and animal painter, was made.
History records thousands of those who have pressed their way upward until they were crowned with success in spite of the distressing, discouraging, circumstantial law of gravitation, in which poverty and uncouth ancestry have played an important part. What these have done, any other boy can do, providing he argues not
“Against heaven’s hand or will, not ’bate a jot
Of heart or hope, but still bear up and steer
Right onward.”
THE SPIRIT OF DISCONTENT.
There is, however, a spirit of discontent manifested by many who envy those a few rounds higher on life’s social or business ladder, and who are determined to surpass them at whatever cost. Such ambition is justly foredoomed to disappointment, like Alexander’s, who wept because there were no more worlds for him to conquer; and like Pisistratus, to whom the Athenian law-giver said, “Were it not for your ambition, you would be the best citizen of Athens.”
Ambition that rises from discontent or selfishness is false. It lacks conscience to engineer it. A boy is only fit to go higher as he demonstrates faithfulness where he is. A boy that simply wants to climb without endeavoring to do well in the position he holds is, as Beecher said, “Neither fit to be where he is, nor yet above it; he is already too high, and should be put lower.” “Out of the frying-pan into the fire,” though not his motto, will doubtless be his result.