How to Get on in the World

M >> Major A.R. Calhoon >> How to Get on in the World

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There is perhaps no finer example in all history of the self-made man
than George Washington. It may be argued that he belonged to a good
family, and that his family was amongst the richest in the country at
that time. This is true, yet there is not a boy who graduates to-day
at our grammar schools who has not had far better educational
advantages than had Washington. But he was self-taught, and he so
prepared himself that no duty that required him, ever found him
deficient. At an age when most young men are thinking about striking
out for themselves, Washington occupied with success and honor
positions requiring courage, judgment, and decision. He grew with his
own deserved advance, until at length by his own splendid efforts, he
found himself, in the words of Adams, "First in war, first in peace,
and first in the hearts of his countrymen."

With all the avenues of life open to him, or ready to be opened, if
he will but boldly knock, the young man starting out in life to-day
has every advantage. If he will carefully study over the splendid
examples we have cited, and follow along the lines that led to their
success, his own prosperity can no longer be a matter for doubt.

CHAPTER XXV

UNSELFISHNESS AND HELPFULNESS.

It must never be forgotten that the position a man occupies at the
close of his life is not an infallible criterion of whether he has
got on in the world. There are some places in the world's history so
illustrious that to occupy them it would be worth dying in poverty
and misery. Ambition might well choose to be remembered with
gratitude by succeeding generations and to have an immortal name,
even if to attain it everything were sacrificed that is counted
desirable in life. Who would not surrender wealth and ease and
luxury, if in exchange for them he could leave such a name as
Columbus, Washington, Lincoln, John Brown, Livingstone or Howard?
Posthumous glory counts for something in the reckoning. And this is
often attained by self-sacrifice. Revile the world as we may, it does
not forget the men who have done it service. The men who have
forgotten themselves, who have not striven after their own advantage,
but have devoted their lives to the good of humanity, achieve
immortality. They get on in the world in the sense of receiving a
crown that cannot fade and a glory outshining that of kings and
millionaires. The hero has a reward all his own and he may well
renounce the lower rewards of riches and ease to gain it. But his
qualities must be heroic or he will make his sacrifices to no
purpose. He must be true to himself at all cost. Washington was a
brilliant example of this fidelity to his ideal. Sparks tells us that
when he clearly saw his duty before him, he did it at all hazards,
and with inflexible integrity. He did not do it for effect; nor did
he think of glory, or of fame and its rewards; but of the right thing
to be done, and the best way of doing it.

Yet Washington had a most modest opinion of himself; and when offered
the chief command of the American patriot army he hesitated to accept
it until it was pressed upon him. When acknowledging in Congress the
honor which had been done him in selecting him to so important a
trust, on the execution of which the future of his country in a great
measure depended, Washington said: "I beg it may be remembered, lest
some unlucky event should happen unfavorable to my reputation, that I
this day declare, with the utmost sincerity, I do not think myself
equal to the command I am honored with."

And in his letter to his wife, communicating to her his appointment
as commander-in-chief, he said: "I have used very endeavor in my
power to avoid it, not only from my unwillingness to part with you
and the family, but from a consciousness of its being a trust too
great for my capacity; and that I should enjoy more real happiness in
one month with you at home than I have the most distant prospect of
finding abroad, if my stay were to be seven times seven years. But,
as it has been a kind of destiny that has thrown me upon this
service, I shall hope that my undertaking is designed for some good
purpose. It was utterly out of my power to refuse the appointment,
without exposing my character to such censures as would have
reflected dishonor upon myself, and given pain to my friends. This, I
am sure, could not, and ought not, to be pleasing to you, and must
have lessened me considerably in my own esteem."

Washington pursued his upright course through life, first as
commander-in-chief, and afterward as President, never faltering in
the path of duty. He had no regard for popularity, but held to his
purpose through good and through evil report, often at the risk of
his power and influence. Thus, on one occasion, when the ratification
of a treaty, arranged by Mr. Jay with Great Britain, was in question,
Washington was urged to reject it. But his honor, and the honor of
his country, was committed, and he refused to do so. A great outcry
was raised against the treaty, and for a time Washington was so
unpopular that he is said to have been actually stoned by the mob.
But he, nevertheless, held it to be his duty to ratify the treaty;
and it was carried out in despite of petitions and remonstrances from
all quarters. "While I fell," he said, in answer to the remonstrants,
"the most lively gratitude for the many instances of approbation from
my country, I can no otherwise deserve it than by obeying the
dictates of my conscience."

When the Oregon, coming along the Atlantic coast, was struck in the
middle of the night by that coaster, and a great wound was made in
her side, through which the water was pouring, Captain Murray stood
on the bridge as calm, apparently, as a May morning, and waited until
every passenger was off, and every officer was off, and every man on
the crew was off, and the last man to step from the sinking ship was
the captain himself; and ten minutes after he stepped off, the
steamer gave a quiver, as of apprehension, and then plunged to the
bottom of the ocean. The steamer was his, and the men were his, and
the boats were his, and the passengers were his, all for this: that
he might save them in time of peril; and he would go down to the
bottom of the ocean rather than that, by his recreancy, one of those
entrusted to him should perish. This was the true hero, the man who
would die rather than be false to duty.

One of the most striking instances that could be given of the
character of the dutiful, truthful, laborious man, who works on
bravely in spite of difficulty and physical suffering, is presented
in the life of the late George Wilson, Professor of Technology in the
University of Edinburgh. Wilson's life was, indeed, a marvel of
cheerful laboriousness; exhibiting the power of the soul to triumph
over the body, and almost to set it at defiance. It might be taken as
an illustration of the saying of the whaling-captain to Dr. Kane, as
to the power of moral force over physical: "Bless you, sir, the soul
will any day lift the body out of its boots!"

A fragile but bright and lively boy, he had scarcely entered manhood
ere his constitution began to exhibit signs of disease. As early,
indeed, as his seventeenth year, he began to complain of melancholy
and sleeplessness, supposed to be the effects of bile. "I don't think
I shall live long," he then said to a friend; "my mind will--must
work itself out, and the body will soon follow it." A strange
confession for a boy to make! But he gave his physical health no fair
chance. His life was all brain work, study, and competition. When he
took exercise it was in sudden bursts, which did him more harm than
good. Long walks in the Highlands jaded and exhausted him; and he
returned to his brain-work unrested and unrefreshed.

It was during one of his forced walks of some twenty-four miles, in
the neighborhood of Stirling, that he injured one of his feet, and he
returned home seriously ill. The result was an abscess, disease of
the ankle-joint, and a long agony, which ended in the amputation of
the right foot. But he never relaxed in his labors. He was now
writing, lecturing and teaching chemistry. Rheumatism and acute
inflammation of the eye next attacked him, and were treated by
cupping, blistering, and colchicum. Unable himself to write, he went
on preparing his lectures, which he dictated to his sister. Pain
haunted him day and night, and sleep was only forced by morphia.
While in this state of general prostration symptoms of pulmonary
disease began to show themselves. Yet he continued to give the weekly
lectures to which he stood committed to the Edinburgh School of Arts.
Not one was shirked, though their delivery, before a large audience,
was a most exhausting duty. "Well, there's another nail put into my
coffin," was the remark made on throwing off his top-coat on
returning home; and a sleepless night almost invariably followed.

At twenty-seven, Wilson was lecturing ten, eleven, or more hours
weekly, usually with setons or open blister-wounds upon him--his
"bosom friends," he used to call them. He felt the shadow of death
upon him, and he worked as if his days were numbered. "Don't be
surprised," he wrote to a friend, "if any morning at breakfast you
hear that I am gone." But while he said so, he did not in the least
degree indulge in the feeling of sickly sentimentality. He worked on
as cheerfully and hopefully as if in the very fullness of strength.
"To none," said he, "is life so sweet as to those who have lost all
fear of dying."

Sometimes he was compelled to desist from his labors by sheer
debility, occasioned by loss of blood from the lungs; but after a few
weeks' rest and change of air, he would return to his work, saying,
"The water is rising in the well again!" Though disease had fastened
on his lungs, and was spreading there, and though suffering from a
distressing cough, he went on lecturing as usual. To add to his
troubles, when one day endeavoring to recover himself from a stumble
occasioned by his lameness, he overstrained his arm, and broke the
bone near the shoulder. But he recovered from his successive
accidents and illnesses in the most extraordinary way. The reed bent,
but did not break; the storm passed, and it stood erect as before.

There was no worry, nor fever, nor fret about him; but instead,
cheerfulness, patience and unfailing perseverance. His mind, amidst
all his sufferings, remained perfectly calm and serene. He went about
his daily work with an apparently charmed life, as if he had the
strength of many men in him. Yet all the while he knew he was dying,
his chief anxiety being to conceal his state from those about him at
home, to whom the knowledge of his actual condition would have been
inexpressibly distressing. "I am cheerful among strangers," he said,
"and try to live day by day as a dying man."

He went on teaching as before--lecturing to the Architectural
Institutes and to the School of Arts. One day, after a lecture before
the latter institute, he lay down to rest, and was shortly awakened
by the rupture of a blood-vessel, which occasioned him the loss of a
considerable quantity of blood. He did not experience the despair and
agony that Keats did on a like occasion, though he equally knew that
the messenger of death had come, and was waiting for him. He appeared
at the family meals as usual, and next day he lectured twice,
punctually fulfilling his engagements; but the exertion of speaking
was followed by a second attack of hemorrhage. He now became
seriously ill, and it was doubted whether he would survive the night.
But he did survive; and during his convalescence he was appointed to
an important public office--that of director of the Scottish
Industrial Museum, which involved a great amount of labor, as well as
lecturing, in his capacity of professor of technology, which he held
in connection with the office.

From this time forward, his "dear museum," as he called it, absorbed
all his surplus energies. While busily occupied in collecting models
and specimens for the museum, he filled up his odds-and-ends of time
in lecturing in Ragged Schools and Medical Missionary Societies. He
gave himself no rest, either of mind or body; and "to die working"
was the fate he envied. His mind would not give in, but his poor body
was forced to yield, and a sever attack of hemorrhage--bleeding from
both lungs and stomach--compelled him to relax in his labors. "For a
month, or some forty days," he wrote--"a dreadful Lent--the wind has
blown geographically from 'Araby the blest,' but thermometrically
from Iceland the accursed. I have been made a prisoner of war, hit by
an icicle in the lungs, and have shivered and burned alternately for
a large portion of the last month, and spat blood till I grew pale
with coughing. Now I am better, and to-morrow I give my concluding
lecture (on technology), thankful that I have contrived,
notwithstanding all my troubles, to early on without missing a
lecture to the last day of the Faculty of Arts, to which I belong."

How long was it to last? He himself began to wonder, for he had long
felt his life as if ebbing away. At length he became languid, weary,
and unfit for work; even the writing of a letter cost him a painful
effort, and he felt "as if to lie down and sleep were the only things
worth doing." Yet shortly after, to help a Sunday school, he wrote
his "Five Gateways of Knowledge," as a lecture, and afterward
expanded it into a book. He also recovered strength sufficient to
enable him to proceed with his lectures to the institutions to which
he belonged, besides on various occasions undertaking to do other
people's work. "I am looked upon as being as mad," he wrote to his
brother, "because on a hasty notice, I took a defaulting lecturer's
place at the Philosophical Institution, and discoursed on the
polarization of light . . . But I like work: it is a family
weakness."

Then followed chronic _malaise_--sleepless nights, days of pain, and
more spitting of blood. "My only painless moments." he says, "were
when lecturing." In this state of prostration and disease, the
indefatigable man undertook to write the "Life of Edward Forbes;" and
he did it, like every thing he undertook, with admirable ability. He
proceeded with his lectures as usual. To an association of teachers
he delivered a discourse on the educational value of industrial
science. After he had spoken to his audience for an hour, he left
them to say whether he should go on or not, and they cheered him on
to another half-hour's address. "It is curious," he wrote, "the
feeling of having an audience, like clay in your hands, to mould for
a season as you please. It is a terribly responsible power . . . I do
not mean for a moment to imply that I am indifferent to the good
opinion of others--far otherwise; but to gain this is much less a
concern with me than to deserve it. It was not so once. I had no wish
for unmerited praise, but I was too ready to settle that I did merit
it. Now, the word DUTY seems to me the biggest word in the world, and
is uppermost in all my serious doings."

That was written only about four months before his death. A little
later he wrote: "I spin my thread of life from week to week, rather
than from year to year." Constant attacks of bleeding from the lungs
sapped his little remaining strength, but did not altogether disable
him from lecturing. He was amused by one of his friends proposing to
put him under trustees for the purpose of looking after his health.
But he would not be restrained from working so long as a vestige of
strength remained.

One day, in the autumn of 1859, he returned from his customary
lecture in the University of Edinburgh with a severe pain in his
side. He was scarcely able to crawl up stairs. Medical aid was sent
for, and he was pronounced to be suffering from pleurisy and
inflammation of the lungs. His enfeebled frame was ill able to resist
so severe a disease, and he sank peacefully to the rest he so longed
for, after a few days' illness.

The life of George Wilson--so admirably and affectionately related by
his sister--is probably one of the most marvelous records of pain and
long-suffering, and yet of persistent, noble and useful work, that is
to be found in the whole history of literature.

Instances of this heroic quality of self-forgetfulness in the
interest of others are more frequent than we realize. Dr. Louis
Albert Banks mentions the following illustration: "The other day, in
one of our cities, two small boys signaled a street-car. When the car
stopped it was noticed that one boy was lame. With much solicitude
the other boy helped the cripple aboard, and, after telling the
conductor to go ahead, returned to the sidewalk. The lame boy braced
himself up in his seat so that he could look out of the car window,
and the other passengers observed that at intervals the little fellow
would wave his hand and smile. Following the direction of his
glances, the passengers saw the other boy running along the sidewalk,
straining every muscle to keep up with the car. They watched his
pantomime in silence for a few blocks, and then a gentleman asked the
lame boy who the other boy was: 'My brother,' was the prompt reply.
'Why does he not ride with you in the car?' was the next question.
'Because he hasn't any money,' answered the lame boy, sorrowfully.
But the little runner--running that his crippled brother might ride--
had a face in which sorrow had no part, only the gladness of a self-
denying soul. O my brother, you who long to do great service for the
King and reach life's noblest triumph, here is your picture--willing
to run that the crippled lives may ride, willing to bear one
another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ--that is the
spirit of the King's country."

"The path of service is open to all, nay, we stumble on to the path
daily without knowing it. Ivan Tourguenieff, in one of his beautiful
poems in prose, says, 'I was walking in the street; a beggar stopped
me--a frail old man. His inflamed, tearful eyes, blue lips, rough
rags, disgusting sores--oh, how horribly poverty had disfigured the
unhappy creature! He stretched out to me his red, swollen, filthy
hands; he groaned and whimpered for alms. I felt in all my pockets;
no purse, watch, or handkerchief did I find; I had left them all at
home. The beggar waited, and his outstretched hand twitched and
trembled. Embarrassed and confused, I seized his dirty hand and
pressed it. 'Don't be vexed with me, brother; I have nothing with me,
brother.' The beggar raised his bloodshot eyes to mine; his blue lips
smiled, and he returned the pressure of my chilled fingers. 'Never
mind, brother,' stammered he; 'thank you for this--this, too, was a
gift, brother.' I felt that I, too, had received a gift from my
brother. This is a line of service open to us all."

A gentleman writing to the Chicago _Interior_, relates this incident
in his own career as a prosecuting attorney: a boy of fifteen was
brought in for trial. He had no attorney, no witnesses and no
friends. As the prosecuting attorney looked him over, he was pleased
with his appearance. He had nothing of the hardened criminal about
him. In fact, he was impressed that the prisoner was an unusually
bright-looking little fellow. He found that the charge against him
was burglary. There had been a fire in a dry goods store, where some
of the merchandise had not been entirely consumed. The place had been
boarded up to protect, for the time being, the damaged articles.
Several boys, among them this defendant, had pulled off a board or
two, and were helping themselves to the contents of the place, when
the police arrived. The others got away, and this was the only one
caught. The attorney asked the boy if he wanted a jury trial. He said
"No;" that he was guilty, and preferred to plead guilty.

Upon the plea being entered, the prosecutor asked him where his home
was. He replied that he had no home.

"Where are your parents?" was asked. He answered that they were both
dead.

"Have you no relatives?" was the next question.

"Only a sister, who works out," was the answer.

"How long have you been in jail?"

"Two months."

"Has anyone been to see you during that time?"

"No, sir."

The last answer was very like a sob. The utterly forlorn and
friendless condition of the boy, coupled with his frankness and
pleasing presence, caused a lump to come into the lawyer's throat,
and into the throats of many others, who were listening to the
dialogue. Finally the attorney suggested to the judge that it was a
pity to send the boy to the reformatory, and that what he needed more
than anything else was a home.

By this time the court officials, jurors and spectators had crowded
around, the better to hear what was being said. At this juncture one
of the jurors addressed the court, and said: "Your honor, a year ago
I lost my only boy. If he were alive, he would be about this boy's
age. Ever since he died I have been wanting a boy. If you will let me
have this little fellow, I'll give him a home, put him to work in my
printing establishment, and treat him as if he were my own son."

The judge turned to the boy, and said: "This gentleman is a
successful business man. Do you think, if you are given this splendid
opportunity, you can make a man of yourself?"

"I'll try," very joyfully answered the boy.

"Very well; sign a recognizance, and go with the gentleman," said the
judge.

A few minutes later the boy and his new friend left together, while
tears of genuine pleasure stood in many eyes in the crowded
courtroom. The lawyer, who signs his name to the story, declares that
the boy turned out well, and proved to be worthy of his benefactor's
kindness.

Deeds like that are waiting for the doing on every hand, and no man
gives himself up to this spirit of helpfulness for others without
strengthening his own life.

This spirit of self-forgetfulness and cheerful helpfulness is and
essential quality of the true heroic soul--the soul that is not
disturbed by circumstances, but goes on its way, strong and imparting
strength.

We have to be on our guard against small troubles, which, by
encouraging, we are apt to magnify into great ones. Indeed, the chief
source of worry in the world is not real but imaginary evil--small
vexations and trivial afflictions. In the presence of a great sorrow,
all petty troubles disappear; but we are too ready to take some
cherished misery to our bosom, and to pet it here. Very often it is
the child of our fancy; and, forgetful of the many means of happiness
which lie within our reach, we indulge this spoiled child of ours
until it masters us. We shut the door against cheerfulness, and
surround ourselves with gloom. The habit gives a coloring to our
life. We grow querulous, moody and unsympathetic. Our conversation
becomes full of regrets. We are harsh in our judgment of others. We
are unsociable, and think everybody else is so. We make our breast a
store-house of pain, which we inflict upon ourselves as well as upon
others.

This disposition is encouraged by selfishness; indeed, it is, for the
most part, selfishness unmingled, without any admixture of sympathy
or consideration for the feelings of those about us. It is simply
willfulness in the wrong direction. It is willful, because it might
be avoided. Let the necessitarians argue as they may, freedom of will
and action is the possession of every man and woman. It is sometimes
our glory, and very often it is our shame; all depends upon the
manner in which it is used. We can choose to look at the bright side
of things or at the dark. We can follow good and eschew evil
thoughts. We can be wrong-headed and wrong-hearted, or the reverse,
as we ourselves determine. The world will be to each one of us very
much what we make it. The cheerful are its real possessors, for the
world belongs to those who enjoy it.

It must, however, be admitted that there are cases beyond the reach
of the moralist. Once, when a miserable-looking dyspeptic called upon
a leading physician, and laid his case before him, "Oh!" said the
doctor, "you only want a good hearty laugh: go and see Grimaldi."
"Alas!" said the miserable patient, "I am Grimaldi!" So, when
Smollett, oppressed by disease, traveled over Europe in the hope of
finding health, he saw everything through his own jaundiced eyes.

The restless, anxious, dissatisfied temper, that is ever ready to run
and meet care half-way, is fatal to all happiness and peace of mind.
How often do we see men and women set themselves about as if with
stiff bristles, so that one dare scarcely approach them without fear
of being pricked! For want of a little occasional command over one's
temper, and amount of misery is occasioned in society which is
positively frightful. Thus enjoyment is turned into bitterness, and
life becomes like a journey barefooted among thorns and briers and
prickles. "Though sometimes small evils," says Richard Sharp, "like
invisible insects, inflict great pain, and a single hair may stop a
vast machine, yet the chief secret of comfort lies in not suffering
trifles to vex us; and in prudently cultivating and under-growth of
small pleasures, since very few great ones, alas! are let on long
leases."

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