Rutland weekly herald. [volume] (Rutland, Vt.) 1859-1877, 1875-01-07
ROOM AT The ToP.
Or. Holland s New Year Sermon
to Young Men.

4
/ Teaile yonng HlpI Annually making
gea5t gteat sn{ae atf5s n e5nseioGY ait5GY gbacMftitg NTH
and high hopes, the prospect is, in nIne-
/ ty-nine- cases in a hundred, most per-
| picking. They see every avenue IN
I prosperity thronged with their superiors
! in experience, in social advantages and
! in the possession of all the elements and
conditions of success. Every post is oc-
! oupied, every office filed, every path
crowded. Where shall they fad room 2
| II is related of Dir. Webster, that when
d young lawyer suggested to him that
the profession to which be had devoted
himself was oYercrowded, the great
man replied, "YouHg man, there is al
ways room enough at the top. Never
was wiser or more suggestive word
said There undoubtedly is always
room enough where excellence lives
Mr. Webster was not troubled for lack
of room. Mr.. Clay and Mr.. Colhoun
were never crowded. Mr. EveFts, Mr.
Cushing and 0'Connor have plenty of
space around them. Mr.. Beecher, DIR.
Storrs, DIR. Hall, Mr.. Phillips Brooks,
would never know in their personal ex-
perience, that it was hard to obtain
desirable ministerial charge. The pro-
fession is not crowded where they are.
DR.. Brown Sequard, DIR. Willard Parker,
DR.. hammond, are not troubled for
space for their elbows. When Nelation
died in Paris, he died like Moses on a
mountain. When Won Graefe died in
Berlin, he had DO neighbor at his alti-
tude.
1t is well, first, that all young men re-
member that not thing will do them SO
much injury as quick and easy success, /
and that nothing will do them SO much
good as struggle which teaches them
exactly there is in them, educates
them gradually to its use. instructs them
TO personal economy, drills them into
patient and persistent habit Of work,
and keeps them at the foot of the ladder
until they become strong enough to hold
every step they are enabled to gain The
first years of every mans business or
professional life are years of education.
They are intended to be in the order of
nature and Providence. Doors do not
open to man until he is prepared TO en-
ter them. The man without wedding
garment may get in surreptitously, but
he Immediately goes out with a flea in
his ear. We think it is the experience
of most successful men who have
watched the course of their lives In re-
trospect, that whenever they have ar |
rived at point where they were |
thoroughly prepared to go up higher, |
the door TO the higher place has swung /
back of itself, and they have heard the |
call to enter. The old die. or voluntari-
ly retire for rest. The best men who |
stand ready to take their places will sue
ceed to their positioniand its honors and
The young men will say that only q
few can reach the top. That is true
but it is also true that the further from
the bottom one goes, the raore scattering.
the neighborhood. One can fancy for
that every profession and
every calling is pyramidal in lis living
and that while. only enc
man was at the top, there are ssFerai
tiers of men below him who nave plenty
of elbow room; and that it is only a. the
base thar men are 90 thick that they pick
the meat out of one anotbere teeeh 10 !
keep. from. starving. If man has no
power to get. out of the rabble at the
bottom, then he is self-convicted of hav- /
ng chosen calling or profession TO q
whose duties he has no adaptation.
The grand mistake that young men
make, during the first ten years OF their
business and professional life, is in idly
waiting for their chance. They seem
10: forget, or they do not know, that |
Turing those ten years they enjoy the
only leisure they will ever have. After
'en years, in the natural course of things,
hey will be absorbingly busy. There
will then be no time for reading, cultnre s
and: study. If they do not ,.eonEe
thoroughly grounded In the / liiciples
md practical details of their profession
turing those years if they do not etore