Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1889-11-21
INTELLECTUAL LABOR.
ITS PECUNIARY REWARDS ARE CON-
PARATNELY SMALL.

The tendency of the present age is to
place pecuniary value upon everything,
and to underestimate, or hold in con-
tempt, anything which cannot at will be
turned into cash. That this is a superficial,
incorrect and vulgar way of estimating
the value of things cannot be questioned,
but it is equally true that nowhere is this
tendency more pronounced than in this
country. Millet's ''Angelus" is likely to
attract wider public attention and be
valued more highly than any other paint
ing, simply because it has cost more,
and no other means of advertising could
have been more effective.
THEY NEVER STRUCK.
Intellectual labor can claim no such
advantage to give it charm in the popu-
/ lar eye, nor can it hold out the attrac-
ton of great pecuniary rewards to young
men choosing a career, such as many of
the commercial activities of the present
time can safely promise. When it is
remembered that clergymen, lawyers,
physicians, writers of all kinds and art
lists are picked men, with more than av-
erage talent, and of many years of ex-
pensive discipline and experience, it is
evident that their pecuniary rewards are
small compared with those of many
other callings requiring no greater talent
and far less preparation.
The moment such topic is suggested
countless illustrations come to mind of
the inequality between the service rem
dered to the world and the pecuniary
return that the world has been willing
| to give. Milton received e. FOR Para
disc LOST" a host of authors whose
names are inseparably connected with
the chief glories of English literature,
including johnson and Goldsmith, al
most starving in London, Heine and De
Musset dying in garrets in Paris, with
the financial straits to which Carlyle,
Matthew Arnold and even Emerson were
often reduced, are striking examples of
the truth running all through ancient
and modern history that great thinkers
are not rewarded in money by the gen.
Grafton which they adOrn.
Of certain class of literary workers
this is always true. The works of Her
bert Spencer, widely as they are known
and great as has been their influence
upon contemporary thought, have never
yielded their author an annual support
Great pecuniary prizes are frequently
won by striking some popular chord,
and the growth of habits and of facii-
ties for reading have made the rewards
of literary labor greater now than ever
before; but, nevertheless, the worlds
thinking is still largely done for it gratu
itously. The greater number of literary
aspirants are obliged, like the Edinburgh
reviewers, to cultivate literature upon
little oatmeal" and the majority of
professional men are compelled to live
in modest circumstances and with the
practice of rigid economy.
There are many reasons why it is well
that this should be so. There is certain
degree of self denial which seems neces-
sary to the attainment of the strongest
influence over mankind. The thoughts
and labors of many man, living in pow
erty and sacrifice, have weight which
would never be given them if it were
known that they were well paid. This
has always been recognized by the great
majority of literary workers, and con-
sidering the degree of their deprivations
they have not been discontented at giving
their labor to the world without ade-
quate return. They have never struck
for higher wages.
THE REWARDS.
Few of the great writers of the world
have not been more or less under subjec-
ton to this stern mother of invention.
Whether this was best for them or not
the world has freely left them so. It
has often refused bare existence to its
most richly endowed members, except on
condition of earning by manual labor
the rewards which the fruits of their in
tellectual toll were not thought worthy
to receive.
1t might have been thought that the
latter part of the eighteenth century
could have made better use, for itself
and posterity, of its most exquisite genius
for song than to have made him an ex-
ciseman in the Scottish lowlands; or
that Charles Lamb or Nathaniel Haw-
thorne could have been better employed
than the one as a clerk in the India office
in Salem. 1t was poor discernment, as
well as inadequate reward of genius, to
have left Thoreau with the larger part of
the edition of "Walden" on his hands,
and to have allowed Corot to have re-
tanned an almost unbroken collection of
his own paintings until he was 60 years
old
1t would be unjust, however, to speak
as if the rewards of intellectual toll were
confined to, or mainly represented by,
either the recognition of mankind or pc
cuniary returns. In no other sphere of
life can so much happiness of high and
noble kind be found. Whoever has fitted
himself by whatever expense of time and
toll to appreciate the best that has been
said and done in the world, to take part
however humbly, in molding public opin-
ion, and in contributing to the advance
of the race toward better conditions, has |
entered on career which may have its
deprivations, its perplexities and discour-
agements, but has also an undercurrent |
of enjoyment that nothing can wholly |
disturb. The physician who has saved a |
valuable life, the clergyman who clears |
away the mists of superstition from the |
minds of large congregation, and gives |
them vision of religious things in their |
true nationality and beauty, or the states |
man, author or editor who aids in lifting |
his generation up above itself. can afford |
to be i'll paid in mere money.
Such mems payment comes in different |
coin-in daily increasing personal
worth in the satisfaction of thinking the |
best thoughts OF the time. in the con-
sciousness of contributing to the worlds
advancement, and in the increasing graft.
tude and affection of the best men and