The Van Buren press., 1893-04-22
SUCCESS IN LIFE.

The youth who would get on in the
world must choose pursuit which will
enable him to follow the natural bent
OF his mind-to exercise and crafty his
predominant faculty, his ruling pas
sion. II You have strong original in
clination or fondness for certain pur
suit, you will not have to force your.
self to di scharge even its difficult du-
ties; that natural bias will insure the
intensest application to it as matter
of course. Biography teens with
proofs of this. The men who have
made their mark in the world have diff.
fered from those who have lived and
died in obscurity not more in mental
power than in their early self-knowl.
edge and PERCEPTION of their inborn
aptitudes. See the boy Murillo filling
the margins of his school books with
drawings; the little Handel stealing
midnight interviews with n smuggled
clavichord in n secret attic; the young
Faraday making an electric light ma
chine out of bottle: Chantrey, the
predestined sculptor, carving in his
boyhood the head of "old Fox" his
school-mastcr, in bit of pine wood
Were not the greatness of John Hun
ter, the celebrated anatomist and sur
geon, and the choice of his calling shad-
owed forth in youth by his observations
on the incubated egg? Were not the
great painting of West the natural out
come OF the fly SO naturally ycounterfeitcd
by him on a sheet Of pm per when boy?
Who is that boy, who, in spite of whip
pings upon whippings, keeps his lonely
vigils in the steeple of the parish
church, watching the stars in their
courses through the sky? 1t is the
Able La CASTLE. destined to be the
first astronomer of his time. Daniel
Webster was but eight when he saw In
a country shop cotton handkerchief
with the constitution OF the United
States printed on both sides Of it, and
emptied his pockets Of his boarded
pennies to buy. it. That night,
on the kitchen floor, before the
roaring chimney fire, he ab-
sorbed its contents into his
brain and blood, and from that hour
was the predestined great expoundcr''
and defender of that instrument against
its misinterpreters, violators and
foes
win you say that these boys were all
prodigies. boys of rare and exceptional
genius, and that in ninety-nine out of
hundred youths the bent of their
talents is far less distinctly marked?
No doubt; but though less decided, it
still in most boys exists; and everyone
should study himself till he learns for
what calling nature has designed him.
So many Young men to-day drift help
lessly and hopelessly into their life pur-
suits that the word vocation" or ''call-
ing" has almost become misnomer.
Find ont early, therefore, what ma
ture designed you to be-whether a
lawyer doctor, preacher, trader, Or
mechanic-and strive Qssduously to
qualify yourself for the discharge of
the duties of your calling Be careful
not to mistake hasty impulse. a shall
low temporary liking, for real bent
or deep love for vocation; and, on
the other hand. when you have pur-
sued any business for some years, and
found that it has many difficulties,
trials and perplexities of which you
had not dreamed, do not hastily
abandon it for another-thus throwing
away most of the knowledge and ex-
perience acquired-with the expecta-
ton OF finding your pathway in the
latter strewn with roses without any
thorns. All cnllings that are worth
pursuing are alike in this-that not
one of them is easy. Only
after repeated failures following
the most earnest and persist
ent efforts to succeed should
q change be made. Remember, too,
that those kinds of business which pay
best in the long-run are the slowest in
the beginning to yield return. Sue
cess in them is like the growth of the
aloe--for long time slow and imper-
ccptible. For years You perceive no
change; then all at once, when the
time comes, there Is crisis, and 1t
shoots up a stalk ten or fifteen feet
high hung with innumerablc flowers.
Stick, then, If possible, to your chosen
calling, lest it be said Of you, as char
acter in Owen Meredith's "Lucile":
With irresolute finger he knocked at each one
or the doorways Of life but abided at none.
His course by each star that crossed IL was set.
And whatever he did he was sure to regret.
Finally, whatever your calling, do
not be content with mediocre degree
of skill in it. Remember that talent,
ability or skill in it, II it be only of
average quality, In of little market
value. Only when 1t rises above the
average has it decided value, and its
worth increases in a geometrical rather
than in an arithmetical progression.
You may have been told how it is with
the precious stones-with diamonds,
emeralds or pearls-that the relative
values OF large and small ones are ont
Of all proportion to the SIZE Every in