The Denison review. [volume] (Denison, Iowa) 1867-current, 1907-10-16

~ VI ohu SApS 1SiSCS euQ WdINIluS
for opportunities to utilize them. Josh Billings
says success does not consist in making no err
rors, but in not making the same error twice.
Now let us consider the classes of education.
Any kind of an education is better than none;
but there is a vast difference between the deep
and the shallow one.
1t has been said that at Chautauqua they teach
everybody and everything. They teach some peo-
pie, perhaps, more than they are capable of learn
ing. That is not Chautauqua's fault; Chautauuua
cannot be blamed for sowing the seed, whether it
fall On fruitful soil or barren and stony ground.
But that silken and golden motto suggests q con-
SENTATIVE reflection. The horizon certainly does
broaden as we go up in the air, but it broadens
just the same whether we are darting upward in
a balloon or ascending a mountain with laborious
steps. Only a mountain is always there with it's
glorious perspective, whereas the balloon will
come down in fifteen minutes, and the whole
scene be lost; it is even very apt to burst and
carry its aeronaut to destruction. The mountain
represents the slowly built foundation of a real
education-the balloon the hasty and often dis
torted view that we get with a habit of merely
superficial consideration of things. Education is
broad and enduring. Like the mountain, it has
a firm substructure which is quite out of sight.
You cannot see into it's depths. The greater part
OF that which constitutes it has gone out of sight
long ago. But it holds a man up to some pur-
pose, and he may build his house on it's heights
and abide there all his life. Not a word of all
THIS is in any sense an argument against Chau-
tauquas and similar circles. They do nothing but
" III SpIGduluS DTUduCdSC UQelr ctlltlVatlOn.
They, as we'll as the colleges, are solidly educat-
ing many persons. But what a chance they do
afford for people who do not know anything at
all to put on the airs of learning!
1t is a great mistake to try to do too many
things at once, for certainly none of them will be
done as we'll as you are capable of in concen-
trated action. Try one thing at a time, and that
try hard. Though like all rules, susceptible of
some stretching, in the abstract it is a good rule
to follow. A person SO trained will be able to
take advantage OF the opportunities which are
Opportunity is a grand thing in educationa
fields. Without it the child becomes an inane
quantity or a criminal; with opportunity he
reaches out into the vast beyond. He governs
men; ne builds warehouses and controls trade;
ne masters the sciences and unearths great truths
that make their impress upon Time.
$50 nigh is grandeur to our dust.
So near is God to man,
When Duty wispers low, Thou must
The youth replies, 4 can"
Lincoln, while clerking in a general store.
studied books; while surveying he studied Inv;
and while practlcing law he studied men. Thus
each opportunity, struggled with, advanced the
man until he became a leader of men.
In 1861 the North sent her boys to the battle
fields. They met their dangers. The South threw
her most valiant men to the front. The world
was startled by the clash; leaders were born in
those days of fearful opportunity. They were sol.
d1ers, but not "soldierers." They were enthusi-
asts who saw openings and made opportunities
and who acquired greatness.
And so it is through all the lists of those who
achieve things. They ~learn-whether at the cam
mons mouth, in the Workshop, or from the store
houses of knowledge. They learn and are ready
they act. You gain nothing by education if you
do not act. The man, the woman, the boy, the girl
who will gain success is the one who has learned
the face of opportunity and follows the insight
with action. Thew Is education worth while; then