The Irish standard. [volume] (Minneapolis, Minn. ;) 1886-1920, 1908-01-04
TO AVOID FAILURE.
Know One Thing and Be Sure to Know
That SupremeIy We'll.

] That Supremacy Well.
Knowing one thing-not a very long
curriculum, surely, even for d man
born blind, writes George Clarke Peck.
Yet that single piece of knowledge was
worth a ton OF things ordinarily known.
| Moreover, he did not say that one
thing" was all he knew. He merely
seized upon the one thing which meant
most to him just then, the thing which
he supremely knew, AMI thrust it in
the faces of his tornentors--"Onc
thing I know" .t .
For men who can say that same thing
the age is always waiting. Men who
know ono thing, and know that one
thing suprelnely well, are always in de-
1nand. Many a brilliant fellow has
been spoiled by his versatility. or
such a one, prominent in professional
circles. his friend said recently: He
failed by knowing too many things and
not knowing any one of them pro-
foundly."
Not our versatility but our grip on
one particular thing, is what really
counts Most Of us begin life us Eileen
4 in Chambers recent novel said she be :
gain, expecting to know "cvcrythins
about everything" Soon. however, we
reach the stage at which we are con-
tent to know everything about some
thing" And we probably end, as she
did, by confcssing that the most we
can hope is to know something about
something But to know something
supremely well, and to subordinate
every other knowledge to it, is one part
OF greatness.
There were many things doubtless,
which Gen. Grant did not know AS n
wood seller he was worstcd by all his
neighbors I'm tho business. He was SO
little fitted for commercial life that all
the world knew of his failure. IN {.
certain clcrkship he was accounted n
dreaming nobody. But he knew "one
| lIhiS -hIlC" ~ ~ tIIpIouSIllS lJdI IIS
left his whole country in debt to him;
knew it SO splendidly that his name
has gone down in history as one Of it's
greatest military stratcgists.
IT was said Of n certain profcsso,
that he knew nothing but Greek" So
cially. he was hopeless; so absent
80
tached he would have left it in the hall.
He lived Greek, dreamed Greek and ir
one might judge from his cadaveroIs
cheeks. lie might have subsisted on
Greek roots. But he knew a thing
which his pitying students had yet to
learn-that all the world asks OF any
, man is that he know one thing well,
and dying he will leave the whole
:. world in his debt. ......
Darwin once sadly confessed that nc
had lost his early love for poetry and
music. But that confession registers
also the value OF such 81 man to tho
world. He had TO live his own life on
the principle Of natural selection. To
turn in at one gate meant the shutting
of other gates behind him. And who
shall say but that the cultivation Of an
early taste for music and Shakespeare
might have Iessened the peerless con-
tribution he made to human knowledge
To know one thing, and to know il
, thoroughly; to dig into 81 subject rather
than to make the leaves fly over II, is
, the surest way to a. large place in life
But let It be remembered what this
former blind man said he knew. II
which he had done. Something had
been done for him. He had been recip.
v lent, not actor. God had opened his
I eyes. His was that fundamental, IRE.
t fragabIc. final knowledge on which the
| pillars of all knowledge fest-experi-
ence.
i "W1hereas, was blind, now see.
4 He was not so much believer as below.
0 ed He had learned his great lessor
S by letting another do something fol
). him. To know what that blind mar
e knew, and to know 1t in the way Ii.
e knew 1t. is the greatest thing in ths
{ world.