The Washington herald., 1915-04-09
THE CURSE OF POVERTY
By oRIsoN SWEEP MARDEN.

1
The story is told Of young maj
anxious to succeed in life who wen
to multimillionaire. the late Colli'
iP. Huntington. for advice as to how
h. should proceed.
Take $4,000 and go into the bust
ness of raising rubber trees" said tn,
railroad magnate. as though $4,000
were a mere bagateIle that any one
could lay his hands on at a moment:
notice.
But the young man didn't have S10..
1000. and didn't know how or where tc
l get it. and SO he went away sorrow.
full.
This recalls the story of that Other
young man who was anxious to sue
coed. You remember how he went to
the Christ and asked him the question
eternal life?" And our Lord said to
him. Go. sell all thou hast. and give
to the poor. and follow me-" And the
young man turned away sorrowful. for
he had much goods.
| Now, the man who doesn't want to
succeed is not worth his salt. But
there are many brands of socalled sue
cess. and the supreme question is.
What sort of success are you after?
!
who went to Coils p. Huntington for
advise was a perfectly legitimate one.
| He wanted to raise himself to posi-
ton of independence, which must be
the aim of every young man who will
| ever amount to anything. When a
man ceases to have that ambition the
salt will have gone out of him. Equal
| ly. II he becomes SO absorbed in the
pursuit of material gain that he de-
4 Nr..l.. IT, H.
is as great a failure as if he had never
aspired. For the meaning of any sue
cess worthy the name is sservice-serv-
ice to mankind.
This is the lesson that Christ taught
to all men through the young man in
the Gospel. and through the entire
course of His life on earth. But the
young man would not follow Him. He
was not willing to serve in the way the
time needed and our Divine Master
wanted him to serve. He loved money
better than service. His heart was in
his possessions. and SO when he was
asked to part with them he turned
away sorrowful-probably to spend the
rest of his life in adding to them.
Nowhere in the Bible do we find the
condemnation of money; it is only Of
the love of money. But we do find
this very significant text: The de-
struction of the poor is their poverty"
Every Investigator of slum life in our
big cities. every record of the lives of
the unfortunate poor in our midst
proves that this is an absolute truth.
There is no denying the fact that pow
erty is responsible for more ignorance
and crime, more discomfort and unhap-
piness. more suicides and ruined ambi-
tions. more wrecked hopes and homes
than almost anything else.
No young man has a right to remain
in a position. if it Is possible to get
out of it, where he will be constantly
subjected to the great temptations of
poverty, which in many instances are
greater than those OF wealth. His
self-respect demands that he should
rise above it. If il is his duty to put
himself in a position of dignity and
independence, where he will not be liza
BILE at any moment to be burden to
his friends, or to the community in
case of sickness or other emergency.
The supply is open to you and me.
to all of us who have an ambition to
make the most of ourselves. When
you realize that your splendid powers
and possibilities of manhood or woman
hood were given you to be developed
and used in the service of the race, you
will never allow them to be strangled
and rendered useless by poverty.
The means and appliances for self
education. self-improvement are open
to every one in this land of ours. Go,
use them, and by their help unfold the
powers the Creator has infolded in you.
You can thus make yourself a tremen-
dous factor in the solution of the pow
erty problem.
UroDyrirht lql5)