The Pensacola journal. (Pensacola, Fla.) 1898-1985, 1921-02-09
A DAILY MESSAGE
BY DR.. WILLIAM e. BARTON
THE FAILURES OF SUCCESS

1t is commonly declared that moth
ing succeeds like success. There is
much to be said in favor Of this time
honored proverb. But 1t is not al
ways true. Often in human expert
ence nothing succeeds. like failure; and
there are instances in which nothing
fails like success.
The year 1855 brought to Abraham
Lincoln his two largest fees as law
Yer. One Of these was paid by the
Illinois Central railroad, and the other
he won in the Mccormick reaper case.
These two fees were assurance of sue
cess In his profession, and one of the
cases brought him one of his keenesI
disappointments. He went to Cincin-.
natl to plead in the reaper case, am
Stanton, whom he afterward appointed
secretary of war, refused to let him
plead. You know the story; il ys,t
do not, read it in the biographies or
Lincoln. 1t is commonly cited, and
justly, to show that Lincoln dod not
cherish resentments. But that Incl
dent has other lessons. Lincoln might
have gone back to Illinois nursing
his hurt feelings, and saying, Here,
where am known, I am as great a
lawyer as Stanton"
Mr.. Ralph Emerson, one Of the firm
that employed Lincoln, has told, and
the lives Of Lincoln record, what the
actually said and did. Said he:
I am going back to Illinois to study
law"
why. Mr.. Lincoln" exclaimed En-
erson, who was himself a law student
and an admirer of Lincoln, You stand
at the head of the bar in Illinois. What
are you talking about?"
"Ah yes" said Lincoln, 81 do occl1-
py good position there, and / think
| that | can get along with the way
| things are done there now. But these
college trained men, who have de-
voted their whole lives to study, are
coming west, and they study their
| cases as we never do. They have got
as far west as Cincinnati They win
soon be in Illinois,"
MI. Emerson said that Lincoln
| paused good while after their re-
sumo of the situation, and then said
| again, Il am going home to study
law"
He did it. And in way it was the
| making or him. That year Of success
was the year also of his peril. Lincoln
knew It. He also knew that it was
the year of his opportunity.
| Many a man is ruined by premature
success.
| Many man is unprepared for the
discipline and the. Disappointment
which success brings
I Many man stops far below where
Lincoln was in 1855. because he does
| not rightly estimate the opport,,ni-
ties and the dangers of the success be
has already won.
When Lincoln was forbidden -
plead in Cincinnati, he sat down and
listened to the other lawyers. He
saw that they were able to mass their
facts in logical sequence, to pile their
arguments with cumulative effect
which he had never found necessary
In jury trials. He knew that this-was
challenge to him to put into his
preparation something which he did
not as yet possess. He saw that
while he had abilities which Stanton
did not have, Stanton had a prepara-
| ton which he himself lacked.
| 1t would be the making of rnany a
man who has had a moderate sue
cess, if he could have with it a heart
breaking disappointment to bring him
to such decision as Abraham Lin
coin made at Cincinnati in 1855.
Fortunate is the man who rightly
estimates the opportunities and perils
of his successes. Fortunate also il
the man whol knows how to transform
his failures and disappointments into
material for future success.