The Steady Aim, Examples and Encouragements from Modern Biography

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: chapter{Section 4THE STEADY AIM. CHAPTER I. EXAMPLES AND ENCOURAGEMENTS FROM THE LIVES OP EMINENT INVENTOKS AND D1SCOVEKERS. Never yet was good accomplish'd Without hand and thought. Barry Cornwall. PROLOGUE. 1. It is fitting that every man, however humble his condition, should set before himself, at the outset of his career, some object to be attained, some desire to be gratified, or some hope to be fulfilled. And it is the design of this volume show, by examples from modern Biography, that if he resolutely adhere to the purpose thus defined, and steadfastly carry out his Steady Aim, his exertions, sooner or later, will be crowned with success. 2. And success?success in life?is equally dear to the philanthropist as to the statesman, to the artist in his studio as to the captain who would bind his brow with ' War's red laurels.' For we would be understood by ' success in life' to mean not only material, but, if we may use the expression, moral success?a success not to be appraised by any worldly standard. Let the student declare that by chapter{Section 52 SUCCESS IN LIFE. success in life he means the acquirement of extensive knowledge. Let the savant protest that it consists in the felicitous investigation of scientific mysteries. Let the poet assert that it is a noble place on the bead-roll of those sublime singers whose music ' vibrates in the memory ' of successive generations. The engineer shall limit his ambition to the perfection of some wonderful mechanism, or the development of one of those inventions which help man to subdue nature. The merchant shall freight his ships with the treasure of far-off lands; and the man of letters be content if he secure a fitting audience for what he has to say. Thus, success in life may be rightly comprehended...