Brave Men and Women: Their Struggles, Failures, And Triumphs
9781465549310
418 pages
Library of Alexandria
Overview
Struggle, failure, triumph: while triumph is the thing sought, struggle has its joy, and failure is not without its uses. "It is not the goal," says Jean Paul, "but the course which makes us happy." The law of life is what a great orator affirmed of oratory--"Action, action, action!" As soon as one point is gained, another, and another presents itself. "It is a mistake," says Samuel Smiles, "to suppose that men succeed through success; they much oftener succeed through failure." He cites, among others, the example of Cowper, who, through his diffidence and shyness, broke down when pleading his first cause, and lived to revive the poetic art in England; and that of Goldsmith, who failed in passing as a surgeon, and yet wrote the "Deserted Village" and the "Vicar of Wakefield." Even when one turns to no new course, how many failures, as a rule, mark the way to triumph, and brand into life, as with a hot iron, the lessons of defeat! The brave man or the brave woman is one who looks life in the eye, and says: "God helping me, I am going to realize the best possibilities of my nature, by calling into action the beneficent laws which govern and determine the development of each individual member of the race." And the failures of such a person are the jewels of triumph; that triumph which is certain in the sight of heaven, if not in the eyes of men. "Brave Men and Women," the title of this volume, is used in a double sense, as referring not only to those whose words and deeds are here recorded, or cited as examples, but also to all who read the book, and are striving after the riches of character. Some of the sketches and short papers are anonymous, and have been adapted for use in these pages. Where the authorship is known, and the productions have been given verbatim, the source, if not the pen of the editor, has been indicated. Thanks are due to the press, and to those who have permitted the use of copyrighted matter. The late Judge Black was remarkable not only for his wit and humor, which often enlivened the dry logic of law and fact, but also for flashes of unique eloquence. In presenting a certain brief before the United States Supreme Court he had occasion to animadvert upon some of our great men. Among other things he said, as related to the writer by one who heard him: "The colossal name of Washington is growing year by year, and the fame of Franklin is still climbing to heaven," accompanying the latter words by such a movement of his right hand that not one of his hearers failed to see the immortal kite quietly bearing the philosopher's question to the clouds. It was a point which delivered the answer. In the life of every great man there is likewise a point which delivers the special message which he was born to publish to the world. Biography is greatly simplified when it confines itself chiefly to that one point. What does the reader, who has his own work to do, care for a great multitude of details which are not needed for the setting of the picture? To the point is the cry of our busy life. What had he done at that age to command more than ordinary respect and admiration? Born in poverty and obscurity, in which he passed his early years; with no advantages of education in the schools of his day, after he entered his teens; under the condition of daily toil for his bread; he had carried on, in spite of all obstacles, the process of self-education through books and observation, and become in literature and science, as well as in the practical affairs of every-day life, the best informed man in America.
