"As soon as possible after reaching the grounds of the Hampton Inst.i.tute, I presented myself before the head teacher for a.s.signment to a cla.s.s.
Having been so long without proper food, a bath, and change of clothing, I did not, of course, make a very favorable impression upon her, and I could see at once that there were doubts in her mind about the wisdom of admitting me as a student. I felt that I could hardly blame her if she got the idea that I was a worthless loafer or tramp. For some time she did not refuse to admit me; neither did she decide in my favor, and I continued to linger about her, and to impress her in all the ways I could with my worthiness. In the meantime, I saw her admitting other students, and that added greatly to my discomfort, for I felt, deep down in my heart, that I could do as well as they, if I could only get a chance to show her what was in me.
"After some hours had pa.s.sed, the head teacher said to me: "The adjoining recitation room needs sweeping. Take the broom and sweep it,"
"It occurred to me at once that here was my chance. Never did I receive an order with more delight. I knew that I could sweep, for Mrs. Ruffner had thoroughly taught me how to do that when I lived with her.
"_I_ swept the recitation room three times. Then I got a dusting cloth and I dusted it four times. All the woodwork around the walls, every bench, table, and desk, I went over four times with my dusting cloth. Besides, every piece of furniture had been moved and every closet and corner of the room had been thoroughly cleaned. I had the feeling that, in a large measure, my future depended upon the impression I made upon the teacher in the cleaning of that room. When I was through, I reported to the head teacher. She was a Yankee woman, who knew just where to look for dirt. She went into the room and inspected the floor and closets; then she took her handkerchief and rubbed it on the woodwork, about the walls, and over the table and benches. When she was unable to find one bit of dirt on the floor, or a particle of dust on any of the furniture, she quietly remarked: "I guess you will do to enter this inst.i.tution."
"I was one of the happiest souls on earth. The sweeping of that room was my college examination, and never did any youth pa.s.s an examination for entrance into Harvard or Yale that gave him more genuine satisfaction. I have pa.s.sed several examinations since then, but I have always felt that this was the best one I ever pa.s.sed."
If Lincoln, Burritt, Booker T. Washington, and thousands of others, with all their handicaps, could secure needed education for their life work, why should any man remain in an uncongenial calling? There is danger that we may give our boys and girls too much help; that life be made too easy for them; that their moral backbones may grow flabby by reason of too much support. Normal young people do not need aid and support. They need guidance and direction--and the majority of them, either the sharp spur of necessity or the relentless urge of an ambition which will not be denied.
Almost without exception we have found that the only difference between genius or millionaire and dunce or tramp is a willingness to pay the price.
THE PRICE OF SUCCESS
From an unknown author comes the all-important question to every seeker for success:
"You want success. Are you willing to pay the price for it?
"How much discouragement can you stand?
"How much bruising can you take?
"How long can you hang on in the face of obstacles?
"Have you the grit to try to do what others have failed to do?
"Have you the nerve to attempt things that the average man would never dream of tackling?
"Have you the persistence to keep on trying after repeated failures?
"Can you cut out luxuries? Can you do without things that others consider necessities?
"Can you go up against skepticism, ridicule, friendly advice to quit, without flinching?
"Can you keep your mind steadily on the single object you are pursuing, resisting all temptations to divide your attention?
"Have you the patience to plan all the work you attempt; the energy to wade through ma.s.ses of detail; the accuracy to overlook no point, however small, in planning or executing?
"Are you strong on the finish as well as quick at the start?
"Success is sold in the open market. You can buy it--I can buy it--any man can buy it who is willing to pay the price for it."
CHAPTER III
CLa.s.sES OF MISFITS
To the casual observer, humanity seems to be divided into countless different kinds of people. In fact, it is often said that of all the millions of people on the earth, no two are just alike. Some writers on vocational guidance, indeed, express discouragement. They see humanity in such infinite variety that it is impossible ever to cla.s.sify types.
Therefore, they mourn, the vocational expert cannot judge of apt.i.tudes except by trial in various kinds of work until, finally, real native talents appear in actual accomplishment. The anthropologist, however, easily divides mankind by means of several broad cla.s.sifications, A few distinct variations, easily recognizable by the anthropological expert, put every one of the billion and one-half people on the face of the earth in his particular cla.s.s.
In the same way, to the casual observer, it no doubt seems that the number and kind of misfits is so great that any attempt to a.n.a.lyze them and cla.s.sify them must meet with failure. Those, however, who have studied the problem and have met and talked with thousands of those struggling against the handicap of unloved and difficult work, find a few cla.s.ses which include nearly all of them. Just as there are two fundamental reasons why men and women select wrong vocations, and a few common variations upon these two reasons, so there are just a few general ways in which people select the wrong vocations. An examination of some of these will be illuminating to the reader.
THE PHYSICALLY FRAIL
In the beginning of the life of the race all men hunted, fished, fought, danced, sang, and loafed. These were the only manly vocations. There were no clerks, no doctors, and, perhaps, no priests. In some races and under some conditions to-day, all of the men are hunters and fishers, or shepherds and stock-raisers, or all the men till the field. Some years ago, in our country, practically all the male population worked at the trade of agriculture, there being only a few preachers, doctors, lawyers, merchants, and clerks.
In the nations of Europe to-day people are born to certain professions or born to a certain narrow circle of vocations; some people are born to manual labor, and, having once performed manual labor, are thereby firmly fixed in the cla.s.s of those who earn their living by their hands; others are born in a cla.s.s above that, and will suffer almost any privation rather than earn their living by manual labor. In the United States this same feeling is becoming more and more prevalent. Our physical work is nearly all of it done by those who came to us from across the sea, and native-born Americans seek vocations in some other sphere.
The common school is everywhere, and education is compulsory. The high school is also to be found in all parts of the country. There are also business colleges, technical schools, academies, universities, colleges, professional schools, correspondence schools, and other educational inst.i.tutions of every possible kind. These are patronized by the native-born population as well as by many of those who come to us from foreign lands. The result is that, of the first great cla.s.s which we shall treat, there are comparatively few in relation to the whole population.
Even though this is true, there are all too many.
The first cla.s.s of misfits is composed of those who are too frail for physical labor and who are not well enough educated to take their places amongst clerical or professional workers. These unfortunates do not like hard, manual work; they cannot do it well; they are outcla.s.sed in it. They do not hold any position long; they are frequently unemployed; and they are often compelled to live by their wits. As a general rule, those in this cla.s.s are well equipped intellectually by nature, and would have responded splendidly to educative efforts if they had been given an opportunity. People of this cla.s.s lack physical courage. They shrink from hardship and will do almost anything to escape physical suffering. It is this lack of courage, as well as their inability to make a decent living out of their hands and muscles, that leads them, in so many cases, to unlawful means.
As a general rule, people of this type have considerable natural refinement, and refinement is always expensive. They are the kind of people of whom it is often said that they have "champagne tastes and beer incomes." It is difficult for them to finance themselves, with any degree of frugality or economy, upon the small and precarious income they earn at manual labor. This is the cla.s.s of people who sometimes become counterfeiters, sneak thieves, pickpockets, forgers, gamblers, stool pigeons, second-story workers, and petty criminals along other lines which do not require physical courage, strength, and force. Of course, the great majority of these misfits do not enter upon a life of crime. They are, however, poor, often in need, sometimes pauperized, and, as a general rule, their lives are short and miserable. There are those, also, whose cases are not so extreme. Unfitness for manual labor results merely in bare living, a life of comparative poverty, and general lack of success.
THE FAT MAN
Another cla.s.s of those who are physically unfit for hard, manual labor are those who are too stout. The fat man is, by nature, fitted to sit in a large, luxurious chair and direct the work of others. He is too heavy on his feet for physical work, as a general rule, and is also too much disinclined to physical effort. It is a well-known fact that, almost without exception, fat men are physically lazy. The natural work, therefore, of the stout man is executive work, banking, finance, merchandising, handling of food products, and the arbitration of differences between his fellow men. Fat men are natural bankers, financiers, lawyers, judges, politicians, managers, bakers, butchers, grocers, restaurant owners, preachers, and orators. If, however, the man of this type does not secure sufficient education and training to enable him to undertake one of these professions, but grows up with no other ways to satisfy his wants than by the exercise of his muscles, he is greatly handicapped in the race for success. It is not usual, however, to find a man of this type amongst the ranks of the poor. Most of them are fairly well supplied with means, and usually have plenty to eat, plenty to wear, and a good place to sleep.
In order to obtain the things he desires, the man who has no apt.i.tude for physical labor on account of his great bulk sometimes turns his attention to crime. This type of man may be a gambler, a grafting politician, a confidence man, a promoter of wild-cat stocks or bonds, the man who sits behind the scenes and directs a band of criminals or, perhaps, a whole community of them, or in some other way preys upon the gullibility of the public.
Naturally, there are fat men, also, who are honest and high-principled in their intentions and who still have not fitted themselves for their true vocation in life. Such men, like those who are physically frail and honest, drag through a miserable existence, never fully realizing their possibilities, or expressing themselves; never finding an outlet for their real talents; never making the success of life which they might have made with sufficient training and in their true vocations.
THE MAN OF BONE AND MUSCLE
Just as there were, doubtless, thousands of men too frail or too corpulent for physical work who were compelled to do it in the days when practically all men were either farmers or carpenters and builders, so to-day there are thousands of men far too active for clerical work who are compelled to do it because certain circles in society have a prejudice against manual labor. There is a type of man whose bony and muscular system predominates in his organization. This type of man loves the out-of-doors; freedom is to him a physical and moral necessity. He hates, and even grows irritable under, restraint. He demands physical activity; his muscles call for exercise; his whole physical being is keen for life in the open, with plenty of activity. Yet this type of man, by thousands, is sentenced to spend his life behind the counter or chained to a desk. He is as unhappy there, and almost as badly placed, as if he were, indeed, in prison. Look around the parks, the roads, the athletic fields, the lakes and streams, the woods, and all out-of-door places in this country and you will find this man taking a brief rest from his prison cell, engaged in strenuous forms of muscular activity--tennis, golf, baseball, football, lacrosse, cross-country running, boating, swimming, yachting, motoring, horseback riding, hunting, fishing, exploring, mountain climbing, ranching--in many ways seeking to find an outlet for his stored-up physical energy.
WORK FOR THE ACTIVE MAN
There is plenty of room for the mental capacity, the executive ability, and the splendid organizing genius of this type of man in outdoor work.
Our great forests and fields are not producing twenty-five per cent of the amount of wealth that they should produce, under even such scientific methods as are known at present. But these are only the beginning. There is an opportunity for those with both mental and physical apt.i.tudes to undertake the solution of the problem. The resources of the universe are infinite. There is no parsimony in Nature. There is plenty and to spare for all.
Recently there has been a great deal said about the fact that all of the land on the surface of the earth has now been occupied by mankind; that hereafter, food products will become higher and higher in price; that each of us will have to be satisfied with a little less wealth than formerly; that rents will be higher; that the price of land will steadily increase--that, already, there is not enough of the bare necessities of life to go around. This is cited as the cause of pauperism and given as an excuse for war. May not this att.i.tude be mistaken? We have not yet scratched the surface of the possibilities. These out-of-door men are fitted by nature to take the scientific truths discovered by those better fitted to sit indoors, and make practical application of them to the problems of increasing the wealth of the race. If a boy in Alabama can grow 232 bushels of corn on one acre of ground, then farmers all over the country can grow at least 100 bushels of corn on an acre which now yields an average of 25 to 30 bushels. By scientific methods, Eugene Grubb has grown a thousand bushels of potatoes upon an acre of Wyoming land. A considerable addition will be made to the wealth of the race when a thousand other Eugene Grubbs arise and increase the productivity of thousands of other acres of potatoes.
THE BORN LEADER OF MEN
In his excellent little book, "The Art of Handling Men,"[4] Mr. James H.
Collins says:
Broadly speaking, the personal equation is that Something in a man that makes him effective in managing other men.
It is the difference between the fellow who lets a political club, a military company or a factory force go all to pieces, and some other fellow who can put the pieces together again, or rather, draw them together instantly. For the man who reorganizes without this Something is like the chap who cleans his own clock--he usually has a few pieces of the organization left over because they wouldn"t fit in anywhere. The personal equation is magnetic. It comes along and acts, and every part falls into place, and the organization is capable of performing a lot of new functions.
Not one person in five hundred possesses the faculty. Those who don"t, like to comfort themselves with the a.s.surance that it is a gift which Providence forgot to hand out to them. Innumerable stories grow up around the man who does possess it. One glance from his eagle eye, people say, and he reads you through. One word, and he enforces instant obedience.