If you are a smoker and find you have no appet.i.te for lunch, give up cigars in the forenoon, and you will notice an immediate difference when you sit down to the noonday meal.
The hypochondriac imagines he has things the matter with him, and he becomes confirmed in his belief, he finds that so long as he lives he has something the matter with him. He no sooner gets cured of one than something else attacks him. There is no medicine like air and exercise and occupation. The man who gives in to trifling ailments is in a sad plight. He is never happy unless he is sick. He is unreasonable, and he is the last one to appreciate what can be done by a man who cures himself through the mental processes.
We all know that we can take a perfectly well man and pre-arrange to have a dozen of his friends on a given day greet him with some remark about his ill appearance. That man will be sick before the tenth man accosts him.
Politics
Politics is a losing game. Every man owes it to himself and to his family and to his country to take an interest in politics to the extent of getting out to the primaries and voting for the right man, and help to get good men in office. But when a man carries politics to extremes or mixes it with his business, his business is sure to suffer.
There are two kinds of politics--the honest kind and the grafting kind.
The honest politician gets very slight remuneration for the time and energy he spends, and the grafting politician sooner or later winds up in the soup through his dishonest practices.
There is no greater danger to business than to have the proprietor spend much of his time in politics. The upright business man will not descend to the things practised by the dishonest politician, and the sharp business man who has no compunctions on this score will make a loss in his business.
The law of compensation surely comes in here, for in proportion as a man plays politics his business is bound to suffer.
Profanity
Twenty-five years ago profanity was found on every side. Today you find it only among laborers. Business men won"t allow profanity.
Swearing goes with lying. The truthful man can look you in the eye and chisel out his words and you know he means it.
The liar gets angry and swears, and he is a bluff.
Truth doesn"t need curse words to make it stick.
Some great men swear and many small men swear. Usually, however, the truly great man doesn"t swear.
Men who think, men who study and a.n.a.lyze, seldom swear.
Swear words are usually used as fillers in sentences. Some men have limited knowledge of adjectives so they resort to swearing.
Mark this when you hear a man firing a volley of profanity in rapid succession--You lose respect for that man!
Profanity is an easier habit to acquire and harder to give up than its distant relative, slang.
Slang has its value for it has taken place of much profanity.
Slang and profanity, and logic and thought don"t mix well together. The more profanity, the less brains in your make-up. Profanity is a hold-back.
System
System is all right so long as it lessens labor. Generally system is complex and increases fixed charges.
The system of copying every letter is a waste of time. Not once in a thousand cases do you require to refer to a letter.
Have fixed rules and prices and you won"t have to refer to letters.
When you do copy a letter copy it on the back of the letter you are answering. Use a carbon sheet.
Have Simplicity your rule instead of System.
System has tangled many inst.i.tutions.
Beware of system that makes more work.
Don"t clutter up your office with a lot of useless data and wagon loads of old letters and records.
Rule of Gold
Centuries ago Confucius was walking through the woods soliloquizing and a.n.a.lyzing and sizing up things in solitude. While thus engaged he was waylaid by two Chinese peasants. These men had heard of Confucius"
philosophy, but they could not make much out of it, for Confucius used words beyond their limited understanding. These men, with raised clubs, halted Confucius and said to him: "Our minds are small. We do not understand the things you say. Tell us how to live. Make your story short or we will slay you. We can only remember as much as you can tell in a moment. Therefore, stand on one foot and tell us quickly what we are to do. We can only remember what you can tell while standing on one foot."
Confucius stood on one foot and said: "Sing, fat, bong, lung, looy,"
which, being interpreted, means "what you would like others to do to you, do to them."
This is the golden rule which has been handed down through centuries.
It has been alloyed and simulated. It has been attacked, but, like all pure gold, it has endured forever. There is no line of action we can suggest or anything that will prove more valuable to the young man or old man through life than the golden rule.
The golden rule is not theoretical, but a wholly practical help, and so in closing this series of talks with you, the writer feels that the essence of all the logic, good advice and philosophy may be summed up in the following:
"Do unto others as you would have others do unto you."
In saying good-bye we suggest that you particularly remember the key to knowledge, which is O.R.B., and which means Observe, Reflect and Benefit, and the practice of the following: Work, Horse Sense and Golden Rule.
THE END