Part 27 (1/2)

I heard of a banker once who saw to it that at least once each week he hunted up some young man, bravely struggling, bravely fighting, and gave him some little a.s.sistance--a piece of business, an opportunity, needful and kindly counsel--something that moistened his parched lips, dry and hot from running the hard race that all youth must run for success. I said to myself: ”There is something in reincarnation; the soul of Abou-ben-Adhem is dwelling in that banker's heart.”

For years the greatest pleasure of my life has been that young boys have come to me from all over my State to talk about how they should proceed in life's battle. You, too, may have the pleasure of helping young men. But beware how you do this, saying in your heart, ”I will help this young man, and when he succeeds I will reap my reward.” Such a selfish thought will utterly poison your advice, deflect your moral vision, distort your intellectual perceptions.

That man who advises a young man with the thought that some day he will be able to harvest personal advantage from that young man's success, has probably by that very thought been rendered incapable of giving sound advice or profitable help. Help the young man for his sake, for the sake of the great humanity of which he is a fresh and beautiful part, for the sake of that abstract good which, after all, is the only reward in this life worthy the consideration of a serious man.

I heard not long ago of a brilliant and crafty young politician who was and is an earnest champion and helper of a very successful and highly practical man in public life. He had acquired some unfortunate traits. He was suspicious, distrustful. He feared betrayal here, a Judas there. The caution increased his cunning but was impairing his character. The man to whose fortunes he was attached called him in, in the midst of a great political battle on which the fortunes of that man depended, and said to his young lieutenant:

”Success in this fight is important to me, but it is not so important as the impairing of your character which I see going on. You are becoming permanently distrustful, suspicious. You think one friend will fail us here, that that friend is untrue, that the other one may be influenced improperly. Very soon you will begin to suspect me, then you will suspect yourself, and then--then, you are utterly lost. Stop it. I would rather lose the fight than see your character become negative.”

That man was right, and the att.i.tude he took in his advice to the young man was right. Let the world quit encouraging young men to think that guile succeeds. Let it encourage the faith that nothing but the n.o.ble and the good really succeed in the end. Let every one point out to the young man confronting the world that it is not so great a thing after all to be ”smart,” not so great a thing after all to be capable with the little tricks of life, but that it is everything to be good and trustful and fearless and constructive.

It will not do for the world to reply that it does, in words, encourage these fine qualities of youth. It does not, except in formal and meaningless utterances--preachments that have not the vitality of individuality in them. Words are very little, almost less than nothing; but att.i.tude and action are everything. The young man would not feel that he had to be ”slick,” or crafty, or cunning, if the world's att.i.tude did not invite him to such a conclusion. It is the nature of young men the world over, and particularly of young Americans, to be open in life, direct in method, lofty in purpose, and fearless in action.

A very successful lawyer once told me the following--it ill.u.s.trates my point: ”I remember,” said he, ”that when I was a law student one of the most brilliant young men I ever met--one of the most brilliant young or old men I ever met--one day received a client of the firm with a luxury of attention and a sumptuousness of courtesy that deeply aroused my ignorant and rural admiration.

”When the consultation had been finished and the rich client had left the office, this young lawyer, who had bowed him out with a deft compliment which made the client feel that he was the point about which the universe was revolving, turned and said, as he went to his desk, 'There goes the shallowest fool and most stupid rascal in the state.'

”When asked how he could say such a thing after having treated the client with such distinction, he turned with a wink of his eye, and said: 'That is the way to work them. You don't know the world yet.

Wait till you get on in the world; it will teach you how to handle them.'

”That young man had become thoroughly saturated with the opinion that Ferrers, in ”Ernest Maltravers,” is the type to be imitated--a character of crafty cunning, playing on the weaknesses of men. He had gotten his opinion from the apparent success of the tricks and sharp practises of the law. He had not seen the broader horizon above which only those who are as good as they are capable ever rise.

”It was a fatal method for _him_. He finally failed. It was a fatal method for at least two young students upon whom his ideals and influences fell with determining power.”

Of course; and it is a fatal view of life for any young man to get.

The young man who comes out from the enn.o.bling influence of the American mother will not take this view if the world does not compel him to do so. The world, then, should not applaud any feat of smartness or cunning on the part of the young man. It should not wink its eye and pat him on the shoulder and say, ”That was very 'smooth,'

very 'smooth' indeed; I congratulate you.”

The young man confronts the world with mingled courage and timidity.

It is so vast. It seems so unconquerable. And yet he has been taught to believe that if he meets it with a high fearlessness he will conquer. That is what his mother taught him. Out of this thought and his nervous timidity combined comes what appears to the world to be a senseless courage, a foolish daring. He is very much afraid; he wants to make the world think he is not afraid; he has been told to put up a bold front--and men think him rash and adventurous. He is not--he is only trying to keep you from seeing how scared he is.

In the campaign of 1898 a young man with all of these qualities, and gifted with considerable oratorical power, was seeking an opportunity to get a little hearing. He had just graduated from college, had opened a law office, had never had the shadow or substance of a client, but he had that fresh confidence and the ability back of it which the world neglects until, finally, it is forced to accept it.

I secured for him an invitation to make some speeches in a neighboring State. He was delighted. He went, but returned wounded in spirit by the heedlessness of the State Committee and the indifference of the men of prominence who had refused to notice him. And yet the fine courage that dared take part in the great struggle just beginning was a quality which was more valuable to his party and to the world and to humanity, than all of the schemes of the men who rejected him.

It is this courage constantly injected into the veins of the world which, little by little, is lifting mankind up to a more and still more endurable estate. I shall never be able to perform a higher service than to light again, as I did, the fires of his confidence and young daring.

Let the world not suppose that by encouraging these great qualities of youth which it now heedlessly represses, and only too often kills, it will spoil the young man. The intrinsic difficulties of life are great enough to keep him within bounds, no matter how much encouragement he receives. The very nature of things, and the const.i.tution of society as he comes to examine it in its concrete manifestations, will chasten his illusions.

The rarity of the air as he mounts upward in life will weight his wings at last. The limitations of Nature and of affairs will in themselves be all the chastis.e.m.e.nt he needs to correct abnormal hope, courage, faith, or honor--yes, even more than enough. Let the world, then--the men and women who have won their places in life--let them nourish the enthusiasms and the elemental ”illusions” of youth wherever they see them.

After all, they are not illusions; they are the only true things in this universe. The houses that men construct will in time decay. The remorseless elements will rot the n.o.blest trees down to the earth from which they grew. The laws that men make will lose their force and be succeeded by other statutes, equally temporary and futile. Reputations men build will vanish almost before they are made. Civilizations they erect will pa.s.s from their flowering into the seeds of future civilizations and be forgotten, too.

But the ”illusions” with which the young man confronts the world at the beginning of his career are as everlasting as G.o.d's word: ”Till heaven and earth pa.s.s, one jot or one little shall in no wise pa.s.s from the law, till all be fulfilled.” The ”illusions” of the young man--of the young American particularly--are the manifestations of that law, the eternal law of the eternal verities.

”The lyrical dream of the boy is the kingly truth.

The world is a vapor and only the Vision is real-- Yea, nothing can hold against h.e.l.l but the Winged Ideal.”