Succeeding and Success

          Webster defines "success" as "the prosperous termination of any enterprise." In other words "success" is the finished product of "succeeding." Some people, and many young people, are included, who are not succeeding now, expect finally to have success. It seems to me that every young person who is expecting finally to have success in the enterprise he is undertaking should stop right now and ask himself these questions: "Am I succeeding now?" "Am I traveling the road right now that will lead to success?" Then if you find that you are weaving into your life's fabric things that tend to ultimate failure rather than to ultimate success, right here make a radical change in your life that will put you on the road that leads to success. If you do not do this and persist in traveling on the road that leads to failure your destination will be "Failure" rather than "Success."
          Too much care cannot be exercised now, in the formative period of your lives. You are now in "school," whether it be in an educational institution or in the "school of life." Tomorrow you will be more than a student--you will be engaged in some occupation that will require the use of what you have learned in "school." How well did you learn it? Did you make it your own? Did you master that hard problem--or did it master you? Is there a problem here and there, a definition here and there, an equation or other difficult thing on certain pages of your text-book that you "skipped" as you went through the book, excusing yourself thus, "Well, maybe I'll not need that anyway"? This is not succeeding, but rather is failing as you go. Better burn the midnight oil mastering that difficulty than to "skip" it.
          Is there a habit that you found yourself acquiring, and instead of conquering and mastering it, you yielded inch by inch, almost unconsciously at first, until now it has planted itself squarely in front of you, across the pathway that leads to success, requiring ten times the effort now to master it that would have been required in the beginning? You can master it even now, with God's help, but it is very much better to conquer as we go and to plant our feet firmly on each succeeding rung of the ladder that leads to success.
          Maybe that awful curse, the cigaret-habit, has fastened itself upon you. Maybe you are developing a habit of dishonesty in your classes. Maybe you are developing the habit of slighting your work, of neglecting your duties, hoping at some later time to take them up. Maybe it is discourtesy to your parents, brothers and sisters, or friends. Maybe it is tardiness, or carelessness in dress, manner, language, or something else. If you expect finally to have success, better begin right now to succeed, and keep succeeding daily and hourly until your efforts are crowned with complete success; else there is a danger that while you are planning for ultimate success you are working toward ultimate failure.
          Do not put off until some later date the beginning of a good work. "Putting It Off" is one of the way-marks that stand out prominently on the road to failure. "Do It Now" is a sign-board on the road to success. Do not make the terrible mistake of expecting to have success if you are now traveling on the road of failure. Begin now to succeed. Do not relax your efforts for a moment. Say with the Apostle, "Forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark." This road leads to final success.
          Success is not measured by the possession or lack of either power, fame, or riches. It is not necessarily evident at any given time; for a man may be what is called "successful" today and a failure next week. We are speaking of a successful life, or a life that has succeeded.
          Here are some definitions of success. Do you agree with any of them? If so, which ones? Can you write a better definition of success than these?

1. Success is getting what you go after.
2. Success is being useful to the largest possible percentage of one's possibilities.
3. A man is successful when he overcomes obstacles.
4. A man is successful when he makes the most of himself.
5. Success is living a God-planned life filled to the limit of your ability, with loving service to Him and to your fellowmen.
6. A man is successful when he leaves the world better and richer than he found it.
7. Success is the attainment of a God-approved goal in life.
8. A man is successful when he does something better than anyone has ever done it before.
9. Success is the accomplishment of a purpose, the effects of which will live on for the betterment of the human race and the glory of God.

          What do you think success--not merely theoretically, but in actual practise?
          How many times in trying to arouse young people to higher aspirations we are met with such objections as this: "I am no genius; I have just common ordinary talents." Or "if I only had the talent of a Woodrow Wilson, a Spurgeon, a Moody, I might accomplish something, but I am only an ordinary fellow, and slow to learn. I have only an ordinary education, and never expect to fill a big place in life."
          The truth is that the big majority of those who have accomplished great things that have blessed mankind have not been ranked among the geniuses. D. L. Moody had a very meager education and was not an ordained preacher, yet he preached the gospel to more than fifty million people and was the means in God's hands of saving thousands of souls. Henry Ward Beecher was in his youth classed with the dunces. This bashful, dazed-looking boy pattered barefoot to and from the little unpainted schoolhouse, with a brown towel or a blue-checked apron to hem during the intervals between his spelling and reading lessons. Nobody thought much of his future farther than to see that he was safe and healthy.
          The late Colonel Theodore Roosevelt was in youth a sickly boy, and historians claim that he was of only ordinary ability. At Harvard University he took no prizes either in scholarship or in sports. Roosevelt is described by historians as "an example of what ordinary capabilities can do when they are applied unceasingly, intensely, and with their full energy to the work nearest at hand."
          Edwin A. Abbey, the great artist, was a remarkable example of indefatigable industry and conscientiousness, rather than genius.
          Abraham Lincoln would never have passed as a genius. His greatest characteristics were his industry, thoroughness, unselfishness in motive, simple kindliness of heart, integrity of purpose, transparency of character, persistence, passion for justice and fairness and self-enlargement, his aspiration, his yearning for wholeness of life. Every one of the attributes possessed by Lincoln may be developed by the poorest boy or girl.
          Daniel Webster had no remarkable traits of character in boyhood. He was found one day crying as he returned from school. On being asked the reason he replied that he despaired of ever being a scholar, that the boys made fun of him for always being at the foot of the class, and that he had decided to give up and go home. Upon the friend's urging he went back to school, applied himself to study, and by determination won his way to the head of the class and remained there.
          Choose what you will within the limits of reason, and with the exercise of the average ability you possess you will in time reach your goal.
          There is danger that we may lay too much stress upon making some supreme effort, instead of bearing upon the seemingly common-place, the ordinary elements of character which contribute to an all-round success in life. In straining for effect in the struggle to do something great and wonderful we are liable to overlook the importance of the common talents.
          The building of a noble Christian character is the greatest of all achievements anyway, and that is accomplished without straining or noise by the natural exercise of the most common, most every-day qualitites.
          It would seem, then that our chief difficulty in not getting on, is not that we do not have talents, but that we are not willing to take pains. We are too lazy to get right down to hard work. We are not willing to face the stern problems of life and solve them. We are not willing to put ourselves under the same severe training for our life-work as did those great men who made the most of the stuff that was in them and gave their best to the service of mankind, thus developing characters that are an inspiration to all who came after them. We expect somebody to "boost" us, to save us all the painful labor of self-development. It is folly to depend upon "pull"; a better method is to have "push"; it is more dependable. The truth is that "what man has done, man can do" provided he is willing to pay the price.

And now, on to "How They Succeeded."