General MacArthur's Prayer for His Son
Remember, my son, you have to work. Whether you handle a pick or a pen, a wheel-barrow or a set of books, digging ditches or editing a paper, ringing an auction bell or writing funny things, you must work. If you look around you will see the men who are the most able to live the rest of their days without work are the most men who work the hardest. Don't be afraid of killing yourself with overwork. It is beyond your power to do that on the sunny side of thirty. They die sometimes, but it is because they quit work at six in the evening, and do not go home until two in the morning, It's the interval that kills, my son. The work gives you an appetite for your meals, it lends solidity to your slumbers, it gives you a perfect and grateful appreciation of a holiday. There are young man who do not work, but the world is not proud of them. It does not know their names, even; it simply speaks of them as "old So-and-So's boy. Nobody likes them; the great, busy world doesn't know that they are there. So find out what you want to be and do, and take off your coat and make a dust in the world. The busier you are, the less harm you will be apt to get into the sweeter will be your sleep, the brighter and happier your holidays, and the better satisfied will the world be with you.
--Robert Jones Burdette
by Roger Hull
"If everyone swep his own doorstep, then the whole wide world would be clean"Have you ever asked yourself this question: if every citizen performed just as you do, where would the country be? What if every fellow worked at his job the way you work, showed the same interest, the same diligence, the same faithfulness, the same skill and discipline? What would happen to our country? Someone has aptly said that there are really only two kinds of people: those who are part of the problem and those who are part of the solution. Well, what about you?
Our fatherland is in danger. Citizens to arms! to arms! Unless the whole nation rise up as one man to defend itself all the noble blood already shed is in vain People of Hungary, will you die under the exterminating sword of the Russians? If not, defend yourselves. Will you look on while the Cossacks of the far north tread under foot the bodies of your fathers, mothers, wives, and children? If not, defend yourselves. Will you see a part of your fellow-citizens sent to the wilds of Siberia make to serve in the wars of tyrans, or bleed under the murderous knout? If not, defend yourselves. Will you behold your village in flames, and your harvests destroyed? Will you die of hunger on the land which your sweat has made fertile? If not, defend yourselves.
--Louis Kossuth
Once a Mr. Wong, with a portmanteau under his arm, panting and sweating, was hurrying toward the railway station to catch the express on nie thirty. While running, he rolled up his sleeves and looked at his wrist-watch now and then. It was early yet. As his watch told him, it was jus nine. But Mr. Wong had a very quick temper. He doubted and worried that his watch might be wrong and thus the train might be missed. Just at that time, a boy was walking toward him. "Hello, my young friend, I'm sorry that I do not know the way very well." said Mr. Wong in a agreable manner. "Would you tell me which way is the shortest one leading to the station?" "The shortest one? the boy asked. "You are asking me the shortest way, aren't you?" "Yes" answered Mr. Wong passionately. "It is very easy, dear sir," said the boy, "Run fast ahead!"
Get up, little sister; the morning is bright, And the birds are all singing to welcome the light, The buds are all opening; the dew's on the flower; If you shake but a branch, see, there falls a shower. By the side of their mothers, look, under the trees, How the young lambs are skipping, about as they please; And by all those rings on the water, I know, The fishes are merrily swimming below. The bee, I dare say, has been long on the wing. To get honey from every flower of spring; For the bee never idles, but labors all day, Thinking to work is better than to play. The lark's singing gaily; it loves the bright sun, And rejoices that now the gay spring has begun. For the spring is so cheerful, I think it would be wrong If we did not feel happy to hear the lark's song. Get up; for when all things are merry and glad, Good children should never be lazy or sad For God gives us daylight, dear sisters, that we May rejoice like the lark, and may work like the bee.
"Always remember your first obligation is to your conscience."
Often during my boyhood I heard these words repeated by my grandfather, who was a clergyman. It was his private sermon to me, his personal version of shakespear's "To thine own self be true." His words still make good sense. Who among us is not from time to time driven to make a decision between conflicting demands? A public servant or private citizen, all of us are often tempted to compromise on the easy pleasant course. By doing one thing, we sidestep embarrassment. By doing another, we gain immediate applause. By doing a third, we quiet the loudest voices. How then, can we determine the right thing to do? My grandfather's answer was always the same: "Remember your first obligation is to your conscience. If you have to make a difficult decision, ask yourself how your conscience will react to it tomorrow, the next day and the next year. If you have any qualms, then that decision is wrong. Change it."
For more than fifty years I have found my grandfather's counsel not always the easiest advice to follow, but once having followed it, I have found it the best possible medicine for peace of mind.
It is said that a certain rich man once lived in the interior. For him the most pleasant thing was to go sight-seeing. He had been in all the famous cities in Europe, Africa, and America.
One day, when he had just come back from America, he boasted in the presence of his friends and relatives of all the strange sights he had seen. He was proud and content, because he was the only well-informed one in his village. Some of his friends and relatives questioned him about the big places of interest he had visited.
"Did you visit Washington?" inquired one.
"And St. Louis?", asked another.
"O surely," said the rich man, "I dined with them both in New York".
"He is a fool who cannot be angry, but he is really a wise man who will not".
The habit of keeping pleasant is indeed better than an income of a thousand dollars a year. The life without cheerfulness is like the severe winter without the sun.
We all love cheerful company, but we are apt to forget that cheerfulness is a habit which can be cultivated by all.
We find it very difficult to be gay when we are in distress. It requires great courage. We should never forget that to be cheerful when it is not easy to be
cheerful shows greatness. Thorny may be our way, but how happy is the conqueror's song!
The perfection of cheerfulness consists in the happy frame of mind. It is displayed in good temper and kind behaviour. It arises partly from personal goodness and
partly from belief in the goodness of others. It sees the glory,in the grass and the sunshine on the flower. It encourages happy thoughts, and lives in an atmosphere of peace. It costs nothing, and yet it is invaluable. It blesses its possessor, and affords a large measure of enjoyment to others!
by Christopher Morley
Doors are the symbol of privacy, of retreat, of the mind's escape into blissful quietude or sad secret struggle. A room without door is not a room, but a hallway.
No matter where he is, a man can make himself at home behind a closed door. The mind works best behind closed doors. Men are not horses to be herded together. Dogs know the meaning and anguish of doors. Have you ever noticed a puppy yearning at a shut portal? It is a symbol of human life.
The opening and closing of doors is a part of the stern fluercy of life. Life will not stay still and let us alone. We are continually opening doors with hope, closing them with despair. Life lasts not much longer than a pipe of tobacco, and destiny knocks us out like the ashes.
by Henry Ward Beecher
When justly obtained, and rationally used, riches are called a gift of God, an evidence of His favor, and a great reward. When gathered unjustly, and corruptly used, wealth is pronounced a canker, a fire, a curse. There is no contradiction, then, when the Bible persuades to industry and integrity, by a promise of riches; and then
dissuabes from wealth, as a terrible thing destroying soul and body. Blessings are vindictive to abusers, and kind to rightful users; they serve us or rule us. Fire warms our dwellings, or consumes them. Steal Steam serves man, and also destroys him. Iron, in the plow, the sickle, the house, the ship, is indispensable. The dirk, the assassin's knife, the cruel sword, and the spear are iron also.
by Samuel Ullman
Youth is not a time of life -- it is a state of mind. It is not a matter of ripe cheeks, red lips and supple knees. It is temper of the will, a quality of the imagination, a vigor of the emotions. It is a freshness of the deep spring of life. Youth means a temperamental predominance of courage over timidity, of the appetite of adventure over love of ease, This often exists in a man of fifty more than a boy of twenty.
Nobody grows old by merely living a number of years. People grow old only by deserting their ideals. Years wrinkle the skin, but to give up enthusiasm wrinkles the soul. Worry, doubt, self-distrust, fear, and despair -- these are the long, long years that bow the head and turn the growing spirit back to dust. Whether seventy or sixteen, there is in every being's heart the love of wonder, the sweet amazement at the stars and the starlike things and thoughts, the undaunted challenge of events, the unfalling childlike appetite of what next and the joy and the game of life.
You are as young as your faith, as old as your doubt; as young as your self-confidence, as old as your fear; as young as your hope, as old as your despair.
by Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)
She was 82 and living in Keoluk when, unaccountably, she insisted upon attending a convention of old settlers of the Mississippi Valley.
All the way there, and it was some distance, she was young again with excitement and eagerness. At the hotel she asked immediately for Dr. Barrett, of St. Louis.
He had left for home that morning and would not be back, she was told. She turned away, the fire all gone for her, and asked to go home. Once there she sat silent and
thinking for many days, then told us that when she was 18 she had loved a young medical student with all her heart. There was a misunderstanding and he left the country;
she had immediately married, to show him that she did not care. She had never seen him since and then she had read in a newspaper that he was going to attend the old
settlers' convention. "Only three hours before we reached that hotel he had been there," she mourned.
She had kept that pathetic burden in her heart 64 years without any of us suspecting it. Before the year was out, her memory began to fail. She would write letters to schoolmates
who had been dead 40 years, and wonder why they never answered. Four years later she died.
Frankness is the child of honesty and courage. Say just what you mean to do, on every occasion. If a friend asks a favor, you should grant it, if it is reasonable; if not, tell him
plaintly why you cannot. You would wrong him and wrong yourself by equivocation of any kind.
Never do a wrong thing to make a friend or keep one. The man who requires you to do so is dearly purchased at a sacrifice. Deal kindly but firmly with all your classmates.
You will find it the policy which wears best. Above all, do not appear to others what you are not.
If you have any fault to find with anyone, tell him, not others, of what you complain. There is no more dangerous experiment than that of undertaking to do one thing before
a man's face and another behind his back. We should say and do nothing to the injury of any one. It is not only a matter of principle, but also the path of peace and honor.
-- Robert E. Lee
by Leon Gutterman
There is no substitute for education. There is no substitute for wisdom. Each generation owes it to itself and to its posterity to protect its culture, to enrich it, and to transmit it.
The institution that mankind work out for that purpose is know as education.
The aim of education is wisdom, and each one of us must have the chance to become as wise as he can. The purpose of education is not the accumulation of information but the development of mental ability. The highest development of the human mind and soul are the ends of human life. What we need today are more educated men and women. Learning does not stop as long as a man lives, unless his learning power atrophies because he does not use it. Educated people seek truth, but truth is never easy to find, never wholly revealed, seldom fully understood,but always to be sought. Truth wears no label, and the seeker has no guarantee of success. Life is an unending adventure in this search and education a training and preparation for it -- the supreme means of ennobling and enriching the resources of the human mind and heart.
Build me a son, O Lord, who will be strong enough to know when he is weak; and brave enough to face himself when he is afraid; one who will be proud and unbending in honest defeat, and humble and gentle in victory. Build me a son whose wishes will not take the place of deeds; a son who will know Thee -- and that to know himself is the foundation stone of knowledge. Lead him, I pray, not in the path of ease and comfort, but under the stress and spur of difficulties and challenge. Here let him learn to stand up in the storm; here let him learn compassion for those who fail. Build me a son whose heart will be clean, whose goal will be high, a son who will master himself before he seeks to master other men, one who will reach into the future, yet never forget the past. And after all these things are his, add, I pray enough of a sense of humor, so that he may always be serious, yet never take himself too seriously. Give him humility, so that he may always remember the simplicity of true greatness, the open mind of true wisdom, and the meekness of true strength. Then I, his father, will dare to whisper, "I have not lived in vain!"