experience and educational advantages. Either that
proposition is both reasonable and sound, or Arnold Bennett was
singing off key when he said: "I think fine this necessity for the
tense bracing of the will before anything worth doing can be done. It
is the chief thing that distinguishes me from the cat by the fire."

Love of work is the sheet-anchor of the man who truly aspires to
command responsibilities; that means love of it, not for the reward,
or for the skill exercised, but for the final and successful
accomplishment of the work itself. For out of interest in the job
comes thoroughness, and it is this quality above all which
distinguishes the willing spirit. The willingness to learn, to study
and to try harder are requisite to individual progress and the
improvement of opportunity--the process that Thomas Carlyle described
as the "unfolding of one's self." Thus it can be taken as an axiom
that any man can lead who is determined to become master of that
knowledge which an increased responsibility would require of him; and
by the same token, that to achieve maximum efficiency at one's own
working level, it is necessary to see it as if from the perspective of
the next level up. To excel in the management of a squad, the leader
must be knowledgeable of all that bears upon the command of a platoon.
Otherwise the mechanism lacks something of unity.

Mark Twain said at one point that we should be thankful for the
indolent, since but for them the rest of us could not get ahead.
That's on the target, and it emphasizes that how fast and far each of
us travels is largely a matter of free choice.

Personal advancement, within any worthwhile system, requires some
sacrifice of leisure, and more careful attention to the better
organization of one's working routine. But that does not entail heroic
self-sacrifice or the forfeiting of any of life's truly enduring
rewards. It means putting the completion of work ahead of golf and
bridge. It means rejecting the convenient excuse for postponing
solution of the problem until the next time. It means cultivating the
mind during hours that would otherwise be spent in idleness. It means
concentrating for longer periods on the work at hand without getting
up from one's chair. But after all, these things do not require an
extraordinary faculty. The ability of the normal man to concentrate
his thought and effort are mainly the product of a personal conviction
that concentration is necess