There's not a task to mankind given,
There's not a blessing or a woe,
There's not a whisper, Yes or No,
There's not a life, or death, or birth,
That has a feather's weight of worth,
Without a woman in it."

"Do that which is assigned you," says Emerson, "and you cannot hope too
much or dare too much. There is at this moment for you an utterance
brave and grand as that of the colossal chisel of Phidias, or trowel of
the Egyptians, or the pen of Moses or Dante, but different from all
these."

"The best way for a young man to begin, who is without friends or
influence," said Russell Sage, "is, first, by getting a position;
second, keeping his mouth shut; third, observing; fourth, being
faithful; fifth, making his employer think he would be lost in a fog
without him; and sixth, being polite."

"Close application, integrity, attention to details, discreet
advertising," are given as the four steps to success by John Wanamaker,
whose motto is, "Do the next thing."

Whatever you do in life, be greater than your calling. Most people
look upon an occupation or calling as a mere expedient for earning a
living. What a mean, narrow view to take of what was intended for the
great school of life, the great man developer, the character-builder;
that which should broaden, deepen, heighten, and round out into
symmetry, harmony, and beauty all the God-given faculties within us!
How we shrink from the task and evade the lessons which were intended
for the unfolding of life's great possibilities into usefulness and
power, as the sun unfolds into beauty and fragrance the petals of the
flower!

I am glad to think
I am not bound to make the world go round;
But only to discover and to do,
With cheerful heart, the work that God appoints.
JEAN INGELOW.

"'What shall I do to be forever known?'
Thy duty ever!
'This did full many who yet sleep all unknown,'--
Oh, never, never!
Think'st thou, perchance, that they remain unknown
Whom thou know'st not?
By angel trumps in heaven their praise is blown,
Divine their lot."

CHAPTER XI

CHOOSING A VOCATION

Be what nature intended you for, and you will succeed; be anything
else, and you will be ten thousand times worse than nothing.--SYDNEY
SMITH.

"Many a man pays for his success with a slice of his constitution."

No man struggles perpetually and victoriously against his own
character; and one of the first principles