ieces which he slyly sent to his
brother's paper were thought to have been written by some of the most
learned men in the colony.

Henry Clay, the "mill-boy of the slashes," was one of seven children of
a widow too poor to send him to any but a common country school, where
he was drilled only in the "three R's." But he used every spare moment
to study without a teacher, and in after years he was a king among
self-made men.

The most successful man is he who has triumphed over obstacles,
disadvantages and discouragements.

It is Goodyear in his rude laboratory enduring poverty and failure until
the pasty rubber is at length hardened; it is Edison biding his time in
baggage car and in printing office until that mysterious light and power
glows and throbs at his command; it is Carey on his cobbler's bench
nourishing the great purpose that at length carried the message of love
to benighted India;--these are the cases and examples of true success.

CHAPTER IV.

OUT OF PLACE.

The high prize of life, the crowning fortune of a man, is to be
born with a bias to some pursuit, which finds him in employment
and happiness.
--EMERSON.

The art of putting the right man in the right place is perhaps
the first in the science of government, but the art of finding
a satisfactory position for the discontented is the most
difficult.
--TALLEYRAND.

It is a celebrated thought of Socrates, that if all the
misfortunes of mankind were cast into a public stock, in order
to be equally distributed among the whole species, those who
now think themselves the most unhappy would prefer the share
they are already possessed of, before that which would fall to
them by such a division.
--ADDISON.

I was born to other things.
--TENNYSON.

How many a rustic Milton has passed by,
Stifling the speechless longings of his heart,
In unremitting drudgery and care!
How many a vulgar Cato has compelled
His energies, no longer tameless then,
To mould a pin, or fabricate a nail.
--SHELLEY.

"But I'm good for something," pleaded a young man whom a merchant was
about to discharge for his bluntness. "You are good for nothing as a
salesman," said his employer. "I am sure I can be useful," said the
youth. "How? Tell me how." "I don't know, sir, I don't know." "Nor do
I," said the merchant, laughing at the earnestness of