er,
and say that his dreadful virtuous sagacity often hindered his
success.

No one is a worse guide to success than your typical successful man. He
seldom understands the reasons of his own success; and when he is asked
by a popular magazine to give his experiences for the benefit of the
youth of a whole nation, it is impossible for him to be natural and
sincere. He knows the kind of thing that is expected from him, and if
he didn't come to London with half a crown in his pocket he probably
did something equally silly, and he puts _that_ down, and the note of
the article or interview is struck, and good-bye to genuine truth!
There recently appeared in a daily paper an autobiographic-didactic
article by one of the world's richest men which was the most
"inadequate" article of the sort that I have ever come across.
Successful men forget so much of their lives! Moreover, nothing is
easier than to explain an accomplished fact in a nice, agreeable,
conventional way. The entire business of success is a gigantic tacit
conspiracy on the part of the minority to deceive the majority.

Are successful men more industrious, frugal, and intelligent than men
who are not successful? I maintain that they are not, and I have
studied successful men at close quarters. One of the commonest
characteristics of the successful man is his idleness, his immense
capacity for wasting time. I stoutly assert that as a rule successful
men are by habit comparatively idle. As for frugality, it is
practically unknown among the successful classes: this statement
applies with particular force to financiers. As for intelligence, I
have over and over again been startled by the lack of intelligence in
successful men. They are, indeed, capable of stupidities that would be
the ruin of a plain clerk. And much of the talk in those circles which
surround the successful man is devoted to the enumeration of instances
of his lack of intelligence. Another point: successful men seldom
succeed as the result of an ordered arrangement of their lives; they
are the least methodical of creatures. Naturally when they have
"arrived" they amuse themselves and impress the majority by being
convinced that right from the start, with a steady eye on the goal,
they had carefully planned every foot of the route.

No! Great success never depends on the practice of the humbler
virtues, though it may occasionally depend on the practice of the
prouder vices. Use industry, frugality,