Self Help

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Lord Lyndhurst's father was a portrait painter, and that of St.
Leonards a perfumer and hairdresser in Burlington Street. Young
Edward Sugden was originally an errand-boy in the office of the
late Mr. Groom, of Henrietta Street, Cavendish Square, a
certificated conveyancer; and it was there that the future Lord
Chancellor of Ireland obtained his first notions of law. The
origin of the late Lord Tenterden was perhaps the humblest of all,
nor was he ashamed of it; for he felt that the industry, study, and
application, by means of which he achieved his eminent position,
were entirely due to himself. It is related of him, that on one
occasion he took his son Charles to a little shed, then standing
opposite the western front of Canterbury Cathedral, and pointing it
out to him, said, "Charles, you see this little shop; I have
brought you here on purpose to show it you. In that shop your
grandfather used to shave for a penny: that is the proudest
reflection of my life." When a boy, Lord Tenterden was a singer in
the Cathedral, and it is a curious circumstance that his
destination in life was changed by a disappointment. When he and
Mr. Justice Richards were going the Home Circuit together, they
went to service in the cathedral; and on Richards commending the
voice of a singing man in the choir, Lord Tenterden said, "Ah! that
is the only man I ever envied! When at school in this town, we
were candidates for a chorister's place, and he obtained it."

Not less remarkable was the rise to the same distinguished office
of Lord Chief Justice, of the rugged Kenyon and the robust
Ellenborough; nor was he a less notable man who recently held the
same office--the astute Lord Campbell, late Lord Chancellor of
England, son of a parish minister in Fifeshire. For many years he
worked hard as a reporter for the press, while diligently preparing
himself for the practice of his profession. It is said of him,
that at the beginning of his career, he was accustomed to walk from
county town to county town when on circuit, being as yet too poor
to afford the luxury of posting. But step by step he rose slowly
but surely to that eminence and distinction which ever follow a
career of industry honourably and energetically pursued, in the
legal, as in every other profession.

There have been other illustrious instances of Lords Chancellors
who have plodded up the steep of fame and honour with equal energy
and success. The career of the late Lord Eldon is perhaps one of
the most remarkable examples. He was the son of a Newcastle coal-
fitter; a mischievous rather than a studious boy; a great
scapegrace at school, and the subject of many terrible thrashings,-
-for orchard-robbing was one of the favourite exploits of the
future Lord Chancellor. His father first thought of putting him
apprentice to a grocer, and afterwards had almost made up his mind
to bring him up to his own trade of a coal-fitter. But by this
time his eldest son William (afterwards Lord Stowell) who had
gained a scholarship at Oxford, wrote to his father, "Send Jack up
to me, I can do better for him." John was sent up to Oxford
accordingly, where, by his brother's influence and his own
application, he succeeded in obtaining a fellowship. But when at
home during the vacation, he was so unfortunate--or rather so
fortunate, as the issue proved--as to fall in love; and running
across the Border with his eloped bride, he married, and as his
friends thought, ruined himself for life. He had neither house nor
home when he married, and had not yet earned a penny. He lost his
fellowship, and at the same time shut himself out from preferment
in the Church, for which he had been destined. He accordingly
turned his attention to the study of the law. To a friend he
wrote, "I have married rashly; but it is my determination to work
hard to provide for the woman I love."

John Scott came up to London, and took a small house in Cursitor
Lane, where he settled down to the study of the law. He worked
with great diligence and resolution; rising at four every morning
and studying till late at night, binding a wet towel round his head
to keep himself awake. Too poor to study under a special pleader,
he copied out three folio volumes from a manuscript collection of
precedents. Long after, when Lord Chancellor, passing down
Cursitor Lane one day, he said to his secretary, "Here was my first
perch: many a time do I recollect coming down this street with
sixpence in my hand to buy sprats for supper." When at length
called to the bar, he waited long for employment. His first year's
earnings amounted to only nine shillings. For four years he
assiduously attended the London Courts and the Northern Circuit,
with little better success. Even in his native town, he seldom had
other than pauper cases to defend. The results were indeed so
discouraging, that he had almost determined to relinquish his
chance of London business, and settle down in some provincial town
as a country barrister. His brother William wrote home, "Business
is dull with poor Jack, very dull indeed!" But as he had escaped
being a grocer, a coal-fitter, and a country parson so did he also
escape being a country lawyer.

An opportunity at length occurred which enabled John Scott to
exhibit the large legal knowledge which he had so laboriously
acquired. In a case in which he was engaged, he urged a legal
point against the wishes both of the attorney and client who
employed him. The Master of the Rolls decided against him, but on
an appeal to the House of Lords, Lord Thurlow reversed the decision
on the very point that Scott had urged. On leaving the House that
day, a solicitor tapped him on the shoulder and said, "Young man,
your bread and butter's cut for life." And the prophecy proved a
true one. Lord Mansfield used to say that he knew no interval
between no business and 3000l. a-year, and Scott might have told
the same story; for so rapid was his progress, that in 1783, when
only thirty-two, he was appointed King's Counsel, was at the head
of the Northern Circuit, and sat in Parliament for the borough of
Weobley. It was in the dull but unflinching drudgery of the early
part of his career that he laid the foundation of his future
success. He won his spurs by perseverance, knowledge, and ability,
diligently cultivated. He was successively appointed to the
offices of solicitor and attorney-general, and rose steadily
upwards to the highest office that the Crown had to bestow--that of
Lord Chancellor of England, which he held for a quarter of a
century.

Henry Bickersteth was the son of a surgeon at Kirkby Lonsdale, in
Westmoreland, and was himself educated to that profession. As a
student at Edinburgh, he distinguished himself by the steadiness
with which he worked, and the application which he devoted to the
science of medicine. Returned to Kirkby Lonsdale, he took an
active part in his father's practice; but he had no liking for the
profession, and grew discontented with the obscurity of a country
town. He went on, nevertheless, diligently improving himself, and
engaged on speculations in the higher branches of physiology. In
conformity with his own wish, his father consented to send him to
Cambridge, where it was his intention to take a medical degree with
the view of practising in the metropolis. Close application to his
studies, however, threw him out of health, and with a view to re-
establishing his strength he accepted the appointment of travelling
physician to Lord Oxford. While abroad he mastered Italian, and
acquired a great admiration for Italian literature, but no greater
liking for medicine than before. On the contrary, he determined to
abandon it; but returning to Cambridge, he took his degree; and
that he worked hard may be inferred from the fact that he was
senior wrangler of his year. Disappointed in his desire to enter
the army, he turned to the bar, and entered a student of the Inner
Temple. He worked as hard at law as he had done at medicine.
Writing to his father, he said, "Everybody says to me, 'You are
certain of success in the end--only persevere;' and though I don't
well understand how this is to happen, I try to believe it as much
as I can, and I shall not fail to do everything in my power." At
twenty-eight he was called to the bar, and had every step in life
yet to make. His means were straitened, and he lived upon the
contributions of his friends. For years he studied and waited.
Still no business came. He stinted himself in recreation, in
clothes, and even in the necessaries of life; struggling on
indefatigably through all. Writing home, he "confessed that he
hardly knew how he should be able to struggle on till he had fair
time and opportunity to establish himself." After three years'
waiting, still without success, he wrote to his friends that rather
than be a burden upon them longer, he was willing to give the
matter up and return to Cambridge, "where he was sure of support
and some profit." The friends at home sent him another small
remittance, and he persevered. Business gradually came in.
Acquitting himself creditably in small matters, he was at length
entrusted with cases of greater importance. He was a man who never
missed an opportunity, nor allowed a legitimate chance of
improvement to escape him. His unflinching industry soon began to
tell upon his fortunes; a few more years and he was not only
enabled to do without assistance from home, but he was in a
position to pay back with interest the debts which he had incurred.
The clouds had dispersed, and the after career of Henry Bickersteth
was one of honour, of emolument, and of distinguished fame. He
ended his career as Master of the Rolls, sitting in the House of
Peers as Baron Langdale. His life affords only another
illustration of the power of patience, perseverance, and
conscientious working, in elevating the character of the
individual, and crowning his labours with the most complete
success.

Such are a few of the distinguished men who have honourably worked
their way to the highest position, and won the richest rewards of
their profession, by the diligent exercise of qualities in many
respects of an ordinary character, but made potent by the force of
application and industry.

CHAPTER VIII--ENERGY AND COURAGE

"A coeur vaillant rien d'impossible."--Jacques Coeur.

"Den Muthigen gehort die Welt."--German Proverb.

"In every work that he began . . . he did it with all his heart,
and prospered."--II. Chron. XXXI. 21.

There is a famous speech recorded of an old Norseman, thoroughly
characteristic of the Teuton. "I believe neither in idols nor
demons," said he, "I put my sole trust in my own strength of body
and soul." The ancient crest of a pickaxe with the motto of
"Either I will find a way or make one," was an expression of the
same sturdy independence which to this day distinguishes the
descendants of the Northmen. Indeed nothing could be more
characteristic of the Scandinavian mythology, than that it had a
god with a hammer. A man's character is seen in small matters; and
from even so slight a test as the mode in which a man wields a
hammer, his energy may in some measure be inferred. Thus an
eminent Frenchman hit off in a single phrase the characteristic
quality of the inhabitants of a particular district, in which a
friend of his proposed to settle and buy land. "Beware," said he,
"of making a purchase there; I know the men of that department; the
pupils who come from it to our veterinary school at Paris DO NOR
STRIKE HARD UPON THE ANVIL; they want energy; and you will not get
a satisfactory return on any capital you may invest there." A fine
and just appreciation of character, indicating the thoughtful
observer; and strikingly illustrative of the fact that it is the
energy of the individual men that gives strength to a State, and
confers a value even upon the very soil which they cultivate. As
the French proverb has it: "Tant vaut l'homme, tant vaut sa
terre."

The cultivation of this quality is of the greatest importance;
resolute determination in the pursuit of worthy objects being the
foundation of all true greatness of character. Energy enables a
man to force his way through irksome drudgery and dry details, and
carries him onward and upward in every station in life. It
accomplishes more than genius, with not one-half the disappointment
and peril. It is not eminent talent that is required to ensure
success in any pursuit, so much as purpose,--not merely the power
to achieve, but the will to labour energetically and perseveringly.
Hence energy of will may be defined to be the very central power of
character in a man--in a word, it is the Man himself. It gives
impulse to his every action, and soul to every effort. True hope
is based on it,--and it is hope that gives the real perfume to
life. There is a fine heraldic motto on a broken helmet in Battle
Abbey, "L'espoir est ma force," which might be the motto of every
man's life. "Woe unto him that is fainthearted," says the son of
Sirach. There is, indeed, no blessing equal to the possession of a
stout heart. Even if a man fail in his efforts, it will be a
satisfaction to him to enjoy the consciousness of having done his
best. In humble life nothing can be more cheering and beautiful
than to see a man combating suffering by patience, triumphing in
his integrity, and who, when his feet are bleeding and his limbs
failing him, still walks upon his courage.

Mere wishes and desires but engender a sort of green sickness in
young minds, unless they are promptly embodied in act and deed. It
will not avail merely to wait as so many do, "until Blucher comes
up," but they must struggle on and persevere in the mean time, as
Wellington did. The good purpose once formed must be carried out
with alacrity and without swerving. In most conditions of life,
drudgery and toil are to be cheerfully endured as the best and most
wholesome discipline. "In life," said Ary Scheffer, "nothing bears
fruit except by labour of mind or body. To strive and still
strive--such is life; and in this respect mine is fulfilled; but I
dare to say, with just pride, that nothing has ever shaken my
courage. With a strong soul, and a noble aim, one can do what one
wills, morally speaking."

Hugh Miller said the only school in which he was properly taught
was "that world-wide school in which toil and hardship are the
severe but noble teachers." He who allows his application to
falter, or shirks his work on frivolous pretexts, is on the sure
road to ultimate failure. Let any task be undertaken as a thing
not possible to be evaded, and it will soon come to be performed
with alacrity and cheerfulness. Charles IX. of Sweden was a firm
believer in the power of will, even in youth. Laying his hand on
the head of his youngest son when engaged on a difficult task, he
exclaimed, "He SHALL do it! he SHALL do it!" The habit of
application becomes easy in time, like every other habit. Thus
persons with comparatively moderate powers will accomplish much, if
they apply themselves wholly and indefatigably to one thing at a
time. Fowell Buxton placed his confidence in ordinary means and
extraordinary application; realizing the scriptural injunction,
"Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with all thy might;" and
he attributed his own success in life to his practice of "being a
whole man to one thing at a time."

Nothing that is of real worth can be achieved without courageous
working. Man owes his growth chiefly to that active striving of
the will, that encounter with difficulty, which we call effort; and
it is astonishing to find how often results apparently
impracticable are thus made possible. An intense anticipation
itself transforms possibility into reality; our desires being often
but the precursors of the things which we are capable of
performing. On the contrary, the timid and hesitating find
everything impossible, chiefly because it seems so. It is related
of a young French officer, that he used to walk about his apartment
exclaiming, "I WILL be Marshal of France and a great general." His
ardent desire was the presentiment of his success; for the young
officer did become a distinguished commander, and he died a Marshal
of France.

Mr. Walker, author of the 'Original,' had so great a faith in the
power of will, that he says on one occasion he DETERMINED to be
well, and he was so. This may answer once; but, though safer to
follow than many prescriptions, it will not always succeed. The
power of mind over body is no doubt great, but it may be strained
until the physical power breaks down altogether. It is related of
Muley Moluc, the Moorish leader, that, when lying ill, almost worn
out by an incurable disease, a battle took place between his troops
and the Portuguese; when, starting from his litter at the great
crisis of the fight, he rallied his army, led them to victory, and
instantly afterwards sank exhausted and expired.

It is will,--force of purpose,--that enables a man to do or be
whatever he sets his mind on being or doing. A holy man was
accustomed to say, "Whatever you wish, that you are: for such is
the force of our will, joined to the Divine, that whatever we wish
to be, seriously, and with a true intention, that we become. No
one ardently wishes to be submissive, patient, modest, or liberal,
who does not become what he wishes." The story is told of a
working carpenter, who was observed one day planing a magistrate's
bench which he was repairing, with more than usual carefulness; and
when asked the reason, he replied, "Because I wish to make it easy
against the time when I come to sit upon it myself." And
singularly enough, the man actually lived to sit upon that very
bench as a magistrate.

Whatever theoretical conclusions logicians may have formed as to
the freedom of the will, each individual feels that practically he
is free to choose between good and evil--that he is not as a mere
straw thrown upon the water to mark the direction of the current,
but that he has within him the power of a strong swimmer, and is
capable of striking out for himself, of buffeting with the waves,
and directing to a great extent his own independent course. There
is no absolute constraint upon our volitions, and we feel and know
that we are not bound, as by a spell, with reference to our
actions. It would paralyze all desire of excellence were we to
think otherwise. The entire business and conduct of life, with its
domestic rules, its social arrangements, and its public
institutions, proceed upon the practical conviction that the will
is free. Without this where would be responsibility?--and what the
advantage of teaching, advising, preaching, reproof, and
correction? What were the use of laws, were it not the universal
belief, as it is the universal fact, that men obey them or not,
very much as they individually determine? In every moment of our
life, conscience is proclaiming that our will is free. It is the
only thing that is wholly ours, and it rests solely with ourselves
individually, whether we give it the right or the wrong direction.
Our habits or our temptations are not our masters, but we of them.
Even in yielding, conscience tells us we might resist; and that
were we determined to master them, there would not be required for
that purpose a stronger resolution than we know ourselves to be
capable of exercising.

"You are now at the age," said Lamennais once, addressing a gay
youth, "at which a decision must be formed by you; a little later,
and you may have to groan within the tomb which you yourself have
dug, without the power of rolling away the stone. That which the
easiest becomes a habit in us is the will. Learn then to will
strongly and decisively; thus fix your floating life, and leave it
no longer to be carried hither and thither, like a withered leaf,
by every wind that blows."

Buxton held the conviction that a young man might be very much what
he pleased, provided he formed a strong resolution and held to it.
Writing to one of his sons, he said to him, "You are now at that
period of life, in which you must make a turn to the right or the
left. You must now give proofs of principle, determination, and
strength of mind; or you must sink into idleness, and acquire the
habits and character of a desultory, ineffective young man; and if
once you fall to that point, you will find it no easy matter to
rise again. I am sure that a young man may be very much what he
pleases. In my own case it was so. . . . Much of my happiness, and
all my prosperity in life, have resulted from the change I made at
your age. If you seriously resolve to be energetic and
industrious, depend upon it that you will for your whole life have
reason to rejoice that you were wise enough to form and to act upon
that determination." As will, considered without regard to
direction, is simply constancy, firmness, perseverance, it will be
obvious that everything depends upon right direction and motives.
Directed towards the enjoyment of the senses, the strong will may
be a demon, and the intellect merely its debased slave; but
directed towards good, the strong will is a king, and the intellect
the minister of man's highest well-being.

"Where there is a will there is a way," is an old and true saying.
He who resolves upon doing a thing, by that very resolution often
scales the barriers to it, and secures its achievement. To think
we are able, is almost to be so--to determine upon attainment is
frequently attainment itself. Thus, earnest resolution has often
seemed to have about it almost a savour of omnipotence. The
strength of Suwarrow's character lay in his power of willing, and,
like most resolute persons, he preached it up as a system. "You
can only half will," he would say to people who failed. Like
Richelieu and Napoleon, he would have the word "impossible"
banished from the dictionary. "I don't know," "I can't," and
"impossible," were words which he detested above all others.
"Learn! Do! Try!" he would exclaim. His biographer has said of
him, that he furnished a remarkable illustration of what may be
effected by the energetic development and exercise of faculties,
the germs of which at least are in every human heart.

One of Napoleon's favourite maxims was, "The truest wisdom is a
resolute determination." His life, beyond most others, vividly
showed what a powerful and unscrupulous will could accomplish. He
threw his whole force of body and mind direct upon his work.
Imbecile rulers and the nations they governed went down before him
in succession. He was told that the Alps stood in the way of his
armies--"There shall be no Alps," he said, and the road across the
Simplon was constructed, through a district formerly almost
inaccessible. "Impossible," said he, "is a word only to be found
in the dictionary of fools." He was a man who toiled terribly;
sometimes employing and exhausting four secretaries at a time. He
spared no one, not even himself. His influence inspired other men,
and put a new life into them. "I made my generals out of mud," he
said. But all was of no avail; for Napoleon's intense selfishness
was his ruin, and the ruin of France, which he left a prey to
anarchy. His life taught the lesson that power, however
energetically wielded, without beneficence, is fatal to its
possessor and its subjects; and that knowledge, or knowingness,
without goodness, is but the incarnate principle of Evil.

Our own Wellington was a far greater man. Not less resolute, firm,
and persistent, but more self-denying, conscientious, and truly
patriotic. Napoleon's aim was "Glory;" Wellington's watchword,
like Nelson's, was "Duty." The former word, it is said, does not
once occur in his despatches; the latter often, but never
accompanied by any high-sounding professions. The greatest
difficulties could neither embarrass nor intimidate Wellington; his
energy invariably rising in proportion to the obstacles to be
surmounted. The patience, the firmness, the resolution, with which
he bore through the maddening vexations and gigantic difficulties
of the Peninsular campaigns, is, perhaps, one of the sublimest
things to be found in history. In Spain, Wellington not only
exhibited the genius of the general, but the comprehensive wisdom
of the statesman. Though his natural temper was irritable in the
extreme, his high sense of duty enabled him to restrain it; and to
those about him his patience seemed absolutely inexhaustible. His
great character stands untarnished by ambition, by avarice, or any
low passion. Though a man of powerful individuality, he yet
displayed a great variety of endowment. The equal of Napoleon in
generalship, he was as prompt, vigorous, and daring as Clive; as
wise a statesman as Cromwell; and as pure and high-minded as
Washington. The great Wellington left behind him an enduring
reputation, founded on toilsome campaigns won by skilful
combination, by fortitude which nothing could exhaust, by sublime
daring, and perhaps by still sublimer patience.

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