II.
THE TRUTH ABOUT LUCK.
“How Many Papers Have You Sold To-day, Tommy?”
This is a world of order and system. There is nothing haphazard about it. The sun rises and sets according to a regular and unchanging law. The tides come in and the tides go out not by accident or chance, but in accordance with well-defined laws. Winter and Summer, sunshine and rain, follow each other in well-ordered succession. What is true in the natural world is also true in the moral and business worlds. A boy reaps that which he sows and gains the prizes for which he is willing to pay the price in labor and self-denial. A divine law controls success and defeat in this life and no strategem or trick can take the place of hard work.
Some years ago, I happened to find myself near the terminal of the great East River Bridge in New York City. Two little boys were standing near one of the large iron posts crying their afternoon papers. I tarried near them because I was waiting for a particular car. One little fellow said to the other,——
“How many papers have you sold to-day, Tommie?”
“Nearly one hundred an’ fifty,” was Tommie’s quick reply.
“Honor bright?”
“Yes; honor bright.”
“Whoopee! but ain’t you in big luck, Tommie?”
“Luck!” exclaimed Tommie, wiping the perspiration from his brow. “There ain’t no luck about it; I’ve just been everlastingly at it since four o’clock this morning—that’s all!”
And that is the all of real success. Those who achieve success are “everlastingly at” what they are trying to do. Tommie was right in declining to have his hard and honest work cheapened by calling the result of it luck.
“You are the luckiest chap I ever saw,” I once heard a little boy about sixteen years say to another boy of about the same age.
“Why do you say that?” asked the other.
“Because you have had your salary raised twice in the same year.”
“Well,” was the reply, “you may call it luck; but I don’t. I have always done my work the very best I knew how. I have never once in the whole year been a single minute late in getting to the office, nor have I ever left a single minute before it was time for me to leave. When I have worked over-time, I have not made any fuss about it. My boss said when he raised my salary last week that he had taken these things into account. So, I don’t see where the luck comes in.”
“All the same,” said the first boy, “some bosses wouldn’t have raised your salary.”
“Then I would have the satisfaction of knowing that I had done my duty.”
Boys, I tell you that’s right. Nine out of ten employers know that it is to their advantage to show appreciation of faithful work and they show it. When this appreciation comes luck has had nothing to do with it. The thing that passes for luck is in nearly all cases the just reward of honest endeavor.
Do not, therefore, start out in life with the expectation that some “lucky turn” will bring you sudden honor or wealth or position without any effort on your part. Substitute that fine old word “work” for that deceitful word “luck,” and base your hopes of future success and usefulness upon the honorable labor that it is a God-given privilege for every well and strong and right-minded boy to give his heart and hands to performing.