Self Help by Samuel Smiles (desktop ebook reader txt) 📖

the flowers and shrubs through which they have passed.

Those who knew the late John Sterling intimately, have spoken of

the beneficial influence which he exercised on all with whom he

came into personal contact. Many owed to him their first awakening

to a higher being; from him they learnt what they were, and what

they ought to be. Mr. Trench says of him:- “It was impossible to

come in contact with his noble nature without feeling one’s self in

some measure ENNOBLED and LIFTED UP, as I ever felt when I left

him, into a higher region of objects and aims than that in which

one is tempted habitually to dwell.” It is thus that the noble

character always acts; we become insensibly elevated by him, and

cannot help feeling as he does and acquiring the habit of looking

at things in the same light. Such is the magical action and

reaction of minds upon each other.

 

Artists, also, feel themselves elevated by contact with artists

greater than themselves. Thus Haydn’s genius was first fired by

Handel. Hearing him play, Haydn’s ardour for musical composition

was at once excited, and but for this circumstance, he himself

believed that he would never have written the ‘Creation.’ Speaking

of Handel, he said, “When he chooses, he strikes like the

thunderbolt;” and at another time, “There is not a note of him but

draws blood.” Scarlatti was another of Handel’s ardent admirers,

following him all over Italy; afterwards, when speaking of the

great master, he would cross himself in token of admiration. True

artists never fail generously to recognise each other’s greatness.

Thus Beethoven’s admiration for Cherubini was regal: and he

ardently hailed the genius of Schubert: “Truly,” said he, “in

Schubert dwells a divine fire.” When Northcote was a mere youth he

had such an admiration for Reynolds that, when the great painter

was once attending a public meeting down in Devonshire, the boy

pushed through the crowd, and got so near Reynolds as to touch the

skirt of his coat, “which I did,” says Northcote, “with great

satisfaction to my mind,”—a true touch of youthful enthusiasm in

its admiration of genius.

 

The example of the brave is an inspiration to the timid, their

presence thrilling through every fibre. Hence the miracles of

valour so often performed by ordinary men under the leadership of

the heroic. The very recollection of the deeds of the valiant

stirs men’s blood like the sound of a trumpet. Ziska bequeathed

his skin to be used as a drum to inspire the valour of the

Bohemians. When Scanderbeg, prince of Epirus, was dead, the Turks

wished to possess his bones, that each might wear a piece next his

heart, hoping thus to secure some portion of the courage he had

displayed while living, and which they had so often experienced in

battle. When the gallant Douglas, bearing the heart of Bruce to

the Holy Land, saw one of his knights surrounded and sorely pressed

by the Saracens, he took from his neck the silver case containing

the hero’s bequest, and throwing it amidst the thickest press of

his foes, cried, “Pass first in fight, as thou wert wont to do, and

Douglas will follow thee, or die;” and so saying, he rushed forward

to the place where it fell, and was there slain.

 

The chief use of biography consists in the noble models of

character in which it abounds. Our great forefathers still live

among us in the records of their lives, as well as in the acts they

have done, which live also; still sit by us at table, and hold us

by the hand; furnishing examples for our benefit, which we may

still study, admire and imitate. Indeed, whoever has left behind

him the record of a noble life, has bequeathed to posterity an

enduring source of good, for it serves as a model for others to

form themselves by in all time to come; still breathing fresh life

into men, helping them to reproduce his life anew, and to

illustrate his character in other forms. Hence a book containing

the life of a true man is full of precious seed. It is a still

living voice; it is an intellect. To use Milton’s words, “it is

the precious life-blood of a master spirit, embalmed and treasured

up on purpose to a life beyond life.” Such a book never ceases to

exercise an elevating and ennobling influence. But, above all,

there is the Book containing the very highest Example set before us

to shape our lives by in this world—the most suitable for all the

necessities of our mind and heart—an example which we can only

follow afar off and feel after,

 

“Like plants or vines which never saw the sun,

But dream of him and guess where he may be,

And do their best to climb and get to him.”

 

Again, no young man can rise from the perusal of such lives as

those of Buxton and Arnold, without feeling his mind and heart made

better, and his best resolves invigorated. Such biographies

increase a man’s self-reliance by demonstrating what men can be,

and what they can do; fortifying his hopes and elevating his aims

in life. Sometimes a young man discovers himself in a biography,

as Correggio felt within him the risings of genius on contemplating

the works of Michael Angelo: “And I too, am a painter,” he

exclaimed. Sir Samuel Romilly, in his autobiography, confessed

himself to have been powerfully influenced by the life of the great

and noble-minded French Chancellor Daguesseau:- “The works of

Thomas,” says he, “had fallen into my hands, and I had read with

admiration his ‘Eloge of Daguesseau;’ and the career of honour

which he represented that illustrious magistrate to have run,

excited to a great degree my ardour and ambition, and opened to my

imagination new paths of glory.”

 

Franklin was accustomed to attribute his usefulness and eminence to

his having early read Cotton Mather’s ‘Essays to do Good’—a book

which grew out of Mather’s own life. And see how good example

draws other men after it, and propagates itself through future

generations in all lands. For Samuel Drew avers that he framed his

own life, and especially his business habits, after the model left

on record by Benjamin Franklin. Thus it is impossible to say where

a good example may not reach, or where it will end, if indeed it

have an end. Hence the advantage, in literature as in life, of

keeping the best society, reading the best books, and wisely

admiring and imitating the best things we find in them. “In

literature,” said Lord Dudley, “I am fond of confining myself to

the best company, which consists chiefly of my old acquaintance,

with whom I am desirous of becoming more intimate; and I suspect

that nine times out of ten it is more profitable, if not more

agreeable, to read an old book over again, than to read a new one

for the first time.”

 

Sometimes a book containing a noble exemplar of life, taken up at

random, merely with the object of reading it as a pastime, has been

known to call forth energies whose existence had not before been

suspected. Alfieri was first drawn with passion to literature by

reading ‘Plutarch’s Lives.’ Loyola, when a soldier serving at the

siege of Pampeluna, and laid up by a dangerous wound in his leg,

asked for a book to divert his thoughts: the ‘Lives of the Saints’

was brought to him, and its perusal so inflamed his mind, that he

determined thenceforth to devote himself to the founding of a

religious order. Luther, in like manner, was inspired to undertake

the great labours of his life by a perusal of the ‘Life and

Writings of John Huss.’ Dr. Wolff was stimulated to enter upon his

missionary career by reading the ‘Life of Francis Xavier;’ and the

book fired his youthful bosom with a passion the most sincere and

ardent to devote himself to the enterprise of his life. William

Carey, also, got the first idea of entering upon his sublime

labours as a missionary from a perusal of the Voyages of Captain

Cook.

 

Francis Horner was accustomed to note in his diary and letters the

books by which he was most improved and influenced. Amongst these

were Condorcet’s ‘Eloge of Haller,’ Sir Joshua Reynolds’

‘Discourses,’ the writings of Bacon, and ‘Burnet’s Account of Sir

Matthew Hale.’ The perusal of the last-mentioned book—the

portrait of a prodigy of labour—Horner says, filled him with

enthusiasm. Of Condorcet’s ‘Eloge of Haller,’ he said: “I never

rise from the account of such men without a sort of thrilling

palpitation about me, which I know not whether I should call

admiration, ambition, or despair.” And speaking of the

‘Discourses’ of Sir Joshua Reynolds, he said: “Next to the

writings of Bacon, there is no book which has more powerfully

impelled me to self-culture. He is one of the first men of genius

who has condescended to inform the world of the steps by which

greatness is attained. The confidence with which he asserts the

omnipotence of human labour has the effect of familiarising his

reader with the idea that genius is an acquisition rather than a

gift; whilst with all there is blended so naturally and eloquently

the most elevated and passionate admiration of excellence, that

upon the whole there is no book of a more INFLAMMATORY effect.” It

is remarkable that Reynolds himself attributed his first passionate

impulse towards the study of art, to reading Richardson’s account

of a great painter; and Haydon was in like manner afterwards

inflamed to follow the same pursuit by reading of the career of

Reynolds. Thus the brave and aspiring life of one man lights a

flame in the minds of others of like faculties and impulse; and

where there is equally vigorous efforts like distinction and

success will almost surely follow. Thus the chain of example is

carried down through time in an endless succession of links,—

admiration exciting imitation, and perpetuating the true

aristocracy of genius.

 

One of the most valuable, and one of the most infectious examples

which can be set before the young, is that of cheerful working.

Cheerfulness gives elasticity to the spirit. Spectres fly before

it; difficulties cause no despair, for they are encountered with

hope, and the mind acquires that happy disposition to improve

opportunities which rarely fails of success. The fervent spirit is

always a healthy and happy spirit; working cheerfully itself, and

stimulating others to work. It confers a dignity on even the most

ordinary occupations. The most effective work, also, is usually

the full-hearted work—that which passes through the hands or the

head of him whose heart is glad. Hume was accustomed to say that

he would rather possess a cheerful disposition—inclined always to

look at the bright side of things—than with a gloomy mind to be

the master of an estate of ten thousand a year. Granville Sharp,

amidst his indefatigable labours on behalf of the slave, solaced

himself in the evenings by taking part in glees and instrumental

concerts at his brother’s house, singing, or playing on the flute,

the clarionet or the oboe; and, at the Sunday evening oratorios,

when Handel was played, he beat the kettle-drums. He also

indulged, though sparingly, in caricature drawing. Fowell Buxton

also was an eminently cheerful man; taking special pleasure in

field sports, in riding about the country with his children, and in

mixing in all their domestic amusements.

 

In another sphere of action, Dr. Arnold was a noble and a cheerful

worker, throwing himself into the great business of his life, the

training and teaching of young men, with his whole heart and soul.

It is stated in his admirable biography, that “the most remarkable

thing in the Laleham circle was the wonderful healthiness of tone

which prevailed there. It