Wisdom & Empowerment: The Orison Swett Marden Edition (18 Books in One Volume). Orison Swett Marden
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little weakness, some self-indulgence, a quick temper, want of decision, are little things, you say, when placed beside great abilities, but they have wrecked many a career. The Parliament of Great Britain, the Congress of the United States, and representative governments all over the world have come from King John signing the Magna Charta.
Bentham says, "The turn of a sentence has decided many a friendship, and, for aught we know, the fate of many a kingdom."
The sight of a stranded cuttlefish led Cuvier to an investigation which made him one of the greatest natural historians in the world. The web of a spider suggested to Captain Brown the idea of a suspension bridge. A man, looking for a lost horse, picked up a stone in the Idaho mountains which led to the discovery of a rich gold mine.
An officer apologized to General O. M. Mitchel, the astronomer, for a brief delay, saying he was only a few moments late. "I have been in the habit of calculating the value of the thousandth part of a second," was Mitchel's reply.
A missing marriage certificate kept the hod-carrier of Hugh Miller from establishing his claim to the Earldom of Crawford. The masons would call out, "John, Yearl of Crawford, bring us anither hod o' lime."
Not long ago the great steamship Umbria was stopped in mid-Atlantic by a flaw in her engine shaft.
The absence of a comma in a bill which passed through Congress several years ago cost our government a million dollars. A single misspelled word prevented a deserving young man from obtaining a situation as instructor in a New England college. A cinder on the eyeball will conquer a Napoleon. Some little weakness, as lack of courtesy, want of decision, a bad temper, may nullify the labor of years.
"I cannot see that you have made any progress since my last visit," said a gentleman to Michael Angelo. "But," said the sculptor, "I have retouched this part, polished that, softened that feature, brought out that muscle, given some expression to this lip, more energy to that limb, etc." "But they are trifles!" exclaimed the visitor. "It may be so," replied the great artist, "but trifles make perfection, and perfection is no trifle."
That infinite patience which made Michael Angelo spend a week in bringing out a muscle in a statue with more vital fidelity to truth, or Gerhard Dow a day in giving the right effect to a dewdrop on a cabbage leaf, makes all the difference between success and failure.
By scattering it upon a sloping field of grain so as to form, in letters of great size, "Effects of Gypsum," Franklin brought this fertilizer into general use in America. By means of a kite he established principles in the science of electricity of such broad significance that they underlie nearly all the modern applications of that science, with probably boundless possibilities of development in the future.
More than four hundred and fifty years have passed since Laurens Coster amused his children by cutting their names in the bark of trees, in the land of windmills, and the monks have laid aside forever their old trade of copying books. From that day monarchies have crumbled, and Liberty, lifting up her head for the first time among the nations of the earth, has ever since kept pace with the march of her sister, Knowledge, up through the centuries. Yet how simple was the thought which has borne such a rich harvest of benefit to mankind.
As he carved the names of his prattling children it occurred to him that if the letters were made in separate blocks, and wet with ink, they would make clear printed impressions better and more rapidly than would the pen. So he made blocks, tied them together with strings, and printed a pamphlet with the aid of a hired man, John Gutenberg. People bought the pamphlets at a slight reduction from the price charged by the monks, supposing that the work was done in the old way. Coster died soon afterward, but young Gutenberg kept the secret, and experimented with metals until he had invented the metal type. In an obscure chamber in Strasburg he printed his first book.
At about this time a traveler called upon Charles VII. of France, who was so afraid somebody would poison him that he dared eat but little, and made his servants taste of every dish of food before he ate any. He looked with suspicion upon the stranger; but when the latter offered a beautiful copy of the Bible for only seven hundred and fifty crowns, the monarch bought it at once. Charles showed his Bible to the archbishop, telling him that it was the finest copy in the world, without a blot or mistake, and that it must have taken the copyist a lifetime to write it. "Why!" exclaimed the archbishop in surprise, "I bought one exactly like it a few days ago." It was soon learned that other rich people in Paris had bought similar copies. The king traced the book to John Faust, of Strasburg, who had furnished Gutenberg money to experiment with. The people said that Faust must have sold himself to the devil, and he only escaped burning at the stake by divulging the secret.
William Caxton, a London merchant who went to Holland to purchase cloth, bought a few books and some type, and established a printing-office in Westminster Chapel, where he issued, in 1474, "The Game of Chess," the first book printed in England.
The cry of the infant Moses attracted the attention of Pharaoh's daughter, and gave the Jews a lawgiver. A bird alighting on the bough of a tree at the mouth of the cave where Mahomet lay hid turned aside his pursuers, and gave a prophet to many nations. A flight of birds probably prevented Columbus from discovering this continent, for when he was growing anxious, Martin Alonzo Pinzon persuaded him to follow a flight of parrots toward the southwest; for to the Spanish seamen of that day it was good luck to follow in the wake of a flock of birds when on a voyage of discovery. But for his change of course Columbus would have reached the coast of Florida. "Never," wrote Humboldt, "had the flight of birds more important consequences."
The children of a spectacle-maker placed two or more pairs of the spectacles before each other in play, and told their father that distant objects looked larger. From this hint came the telescope.
"Of what use is it?" people asked with a sneer, when Franklin told of his discovery that lightning and electricity are identical. "What is the use of a child?" replied Franklin; "it may become a man."
"He who waits to do a great deal of good at once," said Dr. Johnson, "will never do any." Do good with what thou hast, or it will do thee no good.
Every day is a little life; and our whole life but a day repeated. Those that dare lose a day are dangerously prodigal, those that dare misspend it, desperate. What is the happiness of your life made up of? Little courtesies, little kindnesses, pleasant words, genial smiles, a friendly letter, good wishes, and good deeds. One in a million—once in a lifetime—may do a heroic action. The atomic theory is the true one. Many think common fractions vulgar, but they are the components of millions.
He is a great man who sees great things where others see little things, who sees the extraordinary in the ordinary. Ruskin sees a poem in the rose or the lily, while the hod-carrier would perhaps not go a rod out of his way to see a sunset which Ruskin would feed upon for a year.
Napoleon was a master of trifles. To details which his inferior officers thought too microscopic for their notice he gave the most exhaustive attention. Nothing was too small for his attention. He must know all about the provisions, the horse fodder, the biscuits, the camp kettles, the shoes. When the bugle sounded for the march to battle, every officer had his orders as to the exact route which he should follow, the exact day he was to arrive at a certain station, and the exact hour he was to leave, and they were all to reach the point of destination at a precise moment. It is said that nothing could be more perfectly planned than his memorable march which led to the victory of Austerlitz, and which sealed the fate of Europe for many years. He would often charge his absent officers to send him perfectly accurate returns, even to the smallest detail. "When they are sent to me, I give up every occupation in order to read them in detail, and to observe the difference between one monthly return and another. No young girl enjoys her novel as much as I do these returns." The captain who conveyed Napoleon to Elba was astonished with his familiarity with all the minute details connected with the ship. Napoleon left nothing to chance, nothing to contingency, so far as he could possibly avoid it. Everything was planned to a nicety before he attempted to execute it.
Wellington too was "great in little things." He knew no such things as trifles. While other generals trusted to subordinates, he gave his personal attention to the minutest detail. The history of many a failure could be written