Many a man who envies his more fortunate rivals grudges the work which success involves. If the great men of the world find it necessary to toil early and late to secure their positions, how vital must it be for the man who is struggling towards the achievement of his ambitions to work just as hard! These men do not work for money or for fame, for they have won both. They work for the love of the working, for the joy of the struggle, and the ecstasy of the final triumph; and when they have conquered one thing the lust of power which possesses them urges them on anew to fresh fields which are ready for conquest.

Think of the men possessed of all they need in life, going forth to the outer parts of the Empire to work hard for their country. Think of the scientists pursuing their laborious investigations, or, of the commercial magnates continuing to work harder than any clerk when they have earned fortunes and the right to enjoy luxurious leisure. These men are not called upon to undertake the daily drudgery and the thousand worries, perils, and anxieties which every day brings to them. Why, then, do they work ? The only answer is that there must be something in the very nature of labour which gives the worker such joy as he can obtain in no other way. It is the use of their mental powers, the act of creation, that enthrals them.

Some men work for money and some for work's sake. Generally the former, when they have made their money, continue to work because they love it. The man whose sole aim is to earn enough to satisfy his wants does very little more, and often, owing to his lack of foresight and an entire absence of ambition, he ends his days in poverty. Making money is laudable, but it is not the chief end of work. The man who toils in the fields and loves it is more successful than he who works in an office for money alone and loathes his routine. The more one thinks about the matter the plainer it is that the habit of loving work so much that even drudgery loses its burden is to be easily acquired by adopting the right mental attitude. Totting up figures and ruling up a ledger are, in themselves, dreary work. Any interest they may possess must be given to them by the worker. If he can do the work quickly and accurately and get quicker and more accurate, he derives a satisfaction from it that makes it even pleasant; and when his reward comes and he is given betterpaid work, he begins to feel the benefit of that power which impelled him forward, though he never knew it.

The most miserable people in the world are those who have nothing to do. Only a little better off are persons who are forced to work for their livelihood, and do it so grudgingly that life is merely

a matter of dull routine. Happy is the man who loves his work, who rejoices in all the details of his calling because he can carry them out perfectly; who rises slowly and surely towards the height of his ambition, and sees the labour of his mind and of his hands growing out of the weary days into the beauty and strength that he gave them.

P

CHAPTER XXIII

ACHIEVEMENT

"And now the matchless deed's achieved,

Determined, dared, and done."

CHRISTOPHER SMART.

N work well done there is a satisfaction which

IN

is the greatest reward of labour. The sense of achievement is at once a payment and a promise. It compensates a man for toil and drudgery, and it stimulates him with such a sense of power that his ambition seems nearer to realisation. Those who plod on day by day, following well-defined roads and making no excursions away from the herded crowds into the byways of life where perils and adventures wait, never know the joys of triumph that come to a man who has been battered and wounded in fierce fights, who has been hurled down into the depths of despair, and yet from those depths has started to climb again with undiminished cheerfulness and courage until he has painfully gained the heights. Only the man who has been down, who, in the words of the world, has "failed," can know the exquisite pleasure of rising to the

summits of life. He knows that he is more than equal to whatever troubles may await him. He knows that in the hour of danger his mental powers will take unto themselves such an access of strength that the perils will be overcome, that the struggle will be joyous, and that the triumph will be sweet.

If it were not true that every completed task brings a sense of power that is more than a compensation for the weariness of the work, life would be unbearable. The ambition that lures us on over the stony and terrible ways of life is never completely satisfied. Always a man hungers, like Alexander of old, for fresh worlds to conquer. He does not gain his reward from his gratified wishes, but from the sense of personal power that his conquests bring him.

It is a fine thing to attempt what other men fear, and to succeed in the endeavour. It is finer still to go forth into the dark, fearing yourself, yet determined to conquer and prevail. Do you suppose that a man who has once tasted the sweet fruit of achievement in the face of odds that looked overwhelming, would exchange his stony path for the well-trodden highways that the crowd travels over? To live by routine, to answer to the beck and call of others, to subject your will always to the wills of others, and never to assert yourself, to