It is reported of Abernethy, the celebrated Surgeon, that, on one occasion, appearing before his class as usual, at the commencement of a session, he seemed suddenly to forget the very business for which he came. His eye wandered absently around the chamber, and, for awhile, he surveyed the circle in a profound silence. When, at length, he did speak, it was only to confound his auditory. Instead of discoursing to them of nerves & muscles, bones & arteries, he cried out, in sudden ejaculation—“Good Heavens! young Gentlemen,—what is to become of you all!”

And well might he so exclaim! Before him were arrayed a body of 500 or more students, all eagerly seeking to enter a profession which was everywhere crowded to excess. Even were it possible that he should send them all forth, equally armed & accomplished for the successful struggle with Disease & Death, he yet well knew that it was not possible that all of them should secure the opportunities which their hopes & necessities could equally demand. Some of them,—nay, many,—the more modest and perhaps capable among them—would linger long in the shades of obscurity, & probably never emerge from it: A few, by dint of diligence & good fortune, might secure employment, & realize the anticipated opportunities & all their pecuniary results; while the more confident, presumptuous & incapable, would rush audaciously into the conflict, for which they have made no adequate preparation—would commit a thousand fearful errors in their ignorance & audacity, & perhaps never achieve a progress of any sort, except such as is only dishonoring to a professional career. In brief, of the Host before him,—not fifty, perhaps, would ever attain a success commensurable with their expectations; and, of this fifty, the proportion would be even smaller, of those, who, by reason of natural endowment, & faithful study, would deserve to do so! And this, my friends, is true of all the Professions! Yet, in all, the Candidates are eager, hopeful, confident; never once doubtful of the future & their own prospects;—all impatient to begin the wrestle with fortune, in the departments they have severally chosen!

To the good man and the wise, who has attained that culminating period—“rel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita”—who has already reached, midway, the Page 138 →perilous path of Life—who has survived its trials—withstood its temptations—escaped its lures; grappled bravely with its necessities—and won, at length, the highest place of security and rank which belongs to a successful career,—there is nothing more touching & impressive than the spectacle of a host of ingenious youth—ardent, bold, hopeful,—eager for the opportunity, & impatient of all those wholesome restraints which would keep them back from the struggle, until the gristle of youth has fairly hardened into manhood. They resent—and revolt—against the very training for success, as an offence to self-esteem, and as only delaying them, unnecessarily, in their march to triumph. They see the goal only—the ideal of hope and pride, or vanity and love of gain! They never once conceive how severe must be the conflict, in the gratification of either of these objects. They never once conjecture the exhausting length of the struggle. They feel only the eager enthusiasm of youth;—they only behold, at distance, the smiling Fortune, waving her fair white hands, with purple streamers, and beckoning them onward, to glorious heights, crowned with flowers, hallowed by the sunlight, over which hangs a bow of the brightest colours, and the most brilliant promise!

The Philosopher well knows that to one only, of the many, is this beautiful ideal, a real & attainable goal. To the greater number it is all delusion. He knows that the flowers will wither at the touch—the rainbow dissolve into vapor even while you gaze—that the bloom will disappear from the sunny slopes as you approach—the heights grow more & more inaccessible with the upward toiling footsteps; and that the becoming Fortune will elude the ardent embrace of the very worshipper she woos, and disappear, in darkness, from the enamored eyes which she has blinded with her witching glamour. He, himself, that Philosopher, walks amid the wrecks of bloom and promise; &, whatever his own acquisitions, he is, at least, no longer the victim of any delusion! But he feels, even as he surveys the Host of eager aspirants in his sight, that they can only be undeceived, in their roseate fancies, by the sad & trying discipline of an individual career—that no warning counsels of age will be heard by those who are still happy in the delusions of youth. They must work out their own problems—achieve their own deliverance as they may—and pass in turn, through the same fiery ordeals which have tried & purified himself!

Let us enter, if possible, into the moods of Abernethy, & look, with him, at the prospect which severally awaits his pupils. Their case is that of all students, in all the Professions. What is the degree of success which they may attain, and what the means which shall render it attainable? The inquiry is of a sort to justify all his doubts & apprehensions. He knows, for example, that he himself, is a remarkable exception to the common progress;—that, of all his associates, but few have ever attained either professional rank or fortune. Many have abandoned the profession in disgust. Many more but indifferently pursue it, having neither Page 139 →heart nor hope in the labour. They make no progress, report no discovery, do not even task themselves to keep pace with the current progress of their mystery. It is, with most of them, a helpless drudgery—the mere continuance of an ungrateful pursuit which they can now neither change nor abandon. They have reached that period in life when they can no longer engage in new occupations—when the mind instinctively recoils from unusual effort. They have exhausted their youthful energies in the disappointment of their youthful dream; and, with mental aims & physical strength equally unimpulsive, they are now capable only of the habitual toil, equally cheerless & profitless, of drawing water in a sieve! Defeat and Disappointment have encountered all the efforts of their manhood, and baffled them; and age, now, asks nothing more from Life, than to be permitted to pass out gently from its cheerless habitation. They see nothing before them, to encourage; and the backward glance reveals nothing but delusive mockeries. He beholds these unfortunates, as one by one, they sink out of sight along the wayside, leaving not a single trophy of well directed effort, or well conceived performance. They were simply the victims of their own dreams—dreams engendered by vanity, in the day of their strength, which became power, equal to their destruction in the day of their decline. And these victims are so many beacons, which might profitably warn other dreamers, were it not for that impetuous blood of youth—that eager passion—which suffers it to behold nothing, at the opening of its career, but that beautiful goal which blinds even as it beguiles.—The pathway of our philosophic Teacher has, even thus, been strewn with the wrecks of youthful enthusiasm—and, as he looks about him, over the host of hungering aspirants,—each eager to begin the same delusive in pursuit of a phantom,—without a single calculation of the dangers and disasters of the progress, he may well exclaim, as I do to those, in the same category, who may happen to hear my voice,—“Good Heavens, young Gentlemen, what is to become of you all!”

His sympathies declare themselves in this exclamation. He would discourage none. He will cheerfully teach, honestly counsel, and generously assist. He is no churl, but a good, thoughtful, & benevolent man. What he can do, to prepare the way, & direct the progress of the young beginner, will faithfully be done. He is not insensible to their claims, or to the claims of society. He sees in them, the representations of society, having a thousand interesting relations, with humanity and its safe progress, which, as yet, they do not conceive for themselves. He beholds the future in their hands, even as he sees them in the hands of the Future! They constitute the germs of posterity to him. He feels, that, in some degree, the destinies of the race, no less than their own, must be confided to their keeping. Shall it be for good or for evil? Shall they maintain, for the great family of man, his present status, and possessions, and add glorious increase, through their own individual performances, to the common capital of Humanity? These are the Page 140 →special concerns of the Professions. This is their mission. It is for this reason, beyond all others, that they called, par excellence, the Liberal! They are supposed to be especially the guardians of the wisdom of Past ages—the special priesthood, having most sacred functions—on whom, Humanity, with all her glorious trains of Art and Science, Literature & Philosophy, Life & Justice, Knowledge & Religion, must absolutely defend. How natural that he should look with trembling & anxiety, to the character, the talents, the industry, the aims of those, who aspire to be the guardians of such Holy Trusts! The results, of their lives and labours, to themselves, though not to be disregarded; are really of insignificant consideration, when we look to their social impossibilities. What, to the race, or to the generation, if they do fail to realize the individual advantages which were naturally the first objects of their aim? If they acquire no fortunes—attain no eminence, no rank? If they toil on to the close of a long career, and, to the last, still feel the necessity of toil as a means of simple existence. This, even where they may be well endowed for the vocation, and ably working in it—however cruel the fortune to themselves,—is yet, so far as Humanity is concerned, a subject of small consideration. They may toil laboriously and die poor, yet still establish the noblest claims to the honours & gratitude of society and man. One does not necessarily labor in vain, though he may achieve but little for himself!

All these considerations occur naturally to the thought of the philosophic teacher as he surveys his classes. But it is not likely that this remoter view of the subject was in the mind of Abernethey when he uttered his ejaculation. His thought did not probably extend beyond the mere pecuniary prospects of his pupils. He regards them, simply, as so many young persons choosing a career, which, he well knew must defraud the expectations of most of them. He felt that none of them fully estimated his own objects, the obstacles to his progress, the self training and sleepless diligence which are essential to success, & the thousand baffling caprices of Fortune, which are apt to set at nought the best industry, and the most persevering talents. He knew that, to many of these young men, pecuniary success was necessary to existence—that, to most of them, it was the real & only object of desire. Necessity, quite as much as vanity, or ambition, was urging their studies, and goading them to that zealous endeavour which yet lacked the higher stimulus of Genius. Many of them were in training with reference to the wants & succour of large dependent families. There are invalided fathers who look to some of these young men to take their places in the professional harness. There are widowed mothers, who have pinched their domestic comforts that they may provide the means of a higher education for an only son. In his mind’s eye, the teacher beholds one of these widowed mothers. Even now, pursuing her midnight toils, with the needle, by a dim light, in some lonely forest cabin. Her tears drop silently upon the garment which she shapes or embroiders. A young sister’s fingers are busy, at the same time, with painful labours, seeking to eke out the Page 141 →slender pittance, which shall sustain the young man in the distant & expensive city where he pursues his studies. His professional success is to recompense them for these midnight toils & pains, by present devotion to his studies, by future Cares and Comforts, by reverence & protection. In silence, as they work, mother and sister brood together, with tearful hopes, over these natural expectations. Hope lightens their labors, sweetens their cares, elevates their thoughts, makes gladsome the promise in the prospect. They dare not otherwise than hope. Were they to doubt, they would die! They do not doubt, but that the Good God, who loves to behold the spectacle of struggling & unrepining virtue, will finally crown their toils & hopes, equally, with fruition!—All these thoughts naturally occur to the Philosophic teacher as he looks over his classes. A thousand such histories are in daily progress in every portion of the Earth. He has known a thousand such himself. He doubts not, that of the thoughtless, eager, hopeful and impatient groups around him, there are many who depend, on just this sort of resource, for the means of present study. The bread they eat, is salted by a mother’s tears! The clothes they wear, are wrought by her midnight toils, in anxiety and self-denial. The very sleep they take, upon luxurious couches, robs her eyes of those slumbers which are so essential to the health & happiness of age! Ah! Should these sacrifices of maternal & sisterly love be made in vain! Should the young student fail! Should the only son prove worthless!—insensible, in appreciation of these toils & pains—heedless of his own duties—his honour—and ungrateful to their love! Should he be a vain, weak, heartless & capricious boy—base of spirit—selfish in the search after his own pleasures—without any generous sentiment of gratitude—without any elevating ambition, urging him perpetually, to the use of the midnight lamp, as patiently & persevering as that poor mother & sister pursue their toils in his behalf;—then come, to them, the bitterness of mortified hopes & wasted cares—the desponding spirit—the salt, salt tears—the sister’s anguish—the mother’s broken heart!—We will suppose better things, though this melancholy history is one of too common experience! We will take for granted that the young man for whom Love thus labors in poverty & solitude, only cheered by Hope, is not ungrateful; not insensible—feels all that is done for him;—that he strives honestly, earnestly, and with all his soul set upon his tasks, in the pursuit of professional knowledge;—that he, too, keeps his midnight vigil, with study; & that he strives faithfully to compensate the Love which provides, with a kindred passion that longs anxiously for the opportunity to requite it!—“But” says our sage Professor, “is even this altogether sufficient for success?” And the question leads him to yet more searching considerations of what the Professions demand. Even honest toils, & patient industry, & persevering study, will not wholly suffice for those more exacting pursuits, which seem to imply an original destination. Diplomas may be obtained, but the Professions are never acquirable by the inferior intellect. They are secrets of the temple. They imply a Page 142 →chosen Priesthood. The God must call for them, first, and only. They are the superior agents through which he works on the higher necessities of man. They are not to be chosen, at pleasure, by those who aim only at pecuniary results. No one has the right to degrade them to the rank of mere trades, to be acquired as one acquires the use of common tools. No one should assume that they can be duly represented by the exercise of mere will & simple industry. The very phrase—so common in our ears—choosing a Profession—what an impertinence! As if the boy were equally endowed for all. He has universal genius—has only to decide, and be a Lawyer; to put on black garments and a white cravat, and a lugubrious image, and become God’s representative to perishing souls; a preacher, a prophet, a divinely inspired man!—to emulate the emphatic nod of my Lord Burleigh, and become at once a master in the art of Healing. All these several vocations demand several endowments. If the individual be not chosen by the Profession, he will as vainly as impudently choose the profession for himself!—There is no doubt that, in all the professions, there are certain inferior labours which common faculties may execute: These might, perhaps, be profitably separated from the superior, & assigned to an order of serving brothers, such as formed a class among the Knights Hospitaller of old; and were known in the Catholic abbeys in the same character; persons, who, modestly, forbore all vain aspirations; who asked of God permission only to do those things which were fairly within their powers; content to fetch wood and water, to perform servile offices—any labour, the meanest, in the cause of humanity: Who, in the Priesthood ministered only in parochial duties; watched the sick, nursed them; buried the dead, wived the living: Who, among Lawyers, as in Great Britain at the present day, were scribes simply, and attorneys; did office work; made records; drew up arbitrary writings, & so forth; among Physicians, were assistants, compounding drugs; bandaging wounds; perhaps bleeding, & doing subordinate offices which required mechanical dexterity rather than thought.—These, however subordinate, are necessary duties of the several professions, demanding ordinary agencies; and under a proper division of labour, easily disposed of in inferior hands; leaving to the superior those only which can employ them most profitably & might be undertaken by no other. These distinctions of duty, indicate a wise policy, if in reference to economy of time merely, and without regard to higher requisitions. The Serving Brothers, in neither profession were ever suffered to undertake those severer trusts, which implied the noblest offices of intellect or inspiration. And were it that the vanity of the young would be content to humble itself to these subordinate agencies, there might be some plea for that reckless audacity with which so many thousand incompetents rush into the professions! These, in their full & proper exercise, demand special & very superior endowments. They imply gifts of a divine distinction, the lack of which, no mere industry, however urgent;—no mere will, however determined, will enable us to supply. Saint Paul ought to be a Page 143 →sufficient authority on the subject, even if our own daily observation should fail to lead us to similar convictions. “There are,” he tells us—“diversities of gifts. To one, is given the word of wisdom; to another, that of knowledge; to another, faith; to another, the gift of healing; to another, the working of miracles, to another, the gift of tongues; to another, their interpretation; the Deity thus, as he says, “dividing to every man severally, as He will.” It is not then as we will! But as He wills! And what a terrible arrogance it is, when we substitute our will for his! Here, in the language used by Paul, each of the Professions is clearly indicated;—Education, Law, Literature, Science, Medicine & Religion. Here is just such a distribution of faculties, under the head of endowments, as, under God’s direction, rather than that of vanity or Mammon, would keep the Professions from being crowded any where! Were each of us but to follow the toils indicated by his endowment, there would not be one person too many in any of the professions;—and there would be no mischievous & fatal practice; no quackery, no charlatanism; no fraud of any sort of either. And surely, it is obvious that such a division of labour among men, so arbitrarily indicated, is a most essential necessity for preventing that conflict of opinion among Professions, which has grown into a proverbial conviction that they must always disagree. It is evident that God has never so profligately bestowed his gifts, as that they shall operate to the utter defeat of their own uses, and to the hurt of the very races for whom they were meant to bring healing & protection. The Professions are crowded, not because of the excessive endowments of Humanity; but because Vanity, Presumption, Ignorance, Cupidity—false notions of self & society, on every hand, prompt fools to rush in to provinces where the very angels fear to tread. It is thus, my friends, that the Blind are said to lead the Blind. Hence the false Prophets that swarm the land at all seasons. Hence all the mischiefs done by licensed Ignorance—hence the abuses, the usurpations & the downfall of Governments—hence most of the corruption, growing, and festering as they grow—which precipitates the fate of Empires & the destruction of a race. Reading the histories of men, as we should read them quite as much in search of beacons as of guides,—examining in what states & communities have fatally erred,—you will come to but the one conclusion—that the most direct & destructive agency of Evil, has been invariably the incompetence of men in power; this incompetence being equally mischievous in reducing the people to its own level of comprehension, and in precipitating the Fate which it needed the highest wisdom to avert. We have had recently before ourselves a marvellous example, of the most imposing character, and of still impending danger, to one of the greatest of nations, in the miserable policy of the British ministry in rushing without due preparation into the war with Russia. Here, you have been permitted to see how destructive of the securities of a nation is the rule of presumption & imbecility. The military chiefs are inefficient, and inert. The civil administration makes no preparation; Page 144 →takes no precautions. The army is inadequately provided with the necessaries of war, no less than of life. The agents employed are improvident & worthless; and while the French are well employed & well provided; the British, starving & freezing in camp or bivouack, are hurled recklessly upon ruin, under a Generalship, that seems equally blind, deaf & heartless. But the worse exposure lies in that gratuitous exhibition to the world’s eye, of the terrible decline of resource—of that lack in vigilant wisdom—that lack of method, order, forethought and sagacious plan, which constitutes statesmanship. There is not only loss of power, and capital, strength, men & money, but of prestige; which, in the case of such a power as Great Britain, is the most dangerous as the most humiliating. Instead of laying bare the weakness of Russian power, it makes the most lamentable exposure of its own. What follows; but new combinations of hostile forces against a Kingdom which has made itself odious to all in turn? The probabilities are that this Russian war forms but a first act, in a terrible drama of nations, in which Britain, stript of her Indian colonies, shrinks, by rapid contraction, to a second or third rate power.—Now, as politics & Government properly constitute a Profession, they represent, in considerable degree, the Evils which defeat the virtues of all the professions. These are all to be found in the imbecility & presumption of those who usurp their powers;—and this imbecility is the more dangerous as it usually possesses, for a time, at least, a most wonderful faculty of inspiring trust. Fully conscious of its own deficiencies, in the real essentials of its place, it arms itself with audacity. In the lack of wisdom, and the necessary endowment, it farther justifies with the wisdom of the serpent, which is Cunning! It pieces out the lion’s skin with the Fox’s tail. It employs arts which subsidize the cunning of others—it engages in traffic of mutual service,—which, in politics, we call logrolling—and does not scruple, in the maintenance of place, at the sale and sacrifice of all the precious trusts yielded to its keeping. For, my friends, every man in a false position,—in a place for which his endowment leaves him unfitted,—must be dishonest. What right has he to be there? He defrauds the proper man. He defrauds the country. He can only maintain himself in his position by the practice of habitual fraud. Hence, in politics, he is demagogical. By bluster he will stun the ears; and, by his own, and the helping cunning of others, blind the eyes, of that society whose powers he abuses, to the exclusion and denial of all those who possess the appropriate gifts for station. In the professions, he will band with other mediocrities against the meritorious, or he will fasten upon the more ignorant classes of the community, and maintain himself, so long as he can, to the gross wrong, and sometimes grievous hurt, of humanity. It is scarcely a matter of consolation to know that such pretenders are exposed at sometime or other. They are unhappily succeeded by a new set of the same school, who travel over the same grounds, with equally mischievous footsteps, and if you will be at the pains to follow them, and trace the thousand ramifications of evil on every Page 145 →hand, which they diffuse, you will perhaps arrive with me at the conviction that they are the true sources of most of the worst mischiefs of society;—those which degrade and demoralize society, and finally destroy its most enduring characteristics. It is thus that men come to despair of medicine as an ass;—learn to despise religion as the mere fraud of a cunning priesthood; and regard Law as licensed iniquity. So, in literature, banding as a cliqueism, which is only one of the thousand forms of the mutual admiration society, they become false mediums, interposing their dicta between the truly meritorious & the people. Our Philosophic Professor readily conceives all these dangers; as he well understands that the Professions exercise—and this is a matter of vast importance—an authority over society, apart from, and even superior to, their mere professional duties. They are social, as well as scientific authorities. If incompetent to their professional responsibilities, they must lack also in moral; and, lacking in moral, how much greater must be their mischievous influence upon society, in all those relations which do not involve professional wisdom? Next then, my friends, to the expression of his fears, with respect to the individual fortunes of his pupils, he will be very apt to exclaim—“Good Heavens! young Gentlemen, in such hands as yours, what is to become of the Human Family.”

Thus feeling, thinking and fearing, he would probably begin his course of tuition with some such exordium as this:

“Young Gentlemen, you are here to acquire my profession. But, young Gentlemen, your first duty is to be honest! You must not undertake this profession, if you fancy that you can succeed in any other. The Professions do not recognize universal Geniuses. The Universal Genius, my young friends, is one that can never accord to any one Profession, that concentration of will, thought, and soul, which it requires. You cannot serve God & Mammon. Before you undertake this, or any profession, you must first honestly assure yourself that you are especially fitted for it. Your mind must habitually run upon it, & with such a will, such an inevitable direction, that you find it impossible, with any effort, to turn your thoughts to any other. You must really be sure that you feel an interest & a pleasure in this study, which is afforded you by no other subject of pursuit or inquiry. Be sure that you are governed by no motive, short of a love for knowledge, for its own sake, & for the efficient development of your own peculiar powers. You are not to choose this profession or that, because, in the existing condition of society, it promises to be especially distinguished or profitable. You are in no degree, to regard the profit or the loss to yourself; since this is a matter which involves your truth, your honor, your obligations to your race. You are not to impose a fraud upon your people. Your only question, and it is a vital one, is simply this—“Have I really a call to this pursuit? Am I specially fitted for it? Does it seem, from all that I can see & learn of myself—after devout self-examination, of my own nature & resources, that, I have been endowed for this one profession in greater Page 146 →degree than any other. If not thus endowed, my young friends, you are scarcely fitted for any profession. But you are unquestionably fitted for something. It is for you to find out what that something is.” Suppose he adds—“And, Gentlemen, the best proofs of the fitness & endowment, are—that you do address yourselves, lovingly, to your studies—with a hearty zeal, that suffers no temptations to turn you aside from your appointed tasks. You are to remember, that, having emerged from the schoolhouse, it is expected that you will rise, of your own thoughts, to a full appreciation of what is required at your hands. You are boys no longer, to be watched and sentinelled, catechized & punished. You are now to feel, as well as to understand, your own responsibilities, for the virtues that are in you, at once to yourselves, to society & God. Your discretion has begun: you are about to put your mind & nature to their best uses—& the great question of each,—solemnly urged, in the secrecy of his own heart—without suffering vanity, cupidity, or any base desire to conflict with the answer—a question to be urged unremittingly until you do receive an answer; is one as brief as it is direct:—“What am I appointed to be & to do? What can I do best? What am I good for?” Ask honestly, earnestly, & under the prescribed conditions, & the answer is inevitable, in the case of him who is good for any thing. Having found your answer, you are then to do your duty; with all your heart, all your soul, all your strength—regardless, equally of the Profit & the Loss. Decide then, at your peril, what profession you will choose! Your whole future, honor or shame, glory or disgrace, rests upon this first choice which you make in life!”

It is not denied, my friends, as society is at present constituted, that ordinary common sense, patient industry and honest application, may enable us to maintain a decent rank in the profession—may enable us, in short, to escape rebuke for presumption, & to acquire a tolerable share of the business of the community; reaping a certain amount of pecuniary reward. To acquire enough of a profession, to deceive those who know nothing, is the simple secret of the Quack, in all the professions. To obtain mere formula, demands not only very little endowment, but even less of industrious exertions, on the part of the student. In our country, especially, a most unwise facility of access, is accorded to the urgency of the young beginner. The standards are graduated to the impatient appetites, & the inferiority of the general education. To lisp the common formula, parrot fashion, constitutes very much the sufficient “open sesame” to all the professions; & a moderate accumulation of dicta, will enable a bold and dashing graduate to assert himself, unquestioned, in a community where most studies are too superficially pursued to render society very critical in any. Is not this very much the amount of ultimate acquisition, with a very large proportion? Do we not see thousands who never take one step in advance, beyond the slight elevation which they have reached, in order to gain the diploma? This done, what of labour follows, on the part of the student, as student still, is the mere accumulation of examples, Page 147 →and the classing of his cases under arbitrary alphabetted heads. The practitioner thus works by authorities wholly, who should be a growing authority himself; and there will be thousands, quite satisfied with this slender degree of acquisition, who never pass beyond it—constituting a mere mob of mediocrities; not one of whom can teach what he yet professes to know—all of whom feel their way tremblingly at every step, uncertain of results, ignorant of cause & doubtful of effect—relying upon simple dicta which they know not how to apply, and upon laws which they have been able to memorize, but never to digest! And it is upon such poor drivellers as these, that the health & life of a people,—the rights and liberties of a people—the elemental welfare of a people—must in millions of instances depend. What an awful reflection for the young man, having any conscientiousness at all, to feel that Life & Death are in his hands—that Liberty and Law depend upon his knowledge & wisdom—that the soul’s eternal safety, is entrusted to his spiritual guidance!

We may take for granted that our Philosopher, whether Abernethy or Arnold, Mittenmaier or Comte, or any of the great teachers, in any of the departments, looking around among his classes, is frequently oppressed with the self-reproachful reflection, that he is unwisely contributing to a great public grievance. He beholds but too large a proportion of those whom he undertakes to prepare for the professions, who can never succeed in any—who have no just right to success—who evidently regard the profession, not with any view to the development of their individual gifts, for they posses none within his province; who seek the diploma, rather than the knowledge;—whose sole object is gain with ease; sinking the profession to a mere trade; & having no sort of notion of those superior objects, of Wisdom & Humanity, which the Profession should always contemplate. There is not one of these great teachers, who does not feel many compunctious visitings, as he reflects upon his own agency, in thus contributing to the most serious of all the evils which afflict society. They excuse themselves, to themselves, by a tacit reference to society itself. Society demands, society tolerates, society sanctions this self-degradation. They argue—“If we withhold the service, it will be performed by others, perhaps less competent,” and, as they cannot wholly prevent the evil, they naturally persuade themselves that they may somewhat lessen its amount by the better education which they can bestow, & the superior fidelity with which they will perform their duties.—I need scarcely say that the argument is a deceptive one. The true duty which we owe to society is every where to discourage, & not delude the incompetent. This we rarely attempt. We recoil, at the outset, not only from what seems a rudeness & a cruelty, but from a task which we hold to be hopeless of profitable result; and they directly contribute, not only to sanction, but to stimulate a mischief, the agency of which, upon Society, we all secretly deplore.—But the Philosopher naturally asks “Why should these young men enter a Profession at all? Why embark in studies which require such Page 148 →especial gifts, such a rare combination of gifts—such strict and trying discipline? Why attempt pursuits, in which they cannot only reach no distinctions, but in which, exposing their absolute deficiencies, they are so much more likely to incur disgrace?” There are a thousand manly employments, in which such broad backs, stout limbs, and vigorous muscles, might admirably exercise themselves to profitable ends, without exposing, and putting to discredit, the poor head, by urging it to assertions which only discredit itself, & lead to the disuse of its proper faculties. These questions, my friends, open to us the whole mystery. There must surely be some pressing motives which persuade Incompetence to such audacity; to a folly which is so likely to be followed by so many heavy penalties. Now, what are these motives? They are, unhappily, such as seldom declare themselves frankly to the student, and, like all self-delusions, they show themselves in the disguise of virtue. It is but a friendly act which shall lay them bare to detection, & enables the young beginner to see justly, and, for himself, how he is commonly deluded. They may be summed up in a brief catalogue. The Professions are supposed to appeal especially to the love of ease, to the dislike of physical labour; to cupidity; and to the vanity of the individual. They appeal to the love of ease, as they seem to require no such severe drilling, nor so protracted a term of ordeal & preparation, as mechanics & the trades. A course of two years probation, studies carelessly pursued, will suffice, in most cases, to secure a diploma in either; while mechanics and the trades, will demand an average apprenticeship of five or seven years. Where the social position is so humble, & the primary education of so limited a kind, as to seem not to justify any approach to the professions, then the same motives, in part, the love of gain, the escape from heavy labor, prompt another, and still larger class, to enter occupations, which, in the more civilized states of Europe, are confided mostly to young women. Labour, we are told, was the terrible penalty for a mortal sin; but we learn but half of this moral, unless we are taught also, that, by the Christian dispensation, the desire to escape the penalty, is not less a sin than the original offence which incurred it. Nevertheless, it is unquestionably the great struggle with a large portion of mankind, to shift its burdens upon any other shoulders than their own; and the Professions are chosen by too many, in the hope to escape from the severer labors of society. A vain hope, my friends, since there is no more laborious life in the world, than that of the Professions, when honestly pursued—They appeal to the ignorant cupidity of another class, inasmuch as they promise large compensative results for a moderate outlay of capital. Such, at least, is the notion among the thoughtless. But the strongest lure which the Professions hold out to the Incompetent, is in their appeal to the social vanity. The Professions, in a country like ours, which enjoys none of the privileges of an hereditary aristocracy, are necessarily the highest passports to Society. They constitute our principal aristocracies. They take rank by prescription, & confer rank. The very fact, that the Professions imply Page 149 →special gifts of intellect from God, and, a superior education at the hands of men, naturally clothes them with dignity & authority. For these, and other similar reasons, they are always of intense desire with all those who regard social position as a paramount concern. Unless, therefore, the conscientiousness of the student be very strong & active, and associated, besides, with that noblest wisdom, which teaches the knowledge of onesself, his vanity, cupidity, or distaste for labour, will prevail;—will get the better of his good sense & his honesty; and he will struggle, however idly, and with no matter what miserable means, for a distinction, which will not only prove worthless in his hands, but prove his own worthlessness in the eyes of others! He will turn from the very employment, in which, being useful, he would be honorable; to become a mockery & a fraud in that which he undertakes. He will thus inflict a twofold wrong, at once upon his own nature & upon society—the one, by a neglect or perversion of his own true gift—for every human being has his gifts;—the other by an imprudent usurpation of the place & trust which belong to a different endowment. And the evil will not rest here. No mischief ever ends with the single error in which it begins. It is the fruitful mother of an endless progeny, & entails a thousand evils upon society. Worst of all, it tends to habituate society to this sort of usurpation;—till, grade by grade, step by step,—insensibly, except to a very few—the guardian & conservative securities of a race are withdrawn—the God-chartered intellects, in all the departments disappear, & are totally superceded by the Incompetent. Then, it is, that all motive to honourable ambition is taken away, and the true aspirant no longer strives for a position which is coupled with no distinction. As Shakespeare hath it—

“Degree being vizarded

Th’ unworthiest shows as fairly in the mask.”

Merit pines in obscurity. Conceit & arrogance reign rampant in the land. Then it is that the armies of the republic are sacrificed by worthless Generalship—the Government of the Country abased by wretched Politicians—its foreign diplomacy disgraced by demagogues at once dirty & dishonest—the Professions & Arts degraded by a Quackery, which would only move our ridicule, were it not of such terrible consequences to Humanity. You may judge of the mischiefs done to Society in the Professions by the Pretender, by what you see of the vices & danger from the same sort of person in political affairs. And such, already, is the degradation we have reached, in this province, that, in many places, you cannot persuade the really able & honest man to become a candidate. The conditions of the canvas would work for him a forfeiture of self-respect. He cannot enter the field with bribery & corruption. He cannot fling filth from hands & mouth ad libitum. Besides the distinction of politics are no longer enviable. Thus it is that society becomes the victim to its own moral weakness—is sacrificed by its Page 150 →own imbecilities; whether in arts or arms, in Government or Law; in medicine or Divinity. The more loose & tolerant we show ourselves of presumption & cupidity in high places, the more surely do we destroy our own securities. There is no measuring the disastrous consequences to a people from this most fruitful of all sources of abuse and error. They enure to the remotest periods in their deteriorating effects; & end, finally, in their destruction of society, unless there shall happen suddenly to arise, at the moment of greatest dearth & danger, some God-appointed intellect—some prophet mind—capable, by great performances, to repair the faults of great usurpations! It is indeed, fortunate for mankind, that Imbecility, however audacious in smooth waters, has such an unerring instinct in the moment of exigency, & usually skulks & sneaks out of sight when the Danger becomes pressing. Your fair-weather seamen are always ready enough, when the storm rages, to yield up the helm to any body who is then bold enough to take it.

Once establish the fact, of the meanness of motive, in the choice of a Profession, and you establish, conclusively, the gross inadequacy and incompetence of the party. There is, my friends, a moral necessity in mere aim, which determines the character of the individual. What is really the object of his ambitions—wealth, show, vanity; or the desire to achieve famously, grandly, nobly, virtuously, wisely, usefully? It is the aim which the individual takes in life—the real object of his ambition or desire; and not the adventitious, or contingent advantages,—which must determine his rightful claim to his position. This must be sustained by the steady regard with which he pursues it; neither turning to the right side nor the left—the will with which he works;—the fact that he can, and does work, con amore;—with equal discretion & zeal—with equal ardor & results; these constitute the best credentials of fitness & endowment. The brave, truly honest, capable mind, shrinks intuitively, from any false position. He aims to do; not to pretend to do;—to Be, not to seem! It gives him no satisfaction to appear the thing which he is not; but to achieve the object which is within his power. To him, it is no source of pride or gratification, that Society arms him with a weapon which he knows not how to wield; crowns him with a sceptre which confers no authority! He is coerced by the exigencies of his own nature, to achievement; to positive performances, which imply wrestle & strength; trial & obligation; and take equal intellect & effort. He must work—must seek out real work—he cannot help but work! The very ambition which constitutes a necessary element in every mind of talents, or Genius, is coupled with an enthusiasm which takes no excuse—which leaves him no choice of occupation, but keeps him unhappy until he can grapple with his decreed duties with all the sinews of his soul! He, as naturally, turns to the one employment, over all others, in which he can work to most advantage. He falls inevitably into his proper place. He has but a single aim, and it determines him finally, & before it is too late, in the direction Page 151 →of his proper labours. It may be—no doubt has been,—that, in thousands of cases—moved by seeming, or absolute necessities—by social influences—by the wishes of parents,—the examples and arguments & young associates; he has, at the outset, made a mistake in his vocation. But, thus endowed, and honest, he will recover himself in due season, & with a celerity corresponding, in degree as his faculty is demonstrative, will take the right course which his endowment requires. That his gifts are peculiar, implies the necessity of aim. All great have thus been distinguished; even where Poverty & Convention have reared a thousand appalling barriers between themselves & their object. You harness them in vain to the drudgeries of life. They break away from plough and anvil. They are taught in no mortal schools. They have divine teachers, who sing for them, in the choiring stars, and fill their souls with a deep religious thirst, which compels them to aspire. Voices speak to them in the winds, telling of far lands & seas, which rouse their curiosity to that ardency which brings Adventure & Enterprise in their train. The rock by the wayside, the flower & the leaf, the running water, and the successive seasons, are all so many moral teachers, which do more than teach;—which inspire and persuade! For all such persons are remarkably endowed with the keenest senses and sensibilities; a most necessary feature in mental endowment; since, by these alone, are they ennobled to find the clue to other hearts, and this clue to hearts, is an essential one in every professional career. Briefly, they have gifts, and these are coercive. He who is born with bow & arrow in his grasp, must need become an archer. He who feels the wings growing at his shoulders, will soar, however much society may seek to restrain his flight. The impulse, strongly and genuinely felt, is irresistible, & a sure sign of the endowment. Those who lack this singleness of aim, who never feel this strenuous impulse, to one profession more than to another, you may be sure were destined to no such elevated duties. If they seek the higher places of art, in society, they are governed wholly by the baser motives, one or all, which I have indicated. Nature has decreed them to humbler toils; happy, if they can so control the vanities of their own hearts, as to grapple cheerfully with their appointed labours, & compel the respect of society, by the virtues of diligence, industry and the modest pursuit of Fortune in comparative obscurity!

To the ingenious & thoughtful mind, the question occurs, indeed, as a surprise—why any one should be so besotted as to propose to himself a profession to which he can do no honour. None other, will the profession honour, though Society may honour the Profession. He gains nothing from social or professional distinction, who cannot wield his art, or his office, with equal skill & power, even as the accomplished Cavalier flourishes his rapier! Why should a man, for example, seek political position, unless with some conviction that he is capable of effecting some great social or governmental reform or progress—some noble scheme for human improvement,—the ideas of which crowd his thoughts Page 152 →by day, and haunt his dreams by night? Why ask social aids and agencies, the object of which is some great utility, when one has nothing to develop?—When there is no voice, crying from, and to, his secret soul,—like that which roused the boy Samuel, from his midnight slumber, compelling sleep from his eyelids, and goading him to the altars with a prophetic necessity!—It will not do, my friends, to excuse the Pretender by any plea of ambition. Can you conceive of such a monstrosity in Nature as an ambitious blockhead? You may conceive of a vain, but never of an ambitious one. It is a ridiculous impertinence to speak of ambition in any such connection. It is not ambition, by which such a creature is moved—and if not cupidity, it is a poor, sneaking, silly, miserable vanity; just that sort of vanity which prompts a person having no talents for a military career, to don sword & epaulette, and sport the gay plumage of the soldier! When war breaks out, you hear no more of these Holiday soldiers. And of just this petty order, are most of the motives that prompt to the Professions, on the part of those who lack the honorable impulses of a true endowment. It is the child passion for drum & feather;—vanity, not ambition! Is it ambition, think you, which has persuaded the Dullard to the Bar, where he blunders away the rights of his clients, while the widow & the orphan cry aloud to his conscience, “You have made us Beggars!” Ambition, which prompts the Quack to Medicine, where he experiments upon precious lives; Manhood, Youth & Beauty, with no knowledge of what they need, or what might save; no happy instincts, which conduct to the mysterious remedies, which God has every where planted around us, remedial of all disease;—ambition which elevates the Drone into the Pulpit, where drowsing all the while himself, he purrs a silly undersong of sleep, like a fat tabby on the hearth rug, while Immortal Souls, on all sides, slipping over the eternal precipice, cry out to him, as they perish—“We are lost, lost forever, through your blind guidance.” Ah! my friends, when the Professions are thus incompetent, there is just as little ambition, in the case, or Conscience! Now, ambition is always conscientious. If it errs, it is from the excess of its zeal, never from selfishness. It drives a fiery team, and the steeds, sometimes, run away with it!—A great deal too much is said about ambition, absurdly, and in its disparagement, by those who deal in cheap commonplace moralities. They know nothing of the matter. They confound the Monkey with the Lion—inspiration with presumption! Ambition is truly, in one sense, the last infirmity of noblest minds; but an infirmity only as regards the saving policy of the individual himself, irrespective of society. It is a policy of self-sacrifice, & considering the mere successes of the actor, not to be commended to himself. He must lose, do what he will, who works for renown! But it is an infirmity, the very nobleness of whose aim redeems all its errors. At least, society has no reason to complain, and still less to sneer, at the toils which unselfishly contemplate only the great progresses of the race! The Passion by which the Angels are said to have fallen, it is yet an angelic passion. It implies Page 153 →almost angelic powers. It is the passion for real power; & not for its pageantries. I could wish that this passion were more commonly felt among our young men. So far from being a common one, as is erroneously thought, it is a very rare & infrequent passion; so rare,—so powerless, as a motor, that there is scarcely a drivelling, dirty passion in Society that does not take the start of it; run ahead of it; get the better of it; and crush it out in human bosoms. The love of money, the lusts of the flesh, the vanities of society, all these triumph over it; & exile it to the cell of the silent student; the sad enthusiast in seclusion; whom the vulgar world looks down upon in scorn. Ambition is never entertained by the selfish, the infirm, the weak, the base, the purposeless & unperforming. It is always a quality of high aim, intense earnestness, unflagging zeal, and sleepless industry. It is a quality of work, especially, and loves the wrestle of Life, not merely with Toil, but with Trial! It shrinks from neither. You cannot well task it beyond its courage, if you may beyond its strength. It craves occasion, and opportunity, only, as its only object is performance! It asks no favor, no indulgence, no reward; would rather work without either, than not be permitted to engage in that labor which is craved by its Endowment. Its prayer is only that it may be suffered to do! Yield it the occasion,—give it the opportunity—let it fairly grapple with its appointed duties, and it gives no rest to its hands, no slumber to its eyelids. It would scorn the power, were it not for the performance. It is not content to wear the crown,—it must also wield the sceptre. The pageant does not blind its eyes;—it is the glorious opportunity that woos them! Merely to hold rank & place, offers no temptation to that endowment whose only, & grand motive is its own development—which seeks nothing, but the free exercise of great & conscious powers;—looking fondly forward, whatever the pursuit, to carry, on & onward, to yet loftier heights of art & civilization, the professional banner which it bears. This is the only true ambition! All others, having no such aim & purpose, are simulacra—miserable mockeries—frauds upon society—the fruit of a shameful self-deception, if a self-deception at all,—or of a shameless impudence, which confounds place with dignity, & assumes that once upon the pedestal, the mere ape may become the Apollo! The very fact that the throne implies the Sovereign, makes us only revolt the more when we behold its desecration by the subject. He who thus usurps the false position—rising to the station which he cannot honor by corresponding nobleness of performance,—only exposes himself to our contempt & scorn, the higher he ascends before our eyes. In his proper place, at the foot of the altar, or on some of its lower platforms, he might not have won our applauses, but he would have escaped our loathing. In his false position, the throne becomes his pillory; and he looks out from it, not to fields of honour, but to a grinning infamy, which is not the less certainly felt, as it is so commonly left unexpressed by society. Society, itself, strange to say, governed by its own narrow impulses of self, or by its reckless caprices, not unfrequently despises the very Page 154 →creature whom it arms with an authority, which must degrade, and may probably destroy itself!

Regarding all these considerations, and their perilous consequences, our Professor may well ask, why this insane pursuit of professions in which Incompetence can acquire no distinctions? Why Law, Medicine, Politics, Literature, Divinity—each of which demands great natural gifts, & the most laborious training—when, not only nothing can be won from their pursuit, but when a thousand other fields of employment lie open on every hand;—in all of which Society has an earnest need—all of which implore enterprise & groan for performing Industry.

The answer lies in the error of Society itself, and this brings us to another evil, the fruit of mere vanity, the mischievous results of which are endless. Society has established false standards of honor & excellence, which tend to discredit arts & occupations, which are quite as honorable as the Professions; and has made certain professions the almost necessary conditions, by which to enter its conventional precincts. In the staple states, for example, we distinguish between the Planter & the Farmer, & to the disparagement of the latter—the distinction implying really superior merit in superior wealth only. We ignore the mechanic arts, as implying physical labour; the Law for which, at the same time, constitutes the very foundation, & the final article, of the Religion we profess. We honour him, as the Gentleman, who has no toils—no necessities or cares of Fortune; thus making Idleness a virtue; while we exclude Industry, one of the elementary virtues, from our respect; and too frequently treat it with a contempt & exclusion which should be due only to demerit. We give preference to Inanity, in fine society, while, in the same circles, we hold Performance in scorn & contumely. Nay, so tenacious are we of these absurd distinctions, that, even the Fine Arts, which, in theory, we are compelled to recognize as Honorable, are yet discredited through the Individual Professor; unless their pursuit happens to be crowned with Fortune; and you will find but few of our Gentry, even where possessed of their gifts, who is willing to work in them manfully as a Professor. He is willing that you should recognize him as an Amateur, condescending to an art; but not as one who strips to it, whether from the coercion of his own genius or the necessities of his own life. The more wealthy classes too rarely address themselves to their individual duties; and thus contribute to the social disparagement of the useful. It is one of the terrible evils of wealth, in our country, that the Planter too infrequently takes charge of his own estates. Yet, what loss to themselves, as well as to the country, follows their absenteeism. We devolve the trust of great estates, too commonly, upon ignorant, inferior, & irresponsible classes; when we should bring to bear, upon their working, all of our better knowledge—the benefits of a scientific education; and of tastes, which, properly exercised upon the inferior, would be lifted into the rank of virtues.—And yet, dear friends, what a Page 155 →wilderness of work lies before us, in the South, imploring our energies, ennobling the worker, & rewarding, in a thousand ways, the Zeal & Industry, which shall grapple bravely with the necessity. Are there no new lessons to be learned in Agriculture itself? We are scarcely thoroughly masters of the mystery of growth & nurture; of soil & affinities, of any one of the plants upon which we yet mostly rely for food & commerce. Can we get these new lessons from slaves & overseers? Does it not need the concentration, upon them, of all of our thoughts, our best energies, & our most curious analysis? Are there no new wildernesses of waste to be developed by cultivation, into glorious garden spots of fertility & beauty? No mountain barriers to be pierced by our Engineers, & subdued to pleasant avenues leading to regions of retreat, salubrity & beauty? No vast swamps to be rescued from the wave—reclaimed, converted to Empires of wealth & grandeur, such as reward & illustrate the indefatigable genius of the Hollander? All of these performances demand genius, and art & science, as well as Industry, and would crown the conqueror with imperishable honours. Have our mechanic arts attained perfection? The world, even now, with all its mighty boast of progress, has not yet recovered the lost arts of the Phoenician, Assyrian & Egyptian; and cannot well conceive, by what wondrous mechanical agencies, they were enabled to heave the very mountains into symmetrical relation, in their stupendous masonry & their gigantic pyramids. The grand conceptions of [the] Greek & Etruscan still mock & defy our ambition & invention. The provinces of mechanics & manufactures—nay, even those of agriculture—the fields, forests, swamps & mountains—still stretch interminably around us, affording ample fields, at once for enterprise & Genius; in either of which every Conquest is glory no less than gain. What we do lack for the Conquest is Ambition!—The ambition to do great things—and not petty ones!—Sloth, Vanity, Conceit, Presumption—these achieve no conquests, any where, or only over Cap, and bell & feathers!—As our Professor thinks of these appropriate fields, lying in naked fallow around us, and thinks how much more honorably and appropriately his classes might engage in them without fear of rivalry, and in the pursuit of a really laudable ambition,—his note probably changes. He claps hands & cheers; no longer cries out, in equal commiseration & reproach, “Good Heavens, what is to become of you all!”—but “Heavens, Young Gentlemen, what glorious fields for Ambition invite your enterprise, equal to all your endowments, & capable of rewarding all your industry. Here you shall never come in conflict with each other; here you can, by no possibility, do mischief; here you will dishonor no office; wrong no confidence; discredit no profession; and here you may find Eminence from all! Here, the very hammer, in a brave hand, may become a sceptre; the plough encloses a principality; the augur, makes you a triumphal arch of granite, through the hitherto incorrigible mountains. Only, he cries, only, young men, show yourselves ambitious! It is ambition that we want;—Ambition, which is born of Endowment, & which Page 156 →always carries Enthusiasm in its train. Discard, I pray you, the poor conditions of a decrepit society. Assert your individual manhood against Convention. Better reject all society than suffer it to debase you; for society debases all those whom it keeps from the exercise of a proper manhood. Treat with scorn its poor inanities—its wretched traditions & superstitions—its pretty commonplaces of conversation—the small penny worth of wit of small, smart people about town,—and its drivelling herd of licensed blockheads;—leave all these;—and go forth to the real conflicts of life; and to its permanent & original conquests, with all the vigour of a perfect manhood! I, for my poor part, would rather build my native town of Charleston, into a great city, than wear the proudest crown of Christendom! I would rather enjoy the reputation of draining my native swamps of the Cooper & the Ashley, covering them by impassable barriers from the Sea, and clothing their fields with Rice, than be fifty Polk, & Pierce & Harrison, Presidents of this Confederacy! Nay, I should regard it as a far nobler exercise of life; a far higher achievement of pride and power; to be able to convert ten thousand acres of our ordinary poor pineland levels, such as you may find every where, into a glorious garden spot, than possess all the public & private honours, of all the States of Europe! Here are fields, open at once to profit and ambition. Here are labours, of every variety, for mind & body, which are a thousand times more honourable than any professional career, pursued without distinction. All labors which are honest, are honorable; since all imply an ideal; all exercise the intellect—will tax the highest—and are susceptible of indefinite improvement. The Ideal, let me remark, used vaguely every day in speech, & too frequently supposed to be in antagonism with the Real, is, in fact, only the Possible Real;—the most perfect notion of the Real, to which the highly endowed ambition constantly aspires. There is not, accordingly, any occupation, however seemingly humble, which has not its ideal. The merchant sees it in the discovery and development of new fields for commerce—new marts and objects of exchange & trade. The mechanic, in new inventions, which convert common ores & minerals into winged steeds of flight & fire. The agriculturist, in creating new forms of Use & Beauty upon this Earth; Art & Science, thus, embracing Labour, and from the simplest agencies, evoking the perfect ideals, of mind, and majesty! Thus it is, that, to the Scientific Thought, thus exercising in its natural province, the simple Tea kettle prefaces the miracle of the Steam Engine. And it is not possible, for any mind, engaging in appropriate labors, & pursuing them with a loving ardour, not secrets and discoveries, equally brilliant and useful, which shall crown itself with honour, and bless the races of men with new possessions, which gradually tend to their perfect civilization. In all vocations, there are motives to ambition, incentives to enterprise, materials for Genius, rewards for Industry, infinitely Superior to any, which can possibly result to Incompetence, struggling like an Elephant in a Quagmire, in the depths and mazes of an inextricable Profession. Thorough Page 157 →tillage, or Farming, Staple Culture, Engineering, the Mechanic and the Fine Arts,—all reveal to us fields of enterprise, the working of which, at this very time, constitutes the paramount necessity of our Southern States. We lack our proper share of labour—we lack Home Industry, & Home Thought upon it,—which alone make Home sacred;—we lack in enterprise, curiosity and art—we lack in useful ambition! We are daily importing the agencies which are essential to the maintenance, no less than the progress & improvement, of our condition in town & country. We should need to import none! The necessities of life, in the higher exactions of Civilization, are pressing heavily upon us, demanding the development of our individual gifts. No mind need be unoccupied—no field need be as naked fallow. Let us only ignore the unwholesome standards of a frivolous convention, and clothe ourselves in the noblest sort of ambition,—to be useful, according to the several qualities and virtues that are in us;—working, watching, achieving; aiming grandly, & wisely; & conquering bravely; and not waste gifts, genius, Life; showing ourselves in petty, puerile, conceited attitudes, of vanity and Indolence, cursed & crushed by a poor, slavish, ridiculous convention. Let us be something,—not the shadows of something!—Men, not monkeys; and Honor is ours, and Profit is ours; and the sweeter, prouder, consciousness, so necessary to self-respect, that we are the Beings, that we appear, and have done our best towards the just development of our real endowments. I have shown you, apart from the Professions, ample provinces for the exercise of all your talents & energies, in the cultivation of which you will best contribute to perpetuate the objects contemplated by a noble & conquering ancestry.

“They,—our fathers—made the nation!

We must save it! We must say

Such shall be its sovereign station,

Glorious in the eyes of Day!

What shall make a nation glorious?

What but Toil and Art? The toil,

Which, alone, is all victorious

Springing from the soul, and soil!

Rising o’er the nation’s ruin,

When its Laws are in the dust:

Saved by arts, that still recurring

Keep the Precious in their trust!

Toils of Art—the generous duty

of the Genius, worker, man!—

That make things of worth & Beauty,

Things of worship—as they can!

They build temples for the spirit,

Where, like Gods, the virtues shine,

Page 158 →And bestow, as they inherit,

Models, glorious as Divine:

Clothe the giant tree with pinions,

Send it forth on ocean wide,

Till they win, from all dominions,

Homage for their works of pride:

Hew the forest, bare the prospect,

Span the chasm, drain the swamp;

Rear the Dome, whose swelling aspect,

Soars to Heaven, & wears its stamp:

Rend the marble from the quarry,

And with Labour, Art and Prayer,

To its shapeless masses marry

Glorious form, and godlike air:

Raise the shrine that tells the glory

Of the Sires who saved the land;

Every shaft a Patriot story,

Of great soul, & conquering hand:

How they toil’d in deserts sterile,

For the bitter bread they ate:

How they fought, in fields of peril,

‘Till they rear’d the sovran state!

They shall Ask, with voice incessant,

Laws of Life to man convey;

Warn the Future, teach the Present,

Point to Fame, and lead the way.

Thus should we, old virtues heightening,

Follow in the sun’s great eye,

‘Till, with utmost glories brightening,

High we stand, among the High!

‘Till, a music, faint and failing,

Grecian Art & Song shall be [become]

And Italia’s voice of wailing,

Hails our shrines, beyond the Sea. [her own grown dumb]

Whilst far seeking admiration,

In remotest lands shall turn,

Fill’d with loving veneration,

Where our Prouder planets burn.