Too many men make the mistake, when they reach the point of enough, of
going on pursuing the same old game: accumulating more money, grasping
for more power until either a nervous breakdown overtakes them and a
sad incapacity results, or they drop "in the harness," which is, of
course; only calling an early grave by another name. They cannot seem
to get the truth into their heads that as they have been helped by
others so should they now help others: as their means have come from
the public, so now they owe something in turn to that public.
No man has a right to leave the world no better than he found it. He
must add something to it: either he must make its people better and
happier, or he must make the face of the world fairer to look at. And
the one really means the other.
"Idealism," immediately say some. Of course, it is. But what is the
matter with idealism? What really is idealism? Do one-tenth of those
who use the phrase so glibly know its true meaning, the part it has
played in the world? The worthy interpretation of an ideal is that it
embodies an idea--a conception of the imagination.
Pages:
284
285
286
287
288
289
290
291
292
293
294
295
296
297
298
299
300
301
302
303
304
305
306
307
308