The Majesty of Calmness | Page 7

man who is self-reliant seeks ever to discover and conquer the
weakness within him that keeps him from the attainment of what he
holds dearest; he seeks within himself the power to battle against all
outside influences. He realizes that all the greatest men in history, in
every phase of human effort, have been those who have had to fight
against the odds of sickness, suffering, sorrow. To him, defeat is no
more than passing through a tunnel is to a traveller,--he knows he must
emerge again into the sunlight.
The nation that is strongest is the one that is most self-reliant, the one
that contains within its boundaries all that its people need. If, with its
ports all blockaded it has not within itself the necessities of life and the
elements of its continual progress then,--it is weak, held by the enemy,
and it is but a question of time till it must surrender. Its independence is
in proportion to its self-reliance, to its power to sustain itself from
within. What is true of nations is true of individuals. The history of
nations is but the biography of individuals magnified, intensified,
multiplied, and projected on the screen of the past. History is the
biography of a nation; biography is the history of an individual. So it
must be that the individual who is most strong in any trial, sorrow or

need is he who can live from his inherent strength, who needs no
scaffolding of commonplace sympathy to uphold him. He must ever be
self-reliant.
The wealth and prosperity of ancient Rome, relying on her slaves to do
the real work of the nation, proved the nation's downfall. The constant
dependence on the captives of war to do the thousand details of life for
them, killed self-reliance in the nation and in the individual. Then,
through weakened self-reliance and the increased opportunity for idle,
luxurious ease that came with it, Rome, a nation of fighters, became,--a
nation of men more effeminate than women. As we depend on others to
do those things we should do for ourselves, our self-reliance weakens
and our powers and our control of them becomes continuously less.
Man to be great must be self-reliant. Though he may not be so in all
things, he must be self-reliant in the one in which he would be great.
This self-reliance is not the self-sufficiency of conceit. It is daring to
stand alone. Be an oak, not a vine. Be ready to give support, but do not
crave it; do not be dependent on it. To develop your true self- reliance,
you must see from the very beginning that life is a battle you must fight
for yourself,--you must be your own soldier. You cannot buy a
substitute, you cannot win a reprieve, you can never be placed on the
retired list. The retired list of life is,--death. The world is busy with its
own cares, sorrows and joys, and pays little heed to you. There is but
one great password to success,--self-reliance.
If you would learn to converse, put yourself into positions where you
must speak. If you would conquer your morbidness, mingle with the
bright people around you, no matter how difficult it may be. If you
desire the power that some one else possesses, do not envy his strength,
and dissipate your energy by weakly wishing his force were yours.
Emulate the process by which it became his, depend on your self-
reliance, pay the price for it, and equal power may be yours. The
individual must look upon himself as an investment, of untold
possibilities if rightly developed,--a mine whose resources can never be
known but by going down into it and bringing out what is hidden.
Man can develop his self-reliance by seeking constantly to surpass
himself. We try too much to surpass others. If we seek ever to surpass
ourselves, we are moving on a uniform line of progress, that gives a
harmonious unifying to our growth in all its parts. Daniel Morrell, at

one time President of the Cambria Rail Works, that employed 7,000
men and made a rail famed throughout the world, was asked the secret
of the great success of the works. "We have no secret," he said, "but
this,-- we always try to beat our last batch of rails." Competition is
good, but it has its danger side. There is a tendency to sacrifice real
worth to mere appearance, to have seeming rather than reality. But the
true competition is the competition of the individual with himself,--his
present seeking to excel his past. This means real growth from within.
Self-reliance develops it, and it develops self-reliance. Let the
individual feel thus as to his own progress and possibilities, and he can
almost create his life as he will. Let him