POWER OF A PURPOSE

Te Aroha News, Volume XLI, Issue 6543, 13 November 1924, Page 2

POWER OF A PURPOSE

BUSINESS STORY ANB PHILOSOPHY You will agree with me at the outset that no man is apt to arrive unless he has a distinct idea as to where he is going. You can steer a ship that is moving, every part of it brought under the power of some impelling force—even if it is headed wrong it can be turned around. You cannot do anything with a ship that is drifting—it simply lies in the trough of the sea, beaten and tossed. • You can do almost anything with a young man who is possessed by a purpose. If that purpose in certain particulars is a mistaken one, he can be faced about. But it is hard to do anything with those human derelicts who are just drifting along waiting to see what will happen to them instead of being up and out to make things happen on their own account. The real purpose organises the various elements of a man’s life for effective action. A,'pile of steel filings and shavings lying on the floor of a foundary may be fine in quality; they may weigh a ton when placed upon the scales, but unorganised they have little value. Organise and weld them into a shaft, attach one end of the shaft to an engine, and the other to a screw propeller, and it will send a mighty ocean liner from New York to Liverpool in five days. Bring all those bits of steel under the organising power of a purpose and they become effective. In like manner a mind, a heart, a soul is nothing more than a confused heap of thoughts and wishes, impulses and desires, 1 longings and aspirations, until by the power of a purpose all these are brought into unity and made effective in their thrust toward some worthy fulfilment. —Charles R. Browp.