"Do Your Possible."

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXVI, Issue II, 12 January 1901, Page 91

"Do Your Possible."

Some men are invincible by nature. No failure can break them down. After a life of cloud and storm, with scarcely a ray of sunshine to brighten it. they die facing fate defiantly. This constitutional indomitabilitv is a fine

thing. It is the attribute of the highest *y|* of manhood, and if not always a guaranty of success tn life, it is certainly, humanely sfieakiiig, more likely, when combined with integrity, to attain success. than any other quality with which man is endowed. But there are thousands of men of superior intellect who are deficient in this glorious gift. Who cannot call to n.iinl some individual of this class, who. after battling manfully against perverse circumstances for a time, at last gave up, acknowledged himself beaten, and tactily admitted that his life was a miserable failure? Many a man has thus broken down, when one more vigorous essay would have tided him over his difficulties, brought him into smooth water, and enabled him to snap his fingers triumphantly at a world which scarcely bestowed a pitying look on him as he threw up his arms anti eeased to struggle. Certain dismal moralists tell us that it is unwise to view the world through rose-colon red glass; that our surroundings are "all a fleeting show for man's illusion given.” But we maintain that it is always best to look at the bright side of things if they have one. and if they have not, to believe that they will have if we persistently try to light them up. This is the creed in which every boy should be educated. Let the young tie taught to trust in Providence and themselves, and to tight adverse circumstances to the last gasp. In a large majority of such gladiatorial combats, he who thus "champions fate to the uttermost." wins the day; and at the worst it is a consolation in defeat to feel that nothing man could do to secure victory has been left undone. Never think of breaking down before anv impediments. Think only of breaking over them. Let difficulty find you. as the Scotch say, always ready to“do your possible.”—Selected.