Penny Magazine

No. 001 - THE PENNY MAGAZINE - Mar. 31, 1832

EXCELLENCE NOT LIMITED BY STATION.

THERE is not a more common error of self-deception than a habit of considering our stations in life so ill-suited to our powers, as to be unworthy of calling out a full and proper exercise of our virtues and talents.

As society is constituted, there cannot be many employments which demand very brilliant talents, or great delicacy of taste, for their proper discharge. The great bulk of society is composed of plain, plodding men, who move " right onwards" to the sober duties of their calling. At the same time the universal good demands that those whom nature has greatly endowed should be called from the ordinary track to take up higher and more ennobling duties. England, happily for us, is full of bright examples of the greatest men raised from the meanest situations; and the education which England is now beginning to bestow upon her children will multiply these examples. But a partial and incomplete diffusion of knowledge will also multiply the victims of that evil principle which postpones the discharge of present and immediate duties, for the anticipations of some destiny above the labours of a handicraftsman, or the calculations of a shop keeper. Years and experience, which afford us the opportunity of comparing our own powers with those of others, will, it is true, correct the inconsistent expectations which arise from a want of capacity to set the right value on ourselves. But the wisdom thus gained may come too late. The object of desire may be found decidedly unattainable, and existence is then wasted in a sluggish contempt of present duties; the spirit is broken; the temper is soured; habits of misanthropy and personal neglect creep on; and life eventually becomes a tedious and miserable pilgrimage of never-satisfied desires. Youth, however, is happily not without its guide, if it will take a warning from example. Of the highly gifted men whose abandonment of their humble calling, has been the apparent beginning of a distinguished career, we do not recollect an instance of one who did not pursue that humble calling, with credit and success until the occasion presented itself for exhibiting those superior powers which nature occasionally bestows. Benjamin Franklin was as valuable to his master, as a printer's apprentice, as he was to his country as a statesman and a negotiator, or to the world as a philosopher. Had he not been so, indeed, it may be doubted whether he ever would have taken his rank among the first statesmen and philosophers of his time. One of the great secrets of advancing in life is to be ready to take advantage of those opportunities which, if a man really possesses superior abilities, are sure to present themselves some time or other. As the poet expresses it, " There is a tide in the affairs of men,"—an ebbing and flowing of the unstable element on which they are borne,—and if this be only "taken at the flood," the "full sea" is gained on which "the voyage of their life" may be made with ease and the prospect of a happy issue.

But we should remember, that for those who are not ready to embark at the moment when their tide is at its flood, that tide may never serve again; and nothing is more likely to be a hindrance at such a moment than the distress which is certain to follow a neglect of our ordinary business.

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