"
Before we have finished _Self-Reliance_, he has made us feel that, with the
exercise of self-trust, new powers will appear; that a man should not
postpone his life, but live now; that a man is weak if he expects aid from
others; that discontent is want of self-reliance.
We pick up another volume of essays, _Society and Solitude_, and wonder
whether we shall read _Success_, or _Books_, or _Civilization_, or any one
of nine others. While we are turning the pages, we see this sentence:--
"Hitch your wagon to a star,"
and we decide to read _Civilization_.
"Now that is the wisdom of a man, in every instance of his labor, to
hitch his wagon to a star, and see his chore done by the gods
themselves. ... We cannot bring the heavenly powers to us, but, if
we will only choose our jobs in directions in which they travel,
they will undertake them with the greatest pleasure.... Let us not
lie and steal. No god will help. We shall find all their teams going
the other way."
The youth is to be pitied if this does not quicken his determination to
choose his work in the direction in which the aiding forces of the universe
are traveling.
Pages:
219
220
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229
230
231
232
233
234
235
236
237
238
239
240
241
242
243