The Conquest of Obstacles
奥里森·马登 / Orison Marden
“What a fine profession ours would be if there were no gibbets!” said one of two highwaymen who chanced to pass a gallows. “Tut, you blockhead,” replied the other,“gibbets are the making of us; for, if there were no gibbets, every one would be a highwayman.” Just so with every art, trade, or pursuit; it is the difficulties that scare and keep out unworthy competitors.
“Adversity is a severe instructor,” says Edmund Burke,“set over us by one who knows us better than we do ourselves, as He loves us better too. He that wrestles with us strengthens our nerves and sharpens our skill. Our antagonist is our helper. This conflict with difficulty makes us acquainted with our object, and compels us to consider it in all its relations. It will not suffer us to be superficial .”
Strong characters, like the palm tree, seem to thrive best when most abused. Men who have stood up bravely under great misfortune for years are often unable to bear prosperity. Their good fortune takes the spring out of their energy, as the torrid zone enervates races accustomed to a vigorous climate. Some people never come to themselves until baffled, rebuffed, thwarted, defeated, cashed, in the opinion of those around them. Trials unlock their virtues; defeat is the threshold of their victory.
“To make his way at the bar,” said an eminent jurist,“a young man must live like a hermits and work like a horse. There is nothing that does a young lawyer so much good as to be half starved. ”
We are the victors of our opponents. They have developed in us the very power by which we overcome them.
Without their opposition we could never have braced and anchored and fortified ourselves, as the oak is braced and anchored for its thousand battles with the tempests. Our trials, our sorrows, and our griefs develop us in a similar way.
Take two acorns from the same tree, as nearly alike as possible; plant one on a hill by itself, and the other in the dense forest, and watch them grow. The oak standing alone is exposed to every storm. Its roots reach out in every direction, clutching the rocks and piercing deep into the earth. Every rootlet lends itself to steady the growing giant, as if in anticipation of fierce conflict with the elements. Sometimes its upward growth seems checked for years, but all the while it has been expending its energy in pushing a root across a large rock to gain a firmer anchorage. Then it shoots proudly aloft again, prepared to defy the hurricane. The gales which sport so rudely with its wide branches find more than their match, and only serve still further to toughen every minutest fiber from pith to bark.
The acorn planted in the deep forest shoots up a weak, slender sapling. Shielded by its neighbors, it feels no need of spreading its roots far and wide for support.