Aspen Leaf
This shows what expensive, useless and injurious habits men will get into. I speak from experience.
I have smoked until I trembled like an aspen leaf, the blood rushed tomy head, and I had a palpitation of the heart which I thought was heart disease, till I was almost killed with fright.
When I consulted my physician, he said "break off tobacco using." I was not only injuring my health and spending a great deal of money, but I was setting a bad example. I obeyed his counsel. No young man in the world ever looked so beautiful, as he thought he did, behind a fifteen cent cigar or a meerschaum!
These remarks apply with tenfold force to the use of intoxicating drinks. To make money, requires a clear brain.A man has got to see that two and two make four; he must lay all his plans with reflection and forethought, and closely examine all thedetails and the ins and outs of business.
As no man can succeed in business unless he has a brain to enable him to lay his plans, and reason to guide him in their execution,so, no matter how bountifully a man may be blessed with intelligence, if the brain is muddled, and his judgment warped by intoxicating drinks, it is impossible for him to carry on business successfully.
How many good opportunities have passed, never to return, while a man was sipping a "social glass," with his friend! How many foolish bargains have been made under the influence of the "nervine," which temporarily makes its victim think he is rich.
How many important chances have been put off until to-morrow, and then forever, because the wine cup has thrown the system into a state of lassitude, neutralizing the energies so essential to success in business.
Verily, "wine is a mocker." The use of intoxicating drinks as a beverage, is as much an infatuation, as is the smoking of opium by the Chinese, and the former is quite as destructive to the success of the business man as the latter.
It is an unmitigated evil, utterly indefensible in the light of philosophy; religion or good sense. It is the parent of nearly every other evil in our country.
DON'T MISTAKE YOUR VOCATION
The safest plan, and the one most sure of success for the young man starting in life, is to select the vocation which is most congenial to his tastes. Parents and guardians are often quite too negligent in regard to this.
It very common for a father to say, for example: "I have five boys. I will make Billy a clergyman; John a lawyer; Tom a doctor,and Dick a farmer." He then goes into town and looks about to see what he will do with Sammy.
He returns home and says "Sammy, I see watch- making is a nice genteel business; I think I will make you a goldsmith." He does this, regardless of Sam's natural inclinations, or genius.
|
