The rich man's son inherits cares; The bank may break, the factory burn, A breath may burst his bubble-shares ; Then, soft white hands could hardly earn A living that would serve his turn. What doth the poor man's son inherit? A heritage it seems to me, Aking might wish to hold in fee. LOWELL CHAPTER III. AN IRON WILL. The truest wisdom is a resolute determination. — NAPOLEON I. When a firm decisive spirit is recognized, it is curious to see how the space clears around a man and leaves him room and freedom. -JOHN FOSTER. A strong, defiant purpose is many-handed, and lays hold of whatever is near that can serve it; it has a magnetic power that draws to itself whatever is kindred.-T. T. MUNGER. People do not lack strength; they lack will. - VICTOR HUGO. He who has resolved to conquer or die is seldom conquered; such noble despair perishes with difficulty. Corneille. Every man stamps his own value upon himself, and we are great or little according to our own will. - SAMUEL SMILES. The saddest failures in life are those that come from not putting forth of the power and will to succeed. - WHIPPLE. As men in a crowd instinctively make room for one who would force his way through it, so mankind makes way for one who rushes toward an object beyond them. - DWIGHT. In idle wishes fools supinely stay; Be there a will, and wisdom finds a way. CRABBE. "I CAN'T! it is impossible!" said a lieutenant to Alexander, after failing to take a rock-crested fortress. "Begone!" thundered the great Macedonian; "there is nothing impossible to him who will try;" and at the head of a phalanx he swept the foe from the strong. hold. "You can only half will," Suwarrow would say to people who failed. He preached willing as a system. "I don't know," "I can't," and "impossible" he would not listen to. "Learn!" "Do!" "Try!" he would exclaim. Napoleon in Egypt visited those sick with the plague, that scourge. to show that a man who is never afraid can vanquish A will power like this is a strong tonic to the body, and it will stimulate to almost superhuman undertakings. Such a will has taken many men from apparent death-beds, and enabled them to perform wonderful deeds of valor. Aaron Burr was dangerously sick when he joined Arnold in leading the expedition against Canada. Gen. eral Wolfe, sick with fever, led his troops up the heights of Abraham, defeated Montcalm, and compelled impreg nable Quebec to surrender. But five days before, he wrote home to England: "My constitution is entirely ruined, and without the consolation of having rendered any considerable service to the State, or without pros pects of it." When told by his physicians that he must die, Doug las Jerrold said, "And leave a family of helpless chil dren? I won't die." He kept his word, and lived for years. After a sickness in which he lay a long time at death's door, Seneca said: "The thought of my father, who could not have sustained such a blow as my death, restrained me, and I commanded myself to live." Professor George Wilson, of Edinburgh University, was so fragile that no one thought he ever could amount to much; but he became a noted scholar in spite of discouragements which would have daunted most men of the strongest constitutions. Disaster, amputation of one foot, consumption, frightful hemorrhages, -nothing could shake his imperious will. Death itself seemed to stand aghast before that mighty resolution, hesitating to take possession of the body after ail else had fled. At fifty-five years of age, Sir Walter Scott owed more than six hundred thousand dollars. He determined that every dollar should be paid. This iron resolution gave confidence and inspiration to the other faculties |