Jasper County Democrat, Volume 9, Number 38, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 December 1906 — DANGER SIGNALS. [ARTICLE]

DANGER SIGNALS.

Chicago American. At regular intervals along every well-equipped railroad line, and always at the approaches of curves, semaphores are set —the danger signals—that tell the engineer whether he can safely continue the terrific speed of his trainload of passengers. Besides knowing all about his engine, the engineer must know these signals as he knows the alphabet. Upon his ability to read them at a glance—to see that the green light and the yellow arm mean ‘'go slow” and the red light and the red arm mean “stop!” depends his fitness as an engineer, and incidentally the lives of the people in the coaches behind him. You would hardly trust yourself to an engine driver who depended solely on the track ahead—who felt sufe in running at a high speed because the track was clear as Ur us he could see it. The employment of that kind of men would speedily fill the right-of-way of every railroad so full of wrecks that the public would as soon think of (raveling on it as going to sea in leaky open rowboats. But the road that people travel toward the success they are all striving for is set with danger signals at every turn, yet the habit of disregarding them is too common to attract attention. Men who are tremendously in earnest about their ambitions and their desire to provide for their families do not think it necessary ■ either to understand their own physical machinery, as an engineer must understand his engine, or to know where to look for the danger signals or what they mean. In the parks of Chicago, and of every great city, you see scores of poor, desolate human wrecks, sitting or sleeping on the benohes, their usefulness gone, their ambition dead. They are there because there is nothing else to do—nothing else that they can do. These men—failures, many of them, because of whiskey or gambling—are as plainly danger signals to the passer-by as are the red semaphores raised warningly over a railroad track. To the man hurrying across the square to take a few last drinks with the boys before going home, they say, “go slow, there is trouble ahead on that track.” To the man who thinks it will add a little spice to life to play a few dollars of his week’s wages in a poolroom, the mute figures of the poor “benchwarmers” say “stop!” H«d ih., --o, | ~ m

one of those who have not learned to know danger signals. Look at their helplessness, their worthlessness. Once they were men, many of them able and of good earning capacity. They ran past the danger signals, believing the track was clear because they could not see the pitfall around the curve ahead. There were plenty of wrecks to warn them then, as now, but lacking the wisdom to heed, they went on, until they came in collision with the inevitable, and themselves became warnings for other men. It is not alone in the parks that the danger signals are set. Every man can find them if he looks about him; and it is pathetically easy to understand their meaning. The failures that you know, the men who have meant to succeed, but have failed because of indolence, or conceit or dishonesty, all point the way to the wrong track. You do not need to know, of course, all the wrong tracks, or why they are the wrong tracks any more than the pilot of a river steamer needs to know the location of every rock, shoal and sandbar in the waters he navigates. The pilot needs only to know where the deep water is. And you, traveling on your way to success, need only know the right track. All the others are labeled. Pick up any newspaper, and the story of some suicide will tell you of a bank clerk who tried the road of dishonesty and found an open bridge. Go to the race track, or watch the crowd coming from it, and the haggard, hunted faces of scores of men will warn you against the gnmbling road. In any great office you will find old, bent tired men, still holding poorly paid positions because indolence or conceit has led them astray, and because they did not use their intelligence to read the warnings of others as you can read the warning they give. The hospitals are full of hopeless incurables who have run past the danger signals of excess, or neglect of health, or such eager pursuit of pleasure that they have

forgotten to get enough sleep. If all the danger signals of life could be daily explained, or if they could be labeled with their meaning in largo letters, few men would disregard them. But success in this life means the use of intelligence and the ability to depend on yourself for the information you need. The engineer, before he is competent enough to run an engine, m ist know exactly what every signal means He must not mistake the warnings set against other trains for those meant for him. He must not mistake a signal that says “stop” for a distance signal that bids him go slow. But his knowledge of the system must be complete and exact, and always ready for instant use On the semaphores that he sees raised or lowered are no letters explaining to him the exact nature of the trouble ahead. They are not lettered at all, but it is a part of his business to read them as clearly as though each one was a message explaining fully why he should halt or slow down his train. It is a comparatively simple matter for him to understand the system, but no simpler than it is for men and women to understand the system provided for their guidance. We are given eyes and ears to help us on the right road, but they are useless without intelligence, which is more generally called common sense. Every wrong traok has its semaphore. Do not think you must explore any of them a little way, to run just a few hundred yards past the signal in order to satisfy your curiosity. If you are going to any worthy destination, and going through on time, you had besU keep to the main traok, reading wisely the signals on the way. *