Rensselaer Republican, Volume 17, Number 45, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 16 July 1885 — Seeking Their Level. [ARTICLE]

Seeking Their Level.

“Water,” says natural philosophy, “will always seek its level.” From a fairly extensive acquaintance with this fluid we are inclined to accept this statement as correct, and feel disposed to add that things in general -have the same tendency. The boy who comes to a new school and stands aloof from his companions looking wise ’ and straightening out his fancy trousers’ legs, while the others talk and scuffle, may think he travels on an upper plane for a time, but pretty soon another boy will come along and trip him up, sending him head over heels into the mud. The way he acts for the next five minutes will settle the level he is to occupy in that school. If he squares off for a rough-and-tumble tight and. displays grit and good nature mixed in proper style, he will be counted a fine lad and the ideal of the school, no matter whether he wins or loses. If on the other hand, he whimpers and whines and goes to the teacher with his complaint, no good clothes, nor good looks, nor money, nor jewels can make him solid with those who’ rule. An addition is made to the clerical force in a big store. He is a prime, modest lad from the country, put in by one of the proprietors who knew his father. For a day ©j- two. he stands there behind the counters, dealing out goods as punctual and solemn as a sexton. Soon his companions begin to work in their little jokfes,. and the girls blush and look up side ways-just to see what kind of a fellow' the new man is. He was put there to sell gdods and Work for so much a week, hut under, above and around all thege business transactions influences are at. work that are recording his place jn the wqdd and telling whether he shall continue behind that counter during good behavior or rise to places of more pay and greater trust. All men and all women who live and act in this world are working out their fitness to hold certain positions and seeking their

levels as surely as the chafing streams j that roll to the Atlantic. > When we see dressy young men hanging around the corners and baunjing the offices in the’ citsr, complaining ' of fate and ill-luck, and saying they are going West to grow up in a country , where talent is appreciated, we pity i them and pity the West; for we know ' that the world had no use for them" so long as they hold to such doctrines. Let them strip off tbeir coats and go to work at the first thing they can find to do, and let them work at it until something better offers. Now and here are the place and time for men to show their mettle. Bight here in Boston and Massachusetts and New England, and right now in the year of our Lord 1885, are as good opportunities for work and talent as anywhere. Men w r ho occupy high positions to-day do so because they were wide awake, and gained their proper level by push, and men who want such places must exert themselves to get them. “Soft snaps” and “fat salaries” do not go a-begging to any great extent. They don’t this year, at least, and we have no authority for saying they will next. If a thing is worth having, it is worth working for. Work, young man, work. — Boston Globe.