oo. You have got to say to yourself, "I am
going to make more out of what is in me than any man with like ability
ever did before." You cannot dawdle--remember that.

Imagine every day, and every hour of every day, that you are in the
real world and in the real conflicts thereof, instead of in college
with its practise conflicts, and handle yourself precisely as you
would if your whole career depended upon each task set for you. If you
mean to go to college for the principal purpose of idling around,
wearing a small cap and good clothes, and being the adoration of your
mother and your sisters on your vacation, you had a good deal better
be at work at some gainful occupation. College is not helping you if
that is what you are doing. It is hurting you.

Go to college, therefore, say I; but go to college for business. Those
drill years are the most important ones of your life.

Be in earnest, therefore. I know I have said that before; yes, and I
am going to say it again. For if you are not going to be in earnest,
quit--get out. Resolve to get absolutely everything there is to be had
out of your college experience, and then _get it_. _Get it_, I say,
for that is what you will have to do. Nobody is going to give it to
you.

The spirit with which you enter college is just as important as going
to college at all. It is more important. For if a man has the spirit
that will get for him all that a college education has to give, it
will also make him triumph in a contest with the world, even if he
does not get his college education. It will only be a little harder
for him, that is all.

But if a man has not that mingled will and wish for a college
education flaming through his young veins that makes him capable of
any sacrifice to get through college, I do not see what good a college
education will do him--no, nor any other kind of an education. The
quicker such a man is compelled to make his own living without help
from any source, the better for him.

So if you mean business, but have not decided whether it is better for
you to go to college or not to go to college, settle the question
to-day by deciding to go to college. Then pick your college. That is
as important a matter as choosing your occupation in life. One college
is not as good as another for _you_. A score of colleges may be
equally excellent in the ability of their faculties, in the
perfection of their equipment.

But each has its own atmosphere and traditio