It is men like Mirabeau, who "trample upon impossibilities"; like
Napoleon, who do not wait for opportunities, but make them; like Grant,
who has only "unconditional surrender" for the enemy, who change the
very front of the world.

"I can't, it is impossible," said a foiled lieutenant to Alexander.
"Be gone," shouted the conquering Macedonian, "there is nothing
impossible to him who will try."

Were I called upon to express in a word the secret of so many failures
among those who started out in life with high hopes, I should say
unhesitatingly, they lacked will-power. They could not half will.
What is a man without a will? He is like an engine without steam, a
mere sport of chance, to be tossed about hither and thither, always at
the mercy of those who have wills. I should call the strength of will
the test of a young man's possibilities. Can he will strong enough,
and hold whatever he undertakes with an iron grip? It is the iron grip
that takes the strong hold on life. "The truest wisdom," said
Napoleon, "is a resolute determination." An iron will without
principle might produce a Napoleon; but with character it would make a
Wellington or a Grant, untarnished by ambition or avarice.

"The undivided will
'Tis that compels the elements and wrings
A human music from the indifferent air."

CHAPTER XXXIX

ONE UNWAVERING AIM

Life is an arrow--therefore you must know
What mark to aim at, how to use the bow--
Then draw it to the head and let it go.
HENRY VAN DYKE.

The important thing in life is to have a great aim, and to possess the
aptitude and perseverance to attain it.--GOETHE.

"A double-minded man is unstable in all his ways."

Let every one ascertain his special business and calling, and then
stick to it if he would be successful.--FRANKLIN.

"Why do you lead such a solitary life?" asked a friend of Michael
Angelo. "Art is a jealous mistress," replied the artist; "she requires
the whole man." During his labors at the Sistine Chapel, according to
Disraeli, he refused to meet any one, even at his own house.

"This day we sailed westward, which was our course," were the simple
but grand words which Columbus wrote in his journal day after day.
Hope might rise and fall, terror and dismay might seize upon the crew
at the mysterious variations of the compass, but Columbus, unappalled,
pushed due west and nightly added to his record the above words.

"Cut an inc