Plainfield High School - Milestone Yearbook (Plainfield, NJ)

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24 THE ORACLE. that you can leave to those who come after you, they constitute the only things that you can take with you out of life on that day when your useless body is laid away under the sod. In these last words of instruction, I wish to emphasize two or three principles that seem to me to lie at the foundation of true success in life. My first thought pertains to work. Work is the universal characteristic of all thinking men and women. Some men work from necessity, as the only means of providing nourishment and comfort for their bodies, but all men that give the matter thought work from choice, as the means necessary for giv- ing nourishment to mind and soul. What is your attitude toward work? Do you regard it as a disagreeable necessity, to be met and endured with resignation, for the sake of the wages which it gives you to use for physi- cal existence and gratification, or as an opportunity to be seized gladly and used joyously, for the purpose of working out and developing to the high- est degree all the best that is in you and for doing your part of the world’s work? On your answer to this question rests largely the character of the life you will lead. It is right to seek for wages, but do not let wages become the all-important aim of life. Ruskin says “It is physically impos- sible for a well educated, intellectual or brave man to make money the chief object of his thoughts. All healthy minded people like making money,— ought to like it, and to enjoy the sensation of winning it, but the main object of their life is not money; it is something better than money. The soldier lives to win battles, not to be paid for winning them; the clergyman to preach and baptize, not to be paid for preaching; the doctor to cure his patient, not to win his fee. With all brave, right minded men, the work is first, the fee second, and you cannot serve two masters, you must serve one or the other. If your work is first with you and your fee second, work is your master and the lord of work, who is God. But if your fee is first with you, and your work second, fee is your master, and the lord of fee, who is the Devil; and not only the Devil, but the lowest of devils—the ‘least erected fiend that fell.” So there you have it in brief terms: Work first— you are God’s servant. Fee first—you are the Fiend’s.” So I say to you, seek wages, the highest wages you can obtain, but earn every dollar you receive, and never let the question of wages outweigh the question of the character of the work itself, for thereby you stand in danger of degenerating from the high estate of a clear-eyed man, with face aglow with the brightness of heaven, to that of a slave with his lustreless face bent toward the earth.

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THECORA Cle ke . 23 The Art of Living Commencement Address of Dr. Henry M. Maxson You have been my boys and girls here in the High School for four years. It has been my privilege to exercise over you the power of joy and sorrow, power to make your ways rough and thorny, or smooth and happy. I have not had the power of physical life and death over you, but I have tried to so order my dealings with you as if the responsibility of life and death, spiritually, did rest in my hands. Today you escape from my power. No longer shall I directly influ- ence your destinies. You cease to be my boys and girls in a legal sense, but I assure you that in that precious part of a man’s life, the memory of the years that are gone, you will still live as my boys and girls, and when- ever a spoken word or a printed name recalls the recollections of one of you, that recollection will be clothed in the form that I now look upon, for the children of one’s memory never grow up. The other day, a marriage notice called to mind one of my oldtime pupils. The form which I saw was not that of a young man, clad in bridal array, it was that of a chubby-faced urchin sitting on a bench with tears rolling down his face as he chewed paper wads in punishment for the dreadful sin (?) of sticking paper balls on the ceiling of the schoolroom. So, however old you may be, the mention of your name will call up the happy, youthful faces that I see today, altho, in your case, none of them will be bathed in tears, for it has been my good fortune that all my dealings with you have been those of joy and happiness. My hours with you have been hours of enjoyment. During your high school course, you have had many priceless oppor- tunities ; indeed, the whole four years have been one grand opportunity for laying the sure foundation of success. The work of the school, as com- monly considered, consists of Latin, mathematics, history and other book studies, but in it all and through it all, in the recitation and in the discipline of the school, in your work and in your play, wherever the life of the teacher touches the life of the pupil, in all this I have tried to so provide that each one of you shall be brought into a broad and deep knowledge of the real values of life, the principles and motives, the ambitions and desires whose accomplishment make life really worth living; for, after all, the one great product of the school,—the highest product of life, in fact,—is char- acter. Rightness of conduct, richness of thought, purity of soul, these are the things that outlive the ages, these constitute the richest inheritance

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THE ORACLE. 25 Again, do not be misled by the thought that only great things are worth while. It is given to but few to do notable things, but to every one there are given many opportunities to do little things well, and little things well done are of the highest importance to the world’s s advancement, Asa contractor was visiting his building one morning, he was stopped by a man who was mixing mortar. “Does you recognize, boss,” said the man, “that I'se the whole thing, this morning?” “No, Sam, I hadn't thought of it in that way,” said the boss. “How do you make it out?” Why, boss,” said Sam, “I’se mixing dis mortar to put between the bricks in the wall; if the mortar is rotten, the walls’ll be rotten, and if the walls are rotten, you mought as well leave off the gold leaf and the paint and the fancy finish, for the building’s no good. I reckon I’se the whole thing, this morning, and I’d better get right onto my job”: and Sam was right. A failure on his part to perform well the very humble task assigned to him, would destroy the value of that done by the most skilled worker in the whole building. And so it is in life. The work of great men is important, but it cannot reach its full fruition without the faithful work of the men w ho hold the humble positions. Great men push the world forward, but the ordinary men, by their faithful work in obscure positions, enable the world to hold the ground. See to it that your particular work, however humble it may be, is performed with utmost conscientiousness and effectiveness, and thank God that it is given you to do. What is your outlook on life? There are some men who seem to think that the world centers in them. Their only thought is to draw in as much of the world as possible for their own gratification and profit, and these men are not found solely in the class of those who hold wealth and power ; there is many a man working for a dollar and a half a day who does not think once, from morning till night, of any one’s interests but his own. The question, “What can [| get out of the world?” is one that every man ought to ask himself, and the character of the man will be shown by the nature of his answer to the question. If that answer can be measured in dollars and cents, in houses and lands, in power or personal pleasure, then that man has failed to apprehend what is really the richest and best of life. Indeed, the only way to answer me question wisely is to turn it around and ask, “What can I give the world?” for it is not the man who is continually drawing things in to himself, but the man who is continually drawing him- self out for the benefit of others, that finds the truest happiness the world can give.