San Jose High School - Bell Yearbook (San Jose, CA)

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T41 l i The Conquering Will. By R. W. FISHER. 143 HERE there's a will, there's a way is Poor Richard's expression of the truth that the will by makes the path to victory. To reach any end by XZ will power one must overcome sinister and un- S V Z welcome obstacles by courage and endurance. Q0 The will of a person is measured by the amount of effort put forthg the power to say yes or no , or the power to say yes, I will or no, Iwill not , and then to act in accordance. Concerning effort Dr. James says, He who can make none is but a shadow, he who can make much is a hero. Everyone has a wish to conquer, but wishing and willing are not always the same thing. There are two kinds of will 5 the im- pulsive and the deliberative. With an impulsive person it is true that to wish is to actg a thought is followed by immediate eiort. He acts without realizing whether the move he makes be wise or unwise. Many valiant and brilliant deeds have been performed in this way where the impulse has been a right oneg but, on the other hand, untold misery has come from rash action. A person having a deliberative will studies before performing any deed, so that when he acts he knows his course and the result which will follow. He weighs the consequences and reasons out his course of action. The first character can solve a problem more quickly, but the second can solve more accurately. The second is less liable to make mistakes, but the first is better able to retrieve them. From the beginning of life the will is called into action, and even in the child we see oftentimes the conquering will. In our American schools a common sight is a young man doing what is 32

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C1358 . SOFT Rah I Rah I Rah I Rah I 1-0, San Jose Rah I , LOUD Q Rah I Rah I Rah I Rah I 1-0, San Jose Rah I Yell Leader GEORGE C. BRYANT

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called working his way through school. He succeeds for he has the will to conquer, and when he has gained his education he is better fitted to use it than are those who take their education as a matter of course , and make no effort to benefit by its advantages. There are those who, at school, wish to be leaders in the different activities. He who leads his class in his studies, he who is the best debater, he who is the best athlete, each desires honors for which there is big competition, and which can be gained only by persistent and constant effort. In this school is a young man who wished to be a track athlete, a long distance runner. He began with nothing but the will to be a track man for he couldn't run at all., For a long while he worked hard, meeting discouragement with a smile and a resolve to train more. Then he began to improve. Today he is the best long distance runner in the school and has won many medals. After school life is over the student enters the wider world, and there wishes to make his mark -to make a success of whatever occupation he may enter. He must have the power to endure, the courage to undergo failure, the will to overcome all obstacles, in order that in the end he may reach the goal of his ambition. A The conquering will numbers its heroes by the thousands, and we find them overcoming difficulties of every kind. Demosthenes was a stuttering boy who wished to be an orator. He practised talking to the waves with ,pebbles in his mouth until finally he became the greatest orator of Greece and even today is recognized as one of the greatest orators the world has ever known. And not only in far distant ages-the times of Alexander and Caesar-do we find men of conquering will. Our own history, our own times give us many examples. General Grant said, when before Richmond in 1864, We will fight it out on this line if it takes all summer. His was the bulldog's will that Holmes is speaking of when he says : Stick to your aim: the mongrel's hold will slip, But only crowbars loose the bulldog's lip, Small as he looks, the jaw that never yields Drags down the bellowing monarch of the fields. In spite of seeming insuperable difhculties Field laid the Atlantic cable. His plan was at first -ridiculed, but finally he obtained funds for the undertaking. At great expense of money and labor the first cable was laid only to be cut. The second time the cable was cut, but Field did not vvaver. He worked until a successful cable was laid and today, at any time, a message can be sent by electricity across the ocean. 33A