And State Papers 291 



the boy and girl so sheltered that they can not stand 

 any rough knocks, that they shrink from toil, that 

 when they meet an obstacle they feel they ought to 

 go around or back instead of going on over it the 

 man or the woman who does that is wronging the 

 children to a degree that no other human being can 

 wrong them. If you are worth your salt and want 

 your children to be worth their salt, teach them that 

 the life that is not a life of work and effort is worth 

 less, a curse to the man or woman leading it, a 

 curse to those around him or her. Teach the boys 

 that if they are ever to count in the world they will 

 count not by flinching from difficulties, but by war 

 ring with and overcoming them. What utter scorn 

 one feels for those who seek only the life of ease; 

 the life passed in dexterous effort to avoid all an 

 gular corners, to avoid being put in the places where 

 a strong man by blood and sweat and toil and risk 

 wins triumph ! What a wretched life is the life of the 

 man passed in endeavoring to shirk his share of the 

 burden laid upon him in this world ! And it makes 

 no difference whether that man is a man of inher 

 ited wealth or one who has to earn his bread by the 

 sweat of his brow; it is equally ignoble in either 

 case. What is true of the individual is true of the 

 nation. The man who counts is not the man who 

 dodges work, but he who goes out into life re 

 joicing as a strong man to run a race, girding him 

 self for the effort, bound to win and wrest triumph 

 from difficulty and disaster. 



So it is with our Nation. No nation which has 



