

VOL. II. 



FLINT, MICHieAH, NOVEMBER 10, 1889. 



NO. 11. 



Is a Specialty Desirable? 



E. L. TAYLOK. 



^ ^x /IV NE thing at a time" is an old 

 ')Ur J *»> adage, and as a])i)licable to great 



L CX^J-' things as to small. Men are 

 sometimes said to have been 

 born with silver spoons in their mouths, but 

 no one is ever said to be born with a trade. 

 We have to learn trades or be withoftt them. 

 And such is the constitution of things — mind 

 and matter — that a lifetime is reciuired to 

 accgmplish that purpose well; so that we 

 only begin to approach perfection, if ever, 

 when our hand becomes feeble and unsteady 

 and the twilight of life draws on apace, for- 

 bidding the further pursuit of our labors. 

 Every added trade clearly impedes one's 

 progress towards perfection and makes a 

 less degree of skill attainable. 



What is the significance of skill in this 

 connection':* It avoids injurious mistakes; 

 it lightens and lessens labor; it relieves or 

 prevents friction; it attains the best results; 

 it increases pleasure, satisfaction and happi- 

 ness. A multiplicity of occupations multi- 

 plies the burdens of responsibility, induces 

 unrest and embarrassment, and our powers 

 becoming overtaxed, carelessness, slovenli- 

 ness, unthrift and failure result. A jack at 

 all trades is almost a synonym of a ne'er- 

 do-well. What reason is there for dulling 

 the edge of skill and sacriticing tliorough- 

 ness by combining another business with 

 that of bee-keeping? Not certainly to till 

 up the time. Bee-keeping as a specialty is 

 no small business. It is capable of great 

 expansion. It can well furnish work for 

 every day of tlie year, and the larger the 

 business thesinallerthe proportional expense 

 of the plant and the management, and, con- 

 sequently, the larger the profits. 



If bee-keeping is so unprofitable as a spe- 

 cialty that the operator must pursue another 

 business to eke out a living, then it is too 

 unprofitable to be pursued at all, and should 

 be abandoned altogether. If it cannot be 

 made profitable as a specialty, with all 

 the advantages that specialty brings, then it 

 cannot be made profitable as a suljsidiary 

 pursuit. We see this demonstrated in prac- 

 tice. It is not the specialist, but the non- 

 specialist, that fails. A poor season serves 

 to tighten the grip of the former, but how it 

 disheartens those who make bee-keeping a 

 by-play for profit may be known by the dis- 



gust it causes to emanate from their every 

 countenance. For an avocation or subsid- 

 iary business bee-keeping is the least 

 adapted of all as shown by a large percent- 

 age of failures among those who pursue it in 

 that way, so much does success in it depend 

 upon the small but critical matters that the 

 non-specialist is sure to neglect. 



The Great Apostle tersely approves the 

 principle when he exclaims: "This one 

 thing I do." Steadfastly adhering to the 

 principle he became not only the first of the 

 apostles but the first of Christians and sur- 

 passingly successful. No one would fear 

 for the success of the bee-keeper who should 

 declare, with the firmness of puri)Ose of 

 Paul: "This one thing I do." 



There is undoubtedly one advantage in 

 combining two or more kinds of business. 

 If one's eggs may be either all in a single 

 basket, or in more than one, and in either 

 case those in one basket are likely to be 

 broken, and it is indispensible that enough 

 be saved for breakfast, it may be better, 

 notwithstanding the additional expense of 

 additional baskets and the difficulty of carry- 

 ing them all at the same time, to have the 

 eggs in more than one basket, but it makes 

 rosfhj e(j(is. It is paying heavy insurance 

 against the wolf that threatens the door. If 

 it is a necessity it ought to be a temporary 

 one. 



But there is what seems at first glance a 

 weightier consideration. Men who devote 

 themselves exclusively to one line of thought 

 or study, or to one branch of business, be- 

 come of necessity narrow in mind; in short, 

 imperfectly developed men. They make 

 more money and do well for their vocation, 

 but they do not make the best citizens, nor 

 do they make the most of life for themselves. 

 But I think this class cannot be fairly 

 charged to the doctrine of specialty prpperly 

 understood. A dentist makes the filling of 

 ^teeth a specialty, but he also practices and 

 is familiar with all the other branches of the 

 calling. A lawyer makes commercial paper 

 his specialty, but on occasion can readily 

 turn his hand to any other of the thousand 

 and one branches of this calling, and at the 

 same time not hesitate to dabble in politics 

 or real estate. Terry makes the production 

 of i)otatoes a specialty, but he is no weak- 

 ling at the care of stock and the production 

 of clover and wheat. But these things rather 

 minister to his success in his specialty than 

 interfere with it. 



