HE CAN WHO THINKS HE CAN, AN IRON WILL & PUSHING TO THE FRONT. Orison Swett Marden
incapable of projecting system and order through their establishments. They may do their own work well, and then they strike their limitations. They are not good judges of human nature; their discernment is not sharp. They are misled by conversational powers, display of education, and often place a theoretical man where only practical talent could succeed. They are likely to place a man of great refinement, sensitiveness, delicate make-up, in a position where a strong, robust, thick-skinned man is required, where an oversensitive soul will chafe and shrink from the cold, aggressive business methods necessary to effective, efficient management.
People are continually being led into all sorts of unfortunate positions, entangling alliances, and mortifying, embarrassing situations because of their lack of ability to read human nature and to estimate character at a glance. Good people everywhere are being imposed upon and are losing their money in all sorts of foolish investments because of their ignorance of human nature. They are not able to see the rascal, the scoundrel behind the mask. They have not developed the power of discernment, the ability to see the “wolf in sheep’s clothing.” The knowledge of human nature as a protector of money, of character, as a protector against frauds and imposition is inestimable.
Gullible people are proverbially poor readers of human nature, and hence they are always open to imposition. Oily, cunning promoters are keen observers of human nature, and they can tell very quickly when they strike a good-natured, large-hearted professor, scholar, clergyman or artist who knows very little about business matters and who trusts everybody. They know that if they can only get an opportunity they can very quickly make such a man believe almost anything. They know he will be an easy prey to their wiles and their keener knowledge of men.
These promoters would not think of tackling a shrewd, level-headed business man for their nefarious schemes, because he is too keen, too sharp, too good a judge of human nature. Such a man would be likely to penetrate the mask and see the real motive beneath the oily, honeyed words, the smooth seductive manner.
The ability to read people at sight is a great business asset. Expertness in reading human nature is just as valuable to a young lawyer as a knowledge of law; it is as valuable to a physician as a knowledge of medicine. The man who can read human nature, who can “size up” a person quickly, who can arrive at an accurate estimate of character, no matter what his vocation, or profession, has a great advantage over others.
With some men the power to read people aright amounts to an instinct. They look through all pretenses; they tear off all masks. They see the man as he is, his reality, and measure him for what he is worth.
A man possessing this power of character-reading pays little attention to what a person seeking employment may say of himself. He can see for himself. Human nature is to him an open book, while to others it is a sealed book. They do not have the faculty of going back of pretensions. They are largely at the mercy of what he claims for himself, and they are always being duped. They make very poor employers.
I know a popular business man, a very able man in many respects, and one much beloved by everybody who knows him, but he has always been the victim of his ignorance of human nature. He cannot read motives, weigh or estimate the ability of others to do certain things. If an applicant for a position talks well, he immediately jumps to the conclusion that he is a good man for the position, and hires him, usually to be disappointed. He has a great weakness for clergymen who have lost their positions through failing health or for other reasons, and also for ex-teachers and professors. The result is that he has a lot of impractical people about him who know nothing of progressive, scientific business building.
It is an education in itself to form the habit of measuring, weighing, estimating the different people we meet, for in this way we are improving our own powers of observation, sharpening our perspective faculties, improving our judgment. The ability to read human nature is a cultivable quality, and we have a great opportunity in this country, with its conglomerate population, to study the various types of character.
What a wonderful school most of us are in practically all of the time, especially in large cities, where we are constantly coming in contact with strangers! What a chance to become experts in reading human nature, in studying motives!
The face, the eye, the manners, the gestures, the walk, all these are hieroglyphics which, if we can only decipher them, spell out the character. Sometimes a single glance of the eye, when one is unconscious, will give you a glimpse into his innermost soul and reveal secrets which he would never dare to utter with his tongue. The facial expression and the manner, especially when people are off their guard, or unconscious that they are being watched, are great revealers of character.
You will find, as you become an expert in face study, in reading character, human nature, that you will develop marvelous skill in seeing things which you never noticed before. You will be able to protect yourself from the promoter, the insinuating man who is trying to persuade you into something which may not be to your benefit, but which will be to his. You will be able to discriminate between friendship and duplicity. You will be able to protect yourself from a thousand annoyances and embarrassments and humiliations which might cripple your career.
How many people are living in poverty, are wretched, homeless to-day because they could not read human nature and were robbed of their property and their rights!
To discern the difference between the false and the true, to place the right values upon men, to emphasize the right thing in them, to discriminate between the genuine and the pretended, is an accomplishment which may be worth infinitely more to you than a college education without this practical power, and may make all the difference to you between success and failure, happiness and misery.
Chapter XV.
Does The World Owe You A Living?
A FIFTEEN-YEAR-OLD bell boy, was arrested in Cleveland, for stealing eight dollars. When asked in court why he stole, he said “Because the world owes me a living.” No doubt the youth had heard this many times from older lips.
When the armies of Louis XIV. were devastated in Flanders, the monarch exclaimed: “Has God forgotten all that I have done for him?” A vast number of people seem to think that God and the world are under great obligations to them, and that the world owes them a living without any return service from them. Not long ago I heard a young woman say that she did not consider that she owed the world anything, that she was thrust into it without being consulted, that she proposed to get out of it what she could with as little effort as possible, and that she did not feel under the slightest obligation to the past.
Did you ever think, my idle friend, what you really owe the world for the privilege of living in it? Did you ever think that all the civilizations of the globe have been working for you through all the ages up to the present moment, and that you are reaping the harvest of all the hard-working, sacrificing, suffering, drudging sowers that have preceded you?
Can you look the workers of the world in the face and tell them that you intend to have all the benefits of their labor, to enjoy all the good things of the world without doing anything to compensate for them?
The man who does not feel his heart throb with gratitude every day of his life for being born in the very golden age of the world, and who does not feel that he owes a tremendous debt to the past, to all the people who have struggled and striven and sacrificed before him, is not made of the right kind of stuff. In other words, he is not a man, and he ought to be treated as a drone, a thief of other men's labors.
Everything that has gone before you, enters into your life and time. You enjoy the sum of all the past every moment of your life. Think of the untold thousands who have laid down their lives to make possible the comforts, the blessings, and the immunities you now enjoy. Think of the rivers of blood that have been spilt, of the thousands who have perished or lived in the misery of prison and dungeon to purchase the liberties of speech and freedom of action which you enjoy to-day.
How many lives have been lived in solitude and misery in order to develop sciences which are to-day beacon lights