but they never attain to more than a respectable mediocrity and spend their lives in a fool's paradise without knowing it.

These things being true, it is of the utmost importance for one to know current happenings. Further, in this age of papers and periodicals, it is inexcusable indolence not to be informed concerning current events. The current events of to-day become history to-morrow, so that he who grasps the present as it comes has also the immediate past at his command. There is but one way of forecasting the future and that is by understanding the relation of the present to the past. The one who fully comprehends the present must also know how the past is related to it. There is not an isolated fact in history, neither is there an isolated current event. Every fact bears definite relation to some other fact, and so every current event has its relation to some other event, as cause, effect, or corollary. Happy is he who is able to grasp these relations, for he holds the promise of success. The one who is not able to do this fails to win. He stops to wonder. He is surprised that others succeed and blames his own lack of success on his evil stars or the machinations of an enemy.

He

The successful man of to-day is the wide-awake man. not only knows his own business well, in fact, a little better than anyone else, but he knows something of life around him. It is this that has given the characteristics of the present age. Newspapers abound, filled not only with current news, but with current knowledge. We have magazines and periodicals with their rich stores of material. Books are on every hand and on many subjects, but predominant will be found some reference to the present.

History and economics are receiving more attention than ever before because men want light on present problems. The greatest problems of to-day are political, sccial, and industrial. The trend of education in the present age is another argument in favor of a knowledge of the present.

The question is no longer, What do you know? but, What can you do? The expression "Knowledge is power" is an old

adage, but to-day it is a back number. Power is only in the ability to apply knowledge, and so we find a class of schools gaining in favor that not only furnish knowledge but train their students in the application of it.

In these technical schools it is the present that must take precedence, although viewed with all the light the past can shed upon it. Not the ancient history of the steam engine is demanded, but the ability to construct the most modern and complete form; not the story of how Franklin discovered the relation of the lightning to the electric fluid, but the ability to design and construct the dynamo that will run the greatest number of lights at least expense; not how the subject of alchemy has developed into modern chemistry, but how to conduct manufactures, prepare fertilizers, and compound pharmaceutical preparations with the least possible waste.

These things are possible to those only who know the present, and, fully comprehending current events, are able to turn them to proper account in the routine of daily life.

Chimney Corner Graduates.

JAMES LANE ALLEN, Noted Lecturer and Writer, of Cincinnati, Ohio.

UNDREDS of young men in this country, because they cannot go to college, give up the thought of ever becom

H

ing educated, relinquish the happiness, honors, and usefulness which education alone can bring, and enter upon early manhood as self-accepted failures. I should like to link my arm within that of each of these young men and walk out with him some night when the heavens are clear. Then for every star that he could point out to me, beginning with the brightest, I would undertake to point out for him some shining name among the living or the dead, who, without college or teacher, transformed his inner darkness into light, his ignorance into knowledge, and is now set, either as a greater or as a lesser light, in the firmament of the world's benefactors. The dawn would break and we should still be talking; and for nights to come there would be no end for the names, as there would be no number for the stars.

Not lack of schools and teachers, nor want of books and friends; not the most despised rank or calling; not poverty nor ill health nor deafness nor blindness; not hunger, cold, weariness, care, nor sickness of heart, have been able to keep men in this life from self-education. What is it that you want to learn and cannot? Is it writing? Remember Murray, the linguist, who made a pen for himself out of a stem of heather, sharpening it in the fire, and for a copy book used a worn-out wool card. Is it English grammar? Remember Cobbett, who learned it while he was making sixpence a day, often with no light but winter fire light, and often crowded away from this and reduced

almost to starvation if he spent but a penny for pens or paper. Have you no money to buy books? Remember More, who borrowed Newton's Principia and copied it for himself. Is it the multiplication table you wish to learn? Remember Biddle, the poorest of boys, afterward known throughout the world, who learned it up to a million by means of peas, marbles, and a bag of shot. Is it music? Remember Watt,. inventor of the steam engine, who, with no ear for music, mastered harmonics for himself because he had determined to build an organ. Is it Latin? Remember the son of a poor jeweler, afterward Sir Samuel Romilly, who learned it untaught. Is it Greek or Hebrew? Remember the dull carpenter apprentice, Lee, afterwards master of many tongues and professor at Cambridge, who began by buying a Latin grammar, sold his Latin books and bought Greek ones, sold his Greek books to buy Hebrew ones, always teaching himself. Is it geology? Remember Hugh Miller, who learned in a stone quarry. There is little taught in the school that men have not taught themselves amid difficulties and despite obstacles greater perhaps than you have ever known.

Are you hindered and disheartened by your position in life and the sort of trade you follow? Well, what then, in heaven's name, are you? A barber? So was Arkwright, founder of the cotton manufacture of England, who began by shaving people in a cellar at a penny a shave. Are you a coal miner? So was Bewick, founder of wood engraving. Are you the son of a poor farmer? So was Sir Isaac Newton, the sun itself in the heaven of science. A bricklayer? So was Ben Jonson, one of the most illustrious names in English literature. A tailor? So was brave Hobson, admiral of the navy. A butcher? So was Wolsey, the most illustrious cardinal of England. The fireman on an engine? So was Stephenson, inventor of the locomotive. A shoemaker? So was Edwards, the profound naturalist. A bookbinder? So was Faraday, afterwards lecturer on chemistry before the Royal Institution. From every human craft men have started out in quest of knowledge and found wisdom.

You say, Ah! these were extraordinary men; I am ordinary and cannot do what they did. Certainly not. You miss the lesson: do what you can with your powers and opportunities as faithfully as they did what they could with theirs. Then perhaps you will find yourself no longer ordinary. For what made these men extraordinary? Genius? Don't you believe it. If you could collect them into one august company and bid each rise and state the secret of his success, perhaps not one would say, my genius. One would say, my patience; another, hard work; another, energy; another, perseverance; another, memory; another, common sense; another, self-reliance; another, the habit of attention; another, not wasting time; another, the capacity to take infinite pains. All the answers would be the simplest; and these are the old, old answers that have been given since the world was made and must be given while the world shall stand. Nor can anything new be said to you that has not been repeated to every generation seeking knowledge this side of the youthful priests of Egypt and the calm scholars of Greece, except this one thing, that self-education is more practicable in the United States at the present time than in any land in the past; for four reasons: books are cheaper than ever before; text-books are now made simple and easy to meet the wants of students at home; much of the knowledge taught in the universities is now put within reach of the chimney-corner student in a popular form through newspapers, weekly and monthly publications; and in every village, so widespread has cducation become, will be found some persons to whom the solitary, earnest toiler can apply for suggestion and guidance. These advantages the self-educated men of the past never enjoyed. What is your further necessary outfit? It is very simple: a few hours of leisure out of every twenty-four; a little money; and the determination to act as teacher to the powers of your own mind.

Yes, that is the whole truth; teach yourself. You can; if ever educated, whether in college or not, you must. For what is a college? A place where a set of men will train the powers