Life is full of opportunities for new beginnings. Courage and hope go out of a person only when he ceases to believe that for him there is one more chance to retrieve the mistakes of the past. George Eliot says, “It is never too late to be what you might have been.” Such a conviction is necessary if we would live lives of power. There is a sonnet by Senator Ingalls in which Opportunity is represented as saying,—

One who saw life from a different point of view^[1] replied by a poem on the same subject in which Opportunity says,—

The latter view is surely the truer and more inspiring one.

To the person with the forward look and genuine enthusiasm there are ever-recurring opportunities for a fresh beginning. Indeed, there ought to be no one for whom each day does not commence the world anew. A well-known woman, noted for the inspiring and cheer-bringing quality of her life, used to say upon awakening each morning, “Another great, rich day!” There is no reason why every one of us should not hail each returning morning in this spirit.

New Year’s Day is proverbially the time for “turning over a new leaf.” The thought of the clean, fresh pages of another year so soon to be written upon has proved a stimulus and an inspiration in many a life; and, in spite of all the broken resolutions, the world is on the whole much better because of a certain fresh impulse to right living which this day always brings.

Nature has her New Year in the lovely springtime, the time of budding leaf and blossoming flower and nesting bird. Yet for us human beings the real New Year’s Day of work is neither the first of January nor the twenty-first of March, but the early autumn. At that time activities of all sorts that have been dormant throughout the summer take on renewed life. The stores and shops have a new air of briskness and prosperity; churches that have languished during the vacation season now settle down to their wonted usefulness; benevolent organizations open up their year’s campaign; the great army of teachers and students return to their work rested, freshened and recreated by the long vacation and ready for new tasks. There is a feeling of joy and strength in the very air.

There is possible at this time, for every student and teacher, a very real “new start in life.” I myself never get over a strange sense of exhilaration as I realize that another volume of the book of life has closed and that I am just opening a new one. Never do I cease to be strangely moved by the thought of the great opportunity that is mine, the opportunity to retrieve the mistakes of the past. Never do I fail to be grateful for the privilege of leaving behind me all the blunders and failures of former years and of beginning life anew.

The student who goes back to the school where other years have been spent finds much that is different. There are always some new studies, and no two years ever see quite the same combination of teachers and pupils. Here, then, are opportunities which may be fraught with momentous consequences. Some fresh subject may awaken dormant powers, some new teacher may call forth undreamed-of possibilities, some friend not yet discovered may add new meaning to life.

But the greatest changes are likely to come to the student who, for the first time, goes away from home to school or college. Such an event has been the turning-point in the lives of thousands of men and women. From that time date their most precious experiences. It was then that they really began to live. Dull and spiritless, indeed, must be the student who under such circumstances does not feel his soul stirred within him with wonder and with expectation. I have always appreciated the feelings of a young friend of mine, who was hardly able to close her eyes in sleep the night before she went away to school, so filled was she with joyful anticipation.

In going away to school among strangers, perhaps the most coveted opportunity you have is the privilege of taking only your best self with you. When we live and work with the same people day after day and month after month, they often get so used to us that they do not recognize the springing-up of new desires within us and the putting-forth of new effort, but remember only the faults and failings of the past. When we go away among those who do not know us, however, our shortcomings will never be discovered unless they manifest themselves anew. Have you made mistakes in the past? Have you blundered and have you failed, not once, but over and over again? Have you been selfish and inconsiderate of the rights of others? Let no one guess from your conduct now that such has ever been the case. Have you been indolent, wasting your time, and placing too high a value upon things not worth while? Among strangers these faults may be buried, never to come to life again. You will be judged by what you are, not by what you have been.

It is well to cultivate the habit of mind which lets the dead past bury its dead. This was St. Paul’s attitude toward the things of the past. “Forgetting the things which are behind, I press forward.” There are, of course, many memories of the past that one would never wish to forget, memories of uplifting associations and of victories over weaknesses that give courage and strength for the future. Along with these, however, there are memories of mistakes and failures now irremediable but which, though they cannot be effaced, can, in a measure, be atoned for by the future. Constantly to look backward with pain and regret only paralyzes one’s energy. The fact that much is expected of you for the future should put you on your mettle and call forth your highest powers.

Your duties and obligations to yourself and to others may, for the most part, be placed in four classes. You have an intellectual life, a moral and spiritual life, a social life, and a physical life. Your problem will be to adjust to one another the various claims upon you from these different sources. This is not an easy task. It is so difficult, that, because of inability to make the adjustment, many make shipwreck of what seemed to be a promising career. Indeed, he is a wise person who at any age has his life so harmoniously balanced that none of these different claims unduly crowd the others. Most of us are more or less one-sided. The best that we can say is that we are working toward the goal of perfect adjustment. Few reach it.

There are in so-called “society,” for example, thousands of women who have so emphasized one side of their nature, the social, that all other sides are dwarfed. Life is one constant round of balls and dinners and social gayeties. What ought to be the spice of life, or its dessert, has become the main dish of the feast. So in school and college there are always some who make social pleasures the main issue, forgetting all higher claims.

We see the exaltation of the physical life in the absurdly exaggerated emphasis placed upon athletics in many of the colleges for men. The tacit insistence upon the supreme importance of these and kindred interests is one of the reasons why scholarship in America is inferior to that in some European countries. Though athletic interests do not often encroach upon scholarly work in our schools and colleges for women, the same cannot be said of other activities, such as dramatics and the manifold phases of social life.

One who cares only for the things of the intellect may be a “clear, cold logic engine,” but he is not of much use as a human being. Sympathy and spiritual vision are beyond his ken. The finer side of his nature remains undeveloped. “He has become a machine,” as Emerson declared, “a thinker, not a man thinking.” The student who is merely a grind is not making the best of his opportunities. In losing all sides of student life but one, he is not even becoming a scholar in any real sense.

It is even possible to place too much emphasis upon the moral and spiritual side of life. This does not mean that one’s own moral standards can be too high, nor does it mean that there is anything else which can weigh for a moment against character. It does mean, however, that one has other obligations besides that of being good. Many a person who has walked the path of duty unflinchingly has lived a narrow and unlovely life.

It will be seen, then, that one of the most difficult lessons the young student will have to learn will be how much time and how much emphasis to give to each of these various provinces of student life.

There are people who regard the physical life as an end in itself and who live only for it. Browning has the right view when he says,—

The physical life always should be subordinated to the mental and the spiritual life, yet the body must command our respect because it is the house in which the spirit dwells. “Know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost, which is in you?” One of your first duties, then, is to take care of your health and to make your body the efficient, ready instrument of your will. You have no more important duty, not only to self, but to others, than to obey the laws of health, the most fundamental of which pertain to exercise, sleep, rest, and food. It is astonishing how few people, especially how few women, there are who do obey these simple laws, the importance of which ought to be apparent to every one. Nature’s disapproval of such disobedience is shown promptly, and the penalty she inflicts is inexorable. If ever I feel inclined to doubt the wisdom of any of Nature’s ways—which I really do not—it is when I see that girls, young, ignorant, and inexperienced, have so important a matter as their health given into their own keeping, though their bad judgment or wilfulness may have consequences so dire! Be willing to deny yourself, to put forth effort, to pay a very high price if need be, for a healthy body.

The desire for social intercourse is natural and right, and the person who shuns the society of others is abnormal; yet social intercourse probably offers, in one form or another, most of the dangers which beset both young women and young men while in school or college. Those who fail ignominiously and are obliged to withdraw, fail, not so often because of lack of ability or insufficient preparation as because they are swept off their feet by the multitude of their new engagements and social activities. The mind is full of a thousand other things and study is deferred until a more convenient season, which never comes. In the college, where comparatively little supervision over students is exercised, this has disastrous consequences, though in the school, with its closer supervision, the student is often saved from himself. It seems hardly necessary to say that your friends and your pleasures must not monopolize your whole life. With the sensible student, work comes first and pleasure afterward. One of the greatest temptations, when you are surrounded by pleasant friends, is to fritter time away. Hours, days, months pass by and leave very little that makes life permanently richer and stronger. Sometimes, indeed, the personality seems almost to disappear, merged in that of others. I have known girls who were miserable if they were left alone for half an hour. The reason is that they have no resources within themselves. They are parasites and derive their sustenance entirely from others. Such a life is not providing itself with the intellectual and spiritual resources which we all need to have at our command, and which should be gained in youth or they are not likely to be gained at all. Be friendly, be sociable, give your love freely, but preserve your own individuality and independence.

In no way do we reveal ourselves more surely than in our choice of companions. Be slow in choosing your nearest and dearest friends. Many a girl has been very unhappy because she rushed impetuously into a friendship from which she afterward had to extricate herself at the cost of great suffering both to herself and to her friend. Take plenty of time in selecting those who are to be your life friends, and remember that here, as everywhere, “All is not gold that glitters.”

The intellectual life above all else distinguishes man from the brute creation. Schools and colleges exist chiefly for the purpose of developing the intellectual life of the young, though one sometimes meets students who would admit the truth of that statement very reluctantly if at all. A well-disciplined and well-furnished mind is one of the chief satisfactions of life. Changing fortune cannot take from us our mental treasure. Its value never diminishes, but increases, and never seems greater than when other things upon which we relied have been snatched from us. If we place reliance upon money, it may take to itself wings and fly away. We cannot be sure of keeping health. Our friends may be taken from us. Is it not the part of wisdom, in looking forward and preparing for what one hopes may be a successful and happy future, to ask what are the “durable satisfactions” of life? These should not be sacrificed for ephemeral pleasures.

The ability to focus a well-trained intelligence upon any problem in hand is one for which we should be willing to pay a high price. Intellectual capacity and a cultivated mind are not acquired without effort, and cannot be secured by merely sitting through lectures or recitations. The student who has a true sense of values will plan her life in so systematic and orderly a way that her use of time will be determined by something more than present inclination. You must remember that in order to have this, you must give up that. One of the hardest things for the inexperienced to learn is that some very good things have to be sacrificed in order that we may not miss better things. All through life this is so, and there is no advantage in deferring the time when it must be learned. To your daily work, then, give your best self, realizing that if you fail in that, you will derive but little comfort from the fact that you have had some success in other things. Mental concentration and correct methods of work should be the first lessons learned, and they should be learned with thoroughness.

Lastly, we have a moral and spiritual nature. One might have superb intellectual powers and brilliant social gifts, yet if he lacked character, these would bring him neither content nor success in any large sense. Character is the foundation upon which all success worthy the name must rest. If the foundation be insecure, it matters little how fine the superstructure. When the writer of old said, “With all thy getting, get wisdom,” he meant something more than knowledge. Wisdom means insight into life and into human nature. Still more, it implies some comprehension of “the ways of God with men,” that is, of the profound laws which underlie the government of the moral and spiritual universe. The greatest struggle of all, to the student, should be the struggle for the ideal life. In moral and spiritual stature, are you small? Then it is your sacred duty to become large. Where will there ever be a better opportunity than under the ideal conditions that surround you, with stimulating lessons, inspiring teachers, understanding and appreciative friends and leisure to use all of these for the attainment of personal power?

Remember that character is not something that will take care of itself. You do not really expect to acquire knowledge for which you do not work. You admit that if you would have intellectual capacity you must study and train the mind. Yet it is hard for you to comprehend that you have anything to do with the development of your own character. Do not believe that honor, courage, generosity and courtesy come by chance.

There is this to be said, however, about the development of character. It is, to use Woodrow Wilson’s phrase, “a by-product.” As he says, it comes whether you will or not as a consequence of a life devoted to duty. You do not deliberately say, “I will improve my character.” What you do say is, “I will do the duty that plainly lies before me. I will not shirk it. I will not defer it.” In this way, and perhaps only in this way, does character grow.

There is no royal road to high character any more than there is to learning. Indeed, there is no royal road to anything worth while. “What wouldst thou?” says the old proverb; “Pay for it and take it.” Character is formed from within, by the efforts and strivings and aspirations of the individual. The will is made strong by choosing the right, not by having the right thrust upon it.

Who can tell what momentous changes are to be wrought in your life by going away to school? The windows of your soul will be opened in a hundred new directions. You will learn, or you ought to learn, what things are most worth while. There is so much more in life than you ever dreamed there was, so much more of interest and beauty and abiding charm! This means that even if you do your best there will be time for you to master only a little of that knowledge which attracts its devotees and forever beckons them on. Life is too short either to know or to do but a fraction of all that every earnest person longs to know and to do. Until we reach this view of things we can have no sense of the true value of time. As soon as we do reach it, as soon as we grasp something of the real worth of life, we cannot waste time, for time is the stuff of which life is made.