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“How
to Develop Self-Confidence
In Speech and Manner” eBook Online Version
I remember as a boy the burning of the Grand Opera House in Toronto, Canada. After witnessing a Shakespearian performance, the audience had dispersed to their homes, when at midnight a cry went through the city "Fire! Fire! The Opera House is on fire!" Thousands of people gathered to see the brilliant spectacle. Suddenly the flames burst out afresh, driving the firemen back, and at that moment there appeared at a small window close to the roof two men, and a woman with a babe clasped in her arms. What should they do? No ladder in those days could reach such a height. Below was nothing but a frail wood-shed on which they would be dashed to pieces were they to jump. The great crowd stood dumb and helpless as they watched the blanched and terror-stricken faces in that little window. The flames had now reached so close to them that soon they must jump or perish. There was a moment of breathless anxiety, when men, woman and child fell back from view.
Then suddenly a sheet was thrown from the window, and a man followed clinging to it desperately as he fell to the ground. He was carried to the hospital with body bruised and broken, but afterward miraculously recovered. When asked to give an account of his experience, he said he had tried to induce his companions, the janitor and his wife, to jump from the window with him, but they could not bring themselves to do it. He felt, as they did, unable to jump out into open space. He thought he must have something to cling to. Then it occurred to him to throw out the sheet which saved his life.
To every man there comes at some time a strong religious intuition that he is dependent upon some higher power, that he must have something to which he can cling. For two thousand years men have been telling others that there is no one to whom they can cling so well as to Christ. Dr. Van Dyke does not say "Think once in a while of Christ," but counsel’s men to "think of him every day." No better substitute has ever yet been found, nothing comparable to Him ever will be.
This is the new day of healthful living. A man is no longer content to shut body and soul within four walls. He must have air and sunshine; he must hear the birds, and inhale the perfume of bud and flower. So every man may through gladness, love, work and play, move steadily toward the heights, inspired by courage, kindness and gentleness of heart, thinking every day of the Master, until at last he comes to his own, where all is joy and peace.
Chapter XX
MEMORY PASSAGES THAT BUILD CONFIDENCE
A great deal of talent is lost in the world for the want of a little courage. Every day sends to their graves a number of obscure men who have only remained in obscurity because their timidity has prevented them from making a first effort; and who, if they could have been induced to begin, would in all probability have gone great lengths in the career of fame. The fact is, that to do anything in this world worth doing, we must not stand back shivering and thinking of the cold and danger, but jump in and scramble through as well as we can. It will not do to be perpetually calculating risks and adjusting nice chances; it did very well before the flood, when a man could consult his friends upon an intended publication for a hundred and fifty years, and then live to see his success afterward; but at present a man waits, and doubts, and consults his brother and his particular friends, till one fine day he finds that he is sixty years of age; that he has lost so much in consulting his first cousins and particular friends that he has no more time to follow their advice.
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