Knowledge… Character… Responsibility…

“The essence of character-building lies in action,” said David Starr Jordan. “Precepts of virtue are useless unless they can be built into life…. The habit of finding out the best thing to do next, and then doing it, is the basis of character…. Wisdom,,, is knowing what is best to do next. Virtue is doing it. Doing right becomes a habit, if it is pursued long enough. It becomes a ‘second nature’…. Learning to know what is right and why it is right, [and] doing it… is the basis of character…. The moral character is based on knowing the best, choosing the best, and doing the best…. It is the clinching of good purposes with good actions that makes the man.”

These words bring to mind a statement from an unknown source which says, “A man is not paid for having brains but for using them.” Students are not paid for learning but for using their learning. They are not paid merely for knowing principles, but for living and applying principles. And along with the ability to learn, there must be a willingness to take responsibility, not holding back, not ignoring any obligation, not permitting any indifference to duty.

Recently a deeply disappointed person was heard to say: “No one does what he says he will do. I can’t find anyone to follow through, to take real responsibility.” This could not be literally true. If it were, the world would not run. But it is too often too true.

There is nothing within reason that a young person cannot achieve, if he is willing to prepare, willing to learn, willing to work, willing to take real responsibility, willing to follow through. But it cannot be done with shoddiness or shortcuts, or by casual carefree convenience. Knowledge, learning, work, accepting real responsibility, character and trustworthy conduct⎯with these there is as much opportunity as ever there was⎯indeed, much more.

“The future,” said Emerson, “belongs to those who prepare for it” ⎯and who work for it and live for it.