The Personal Contribution

Rudyard Kipling, said an eminent observer, took a piece of paper, which certainly would have cost less than a penny, and wrote on it the “Recessional,” with all the stirring, moving meaning of its thirty unforgettable lines: “Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet, Lest we forget.” And then said this same observer: “Millions of machines could not have thought this out”⎯could not have written the “Recessional” with its emotion and message.

This has its application for a time when young people are moving forth to find their way into the future. The personal contribution is still the most important element and asset in life⎯learning, working, serving, creating, comforting, counseling, proving, and improving. Basically there is no substitute for the personal process.

As an eminent educator once observed: “We have not resigned from the human race: Neither science nor technology nor all the deterministic doctrine inspired by them, nor the despotism that has tried to force that doctrine upon mankind, has succeeded in producing a world that can function without our individual powers of reason, imagination, and conscience. We are not mere sponges or plankton afloat on a tide . . . we are rational beings, capable of charting the tide and navigating it, and even diverting and directing it . . . There is no . . . substitute for the creative individual.”

It is people who write music, who think thoughts, who love loved ones. It is people who make machines, who improve processes and products. And people who take responsibility, who are creative, who solve problems, who live and serve with integrity are still the greatest product of all our education and effort.

And to those who are searching for a future, for a purpose, for a place: first get the best preparation possible, then don’t be satisfied with average or routine performance. Think, try, plan, pursue. Be a sincere, interested, productive, and responsible person. Personal contribution is still the most important contribution in life. Personal service is still the greatest service. Personal standards, personal morals, personal conduct⎯the personal, eternal worth of the individual⎯this indeed is the very purpose of life. “Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet, Lest we forget” this also.