Whoso Neglects Learning in His Youth…

In some thoughtful lines on life, Samuel Johnson said: “Reflect that life, life every other blessing, derives its value from its use alone.”¹ Last week we spoke somewhat of the uses of life — of beginning to be what we want to be, or beginning to do what we ought to do, of beginning to go where we ought to go, and cited Arnold Bennett’s example of a man at the edge of a swimming pool who asks, “How do I begin to jump?” with the obvious answer: “Just jump”² — just begin to do what you ought to do, just begin to go where you ought to go. One of the most disheartening wastes in the world is sitting and waiting on the assumption that something constructive will happen, without any beginning, without any initiative, without any effort of our own. Nothing does itself — that is, nothing constructive. Someone has to do everything. Lessons don’t learn themselves; classes don’t teach themselves; food doesn’t prepare itself; dishes and other household duties don’t do themselves; the very sick don’t serve themselves; machines don’t make themselves; words don’t memorize themselves; skills don’t develop themselves; projects don’t plan themselves; buildings don’t build themselves. Someone has to lay every brick and drive every nail, make everything that is make, do everything that is done, think everything that is thought. And the person who prepares early, who begins early, who starts early to go where he earnestly wants to go, or ought to go, takes a long lead on life. Preparation in youth is exceeding important. The decisions of youth are also. “Whoso neglects learning in his youth,” said Euripides, “loses the past, and is dead for the future.”³ The earliest possible preparation is exceedingly important: early decisions, sound and solid decisions, and doing something about decisions. Someone has to make everything; someone has to do everything; someone has to think everything — and the best-prepared people, the most productive people will find life most satisfying, most rich and rewarding, with fewest frustrations, and with the least torment from unrealized intentions.