Self Help; with Illustrations of Conduct and Perseverance — John Shaqi
Self Help; with Illustrations of Conduct and PerseveranceSmiles, Samuel
Philosophy
Self Help; with Illustrations of Conduct and Perseverance
Smiles, Samuel
Conduct of life
Nor have tailors been undistinguished. John Stow, the historian, worked
at the trade during some part of his life. Jackson, the painter, made
clothes until he reached manhood. The brave Sir John Hawkswood, who so
greatly distinguished himself at Poictiers, and was knighted by Edward
III. for his valour, was in early life apprenticed to a London tailor.
Admiral Hobson, who broke the boom at Vigo in 1702, belonged to the same
calling. He was working as a tailor’s apprentice near Bonchurch, in the
Isle of Wight, when the news flew through the village that a squadron of
men-of-war was sailing off the island. He sprang from the shopboard, and
ran down with his comrades to the beach, to gaze upon the glorious sight.
The boy was suddenly inflamed with the ambition to be a sailor; and
springing into a boat, he rowed off to the squadron, gained the admiral’s
ship, and was accepted as a volunteer. Years after, he returned to his
native village full of honours, and dined off bacon and eggs in the
cottage where he had worked as an apprentice. But the greatest tailor of
all is unquestionably Andrew Johnson, the present President of the United
States—a man of extraordinary force of character and vigour of intellect.
In his great speech at Washington, when describing himself as having
begun his political career as an alderman, and run through all the
branches of the legislature, a voice in the crowd cried, “From a tailor
up.” It was characteristic of Johnson to take the intended sarcasm in
good part, and even to turn it to account. “Some gentleman says I have
been a tailor. That does not disconcert me in the least; for when I was
a tailor I had the reputation of being a good one, and making close fits;
I was always punctual with my customers, and always did good work.”
Cardinal Wolsey, De Foe, Akenside, and Kirke White were the sons of
butchers; Bunyan was a tinker, and Joseph Lancaster a basket-maker.
Among the great names identified with the invention of the steam-engine
are those of Newcomen, Watt, and Stephenson; the first a blacksmith, the
second a maker of mathematical instruments, and the third an
engine-fireman. Huntingdon the preacher was originally a coalheaver, and
Bewick, the father of wood-engraving, a coalminer. Dodsley was a
footman, and Holcroft a groom. Baffin the navigator began his seafaring
career as a man before the mast, and Sir Cloudesley Shovel as a
cabin-boy. Herschel played the oboe in a military band. Chantrey was a
journeyman carver, Etty a journeyman printer, and Sir Thomas Lawrence the
son of a tavern-keeper. Michael Faraday, the son of a blacksmith, was in
early life apprenticed to a bookbinder, and worked at that trade until he
reached his twenty-second year: he now occupies the very first rank as a
philosopher, excelling even his master, Sir Humphry Davy, in the art of
lucidly expounding the most difficult and abstruse points in natural
science.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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