But this is scarcely true. All succeed who deserve, though not perhaps as they hoped. An honorable defeat is better than a mean victory, and no one is really the worse for being beaten, unless he loses heart. Though we may not be able to attain, that is no reason why we should not aspire. I know, says Morris, "How far high failure overleaps the bound Of low successes." And Bacon assures us that "if a man look sharp and attentively he shall see fortune; for though she is blind, she is not invisible." To give ourselves a reasonable prospect of success we must realize what we hope to achieve; and then make the most of our opportunities. Of these the use of time is one of the most important. What have we to do with time, asks Oliver Wendell Holmes, but to fill it up with labor. "At the battle of Montebello," said Napoleon, "I ordered Kellermann to attack with 800 horse, and with these he separated the 6000 Hungarian grenadiers before the very eyes of the Austrian cavalry. This cavalry was half a league off, and required a quarter of an hour to arrive on the field of action; and I have observed that it is always these quarters of an hour that decide the fate of a battle," including, we may add, the battle of life. Nor must we spare ourselves in other ways, for "He who thinks in strife To earn a deathless fame, must do, nor ever care for life." [2] In the excitement of the struggle, moreover, he will suffer comparatively little from wounds and blows which would otherwise cause intense suffering. It is well to weigh scrupulously the object in view, to run as little risk as may be, to count the cost with care. But when the mind is once made up, there must be no looking back, you must spare yourself no labor, nor shrink from danger. "He either fears his fate too much Or his deserts are small, That dares not put it to the touch To gain or lose it all." [3] Glory, says Renan, "is after all the thing which has the best chance of not being altogether vanity." But what is glory? Marcus Aurelius observes that "a spider is proud when it has caught a fly, a man when he has caught a hare, another when he has taken a little fish in a net, another when he has taken wild boars, another when he has taken bears, and another when he has taken Sarmatians;" [4] but this, if from one point of view it shows the vanity of fame, also encourages us with the evidence that every one may succeed if his objects are but reasonable. Alexander may be taken as almost a type of Ambition in its usual form, though carried to an extreme.