2. Another condition of success is diligence. Mark the word. It is not the precise equivalent of industry. It implies choice, selection, delight. One needs to have true delight and enthusiasm in his business. Therefore the great importance of choosing wisely at the outset. We pity men and women who in their babyhood had inflicted upon them fanciful names, but this is nothing to the blunder of putting a son to a business in which through his whole life he can take no delight. His only relief is to set himself, with all possible energy and enterprise, to lift his business, supposing it to be right in itself, up to a plane so high that he can sincerely rejoice in his achievement, as very difficult to make but of great worth when it is made. Diligence supposes a fixed purpose and constancy of effort, as well as enthusiastic devotion. When Isaac Rich trundled his wheelbarrow from the oyster-boat in Boston to the market-place three miles off, having invested all his worldly goods in what was before him, there was light in his eye and warmth in his heart though the day had not dawned. He was a poor young man from Cape Cod. He had made choice of his business for life. I do not know how long he followed it behind the barrow. Years ago he gave a million and three quarters of dollars to found a college in the city that itself yielded this treasure to his diligence and thrift. “The hand of the diligent maketh rich.” “Seest thou a man diligent in his business? He shall stand before kings. He shall not stand before mean men.” Let young men bind these divine proverbs upon their foreheads, and write them where they can be seen, as rules of their business lives. 3. Another condition of success is force, or energy. This comes often by heredity, transmitted from parent to child. In any case it is a precious gift, a great talent, for the right use of which every one receiving it must give account. From it, as a reserve power, one may draw at will to push on any work in which he takes delight. Call it the magnetic or electric power of the will, if you please. It may be like the same subtle fluid in destructive flash, or like it in the crisp air of a winter’s day, nerving one for almost tireless effort.