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Chapter XXI: Enamored of Accuracy · Pushing to the Front

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Chapter twenty one of Pushing to the Front by Horizon Sweat Martin. This LibriVox
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recording is in the public domain recording by Luke's Artor Chapter twenty one. Enamored
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of Accuracy, Antonio Stradivali has an eye that winces at false work and loves
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the true. Accuracy is the twin brother of honesty. C Simmonds, Genius
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is the infinite art of taking pains, Carlyle. I hate a thing done
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by halves. If it be right, do it boldly. If it be
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wrong, leave it undone, Gilpin. If I were a cobbler, it
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would be my pride the best of all cobblers to be if if I were
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a tinker, no tinker beside should mend an old kettle like me old song.
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If a man can write a better book, preach a better sermon,
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or make a better mouse trap than his neighbor, though he build his house
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in the woods, the world will make a beaten path to his door.
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Emerson, Sir, It is a watch which I have made and regulated myself,
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said George Graham of London to a customer who asked how far he could
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depend upon its keeping correct time. Take it with you wherever you please.
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If after seven years you come back to see me and can tell me there
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has been a difference of five minutes, I will return you your money.
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Seven years later, the gentleman returned from India. Sir said he, I
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bring you back your watch. I remember our conditions, said Graham. Let
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me see the watch. Well, what do you complain of, why,
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said the man. I have had it seven years and there is a difference
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of more than five minutes. Indeed, in that case, I return you
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your money. I will not part with the watch, said the man,
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for ten times the sum I paid for it, and I would not break
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my word for any consideration, replied Graham. So he paid the money and
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took the watch, which he used as a regulator. He learned his trade
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of Tampion, the most exquisite mechanic in London, if not in the world,
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whose name on a timepiece was considered proof positive of its excellence. When
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a person once asked him to repair a watch upon which his name was fraudulently
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engraved, Tampion smashed it with a hammer and handed the astonished customer one of
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his own masterpieces, saying, sir, here is a watch of my making.
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Graham invented the compensatory, mercury pendulum, the deep escapement, and the
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oroory, none of which have been much improved since. The clock which he
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made for Greenwich Observatory, has been running one hundred and fifty years. Yet
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a needs regulating, but once in fifteen months Tampion and Graham lae in Westminster
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Abbey because of the accuracy of their work. To insure safety, a navigator
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must know how far he is from the equator north or south, and how
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far east or west of some known point as Greenwich, Paris, or Washington.
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He could be sure of this knowledge when the sun is shining if he
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could have an absolutely accurate timekeeper, but such a thing has not yet been
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made. In the sixteenth century, Spain offered a prize of a thousand crowns
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for the discovery of an approximately correct method of determining longitude. About two hundred
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years later, the English government offered five thousand pounds for a chronometer by which
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a ship six months from home could get her longitude within sixty miles, seven
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thousand, five hundred pounds if within forty miles, ten thousand pounds if within
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thirty miles, and in another clause twenty thousand pounds for correctness within thirty miles,
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a careless repetition. The watchmakers of the world contested for the prizes,
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but seventeen sixty one came and they had not been awarded. In that year,
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John Harrison asked for a test of his chronometer. In a trip of
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one hundred and forty seven days from Portsmouth to Jamaica and back, it varied
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less than two minutes and only four seconds on the outward voyage. In a
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round trip of one hundred and fifty six days to Barbadoes, the variation was
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only fifteen seconds. The twenty thousand pounds was paid to the man who had
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worked and experimented for forty years, and whose hand was as exquisitely delicate in
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its movement as the mechanism of his chronometer. Make me as good a hammer
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as you know how, said a carpenter to the blacksmith in a New York
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village before the first railroad was built. Six of us have come to work
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on the new church, and I've left mine at home as good a one
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as I know how, asked David Maydoyle. Doubtfully, But perhaps you don't
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want to pay for as good a one as I know how to make.
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Yes, I do, said the carpenter, I want a good hammer.
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It was indeed a good hammer that he received, the best, probably that
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it ever been made. By means of a longer hole than usual. David
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had wedged the handle in its place so that the head could not fly off,
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a wonderful improvement in the eyes of the carpenter, who boasted of his
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prize to his companions. They all came to the shop next day and each
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ordered just such a hammer. When the contractor saw the tools, he ordered
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two for himself, asking that they be made a little better than those of
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his men. I can't make any better ones, said may Doyle. When
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I make a thing, I make it as well as I can, no
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matter whom it is for. The yorkeeper soon ordered two dozen, a supply
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unheard of in his previous business career. A New York dealer in tools came
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to the village to sell his wares and bought all the storekeeper had, and
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left a standing order for all the blacksmith could make. David might have grown
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very wealthy by making goods of the standard already attained, but throughout his long
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and successful life, he never ceased to study still further to perfect his hammers
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in the minutest detail. They were usually sold without any warrant of excellence,
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the word May Doyle stamped on the head, being universally considered a guarantee of
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the best article the world could produce. Character is power, and is the
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best advertisement in the world. We have no secret, said the manager of
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an iron works employing thousands of men. We always try to beat our last
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batch of rails. That is all the secret we've got, and we don't
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care who knows it. I don't try to see how cheap a machine I
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can produce, but how good a machine, said the late John C.
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Witten of Northbridge, Massachusetts, to a customer who complained of the high price
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of some cotton machinery. Business Men soon learned what this meant, and when
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there was occasion to advertise any machinery for sale, New England cotton manufacturers were
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accustomed to state the number of years that had been in use and add as
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an all sufficient guarantee of Northbridge products. Witten make madame, said the sculptor
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H. K. Brown, as he admired a statue in alabaster made by
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a youth in his teens. This boy has something in him. It was
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the figure of an irishman who worked for the Ward family in Brooklyn years ago,
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and gave with my nutest fidelity, not merely the men's features and expression,
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but even the patches in his trousers, the rent in his coat,
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and the creases in his narrow brimmed stovepipe hat. Mister Brown saw the statue
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at the house of a lady living at Newburgh on the Hudson. Six years
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later he invited her brother J. Q. A. Ward, to become
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a pupil in his studio. To day, the name of Ward is that
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of the most prosperous of all American sculptors. Paint me just as I am,
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warts and all, said Oliver Cromwell to the artist, who, thinking
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to please the Great Man, had omitted a mole. I can remember when
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you blacked my father's shoes, said one member of the House of Commons to
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another in the heat of debate. True enough, was the prompt reply.
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But did I not black them? Well? It is easy to tell a
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good indigo, said an old lady. Just take a lump and put it
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into water, and if it is good, it will either sink or swim.
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I am not sure which, but never mind, you can try it
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for yourself. John B. Goff told of a colored preacher who, wishing
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his congregation to fresco the recess back of the pulpit, suddenly closed his Bible
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and said, there, my bredren de gospel would not be dispensed with any
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more from this pulpit to a de collection of sufficient to preccede dis abscess.
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When troubled with deafness, Wellington consulted a celebrated physician who put strong caustic into
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his ear, causing an inflammation which threatened his life. The doctor apologized,
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expressed great regrets, and said that the blunder would ruin him. No,
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said Wellington, I will never mention it, but you will allow me to
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attend you so that people will not withdraw their confidence. No, said the
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iron duke. That would be lying. Father said a boy. I saw
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an immense number of dogs, five hundred, I am sure in our street
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last night. Surely not so many, said the father. Well there were
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one hundred. I'm quite sure it could not be, said the father.
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I don't think there are a hundred dogs in our village. Well, sir,
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it could not be less than ten. This I am quite certain of.
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I will not believe you saw ten, even said the father, For
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you spoke as confidently of seeing five hundred as of seeing this smaller number.
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You have contradicted yourself twice already, and now I cannot believe you. Well,
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sir, said the disconcerted boy, I saw at least our dash and
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another one. We condemned the boy for exaggerating in order to tell a wonderful
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story. But how much more truthful are they who never saw it rain so
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before, or who called day after day the hottest of the summer or the
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coldest of the winter. There is nothing which all mankind vanerate and admire so
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much as simple truth. Exempt from artifice, duplicity, and design. It
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exhibits at once a strength of character and integrity of purpose, in which all
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are willing to confide, to say nice things merely to avoid giving offense,
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to keep silent rather than speak the truth, To equivocate, to evade,
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to dodge, to say what is expedient rather than what is truthful, to
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shirk the truth, to face both ways, to exaggerate, to seem to
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concur with another's opinions when you do. Not to deceive by a glance of
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the eye, a nod of the head, a smile, a gesture to
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lack sincerity, to assume to know or think or feel what you do not.
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All these are but various manifestations of hollowness and falsehood resulting from want of
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accuracy. We find no lying, no inaccuracy, no slipshod business. In
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nature, roses, blossom, and crystals form with the same precision of tint
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and angle to day as in Eden on the morning of creation. The rose
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in the queen's garden is not more beautiful, more fragrant, more exquisitely perfect,
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than that which blooms and blush as unheeded amid the fern decked brush by
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the roadside, or in some far off glen where no human eye ever sees
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it. The crystal found deep in the earth is constructed with the same fidelity
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as that formed above ground. Even the tiny snowflake, whose destiny is to
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become an apparently insignificant and a wholly unnoticed part of an enormous bank, assumes
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its shape of ethereal beauty as faithfully as though preparing for some grand exhibition.
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Planets rush with dizzy sweep through almost limitless courses, yet returned equinox or solstice
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at the appointed second, their very movement being the uniform manifestation of the will
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of God. The marvelous resources and growth of America have developed an unfortunate tendency
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to overstate, overdraw, and exaggerate. It seems strange that there should be
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so strong a temptation to exaggerate in a country where the truth is more wonderful
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than fiction. The positive is stronger than the superlative, but we ignore this
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fact in our speech. Indeed, it is really difficult to ascertain the exact
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truth in America. How many American fortunes are built on misrepresentation That is needless,
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for nothing else is half so strong as truth does. The devil lie
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was asked of Sir Thomas Browne. No, for then even he could not
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exist. Truth is necessary to permanency. In Siberia, a travel of found
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men who could see the satellites of Jupiter with the naked eye. These men
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have made little advance in civilization, yet they are far superior to us in
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their accurate sy of vision. It is a curious fact that not a single
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astronomical discovery of importance has been made through a large telescope. The men who
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have advanced our knowledge of that science the most, working with ordinary instruments,
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backed by most accurately trained minds and eyes. A double convex lens three feet
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in diameter is worth sixty thousand dollars. Its adjustment is so delicate that the
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human hand is the only instrument thus far known suitable for giving the final polish.
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And one sweep of the hand more than is needed, Alvin Clark says,
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would impair the correctness of the glass. During the test of the Great
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Glass which he made for Russia, the workmen turned it a little with their
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hands. Wait, boys, let it cool before making another trial, said
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Clark. The poise is so delicate that the heat from your hands affects it.
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Mister Clark's love of accuracy has made his name a synonym of exactness the
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world over. No, I can't do it. It is impossible, said
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Webster, when urged to speak on a question soon to come up towards the
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close of a congressional session. I am so pressed with other duties that I
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haven't time to prepare myself to speak upon that theme. Ah, But mister
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Webster. You always speak well upon any subject, you never fail. But
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that's the very reason, said the orator, because I never allow myself to
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speak upon any subject without first making that subject thoroughly my own. I haven't
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time to do that in this instance. Hence I must refuse. Rufus Chowait
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would plead before his shoemaker, Justice of the Peace in a petty case,
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with all the fervor and careful attention to detail with which he addressed the United
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States Supreme Court. Whatever is right to do, said an eminent writer,
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should be done with our best care, strength, and faithfulness of purpose.
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We have no scales by which we can weigh our faithfulness to duties or determine
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their relative importance. In God's eyes, That which seems a trifle to us
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may be the secret spring which shall move the issues of life and death.
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There goes a man that has been to hell, the Florentines would say when
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Dantes passed, so realistic seemed to them his description of the nether world.
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There is one real failure in life possible, said Canon Farrar, and that
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is not to be true to the best one knows. It is quite astonishing,
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Grove said of Beethoven to find the length of time during which some of
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the best known instrumental melodies remained in his thoughts till they were finally used.
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All the crude, vague, commonplace shape in which they were first written down.
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The more they are elaborated, the more freshened, spontaneous they become.
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Leonardo da Vinci would walk across Milan to change a single tint or the slightest
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detail in his famous picture of the Last Supper. Every line was then written
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twice over by Pope, said his publisher Dodsley, of manuscript brought to be
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copied. Gibbon wrote his memoir nine and the first chapters of his history eighteen
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times. Of one of his works, Montesquieu said to a friend, you
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will read it in a few hours, but I assure you it has cost
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me so much labor that it has whitened my hair. He had made it
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his study by day and his dream by night, the alpha and omega of
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his aims and objects. He who does not write as well as he can
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on every occasion, said George Ripley, will soon form the habit of not
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writing well on any occasion. An accomplished entomologist thought he would perfect his knowledge
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by a few lessons under Professor Agassiz. The latter handed him a dead fish
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and told him to use his eyes. Two hours later, he examined his
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new pupil, but soon remarked, you haven't really looked at the fish yet.
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We'll have to try again. After a second examination, he shook his
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head, saying, you do not show that you can use your eyes.
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This roused the pupil to earnest effort, and he became so interested in things
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he had never noticed before that he did not see Agassiz when he came for
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the third examination. That will do, said the great scientist. I now
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see that you can use your eyes. Reynolds said he could go on retouching
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a picture forever. The captain of a Nantucket whaler told the man at the
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wheel to steer by the north star, but was awakened towards morning by a
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request for another star to steer by, as they had sailed by the other.
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Stephen Girard was precision itself. He did not allow those in his employ
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to deviate in the slightest degree from his iron clad orders. He believed that
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no great success is possible without the most rigid accuracy. In everything. He
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did not vary from a promise in the slightest degree. People knew that his
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word was not pretty good, but absolutely good. He left nothing to chance.
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Every detail of business was calculated and planned to a nicety. He was
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as exact and precise even in the smallest trifles as Napoleon. Yet his brother
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merchants attributed his superior success to good luck. In eighteen o five, Napoleon
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broke up the great camp he had formed on the shores of the English Channel
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and gave orders for his mighty host to defile towards the Danube. Vast and
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various, as were the projects fermenting in his brain, However, he did
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not content himself with giving the order and leaving the elaboration of its details to
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his lieutenants. To details in minutia which inferior captains would have deemed too microscopic
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for their notice. He gave such exhaustive attention that before the bugle had sounded
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for the march, he had planned the exact route which every regiment was to
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follow, the exact day and hour it was to leave that station, and
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the precise moment when it was to reach its destination. These details so thoroughly
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premediated, were carried out to the letter, and the result of that memorable
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march was the victory of Austerlitz, which sealed the fate of Europe for ten
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years. When a noted French preacher speaks in Notre Dame, the scholars of
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Paris thronged the cathedral to hear his fastating, eloquent, polished discourses. This
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brilliant finish is the result of most patient work, as he delivers but five
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or six sermons a year. When Sir Walter Scott visited a ruined castle about
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which he wished to write, he wrote in a notebook the separate names of
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grasses and wild flowers growing near, saying that only by such means can a
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writer be natural. The historian Macaulay never allowed a sentence to stand until it
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was as good as he could make it. Besides his scrap books, Garfield
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had a large case of some fifty pigeon holes labeled anecdotes electoral laws and commissions,
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French spoliation, general politics, Geneva Award, parliamentary decisions, public men,
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state politics, tariff, the press, United States, history, etc.
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Every valuable hint he could get being preserved in the cold exactness of black
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and white. When he chose to make careful preparation on a subject no other
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speaker could command so great an array of facts. Accurate people are methodical people,
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and method means character. Am offered ten thousand bushels wheat on your account
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at one dollar? Shall I buy? Or is it too high? Telegraph
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to San Francisco merchant to one in Sacramento. No price too high came back
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over the wire instead of no price too high as was intended. The omission
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of a period cost the Sacramento dealer one thousand dollars. How many thousands have
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lost their wealth or lives, and how many frightful accidents have occurred through carelessness
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in sending messages? The accurate boy is always the favored one, said President
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Tuttle. Those who employ men do not wish to be on the constant lookout,
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as though they were rogues or fools. If a carpenter must stand at
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his journeyman's elbow to be sure his work is right, or if a cashier
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must run over his book keeper's columns, he might as well do the work
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himself as employ another to do it. In that way, and it is
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very certain that the employer will get rid of such a blunderer as soon as
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he can. If you make a good pin, said a successful manufacturer,
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you will earn more than if you make a bad steam engine. There are
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women, said Fields, whose stitch has always come out, and the buttons
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they sew on fly off on the mildest provocation. There are other women who
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use the same needle and thread, and you may tug away at their work
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on your coat or waistcoat, and you can't start a button in a generation.
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Carelessness, indifference, sloutiness, slipshod financiering could truthfully be ridden over the
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graves of thousands who have failed in life. How many clerks, cashiers,
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clergymen, editors and professors in college have lost position and prestige by carelessness and
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inaccuracy. You would be the greatest man of your age, Gratan, said
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Kuran, if you would buy a few yards of red tape and tie up
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your bills and papers. Kuran realized that methodical people are accurate and as a
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rule successful. Berg tells of a man beginning business who opened and shut his
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shop regularly at the same hour every day for weeks without selling two cents worth,
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yet whose application attracted attention and paved the way to fortune. A.
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T. Stewart was extremely systematic and precise in all his transactions. Method ruled
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in every department of his store, and for every delinquency a penalty was rigidly
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enforced. His eye was upon his business in all its ramifications. He mastered
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every detail and worked hard. From the time Jonas Chickering began to work for
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a piano maker, he was noted for the pains and care with which he
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did everything. To him, there were no trifles in the manufacturing of pianos.
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Neither time nor labor was of any account to him compared with accuracy and
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knowledge. He soon made pianos in a factory of his own. He determined
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to make an instrument yielding the fullest and richest volume of melody, with the
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least exertion to the player, with standing atmospheric changes, and preserving its purity
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and truthfulness of tone. He resolved that each piano should be an improvement upon
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the one which preceded it. Perfection was his aim to the end of his
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life. He gave the finishing touch to each of his instruments, and would
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trust it to no one else. He permitted no irregularity in workmanship or sales,
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and was characterized by simplicity, transparency, and straightforwardness. He distanced all
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competitors. Shickering's name was such a power that one piano maker had his name
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changed to Shickering by the Massachusetts legislature and put it on his pianos. But
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Jonas Shickering sent a petition to the legislature and the name was changed back.
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Character has a commercial as well as an ethical value. Joseph M. W.
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Turner was intended by his father for a barber, but he showed such
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a taste for drawing that a reluctant permission was given for him to follow art
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as a profession. He soon became skillful, but as he lacked means,
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he took anything to do that came in his way, frequently illustrating guide books
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in almanacs. But although the pay was very small, the work was never
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careless. His labor was worth several times what he received for it, but
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the price was increased and work of higher grade given him simply because men seek
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the services of those who are known to be faithful and employ them in as
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lofty work as they seem to do, and so he toiled upward until he
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began to employ himself, his work sure of a market at some price,
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and the price increasing as other men began to get glimpses of the transcendent art
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revealed in his paintings, and art not fully comprehended even in our day.
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He surpassed the acknowledged masters in various fields of landscape work, and left matchless
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studies of natural scenery in lines never before attempted. What Shakespeare is in literature,
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Turner is in his special field the greatest name on record. The demand
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for perfection in the nature of Wendell Phillips was wonderful. Every word must exactly
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express the shade of his thought. Every phrase must be of due length and
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cadence. Every sentence must be perfectly balanced before it left his lips. Exact
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precision characterized his style. He was easily the first forensic orator America has produced.
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The rhythmic fullness and poise of his periods are remarkable. Alexandre Dumas prepared
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his manuscript with the greatest care. When consulted by a friend whose article had
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been rejected by several publishers, he advised him to have it handsomely copied by
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a professional penman, and then changed the title. The advice was taken,
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and the article eagerly accepted by one of the very publishers who had refused it
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before. Many able essays have been rejected because of poor penmanship. We must
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strive after accuracy as we would after wisdom or hidden treasure, or anything we
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would attain. Determined to form exact business habits, avoid slipshod financiering as you
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would the plague. Careless and indifferent habits would soon ruin a millionaire. Nearly
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every very successful man is accurate and painstaking. Accuracy means character, and character
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is power. End of Chapter twenty one. Enamored of Accuracy. Recording by
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Luke Sartour, Brisbane, Queensland.