Page:Men of Mark in America vol 2.djvu/240

194 The reading that has proved helpful to him in later life includes the Bible, Paley's Moral Philosophy, biography, works on scientific subjects, Blackstone's and Kent's Commentaries, Burns' poems and Pope's essays. He found pleasure and comfort in rest under nature's forest trees, listening to the song-birds, and in luxuriating in the baths at Warm Springs, Virginia; and real happiness in his home in Alabama. He has been debarred from engaging in athletics by a physical disability, which also rendered difficult his military service. His first strong impulse to strive for success in life was felt when he was a lad of twelve years; but it was an impulse of duty, not the desire that is called ambition. The strongest influence in awakening this desire was his early home life and his mother's influence; and he writes: "These alone should have made me a better man than I can justly claim to be"; and he adds, "I have had better success, personally, than any one, I think, expected me to attain, and have not been disappointed in the sense of having failed to gain any special object. A sense of duty has been my chief incentive, and I have kept on fairly agreeable terms with the world, if not with an exacting conscience, in an honest effort to do my duty. So I would recommend such a course to younger persons. Obey the laws of God and the country and follow the guidance of an honest conscience."