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CHAPTER II
THE DANGERS OF OBSTINACY
"Extremes meet," declares a proverb whose truth in no way belies the reputation
that those ancient sayings have made for themselves.
It is a fact that an excess of perseverance can end in obstinacy.
The militant realities that perseverance transforms into so many motives of
realization, become changed, by their defect of obstinacy, into so many Utopian
dreams, whose unreality is unwittingly--and sometimes even knowingly--defended
as fact by those who are not willing to be guided by the counsels of reason.
We are not now speaking of the idealism that knowledge or hard work can bring to
fruitage in various ways.
Obstinacy consists in the pursuit of an object when one sees that its successful
attainment can not reasonably be hoped for.
The point of departure from this determination to persist in seeing things from
the wrong point of view nearly always rests upon a false process of reasoning.
One goes into such an enterprise thoughtlessly, discounting a hope that is
dissipated by the clear light of reason like a mist vanishes at the first hint
of a sunbeam.
There will often be plenty of time left to change one's determination in such
cases, but one becomes entangled by considerations which, in view of the
absolute hopelessness of succeeding, must necessarily lose all their value.
Nearly always is there an admixture of vanity in the matter. One does not like
to acknowledge that one is wrong and one does not take into account that in
persisting in one's error one is aggravating it more and more every moment.
Inertia also plays a part in the wrong-headed-ness of the obstinate.
To abandon their first attempt in order to undertake another is to their minds
merely to double the amount of effort that their will-power has already had so
much trouble to call forth.
They do not stop to consider that even the smallest step aside from the direct
road is a thing that they must inevitably regret sooner or later, for it leads
nowhere and can contribute in no way to the perfection of an enterprise.
The man who is satisfied with his own obstinate folly is like the man who tries
to cultivate a field filled with rocks.
All the seed that he confides to the care of the soil will he irremediably lost
and, what is far worse, he will also have been wasting his time.
Thus every moment of our lives that we employ in following fruitless ends is
part of an hour that we shall never be able to recapture and which, without
being of any help to any one, is lost for ever in the gulf of eternity.
But while the man of foolish obstinacy will continue his useless scattering of
seeds upon the granite, the man of perseverance, without attempting an
enterprise that his reason tells him will come to nothing, will think up some
means of making something out of these rocks.
When he has at last hit upon a plan, after carefully weighing all the pros and
cons in his mind, he will decide to put his idea into practice, difficulties
will not deter him and he will continue with courage and patience the work that
he has set himself to do.
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