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Music Trade Review -- © mbsi.org, arcade-museum.com
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REVIEW
THE
VOL. LXI. No. 4
H
Published Every Saturday by Edward Lyman Bffl at 373 Fourth Ave., New York, July 24, 1915
SING
SO C PER ES VEAR CENTS
OW training is reflected in the actions and utterances of men!
When a business man—a manufacturer—a banker or a merchant, rises at some public
function to deliver an address along specific lines he usually says something which is meaty
and straight to the point. It may not electrify his audience, but it appeals forcibly to the
reasoning sense.
When a college professor, or a strictly professional man, is down on the program for a speech,
he usually acquits himself in an easy, satisfied manner. His sentences are well rounded and punctu-
ated, his grammar and diction faultless, and yet, when you come to sift the speeches through a mental
process, or if they are placed in type and you go over them at your leisure, you usually become
convinced of the unmistakable meat and forcefulness in the one, that is the business man's, whose
address did not strike you at the time as being particularly good, while the other, the professional
man's utterances, which charmed you at the banquet, are invariably classed in your mind as imprac-
ticable and theoretical.
Thus the professions of the different types of men are clearly and unmistakably photographed
in their oral expressions, the business man dealing with cold facts, figures and sound logic, and the
other man dealing with theories, many of which could never be placed into practice to operate
successfully.
It shows how the different types of men follow certain ideals, the one developing simply through
the process of speaking and of addressing audiences, and the other speaking less but acting more,
and shaping his theories by practice either into success or defeat in business.
Simply a question after all of ideals, but reflected with unerring accuracy in the individual.
Actual success in life may come to the different types, but I could never understand how sober,
sensible business men can absorb with such avidity many of the theories of men whose entire lives
have been passed in an impractical atmosphere.
There are some students of mental problems who assert that we have within ourselves the
power to be anything that we will be. Whether this theory would stand the test of a final analysis I
have grave doubts, but there is undoubtedly a firm foundation of truth beneath it, and it is not at
all improbable that the weakness that might be displayed in its practical application would be due
to the individual rather than the principle.
Certainly there is ample evidence to show that the ideals we fix for ourselves govern to a large
degree the ends to which we finally attain.
The artist who paints a great picture has the ideal picture in mind and very clearly defined before
he attempts to put his brush to the canvas.
The architect who plans to construct a great building works out his ideal structure in all its
details before bids are passed out for the estimate of the contractor.
It is true that we may never attain fully to the ideal that we have fixed for ourselves, but this is
not infrequently due to the fact that our ideals are never stationary. Even those that seem the
noblest creation of the mind to-day may actually appear shrunken
within a year or two.
The fact is,, that our ideals to be effective must keep ahead of us,
and if they ever halt, then there would be little incentive for a man to
acquire further knowledge.