(The Four Cylinders of Successful Living)

When I began to plan for this occasion I began to ask some advice because I was anxious to make the best possible impression. As usual the first person I asked was Mrs. Cralle-(you know how that is). She said she didn’t know what I should talk about but not to try to appear learned, as you would think I merely got it out of a book. So there was one possibility gone.

Then I asked another friend who has had a great deal of experience in sitting out commencement speeches and he said "Talk about twenty minutes." So whatever I may say to you, you may be assured that it won’t last long. You may be heartened to know that I have somewhat the same idea of a speech as that of the eminent premier of England, Disraeli.

The story is told that on one occasion the queen was to visit an obscure town and would attend church service while there. The high church dignitaries were away and it devolved upon a young minister to preach the sermon for the queen. He was as anxious to make a good impression upon his audience as I am upon mine and he was told that Disraeli would give him some suggestions. Disraeli said, "If you should preach thirty minutes the queen would be greatly displeased; if you should preach twenty minutes the queen would be patient, but if you should preach only ten minutes the queen would be delighted. But," said the young minister, "what can one say in ten minutes?" "That, said Disraeli "is of not the slightest consequence to the queen."

A very great man once said on a very great occasion, "The world will little note nor long remember what we say here." He was mistaken, but I am sure I am safe in assuming that any words that I may say will fall far short of the greatness of the occasion.

Here in this graduating class is the culmination of many years of labor on the part of faithful teachers and years of sacrifice of devoted parents. Class of 1926, YOU are the real masterpiece of this occasion. I know something of the joy of parents and something of the feelings for teachers and friends. Some members of this class have already distinguished themselves beyond the walls of the school and others have established themselves in places of dependable leadership. I can imagine your superintendent, principal, and teachers wondering, as I have wondered on similar occasions, who will take the place of such-and-such in class this coming year.

Dr. Walter O. Cralle Department Head, 1929-1961

But it is not part of my mission here to paint the glories of your past achievements, however worthy they may have been.  With your permission I want to talk to this class of 1926 on the most commonplace topic imaginable. You might call it "Hitting on (all) Four," and I am going to draw my lesson from a plain little four cylinder car. I don’t know much about Packards or Pierce Arrows, but I think I know about everything that can happen to an old four cylinder car. And, after all, you know most of us are not Packards or Pierce Arrows; we’re just a little more or less dependable four cylinder cars after all. Did you ever take the old car down to the shop and tell the head mechanic to overhaul her? And after a time they told you she was ready and you pay your bill. The motor is humming prettily as you slip in the clutch and go rolling down the streets. It is springtime perhaps and the birds are singing in the trees and you can hardly hear the hum of that little old motor. The chances are you say to yourself, "Well, I certainly got my money’s worth that time."

You are full of the joy of life as you make for the open country and all is well. Finally, the road becomes dandy, the car is laboring, the engine is boiling and there is a hill ahead. About halfway up the hill the engine begins to miss - chug, chug, chug--chug, chug—chug—and dies, and the joy of the day is gone.

But you say what is the meaning of all this? It isn’t even funny - it’s almost tragic.  It is just this. I have seen many young people start out in a morning of life. Everything was beautiful; the elementary and high school had done their work and parents and friends joined in predicting a brilliant future. But when the testing times come they come limping home, discouraged. 

Few indeed are the lives that are destined to be lived out along the level read. The heights of success and of complete living are gained only by climbing hills that are steep and difficult. If you are to climb these hills you will have to be "Hitting on (all) Four," and I want very briefly to mention what I shall term the "Four Cylinders of Successful Living."

The first is a Strong Efficient Body

Not necessarily that you must be an athlete though I am a great believer in athletics. I mean a nerve that is steady, a hand that is sure, a body that is bubbling over with the joy of living.  I am keenly aware that some of the greatest minds of the past ages were associated with bodies that were almost never free from pain. Yet these succeeded because of a great mind and an indomitable will that no bodily infirmity could completely restrain. We are living in a very fast age. The speed is breath-taking, and he who does not inherit an iron constitution or care for it carefully is doomed to breakdown early in life.

The second is a Trained Mind

This is an age of specialization. Fifty or a hundred years ago it was possible for a great man to know something of the sum total of the world’s knowledge. Now he can barely hope to know more than a small part of the knowledge in one field. Indeed thoughtful men have begun to wonder if we have not already reached the stage where the mass of our social heritage is so great that only a limited few can comprehend it. Moreover the college has come into its own.

I can remember when college men were sneered at as impractical, not only as agriculturalists but in the industrial and financial world as well. The last ten years has seen an unprecedented demand in every field for college trained men who have been trained in clear thinking to devote their time to specific problems in agriculture or in industry. The beardless college boy on every hand is outstripping the “practical” man who has spent years at a specific trade.

A third essential is a Vision

Don’t be ashamed of your visions. I am reminded of that prophetic verse in the Bible, "Your old men shall dream dreams and your young men shall see visions." If the dreams of old age are to be filled with joy it will be because your visions have been worthy and you have pursued them with unfailing zeal.

Youth is generally filled with visions, but the trouble with most of us is that we are willing to sell our vision for half price or less. We find them difficult to attain and finally take the easier path. Let me tell you a little mountain climbing incident. I remember starting out one morning with a group of boys who were planning to climb Mount Mitchell-the highest peak east of the Rockies. The leader said "We will make the top before night." I said, "Well, I should hope so, it doesn’t look very far to me."

But you know the farther I climbed the more tired I became and the farther away that mountain seemed. The foothills are so deceptive. Many times I urged my tired body up what seemed to me to be the last climb, only to find that it was only another foothill after all and the summit was far in the distance. And then too there were times when the foothills loomed so high that we lost sight of the mountain completely. You know there are foothills of life and many a man has started out for the mountains and later contented himself with the foothills. Sometimes it it’s the foothills and sometimes the clouds that hides the goal. It is easy to get discouraged, but those who have really been successful in life have been the dauntless kind who ever struggled on.

And as I remember that evening we reached the top in time to have our supper and to witness the setting of the sun. As the last rays of that setting sun bathed the mountains in reflected glory and the peace that passeth understanding settled upon those everlasting hills, I was glad for I realized that the toil and the hardship of the day had been worth while. Methinks the end of life must be like that to those who have followed the gleam and amid the difficulties of life have never compromised with their visions.

The fourth and last is The Ideal of Service

One of the most damaging conventionalities we have in this modern day is that success is measured in terms of wealth. We who have to do with the education of youth are frequently unconsciously responsible for this in our tendency to glorify those who have been conspicuously successful in a financial way. We even justify a college or high school education by saying that every day spent in high school or college is worth at least ten dollars to the individual. We are in danger of forgetting that "A man’s wealth consisteth not in the things which he possesseth."

I am reminded of two men who lived and died very near to each other in the rural county in Kentucky where I was born. One was pointed out as our leading citizen. He had acquired what was for that time and place a great deal of wealth. He was respected as all successful men are respected but in his declining years he had no one whom he could really claim as a friend. He seemed to sense the insincerity of many who would claim to take an interest in him. At his funeral was a small crowd of the curious and his sons-in-law sat on the fence and speculated on just how much the old man had left.

The other man was a country doctor. He had never accumulated a great deal of wealth because most of his patients were poor. Yet his old white horse and his saddle bags were familiar figures on every country road in the county. No night was too dark, no weather too severe for him to respond to the call of distress. Many, many times he was never paid-many are the calls which he must have made for which he knew he would never be paid, yet at an age when most men have retired for life he was still trying to meet the demands upon him. He was known and loved by the entire county and when he finally came to die his remains were followed to the little country church by thousands of grateful friends, and when the last words were said there was not a dry eye in that vast audience for they all loved him. To so live is success.

Here then are the cylinders of success: a strong efficient body, a trained mind, a persistent vision, and an ideal of service to humanity.

At a risk of wearying you I want to carry my analogy a little farther. I have never known an automobile to be very successful in the mountains that did not have a dependable low gear. In the same way I have never known real and lasting achievement to be made by those who did not have the capacity for persistent plodding. Speed and freedom from vibration are very desirable attributes on the paved highways, but the car that climbs the mountain roads must be able to settle into low and plod.

If you have a mind so keen that you were able to go through high school with little study, and if you should do the same thing in college you will have been done an incalculable injury. I do not want to be listed among the critics of our present educational system. They are numerous enough, but I believe if there be a weakness in out educational system it is that we have gone so far in diluting and popularizing education to fit the average and the dull student that we have utterly failed to give the superior student that confidence in himself and that joy that comes from having finally surmounted a real difficulty. 

Class of 1926. I congratulate you on having come thus far on your educational journey. I have said very little about going on to college for in this good day it is taken for granted that every boy or girl who has a good mind and a strong body and has no one dependent upon them will go to college. You cannot afford to handicap yourself by doing otherwise.

There is a note of sadness in an occasion like this. When this, your first alma mater says to you, "Go, my son or daughter, I have done for you all I can do and you must now find your way into the larger life."

The school is indeed the Eternal Mother. In their youth she calls her sons and daughters to her bosom and after a few brief years of instruction and inspiration she sends them forth stronger and better equipped to fight life’s battles. The finest wish that I may wish for you is that all the hopes of this vast audience may be realized in you.

Return to History
The Department | Anthropology | Criminology | Sociology | Missouri State | Contact Us