The Americanization of Edward Bok quotes

just as it is told here by the author of this book, who, in the efforts of his later years, has tried to carry out, so far as opportunity has come to him, the message of his grandmother:

"Make you the world a bit more beautiful and better because you have been in it."

The First Days in America

"Now, this world does not often present the condition of facts herein described.

Men entirely great are very rare indeed, and even Washington, who approached greatness as near as any mortal, found good use for the sword and the pen, each in its proper sphere.

"You and I have seen the day when a great and good man ruled this country (Lincoln) who wielded a powerful and prolific pen, and yet had to call to his assistance a million of flaming swords.

His autograph quest cost him stationery, postage, car-fare—all outgo. But it had brought him no income, save a rich mental revenue. And the boy and his family needed money.

He did not know, then, the value of a background.

He was thinking along this line in a restaurant when a man sitting next to him opened a box of cigarettes, and taking a picture out of it threw it on the floor.

"You know I am a doctor," he explained, "and this shop is my medicine.

I believe that every man must have a hobby that is as different from his regular work as it is possible to be. It is not good for a man to work all the time at one thing.

So this is my hobby. This is my change. I like to putter away at these things. Every day I try to come down here for an hour or so. It rests me because it gives my mind a complete change.

"No, my boy, I am not; but it does an old man's heart good to hear you say it.

It means much to those on the down-hill side to be well thought of by the young who are coming up.

"

"There are a good many of these every day," said Longfellow, "but I always like to do this little favor.

It is so little to do, to write your name on a card; and if I didn't do it some boy or girl might be looking, day by day, for the postman and be disappointed.

I only wish I could write my name better for them. You see how I break my letters? That's because I never took pains with my writing when I was a boy.

They love their books so much that they think it nothing short of sacrilege to mark up a book. But to me that's like having a child so prettily dressed that you can't romp and play with it.

What is the good of a book, I say, if it is too pretty for use?

I like to have my books speak to me, and then I like to talk back to them.

But to me that's like having a child so prettily dressed that you can't romp and play with it. What is the good of a book, I say, if it is too pretty for use?

I like to have my books speak to me, and then I like to talk back to them.

"Take my Bible, here," he continued, as he took up an old and much-worn copy of the book. "I have a number of copies of the Great Book: one copy I preach from; another I minister from;

"There's where St. Paul and I had an argument one day. Yes, it was a long argument, and I don't know now who won," he added smilingly. "

But then, no one ever wins in an argument, anyway; do you think so?

"You see," went on the preacher, "I put into these books what other men put into articles and essays for magazines and papers. I never write for publications. I always think of my church when something comes to me to say.

"There is always good in everything, I think," replied Phillips Brooks.

"A thing must be pretty bad that hasn't some good in it."

Then he stopped, and after a moment went on: "My idea is that the fate of Sunday newspapers rests very much with Sunday editors.

less serious and thoughtful and suggestive. Taking for granted the fact of special leisure on the part of its readers, it is apt to appeal to the lower and not to the higher part of them, which the Sunday leisure has set free.

Let the Sunday newspaper be worthy of the day, and the day will not reject it.

So I say its fate is in the hands of its editor. He can give it such a character as will make all good men its champions and friends, or he can preserve for it the suspicion and dislike in which it stands at present."

And in the laughter which met this sally Mr. Beecher ended with

"You see, it isn't always possible to broaden a man."

Mr. Beecher was rarely angry. Once, however, he came near it; yet he was more displeased than angry. Some of his family and Edward had gone to a notable public affair at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, where a box had been placed at Mr.

A few moments later he added:

"A proper dress for any girl or woman is one that reveals the lady, but not her person."

Edward asked Mrs. Beecher one day whether Mr. Beecher had ever expressed an opinion of his sister's famous book, Uncle Tom's Cabin, and she told this interesting story of how the famous preacher read the story:

"So hard to find just the right word," Stevenson would say, and Bok got his first realization of the truth of the maxim:

"Easy writing, hard reading; hard writing, easy reading."

On this particular occasion when Stevenson finished, Bok pulled out his clippings, told the author how his book was being received, and was selling, what the house was doing to advertise it, explained the forthcoming play by Richard Mansfield, and then offered the press notices.

And the amazing part of it all to Bok was how little merit there was. Nothing astonished him more than the low average ability of those with whom he worked or came into contact.

He looked at the top, and instead of finding it overcrowded, he was surprised at the few who had reached there; the top fairly begged for more to climb its heights.

For every young man, earnest, eager to serve, willing to do more than he was paid for, he found ten trying to solve the problem of how little they could actually do for the pay received.

He looked at the top, and instead of finding it overcrowded, he was surprised at the few who had reached there; the top fairly begged for more to climb its heights.

For every young man, earnest, eager to serve, willing to do more than he was paid for, he found ten trying to solve the problem of how little they could actually do for the pay received.

It interested Bok to listen to the talk of his fellow-workers during luncheon hours and at all other times outside of office hours.

the competition was negligible. There was no jostling. In fact, travel on it was just a trifle lonely. One's fellow-travellers were excellent company, but they were few! It was one of Edward Bok's greatest surprises, but it was also one of his greatest stimulants.

To go where others could not go, or were loath to go, where at least they were not, had a tang that savored of the freshest kind of adventure.

And the way was so simple, so much simpler, in fact, than its avoidance, which called for so much argument, explanation, and discussion.

He did not make of himself a pack-horse; what he undertook he did from interest in it, and that made it a pleasure to him when to others it was a burden.

He instinctively reasoned it out that an unpleasant task is never accomplished by stepping aside from it, but that, unerringly, it will return later to be met and done.

Obstacles, to Edward Bok, soon became merely difficulties to be overcome, and he trusted to his instinct to show him the best way to overcome them. He soon learned that the hardest kind of work was back of every success;

He soon learned that the hardest kind of work was back of every success; that nothing in the world of business just happened, but that everything was brought about, and only in one way—by a willingness of spirit and a determination to carry through.

He soon exploded for himself the misleading and comfortable theory of luck: the only lucky people, he found, were those who worked hard.

To them, luck came in the shape of what they had earned. There were exceptions here and there, as there are to every rule; but the majority of these, he soon found, were more in the seeming than in the reality.

"No, boss, no, dat's just it," returned Wash. "Don't want to learn nothing, boss," he said.

"Why, boss, I know more now than I git paid for."

There was one New York newspaper that prided itself on its huge circulation, and its advertising canvassers were particularly insistent in securing the advertisements of publishers.

He early saw the value of white space as one of the most effective factors in advertising; but this was a difficult argument, he soon found, to convey successfully to others.

A white space in an advertisement was to the average publisher something to fill up; Bok saw in it something to cherish for its effectiveness.

But he never got very far with his idea: he could not convince (perhaps because he failed to express his ideas convincingly) his advertisers of what he felt and believed so strongly.

More than any other single argument, this last point destroyed Bok's faith in the judgment of his friends.

He had had experience enough to realize that a man could not be buried in any city, provided he had the ability to stand out from his fellow-men.

He knew from his biographical reading that cream will rise to the surface anywhere, in Philadelphia as well as in New York: it all depended on whether the cream was there: it was up to the man.

Bok now consulted his business associates, and, to a man, they discouraged the step, but almost invariably upon the argument that it was suicidal to leave New York.

He had now a glimpse of the truth that there is no man so provincially narrow as the untravelled New Yorker who believes in his heart that the sun rises in the East River and sets in the North River.

He realized more keenly than ever before that the decision rested with him alone. On September 1, 1889, Bok wrote to Mr. Curtis, accepting the position in Philadelphia;

every one is benefited by the opposite implication, and the public will always follow the leader who comprehends this bit of psychology.

There is always a happy medium between shooting over the public's head and shooting too far under it.

And it is because of the latter aim that we find the modern popular magazine the worthless thing that, in so many instances, it is to-day.

and each year he raised the standard a notch. He always kept "a huckleberry or two" ahead of his readers. His psychology was simple: come down to the level which the public sets and it will leave you at the moment you do it.

It always expects of its leaders that they shall keep a notch above or a step ahead.

The American public always wants something a little better than it asks for, and the successful man, in catering to it, is he who follows this golden rule.

His psychology was simple: come down to the level which the public sets and it will leave you at the moment you do it. It always expects of its leaders that they shall keep a notch above or a step ahead.

The American public always wants something a little better than it asks for, and the successful man, in catering to it, is he who follows this golden rule.

First Years as a Woman's Editor

that every letter, no matter how inconsequential, should be answered quickly, fully, and courteously, with the questioner always encouraged to come again if any problem of whatever nature came to her.

He told his editors that ignorance on any question was a misfortune, not a crime; and he wished their correspondence treated in the most courteous and helpful spirit.

Step by step, the editor built up this service behind the magazine until he had a staff of thirty-five editors on the monthly pay-roll;

"Not at all, my boy," returned Mr. Blaine. "

Memorizing is simply association.

You associate a fact or an incident with a name and you remember the name. It never leaves you. The moment I saw you I remembered you told me that your uncle was secretary of state for the Transvaal.

… your request of a doctor, or a builder, or a sculptor, and there would be no impropriety in it, but if you asked either of those for a specimen of his trade, his handiwork, he would be justified in rising to a point of order.

It would never be fair to ask a doctor for one of his corpses to remember him by.

At another time, after an interesting talk with Mark Twain, Bok wrote an account of the interview, with the humorist's permission. Desirous that the published account should be in every respect accurate, the manuscript was forwarded to Mark Twain for his approval.

"For several quite plain and simple reasons, an 'interview' must, as a rule, be an absurdity. And chiefly for this reason: it is an attempt to use a boat on land, or a wagon on water, to speak figuratively.

Spoken speech is one thing, written speech is quite another.

Print is a proper vehicle for the latter, but it isn't for the former. The moment 'talk' is put into print you recognize that it is not what it was when you heard it; you perceive that an immense something has disappeared from it.

"No; spare the reader and spare me; leave the whole interview out; it is rubbish.

I wouldn't talk in my sleep if I couldn't talk better than that.

"If you wish to print anything, print this letter; it may have some value, for it may explain to a reader here and there why it is that in interviews as a rule men seem to talk like anybody but themselves.

I was not able at the time to look over the MS. and thought it safest to make a bonfire of it all.

I have always regarded a private and confidential letter as sacred and its publicity in any shape a shameful breach of trust, unless authorized by the writer.

I only wish my own letters to thousands of correspondents may be as carefully disposed of.

"

There are no _personæ non gratæ_ at the White House. I long ago learned the waste of time in maintaining such a class.

"

"My family is strongly Roman Catholic, but I am not.

Until I ask some favor the public has no claim to question me further.

"

Nevertheless, a reverse or two was due. Not that his success was having any undesirable effect upon him; his Dutch common sense saved him from any such calamity.

But at thirty years of age it is not good for any one, no matter how well balanced, to have things come his way too fast and too consistently.

And here were breaks. He could not have everything he wanted, and it was just as well that he should find that out.

He used every rung in the ladder as a rung to the one above. He always gave more than his particular position or salary asked for.

He never worked by the clock; always by the job; and saw that it was well done regardless of the time it took to do it.

This meant effort, of course, untiring, ceaseless, unsparing; and it meant work, hard as nails.

and when he did not like what he was doing he still did it as well as he could while he was doing it, but always with an eye single to the purpose not to do it any longer than was strictly necessary.

He used every rung in the ladder as a rung to the one above.

He always gave more than his particular position or salary asked for. He never worked by the clock; always by the job; and saw that it was well done regardless of the time it took to do it.

and, most pathetic of all, of men who having retired, but because of lack of inner resources did not know what to do with themselves, had become a trial to themselves, their families, and their communities.

Bok decided that, given health and mental freshness, he would say good-by to his public before his public might decide to say good-by to him.

So, at forty, he candidly faced the facts of life and began to prepare himself for his retirement at fifty under circumstances that would be of his own making and not those of others.

I am very glad to be associated with you, anyway. At first I doubted the wisdom of the plan, merely because I doubted whether I could give you just that you wished.

I never know what an audience wants: I know what it ought to want: and sometimes I can give it, or make it accept what I think it needs—and sometimes I cannot.

But the more I thought over your proposal, the more I liked it... Whether the wine will be good enough to attract without any bush I don't know;

The "best," while it means good writing, means also that it shall say something.

The most desired writer in the magazine office is the man who has something to say, and knows how to say it.

Variety requires that there shall be many of these writers, and it is the editor's business to ferret them out. It stands to reason, therefore, that there can be no such thing as a "clique";

… new angle on a current subject, whether in article or story—since fiction is really to-day only a reflection of modern thought—the foolish notion that an editor must be approached through "influence," by a letter of introduction from some friend or other author, falls of itself.

There is no more powerful lever to open the modern magazine door than a postage-stamp on an envelope containing a manuscript that says something.

No influence is needed to bring that manuscript to the editor's desk or to his attention. That he will receive it the sender need not for a moment doubt; his mail is too closely scanned for that very envelope.

some "return" stamps in the left corner, and all that the editor requires is there. The author need tell nothing about the manuscript; if what the editor wants is in it he will find it.

An editor can stand a tremendous amount of letting alone.

If young authors could be made to realize how simple is the process of "breaking into" the modern magazine, which apparently gives them such needless heartburn, they would save themselves infinite pains, time, and worry.

Nor must the young author believe that the best work in modern magazine literature "is dashed off at white heat." What is dashed off reads dashed off, and one does not come across it in the well-edited magazine, because it is never accepted.

Good writing is laborious writing, the result of revision upon revision.

The work of masters such as Robert Louis Stevenson and Rudyard Kipling represents never less than eight or ten revisions, and often a far greater number. It was Stevenson who once said to Edward Bok, after a laborious correction of certain proofs:

A readable, lucid style is far preferable to what is called a "literary style"—a foolish phrase, since it often means nothing except a complicated method of expression which confuses rather than clarifies thought.

What the public wants in its literature is human nature, and that human nature simply and forcibly expressed.

This is fundamental, and this is why true literature has no fashion and knows no change, despite the cries of the modern weaklings who affect weird forms. The clarity of Shakespeare is the clarity of to-day and will be that of to-morrow.

What the public wants in its literature is human nature, and that human nature simply and forcibly expressed. This is fundamental, and this is why true literature has no fashion and knows no change, despite the cries of the modern weaklings who affect weird forms.

The clarity of Shakespeare is the clarity of to-day and will be that of to-morrow.

Women's Clubs and Woman Suffrage

Bok sent a handful of these criticisms to Kipling, who was very gleeful about them. "I owe you a good laugh over the clippings," he wrote. "They were delightful.

But what a quantity of spare time some people in this world have to burn!

"

"No," and for the first time the pipe was removed for a moment. "

A critic is one who only exists as such in his own imagination.

"

He had the faculty of putting old wine in new bottles and the public liked it. His ideas were not new; he knew there were no new ideas, but he presented his ideas in such a way that they seemed new.

It is a significant fact, too, that a large public will respond more quickly to an idea than it will to a name.

This The Ladies' Home Journal proved again and again. Its most pronounced successes, from the point of view of circulation, were those in which the idea was the sole and central appeal.

It was the small author who ever resented the touch of the editorial pencil upon his precious effusions.

As a matter of fact there are few authors who cannot be edited with advantage, and it would be infinitely better for our reading if this truth was applied to some of the literature of to-day.

Bok had once under his hand a story by Mark Twain, which he believed contained passages that should be deleted. They represented a goodly portion of the manuscript. They were, however, taken out, and the result submitted to the humorist. The answer was curious.

The amazing part of the "show," however, was the American doughboy.

Never was there a more cheerful, laughing, good-natured set of boys in the world; never a more homesick, lonely, and complaining set.

But good nature predominated, and the smile was always uppermost, even when the moment looked the blackest, the privations were worst, and the longing for home the deepest.

The sad fact is that in all too many instances the average American business man is actually afraid to let go because he realizes that out of business he should not know what to do.

For years he has so excluded all other interests that at fifty or sixty or seventy he finds himself a slave to his business, with positively no inner resources.

Retirement from the one thing he does know would naturally leave such a man useless to himself and his family, and his community:

that no man can be wholly efficient in his life, that he is not living a four-squared existence, if he concentrates every waking thought on his material affairs. He has still to learn that man cannot live by bread alone.

The making of money, the accumulation of material power, is not all there is to living.

Life is something more than these, and the man who misses this truth misses the greatest joy and satisfaction that can come into his life-service for others.

There is no form of service more comfortable or so cheap.

Real service, however, demands that a man give himself with his check.

And that the average man cannot do if he remains in affairs.

They cannot seem to get the truth into their heads that as they have been helped by others so should they now help others: as their means have come from the public, so now they owe something in turn to that public.

No man has a right to leave the world no better than he found it.

He must add something to it: either he must make its people better and happier, or he must make the face of the world fairer to look at. And the one really means the other.

No man has a right to leave the world no better than he found it.

He must add something to it: either he must make its people better and happier, or he must make the face of the world fairer to look at.

And the one really means the other.

What really is idealism? Do one-tenth of those who use the phrase so glibly know its true meaning, the part it has played in the world? The worthy interpretation of an ideal is that it embodies an idea—a conception of the imagination.

All ideas are at first ideals.

They must be. The producer brings forth an idea, but some dreamer has dreamed it before him either in whole or in part.

The worthy interpretation of an ideal is that it embodies an idea—a conception of the imagination. All ideas are at first ideals. They must be.

The producer brings forth an idea, but some dreamer has dreamed it before him either in whole or in part.

Where would the human race be were it not for the ideals of men? It is idealists, in a large sense, that this old world needs to-day. Its soil is sadly in need of new seed. Washington, in his day, was decried as an idealist.

But he reaches his high estate by either of these roads only when he reads or travels to enrich himself in order to give out what he gets to enrich the lives of others.

He owes it to himself to get his own refreshment, his own pleasure, but he need not make that pure self-indulgence.

Other men, more active in body and mind, feel drawn to the modern arena of the great questions that puzzle.

No man can realize, until on awakening some morning he feels the exhilaration, the sense of freedom that comes from knowing he can choose his own doings and control his own goings.

Time is of more value than money, and it is that which the man who retires feels that he possesses.

Hamilton Mabie once said, after his retirement from an active editorial position: "I am so happy that the time has come when I elect what I shall do," which is true; but then he added:

Duty of some sort confronts a man in business or out of business, and duty spells "must." But there is less "must" in the vocabulary of the retired man; and it is this lessened quantity that gives the tang of joy to the new day.

It is a wonderful inner personal satisfaction to reach the point when a man can say: "I have enough."

His soul and character are refreshed by it: he is made over by it. He begins a new life! he gets a sense of a new joy;

that they have overstayed their time: they have worn out their welcome.

There is no satisfaction that so thoroughly satisfies as that of going while the going is good.

The friends of Edward Bok may be right when they said he made a mistake in his retirement.

As Mr. Dooley says: "

It's a good thing, sometimes, to have people size ye up wrong, Hinnessey: it's whin they've got ye'er measure ye're in danger.

"

but we had been in the United States only a few days before the realization came home strongly to my father and mother that they had brought their children to a land of waste.

Where the Dutchman saved, the American wasted.

There was waste, and the most prodigal waste, on every hand. In every street-car and on every ferry-boat the floors and seats were littered with newspapers that had been read and thrown away or left behind.

As a Dutch boy, one of the cardinal truths taught me was that whatever was worth doing was worth doing well: that next to honesty came thoroughness as a factor in success.

It was not enough that anything should be done: it was not done at all if it was not done well.

I came to America to be taught exactly the opposite. The two infernal Americanisms "That's good enough" and "That will do" were early taught me, together with the maxim of quantity rather than quality.

As a Dutch boy I was taught a wholesome respect for law and for authority.

The fact was impressed upon me that laws of themselves were futile unless the people for whom they were made respected them, and obeyed them in spirit more even than in the letter.

I came to America to feel, on every hand, that exactly the opposite was true. Laws were passed, but were not enforced; the spirit to enforce them was lacking in the people. There was little respect for the law;