be fit for work, but to be superfit for play. He sees the means and the
end through an inverted telescope. The story books always tell us that
the Rowing Blue finishes up as a High Court Judge.

The truth is very different. The career of sport leads only to failure,
satiety, or impotence.

The hero of the playing fields becomes the dunce of the office. Other
men go on playing till middle-age robs them of their physical powers. At
the end the whole thing is revealed as vanity. Play tennis or golf once
a day and you may be famous; play it three times a day and you will be
in danger of being thought a professional--without the reward.

The pursuit of pleasure is equally ephemeral. Time and experience rob
even amusement of its charm, and the night before is not worth next
morning's headache. Practical success alone makes early middle-age the
most pleasurable period of a man's career. What has been worked for in
youth then comes to its fruition.

It is true that brains alone are not influence, and that money alone is
not influence, but brains and money combined are power. And fame, the
other object of ambition, is only another name for either money or
power.

Never was there a moment more favourable for turning talent towards
opportunity and opportunity into triumph than Great Britain now presents
to the man or woman whom ambition stirs to make a success of life. The
dominions of the British Empire abolished long ago the privileges which
birth confers. No bar has been set there to prevent poverty rising to
the heights of wealth and power, if the man were found equal to the