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Show 1 1 Dorothy Dix Talks I GET YOUR OWN NUMBER. r; By DOROTHY DIX, the World's Highest Paid Woman Writer ' of lone ago a famous little com- n.cdienne died, and ii was said by those f n-hn knew ho best that he died bro- Yen hearted ; n 1 disappointed because eYif had never been able to realize bei ambition of becoming a second Bern F Jiardt She had studied, and toill I I and sacrificed, trying to do the thins I (hat nature never intended her to dp, and because she had failed at achlei jnc 'he impossible, all of her success v3r; as chist and ashes in her teeth. It gave one a little throb of pitv to think of a woman who cot no pleas 1 turc out of making people laugh because be-cause she wanted to make them cry, find who hated hf r own dainty little figure and saucy piquant face, because Tjhe could never turn them into 'he For in all the world there is nothing more pathetic than misdirected ambition, ambi-tion, (he fi-antir reaching out for SOme- thine we can never get. the futile tgtrucplc towards a goal that we shall I never reach It means so much wasted I effort, bo much fruitless work, so many blasted dream-- and dear hope-; i h - ' barre wreck of so many lies that, would be full of successful achleve-pinent, achleve-pinent, ami prosperity, and happiness, E Jf only men and women would find Lout 'he 'hing they are capable of -lo-jnp. and to do if. instead of wasting t the years In trying to do the thine. they can never do And those of us who Ihe in large cities, see this tragedy of the near genius so often. We see the gr who has the sweet little ' furp, w hich w ould have enabled her to have made a good living at home by teaching music, and singing in the village choir and giving an occasional oc-casional concert if only she had been satisfied to do the things she could do Bui she was not She aspired to be a prand opera singer So we have seen her go from high priced teacher to teacher who took from her ruthlessly the money that was blood money wrung out of her poor family back home. We have s-en her youth fade and her beauty go un der gruelling hours of nraetleine and Insufficient food, worn women who I s'riS for their dinners in cheap cabar- I ' ets while thej loot vainly for the con-j veil position they never get Anil we see the men and women with 1 a little talent for writing who Btarve along. ear after year, in dreary hall bedrooms, while they haunt the offf-CSS offf-CSS of magazines, and newspapers, and j theatrical managers with the stories and that are not quite good enough to be accepted How hard these unsuccessful authors au-thors work, what incredible hours thev labor, what swear and blood they put I into their effort, none but ther Clod can know At the loneliness they en dure, at the priaions they through, I. u the sacrifices Of of all" that make-; life worth livlne that they offrr up in the altar of their mistaken ambt tions, and at the uselessness of all 'their sufferings, the very angels mu?t weep. Kor if the had used only a tithe of 'the intelligence and industry in doing do-ing the thing that they could ha e done, tha' they put In in doing the fhlng they can never do, they would ha e made brilliant auccesse? And we see people who can draw a little and pain a little, and who have an eve for roior and form, who could make fortunes if they applied their small talents to commercial lines, who waste the whole of their lives, and grow into bitter and disgruntled failures, fail-ures, trying in vain to be Whistlers and Inncsse? I nd we come back again to the pity jof it all, and wonder at the folly of 'people who have not intelligence en-ought en-ought to take the measure of their own abllit, and work up to that Instead of deluding themselves with false estimates esti-mates of their talents For when all Is said, nature has set the limit to our achievements before ever we come into the world. As the homeh old proverb puts it, you cannot can-not make a silk puree out of a sow's ! ear Nor can you light the fire of I genius w ith our ow n hand. That is a task the gods themselves must have .performed. Though a man should study the art of writing from the time he was born until he was as old as Methuselah, it would not ghe him the brain of a Kipling. Through no ar. no skill, no labor, can a man create that mysterious something in the throat that makes a Caruso. We are as we are made, with our fixed limitations. We can go so far and no farther, and the wise thing Is to make the most of what we are, in stead of wasting DM strength and energy en-ergy in aspiring to the impossible it Is better to be a successful mechanic than an artistic failure, it is better tO make a loaf nf cnnH hrnoH -.v well designed frock than, to paint a dauby picture or write stories that won t sell. Ambition is the sin by which Satan fell, the poet says Certainly misdirected misdi-rected ambition is the first aid to failure fail-ure to a large number of men and wo I I men who would be successes if they would only cut their aspirations ac-( ac-( online to i heir ability Never was there more mischevious advice given than that we should aim at the stars, even if we only hit tho barn door. A bull's eye in the born door counts for more than a million scattering shots at the milk v way |