Note: Images of the original pages are available through Internet

E
 M. S
.
Edwin M. Stanton, whom President Lincoln selected for his Secretary of
War, notwithstanding the fact that he had served in the cabinet of Buchanan,
was born at Steubenville, Ohio, December 19th, 1814, and died in
Washington, D. C., December 24th, 1869.
When fifteen years old he became a clerk in a book-store in his native
town, and with money thus accumulated, was enabled to attend Kenyon
College, but at the end of two years was obliged to re-enter the book-store
as a clerk.
Thus through poverty he was deterred from graduating, but knowledge is
just as beneficial, whether acquired in school or out. Thurlow Weed never
had the advantages of a college, but stretched prone before the sap-house
fire, he laid the foundation upon which he built that splendid reputation as
an able editor; Elihu Buritt never saw the inside of a college school-room as
a student, but while at the anvil, at work as a blacksmith, with book laying
on a desk near, he framed the basis of that classical learning which made
him, as master of forty different languages, the esteemed friend of John
Bright and others of the most noted people the world has ever known.
As it was with them, so it was with Stanton. He had but little advantages,
but he would not 'down.' It is said that if Henry Ward Beecher had gone to
sea, as he desired to do, he would not have long remained, for in him was
even then a 'slumbering genius,' But he himself once said that had it not
been for his great love of work he never could have half succeeded. Ah,
that's it; if ability to accomplish hard 'digging' is not genius, it is the best
possible substitute for it. A man may have in him a 'slumbering genius,' but
unless he put forth the energy, his efforts will be spasmodic, ill-timed and
scattered.
"Full many a gem, of purest ray serene

---

The dark, unfathomed caves of ocean bear;
Full many a flower is born to blush unseen,
And waste its sweetness on the desert air."
Young men, there is truth hidden in these words, despite what some
writers would make you think. They would argue that if you are to be a
Milton, a Cromwell, a Webster, or a Clay, that you cannot help it, do what
you will. Possibly, this may be so; it may not be thought proper for me to
dispute their lordship, but it does seem to me that such arguments can give
but little hope; if they have influence at all it cannot be an inspiring one.
No, never mind the reputation; never pine to be a Lincoln, or a Garfield, but
if you feel that your chances in youth are equal to theirs, take courage—
WORK.
If you are a farmer strive to excel all the surrounding farmers. If a boot-
black, make up your mind to monopolize the business on your block.
Faculty to do this is the 'best possible substitute for a slumbering genius,' if
perchance you should lack that 'most essential faculty to success.' At any
rate, never wait for the 'slumbering genius' to show itself,—if you do, it will
never awake but slumber on through endless time, and leave you groping on
in midnight darkness.
But to return to Stanton. Whether he possessed a 'slumbering genius' does
not appear, but certain it is that by down-right 
he gained a
knowledge of the law, and was admitted to the bar in 1836, when in his
twenty-first year. While yet a young lawyer he was made prosecuting
attorney of Harrison county. In 1842 he was chosen reporter of the Ohio
Supreme Court, and published three volumes of reports.
In 1847 he moved to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, but for nine years
afterward retained his office in Steubenville, as well as that in Pittsburgh. In
1857 his business had so expanded that he found it necessary to move to
Washington, D. C., the seat of the United States Supreme Court. His first
appearance before the United States Supreme Court was in defence of the
State of Pennsylvania against the Wheeling and Belmont Bridge Company,
and thereafter his practice rapidly increased.

---

In 1858 he was employed by the national government as against the
government of Mexico on land titles, deeds, etc. This great legal success,
together with several others, won for him a national reputation. It has been
stated by one of the leading jurists in the United States that the cause of
nine out of ten of the failures in the legal profession is laziness, so common
in lawyers, after being admitted to the bar. Once in, they seem to think that
they have but to 'sit and wait' for business. Possibly their eye has, at one
time or another, caught those sentiments so dear to some writers in regard to
'the slumbering genius.' Be that as it may, it is very evident that Stanton had
never been idle, and was seldom obliged to 'refer to his library' before
answering questions in relation to the law.
He was called to the high position of attorney-general in President
Buchanan's cabinet, and on January 11th, 1862, nine months after the
inauguration of Lincoln, he was placed in the most responsible position in
his cabinet at that time,—Secretary of War. His labors in this department
were indefatigable, and many of the most important and successful
movements of the war originated with him. Never, perhaps, was there a
more illustrious example of the right man in the right place. It seemed
almost as if it were a special Provincial interposition to incline the President
to go out of his own party and select this man for this most responsible of
all trusts, save his own.
With an unflinching force, an imperial will, a courage never once
admitting the possibility of failure, and having no patience with cowards,
compromisers or self-seekers; with the most jealous patriotism he displaced
the incompetent and exacted brave, mighty, endeavor of all, yet only like
what he 
. He reorganized the war with H
. Through all those long years of war he thought of, saw, labored for
one end—
. The amount of work he does in some of these critical
months was