THE IDES OF FEBRUARY

The new year having been officially welcomed and speeded in unmentioned ways not sanctioned by the most orthodox Puritans, we turn again to work. One of the unfailing companions of the first week of January, as unfailing as shattered resolutions, is a grisly warning of the imminence of mid-years and possible disaster. With a hundred other Cassandra-like prophets we again raise our voice and give warning of impending destruction.

No man ever denied that enjoyment is easier than work, although no doubt less satisfying. Yet no man ever denied that success in anything, at any time, demands hard and consistent work. The choice of a month of leisure or a month of preparation has now come to every man. Even the most slothful blessed with an average college man's intelligence may yet retrieve himself by diligent work. Almost without exception men will decide to do as they have done, the diligent will increase their diligence, the idlers will sleep. For the latter, hopeless as the warning is, it is well to advise that the mills of the gods, however slow, grind exceeding small.

The Ides of February approach. They are ill only for the ill-prepared. The Ides of February, remember!