Page:The Art of Helping People Out of Trouble (1924).pdf/246

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that often when success in helping a human being might be expected it is failure that is met with instead.

On the other hand, the changes that take place in people are greater than we realize. In our search for the dramatic we overlook the very strength of nature's workmanship. We expect a revolution and fail to see the far more certain, though more gradual, process of evolution. When we realize the handicaps under which the greater part of humanity labors; when we consider the close physical proximity in which most people live with one another, and the ignorance, and the malnutrition, and the lack of recreation, and the years spent in an unfavorable environment; the accomplishments of the weakest and poorest individual become colossal. It must never be forgotten that with life as it is to-day the greatest material achievement that most men can hope for is the bare support of a family on the margin of existence. It is only the person who is situated in especially fortunate circumstances, or who has very unusual combinations of native endowment and character, who can win the means of obtaining the cultural and æsthetic opportunities that add much of beauty and interest to life. The vast