--- title: Improvement Era description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930. authors: - Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations collections: - periodicals tags: - magazine - improvement-era periodical: Improvement Era volume: 2 number: 9 published: 1899-07 publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations publisher_place: Salt Lake City language: en type: magazine reference: 'Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations, "Notes," *Improvement Era* 2, no. 9 (July 1899): 704–705.' source: url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera29unse transcription: Transcribed from the Internet Archive scan of each issue (the item for each issue is named in the issue's own source); unnumbered advertising leaves are omitted, printed page numbers are kept as page markers. identifier: improvementera29unse start_page: 704 end_page: 705 rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1899-07) source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera29unse publication_year: 1899 note: The Internet Archive item metadata carries a blanket "© Copyright by Intellectual Reserve, Inc." notice. The library owner judged it inapplicable because this issue was published in 1899, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright. --- # Notes 704 IMPROVEMENT ERA. received with patriotic music, the ten thousand people arising as they entered, waving flags and handkerchiefs. Both the visitors spoke feelingly of their treatment by the people of Utah, and seemed much impressed with what they saw and heard. Every person who partook of the hospitality and spirit of fraternity manifest in the Monday evening reception and Tuesday evening banquet spoke in high terms of the power for social good engendered in them. On the whole the conference was a grand success and will inspire new zeal in the growing cause which may the Lord God richly bless. NOTES. Wendell Phillips said: "At the outset of life I asked God that whenever a thing was wrong it might have no power of temptation over me, and that whenever a thing was right it might take no courage to do it. And from that day to this, whenever I have known a thing to be wrong, it has been no temptation; and whenever I have known a thing to be right, it has taken no courage to do it." This prayer is worthy to be made by every soul. "A sort of universal genius or one who is equally or indifferently turned toward several different professions and arts is not likely to excel in any: although there may be some few exceptions, yet in general it holds, that when the bent of the mind is wholly directed towards some one object, exclusive in a manner of others, there is the fairest prospect of eminence in that, whatever it be. The rays must converge to a pointy in order to glow intensely." —Dr. Hugh Blair. Do not despise, either in manner or in fact, any human being. Learn all you can from everyone, and remember that your own weak points are just as weak as anybody's. And above all, be good-humored and keep your temper. Anger is weakness of fatuous folly. And don't imitate the weaknesses of great — NOTES. 705 men under the mistaken impression that they are the causes of greatness. A great man with great whiskers is a great man in spite of great whiskers.— From "Aphorisms for Young Men." It is not the best things— that is, the things which we call best that make men, it is not pleasant things, it is not the calm experiences of life; it is life's rugged experiences, its tempests, its trials. The discipline of life is here good and there evil, here trouble and there joy, here rudeness and there smoothness, one working with the other; and the alternations of the one and the other which necessitate adaptations constitute a part of that education which makes man a man, in distinction from an animal. The successful man invariably bears on his brow the marks of the struggles which he has had to undergo; and by his dignified calmness in the presence of a calamity is the outward evidence of the effect of those struggles upon his nature. Rear-Admiral George Dewey was officially notified by cable on March 3d that Congress had made him Admiral of the United States Navy. The title signifies a great deal more than most people suppose. It makes him rank relatively higher than any officer in the United States army, not excepting General Miles. There have been only two other full Admirals in the United States navy —David Glascoe Farragut and David Dixon Porter. Farragut was made Admiral on December 21, 1864, and on his death, in 1870, Porter became Admiral, the office dying with him in 1891. Dewey has made the jump from Commodore to Admiral in ten months. Both Farragut and Porter received an annual salary of $13,- 000. Admiral Dewey would have been retired by age limit in December next, but by the terms of the new law his active service is extended ten years. He holds the office for life and the grade will die with him. Dr. William Arnot: "The kingdoms of the world in these days pros, per or fail as they honor or despise God's word. Show me the land where the Bible is degraded and interdicted, and will show you a land I whose history is written in blood and tears; show me a land where the Bible is valued and spread, and I will show you a country prosperous and free. Number the nations over one by one, and see where property is valuable and life secure; mark the places where you would like to invest your means and educate your family; you will shun some of the sunniest climes of earth as if they lay under a polar night, because the light of the truth has been taken from their sky. Traverse the world in search of merely human good, seeking but an earthly home, and your tent, like Abraham's, will certainly be pitched at 'the place of the altar.' The map of the world is sufficient evidence that God is and that he has revealed his will to men."