--- title: Improvement Era description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930. authors: - Brian, Douglas collections: - periodicals tags: - magazine - improvement-era periodical: Improvement Era volume: 24 number: 2 published: 1920-12 publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations publisher_place: Salt Lake City language: en type: magazine reference: 'Brian, Douglas, "Being Great," *Improvement Era* 24, no. 2 (December 1920): 93–94.' source: url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera2402unse 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: improvementera2402unse start_page: 93 end_page: 94 rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1920-12) source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera2402unse publication_year: 1920 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 1920, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright. --- # Being Great Being Great By Douglas Brian Every man longs to be great in one way or another. I do not mean famous — the words are often confused. But great- ness, true greatness is desirable to every man. It requires three things to attain greatness: talent, opportunity and work. I do not believe that a man ever was, is now, or ever will be, born without talent. I believe that|every man can do some one thing better than his fellows. It may be that the oulaw dis- plays the same native shrewdness and bravery that marks a Washington or a Pershing. Perhaps the boisterous rowdyism of the ruffian, if properly directed, would prove to be the raw material of which the manly force and power of a Roosevelt was made. It is not the lack of talent but the lack of development that handicaps us. Talent, without the opportunity to display it, is useless. Gray says: "Full many a flower is born to blush unseen And waste its sweetness on the desert air." That is true but, I fear, too m^any of them were "flowers" for whom God had provided a way to walk from the desert to a place in the hearts of men held only by those who serve. Opportunity conies but once and that is, not when you are fostered by a king or nestled beneath the wing of a great man, but when you say, or fail to say, J will! And now comes work. Ah, that is the stumbling-block. Patience, perseverence, service and many other things are step- ping stones to greatness but they all involve good, hard, solid work of some kind or another. That is the thing we toss about like a leaf on the billows. We justify our neglect of it in many ways. Some have poor health — some have enough talent to make work unnecessary — some are waiting for the opportunity to work but, fool ourselves as we may, the work is there and must be done. And so I say. Find and develop the talent which you have. Say / will with a determination and fervor that will stem the full, tide of discouragement and opposition. Then work, my friends, and you 11 be great. Ogden, Utah. From the painting by Halsell, now in Plymouth Hall THE "MAYFLOWER" IN PLYMOUTH HARBOR The vessel in which the Pilgrim Fathers, the first colonists in New England, sailed to America, in 1620. It was a vessel of 180 tons, a mere barque compared with the present leviathans of the seas. The Mayflower set sail from South Hampton, Eng- land, August 5, in company with the Speedwell, her sister ship. The courage of the captain and crew of the latter vessel failed, and both ships returned to port. On September 6, the May- flower alone set sail, with forty-one men and their families aboard, 102 persons in all. During sixty-seven days of stormy voyage, they succeeded in crossing the Atlantic, and landed at Plymouth, Massachusetts, at a point where Plymouth Rock, a huge granite boulder, stands, at the water's edge, on December 21, 1620. A complete and authentic list of the forty-one heads of families is printed in Professor Lewis' article; and besides these and their families, there were fifteen male servants as follows: Carter, Coper, Ely, Holbeck, Hookie, Langemore, Latham, Minter, Moore, Power, Sampson, Story, Thompson, Trevor, and Wilder.