The life of George Stephenson, railway engineer - Lighthouse ...

CHAP. XIII.] EXHORTATIONS TO PERSEVERE. 145
On another similar occasion, speaking before the same audi-
ence,* he observed that " all his life through -he had felt very
severely the want of education. He had set out in life with-
out much learning,—nay, he might almost say, without any at
all. Now, without education of some sort, it was scarcely pos-
sible for a man to succeed in any undertaking. But with a sound
a,nd comprehensive education, many an humble mechanic might
attain to the rank of civil engineer. Peeseveeancb was one of
the principal qualifications requisite on the part of any young man
who entered that profession. The civil engineer had many dif-
ficulties to contend with ; but if a man wished to rise to the
higher grades of that, or indeed any other profession, he must
never see any difficulties before him. Obstacles might appear
to be difficulties ; but the engineer must be prepared to throw
them overboard, or to conquer them. This was the course
which he had himself pursued."
These characteristic sentiments illustrate the man, and show
the fibre of which he was made. His views respecting the im-
portance of education were in him firmly-rooted convictions
and when he had an opportunity of speaking to young men, he
never failed to urge them. Since the time when, tending the
engine at the West Moor Pit during the night shifts, he had employed
his spare minutes in cleaning the pitmen's clocks and
mending their shoes, that he might save enough money to send
his boy to school, experience had only served to strengthen and
confirm them.
Mr. Stephenson accordingly steadily carried out these views
in the education of his son Eobert. For about three years the
youth attended Bruce's school, at Newcastle, one of the best
seminaries of the district, where he acquired the rudiments of a
sound education. It was expensive ; but the father did not
grudge it, for he held that the best legacy he could leave his son
was a well-nurtured mind. He encouraged him to read and
study for himself; and he made him, as we have seen, in a
measure the instrument of his own better education, by getting
the youth to read for him at the library in Newcastle, and bring
* Soirde of the Leeds Mechanics' Institute, 10th Septeniber, 1842; Mr.
Charles Dickens in the chair.
7
;