Self-Help
Essay # 1
God helps those who help themselves” is an old authentic saying. It carries the message of self-help. Those who help themselves are surely helped by the Lord. Those who want others to work for them often suffer One who is ready to do everything himself makes others do everything for you efficiently and generously. The habit of self-help takes a person from one success to another He never fails and his every mission is accomplished His face always shines in glory.
He who looks to others always for some favour or the other, can never get self-confidence. He is dependent on others. He is handicapped. He is crippled. He lacks conviction. He is wanting in every job. The wheel of his life is always jammed, never moving. If others come to his help, only then is he able to break the sod, otherwise, his progress is stationary, never in the gear. To keep the wheel of life always moving and in time, it is essential to be self-supporting, standing on one’s own feet. Why wait for crutches and other’s support?
By self-help we mean helping one-self with one’s own hands, utilizing all resources, at one’s command. One can move mountains single-handedly if one has the aptitude and courage. There are people who by their constant toil and effort obtain all the comforts of life, wealth, properties, business, power, and everything. They call themselves, “self-made”. And there are others who are not able to make proper use of all the available resources and wealth left for them by their parents. They, simply by lacking initiatives, ruin the empire inherited by them and end in shambles.
Self-help is a reward in itself. It is always accompanied by a satisfaction which keeps them always upright and going.
Self-help
Essay # 2
In this country, it seems to be the habit to expect the Government to do everything. Government must encourage industry, develop agriculture, develop trade, organize and pay for education, supply and maintain hospitals and dispensaries. It was the Government which built the Indian railways and the great irrigation canals. And, whereas in Germany, it was a poor man who started the co-operative credit banks, which were worked by the people themselves, in India, in the absence of any private philanthropist, the Government had to shoulder the burden of starting and supervising the co-operative credit societies.
In England and the USA, all these activities have been entirely carried on by private enterprises, without government help. England’s great industries (such as cotton, wool, iron and steel, coal-mining, shipbuilding, etc.), and her worldwide commerce, have all been built up by the capital, industry, and enterprise of private citizens. There is not a government railway; all belong to private companies. The great hospitals are supported by public subscriptions and managed by voluntary committees. And up to fifty years ago, all the education of the country was given in private schools and colleges: and even now, a large number of the educational institutions are private. The people themselves, without government help or guidance, have made their country the rich and powerful and the advanced country she is today.
No nation can advance far unless its citizens have the qualities of energy and enterprise, and the virtues of self-reliance, honesty, industry, perseverance, and moral courage. Men of this stamp help themselves. They don’t wait until somebody comes along and carries them: they walk on their own feet, and so hold their heads up, independent and self-reliant. They are in the best sense of the term, self-made men. And God helps those who help themselves.
