Is Your Son Last in His Class?

Those who lag behind in their classes are not always failures in life...

Churchill's teachers said of him: he is a disorderly pupil of little intelligence...

Eisenhower never obtained his secondary-school diploma... Roosevelt failed at Harvard University... Edison was known at school for his mental absent-mindedness...

And Einstein was described by his teachers as "weaker than all his classmates."

In a quavering voice, its tones full of mockery, menace, and contempt, the father addressed his son, saying:

"How many pupils are there in your class?"

"Thirty-two."

"Thirty-two!... Ha, ha, thirty-two... Then tell me, who is the thirty-second in mathematics... Yes, who is he... who...?" (Silence.)

"Answer... Are you deaf?... Who is last in mathematics?"

(A stillness like death!)

"Well, what next... what... Lift your head!"

With the utmost slowness the boy's neck moved upward.

"Take your hands out of your pockets! And come forward."

The boy took one timid step, then followed it with another, more terrified than the first, toward his father.

"Look at me — I am no bogeyman."

"Do you suppose this business is going to continue in this fashion?"

(Silence.)

"Do you think your father is going to spend his life in hardship, working twenty-four hours out of the twenty-four cutting rocks, so that you can go on dreaming and staring at the crows?"

(Unbroken silence, interrupted by streaming tears, trembling limbs, and broken, unceasing sobs.)

"I am not asking you for tears but for diligence... When I was your age I was first in my class in mathematics; I was hard-working... Do you hear what I am saying??..."

xxxx

This play — the play of the scolding — is acted out painfully in all manner of homes at the end of every month, when the report cards carry home to the pupils' families the results of their month's work at school.

He is a son of my own day.

In this age of ours no one may detract from the family honor, and in the eyes of parents nothing invites shame and scandal more than failure in one's studies.

"Last, last, my boy. This persistence in failure will in the end make of you a vengeful cutthroat."

And yet!! Einstein, Edison, Churchill, Roosevelt, Eisenhower — all of them were at the bottom of their classes... but that did not keep them from succeeding in life.

Thirty-second and last.

They used to call him "the Red Fire" at the institute where he was enrolled, when he was in the sixth form, dragging the trains of disappointment behind him. Among his fellows he stood at a high degree of dullness; he passed his time in idle talk and play, and at the end of every month he received a hail of anger from his father, the engineer who, as he used to say, had gathered his livelihood from prizes of honor.

"I obtained the baccalaureate, and so did your two brothers, and you must follow in our footsteps. You may take ten years, but you will get it."

"Thirty-second and last."

At once the hall rang with laughter. But Jojo showed no concern beyond counting the flies and yawning. That was his rank in the sixth form, and it clung to him until the first form.

Once the teacher of Latin visited his father and convinced him that it was impossible for his son to go on in this state, which could never bring him to the rank of the diploma. And where was the harm in his having preferred the hobby of taking photographs to the difficult assignments and lessons?... He never obtained his diploma, but he became a brilliant photographer.

It happened once that his teacher was correcting some examination papers and came upon a blank sheet, and he knew at once that its owner was "the Red Fire" (the last in his class). He had always felt that this pupil was a stranger to the class, not only in his outward appearance but in his conduct. And the boy, too, felt it in his depths. The great failure that had accompanied him through his school life had led him to regard it as a real and natural thing, and he no longer cared what was said, or being said, of his poor understanding and behavior.

The hours of study according to the school program vexed him beyond what the mind can conceive. Ten hours of mathematics, as many of natural sciences, and as many again of German or English. The result was that he reached such a state of despair and despondency that he had to be seen by a doctor, and he was placed under treatment.

But this last-in-his-class, whom his father so often rebuked and whose comrades so often mocked that he could no longer find rest from anxiety — this failure who flunked his lessons, every one of them — we see him one day seated upon the chair of the professor of natural sciences.

"Buy him a microscope," said the teacher to Felix's father. The last of his class had begun to rise, and he started his new life where nature had prepared him to be.

He followed the logic of nature, and his success was dazzling where his failure had been great. A quick glance back at history shows us the truth of life's logic in its fullest form. Those who lag behind in their classes are not always failures in life.

Churchill was described by his teachers as the disorderly pupil, possessed of but scant intelligence, and for that reason he was consigned to military life.

As for Eisenhower, he left his secondary studies and was at a loss in choosing his profession. He entered the military academy — his entering it may well have been chance — but he did not graduate at a rank from which one could have foretold his future.

Roosevelt failed most of the examinations at Harvard University, and only with great pains did he manage to obtain his diploma in law. Edison, during the time he spent at school, was known for his mental absent-mindedness, and his diligence was middling.

Einstein was "the Red Fire" of his class, and most of his school reports carried the following remark: "Weaker than all his classmates."

These considerations should suffice to persuade parents to give up blaming their children when they learn their standing at school, for the unseen often holds in store a brilliant future for the last in his class...

The lessons of history are worthy of wonder — and sometimes of astonishment!!