Goldfield Deep Mines Company of Nevada Pamphlet, page 1

GOLDFIELD DEEP MINES COMPANY OF NEVADA,GOLDFIELD, NEVADA.THE sum total of knowledge is the experience of the human race; in other words, the accumulation of small particles of knowledgegained by individual members of the human race, who might be properly termed "mental argonauts," possessed of the courage--the "guts," to use a vulgar but fitting expression--to venture into unknown fields, away from the beaten path or beyond the limits of a previously known sphere or spheres. Without such venturesome souls there would never have been human progress; in fact, but for them we, all of us, would still be primitive cliff-dwellers.The student attends school and college. Normally, he spends twelve years in obtaining an education, or, to be exact, absorbing the knowledge previously possessed by his tutors or embodied in his books. If he lacks initiative, he becomes simply a cog in the human wheel of life and passes to the Great Beyond an unknown among men. On the other hand, if the student be possessed of an intrepid spirit and ambition, his education has the better prepared him for the great battle of life, instilled in him self-reliance and eliminated all thought of fear or failure. Thus equipped mentally, he has no hesitancy in leaving the beaten path and standing alone in his particular field of human endeavor. For he has learned all the knowledge of that field from his tutors and books. To advance further and add to that knowledge he must of necessity formulate his own ideas and follow them, if only for experimental purposes. Only in such manner is human progress made and recorded in the pages of Time.Courage Essential to Success.IN SHORT, to make a personal application: When you have been worried or perplexed by problems in life, did you not experience a quivery feeling in the mid-section of your organism? And, nothwithstanding that quivery feeling, you have battled your problems, and won success? For want of a better word, let us call that determination to succeed "guts". And to win the battle of life, it is essential to have "guts" and plenty of them--the courage to take a chance. It is only those possessing that quality--will power--determination to win--who rise above the level of the common herd and attain the heights of life. Timid souls seldom reach such heights; all their lives they are plodders and must be content with the ordinary comforts and things of life.Were it not for the "guts" of courageous souls--in truth, gamblers with Fate--we today would not have--not even know of--electricity and its multitudinous benefits or any of the many other things that make life really worthwhile. Did you ever give serious thought to that indisputable fact? Speaking of electricity naturally calls to mind the late Thomas Edison, the wizard of electricity. Edison was a self-educated man and probably one of the world's greatest mental argonauts. He