The University of Hard Knocks   By: Ralph Parlette (1870-1930)

by

Ralph Parlette

The School That Completes Our Education

"He that overcometh shall inherit all things; and I will be his God, and he shall be my son" Revelation 21:7.

"Sweet are the uses of adversity; Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous, Wears yet a precious jewel in his head; And thus our life, exempt from public haunt, Finds tongues in trees, books in running brooks Sermons in stones, and good in everything." Shakespeare

Why It Is Printed

MORE than a million people have sat in audiences in all parts of the United States and have listened to "The University of Hard Knocks." It has been delivered to date more than twenty five hundred times upon lyceum courses, at chautauquas, teachers' institutes, club gatherings, conventions and before various other kinds of audiences. Ralph Parlette is kept busy year after year lecturing, because his lectures deal with universal human experience.

"Can I get the lecture in book form?" That continuous question from audiences brought out this book in response. Here is the overflow of many deliveries.

"What is written here is not the way I would write it, were I writing a book," says Ralph Parlette. "It is the way I say it. The lecture took this unconscious colloquial form before audiences. An audience makes a lecture, if the lecture survives. I wish I could shake the hand of every person who has sat in my audiences. And I wish I could tell the lecture committees of America how I appreciate the vast amount of altruistic work they have done in bringing the audiences of America together. For lecture audiences are not drawn together, they are pushed together."

The warm reception given "The University of Hard Knocks" by the public, has encouraged the publishers to put more of Mr. Parlette's lectures into book form, "Big Business" and "Pockets and Paradises" are now in preparation as this, the third edition of "The University of Hard Knocks" comes from the press.

Contents

SOME PRELIMINARY REMARKS The lecturer the delivery wagon The sorghum barrel Audience must have place to put lecture Why so many words

The University of Hard Knocks

I. THE BOOKS ARE BUMPS Every bump a lesson Why the two kinds of bumps Description of University "Sweet are the uses of Adversity" Why children are not interested

II. THE COLLEGE OF NEEDLESS KNOCKS, the bumps that we bump into Getting the coffee pot Teaching a wilful child Bumps make us "stop, look, listen" Blind man learns with one bump Going up requires effort Prodigals must be bumped The fly and the sticky fly paper "Removed" and "knocked out"

III. THE COLLEGE OF NEEDFUL KNOCKS, the bumps that bump into us Our sorrows and disappointments How the piano was made How the "red mud" becomes razor blades The world our mirror The cripple taught by the bumps Every bump brings a blessing You are never down and out

IV. "SHAKE THE BARREL" How we decide our destinies Why the big ones shake up and the little ones shake down The barrel of life sorting people How we hold our places, go down, go up Good luck and bad luck The girl who went up The man who went down The fatal rattle We must get ready to get Testimonials and press notices You cannot uplift people with derrick No laws can equalize Help people to help themselves We cannot get things till we get ready for them

V. GOING UP How we become great We must get inside greatness There is no top We make ourselves great by service the first step at hand All can be greatest Where to find great people A glimpse of Gunsaulus

VI. THE PROBLEM OF "PREPAREDNESS" Preparing children for life Most "advantages" are disadvantages Buying education for children The story of "Gussie" and "Bill Whackem" Schools and books only give better tools for service "Hard knocks" graduates Menace of America not swollen fortunes but shrunken souls Children must have struggle to get strength Not packhorse work Helping the turkeys killed them the happiness of work we love Amusement drunkards Lure of the city Strong men from the country Must save the home towns A school of struggle New School experiment