Probably the disposition to rest on our laurels is more than anything else responsible for the mediocrity of the individual and the slow progress of the race. Having accomplished something, most of us spend some time in admiring it and ourselves. It is characteristic of big men that past achievements do not hold their interest; they are concerned only with their efforts to accomplish still more in the future.
Henry Ford had built an automobile. His four years' work had been successful, and that little machine, scarcely larger than a bicycle, with its pulley-clutch, puffing little one-cylinder engine, and crude steering apparatus, stood for an epoch in human progress.
He might be pardoned if he had spent a month or two in self-congratulation, in driving the car up and down Detroit's streets and enjoying the comments of the men who had laughed at him so long.
But apparently it did not occur to him. He saw already a number of possible improvements in the little machine. He was as indifferent to the praise of other men as he had been to their ridicule.
After that one day of rest he resumed almost the old routine. When a few men at the Edison plant laughingly inquired how he was getting along with the great invention he remarked quietly that the machine was running; he had been riding in it already. Then at 6 o'clock he hurried home and out to the shed for the usual evening's work. He was trying to plan an engine which would give more power; incidentally in his odd moments he was working to improve the steering apparatus.
One imagines the incredulity, the amazement, that followed his quiet statement that the thing was actually running. The men at the plant began to drop around at the Ford place to look at it. They came doubtfully, prepared either to laugh or to be convinced. After they had examined the engine and looked over the transmission and steering gear they went away still hesitating between two conclusions.
"It works, all right," they said. "There's no question the blamed thing runs. How do you suppose he ever happened to stumble onto the idea? But where's he going to get the capital to manufacture it? After all, there won't be much of a market--a few rich fellows'll buy it, probably, for the novelty. After all, you can't make a machine that will do the work of horses to any great extent."