The Turning Point Of My Life

Chapter I

If I understand the idea, the BAZAR invites several of us to
write upon the above text. It means the change in my life's
course which introduced what must be regarded by me as the most
IMPORTANT condition of my career. But it also implies--without
intention, perhaps--that that turning-point ITSELF was the
creator of the new condition. This gives it too much
distinction, too much prominence, too much credit. It is only
the LAST link in a very long chain of turning-points commissioned
to produce the cardinal result; it is not any more important than
the humblest of its ten thousand predecessors. Each of the ten
thousand did its appointed share, on its appointed date, in
forwarding the scheme, and they were all necessary; to have left
out any one of them would have defeated the scheme and brought
about SOME OTHER result. It know we have a fashion of saying
"such and such an event was the turning-point in my life," but we
shouldn't say it. We should merely grant that its place as LAST
link in the chain makes it the most CONSPICUOUS link; in real
importance it has no advantage over any one of its predecessors.

Perhaps the most celebrated turning-point recorded in
history was the crossing of the Rubicon. Suetonius says:

Coming up with his troops on the banks of the Rubicon, he
halted for a while, and, revolving in his mind the importance of
the step he was on the point of taking, he turned to those about
him and said, "We may still retreat; but if we pass this little
bridge, nothing is left for us but to fight it out in arms."

This was a stupendously important moment. And all the
incidents, big and little, of Caesar's previous life had been
leading up to it, stage by stage, link by link. This was the
LAST link--merely the last one, and no bigger than the others;
but as we gaze back at it through the inflating mists of our
imagination, it looks as big as the orbit of Neptune.

You, the reader, have a PERSONAL interest in that link, and
so have I; so has the rest of the human race. It was one of the
links in your life-chain, and it was one of the links in mine.
We may wait, now, with baited breath, while Caesar reflects.
Your fate and mine are involved in his decision.

While he was thus hesitating, the following incident
occurred. A person remarked for his noble mien and graceful
aspect appeared close at hand, sitting and playing upon a pipe.
When not only the shepherds, but a number of soldiers also,
flocked to listen to him, and some trumpeters among them, he
snatched a trumpet from one of them, ran to the river with it,
and, sounding the advance with a piercing blast, crossed to the
other side. Upon this, Caesar exclaimed: "Let