Chapter XIII Discouragements and Dangers
When to-day’s difficulties overshadow yesterday’s triumphs and obscure the bright visions of tomorrow—
When plans upset, and whole years of effort seem to crystallize into a single hour of concentrated bitterness—
When little annoyances eat into the mind’s very quick, and corrode the power to view things calmly—
When the jolts of misfortune threaten to jar loose the judgment from its moorings—
Remember that in every business, in every career, there are valleys to cross, as well as hills to scale, that every mountain range of hope is broken by chasms of discouragement through which run torrent streams of despair!
To quit in the chasms is to fail. See always in your mind’s eye those sunny summits of success!
Don’t quit in the chasm! Keep on!”
—System.
A careful study of the histories of great inventors and inventions impresses the student most forcibly with the glaring fact that while the field of invention offers, and has paid, fabulously large rewards to the fortunate genius who invents or discovers some really new device or idea, it also is a field full of discouragements, dangers and heart-breaking delays, disappointments and unfulfilled hopes, to say nothing of time and energy utterly wasted by misguided zeal and misdirected effort. We need to look at the matter from all angles, and study to avoid the pitfalls and dangers history unerringly points out to us, as well as learn thoroughly the lesson so dearly bought for us by the noble men and women in the army of inventors who have gone before.
The following table shows the startlingly large totals of Patents and Re-issues issued by the United States Government since the year 1837, up to last year, 1908:
| 1837 | 435 | 1855 | 2013 | 1873 | 12864 | 1891 | 23244 |
| 1838 | 520 | 1856 | 2505 | 1874 | 13599 | 1892 | 23559 |
| 1839 | 425 | 1857 | 2896 | 1875 | 14837 | 1893 | 23769 |
| 1840 | 473 | 1858 | 3710 | 1876 | 15595 | 1894 | 20867 |
| 1841 | 495 | 1859 | 4538 | 1877 | 14187 | 1895 | 22057 |
| 1842 | 517 | 1860 | 4819 | 1878 | 13444 | 1896 | 23373 |
| 1843 | 519 | 1861 | 3340 | 1879 | 13213 | 1897 | 23794 |
| 1844 | 497 | 1862 | 3521 | 1880 | 13947 | 1898 | 22267 |
| 1845 | 503 | 1863 | 4170 | 1881 | 16584 | 1899 | 25527 |
| 1846 | 638 | 1864 | 5020 | 1882 | 19267 | 1900 | 26499 |
| 1847 | 569 | 1865 | 6616 | 1883 | 22383 | 1901 | 27373 |
| 1848 | 653 | 1866 | 9450 | 1884 | 20413 | 1902 | 27886 |
| 1849 | 1077 | 1867 | 13015 | 1885 | 24233 | 1903 | 31699 |
| 1850 | 993 | 1868 | 13378 | 1886 | 22508 | 1904 | 30934 |
| 1851 | 872 | 1869 | 13986 | 1887 | 21477 | 1905 | 30399 |
| 1852 | 1019 | 1870 | 13321 | 1888 | 20506 | 1906 | 31965 |
| 1853 | 961 | 1871 | 13033 | 1889 | 24158 | 1907 | 36620 |
| 1854 | 1844 | 1872 | 13590 | 1890 | 26292 | 1908 | 32757 |
The United States Government has issued, approximately, 900,000 PATENTS. When we compare the number of patents that have proven to be commercial successes (in other words, money-makers), how pitifully small the list is by comparison! How many “blasted hopes,” vanishing “air castles”; how much poverty, how many wrecked homes, how many suicides (but why prolong this list?) are represented by those Letters Patent that did not win! Why did they fail? The seal was just as red, the ribbon just as blue, they cost just as much, the drawings were just as clear—then why did they fail?
For one, any or all of the following reasons:
1. The claims were weak.
2. The invention would not work.
3. The cost of manufacture was too great.
4. The idea was feebly patentable, but not sufficiently new or novel.
5. There was no demand for it.
6. The big fellows froze it out!
Or, to be exact, they failed to stand the SIX CARDINAL TESTS given elsewhere.
Don’t intend to “take up inventing,” as some men say, and expect to make a success of it, without any preparation, with little practical education, much less diligent study. You can’t do it, unless it be by merest accident! Look at history. She tells the story so that all can hear and heed it. Think of Edison’s perseverance, his all-night experiments, without food or drink, his life-long hard and unremitting effort. Picture George Stephenson’s disappointments; the silly opposition he met; his constant “if at first you don’t succeed, try, try again!” spirit! Think of John Fitch and his steamboat; Ottmar Mergenthaler and his linotype,—years of trial and study; remember Fulton and his “Clermont”; the Wright Brothers, Wilbur and Orville, working year after year, planning, perfecting, always at it! Success in invention is not “easy money.”—It does not consist of “thinking out an idea,” picking up a magazine or paper and reading a Patent advertisement “Free Report as to Patentability,”—“No Patent No Pay,”—“Send sketch,” etc., etc.; drawing a rough pencil sketch and forwarding it to the attorneys the inventor picked out; getting back a mysterious looking certificate done up in purple ink, seals, etc., purporting to guarantee that the idea is a patentable one, or he doesn’t pay a cent. Next he forwards from $40 to $50 and gets back the specification and claims (the claims “claiming” every thing above the earth, and numbering possibly twenty to fifty) for his oath and signature. Then the case is filed with the Patent Office. After waiting anywhere from six months to several years the attorney notifies him that his case is “allowed” (sometimes it is rejected, and he has thrown his money away), and will be issued upon payment of the final Government fee of $20, that is, of course, provided it has not run into an “interference.” If it has, it is to be regretted, as it may mean the loss of all the inventor’s money in fees and expenses, and the loss of his case in the end. But for the sake of the story we’ll say he gets his patent in a big, official looking envelope. He sees his name on it, the seal, the ribbon, the picture of the Patent Office, and his heart and head naturally swell with pride. But if he looks at it carefully, he will find the claims (and they are what count) consist of one big long paragraph of several hundred words, without a period in it, describing the exact or fancied construction, the protection in the claim being so restricted and limited in scope that a poor chauffeur could drive a sight-seeing auto through the alleged Patent without touching sides, top or bottom! The twenty to fifty claims were all rejected. Then what happens? He shows it to his family, friends, neighbors. He gets his name in the town paper. He is spoken of as an “Inventor.” Then he begins to wonder what he is going to do with it. He is dreaming possibly of millions, when it is not worth cents.
When his name appears in the Official Gazette he will begin getting circulars, cunningly worded letters, postal cards, etc., mentioning his wonderful (?) invention (it may be a new paring knife!) and saying that for any amount ranging from $1.00 to $30.00 the writer will be glad to sell the patent for any amount their fertile imagination may conjure up, always more than ample, but after the money is sent for “advertising,” “printing,” or what not, all signs of a sale absolutely disappear. (Don’t send any money to a firm to sell your patent unless they are known to be reliable and trustworthy, and don’t guarantee to do anything but treat you fairly and make an honest effort to sell it.) The safe and rational way is to test your idea thoroughly in advance of having it patented, and then you are practically sure of a sale.
Here is the moral: Some day he will wake up and find he might better have painted the house with the $65, or given it to his wife for a new dress. He will give up the idea of fame and fortune so alluringly set forth in the circulars sent out by some attorneys.
This is an every-day case one in the business meets with all the time. It is all wrong, but is only too true. Authorities state that 90 per cent. of the patents issued today are worthless from a commercial standpoint! Statistics appear to prove it, although it is hard to get at the real facts. The reader may feel that the author is trying to discourage inventors from entering the field. No. All that is intended is to show and point out the rational course to pursue in applying for Patents and endeavoring to be a success as an inventor. Volumes could be written on this subject, but the above will serve as an average example of blasted hopes and misdirected effort.
“Failure is only endeavor temporarily off the track. How foolish it would be to abandon it in the ditch.”
BRIGHT SIDE
The output of all the gold, silver and diamond mines in the world does not equal in value the profits earned from American inventions.
Probably between fifty and sixty millions of dollars have been, spent in procuring patents issued by the United States Government, on the basis that the average patent costs from $60 to $65, and there have been 900,000 issued. To show that patents are profitable, we need only recall the fact that almost twice this amount has been received in profits from several of them, namely, the Bell Telephone, for instance, or the Harvester, Sewing Machine, Telegraph, Phonograph, etc. Authorities on the subject are of the opinion that there are almost two hundred patents in force in the United States today that return profits of over one million dollars per year; several hundred that return half-a-million dollars profit; five or six hundred that return from $250,000 to $500,000 in profits; and an enormous number which return incomes of from $5,000 to $100,000 annually.
Inventive genius can exact the highest possible price, for its labor in the markets of the world. If you are a genius you cannot employ your time to better advantage than in endeavoring to improve methods at present in use, or invent combinations that will cheapen production, or discover new elements or combinations that will effect economic results. The history of inventions, poets, past and present, tell us that success is possible, if persistently pursued. Do not allow the dangers and discouragements that we must all meet with to dishearten you. As Longfellow so beautifully puts it:
“Be still, sad heart! and cease repining;
Behind the clouds is the sun still shining;
Thy fate is the common fate of all,
Into each life some rain must fall,
Some days must be dark and dreary.”