ANOTHER STEP.
"What are you doing here, Nat?" inquired Charlie, one day, as he entered
the carpenter's shop where he was at work with his father.
"I am going to run a partition through here to make a new study for me.
Father has given me liberty to use this part of the shop."
"It will make a cozy room," said Charlie, "though it is a little lower
down in the world than your other study. It seems you are really going
to be a student and nothing else. You must look out that Mother Lane's
prophecies are not fulfilled," the last sentence being intended for a
sly appeal to Nat's good nature.
"I expect to do a good deal of work yet," replied Nat; "at least, I
shall be obliged to work until I find the way to wealth as plain as the
way to market. I shall study part of the time, and work the remainder."
At this time Nat had resolved to devote a larger portion of his time to
study, and labor only enough to pay his own way along, and provide
himself with books--a plan in which his parents cheerfully acquiesced.
He went on and finished off his study in his father's shop, and
furnished it as well as his limited means would allow. A table, two or
three chairs, his scanty library, and a couch on which he slept nights,
constituted the furniture of this new apartment. It was more convenient
for him to lodge in his study, since he could sit up as late as he
pleased, and rise as early, without disturbing any one.
Now he ceased to labor constantly in the machine shop, and worked at his
trade only a few months at a time, enough to support himself while
pursuing his studies. Occasionally he labored with his father, and
played the part of a carpenter.
Charlie was anxious to see the new study when it was completed, and he
availed himself of the earliest opportunity to look in upon Nat.
"Here you are, in a brown study. This is capital--I had no idea you
would have so good a room as this, Nat. Did you do all this yourself?"
"Certainly; have you any criticisms to offer? You look as if you hardly
credited my word."
"I guess your father was round about home," said Charlie, pleasantly.
"But he did not drive a nail, nor plane a board."
"A carpenter, then, with all the rest," added Charlie. "I suppose now
the library will be read up pretty fast."
"Not so fast as you imagine. I could never begin with you in reading
books. You have read two to my one, I should think."
"Not so bad as that; and it is a poor compliment if it were true, for
too much reading is as bad as too little, I expect. The difference
between you and me is very plain; _you_ read and study to have something
to use; and _I_ read for the pleasure of it."
"It is true," answered Nat, "that I try to make use of what I learn,
though I enjoy the mere pleasure of study as well as you do. But when a
person learns something, and then makes use of it, he will never forget
it. I might study surveying a whole year in school, but if I did not go
out into the fields to apply what I learned to actual practice, it would
do me little good; and it is so with every thing."
"There is a good deal of truth in that," replied Charlie; "but there is
a difference in the ability of persons to use what they acquire. Some
persons have a very poor way of showing what they know."
It was true that Nat did not gorge his mind by excessive reading. Some
readers can scarcely wait to finish one book, because they hanker so for
another. They read for the mere pleasure of reading, without the least
idea of laying up a store of information for future use. Their minds are
crammed all the time with a quantity of undigested knowledge. They read
as some people bolt down a meal of victuals, and the consequences are
similar. The mind is not nourished and strengthened thereby, but is
rather impaired finally by mental indigestion.
Coleridge divides readers into four classes. "The first," he says, "may
be compared to an hour-glass, their reading being as the sand; it runs
in, and it runs out, and leaves not a vestige behind. A second class
resembles a sponge, which imbibes every thing, and returns it nearly in
the same state, only a little dirtier. A third class is like a
jelly-bag, which allows all that is pure to pass away, and retains only
the refuse and the dregs. The fourth class may be compared to the slave
in the diamond mines of Golconda, who, casting aside all that is
worthless, preserves only the pure gem." Nat was a reader of the latter
class, and, at the same time, saved every gem for _use_. He had no
disposition to _hoard_ knowledge, as the miser does his gold. He thought
it was designed for use as really as a coat or hat--an idea that does
not seem to have entered the heads of many youth, of whom it may be
said, "their apparel is the best part of them."
It is as necessary to have a fixed, noble purpose behind a disposition
to _read_, as behind physical strength in secular pursuits, otherwise
what is read will be of comparatively little service. The purpose with
which a thing is done determines the degree of success therein, and the
principle applies equally to reading. Nat's purpose converted every
particle of knowledge acquired into a means of influence and usefulness,
so that he made a given amount of knowledge go further towards making a
mark on society than Charlie. The latter usually mastered what he read,
and he made good use of it, as the end will show, only it was done in
another channel, and in a more private way. He could not have made so
deep and lasting an impression on those around him as Nat, with even
more knowledge, if he had tried.
"What work are you reading now, Nat?"
"Burke's Essay on the Sublime and Beautiful," replied Nat, taking up the
volume from the table. "It is a splendid work."
"I never read it," added Charlie; "the title is so magnificent that I
never thought I should like it. _My_ head is not long enough for such a
work."
"You don't know what it is. It is one of the most practical and useful
volumes there is. It is not so taking a book for rapid reading as many
others; but it is a work to be _studied_."
"What is the particular use of it?"
"Its use to me is, the information it gives concerning those objects and
illustrations that have the most power over the hearts of men in
speaking and writing. I should think it must aid a person very much in
the ability to illustrate and enforce a subject."
"I suppose you are right," said Charlie, "but it is all gammon to me.
That is what helped you to illustrate and enforce the claims of our
Dramatic Society in the lyceum, was it?" meaning no more than a joke by
this suggestion.
"No; I never read it much until recently," answered Nat.
"Well, I thought you had some of the _sublime_ in that speech, if you
had none of the _beautiful_," continued Charlie in a vein of humor. "I
concluded that Burke might have helped you some, as I thought it hardly
probable that Nat did it alone."
"What do you think you should do, Charlie, if you had not me to make fun
of?" asked Nat. "You would have the dyspepsia right away. It is
altogether probable that I was made to promote your digestion."
"Very likely," replied Charlie, assuming a grave appearance. "I believe
they administer rather powerful medicine for that disease. But they say
you go to college now," and here his seeming gravity was displaced by a
smile. "When are you going to graduate?"
"About the time you know enough to enter," answered Nat, paying back in
the same coin.
Charlie was much amused at this turn, for his allusion to college was in
a jesting way, occasioned by the fact that Nat had obtained permission
to use the library of Cambridge College, to which place he frequently
walked to consult volumes. It was a great advantage to him, to enjoy the
opportunity to examine works which he could not possess on account of
his poverty, and such works, too, as the library of his native village
did not contain. It was quite a walk to Harvard College, but necessity
made it comparatively short and pleasant to Nat. Many times he performed
the trip to settle some point of inquiry, or compass some difficult
subject; and the journeys proved to him what similar walks did to Count
Rumford many years before. He, also, was accustomed to visit the
Athenæum in Boston, at this period of his life, where he spent some
pleasant and profitable hours. To many youth it would seem too great an
outlay of labor to make for an education; but to Nat it was a cheap way
of obtaining knowledge. He was willing to make any sacrifice, and to
perform almost any labor, if he could add thereby to his mental stature.
Often a volume would completely absorb his thoughts upon a given
subject, and he could not let it alone until he had thoroughly canvassed
it; and this was one of the elements of his success--a power of
application, in which all the thoughts were concentrated on the subject
before him. It was thus with Hugh Miller from his boyhood. As an
instance, his biographer relates, that, on one occasion he read a work
on military tactics--a subject that one would think could scarcely
command his attention--and he was so thoroughly controlled by the desire
to understand the military movements described, that he repaired to the
sea-shore, where he got up an imposing battle between the English and
French, with a peck or half bushel of shells, one color representing one
nation, and another color the other nation. Time after time he fought an
imaginary battle with shells, until he definitely understood the
military tactics described in the volume which he read.
Sometimes the perusal of a volume starts off the reader upon a career
that is really different from that which the book describes. By its
hints or suggestions, it awakens the powers to some incidental subject,
upon which they seize with an earnestness and devotion that cannot fail
of success. Thus, when William Carey read the "Voyages of Captain Cook,"
he first conceived the idea of going upon a mission to the heathen
world. There was information imparted in that volume, which, in
connection with the marvellous adventures and success of the great
voyager, fired his soul with the determination to carry the gospel to
the perishing.
Nat had such a mind, and difficulties rising mountain high could not
hinder him from examining a subject that absorbed his thoughts. A walk
of ten miles to see a book, the sacrifice of an evening's entertainment
at a party of pleasure, or the loss of a night's sleep, never stood
between him and the information he earnestly desired. His unwavering
purpose surmounted all such obstacles in the attainment of his object.