“What’s bred in the bone will never come out of the flesh.”
Nature cannot by any art or labour be changed; she may indeed be
wrought upon and moulded by good council and discipline; but it is
in vain to attempt a total transformation of our genius, person, or
complexion: therefore our application, assiduity, and pains, when
wrong directed, are of no avail. We should, indeed, strive to discover
which way the bent of our genius lies, that we may apply ourselves
to a judicious cultivation and improvement of it; but we ought to be
sure never to thwart or oppose nature’s fixed laws. When men aspire to
eminence in any of the various arts or sciences, without being gifted
with the innate powers or abilities for such attainments, it is only
like attempting to wash the Blackamoor white.
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