(_For the Mirror_.)
The most important advantages we enjoy, and the greatest discoveries
that science can boast, have proceeded from men who have either seen
little of the world, or have secluded themselves entirely for the
purposes of study. Not only those arts which are exclusively the result
of calculation, such as navigation, mechanism, and others, but even
agriculture, may be said to derive its improvement, if not its origin,
from the same source.
Where a cause is good, an appeal should be directed to the heart rather
than the head: the application comes more home, and reaches more
forcibly, where it is the most necessary--the natural rather than the
improved faculties of the human understanding.
Common sense is looked upon as a vulgar quality, but nevertheless it is
the only talisman to conduct us prosperously through the world. The man
of refined sense has been compared to one who carries about with him
nothing but gold, when he may be every moment in want of smaller change.
The grand cause of failure in most undertakings is the want of
unanimity. This, however, we find is not wanting where actual danger, as
well as possible advantage may accrue to the parties concerned. It is
whimsical enough that thieves and other ruffians, while they bid open
defiance to the laws, both of God and man, pay implicit obedience to
their own.
Aristotle laid it down as a maxim "that all inquiry should begin with
doubt." Whenever, then, we meet with mysteries beyond our feeble
comprehension, would it not be more rational to doubt the very faculty
we are employing--the capacity of our reason itself.
The most politic, because the most effectual way of governing in a
family, is for the husband occasionally to lay aside his supremacy; so
in public, as well as private life, that king will be most popular who
does not at all times exercise his full prerogative.
It would appear that there is a great sympathy between the mind of man
and falsehood: when we have a truth to tell, it takes better, if
conveyed in a fable; and the rage for novels shows, that we may not only
divert extremely without a syllable of truth, but truth is even
compelled to borrow the habit of falsehood to secure itself an agreeable
reception.
In our intercourse with others, we should endeavour to turn the
conversation towards those subjects with which our companions are
professionally acquainted: thus we shall agreeably please as well as
innocently flatter in affording them the opportunity to shine; while we
should acquire that knowledge which we could no where else obtain so
well.
What an extraordinary method of reducing oneself to beggary is gambling!
The man who has but little money in the world, and knows not how to
procure more without risking his life and character, must needs put it
in the power of fortune to take away what he has. Put the case in the
opposite light, it is just as absurd: the man who has money to spare,
must needs make the experiment whether it may not become the property of
another.
It is a mistake to suppose a great mind inattentive to trifles: its
capacity and comprehension enable it to embrace every thing.
The failing of vanity extends throughout all classes: the poor have but
little time to bestow on their persons, and yet in the selection of
their clothes we find they prefer such as are of a flaring and gaudy
colour.
Philosophy has not so much enabled men to overcome their weaknesses, as
it has taught the art of concealing them from the world.
That a little learning is dangerous is one of our surest maxims. If
knowledge does not produce the effect of ameliorating our imperfect
condition, it were, without question, better let alone altogether; it is
not to be made merely an appendix to the mind, but must be incorporated
and identified with it.
They who have experienced sorrow are the most capable of appreciating
joy; so, those only who have been sick, feel the full value of health.
By the expression "common people," is meant the man of rank as well as
the more industrious peasant; for in our estimate of men, the mind, and
not the eye, is the most proper judge.
Some men are, of course, more original thinkers than others, but all,
without exception, who hope to appear in print with any effect, must
first be readers themselves. It was said by Dr. Johnson, that more than
half an author's time was occupied in reading what others had said
concerning the subject he was himself writing upon.
Every man, in his more serious moments, must confess that he has done
few things in the course of his life he would not wish undone; and
experience must have shown him that the things he most feared would have
been better ihan those he most prayed for.
Vanity is our dearest weakness, in more senses than one: a man will
sacrifice every thing, and starve out all his other inclinations to keep
alive that one.
The man who trusts entirely to nature when he is sick, runs a great
risk; but he who puts himself in the hands of a physician runs a still
greater: of the two, nature would seem the better nurse, for she will,
at all events, act honestly, and can have no possible interest in
tampering with disease.
A great idea may be thus defined:--it gives us the perception of many
others, and it discovers to us all at once what we could only have
arrived at by a course of reading or inquiry.
We are told to place no faith in appearances, yet it will be found a
wiser course to judge from the human countenance rather than the human
voice: most men place a guard over their words and their actions, but
very few can blind the expression that is conveyed by the features.
To assist our fellow-creatures is the noblest privilege of mortality: it
is, in some sort, forestalling the bounty of Providence.
There is no doubt that memory, although it may be cultivated, is
originally a gift of nature; so, also, application must be regarded as a
natural endowment; for there are some men, however well disposed, who
can never bring themselves to grapple closely with any thing.
It has been suggested that man has no real necessity for clothing. All
other creatures are furnished with every necessary for their existence,
and it is improbable one nobler than them all should be left in a
defective condition: there are some nations, in severer climates than
ours, who have no notion of clothing; and, even in civilized life, the
most tender parts of the body are constantly exposed, as the face, neck,
&c.
It is the temper of a blade that must be the proof of a good sword, and
not the gilding of the hilt or the richness of the scabbard; so it is
not his grandeur and possessions that make a man considerable, but his
intrinsic merit.