Like Hogarth's good apprentice, it has made admirable use of its trade.
Its web, however frail, is really a marvellous production. It is
distinguished by beauty of design, fineness of texture, nicety and
sensitiveness of touch, reminding us of Pope's couplet--
"The spider's _touch_, how exquisitely fine,
Feels at each thread and lives along the line."
And when we add to this that the whole fabric is spun out of its own
body--a part of its very life--it is not difficult to see that the
spider's work must be of the finest order, and well worthy of the study
and imitation of every young apprentice.
Every lad in going forward to the work of his life should set up a high
ideal. In all that he does he ought to aim at perfection. Like the
spider's web, his work, whatever it is, should be a bit of
himself--steeped in his own thought and shaped by his own effort. He
may only be a weaver, but he must aspire to be a _good_ one--one who
plans as well as labours, and reads as well as plans. For in the race
of life, muscle is no match for mind, and skill will always outstrip
slovenliness--just as the great Goliath must go down before the alert
son of Jesse, and the pigmies of the African forest can easily outmatch
and out-manoeuvre the lion. Let every young life go and examine the
perfection of the spider's web, and seek to do likewise.