I entered upon the execution of this plan for self-examination, and continued it with occasional intermissions for some time. I was surprised to find myself so much fuller of faults than I had imagined; but I had the satisfaction of seeing them diminish. To avoid the trouble of renewing now and then my little book, which, by scraping out the marks on the paper of old faults to make room for new ones in a new course, became full of holes, I transferred my tables and precepts to the ivory leaves of a memorandum book, on which the lines were drawn with red ink, that made a durable stain, and on those lines I marked my faults with a black lead pencil, which marks I could easily wipe out with a wet sponge. After a while I went through one course only in a year, and afterwards only one in several years, till at length I omitted them entirely, being employed in voyages and business abroad, with a multiplicity of affairs that interfered; but I always carried my little book with me.

My scheme of Order gave me the most trouble; and I found that, though it might be practicable where a man's business was such as to leave him the disposition of his time, that of a journeyman printer, for instance, it was not possible to be exactly observed by a master, who must mix with the world, and often receive people of business at their own hours. Order, too, with regard to places for things, papers, etc., I found extremely difficult to acquire. I had not been early accustomed to it, and, having an exceeding good memory, I was not so sensible of the inconvenience attending want of

method. This article, therefore, cost me so much painful attention, and my faults in it vexed me so much, and I made so little progress in amendment, and had such frequent relapses, that I was almost ready to give up the attempt, and content myself with a faulty character in that respect, like the man who, in buying an ax of a smith, my neighbor, desired to have the whole of its surface as bright as the edge. The smith consented to grind it bright for him if he would turn the wheel; he turned, while the smith pressed the broad face of the ax hard and heavily on the stone, which made the turning of it very fatiguing. The man came every now and then from the wheel to see how the work went on, and at length would take his ax as it was, without further grinding. "No," said the smith, "turn on, turn on; we shall have it bright by and by; as yet, it is only speckled." "Yes," says the man, "but I think I like a speckled ax best." And I believe this may have been the case with many, who, having, for want of some such means as I employed, found the difficulty of obtaining good and breaking bad habits in other points of vice and virtue, have given up the struggle, and concluded that “a speckled ax was best"; for something, that pretended to be reason, was every now and then suggesting to me that such extreme nicety as I exacted of myself might be a kind of foppery in morals, which, if it were known, would make me ridiculous; that a perfect character might be attended with the inconvenience of being envied and hated; and that a benevolent man should allow a few faults in himself, to keep his friends in countenance.

In truth, I found myself incorrigible with respect to Order; and now I am grown old, and my memory bad, I feel very sensibly the want of it. But, on the whole, though I never arrived at the perfection I had been so ambitious of obtaining, but fell far short of it, yet I was, by the endeavor, a better and a happier man than I otherwise should have been

if I had not attempted it; as those who aim at perfect writing by imitating the engraved copies, though they never reach the wished-for excellence of those copies, their hand is mended by the endeavor, and is tolerable while it continues fair and legible.

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It may be well my posterity should be informed that to this little artifice, with the blessing of God, their ancestor owed the constant felicity of his life, down to his seventy-ninth year, in which this is written. What reverses may attend the remainder is in the hand of Providence; but, if they arrive, the reflection on past happiness enjoyed ought to help his bearing them with more resignation. To Temperance he ascribes his long-continued health, and what is still left to him of a good constitution; to Industry and Frugality, the early easiness of his circumstances and acquisition of his fortune, with all that knowledge that enabled him to be a useful citizen, and obtained for him some degree of reputation among the learned; to Sincerity and Justice, the confidence of his country and the honorable employs it conferred upon him; and to the joint influence of the whole mass of the virtues, even in the imperfect state he was able to acquire them, all that evenness of temper, and that cheerfulness in conversation, which makes his company still sought for, and agreeable even to his younger acquaintance. I hope, therefore, that some of my descendants may follow the example and reap the benefit.

38 EXTRACTS FROM A COLLEGE JOURNAL1

THE

Ralph Waldo Emerson

HE greatness of the philosopher [Socrates] shines forth in its fullest lustre when we examine the originality, the bold and unequalled sublimity of his conceptions. His powerful mind had surmounted the errors of education and had retained useful acquisitions, whilst it discarded what was absurd or unprofitable. He studied Nature with a chastised enthusiasm, and the constant activity of his mind endowed him with an energy of thought little short of inspiration. When he speaks of the immortality of the soul, or when he enters on considerations of the attributes or nature of the deity, he leaves the little quibblings of the sophists, and his own inferior strains of irony, and his soul warms and expands with his subject; we forget that he is man-he seems seated like Jupiter Creator molding magnificent forms and clothing them with beauty and grandeur.

2 Perhaps our system and all the planets, stars, we can discover, nay, the whole interminable Universe, is moving on, as has been supposed, in one grand circle round the center of light, and since the world began it has never completed at single revolution. It is an improvement on the grandeur of this supposition to suppose there is a source of light before us and the whole vast machinery has been forever and is now sweeping forward in a direct line through the interminable fields-extensions of space. It is a singular fact that we cannot present to the imagination a longer space than just so

1 From the first volume of the Journals. Reprinted by permission of, and by special arrangement with, Houghton Mifflin Company, the authorized publishers. The passages selected were all written by Emerson when he was still very young-the first six when he was sixteen, the remainder when he was seventeen.

much of the world as is bounded by the visible horizon; so that, even in this stretching of thought to comprehend the broad path lengthening itself and widening to receive the rolling Universe, stern necessity bounds us to a little extent of a few miles only. But what matters it? we can talk and write and think it out. . . . Châteaubriand's "the universe is the imagination of the deity made manifest" is worthy him.

3 Let us suppose a pulpit orator to whom the path of his profession is yet untried, but whose talents are good and feelings strong, and his independence, as a man, in opinion and action is established; let him ascend the pulpit for the first time, not to please or displease the multitude, but to expound to them the words of the book and to waft their minds and devotions to heaven. Let him come to them in solemnity and strength, and when he speaks he will claim attention with an interesting figure and an interested face. To expand their views of the sublime doctrines of the religion, he may embrace the universe and bring down the stars from their courses to do homage to their Creator. Here is a fountain which cannot fail them. Wise Christian orators have often and profitably magnified the inconceivable power of the Creator as manifested in His works, and thus elevated and sobered the mind of the people and gradually drawn them off from the world they have left by the animating ideas of Majesty, Beauty, Wonder, which these considerations bestow. Then when life and its frivolities is fastly flowing away from before them, and the spirit is absorbed in the play of its mightiest energies, and their eyes are on him and their hearts are in heaven, then let him discharge his fearful duty, then let him unfold the stupendous designs of celestial wisdom, and whilst admiration is speechless, let him minister to their unearthly wants, and let the ambassador of the Most High prove himself worthy of his tremendous vocation. Let him gain the