A little leak will sink a great ship.
Small sands the mountain,
picked up merely the rudiments of learning, but sub-
sequently rose to be one of the first astronomers of
Europe. Herschel, the great astronomer, was in his
youth a drummer-boy to a marching regiment, and
received but a little more than a drummer-boy's edu-
cation; but his name is now associated with the
brightest discoveries of science, and is borne by the
planet which his zeal discovered. A host of instances
rise up to testify that, by properly improving the
small and perhaps imperfect beginnings of knowledge,
they may become as foundation-stones of a temple
of learning, which the future shall gaze upon and
admire.
A man can scarcely be too avaricious in the
acquisition of knowledge; he should hoard up his
intellectual gain with the utmost assiduity and dili-
gence; but, unlike the lucre-seeking miser, must put out
his knowledge at usury, and, by lending out his stock
to others, increase by the commerce of his thoughts
his capital, until his one talent shall have become five,
and this five shall have gained to them other five.
Despise not the small beginnings of fame or
honour.
The fame which springs up on a sudden, like a mushroom-plant, is seldom lasting. True fame and honour are of slow growth, ascending by degrees from the lowest offices to the highest stations-from the regard of a few to the applause of a nation. But he
For want of a nail the shoe was lost.
Small gains and often make a well-filled purse.
Little strokes fell great oaks.
who despises the lower steps of honour, because they
are low, will seldom reach the higher; and he who
spurns at the commendation of his own circle, as too
small a thing to seek after, will never secure the
esteem and renown of a state or kingdom.
Despise not the small beginnings of error.
The walls of a castle have been undermined by the burrowings of small and despised animals; and the beginning of error, though at first unheeded, will soon, if not checked, sap the foundations of truth, and build up its own wretched dogmas on its ruins. All first errors are small; despise them not; they will soon increase to great ones, and perhaps devastate society.
Y advice is, never to do to-morrow what you can do to-day. "Procrastination is the thief of time." My other piece of advice is: annual income, £20; annual expenditure, £19 19s. 6d.; result, happiness. Annual income, £20; annual expenditure, £20 os. 6d.; result, misery. The blossom is blighted, the leaf is withered, the god of day goes down upon the scene; and-in short, you are for ever floored-as I am now!" DICKENS.
Spend less than you gain.
Half a loaf is better than no bread.
Fools despise wisdom and instruction.
Happy is the man that findeth wisdom.
BROUGHAM'S ADVICE TO MACAULAY.
HEN Lord Macaulay was attending college
at Cambridge, Lord Brougham sent the
following letter of advice to his father,
Zachary Macaulay, Esq.
As it contains many
hints and suggestions which are as valuable at
the present day as they were half a century
ago, no apology is required for its introduction to our
"Book of Good Devices."
"Newcastle, March 10, 1823.
"MY DEAR FRIEND,-My principal object in writing to
you to-day is to offer you some suggestions, in consequence
of some conversation I have just had with Lord Grey, who
has spoken of your son in terms of the greatest praise.
takes his account from his son; but from all I know, and
have learnt from other quarters, I doubt not that his judg-
ment is well formed. Now you of course destine him for
the bar, and assuming that this, and the public objects inci-
dental to it, are in his views, I would fain impress upon you
(and through you upon him) a truth or two which experience
has made me aware of, and which I would have given a
great deal to have been acquainted with earlier in life from
the experience of others.
"First, That the foundation of all excellence is to be
laid in early application to general knowledge is clear; that
he is already aware of; and equally so it is (of which he may
not be so well aware) that professional eminence can only be
Better unborn than untaught.
Wisdom is more precious than rubies.
Reproofs of instruction are the way of life.
Reading maketh a full man,
attained by entering betimes into the lowest drudgery, the
most repulsive labours of the profession; even a year in an
attorney's office, as the law is now practised, I should not
hold too severe a task, or too high a price to pay, for the
benefit it must surely lead to; but at all events the life of a
special pleader, I am quite convinced, is the thing before
being called to the bar. A young man whose mind has
once been well imbued with general learning, and has
acquired classical propensities, will never sink into a mere
drudge. He will always save himself harmless from the
dull atmosphere he must live and work in; and the sooner
he will emerge from it, and arrive at eminence. But what
I wish to inculcate especially, with a view to the great talent
for public speaking which your son happily possesses, is that
he should cultivate that talent in the only way in which it
can reach the height of the art; and I wish to turn his
attention to two points. I speak upon this subject with the
authority both of experience and observation; I have made
it very much my study in theory; have written a great deal
upon it which may never see the light, and something which
has been published; have meditated much, and conversed
much on it with famous men; have had some little practical
experience in it, but have prepared for much more than I
ever tried, by a variety of laborious methods-reading,
writing, much translation, composing in foreign languages,
etc., and I have lived in times when there were great orators
among us; therefore I reckon my opinion worth listening to,
and the rather because I have the utmost confidence in it
myself, and should have saved a world of trouble and much
time had I started with a conviction of its truth.
"1. The first point is this: the beginning of the art is to
acquire a habit of easy speaking; and in whatever way this can
Conference a ready man, and
Books give new views to life, and teach us how to live.
Biography is the most universally pleasant,
be had (which individual inclination or accident will generally
direct, and may safely be allowed to do so), it must be had.
Now I differ from all other doctors of rhetoric in this; I say,
let him first of all learn to speak easily and fluently, as well
and as sensibly as he can no doubt, but at any rate let him
learn to speak. This is to eloquence, or good public speaking,
what the being able to talk in a child is to correct grammatical
It is the requisite foundation, and on it you must
Moreover, it can only be acquired young; therefore
let it by all means, and at any sacrifice, be gotten hold of
forthwith. But in acquiring it every sort of slovenly error
will also be acquired. It must be got by a habit of easy
writing (which, as Wyndham said, proved hard reading); by
a custom of talking much in company; by speaking in
debating societies, with little attention to rule, and mere love
of saying something at any rate, than of saying anything well.
I can even suppose that more attention is paid to the matter
in such discussions than to the manner of saying it; yet still
to say it easily, ad libitum, to be able to say what you
choose, and what you have to say, this is the first requisite;
to acquire which everything else must for the present be
sacrificed.
"2. The next step is the grand one: to convert this style
of easy speaking into chaste eloquence. And here there is
but one rule. I do earnestly entreat your son to set daily and
nightly before him the Greek models. First of all he may
look to the best modern speeches (as he probably has already);
Burke's best compositions, as the Thoughts on the Cause of
the present Discontents; Speech on the American Concilia-
tion, and On the Nabob of Arcot's Debt; Fox's Speech on
the Westminster Scrutiny (the first part of which he should
pore over till he has it by heart); On the Russian Armament;
Universally profitable of all reading.
Whoso findeth wisdom, findeth life.
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