1705039202

1705039203 The physiological study of mental conditions is thus the most powerful ally of hortatory ethics. The hell to be endured hereafter, of which theology tells, is no worse than the hell we make for ourselves in this world by habitually fashioning our characters in the wrong way. Could the young but realize how soon they will become mere walking bundles of habits, they would give more heed to their conduct while in the plastic state. We are spinning our own fates, good or evil, and never to be undone. Every smallest stroke of virtue or of vice leaves its never so little scar. The drunken Rip Van Winkle, in Jefferson’s play, excuses himself for every fresh dereliction by saying, “I won’t count this time!” Well! he may not count it, and a kind Heaven may not count it; but it is being counted none the less. Down among his nerve cells and fibers the molecules are counting it, registering and storing it up to be used against him when the next temptation comes. Nothing we ever do is, in strict scientific literalness, wiped out. Of course, this has its good side as well as its bad one. As we become permanent drunkards by so many separate drinks, so we become saints in the moral, and authorities and experts in the practical and scientific spheres, by so many separate acts and hours of work. Let no youth have any anxiety about the upshot of his education, whatever the line of it may be. If he keep faithfully busy each of the working day, he may safely leave the final result to itself. He can with perfect certainty count on waking up some fine morning, to find himself one of the competent ones of his generation, in whatever pursuit he may have singled out. Silently, between all the details of his business, the power of judging in all that class of matter will have built itself up within him as a possession that will never pass away. Young people should know this truth in advance. The ignorance of it has probably engendered more discouragement and faint-heartedness in youths embarking on arduous careers than all other causes put together.

1705039204

1705039205 Notes

1705039206

1705039207 second nature . Nature is one’s natural endowment or essential character, as, natural impulse or action, instinct or native constitution, intrinsic or inborn nature. Hence, second nature means one’s real nature, something that has become so much a part of the individual that he cannot escape from it.

1705039208

1705039209 Duke of Wellington, Arthur Wellesley （1769-1852）, British general responsible for the defeat of Napoleon at Waterloo.

1705039210

1705039211 “There is a story … ,” from Huxley’s Elementary Lessons in Physiology , Lesson XII.

1705039212

1705039213 practical joker . A practical joke is a joke put into practice, the fun consisting in what is done rather than in what is said, especially a trick played on a person. He who practices such witticisms is called a practical joker.

1705039214

1705039215 gutter, a small channel at the side of a road or elsewhere to lead off surface water.

1705039216

1705039217 cavalry-horses, horses belonging to the cavalry or that branch of the army which serves on horseback.

1705039218

1705039219 customary evolutions, the evolutions that they have been accustomed to go through.

1705039220

1705039221 bugle call, a summons on a bugle, as to call soldiers to duty. The bugle is a brass or copper wind instrument curved and somewhat high-pitched.

1705039222

1705039223 omnibus- and car-horses, horses employed to draw such vehicles. The omnibus is a heavy four-wheeled public vehicle designed to carry a comparatively large number of people; a car is a vehicle adapted to the rails of a railroad.

1705039224

1705039225 menagerie, a collection of wild or foreign animals in cages or inclosures kept especially for exhibition, as with a circus.

1705039226

1705039227 flywheel, a heavy wheel for opposing and moderating by its inertia any fluctuation of speed in the machinery with which it involves.

1705039228

1705039229 ordinance, order.

1705039230

1705039231 walks, occupations.

1705039232

1705039233 deck hand, a common sailor.

1705039234

1705039235 nurture, bringing up; fostering care.

1705039236

1705039237 strata . A stratum is a body of sedimentary rock or earth of one kind formed by natural causes and consisting usually of a series of layers lying between beds of other kinds. Here, social strata refer to the different groups that make up a society.

1705039238

1705039239 mannerism, a recurrent trick of style or behavior.

1705039240

1705039241 cleavage, division, way in which a thing tends to split.

1705039242

1705039243 “shop,” one’s occupation or business as a topic of conversation, especially when introduced unseasonably.

1705039244

1705039245 set like plaster, grown hard, become fixed like plaster.

1705039246

1705039247 fixing, making or becoming rigid.

1705039248

1705039249 vocalization, act of vocalizing or forming into voice; giving intonation or resonance to.

1705039250

1705039251 nasality, in speaking, having the twang described as speaking through the nose.

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