Part 20

It is a sad sight to see a brilliant mind that has dragged down a strong body, because it has been so imperious in its demands, leaving its companion to suffer for lack of attention to some of its plainest wants. It reminds one of a crazy building, tottering under its own weight, yet full of the most costly machinery, which can be run, if at all, only with the greatest caution, or the entire fabric will crumble to ruins. The lesson can not be too soon learned that, while the human body is most wonderfully complex in its organization, still such is the perfection of all nature's works that all that is demanded of us is compliance with simple rules, to enable us to enjoy health. That it is our duty as well as our privilege to so train and cultivate the body that it will answer readily all demands made upon it by an enlightened mind, and will perform all its appropriate functions in the great work of life.

Self-culture also implies suitable efforts to expand and strengthen the intellect by reading, by reflection, and by writing down your thoughts. The strength and vigor given to the mind by self-culture is not materially different from that expressed by the term education in its broad and comprehensive meaning. Intellect being the crowning glory and chief attribute of man, there can be no nobler aim to set before one's self than that of expanding and quickening all of its powers. Rightly lived our every-day life and actions conduce to this result. Our education is by no means entirely the product of organized schools. Our hired teachers and printed books are not all that act on our powers to develop them. Life is one grand school, and its every circumstance a teacher. Society pours in its influence upon us like the thousand streams that flood the ocean.

Scholastic men and women speak of book education; there is also a life education—that great, common arena where men and women do battle with the forces around them. Our duty is so to guide and control these influences as to be educated in the right direction. We should recognize the fact that we are educating all the time, and the great question for us to settle is, "What manner of education are we receiving?" Some are educated in vice, some in folly, some in selfishness, some in deception, some in goodness, some in truth. Every day gives us many lessons in life. Every thought leaves its impression on the mind. Every feeling weaves a garment for the spirit. Every passion plows a furrow in the soul. It is our duty as sentient, moral beings so to guide and direct these thoughts, feelings, and passions that they shall educate us in the right direction. We are lax in duty to ourselves to let the world educate us as it will, for we are running a great risk to yield ourselves up to the circumstances life has thrown about us, to plunge into the stream of popular custom and allow ourselves to drift with the current.

But aside from the practical education of everyday life we are to remember, in our efforts after self-culture, that it is also obligatory upon us to seek the discipline afforded by books and study. In the pursuit of knowledge follow it wherever it is to be found; like fern, it is the product of all climates, and, like air, its circulation is not restricted to any particular class. Any and every legitimate means of acquiring information is to be pursued, and all the odds and bits of time pressed into use. Set a high price upon your leisure moments. They are sands of precious gold; properly expended they will procure for you a stock of great thoughts—thoughts that will fill, stir, invigorate, and expand the soul. As the magnificent river, rolling in the pride of its mighty waters, owes its greatness to the hidden springs of the mountain nook, so does the wide, sweeping influence of distinguished men date its origin from hours of privacy resolutely employed in efforts after self-development.

We should esteem those moments best improved which are employed in developing our own thoughts, rather than in acquiring those of others, since in this kind of intellectual exercise our powers are best brought into action and disciplined for use. Knowledge acquired by labor becomes a possession—a property entirely our own. A greater vividness of impression is secured, and facts thus acquired become registered in the mind in a way that mere imparted information fails of securing. A habit of observation and reflection is well-nigh every thing. He who has spent his whole life in traveling may live and die a thorough novice in most of the important affairs of life, while, on the other hand, a man may be confined to a narrow sphere and be engrossed in the prosaic affairs of every-day life, and yet have very correct ideas of the manners and customs of other nations. He that studies only men will get the body of knowledge without the soul; he that studies only books, the soul without the body. He that to what he sees adds observation, and to what he reads, reflection, is in the right road to knowledge, provided that in scrutinizing the hearts of others he neglects not his own. Be not dismayed at doubts, for remember that doubt is the vestibule through which all must pass before they can enter into the temple of wisdom; therefore, when we are in doubt and puzzle out the truth by our own exertions, we have gained a something which will stay by us and serve us again. But if to avoid the trouble of a search we avail ourselves of the superior information of a friend, such knowledge will not remain with us; we have borrowed it and not bought it.

But man possesses something more than a mere body and intellect; he is the possessor of moral faculties as well. A true self-culture will be none the less careful to have the actions of these refined and pure than it is to possess physical health on the one hand and mental vigor on the other. Indeed, since your happiness depends upon their healthful condition more than upon the state of your body and intellect, your first care should be devoted to giving careful attention to your moral nature. With disordered moral faculties you will be as a ship without a helm, dashed on bars and rocks at the will of winds and waves. It is the vice of the age to substitute learning for wisdom, to educate the head, and to forget that there is a more important education necessary for the heart. Let the heart be opened and a thousand virtues rush in. There is dew in one flower and not in another, because one opens its cup and takes it in, while the other closes itself and the drop runs off. God rains his goodness and mercy as widespread as the dew, and if we lack them it is because we know not how to open our hearts to receive them. No man can tell whether he is rich or poor by turning to his ledger. It is the heart that makes a man rich. He is rich or poor according to what he is, and not what he has. Cultivate your moral nature, then, as well as bodily strength and mental vigor. The heart is the center of vitality in the physical body; so the moral senses seem to give vitality to all the various faculties of the mind. If the moral nature becomes stunted in its development the mind is apt to become chaotic in its action. How often we meet with examples of this character in the common walks of life! Many lose their balance of mind and become wrecks from want of heart culture. Is the head of more importance than the heart? It is true that wealth is the child of the one, but it is equally true that happiness is the offspring of the other.

Such, then, is an outline of the great problem of self-culture. We can not escape its claims; from the time reason dawns until death closes the scene they are pressing upon you. Much of the happiness of life, both here and hereafter, depends on how you meet its demands. You can, if you but will it, grow apace in all that is manly or womanly in life; or, by neglecting the claims of your manifold nature, as utterly fail of so doing as the stunted shrub fails of being the stately tree with waving branches and luxuriant foliage.

The influence of literature upon a country is well-nigh incalculable. The Druid warriors were incited to deeds of desperate valor by the songs of their bards; and in modern times victories are achieved by the writers of books no less important than many won on tented fields. The literature of a nation molds the thoughts of a whole people, guides their actions, and impresses its indelible mark upon the lives and conduct of its citizens. Who can estimate the effect of Voltaire's writings on the French people? The results for which many philanthropists toiled in vain were achieved by the works of Dickens. The power of books and literature is no less marked in the individual than in the mass. To the weak, and to the strong in their times of weakness, books are inspiring friends and teachers. Against the feebleness of individual efforts they proclaim the victory of faith and patience, and against the uncertainties and discouragement of one day's work they set forth the richer and more complete life that results from perseverance in right actions. It sets the mind more and more in harmony with the noblest aims, and holds before it a crown of honor and power.

There is a certain monotony in daily life, and there are those whose aims are high, but who lack the inherent strength to stand true to them amid adverse influences, and so gradually drop out of the ever-thinning ranks of those who would wrest from Fame her richest trophies. They are conquered by routine, and disheartened by the discipline and labor that guard the prizes of life. Even to the resolute, persevering ones there are hours of weakness and weariness. To all such literature comes with its helping hand in hours of discouragement. It revives hope in the minds of those almost discouraged, and brings the comforts of philosophy to the cast-down. Books are a guide to youth and an inspiration for age. They support us under solitude, and keep us from becoming a burden to ourselves. They lessen our cares, compose our passions, and lay our disappointments asleep. When weary of the living, we may, by their aid, repair to the dead, who have nothing of peevishness, pride, or design in their conversation.

In books we live continually in the decisive moments of history, and in the deepest experience of individual lives. The flowers which we cull painfully and at long intervals in our personal history blossom in profusion here, and the air is full of fragrance which touches our own life only in its happier times. In our libraries we meet great minds on an equality, and feel at ease with them. We come to know them better, perhaps, than those who bear their names and sit at their tables. The reserve that makes so many fine natures difficult of access is here entirely lost. No carelessness of manner, no poverty of speech or unfortunate personal peculiarity, mars the intercourse of author and reader. It is a relation in which the exchange of thought is undisturbed by outward conditions. We lose our narrow selves in the broader life that is open to us. We forget the hindrance and limitation of our own work in the full comprehension of that stronger life that can not be bound nor confined, but grows in all soils, and climbs heavenward under every sky.

Literature is the soul of action, the only sensible articulate voice of the accomplished facts of the past. The men of antiquity are dead; their cities are ruins; their temples are dust; their fleets and armies have disappeared; yet all these exist in magic preservation in the literature which they have bequeathed to us, and their manners and their deeds are as familiar to us as the events of yesterday. Papers and books are really the teachers, guides, and lawgivers of the world to-day. Their influence is very much like that of a companion to whom we are attached. Hence it is of more consequence to know what class to avoid than what to choose; for good books are as scarce as good companions, and in both instances all we can learn from bad ones is that so much time has been worse than thrown away.

We should choose our books as we do our friends, for their sterling and intrinsic merit, not for the accidental circumstances in their favor. For, with books as with men, it seldom happens that their performances are fully equal to their pretensions, nor their capital to their credit. As we should always seek the companionship of the best class of people, so we should always seek the companionship of the best books. He that will have no books but such as are scarce evinces about as correct a taste in literature as he would do in friendship who should have no friends but those whom the rest of the world have discarded. Some books we should make our constant companions and associates; others we should receive only as occasional acquaintances and visitors. Some we should take with us wherever we go; others we should leave behind us forever. Some, of gilded outsides, are full of depravity, and we should shun them as we would the actual vices which they represent. Some books we should keep in our hands and lay on our hearts, while the best we could dispose of others would be to throw them in the fire.

You may judge a man more truly by the books and papers that he reads than by the company which he keeps, for his associates are in a measure imposed upon him; but his reading is the result of choice; and the man who chooses a certain class of books and papers unconsciously becomes more colored in their views, more rooted in their opinions, and the mind becomes trained to their way of thinking. All the life and feeling of a young girl fascinated by some glowing love romance is colored and shaped by the page she reads. If it is false and weak and foolish, she is false and weak and foolish too; but if it is true and tender and inspiring, then something of its truth and tenderness and inspiration will grow into her soul, and will become a part of her very self. The boy who reads of deeds of manliness, of bravery and noble doing, feels the spirit of emulation grow within him, and the seed is planted which will bring forth fruit of heroic endeavor and exalted life.

In literature our tastes will be discovered by what we give, our judgment by that which we withhold. That writer does the most who gives his readers the most knowledge and takes from them the least time, for that period of existence is alone deserving the name of life which is rationally employed. Those books are most profitable to read which make the readers think most. Diminutive books, like diminutive men and women, may be of greater value than they seem to be; but great tomes are greatly dreaded. It is a saying that "books file away the mind." Much reading is certainly not profitable without much meditation, and many vigorous and profound thinkers have read comparatively little, though it must be admitted most great minds have been very devout and ardent readers. There is scarcely any thing that is not to be found in books, but it does not follow that we shall find every thing in them unless we handle them with great care.

A beautiful literature springs from the depths and fullness of intellectual and moral life, from an energy of thought and feeling. It deals with questions of life in a plain, practical manner. It holds up the past for your inspection. It brings to light the secrets of nature. It enables us to discover the infinity of things, the immensity of nature, the wonders of the heavens, the earth, and the seas. Works of fiction are the ornamental parts of literature and learning. They are agreeable embellishments of the edifice, but poor foundations for it to rest upon. The literature of the day is largely composed of newspapers and periodicals. No one can too highly appreciate the magic power of the press or too highly depreciate its abuse. Newspapers have become the great highway of that intelligence which exerts a controlling power over a nation, catering the every-day food of the mind. Show us an intelligent family of boys and girls, and we will show you a family where newspapers and periodicals are plenty. Nobody who has been without these private tutors can know their educating power for good or for evil. Think of the innumerable topics of discussion which they suggest at the table; the important public measures with which the children thus early become acquainted; of the great philanthropic questions to which, unconsciously perhaps, their attention is called, and the general spirit of intelligence which is evoked by these quiet visitors. This vast world moves along lines of thought and sentiment and principles, and the press gives to these wings to fly and tongues to speak.

"My mind to me a kingdom is; Such perfect joy therein I find As far exceeds all earthly bliss. Though much I want that most would have, Yet still my mind forbids to crave."

—SIR EDMUND DYER.

The triumph of cultivated intellect over the forces of nature is indeed a wonderful subject for contemplation. The most deadly poisons are made to conduce to human health and welfare. Electricity does the writing and talking, and annihilates space. Steam and iron are made to do the work of nerves and muscles, and lay the four corners of the world under contribution for our benefit. In view of these and many similar facts, how full of meaning becomes the old saying, "Knowledge is power!" Reason, like the magnetic influence imparted to iron, may be said to give to matter properties and powers which it did not possess before; but, without extending its bulk, augmenting its weight, or altering its organization, it is visible only by its effects and perceptible only by its operations.

Unlike those of the warriors, the triumphs of intellect derive all their luster, not from the evil they have produced, but from the good. Her successes and her conquests are the common property of the world, and succeeding ages will be the watchful guardians of the rich legacies she bequeathes. The trophies and titles of the conqueror are on the quick march to oblivion, and amid that desolation where they were planted will decay. As the mind must govern the hand, so in every society the man of intelligence must direct and govern the man of ignorance. There is no exception to this law. It is the natural sequence of the dominion of mind over matter—a dominion so strong that for a time it can make flesh and nerves impregnable, and string the sinews like steel, so that the weak become strong. Some men of a secluded and studious life have sent forth from their closet or cloister rays of intellectual light that have agitated courts and revolutionized kingdoms, as the moon, that far removed from the ocean, and shining upon it with a serene and sober light, is the chief cause of all those ebbings and flowings which incessantly disturb that world of waters.

The triumph of mind is shown in various ways. It enables us to surmount difficulties with facility. Like imprisoned steam, the more it is pressed, the more it rises to resist the pressure. The more we are obliged to do, the more we are able to accomplish. Perhaps in no other respect is the power of mind more signally shown than when it opens to our view avenues of pleasure before unthought of. Happiness is the great aim of life. In one form or another we are all striving for it. There are no pleasures so pure as mental pleasures. We never tire of them. A lofty mind always thinks loftily. It easily creates vivid, agreeable, and natural fancies, places them in their best light, clothes them with all appropriate adornments, studies others' tastes, and clears away from its own thoughts all that is useless and disagreeable. Mental force or power is not the inheritance of birth, nor the result of a few years' spasmodic study; it is only acquired as the result of long and patient exertion. There is no age at which it can not be increased. There is absolutely no branch of literature which, when properly digested and stowed away in the mind, will not show its effect in after life by increased vigor in the whole mind. Those intellectually strong men and women who have left their influence on the world's history are almost without exception found to be those who have possessed broad and deep acquirements; who have permitted no opportunity for obtaining information to pass unimproved; who have been content for years to store away knowledge, confident that in the fullness of time they would reap the reward.

If any one would be the possessor of mental power he must be willing to do his duty in obtaining it. There is a tendency to make the acquisition of knowledge, at the present day, as easy as possible. The end proposed is good, but the means employed are of doubtful utility. Instead of toiling painfully on foot up the rugged steeps of learning the student of to-day flies along a railway track, finding every cliff cut through and every valley bridged. In this world nothing of value is to be obtained without labor. So there are some who will question the value of that education which is not born of patient perseverance and hard work. As in the exercises of the gymnasium the value consists in the exertions required to perform them, so that knowledge and mental power acquired by arduous exertion is of the most lasting and real value. Let patient toilers find a lesson of encouragement in this. What you thus painfully acquire will prove of lasting benefit to you.

Mental power is seen in its best form only when all of the mental faculties have been properly drilled and disciplined. The mind can not grow to its full stature, nor be rounded into just proportions, nor acquire that blended litheness, toughness, and elasticity which it needs, if fed on one aliment. There is no profession or calling which, if too exclusively followed, will not warp and contract the mind. Just as if, in the body, a person resolves to be a rower, and only a rower, the chances are that he will have, indeed, strong arms, but weak legs, and eyes blinded by the glare of water. Or, if he desires to become an athlete, he may be all muscles, with few brains. So, in the mind, if he exercises but one set of faculties and neglects the rest, he may become a subtle theologian or a sharp lawyer, a keen man of business, or a practical mechanic, and though the possessor of power it is not power in its highest and best form.

But for those who are anxious to obtain mental power, and for that purpose devote the years of a life-time to patient study and reflection, the rewards it offers are full compensation for all the hours of weary, self-denying labor. Not only does it afford the best assurance of success in life's battles and point out to its possessor means of happiness denied to others, but it is so peculiarly the highest form of power to which men can aspire that it commands the homage of all, and reposes as a jewel in the crown of the true man or woman.

The chameleon changes its color to agree with that of surrounding objects. We all of us by nature possess this quality to such a degree that our character, habits, and principles take their form and color from those of our intimate associates. Association with persons wiser, better, and more experienced than ourselves is always more or less inspiring and invigorating. They enhance our knowledge of life. We correct our estimate by theirs, and become partners in their wisdom. We enlarge our field of observation through their eyes, profit by their experience, and learn not only by what they have enjoyed, but—which is still more instructive—from what they have suffered. If they are stronger than ourselves, we become participators in their strength. Hence companionship with the wise and energetic never fails to have a most valuable influence on the formation of character—increasing our resources, strengthening our resolves, elevating our aims, and enabling us to exercise greater dexterity and ability in our own affairs, as well as more effective helpfulness in those of others.

Young men are in general but little aware how much their reputation is affected in the view of the public by the company they keep. The character of their associates is soon regarded as their own. If they seek the society of the worthy and the respectable, it elevates them in the public estimation, as it is an evidence that they respect themselves, and are desirous to secure the respect of others. On the contrary, intimacy with persons of bad character always sinks a young man in the eyes of the public. While he, in intercourse with such persons, thinks but little of the consequences, others are making their remarks. They learn what his taste is, what sort of company he prefers, and predict, on no doubtful ground, what will be the result to his own principles and character. It is they only who are elevated in mind, character, and position, who can lift us up; while the ignoble, degraded, and debased only drag us down. We may be deprived of the advantages of better and superior associations at some time or another, but, unless we seek for them, we shall not profit by them, nor be acknowledged to be worthy of them.

No man of position can allow himself to associate, without prejudice, with the profane, the Sabbath-breaking, the drunken, and the licentious; for he lowers himself, without elevating them. The sweep is not made the less black by rubbing against the well-dressed and the clean, while they are inevitably defiled. Keep company with persons rather above than below yourself; for gold in the same pocket with silver loseth both of its weight and color. Nothing elevates us so much as the presence of a spirit similar, yet superior, to our own. What is companionship where nothing that improves the intellect is communicated, and where the larger heart contracts itself to the mold and dimensions of the smaller? In all society it is advisable to associate, if possible, with the highest; not that the highest are always the best, but because, if disgusted there, you can at any time descend; but if we begin at the lowest, to ascend is impossible. It should be the aim of the young man to seek the society of the wise, the intelligent, and the good. It is always safe to be found in the society of those who, with a good heart, combine intelligence and an ability to impart information. If you wish to be respected, if you desire happiness and not misery, associate only with the intelligent and good. Once habituate yourself to a virtuous course, once secure a love of good society, and no punishment would be greater than, by accident, to be obliged to associate, even for a short time, with the low and vulgar.

He that sinks into familiarity with persons much below his own level will be constantly weighed down by his base connections, and, though he may easily sink lower, he will find it hard to rise again. Better be alone than in bad company. "Evil communications corrupt good manners." Ill qualities are catching as well as diseases, and the mind is at least as much, if not a great deal more, liable to infections than the body. Go with mean people and you think life is mean. Society is the atmosphere of souls, and we necessarily imbibe something which is either infectious or salubrious. The society of virtuous persons is enjoyed beyond their company, and vice carries a sting even into solitude. The society you keep is both the indicator and former of your character. In company, when the pores of the mind are all opened, there requires more guard than usual, because the mind is then passive. In vicious company you will feel your reverence for the dictates of conscience wear off. The name at which angels bow and devils tremble you will hear contemned and abused. The Bible will supply materials for unmeaning jests or impious buffoonery. The consequences will be a practical deviation into vice—the principle will become sapped and the fences of conscience broken down.

It is not alone the low and dissipated, the vulgar and profane, from whose example and society you are in danger. These persons of reputation will despise and shun. But there are persons of apparently decent morals, of polished manners and interesting talents, but who, at the same time, are unprincipled and wicked, who make light of sacred things, scoff at religion, and deride the suggestions and scruples of a tender conscience as superstition,—these are the persons whose society and influence are most to be feared. Their breath is pollution; their embrace, death. Unhappily there are many of this description. They mark out their unwary victims: they gradually draw them into their toils; they strike the deadly fang, infuse the poison, and exult to see youthful virtue and parental hope wither and expire under their ruffian example. Many a young man has thus been led on by his elders in iniquity till he has been initiated into all the mysteries of debauchery and crime, and ended his days a poor, outcast wretch.