The sentiments of a man while he is
full of ardour and hope are to be received, it is supposed,
with some qualification. But when the same person has
ignominiously failed and begins to eat up his words, he
should be listened to like an oracle. Most of our pocket
wisdom is conceived for the use of mediocre people, to
discourage them from ambitious attempts, and generally
console them in their mediocrity. And since mediocre
people constitute the bulk of humanity, this is no doubt
very properly so. But it does not follow that the one sort
of proposition is any less true than the other, or that
Icarus is not to be more praised, and perhaps more envied,
than Mr. Samuel Budgett the successful merchant.
*
'You know it very well, it cannot in any way help that you
should brood upon it, and I sometimes wonder whether you
and I--who are a pair of sentimentalists--are quite good
judges of plain men.'
*
For, after all, we are vessels of a very limited content.
Not all men can read all books; it is only in a chosen few
that any man will find his appointed food; and the fittest
lessons are the most, palatable, and make themselves
welcome to the mind.
*
It is all very fine to talk about tramps and morality. Six
hours of police surveillance (such as I have had) or one
brutal rejection from an inn-door change your views upon
the subject like a course of lectures.
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