Apply thine heart to instruction.

'Tis education forms the common mind,

APHORISMS ON EDUCATION.

I. Let not an over-passionate prosecution of learning draw you from making an honest improvement of your estate; as such do who are better read in the bigness of the earth than that little spot left them by their friends for their support.

II. A mixed education suits employment best.

III. Huge volumes, like the ox roasted at Bartholomew Fair, may proclaim plenty of labour and invention, afford less of what is delicate, savoury, and wellconcocted than smaller pieces: this makes me think that though, upon occasion, you may come to the table, and examine the bill of fare set down by such authors; yet it cannot but lessen ingenuity, still to fall aboard with them; human sufficiency being too narrow to inform, with the pure soul of reason, such vast bodies.

IV. As the grave hides the faults of physic, no less than mistakes, opinion and contrary applications are known to have enriched the art withal; so many old books, by like advantages rather than desert, have crawled up to an esteem above new: it being the business of better heads perhaps than ever their writers owned, to put a glorious and significant gloss upon the meanest conceit or improbable opinion of antiquity : whereas modern authors are brought by critics to a

Just as the twig is bent, the tree's inclined,

Whoso loveth instruction loveth knowledge.

A man of knowledge increaseth strength.

A sound heart is the life of the flesh.

strict account for the smallest semblance of a
mistake.
If you consider this seriously, it will learn you more
moderation, if not wisdom.

V. When I consider with what contradiction re-
ports arrived at us, during our late civil wars, I can
give the less encouragement to the reading of history:

romances, never acted, being born purer from sophis-
tication than actions reported to be done, by which
posterity hereafter, no less than antiquity heretofore,
is likely to be led into a false, or at best but a con-
tingent, belief. Cæsar, though in this happy, that he
had a pen able to grave into neat language what his
sword at first more roughly cut out, may, in my judg-
ment, abuse his reader; for he that, for the honour of
his own wit, doth make people speak better than can
be supposed men so barbarously bred were able, may
possibly report they fought worse than really they
did. Of a like value are the orations of Thucydides,
Livy, Tacitus, and most other historians; which doth
not a little prejudice all the rest.

VI. A few books well studied, and thoroughly
digested, nourish the understanding more than hun-
dreds but gargled in the mouth, as ordinary students

use.

VII. Company, if good, is a better refiner of spirits than ordinary books.

VIII. Propose not them for patterns who make all places rattle where they come with Latin and Greek;

There is measure in everything.

No man can be wise but by his own wisdom.

The pen is mightier than the sword.

There is no darkness but ignorance.

for the more you seem to have borrowed from books,
the poorer you proclaim your natural parts, which
only can properly be called yours.

IX. Follow not the tedious practice of such as
seek wisdom only in learning, not attainable but by
experience and natural parts. Much reading, like a
too great repletion, stopping up, through a concourse
of diverse, sometimes contrary opinions, the access of
a nearer, newer, and quicker invention of your own.
And for quotations, they resemble sugar in wine,
marring the natural taste of the liquor, if it be good;
if bad, that of itself; such patches rather making the
rent seem greater, by an interruption of the style,
than less, if not so neatly applied as to fall in without
drawing nor is any thief in this kind sufferable, who
comes not off, like a Lacedemonian, without discovery.
X. The way to elegancy of style is to employ
your pen upon every errand; and the more trivial
and dry it is, the more brains must be allowed for
sauce: thus by checking all ordinary invention, your
reason will attain to such a habit, as not to dare to
present you but with what is excellent; and if void.
of affection, it matters not how mean the subject is:
there being the same exactness observed, by good
architects, in the structure of a kitchen as a parlour.

XI. When business or compliment calls you to write letters, consider what is fit to be said were the party present, and set down that.

Education is the best legacy.

There is no such word as "Fail."

Poetry should be but a pastime.

Fools hate knowledge.

XII. Long experience has taught me that writers, for the most part, spend their money and time in the purchase of reproof and censure from envious contemporaries, or self-conceited posterity.

XIII. Be not frequent in poetry, how excellent
however your vein is, but make it rather your recrea-
tion than business; because, though it swells you in
your own opinion, it may render you less in that of
wiser men, who are not ignorant how great a mass of
vanity for the most part coucheth under this quality,
proclaiming their heads like ships of use only for
pleasure, and so richer in trimming than in lading.

XIV. It is incident to many, but as it were
natural with poets, to think others take the like
pleasure in hearing as they do in reading their own.
inventions. Not considering that the generality of
ears are commonly stopped with prejudice of
ignorance neither can the understandings of men,
any more than their tastes, be wooed to find a like
savour in all things; one approving what others con-
demn, upon no weightier account than the single score
of their own opinions.
FRANCIS OSBORN.

Knowledge is pleasant unto the soul.

A man of understanding shall attain unto wise counsels.

He who errs in the tens errs in the thousands.

In all labour there is profit.

ADVICE TO A YOUNG TRADESMAN.
Written in the Year 1748.

S you have desired it of me, I write the fol-
lowing hints, which have been of service to
me, and may, if observed, be so to you.

Remember that time is money. He that
can earn ten shillings a-day by his labour, and
goes abroad or sits idle one-half of that day,
though he spends but sixpence during his diversion
or idleness, ought not to reckon that the only ex-
pense; he has really spent, or rather thrown away,
five shillings besides.

Remember that credit is money. If a man lets his money lie in my hands after it is due, he gives me the interest, or so much as I can make of it, during that time. This amounts to a considerable sum where a man has good and large credit, and makes good use of it.

Remember that money is of a prolific, generating nature. Money can beget money, and its offspring can beget more, and so on. Five shillings turned is six; turned again it is seven and threepence; and so on till it becomes a hundred pounds. The more there turning, so that

is of it, the more it produces every

the profits rise quicker and quicker. He that kills a
breeding sow, destroys all her offspring to the thou-

Trust, but not too much.

Honesty is the best policy.