, and spread our wings, and take our flight into
untried regions. It is good for man that he should feel himself at some
time unshackled and autocratical, that he should say, This I do, because
it is prescribed to me by the conditions without which I cannot exist,
or by the election which in past time I deliberately made; and this,
because it is dictated by the present frame of my spirit, and is
therefore that in which the powers my nature has entailed upon me may be
most fully manifested. In addition to which we are to consider, that a
certain variety and mutation of employments is best adapted to humanity.
When my mind or my body seems to be overwrought by one species of
occupation, the substitution of another will often impart to me new
life, and make me feel as fresh as if no labour had before engaged me.
For all these reasons it is to be desired, that we should possess the
inestimable privilege of leisure, that in the revolving hours of every
day a period should arrive, at which we should lay down the weapons
of our labour, and engage in a sport that may be no less active and
strenuous than the occupation which preceded it.

A question, which deserves our attention in this place, is, how much of
every day it behoves us to give to regular and stated occupation, and
how much is the just and legitimate province of leisure. It has been
remarked in a preceding Essay(17), that, if my main and leading pursuit
is literary composition, two or three hours in the twenty-four will
often be as much as can advantageously and effectually be so employed.
But this will unavoidably vary according to the nature of the
occupation: the period above named may be taken as the MINIMUM.

(17) See above, Essay 7.

Such, let us say, is the portion of time which the man of letters is
called on to devote to literary composition.

It may next be fitting to enquire as to the humbler classes of society,
and those persons who are engaged in the labour of the hands, how much
time they ought to be expected to consume in their regular and stated
occupations, and how much would remain to them for relaxation and
leisure. It has been said(18), that half an hour in the day given by
every member of the community to manual labour, might be sufficient for
supplying the whole with the absolute necessaries of life. But there are
various considerations that would inevitably lengthen this period. In
a community which has made any considerable advance