?" "You are mistaken," said the gentleman, "he
had a great many. He wiped his feet when he came in, and closed the door
after him, showing that he was careful. He gave up his seat instantly to
that lame old man, showing that he was kind and thoughtful. He took off
his cap when he came in, and answered my questions promptly and
respectfully, showing that he was polite and gentlemanly. He picked up
the book which I had purposely laid upon the floor, and replaced it on
the table, while all the rest stepped over it, or shoved it aside; and
he waited quietly for his turn, instead of pushing and crowding, showing
that he was honest and orderly. When I talked to him, I noticed that
his clothes were carefully brushed, his hair in nice order, and his
teeth as white as milk; and when he wrote his name, I noticed that his
finger-nails were clean, instead of being tipped with jet, like that
handsome little fellow's, in the blue jacket. Don't you call those
letters of recommendation? I do; and I would give more for what I can
tell about a boy by using my eyes ten minutes, than for all the fine
letters he can bring me."

"Least of all seeds, greatest of all harvests," seems to be one of the
great laws of nature. All life comes from microscopic beginnings. In
nature there is nothing small. The microscope reveals as great a world
below as the telescope above. All of nature's laws govern the smallest
atoms, and a single drop of water is a miniature ocean.

"I cannot see that you have made any progress since my last visit," said
a gentleman to Michael Angelo. "But," said the sculptor, "I have
retouched this part, polished that, softened that feature, brought out
that muscle, given some expression to this lip, more energy to that
limb, etc." "But they are trifles!" exclaimed the visitor. "It may be
so," replied the great artist, "but trifles make perfection, and
perfection is no trifle." That infinite patience which made Michael
Angelo spend a week in bringing out a muscle in a statue with more
vital fidelity to truth, or Gerhard Dow a day in giving the right effect
to a dewdrop on a cabbage leaf, makes all the difference between success
and failure.

"Of what use is it?" people asked with a sneer, when Franklin told of
his discovery that lightning and electricity are identical. "What is the
use of a child?" replied Franklin; "it may become a man."

In the earliest days of cotton spinning, the small fibres would stick to
the bobbins,