e or supervening malady might make in his own
constitution; and was anxious in good time to secure in me an assistant,
who might take the helm when his hand grew weary, and keep the vessel's
way according to his counsel and instruction. Paternal affection, as well
as the furtherance of his own plans, determined him to the same
conclusion. Your father, though his fortune was vested in the house, was
only a sleeping partner, as the commercial phrase goes; and Owen, whose
probity and skill in the details of arithmetic rendered his services
invaluable as a head clerk, was not possessed either of information or
talents sufficient to conduct the mysteries of the principal management.
If my father were suddenly summoned from life, what would become of the
world of schemes which he had formed, unless his son were moulded into a
commercial Hercules, fit to sustain the weight when relinquished by the
falling Atlas? and what would become of that son himself, if, a stranger
to business of this description, he found himself at once involved in the
labyrinth of mercantile concerns, without the clew of knowledge necessary
for his extraction? For all these reasons, avowed and secret, my father
was determined I should embrace his profession; and when he was
determined, the resolution of no man was more immovable. I, however, was
also a party to be consulted, and, with something of his own pertinacity,
I had formed a determination precisely contrary. It may, I hope, be some
palliative for the resistance which, on this occasion, I offered to my
father's wishes, that I did not fully understand upon what they were
founded, or how deeply his happiness was involved in them. Imagining
myself certain of a large succession in future, and ample maintenance in
the meanwhile, it never occurred to me that it might be necessary, in
order to secure these blessings, to submit to labour and limitations
unpleasant to my taste and temper. I only saw in my father's proposal for
my engaging in business, a desire that I should add to those heaps of
wealth which he had himself acquired; and imagining myself the best judge
of the path to my own happiness, I did not conceive that I should
increase that happiness by augmenting a fortune which I believed was
already sufficient, and more than sufficient, for every use, comfort, and
elegant enjoyment.

Accordingly, I am compelled to repeat, that my time at Bourdeaux had not
been spent as my father had proposed to hi