to be so ingrained in him as
practically not to exist for his consciousness at all." Have you ever
reflected how miserable you would be and what a task living would be if
you had to learn to write anew every morning when you go to class; or
if you had to relearn how to tie your necktie every day? The burden of
living would be intolerable.

The last advantage to be discerned in habit is economy. Habitual acts
do not have to be actively directed by consciousness. While they are
being performed, consciousness may be otherwise engaged. "The more of
the details of our daily life we can hand over to the effortless
custody of automatism, the more our higher powers of mind will be set
free for their own proper work." While you are brushing your hair or
tying your shoes, your mind may be engaged in memorizing poetry or
calculating arithmetical problems. Habit is thus a great economizer.

The ethical consequences of habit are so striking that before leaving
the subject we must give them acknowledgment. We can do no better than
to turn to the statement by Professor James, whose wise remarks upon
the subject have not been improved upon:

"The physiological study of mental conditions is thus the most powerful
ally of hortatory ethics. The hell to be endured hereafter, of which
theology tells, is no worse than the hell we make for ourselves in this
world by habitually fashioning our characters in the wrong way. Could
the young but realize how soon they will become mere walking bundles of
habits, they would give more heed to their conduct while in the plastic
state. We are spinning our own fates, good or evil, and never to be
undone. Every smallest stroke of virtue or of vice leaves its
never-so-little scar. The drunken Rip Van Winkle, in Jefferson's play,
excuses himself for every fresh dereliction by saying, 'I won't count
this time!' Well! he may not count it and a kind heaven may not count
it; but it is being counted none the less. Down among his nerve-cells
and fibers the molecules are counting it, registering it, and storing
it up to be used against him when the next temptation comes. Nothing we
ever do is, in strict scientific literalness, wiped out. Of course this
has its good side as well as its bad one. As we become permanent
drunkards by so many drinks, so we become saints in the moral, and
authorities and experts in the practical and scientific, spheres, by so
many separate acts and hours of work. But let no youth have a