heroes have loved, thought, and
done. He will still keep close to Nature who, though she utters myriad
sounds, never speaks a human word; but he will also lend his ear to the
voice of wisdom which lies asleep in books, and to sympathetic minds
whispers from other worlds whatever high or holy truth has consecrated
the life of man. His guiding thought must be how to make the work by
which he maintains himself in the world subserve moral and intellectual
ends; for his aim is not merely or chiefly to have goods, but to be wise
and good, and therefore to build up within himself the power of conduct
and the power of intelligence which makes man human, and distinguishes
him from whatever else on earth has life.

It is our indolence and frivolity that make routine duties, however
distracting or importunate, incompatible with the serious application
which the work of self-culture demands; but we are by nature indolent
and frivolous, and only education can make us earnest and laborious.
None but a cultivated mind can understand that if the whole human race
could be turned loose, to eat and drink and play like thoughtless
children, life would become meaningless; that a paradise in which work
should not be necessary would become wearisome. The progress of the race
is the result of effort, physical, religious, moral, and intellectual;
and the advance of individuals is proportional to their exertion. Nature
herself pushes the young to bodily exercise; but though activity is for
them a kind of necessity, only the discipline of habit will lead them to
prefer labor to idleness; and they will not even use their senses
properly unless they are taught to look and to listen,--just as they are
taught to walk and to ride. The habit of manual labor, as it is directly
related to the animal existence to which man is prone, and supplies the
physical wants whose urgency is most keenly felt, is acquired with least
difficulty, and it prepares the way for moral and intellectual life; but
it especially favors the life which has regard to temporal ends and
conduces to comfort and well-being. They whose instrument is the brain
rarely aim at anything higher than wealth and position; and if they
become rich and prominent, they remain narrow and uninteresting. They
talk of progress, of new inventions and discoveries, and they neglect to
improve themselves; they boast of the greatness of their country, while
their real world is one of vulgar thought and desi