Where is this salt found, that we prize so little, yet need so much?
The sea furnishes some, and salt-mines and salt-springs give the rest.
Most of the salt used in this country is obtained from the water of
certain springs. Among the richest of these springs are those at
Salina, now a part of the city of Syracuse, New York. Forty gallons of
water from these wells yield one bushel of salt.

LESSON XLV

STUDIES

Studies serve for delight, for ornament, and for ability. Their chief
use for delight is in privateness; for ornament, in discourse; and for
ability in the judgment and disposition of business.

To spend too much time in studies is sloth; to use them too much for
ornament is affectation; to make judgment wholly by their rules is the
humor of a scholar.

Crafty men contemn studies; simple men admire them; and wise men use
them. Read not to contradict and confute, or to believe and take for
granted, or to find talk and discourse, but to weigh and consider.

Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be
chewed and digested; that is, some books are to be read only in parts;
others to be read, but not curiously; and some few to be read wholly,
and with diligence and attention.

Reading makes a full man; conference, a ready man; and writing, an
exact man.

SELECTION XV

A PSALM OF LIFE

Tell me not, in mournful numbers,
"Life is but an empty dream!"
For the soul is dead that slumbers,
And things are not what they seem.

Life is real! Life is earnest!
And the grave is not its goal;
"Dust thou art, to dust returnest,"
Was not spoken of the soul.

Not enjoyment, and not sorrow,
Is our destined end or way,
But to act, that each to-morrow
Find us farther than to-day.

Art is long, and Time is fleeting;
And our hearts, though strong and brave,
Still, like muffled drums, are beating
Funeral marches to the grave.

In the world's broad field of battle,
In the bivouac of life,
Be not like dumb, driven cattle,
Be a hero in the strife.

Trust no future, however pleasant;
Let the dead past bury its dead:
Act,--act in the living present,
Heart within, and God o'erhead.

Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time.

Footprints, that perhaps another,
Sailing o'er life's solemn main,