with
nails, gimlet, pincers, screwdriver and chisel. Herein he tastes an old
joy of youth and childhood, the cat-like love of garrets, presses and
corn-chambers, and of the conveniences of long housekeeping. His garden
or his poultry-yard tells him many pleasant anecdotes. One might find
argument for optimism in the abundant flow of this saccharine element of
pleasure in every suburb and extremity of the good world. Let a man keep
the law,--any law,--and his way will be strown with satisfactions. There
is more difference in the quality of our pleasures than in the amount.

On the other hand, nature punishes any neglect of prudence. If you think
the senses final, obey their law. If you believe in the soul, do not
clutch at sensual sweetness before it is ripe on the slow tree of cause
and effect. It is vinegar to the eyes to deal with men of loose and
imperfect perception. Dr. Johnson is reported to have said,--"If
the child says he looked out of this window, when he looked out of
that,--whip him." Our American character is marked by a more than
average delight in accurate perception, which is shown by the currency
of the byword, "No mistake." But the discomfort of unpunctuality,
of confusion of thought about facts, of inattention to the wants of
to-morrow, is of no nation. The beautiful laws of time and space,
once dislocated by our inaptitude, are holes and dens. If the hive be
disturbed by rash and stupid hands, instead of honey it will yield
us bees. Our words and actions to be fair must be timely. A gay and
pleasant sound is the whetting of the scythe in the mornings of June,
yet what is more lonesome and sad than the sound of a whetstone
or mower's rifle when it is too late in the season to make hay?
Scatter-brained and "afternoon" men spoil much more than their own
affair in spoiling the temper of those who deal with them. I have seen
a criticism on some paintings, of which I am reminded when I see the
shiftless and unhappy men who are not true to their senses. The last
Grand Duke of Weimar, a man of superior understanding, said,--"I have
sometimes remarked in the presence of great works of art, and just now
especially in Dresden, how much a certain property contributes to the
effect which gives life to the figures, and to the life an irresistible
truth. This property is the hitting, in all the figures we draw, the
right centre of gravity. I mean the placing the figures firm upon their
feet, making the hands grasp,