brain.

I know a father who is training his boy to develop his powers of
observation. He will send him out upon a street with which he is not
familiar for a certain length of time, and then question him on his
return to see how many things he has observed. He sends him to the
show windows of great stores, to museums and other public places to see
how many of the objects he has seen the boy can recall and describe
when he gets home. The father says that this practise develops in the
boy a habit of _seeing_ things, instead of merely _looking_ at them.

When a new student went to the great naturalist, Professor Agassiz of
Harvard, he would give him a fish and tell him to look it over for half
an hour or an hour, and then describe to him what he saw. After the
student thought he had told everything about the fish, the professor
would say, "You have not really seen the fish yet. Look at it a while
longer, and then tell me what you see." He would repeat this several
times, until the student developed a capacity for observation.

If we go through life like an interrogation point, holding an alert,
inquiring mind toward everything, we can acquire great mental wealth,
wisdom which is beyond all material riches.

Ruskin's mind was enriched by the observation of birds, insects,
beasts, trees, rivers, mountains, pictures of sunset and landscape, and
by memories of the song of the lark and of the brook. His brain held
thousands of pictures--of paintings, of architecture, of sculpture, a
wealth of material which he reproduced as a joy for all time.
Everything gave up its lesson, its secret, to his inquiring mind.

The habit of absorbing information of all kinds from others is of
untold value. A man is weak and ineffective in proportion as he
secludes himself from his kind. There is a constant stream of power, a
current of forces running to and fro between individuals who come in
contact with one another, if they have inquiring minds. We are all
giving and taking perpetually when we associate together. The achiever
to-day must keep in touch with the society around him; he must put his
finger on the pulse of the great busy world and feel its throbbing
life. He must be a part of it, or there will be some lack in his life.

A single talent which one can use effectively is worth more than ten
talents imprisoned by ignorance. Education means that knowledge has
been assimilated and become a part of the person. It is the a