an the enthusiasm of educators will
allow. That depends entirely on the work we have to do. Men are
qualified for their work by knowledge, but they are also negatively
qualified for it by their ignorance. Nature herself appears to take care
that the workman shall not know too much--she keeps him steadily to his
task; fixes him in one place mentally if not corporeally, and conquers
his restlessness by fatigue. As we are bound to a little planet, and
hindered by impassable gulfs of space from wandering in stars where we
have no business, so we are kept by the force of circumstances to the
limited studies that belong to us. If we have any kind of efficiency,
very much of it is owing to our narrowness, which is favorable to a
powerful individuality.

Sometimes, it is true, we meet with instances of men remarkable for the
extent of their studies. Franz Woepke, who died in 1864, was an
extraordinary example of this kind. In the course of a short life he
became, although unknown, a prodigy of various learning. His friend M.
Taine says that he was erudite in many eruditions. His favorite pursuit
was the history of mathematics, but as auxiliaries he had learned
Arabic, and Persian, and Sanskrit. He was classically educated, he wrote
and spoke the principal modern languages easily and correctly;[1] his
printed works are in three languages. He had lived in several nations,
and known their leading men of science. And yet this astonishing list of
acquirements may be reduced to the exercise of two decided and natural
tastes. Franz Woepke had the gift of the linguist and an interest in
mathematics, the first serving as auxiliary to the second.

Goethe said that "a vast abundance of objects must lie before us ere we
can think upon them." Woepke felt the need of this abundance, but he
did not go out of his way to find it. The objectionable seeking after
knowledge is the seeking after the knowledge which does not belong to
us. In vain you urge me to go in quest of sciences for which I have no
natural aptitude. Would you have me act like that foolish camel in the
Hebrew proverb, which in going to seek horns lost his ears?

LETTER II.

TO A FRIEND WHO STUDIED MANY THINGS.

Men cannot restrict themselves in learning--Description of a Latin
scholar of two generations since--What is attempted by a cultivated
contemporary--Advantages of a more restricted field--Privilege of
instant admission--Many pursuits cannot be kept up simu