virtue, but fail to carry it into
practice. The late-risers are rebels and sinners--in this respect--to a
man, and so persistently have the wise, from Solomon downwards, harped
upon the moral loveliness of early rising and the degradation which
follows the opposite practice, that one can hardly get up after eight
without either an uncomfortable sense of guilt or an extraordinary
callousness. Yet the late-risers, though obeying no rule, for the
abandoned sinner recognizes none, become regular in their late rising
from the gradual fixing power of habit. Even Julian Fane, though he
regretted his desultory ways, "and dwelt with great earnestness on the
importance of regular habits of work," was perhaps less irregular than
he himself believed. We are sure to acquire habits; what is important is
not so much that the habits should be regular, as that their regularity
should be of the kind most favorable in the long run to the
accomplishment of our designs, and this never comes by chance, it is the
result of an effort of the will in obedience to governing wisdom.

The first question which every one who has the choice of his hours must
settle for himself is at what time of day he will make his principal
effort; for the day of every intellectual workman ought to be marked by
a kind of artistic composition; there ought to be some one labor
distinctly recognized as dominant, with others in subordination, and
subordination of various degrees. Now for the hours at which the
principal effort ought to be made, it is not possible to fix them by the
clock so as to be suitable for everybody, but a broad rule may be
arrived at which is applicable to all imaginable cases. The rule is
this--to do the chief work in the best hours; to give it the pick of
your day; and by day I do not mean only the solar day, but the whole of
the twenty-four hours. There is an important physiological reason for
giving the best hours to the most important work. The better the
condition of the brain and the body, and the more favorable the
surrounding circumstances, the smaller will be the cost to the
organization of the labor that has to be done. It is always the safest
way to do the heaviest (or most important) work at the time and under
the conditions which make it the least costly.

Physicians are unanimous in their preference of early to late work; and
no doubt, if the question were not complicated by other considerations,
we could not do better than to fol