e
readily and perfectly every part of it, in its order. Then practise
yourself in telling it in your own words, aloud, if possible, to
somebody else, until you can make the narration or explanation
continuously, from beginning to end, and without the possibility of
being thrown out or confused by any amount of interruptions. Then at
length are you prepared to recite.

Is this standard of recitation too high? Is it not what every one of
your teachers does daily, and what you yourself will have to do the very
first time you take your position as a teacher of others?

4. This leads me by a natural transition to the subject of _study_. You
need to learn how to study, as much as you need to learn how to recite.
Endeavor then to get some definite idea in your mind of what it is
really to study. Mere reading is not study. Muttering the words over in
a low, gurgling tone, or letting them glide in a soft, half-audible
ripple upon your lips, is not study. Going over the lesson in a
listless, dreamy way, one eye on the book and one eye ready for whatever
is going on in other parts of the room, is not study. Study is work.
Study is agony. The whole soul must be roused, its every energy put
forth, with a fixed, rapt attention, like that of a man struggling with
a giant. Study, worthy of the name, forgets for the time every thing
else, excludes every thing else, is incapable of being diverted by any
thing else, the whole internal and external man being bent upon making
just one thing its own. Such study of course soon exhausts the energies.
It cannot be long protracted, nor need it be protracted. Take rest in
the season of rest; but, when you study, study with all your might.
Throw your whole soul into it. One hour of such study accomplishes more
than whole days of listless poring over books. And, remember, you cannot
study in this manner by merely willing to do it. It is an art, requiring
training and practice, and thorough mental discipline. You might as
well, on seeing the Writing-Master executing those marvels of
penmanship, or the Drawing-Teacher with deft fingers limning with ease
forms of grace and beauty, resolve to go forthwith to the board and do
the same thing, as expect, by a mere _sic volo_, to become a student.
You are here to learn how to study, and the art will come to you only by
slow progress, and after many trials.

Give up the illusion that absolute seclusion and silence are necessary
to study. I do not say tha