him from
obscurity to a place among the immortals, attests the rapidity with
which the perfect flower of achievement can bud and fully bloom, when,
and only when, good seed has been sown in ground fitly prepared.

There are two principal methods of imparting the illustrations that,
in their entirety, compose the body of precedents, by which the
primary teachings of the Art of War are at once elucidated and
established. By the first, the several principles may be separately
stated, more or less at large, each being followed closely by the
appropriate illustrations, drawn, as these in such a treatment most
suitably may, from different periods and from conditions which on the
surface appear most divergent. Or, on the other hand, the consecutive
narrative of a particular series of operations may be given, in such
detail as is necessary, accompanied by a running commentary or
criticism, in which the successive occurrences are brought to the test
of recognized standards; inference being drawn, or judgment passed,
accordingly. The former is the more formal and methodical; it serves
better, perhaps, for starting upon his career the beginner who
proposes to make war the profession of his life; for it provides him,
in a compact and systematic manner, with certain brief rules, by the
use of which he can most readily apply, to his subsequent reading of
military history, criteria drawn from the experience of centuries. He
is thus supplied, in short, with digested knowledge. But digestion by
other minds can in no wise take the place of assimilation performed by
one's own mental processes. The cut and dried information of the
lecture room, and of the treatise, must in every profession be
supplemented by the hard work of personal practice; and failing the
experience of the campaign,--of actual warfare,--the one school of
progress for the soldier or seaman is to be found in the study of
military and naval history, which embodies the experience of others.
To such study the second method contributes; it bears to the first the
relation of an advanced course.

Nor let it be supposed that the experience of others, thus imparted,
is a poor substitute for that acquired by the actual hard work of the
field, or of the ocean. By the process, the fruit possibly may not be
fully matured; but it arrives at that perfection of form which
requires but a few suns to ripen. This, moreover, if not the only way
by which experience in the art of directing