ble
to be 'spoken,' do not lie in the business, as there so often
does!--My firm belief is, that, finding himself now enchanted,
hand-shackled, foot-shackled, in Poor-Law Bastilles and
elsewhere, he will retire three days to his bed, and _arrive_ at
a conclusion or two! His three-years total stagnation of trade,
alas, is not that a painful enough 'lying in bed to consider
himself?' Poor Bull!

Bull is a born Conservative; for this too I inexpressibly honour
him. All great Peoples are conservative; slow to believe in
novelties; patient of much error in actualities; deeply and
forever certain of the greatness that is in LAW, in Custom once
solemnly established, and now long recognised as just and final.
--True, O Radical Reformer, there is no Custom that can, properly
speaking, be final; none. And yet thou seest _Customs_ which,
in all civilised countries, are accounted final; nay, under the
Old Roman name of _Mores,_ are accounted _Morality,_ Virtue, Laws
of God Himself. Such, I assure thee, not a few of them are;
such almost all of them once were. And greatly do I respect the
solid character,--a blockhead, thou wilt say; yes, but a well-
conditioned blockhead, and the best-conditioned,--who esteems all
'Customs once solemnly acknowledged' to be ultimate, divine, and
the rule for a man to walk by, nothing doubting, not inquiring
farther. What a time of it had we, were all men's life and trade
still, in all parts of it, a problem, a hypothetic seeking, to be
settled by painful Logics and Baconian Inductions! The Clerk in
Eastcheap cannot spend the day in verifying his Ready-Reckoner;
he must take it as verified, true and indisputable; or his Book-
keeping by Double Entry will stand still. "Where is your Posted
Ledger?" asks the Master at night.--"Sir," answers the other, "I
was verifying my Ready-Reckoner, and find some errors. The
Ledger is--!"--Fancy such a thing!

True, all turns on your Ready-Reckoner being moderately correct,
--being _not_ insupportably incorrect! A Ready-Reckoner which has
led to distinct entries in your Ledger such as these:
_'Creditor_ an English People by fifteen hundred years of good
Labour; and _Debtor_ to lodging in enchanted Poor-Law Bastilles:
_Creditor_ by conquering the largest Empire the Sun ever saw;
and _Debtor_ to Donothingism and "Impossible" written on all
departments of the government thereof: _Creditor_ by mountains
of gold ingots earned; and _Debtor_ to