at many empty weak things offered, out of which
nothing can be learned, and from which nothing can be deduced?--for 'out
of nothing, nothing can come.'

But, notwithstanding, let me still insist upon it to the tradesman to
keep company with tradesmen; let the fool run on in his own way; let the
talkative green-apron rattle in his own way; let the manufacturer and
his factor squabble and brangle; the grave self-conceited puppy, who was
born a boy, and will die before he is a man, chatter and say a great
deal of nothing, and talk his neighbours to death--out of every one you
will learn something--they are all tradesmen, and there is always
something for a young tradesman to learn from them. If, understanding
but a little French, you were to converse every day a little among some
Frenchmen in your neighbourhood, and suppose those Frenchmen, you thus
kept company with, were every one of them fools, mere ignorant, empty,
foolish fellows, there might be nothing learnt from their sense, but you
would still learn French from them, if it was no more than the tone and
accent, and the ordinary words usual in conversation.

Thus, among your silly empty tradesmen, let them be as foolish and empty
other ways as you can suggest, though you can learn no philosophy from
them, you may learn many things in trade from them, and something from
every one; for though it is not absolutely necessary that every
tradesman should be a philosopher, yet every tradesman, in his way,
knows something that even a philosopher may learn from.

I knew a philosopher that was excellently skilled in the noble science
or study of astronomy, who told me he had some years studied for some
simile, or proper allusion, to explain to his scholars the phenomena of
the sun's motion round its own axis, and could never happen upon one to
his mind, till by accident he saw his maid Betty trundling her mop:
surprised with the exactness of the motion to describe the thing he
wanted, he goes into his study, calls his pupils about him, and tells
them that Betty, who herself knew nothing of the matter, could show them
the sun revolving about itself in a more lively manner than ever he
could. Accordingly, Betty was called, and bidden bring out her mop,
when, placing his scholars in a due-position, opposite not to the face
of the maid, but to her left side, so that they could see the end of the
mop, when it whirled round upon her arm. They took it immediately--there
was the br