True Honor is SelfSufficient

to the average tendency. Your genuine ac-
tion will explain itself, and will explain your
other genuine actions. Your conformity ex-
plains nothing. Act singly, and what you
have already done singly will justify you now.
Greatness always appeals to the future. If I
can be
great enough now to do right and scorn
eyes, I must have done so much right before as
to defend me now. Be it how it will, do right
now. Always scorn appearances, and you
always may. The force of character is cumu-
lative. All the foregone days of virtue work
their health into this. What makes the maj-
esty of the heroes of the senate and the field,
which so fills the imagination? The con-
sciousness of a train of great days and vic-
tories behind. There they all stand, and shed
a united light on the advancing actor. He is
attended as by a visible escort of angels to
every man's eye. That is it which throws
thunder into Chatham's voice, and dignity
into Washington's port, and America into
Adams's eye. Honour is venerable to us, be-
cause it is no ephemeris. It is always ancient
virtue. We worship it to-day, because it is

not of to-day. We love it and pay it homage, because it is not a trap for our love and homage, but is self-dependent, self-derived, and therefore of an old immaculate pedigree, even if shown in a young person. Self Reliance.

ΤΗ

HERE is no virtue which is final; all are initial. The virtues of society are vices of the saint. The terror of reform is the discovery that we must cast away our virtues, or what we have always esteemed such, into the same pit that has consumed our grosser vices. Circles.

WH

HOSO would be a man must be a nonconformist. He who would gather immortal palms must not be hindered by the name of goodness, but must explore if it be goodness. Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of our own mind. Absolve you to yourself, and you shall have the suffrage of the world. Self Reliance.

THERE

HERE is a time in every man's edu-
Ication when he arrives at the convic-

Progress in Virtue

The In

ner

Light

Each

Man a New Force

Contentment

tion that envy is ignorance; that imitation.
is suicide; that he must take himself for
better, for worse, as his portion; that
though the wide universe is full of good,
no kernel of nourishing corn can come to
him but through his toil bestowed on that
plot of ground which is given to him to till.
The power which resides in him is new in
nature, and none but he knows what that
is which he can do, nor does he know until
he has tried.
Self Reliance.

WHY

WHY should we make it a point with our false modesty to disparage that man we are, and that form of being assigned to us? A good man is contented. I love and honour Epaminondas, but I do not wish to be Epaminondas. I hold it more just to love the world of this hour than the world of his hour. Nor can you, if I am true, excite me to the least uneasiness by saying, 'he acted, and thou sittest still.' I see action to be good, when the need is, and sitting still to be also good. Epaminondas, if he was the man I take him for, would

have sat still with joy and peace, if his lot had been mine. Heaven is large, and affords space for all modes of love and fortitude. Why should we be busy-bodies and superserviceable? Action and inaction are alike to the true. One piece of the tree is cut for a weathercock, and one for the sleeper of a bridge; the virtue of the wood is apparent in both.

DESIRE not to disgrace the soul. The fact that I am here, certainly shews me that the soul had need of an organ here. Shall I not assume the post? Shall I skulk and dodge and duck with my unseasonable apologies and vain modesty, and imagine my being here impertinent?

THE

HE good are befriended even by weakness and defect. As no man had ever a point of pride that was not injurious to him, so no man had ever a defect that was not somewhere made useful to him. The stag in the fable admired his horns and blamed his feet; but when the hunter came,

No False
Modesty

The
Use of
Defects

Consistency

his feet saved him, and afterwards, caught in the thicket, his horns destroyed him. Every man in his lifetime needs to thank his faults. As no man thoroughly understands a truth until first he has contended against it, so no man has a thorough acquaintance with the hindrances or talents of men until he has suffered from the one, and seen the triumph of the other over his own want of the same. Has he a defect of temper that unfits him to live in society? Thereby he is driven to entertain himself alone, and acquire habits of self-help; and thus, like the wounded oyster, he mends his shell with pearl. Compensation.

A

FOOLISH consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines. With consistency a great soul has simply nothing to do. He may as well concern himself with his shadow on the wall. Out upon your guarded lips! Sew them up with packthread, do. Else, if you would be a man, speak what you think to-day in words