The Mere Understanding, However Useful

It Is One Of The Misfortunes In Life That One Must Read Thousands Of Books Only To Discover That One Need Not Have Read Them.

There Is First The Literature Of Knowledge, And Secondly, The Literature Of Power. The Function Of The First Is--to Teach; The Function Of The Second Is--to Move, The First Is A Rudder, The Second An Oar Or A Sail. The First Speaks To The Mere Discursive Understanding; The Second Speaks Ultimately, It May Happen, To The Higher Understanding Or Reason, But Always Through Affections Of Pleasure And Sympathy.

No Man Will Ever Unfold The Capacities Of His Own Intellect Who Does Not At Least Checker His Life With Solitude.

No Progressive Knowledge Will Ever Medicine That Dread Misgiving Of A Mysterious And Pathless Power Given To Words Of A Certain Import.

Far Better, And More Cheerfully, I Could Dispense With Some Part Of The Downright Necessaries Of Life, Than With Certain Circumstances Of Elegance And Propriety In The Daily Habits Of Using Them.