Appointed exercises.

President Porter's testimony.

Professor Fisher, that, during his collegiate course, he never missed a recitation of his class, and was never known to have his name handed in by the monitors. And all those men, who have ever become influential among us, almost without exception, began to be distinguished for a conscientious discharge of all appointed exercises, while obtaining their education. You may feel unwell to-day; you have over-eaten, or abused the body in some other way; and now you have but little courage to master your lesson. You are tempted not to try to learn it. But I beg of you not to lay it by. You will lose in self-respect; you will have yielded to a. temptation that will often assail you; you will have lowered yourself in the estimation of others. No call of friends, no preparation for a society, no writing to friends, should ever turn you aside from getting that lesson which is shortly to be recited. The strong language of the late venerable President Porter ought to be hung up in the room of every student. It is the testimony of one who was so careful and so judicious an observer of men and things, that he seldom made mistakes. "Regular, prescribed exercises have the first claim on your time, and should never be thrust aside by incidental things. It should be a point of conscience with every member of this seminary, for his own good, as well as in conformity with his sacred promise at matriculation, never to neglect these regular exercises, unless disabled by Providence. I

was detained by company, is sometimes offered as a reason for such neglect, and it may be a good reason; very rarely; but in my own case as a student, from twelve years of age, through college, it never once was regarded by me as a reason for such neglect ; never once has it been so, in the nineteen years of my connection with this seminary. Take the catalogue of our seminary from the beginning, and mark the men, if you can, on that honored list, who, since they have left us, have been most distinguished for usefulness as ministers and missionaries, and also the men, not a few, who have been elected presidents and professors in colleges and theological seminaries, and then remember, that the same men were distinguished for punctuality, and industry, and conscientious regard to order, while they were here."

These remarks apply with as much force to every other student as to the student in theology. "Les hommes sont a peu pres tous faits de la même maniere; et ainsi ce qui nous a touche, les touchera aussi."

8. Learn to rest the mind, by variety in your studies, rather than by entire cessation from study.

Few can confine the mind down to severe thought, or to one study, long at a time, and therefore most, when they relax, throw the thoughts loose, and do not try to save them. You are studying Homer, or algebra, for example. You apply yourself some

Your body becomes You stop, and throw

two or three hours at a time. weary, and the mind is jaded. aside your books, and rest, perhaps, quite as long as you have been studying. Now, all this time is lost, or nearly so. You forget that the mind is as much refreshed by variety as by idleness. When you lay aside your algebra, take up your Livy, or Tacitus, and you will be surprised to find that it is a refreshment, as you review your last lesson. Or make those minutes in your common-place book of what you last read; or turn your thoughts, and ponder over the subject of your next composition. You may save a vast amount of time in this way.

We wonder how our fathers, and how the students of Germany, at the present time, can study sixteen hours a day. They never could do it, were it not that they pursue one study till the mind reluctates; they then turn to another, by which the mind is relieved, and at once becomes buoyant. This is the difference between him who loses no time, and him who loses very much. The men who accomplish so much in life, are those who practise on this plan. This will account for the fact, that the same man will not unfrequently hold several offices which require talents and efforts seemingly incompatible with each other, and yet promptly execute the duties of all. He is thus continually busy and continually resting.

In this way the justly distinguished Dr. Good, long

Example of Dr. Good.

The old adage untrue.

before he was forty years old, amid the incessant and anxious duties of a laborious profession, had gained prizes by writing essays; had mastered at least eleven different languages; had aided in making a Universal Dictionary in twelve volumes; had written his celebrated Study of Medicine; and was constantly writing and translating poetry. His "Book of Nature" will give the reader an admiring conception of the variety and the accuracy of his attainments. Instead of being thrown into confusion by such a variety and pressure of occupations, he carried them all forward simultaneously, and suffered none to be neglected, or but half executed. His practice was like that of the indefatigable, but somewhat eccentric Dr. Clarke, who said, "I have lived to know the great secret of human happiness is this,-never suffer your energies to stagnate. The old adage of 'too many irons in the fire,' conveys an abominable lie. You cannot have too many; poker, tongs, and allkeep them all going." This habit of keeping the mind employed, will soon destroy the common habit of reverie. The soul will be too busy for reverie; and then, if she gains nothing by change of occupations, by way of acquisition, she gains the satisfaction that she is not wandering off on forbidden ground.

CHAPTER IV.

READING.

THE genius of Shakspeare has shed a glory around the name of Brutus, which the iron pen of history cannot do away. The historian and the poet are certainly greatly at variance in regard to him: the latter has made him so amiable and exalted a character, that we feel unwilling to know the truth about him. I am not now to act as umpire between them; but there is one spot where we see him in the same light, both in history and in poetry. It is this. The night before the celebrated battle of Pharsalia, which was to decide the fate of the known world, Brutus was in his tent reading, and making notes from his author with the pen !

The elder Pliny seldom sat down to eat a meal, without having some one read to him; and he never travelled without having one or more books with him, and conveniences for making extracts or memoranda.

The amiable Petrarch never felt happy a day, if, during it, he did not read or write, or do both. One of his friends, fearing it would injure his health, begged him to lend him the key of his library. Petrarch, without knowing the design, granted it.

His