Heartily wishing that you may always clearly perceive this great truth, I take my leave of you most tenderly, and am, as ever,
Your faithful L——.
LETTER XLVI.
Salisbury, December 27th, 1828.
Beloved Friend,
Yesterday evening at seven o’clock I left Bath, again by the mail, for Salisbury. My only companion was a widow in deep mourning; notwithstanding which, she had already found a lover, whom we took up outside the town. He entertained us, whenever he spoke of any thing but farming, with those horrible occurrences of which the English are so fond that the columns of their newspapers are daily filled with them. Perhaps he was one of their ‘accident makers,’ for he was inexhaustible in horrors. He asserted that the Holyhead mail (the same by which I came) had been washed away by a waterspout; and horses, coachman, and one of the passengers, drowned.
After some hours the loving pair left me, at a place where the widow was proprietress of an inn (probably the real object of John Bull’s tenderness,) and I was quite alone. My solitude was not of long duration, for a very pretty young girl, whom we overtook in the dark, begged that we would take her on to Salisbury, as she must otherwise pass the night in the nearest village. I very willingly took upon myself the cost of her journey. She was very grateful; and told me she was a dress-maker, and had gone to pass her Christmas with her parents; and that she had staid rather too late, but had reckoned on the chance of getting a cast by the mail.—We reached this city at midnight, where a good supper but a cold and smoky bedchamber awaited me.
December 28th.
Early in the morning I was awakened by the monotonous patter of a gentle rain, so that I am still sitting over my breakfast and my book. A good book is a true electrical machine: one’s own thoughts often dart forth like flashes;—they generally, however, vanish as quickly; for if one tries to fix them at the moment with pen and ink, the enjoyment is at an end; and afterwards, as with dreams, it is not worth the pains. The book by which I electrified myself to-day, is a very ingenious and admirable combination of the fundamentals of history, geography, and astronomy, adapted for self-instruction. These little encyclopædias are really one of the great conveniences of our times. Accurate knowledge of details is indeed necessary to the accomplishment of any thing useful, but the walls must be built before the rooms can be adorned. In either sort of study, superficial or profound, I hold self-instruction to be the most efficacious; at least so it has always been with me. It is, however, certain that many men can, in no way, acquire any real knowledge. If, for instance, they study history, they never perceive the Eternal and the True: to them it remains a mere chronicle, which their admirable memory enables them to keep at their fingers’ ends. Every other science is learned in a like mechanical manner, and consists of mere words. And yet this is precisely the sort of knowledge commonly called fundamental; indeed, most examiners by profession require no other. The absurdities still committed by these learned persons in many places, would furnish abundance of most diverting anecdotes if they were brought to light. I know a young man who had to undergo a diplomatic examination a short time ago, in a certain Residenz. He was asked “how much a cubic foot of wood weighed?” Pity he did not answer, “How much does a gold coin weigh?” or, “How much brains does a dolt’s head contain?” Another was asked in the course of a military examination, “Which was the most remarkable siege?” The respondent (a nationalized German) answered, without the slightest hesitation, “The siege of Jericho, because the walls were blown down with trumpets.” Conundrums might be made out of these examinations; indeed I rather think that tiresome diversion sprung from them.