The possession of an elegant mind is greatly superior to the possession of a fortune, and the enjoyment of a good conscience is far superior to both.
The passions will sometimes ruffle the stream of happiness in every man; but they are least likely to discompose him, who spends his time in letters, and who at the same time studies virtue and innocence, which indeed have a natural connexion with true learning.
He who has caught the spirit of the polite writers of the politest ages and cities, must possess a peculiar degree of polish and comprehension of mind.
The best kind of education is that which endeavours to improve the powers of understanding for their own sake; for the sake of exalting the endowments of human nature, and becoming capable of sublime and refined contemplation. This furnishes a power of finding satisfactory amusement for those hours of solitude, which every man must sometimes know in the busiest walks of life; and it constitutes one of the best supports of old age, as well as the most graceful ornament of manhood. Even in the commercial department it is most desirable; for besides that it gives a grace to the man in the active stage of life, and in the midst of his negociations, it ‘enables him to enjoy his retreat with elegance,’ when his industry has accumulated the object of his endeavours.
If taste, which classical learning immediately tends to produce, have no influence in amending the heart, or in promoting virtuous affections; if it contribute not to render men more humane, and more likely to be disgusted with improper behaviour, as a deformed object, and pleased with rectitude of conduct, as beautiful in itself; if it be merely an ornamental appendage; it must be owned, that life is indeed too short to admit of long attention to mere embellishment. Polite learning, on the contrary, is found to be friendly to all that is amiable and laudible in social intercourse; friendly to morality. It has a secret but powerful influence in softening and meliorating the disposition. True and correct taste directly tends to restrain the extravagancies of passion, by regulating that nurse of passion, a discorded imagination.
To be completely skilled in ancient learning is by no means a work of such insuperable pains. The very progress itself is attended with delight, and resembles a journey through some pleasant country, where every mile we advance new charms arise. It is certainly as easy to be a scholar, as a gamester, or many other characters equally illiberal and low. The same application, the same quantity of habit, will fit us for one as well as for the other. As to those who tell us with an air of seeming wisdom, that it is by men, not books, that we must study to become knowing; repeated experience teaches this to be the common consolation and language of dunces.
The article is a paraphrase of Vicesimus Knox, “Liberal Education”. The phrase ‘enables him to enjoy his retreat with elegance’ is a direct quotation.
For the New-York Weekly Magazine.