"This law is the magistrate of a man's life."

JOSEPH JOHNSON.

"Habit is a cable; we weave a thread of it every

day, and at last we cannot break it."

HORACE MANN.

"Use almost can change the stamp of Nature." WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE.

IN

VI

HABIT

N the early history of periodical literature, Dr. Samuel Johnson wrote a series of allegories on familiar subjects for the Rambler. They attracted much attention and have been famous

ever since. One of these allegories personifies education as a gentle queen and describes her solicitude that all her subjects should be free from the power of a tyrant named Habit. Habit was always lying in wait for the unwary. As Education led her followers up the side of the mountains which lay in the pathway of learning, nothing was more noticeable than her frequent cautions to beware of Habit. She was always guarding them against this dangerous enemy and kept calling out to one and another, at every step, that

Habit was ensnaring them; that they would be under the dominion of Habit before they perceived their danger; and that those whom Habit should once enslave had little hope of regaining their liberty.

This has been, from Dr. Johnson's day to the present time, the prevalent idea of Habit. Rousseau, in one of his oracular utterances, says that the only habit which a child should be permitted to form is to contract no habits whatever. Habit has been represented as a devouring monster, as a poisoned atmosphere, paralyzing effort, as a treacherous dwarf, ready to develop a giant's strength at an unguarded moment.

Habit, at first, is but a silken thread,

Fine as the light-winged gossamers that sway
In the warm sunbeams of a summer's day;
A shallow streamlet rippling o'er its bed,
A tiny sapling ere its roots are spread.
A yet unhardened thorn upon the spray,
A lion's whelp that hath not scented prey,
A little smiling child obedient led.

Beware! that thread may bind thee as a chain, That streamlet gather to a fatal sea,

That sapling spread into a gnarled tree,

That thorn, grown hard, may wound and give thee pain,

That playful whelp his murderous fangs reveal, That child, a giant, crush thee 'neath his heel."

But though these figures vividly portray the insidious nature of evil habits, there is another side of this truth far more agreeable to contemplate. The power of an evil habit is not necessarily greater than that of a good habit. The one aids and elevates as surely as the other degrades. Indeed, the value of well formed habits can scarcely be overstated. Habit gives ease and certainty to acts which would otherwise be difficult or misdirected. It is nature's method of accumulating strength and vastly augmenting our powers of accomplishment.

Thus a bookkeeper foots up long columns of figures with an ease and cer