If he offers any thoughts new,
just, and important, they have rather been overlooked for their
simplicity and obviousness. One may dive too deep for that which
floats on the surface. Here are to be expected none of the splendid
results, which dazzle in the popular sciences. The cultivator of this
field can hope only to favor, imperceptibly it may be, the growth of
thoughts and sentiments, tending slowly to work out a better condition
of the human family. And he begs to commend that advice of Lacon,
which himself has found so profitable: "In the pursuit of knowledge,
follow it, wherever it is to be found; like fern, it is the produce of
all climates; and like coin, its circulation is not restricted to any
particular class. * * * * Pride is less ashamed of being ignorant, than
of being instructed; and she looks too high to find that, which very
often lies beneath her. Therefore condescend to men of low estate, and
be for wisdom, that which Alcibiades was for power." (Vol. I., p.
122.)
The difficulty with us Americans, in the way of being instructed, has
been, that too proud, as if already possessed of the fullness of
political wisdom, we have withal cherished a self-distrust, forbidding
us to harmonize our institutions and modes of thinking into conformity
with our work and altered situation.
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