and personal wealth, independent of fortune and circumstances.

The proper employment of time is a real science, which must be acquired by study, like other human attainments. Time, says Bacon, is one of those things, which, when lost, cannot be recovered. If then an easily practicable method can be contrived for obtaining all the advantage possible from this instrument, such a method will not be of less utility than the invention of watches and clocks has proved for determining the regular division of the different parts of the day and night.

Before this division of the days into hours, and of hours into equal, distinct, and separate intervals, many moments were lost for want of a standard to regulate the use of them, by an exact proportion and a strict economy in their various applications. But the pendulum produces only a mechanical division of time; the method of employing time must multiply what the pendulum divides. It enables us to find days in hours.

VII. FIRST CONDITION PROPOSED FOR REGULATING THE DUE
EMPLOYMENT OF TIME. PREVIOUS QUESTION WHICH IT IS
NECESSARY TO ASK OURSELVES BEFORE WE THINK OR ACT:
"WHAT END WILL IT ANSWER?"

Cui bono? "What end will it answer?" is a previous and necessary question, which ought to

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precede all we do and all we say, every procedure, and every kind of occupation. It is easier than may be supposed to contract this habit. Every man, in his particular art, acquires analogous habits without difficulty or effort, by the mere continuity of action. The orator, who has exercised his talent of extemporaneous declamation, capti vates, charms, and hurries us along by the cohe rency, the energy, the rapidity of his address. The musician, who is a proficient in his art, runs over at once with a light and confident touch the cords or keys of an instrument; he calls forth from it hurried tones, the harmony of which enchants us. The practised hand of a painter blends, by a happy mixture, the various tints into a great number of colours, which seem obedient to his genius. A dancer forms regular and rapid steps, with precision although with velocity. We admire the ease, the agility, and the accuracy of his movements. Habit alone, and daily practice, produce these results, which excite our astonishment. Let us contrive to attain, by similar practice, by a habit easily acquired, the like precision, combined with the like promptitude, in our moral conduct. Let us accustom our minds to call forth on all occa sions this brief reflexion-Cui bono? "Of what benefit?" which ought to be to us a kind of

familiar and tutelary spirit, ever ready to appear when we need its aid. We shall thus acquire, great presence of mind, and a correctness of moral and intellectual views, which will enable us to avoid many faults, indiscretions, inconsiderate actions, and an immense and irreparable loss of time. Why should not man, whose noblest prerogative is reason, make such a continual use of that admirable faculty as never to act, or speak, without some fixed aim?

But a rule of conduct, in order to produce real and salutary effects, must be adapted to the weakness and levity unfortunately belonging to the human mind. It is necessary to fortify man against the inconveniencies and dangers attached to his nature. We shall therefore strengthen the first condition, by a second of equal import

ance.

VIII. SECOND CONDITION.---A DAILY EXAMINATION MADE REGULARLY EVERY MORNING AND EVENING OF THE EMPLOYMENT OF THE PRECEDING Day.

EVERY person anxious to make himself better, and to promote his happiness, should daily devote a few moments, either before he retires to rest, or in rising in the morning, to a retrospect of what he has done, said, heard, and observed during the

preceding day. This rapid review will occupy precisely a portion of time which is otherwise lost. by all mankind, but which, by this method, is gained and employed in the most beneficial manner. Seize this moment, which seems to be marked out by nature, and which social life itself always allows you to dispose of as you please, to examine your soul, to recollect all that you have seen, remarked, learned, all that you have said wisely or unwisely, usefully or uselessly, to the benefit or detriment of your body, mind, and heart. Demand of yourself a strict account of the employment of all your moments during the preceding twenty-four hours. Ask, as it were, this question of each day that has just passed :"In what respect hast thou promoted my physical, moral, and intellectual improvement; in a word, my happiness? I made thee my tributary, hast thou paid thy debt?" Consider time as a farmer, whom you bind down to pay a certain rent, by a lease, the conditions of which he must strictly fulfil, or as a person of whom you have a right to exact a certain toll or duty. This toll, or this rent, is to be paid at each fixed term.*

*Time may also be considered as a moral being, which, ever present and ever fugitive, seems every moment to say to us :

Life thus becomes an equally agreeable and instructive journey, in which no lesson is forgotten, no example lost: every moment is rendered subservient to health, the acquisition of knowledge, or moral improvement. Can it be doubted that this method, pursued with constancy and perseverance, would produce effects, slow, imperceptible, and progressive, it is true, but not the less certain and infallible?

IX. THIRD CONDITION.---A WRITTEN SUMMARY OF THE DAILY ACCOUNT OF DEEDS AND WORDS, OR USE OF AN ANALYTICAL JOURNAL.

LET us add a third condition to the two former. It is impossible to guard man too much against his own inconstancy, or to confirm him too strongly in a habit that is acknowledged to be good and beneficial.

The mind would not wander in the proposed examination; it would be circumscribed within

"Here I am, seize me!" and who, while flying, asks this question: "What use have you made of me? what advantage have you derived from the moments that I have given you in my course?" How many would be obliged to answer in the words of the emperor Titus, when reproaching himself for suffering a day to pass without doing a good action: Diem perdidi-"I have lost a day."