Page:Letters, sentences and maxims.djvu/159

 and Latin books you can now read with ease. Can you open Demosthenes at a venture, and understand him? Can you get through an oration of Cicero, or a satire of Horace, without difficulty? What German book do you read to make yourself master of that language? And what French books do you read for your amusement? Pray give me a particular and true account of all this; for I am not indifferent as to any one thing that relates to you. [Same date.]

—There are two sorts of understandings; one of which hinders a man from ever being considerable, and the other commonly makes him ridiculous; I mean the lazy mind, and the trifling, frivolous mind. Yours, I hope, is neither. The lazy mind will not take the trouble of going to the bottom of anything; but, discouraged by the difficulties (and everything worth knowing or having is attended with some), stops short, contents itself with easy and, consequently, superficial knowledge, and prefers a great degree of ignorance to a small degree of trouble. These people either think or represent most things as impossible; whereas few things are so to industry and activity. [July 26, 1748.]

—But difficulties seem to them (lazy