25 April–1 May 1831

From our feeble hands we drop the tools. Nobody thinks of the duty and the nobleness of instituting a perfect life. Nobody acts three days on a system. A man rises from a good book or from a good example and the eternal chord in him vibrates to heaven's melody a moment, and then the superincumbent flesh stops its tone. If in some distant world the vision of these weeks we are now so idly spending shall come full on the memory, is it not probable they will be attended with poignant fegret? Shan't we think what capabilities, — and what nothings of act ! Perhaps we cannot even form steady views of duty ; then we are very low in- deed and this defect should alarm us. But there is a capacity of virtue in us, and there is capac- ity of vice to make your blood creep.