It follows then that dignity and suavity are of service: that these--in many cases essential--are the offspring of a confidence in one's own knowledge. And now, I ask, whence may we draw richer supplies of this than from the pages of ancient writers? Are they not rife with all the useful reasoning--the philosophic intelligence--the happiness of application, that cultivated man could devise for the assistance of untutored intellect?
From the logic of the sage we learn, by a spirit of imitation natural to human beings, to quicken our own powers of reasoning. The perspicuity of arrangement and expression, so admirable in our master, becomes gradually a part of our own style. We are led by the strength of example to lop off the redundancies of a corrupt method, and by the acquirement of correct notions of purity, enabled to render our productions chaste and clear. And these improvements in the reasoning powers are effected at the same time that we possess ourselves of the richest treasures of lore!
But this is only one source of advantage among many as valuable. Wit, a power of the mind seldom granted with a liberal hand by nature--receives, in the course of communion with the playful and keen, a training of no little value. Charmed by the attic grace which softens and mellows the satire of our companions, (for let us conjure up at the hearthside the great masters of the past, and through their works hold with them 'pleasant converse,') our efforts will be to increase by farther intercourse, the small store already laid up perhaps unintentionally. Thus may we, if naturally possessed of wit, so polish and sharpen the gift of nature, that no armor may resist its progress: or, if destitute of this strong weapon, form for ourselves one less beautiful indeed, but of scarce less real worth.
Without this chastening influence, native wit degenerates into a harshness excessively grating to the ear of refinement, and productive of no single good effect.
Thus is improved or created a quality allowed by all to be of much utility in the contests between mind and mind. And what is life but a field of conflict, wherein the passions of one--perpetually at strife with those of another--are forever calling to their assistance the weapons of intellect!