It is
The very young man's method;
and the pure earnestness of it makes it almost desecration to touch
it. It is to keep a private note-book with columns for the days
of the week, and a list of virtues, with spaces against each for
marks. this, with many stern rules for preface, is stored away in
a secret place, and from time to time, at nightfall, the soul is
arraigned before it as before a private judgment bar.
This living by code was Franklin's method; and I suppose thousands
more could tell how they had hung up in their bedrooms, or hid in
locked-fast drawers, the rules which one solemn day they drew up
to shape their lives.
This method is not erroneous, only somehow its success is poor.
You bear me witness that it fails. And it fails generally for very
matter-of-fact reasons--most likely because one day we forget the
rules.
All these methods that have been named--the self-sufficient method,
the self-crucifixion method, the mimetic method, and the diary
method--are perfectly human, perfectly natural, perfectly ignorant, and
as they stand perfectly inadequate. It is not argued, I repeat,
that they must be abandoned. Their harm is rather that they distract
attention from the true working method, and secure a fair result
at the expense of the perfect one.
Pages:
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113