Keowee courier. [volume] (Pickens Court House, S.C.) 1849-current, 1904-02-17
|SeW. G. II. VI. nj

- ~ eNh'N tte& aoNVtsO-
Edwin Arnold.
The great object of all education
should be to train the brain and the
nervous system so that they will ever
after be our allies instead of our
enemies. The brain is a mostmarvel-
GUS piece of mechanism. In every
mental act, the brain cells arrange
themselves in definite manner, and
with every repetition of the act the
arrangement becomes more and more
autcmetic and easy, and repetition
more certain.
There 's an inclination i'm the merry.
GUS system to.repeat the same mode
of action at regularly recurring inter-
walls. Doctor Combe says that all
nervous diseases have a,marked ten
dency to observe regular periods.
eff we repeat any kind of mental
effort at the same hour daily, we find
ourselves entering Iupon it, without
premeditation, when the time ap-
proaches."
Good Habits Form Corps In Reserve.
BY careful training, therefore, of
the brain and nervous system, man
multiplies himself so as to do the
work of many unframed men. Glad
stone, at seyenty-five, had multiplied
himself into a man twenty times as
efficient as he was at twenty-five.
Habit is cumulative. Drop stone
down precipice. BY the law Of
gravitatioD, it sinks with rapidly in
creasiDg momentum. If it falls six
teen feet the first second, it will fall
forty-eight feet the next second,
eighty feet the third second, one hun.
dred and forSy-four feet the fifth Sec
ond, etc.; and, if it falls for ten Sec
onds, it will, in the last second, rush
through three hundred and four feet
After each act of ones life, he is
not the same person as before, but
quite another. He is fastening on,
faster and faster, either toward the
good or the bad, with all the cumula-
tive momentum and force of the
power of habit behind him.
In 1880, one hundred and forty
seven of the eight hundred and
ninety-seven inmates of the State
prison at Auburn were there on sec.
ond indictments. What brings the
prisoner back second, third, OF
fourth time? 1t is habit which drives
him on to commit the deed which,
perhaps, his heart abhors, and his
very soul loathes. 1t is the momen-
tum made up from thousand devia.
tions from the truth and right, fol-
there is great difference between
going just right and little wrong
1t is the result of that mysterious
power which an act has of getting
itself performed again and again.
Habit Is the Keynote Of Life's Tune.
Remember that habit is an arrange.
meet, principle of human nature
which we must use to increase the
efficiency and ease of our work in
life. Just as sea-captain steers his
vessel into the Gulf Stream, which
he knows, will melt the icicles from
his rigging, and push his vessel to.
ward a harbor, 80 should we regard
habit as gulf stream, which, if we
get into it, will make our course glad
and send us toward our goal.
Habit is like seamstress "settine
the stitch" on her sewing machine
or machinist "fxing the gauge, and
the man does the right or the wrong
thing automatically.
''I trust everything, under God, tc
habit" says Lord Brougham, "upor
which, in all ages, the lawgiver as
well as the schoolmaster has mainly
placed his reliance-habit, which
makes everything easy, and casts all
difficulties upon the deviation from
our wonted course.
SNAKE sobriety habit, and intem.
perance will be hateful; make pru.
dence habit, and reckless profigacy
will be as contrary to the course ol
nature in child, or in an adult, as
the most atrocious crimes are to any
of u.s."
Carlyle says "Habit is the deep.
est law of human nature. 1t is our
supreme strength, if also, in certain
circumstances, our miserablest weak.
ness. Let me 90 once, scanning my
way with any calnestncss of outlook,
and successfully arriving, my foot.
steps are an invitation to me a second
time TO go by the same way-it is
easier than any other way. Habit is
our primal fundamental law-babit
and imitation; there is nothing more
perennial in us than these two. They
a"e the source of all working, and all
apprenticeship, a of all practice and
learning in the world"
George Staunton visited man in
India who had committed murder
and, in order not only to save his life
but, what was of much greater conse.
quence to him, his caste, he had sub.
mtted to terrible penalty-to sleep
for seven years on a bed, the entire
top of which was studded with iron