A hideous little wretch has
appeared for trial in a criminal court, having succeeded in marrying
seven wives at once. A painful hesitation has not hindered a certain
eminent person from being one of the principal speakers in the British
Parliament for many years. Yes, even disadvantages never overcome
have not sufficed to hold in obscurity men who were at once able and
fortunate. But sometimes the disadvantage was thoroughly overcome.
Sometimes it served no other end than to draw to one point the attention
and the efforts of a determined will; and that matter in regard to which
Nature seemed to have said that a man should fall short became the thing
in which he attained unrivalled perfection.
A heavy drag-weight upon the powers of some men is the uncertainty of
their powers. The man has not his powers at command. His mind is a
capricious thing, that works when it pleases, and will not work except
when it pleases. I am not thinking now of what to many is a sad
disadvantage: that nervous trepidation which cannot be reasoned away,
and which often deprives them of the full use of their mental abilities
just when they are most needed. It is a vast thing in a man's favor,
that whatever he can do he should be able to do at any time, and to
do at once.
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