1.What is vice?A familiar sight enough.So in everything that befal ls have the thought ready:This is a familiar sight.Look up,look down,everywhere thou wilt find the same things,whereof histories ancient,me dieval,and modern are full;and full of them at this day are cities and houses.There is no new thing under the sun.Everything is stereotyped,everything fleeting.
2.How else can thy axioms be made dead than by the extinction of the ideas that answer to them?And these it lies with thee ever to kindle an ew into flame.I am competent to form the true conception of a thing.If so,why am I harassed?What is outside the scope of my mind has absolute ly no concern with my mind.Learn this lesson and thou standest erect.
Thou canst begin a new life!See but things afresh as thou usedst t o see them;for in this consists the new life.
3.Empty love of pageantry,stage-plays,flocks and herds,sham-fight s,a bone thrown to lap-dogs,crumbs cast in a fish-pond,painful travai l of ants and their bearing of burdens,skurryings of scared little mice,puppets moved by strings.Amid such environment therefore thou must ta ke thy place graciously and not 'snorting defiance',nay thou must kee p abreast of the fact that everyone is worth just so much as those thing s are worth in which he is interested.
4.In conversation keep abreast of what is being said,and,in every effort,of what is being done.In the latter see from the first to what end it has reference,and in the former be careful to catch the meaning.
5.Is my mind competent for this or not?If competent,I apply it to the task as an instrument given me by the Universal Nature.If not compe tent,I either withdraw from the work in favour of someone who can accom plish it better,unless for other reasons duty forbids;or I do the best I can,taking to assist me any one that can utilize my ruling Reason to effect what is at the moment seasonable and useful for the common welfar e.For in whatsoever I do either by myself or with another I must direct my energies to this alone,that it shall conduce to the common interest and be in harmony with it.